What you get

This pdf is 38 pages, with an impressive 33 pages of content (the other five pages being the cover, contents, legalese, and advertisements). The first 5 pages are dedicated to the many various arctic environments that can be found on earth-type worlds, and appear to present a quite thorough set of information on ecologies and environments. In my opinion, these pages read like they were written by someone who LOVES the arctic, and wants to share as much general information as he can about the region. The information presented here isn’t particularly necessary from a gaming perspective, though it could be a useful resource for world building. The section is well written and a pleasant read if you enjoy scientific minutia (which I do), and serves well as an introduction to the text.

The second section is on arctic weather, including visibility effects, cold hazards, and conditions such as hypothermia and frostbite. Third is a few pages of new equipment, which is extremely useful for low-level or low-magic games where constant “endure elements” effects and magical climbing assistance aren’t an option.

Finally, we get what is, in my opinion, the main reason for purchasing this work: the bestiary. This section takes up half of the pages in this work and offers monsters ranging from the CR 1 giant ice spider to the CR 16 melee powerhouse Ymir. There is a pretty good variety of animals, magical beasts, outsiders, etc. representing both supernatural and natural threats to the party (and potential allies, as in the cast of the elder elk). The stat blocks are well laid out and detailed, and I haven’t noticed any glitches in the monsters that I’ve run. The art is pretty good, and most of the pieces have a consistent, grayscale style (with the exception of the polar bear and the giant ice spider, which are black and white; also, my pdf is not rendering the picture of the hoarfrost elk, so I can’t comment on that picture). A lot of the monsters are pretty melee intensive, and tend to be ground-based, so weather effects that interfere with ranged attacks and flight can help add a little more challenge for the party.

What I like

Overall, I think this book presents its subject matter very well. It is tightly focused on the conditions and dangers of the arctic, and doesn't stray away from this theme. Most of the art, though not what I typically think of as “fantasy” or “gaming” art, is very suitable to the subject and generally appears bleak and washed out (in an artistic way), sometimes with a tinge of desperation.

To me, as the GM of a combat-heavy group, the most useful portion of this book is the bestiary. While I like the environmental hazards and weather-related afflictions, and especially love the presentation of hypothermia as a multistage hazard (using rules similar to those presented in FGG’s “Pestilence” book, which I also enjoyed), I get the most use out of the monsters. They are suitably nasty for a teleport spell gone awry (oh, you wanted to go to the city 80 miles south of your current location? Sorry…by the way, there’s a huge bear with antlers running towards you, and he looks hungry) or a ship blown off course in arctic waters.

What I’d like to see

I did have a couple of issues with the book. The biggest problem I ran into was that there was no table of contents for the bestiary. The creatures are not in alphabetical order or arranged by CR, so it takes a moment to find individual entries. There is a table listing monsters by CR, and I would have liked to see another column giving page numbers. Sorting the entries by name or CR would have been nice also. Still, the work is short enough that this is an inconvenience, not a detrimental flaw. From an aesthetic standpoint, the script text at the start of the various sections is wider than the otherwise cleanly laid out columns and intrudes on the margins; in a few places, this even goes outside the printable area of some printers. A minor detail, but slightly distracting from an otherwise excellent layout. There were a few typos, and a few places where I felt that the wording could have been improved for clarity, but they were manageable. Finally, since everyone’s a critic, I will say I didn't care much for the pictures selected for the polar bear and giant ice spider. It’s not so much that they were bad pictures as it is that they didn't fit in…the rest of the art seems to flow and compliment nicely, and those two pieces seemed somewhat out of place. All in all, not too bad…I’d say my problems with it are worth about half a star to me.

Conclusions

I bought this piece a few months ago when it was on sale hoping that it would be useful if I ever took a party to the far north (or, as it turned out, the far south). I’ve only recently had a chance to actually use it in my campaign, but looking back, I’m really glad I made that investment when I did. This is a solid work, and I recommend it to GMs looking for challenges for their parties in cold environs, or who want to have something nice and quick on hand in case the party ever finds themselves stuck in the arctic. While I think some of the material on weather effects and such was covered back in 3.5 by Frostburn, this work has the advantage of being much shorter and more to the point (and not having the broken player options to contend with). Overall I think it’s a very good investment, assuming your party ends up in a situation where you can use it. I give it 4.5 stars overall. I’m torn whether to round up or down for the purpose of rating on a 5 star scale, and frankly, price is the deciding factor there. I got this work on sale for $2.99 (I think the list price was $5.99 at the time), so in light of the price I actually paid for it (hooray for sales!), I will round my rating up to 5 stars.

This is Andre Faucher on behalf of Gamer's Haven, reviewing Horrors of the North, a text centered around all things frozen and the perils that the snow and ice can bring. Centered around that environment, this book offers little more than the specific interest for which this book was written.

What are some of the drawbacks of this book?

1.) Limited Scope. This book is focused on the northern dangers. And while the book accomplishes what it is setting out to cover, it offers little else to a campaign that is only going to be making a small trek into the north. 2.) Feels Copied. This book is much like the book "Frostburn" released in 3.5 also centered on the dangerous icy regions of the world. A lot of this information is available in the Core Rulebook or that could be done with a couple simple modifications to already existing creatures in the bestiary. The first third of the book is dedicated to the numerous types of cold terrain, and while useful to know the locations, feel as though they are merely something that could be gleaned from using a Google search. 3.) Price. The book is normally eight dollars, unless it is on sale, which begins to get near the area where one has to be truly interested in dealing with the cold north.

What are some of the benefits of this book?

1.) Interest. This covers the north, if the next campaign is going to spend a significant amount of time in the cold places on the globe, then it will be of interest. 2.) Artwork. Some of the artwork in this book is fairly good, although I am not particularly pleased with the yeti-gorillas. 3.) Dangers. One of the areas that the book does add is in the dangers section, including rules for frostbite and hypothermia. The book does give a lot of ideas in the realm of natural dangers, that is of non-monster/magical origins. For example the rules regarding hypothermia is something that one does not often encounter and the details given within this book actually make it a viable danger to many characters rather than just a minor annoyance.

Conclusion? Are the adventurers going to be spending a lot of time in the cold north, such as an entire campaign? Buy this book. In almost all other situations, this book will not be needed. With the price putting it out of the "impulse" buy region, the amount of information that could be found in a free location, it requires that there be a long term investment. However if there is going to be several adventures in the cold north, the dangers here change things up enough that the environment becomes as much a danger as the monsters that they are going to be fighting and the artwork, minus the yeti-gorillas, is detailed and interesting.