This supplement comes it at 31 pages, including 27 pages of content.
With no introduction, we start with a table of short descriptions and prerequisites for 101 feats, all meant to work with the Magus base class from Ultimate Magic. Many of the feats are intended for magi with specific class archetypes, and the table is sorted by archetype, including feats for Bladebound, Hexcrafter, Kensai, Myrmidarch, Skirnir, Soul Forger, Spellblade, Spire Defender, and Staff Magus. Also included are feats for four magus archetypes from Owen Stephens’ Ultimate Options: New Magus Arcana. Finally, we get 48 feats intended for ‘standard’ magi.
For the most part, these feats avoid the trap of overly long chains of feat prerequisites. However, many of them still have non-feat prerequisites which make them unavailable until high levels. Lich Assault, for example, requires 11 ranks in spellcraft and a base attack bonus of +8. More affordable feats include Arcane Rejuvenation, which lets you use arcane pool points to recover spell-like abilities and limited-use class features. Other feats give abilities like inflicting ability drain with a special-arcane-pool-powered attack, dispelling magic effects from the target of an attack, and regaining arcane pool points when you disrupt other spellcasters.
There was a significant feature that I expected but did not find in this supplement. Namely, I expected to see some feats which would be useful to gish characters, even those who didn’t necessarily have levels in the magus class. However, every feat in this supplement depends directly on specific magus class features, making them useless to non-magi gishes (unless you have an alternate class feature which gives one or more magus class features to another class). Obviously, the title specifically says [i]101 Magus Feats[/i], not [i]101 Battle-Mage Feats[/i], but I was still a bit disappointed that there was nothing for eldritch knights and duskblades. There are numerous full-color illustrations spread throughout this supplement.

The following review was originally posted at Roleplayers Chronicle and can be read in its entirety at http://roleplayerschronicle.com/?p=21094.

The Magus is a complex hybrid character class for the Pathfinder Fantasy system that is flavorful right out of the gate. With 101 Magus Feats, Rite Publishing has kicked things up a notch for the already yummy Magus.

OVERALL

101 Magus Feats is more than just a list of feats for one class. 101 Magus Feats takes Archetypes into consideration and categorizes the feats presented in this book to create a user-friendly product that is well-thought out and well-executed. Rite Publishing has always gotten crunch right and with 101 Magus Feats they have listened to feedback from the “field” and continue to tweak their format in ways that benefit players and Game Masters alike.

RATINGS

Publication Quality: 9 out of 10 The cover of 101 Magus Feats looks amazing. Rite Publishing went went with their black faux leather pattern this time and the combination of the black “leather” with an outstanding picture of what I could best describe as a dominmagus. This lady looks tough; her sword, while completely impractical, is really wicked looking. Combine the wicked looking sword with stiletto heeled boots, an exposed midriff and spiked spaulders and you have the makings of a woman I wouldn’t want to cross; add the fact that she is casting some type of spell and things only get more interesting. This supplement uses Rite Publishing’s sepia lion boarder which I have yet to have a problem with. The feat entries are standard fare and easy to read. Some of the interior art in the book still fell short for my tastes but the art or images that were chosen normally had a description below them letting me know what feat each image went with. Those small captions make a world of difference. The sinister harbinger picture on page 23 was awesome! One of the best aspects of 101 Magus Feats is the chart listing all of the feats with a brief description. I have seen these charts 100s of times; what made this chart really matter was they broke it down by magus archetype. This small act makes the product much more user-friendly.

Mechanics: 10 out of 10 These feats are mechanically sound. Rite Publishing has always done a good job of keeping mechanics in mind when they design and produce their products. Mechanics is another area where I felt that Rite really hit a home run in 101 Magus Feats. Many of the Archetypes that Rite developed for this product were actually written by Pazio or other third party publishers. All of the archetypes are properly referenced and credited to their originators. There are plenty of third party developers out there and they rarely go out of their way to support concepts that other third party developers come up. I have said that Rite Publishing is good about supporting their products with additional supplements; with 101 Magus Feats, they have just turned themselves into that mom in the neighborhood who feeds all of the kids on the block because she loves to do it and because it is the right thing to do. This mutually supportive environment is what the RPG industry needs.

Value Add: 10 out of 10 Who doesn’t like more feats? 101 feats for your Magus are great, but they are even better when they are this well-written and organized. As far as value, this product is useful on both sides of the screen. As a GM I could add a few of these to any Magus NPC to throw my players a curve ball. When I use this product I will consider actually giving my NPC Magus feats that are normally associated with an Archetype they do not possess just to mix things up.

Overall: 10 out of 10 There is nothing revolutionary about this product. The feats chart I mentioned earlier is a standard, but by placing it in the front of 101 Magus Feats and organizing the feats by Archetype, Rite Publishing did players and GMs a favor. Third party RPG companies work together all of the time, but Rite seems to show special love to their fellow publishers. Their quality work and the way Rite Publishing handles the feats for other publishers concepts shows they are in this business for their customers.

The latest installment of RiP's "101"-series takes a look at the Magus and provides us with a smattering of new feats. The pdf is 31 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD and 1 page advertisement, leaving 27 pages of content for the Magus, so let's check this one out!

After the excellent installment dealing with barbarian feats, I have quite the expectations for this installment and from the feat-lists I could infer that I would be in for something interesting: Several of the feats herein are specifically tailored to Magus-archetypes like the bladebound and the hexcrafter, providing much needed support for them. Fans of SGG's magus-book might also be interested in knowing that 8 of the feats herein are specifically designed for the archetypes presented in SGG's "Ultimate Options: New Magus Arcana"-book, providing another laudable synergy between two of the most prominent 3pps out there. Even the non-core defender of the spire gets a feat! However, before you skip ahead - the majority of the feats herein are useful for all magus-characters. When reading the feats herein, you'll slowly start to realize something: The way in which these feats use the signature arcana pool has expanded from its traditional usages. Several of the feats let you expend points as a reaction to missed attacks, being hit etc. and thus lend more tactical depths and fluidity to combat. The overall mechanics are somewhat reminiscent of the grit-rules for the gunslinger in that a variety of options are provided to regain arcana points e.g. via draining yourself.

It should be noted that some of the feats in this book are definitely geared to high-level magus-characters - there are some feats that enable you to expend 6 points from your pool to petrify or permanently paralyze foes. Thankfully, a high-damage output feat to subdue foes is also part of the deal. And of course the dreaded blade offers a chance for high-level magus-characters to make critical hits HURT. If you're playing a kensai, greater arcane battoujutsu is a similar must have and can be considered the epitome of style and power.

If you think only mechanically interesting feats are in here and that fluff-wise, there's not much happening, you'll be in for a surprise: Tapping into ley-lines is covered by a feat (e.g. great when playing in HHG's ley-line-heavy Mor Aldenn setting) as is sleeping like Odin to regenerate from debilitating effects. Another focused theme in this pdf would be curses and the ability to deliver them as a response to a fully successful attack via "Hexcrafter's Reciprocity". Unfortunately, "Completely successful attacks" is a murky term: If e.g. a foe hits the Magus with a poisoned blade and the magus makes the save, can the attack be considered successful? If so, poisoning would actually be detrimental to the attacker... The text says: "If an opponent attacks you with complete success (you suffer full normal or critical damage from the attack, and if a save is allowed, you fail that save), you hex or curse them in retribution." I can't infer whether additional effects on a weapon thwart this ability or not. If the successful save means he can't be cursed, I have to admit I find that odd to justify in-game and in need of revision. Anyway, the feat needs clarification.

Better examples would be two truly devastating curses that grant the opponent the opposite of a miss chance: If an attack hits, they have to roll a d% to check whether they are not hit in spite of the miss! Interesting mechanic and, while potentially powerful, their restriction to the hexcrafter-class elevates greatly the iconicity of the archetype. It should also be mentioned that true names are used in two feats and enable a magus to put a kind of Geas on his foes if he knows them - Neat! The Spellblade with the force athame is another winner of this pdf, providing one of the coolest little feat-trees I've seen in quite a while an even coming with precise, crippling needle-pinch force-assaults. But my very favorite feat among all of them is the "Sinister Harbinger", also for the Hexcrafter: This archetype gets you an illusionary harbinger of doom you can maneuver around the battlefield to impose penalties on enemies adjacent to it. Essentially, we get a cool-looking, mobile hex! It's feat-design like this that makes me grin, applaud the idea and note it down - the roleplaying opportunities this feat alone offers are staggering!

Unfortunately, the glitch I mentioned before is not alone in this pdf: Elemental Adaption for example makes you immune against detrimental environmental effects, but fails to specify the duration it lasts. There are also several words omitted in the text: In the prerequisites for "Greater Arcane Battoujutsu" the "arcane"-part of "Improved Arcane Battoujutsu" is missing. Hellfire Strike (another one of 2 feats devoted to Asmodeus) lacks the word "arcana" in the description, ending a sentence with an abrupt "magus". There are also missing single letters, e.g. in "Nauseating Assault".

Conclusion: Editing and formatting need another pass. From unclear wordings, a missing duration required to use the feat and several glitches, I unfortunately have to report that this pdf is nowhere up to the high standard RiP usually displays with releases like this. Layout adheres to a 2-column standard and features stock art. The pdf is fully bookmarked. This is one of the ratings that depress me. I really LOVE how imaginative and cool the feats herein are - even from what I've talked about, I've barely touched base with all the options herein, many of which are iconic enough to spawn their very own character-concepts. The support on feats for archetypes is an innovation I'd LOVE to see continued in other publications and I hope that we'll see more of the like. But, oh but. The editing is just not up to the standard the innovative mechanics and iconic ideas deliver, going so far as impeding my ability to understand the sometimes complex mechanics and making a tiny minority of feats guess-work on how they are supposed to work, which is a huge no-go. As soon as the glitches have been taken care of, I'll gladly settle for a final verdict of 5 stars on this one, but until then, I fear I have to remain with a final verdict of 3 stars.

Endzeitgeist out.