In the super hero worlds there are always plenty of through away villains. These villains need to be able to show up, harass and both the party, and then be defeated by the end of the issue. Some times they can last a little longer and even return later if the initial introduction yields some cool and entertaining facets that make the villain popular. However, many villains come and go with ease and it can be a pain for the storyteller to keep coming up with new ideas and new characters for villains that just do not last a while. That is where Villains: Evil Within comes in as a time saving device.

Villains: Evil Within is a PDF by Te Le Games and is their first using the Mutants and Masterminds Superlink. It allows other companies to write support products for the MnM game. The Le Games has a few dozen PDFs publishes and are probably best known for their Unorthodox series of books that presents alternate core classes for many of the typical fantasy classes. The PDF is about twenty five pages long and the layout is a little loose and plain. The art is pretty good with recolor pieces for the same hero. The book has good book marks.

The book offers ten new NPC Villains to use in a Mutants and Mastermind game. There are no new powers, feats, or other rules options presented here. Each villain is written up as a Power Level 15 and PL 20 Villain. They are all given a short history and it is expanded on a little for the PL 20 version. This is a very straight forward product. The characters are a variety of powers and each can easily challenge the players. This book is a time safer. With ten easy to use villains all packaged up this book will really safe time as stating out NPCs can be a time consuming process. None of the villains need to be larger then life, they can serve as henchmen or one shot adversaries. Yet, there is no reason that the histories cannot be expanded on to make the villain a more intrical part of the story.

Atimico: This villain was a hero who is now a crazed hero. Perfect for the players to want to defeat but possible try to save and bring him back to the side of good.

Black Dragon: She is a ninja assassin and carries a powerful blade.

Chill Kill: She is also an assassin, but the background hints at once having moral questions about it. She is another villain with possibilities to redeem.

Daemon: a nasty creature kicked out of her former home a version of hell. Now she wants to reign supreme on Earth.

Doctor mon Star: He makes creatures and uses that ability to cause havoc and make a little cash.

Night Wolf: This Villain is either alien or were wolf. One neat thing they did is have his PL 20 version not be an advanced version of him, but what he is like at night as he gains power at that time.

Obsidian Ghost: One of the rare geologist villains he has ghost like abilities and steals gems and jewels.

Silverlok: She is a mental powered super hero. I like the added detail she fears her powers may grow beyond her control.

Steel Titan: This is a suit of armor like Iron Man that became sentient and now causes havoc for all humans.

Thrasher: he is a rock and roller with powers. He does some crimes but really prefers the rock and roll lifestyle.

The villains are a nice variety and should really serve as decent obstacles for the party. I would have liked to see more about each villain with greater insights into personality and perhaps even some adventure hooks. However, as presented it does serve to be a major time saver and should offer some interesting opponents.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

D20 Modern is an odd game for me. I find it tough to wrap my head around the generic classes that they have like the Fast Hero, the Strong Hero, etc. They seem to be versatile, but just not enough to actually do what I want them to do. And then I look at a product like this, the Versatile Hero. It is even more adaptable then the six base classes, with the possibility of doing them better then they do. But I am not sure it is actually better.

Versatile Hero is a ten page PDF by Big Finger Games. They have a few other PDFs like Troll for the Mutants and Mastermind Superlink system. There is no art and the layout could use a little help. It is nothing that makes the PDF unreadable, but the font and table sizes are a bit big and the last page has a big empty space that just does not look good. The book has book marks though at this size it might not actually need them.

The Versatile Hero is a single class that can do the job of all the others. Or that is what it seems to be able to do. It has a simple point system that allows it to select the saves, hit points, skills and skill points, base attack bonus, and talent tress it has access to. Since it can select any talent tree of the other classes, it can really become those classes.

There is also one new talent tree for each of the six original classes. They range from really not that great like the Rage talents for the Tough Hero to pretty cool like the Authority Talents for the Charismatic Hero. The talents offered are interesting and seem pretty well suited for the game.

The Versatile Hero is versatile but not in the right way. It can mix different class mechanics like the base attacks, saves, etc. but it does not really bring anything new with it. It would have been nice to see a talent tree specifically for the Versatile Hero to take advantage of it being able to be assembled in so many configurations. The Talent tress I feel are the more useful part of this book.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Disappointing<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Legend of the Ripper

The Adventure starts out with the player characters knowing where they are going. The module does say that a DM can expand upon the investigation of the current murders that leads the player character to Ten Bells. It would have been a lot more useful if that investigation where part of the module. The biggest problems I had were with the beginning that is not there and also with the end. The last part of module really seems like a non sequitur.

Legend of the Ripper is a nice module that just does not live up to its potential. It is one of the rare city based adventures that could have gone outside the normal dungeon crawl modules nicely but still have been one. Instead the module thrusts PCs into the action with no real sense of how they got there and ends with the all clich?d evil the PCs accidentally freed and now have to stop. If one ignores the fifth level of this place and involves a nice investigation to the beginning that sets a horror tone early on the module will flow and run a lot better.

<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Lots of potential if a DM doesn't mind the work<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: Ending that came out of no where and lack of a beginning<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Disappointing<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Disappointed<br>

Dungeons and Dragons is its own genre and its own set of realism. There are just some assumptions in the game that get made that do not hold true historically. Some weapons are stated out to be better then others even though in our world they are not. Other times certain weapon characteristics and advantages just get ignore because either they were to difficult to fit into the rules or it was just easier to give the item simple stats. These assumptions will not work for everyone and there have been a few products over the years that tries to real life weapons to make them a little more realistic. The Master at Arms series does this by designing a prestige lass that specializes in a single weapon and allows the class to gain special abilities with the weapon to accomplish this.

Master at Arms: Arbalestier is a PDF by Blackdirge Games. It is published through an imprint with Skeleton Key Games. The book is written by Aeryn Rudel. The seven page PDF has a nice lay out but it also has no book marks. There is a little bit of art in the book that is nice but they do use the art on the cover elsewhere in the book. I am not a fan of repeating art pieces like that.

This book is built around making the heavy crossbow a lot better in game terms. It uses a prestige class to do that and that has the problem of a character needing to be at least sixth level to start to be able to take advantage of the weapon. And one would need to be at least tenth level to get all the abilitie4s of this five level prestige class. It is not an easy class to qualify for needing 3 feats, five plus base attack bonus, and five ranks in spot. The best way seems to be four levels of fighter and possible a level of ranger but there are many ways to get there with all the options one has.

The book starts off with a good one page historical look at the heavy crossbow. The author does a nice over view of the strength and weaknesses of the weapon as well as giving a few design notes of what the author intended to do and why with the prestige class. It makes for a nice and informative read and should help someone figure out how to better have the heavy crossbow fit into their own campaign.

The class is almost a no brainer for a fighter character that wants to use this weapon. The hit points, base attack bonus, and saves are basically the same. Skill points are as bad as the fighter but the class skill list is smaller but includes the all important Spot Skill. The levels of this class stack with that of the fighter to determine when one can qualify for those fighter only feats like Weapon Specialization. The class allows one to ignore armor bonuses to hit, do greater damage with a heavy crossbow, and expand upon the range of precision based damage one can do with the weapon. There are other abilities but these are the main ones that can make the Arbalestier feared with this weapon.

The class is well done and balanced. It has the weakness of depending on one type of weapon which can really be a big restriction should the character ever be without a heavy crossbow. Of course it will take a patient player<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Well balanced prestige class, good history material<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: class is a little tough to get into to to be good with one weapon<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Master at Arms - Peltast Dungeons and Dragons is its own genre and its own set of realism. There are just some assumptions in the game that get made that do not hold true historically. Some weapons are stated out to be better then others even though in our world they are not. Other times certain weapon characteristics and advantages just get ignore because either they were to difficult to fit into the rules or it was just easier to give the item simple stats. These assumptions will not work for everyone and there have been a few products over the years that tries to make real life weapons to make them a little more realistic. The Master at Arms series does this by designing a prestige class that specializes in a single weapon and allows the class to gain special abilities with the weapon to accomplish this. This is the second product of the line I have reviewed so the opening may seem really similar.

Master at Arms: Peltast is a PDF by Blackdirge Games. It is published through an imprint with Skeleton Key Games. The book is written by Aeryn Rudel. The seven page PDF has a nice lay out but it also has no book marks. There is a little bit of art in the book that is nice but they do use the art on the cover elsewhere in the book. I am not a fan of repeating art pieces like that. Again I find it very much like the first book in the series I read. Do not worry from here on it differs.

The book consists of a single prestige class to help one really get a lot of use out the Javelin or Short spear. There is a new weapon detailed and an NPC as well but the class is the main focus of the book. The class can be taken as early as level six though it could be tough for a straight fighter. I mention the straight fighter since this class like stacks with fighter levels to select certain fighter feats. However after taking all five levels in the class one only gets three fighters level so still needs actual fighter level to get to Weapon Specialization. The class gains the ability of a ranged sneak attack, can hamper enemy shields by impaling them with spears, gains movement abilities, gains a ranged power attack and charge option, and superior javelin damage. All in all it is a pretty good class. Not as strong as other prestige classes but can be fun for a player wanting to make use of these weapons. I would also be tempted to use Skirmish instead of a ranged sneak attack but of course that ability is not open content so would not be able to be used in this book.

The NPC is a very interesting choice. The NPC is a gnoll with Barbarian and fighter levels making him a very strong fighter type with javelins. Over all it is a good if small PDF that can help with making short spears and javelins more useful in a campaign.<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Good abilities and balanced prestige class<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: The class could have been a little easier to gain or perhaps just gained at a lower level. <br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Spellbound the Channeler

<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Great alteration to the spells lists and defining how magic works<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Very Satisfied<br>

With all the monster books on the market it can be hard to imagine why one would have need for creating creatures from scratch. However, as one sees the similar monsters that keep coming out without a lot of differences between them one can easily see how such an item would be useful. The Monster Manual and the System Reference Document both have instructions for creating creatures. The problem with the document is they are missing one crucial piece of information; how to assign a challenge rating. Challenge Ratings at times looks like a best guess and at other times seem to be picked out of a hat. Companies are now starting to slowly fill in these major lapses of information for the gamers. This product, Grim Tales: Creature Creation, has a very precise method for calculation challenge rating of creatures.

Grim Tales Creature Creation is a new PDF from Bad Axe Games. The PDF is of material from their Grim Tales book but does include an excel sheet that does a lot of the work for the DM. The Excel sheet does auto calculating as well as has a list of all the creature abilities and options allowing the GM to neatly fill out the form and save them. It makes for easy organization and a good constant format. The PDF is only twenty pages long but is mostly lists of the abilities and their costs as well as explaining how it all works. It is pretty self explanatory and seems to work pretty well.

The product is simple to explain. If anyone has a creature they are creating or even want to double check any creature already made; this product will work. The information can be computed by hand or entered into the auto calculating excel sheet. It is a fantastic timesaver and I am very curious how some monsters from a variety of products turn out when the challenge rating is double checked. It would be interesting to see a table comparing the CRs of the SRD and then using this program to compute the CRs and see how they differ.

Now a lot of people probably do not need this kind of accuracy in their CRS. I for one do not have a problem if CRs are off by a little as I do have alternate ways of granting experience outside the CR system. However, I have a feeling that those people who want something like this will be very happy at the thoroughness and completeness of the products. So, while it is not for everyone those it is for should really enjoy it. And those like myself who will not be using it all the time it still makes for some fun when I want to double check an encounter I want particularly hard.

The work that5 went in figuring out these numbers must have been impressive. The product really does a nice job of making itself user friendly and having all the information in the PDF portion for those that want to see how all the numbers are calculated. This is another impressive utility product from Bad Axe Games. <br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

The game master needs to at times go beyond what is written in the Dungeon Masters Guide. People have found that while that book does a nice job of covering some of the basic s there are some areas that it does not do as well in. At time it has taken another company and another writer to come out with something better that over writes the rules in the DMG. For instance Mystic Eye Games did that with their Artificers Handbook which presented better rules for creating magical items. Grim Tales Gamemastering does it with encounter levels. It walks a person through the encounter levels and shows how they are calculated. This can be tricky for people not used to the math so they have also included and excel sheet that does the entire math for you.

Grim Tales: Gamemasteing is a PDF by Bad Axe Games. Bad Axe Games is one of those small RPG companies that really has deserved all the acclaims that they have gotten. They have not released that many books but those they have are just good. They have four books in the Heroes of High Favor line that cover a single race each. They have the half orc, the halfling, the dwarf, and the elf covered in this series and hopefully we will soon see their gnome book finally come out. It is the only race book series that I can say I have used all the books for in my game. Then they came out with Grim tales an almost revolutionary look at the d20 system and using it for a high adventure low magic type settings.

The PDF is not that long only nine pages total. It is filled though with just how to figure out the encounter levels and award experience based on that. The PDF is easy enough to follow but the excel sheet is really what makes this work. One enters the numbers into the proper places in the excel sheet and all the calculations are easily done. The PDF does a good job of explaining it all but it does use base two logarithms and not everyone is going to be familiar with those.

The material here is reprinted from the Grim Tales books. It is not a word for word reprint as it is expanded on here and the excel sheet is something that Grim Tales does not have with it. So, even for people who have Grim Tales like myself this PDF and excel sheet still has something to offer.

This is one of the first PDF and electronic books that really takes advantage of the benefits the format provides. The excel calculator is not something that can be done in a print book. It is really nice to see electronic products that finally offer something that print books do not. The Gamemastering PDF is well done, nicely organized, and seems easy to follow. It might be too exact for some people. Getting exact ELs is not something everyone worries about. But for those that do this book does exactly that.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Guildcraft is a good addition offering a new option to all characters. The book is full color soft cover which is rare bread in the role playing game market. The book is ninety six pages long and at $24.95 is a little on the pricey side. The art in the book I did not find that exceptional. I do like that it is all color though, that adds a good amount to the book though. The table of contents is small, but effective. The layout and design is very good and it makes reading this book very easy.

This book is actually fairly simple to determine if someone will like it. The book is based on the rules mechanic of spending experience for different abilities. There are many people who do not like that type of mechanic. I, however, like this mechanic and that is why this is a favorable review.

Guildcraft has a series of guilds in it. There are guilds specific to classes, skills, and relationships. All the guilds are very well described. Each guild starts with a good description of the guild and nice overview. It then goes into the purpose of the guild and the membership details. Each guild has information on how to join them and what qualifications a person needs along with other criteria. The detail on the guilds is great and will be of much use even to people who do not choose to use the spend experience for abilities mechanic. Once a person is in the guild they can advance within the guild. Characters spend a few hundred to a few thousand experiences per guild grade. Each grade gives some small ability equal to a feat.

There are guilds suited for most of the classes and guilds that are suited more for non player characters. The guilds are obviously a DM oriented mechanic, and I think the spending of experience is something more suited to a group familiar with the system and looking to expand upon it. I really like the versatility this offers players and non player characters alike. So, overall this is a well handled book, with a good amount of new things that should be useful to most of the people out there.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

NPCs in RPGs are always interesting. There are people that stat them out completely and have ever little thing defined for the NPCs even if they serve little purpose in the game. Then there are those that just come up with a name and basic personality and define things as they are needed. Both ways work and serve different styles of gaming. But perhaps the best way might be taking the NPCs presented in different books and letting someone else do the work and just using it. That brings us to this review, a review of a book of NPCs.

Fantasy Personae: Sages, Spies and Informants is the latest PDF by Inner Circle Games. They are the guys who brought us Denizens of Avadnu a very good and creative monster book. However, they have yet to bring out the follow up to that the setting book so hopefully that is still coming as I am waiting for it and I imagine others are. This PDF covers NPCs. It is a thirty six page PDF. The book is done in a nice full color. It looks really good but can really be murder on the printer. I like fully color but I really hope companies will start offering more printer friendly versions of PDFs. The book is nicely book marked and is easy to access form a computer. The major NPCs defined in here are all given pictures. The art is okay, but could be better. But it is really the NPCs that are going make or break the product.

The idea behind this PDF is quite simple. It presents NPCs that are in the know. These NPCs have reasons for knowing lot and lots of things. But these are not the rumormonger or the criminal with his ear open. These NPCs are fantastic in nature meaning they will only exist in a fantasy world. They are magical, mysterious, and intelligent. There are no omnipotent characters here, they all have an area of expertise and they know that really well. And they might help the player characters for a price. Each NPC is nicely described. There are pictures of each of them as I said above. Each is given a quote that helps reveal the personality of the creature. Each has a full description and background. Each also has attitudes for the NPC so if the players are make it hostile, indifferent or even friendly the DM knows how to role play the creature. This is something that is rarely seen and a great addition to the NPCs here. Each has a reputation and rumors so a Bardic Lore of appropriate knowledge check can yield certain information. Each has a list of adventure ideas to work with the creature. There are alternative ideas just in case the NPC as defined does not quite work for the DM. Lastly, are the statistics for the creature and the source material. This is a great thing as well as most companies have the source in the OGL in the back, but few say what comes from where.

The book also presents a number of cameos. These are less defined NPCs. They do not get pictures only a short description for them. They do not have stat blocks but the book does list creature type and class levels when needed. These are enough to get the creative juices of the DM really flowing and are pretty complete in and of themselves.

The PDF has a good amount of creativity in it and a nice amount of useful NPCs. These are the people PCs seek out and run into in their travels. They can easily have long lasting rumors and stories about them so it can fill out a campaign personnel in that way.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Scaring people in a role playing game can be tough. It takes a lot of the right elements to make players experience the fear and it really does not take much to have them removed from fear. A simple car alarm going off, a player just not into it, a phone call; anything can really take the players out of the horror game at least mentality. They can play scared, but it just is not the same as actually being scared. Sometimes a DM needs to just place in rules to effect the characters knowing that bringing horror to the players might be too much to ask for. There have been a few different systems that have tried this like Beyond the Supernatural and Call of Cthulthu have used different rules to do this in the past. I think Ravenloft for D&D as well as D20 also had similar fear like rules in them. Fear Effects once again brings the fear mechanics to the game.

Fear Effects is by a small publisher who really has been making an effort to bring horror back the game. 12 to Midnight has a few really nice adventures and supplements that move in the more traditional horror ways. Fear Effects is written by Ed Wetterman and this thirteen page book is well laid out. There is not a lot of art in her and it does consist of about half table but it is nicely organized and easy to use. The PDF has two formats one designed for printing and the other for one screen use. This is my preferred way to see the books as it gives me the best of both worlds. The on screen on is nicely book marked and should be really easy to use at the gaming table from a computer or lap top.

The book is fairly simple. It introduces fear checks that are basically saving throws into the game. There are different levels of severity in the saves and the tables cover a lot of bad things that can happen to a character. The check can be modified by some options and I really like what they have there. One gets a bonus if they experience fear with others but a nice negative if they are alone. That is simple and makes a lot of sense. The tables of effects are pretty complete as it covers about six pages of the book.

This is a very simple book to determine if one needs it and that makes things easy. If one needs horror checks or wants to experiment with them in one?s game then the book is what one is after. On the other hand if one sees no reason for adding mechanical and rule oriented fear checks to the game then the book is better left on the self. The table are good for other horror games as ideas for what to do to characters that experience great fear. World of Darkness and Call of Cthulthu games can especially benefit from more ways to mess with the characters but of course one will need to do more converting and figure out how these will exactly work in other rule sets.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Modules seem to be a good place to see a company shine. It is most often the clearest example of how the writers see the game. D&D has many different playing styles and ways groups play. I like a good adventure. I enjoy well crafted Dungeon Crawls to the plot and character heavy role playing driven ones. I like to read what ideas other people use to craft an adventure and to see how they bring it all together. Gambler?s Quest is a new adventure by Expeditious Retreat and it is interesting and a good read.

Gambler?s Quest is a twenty four page adventure. The PDF is put out by Expeditious Retreat who are well known for their Magical Medieval Society series of books. The book is black and white with borders and some good art. It does consume a bit more ink then average with the borders but it is not that bad as all things go. The book is well organized and book marked making it easy to use from a computer or laptop.

Gambler?s Quest is a solo module. That is the module is designed for a single player and a rogue one at that. That will make the module a little less useful for people. It is possible to make this for a group of players but it will not work as well. The module is well written and really does a nice job of crafting an interesting adventure with lots of possibilities and options for a rogue character. The character should be a rogue as that is what the module is designed for but it can work with other characters. The rogues skills are a highlight of the module, many encounters are designed to be able to use stealth and cunning and not just brute strength. Any other class will have problems in the module, a bard might be the second best for this adventure though things like trap finding might be a problem. The adventure does have good advice for scaling it for higher levels. The adventure is designed for a character of second to fourth level. They do have advice for characters up to seventh level and for multiple players to be run through it.

The adventure is nice and simple. It really allows for a lot of player freedom and lets a rouge be a rogue. The adventure starts when the player either gets invited or finds out about a gambling event a lord is hosting. The module has good rules for gambling allowing a rouge to use many of his skills like bluff and sense motive for instance in the game. There are rules for gambling in here using a specific game. The rules allow for cheating, lying, and everything one would expect in such a competition. While the gambling is not going on the character can try to access other parts of the castle and learn lots of interesting information form the many NPCs here. There is a lot of good opportunity for role playing and solo investigation. The character should be able to get some good information and make quite a bit of money along the way. The gambling part is just the beginning but can really be fun for the right people. There are other things going on here and the character has a chance to really impress some important people.

I have run many solo adventures and even a long running solo campaign. I have found that in these games character interaction is important and it is good to be able to offer the character plenty of options. Sometimes with out a lot of different people to talk with a solo player character can be at a loss for what to do. This module has plenty of both: character interaction and options for the character. This seems like a really good and fun solo adventure. The plot is nice and complete and it has many options for the player. The NPCs are well defined and written up and I really like that there is a lot of non combat solutions to be had.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

One of the strengths of the PDF industry is the ability to put out a little quirky product that does not really fit anywhere and just see how it does. PDFs can be of short lengths so devoting a dozen or less pages to a single well defined class or a small collection of magical items or even a few templated creatures and just see what happens. I mention the see what happens since it is hard to predict the popularity of some of these less main streamed products. Modern Advances: Garden Mage is one such book. It is a fully defined class with a few other things thrown in that fit the theme.

Garden Mage is a PDF by Interactive Design Adventures and is written by Steve Miller. The twelve page PDF has a simple layout with a few pictures and a very plain look to it. There is some color to the book so printing it out can be a problem but for the most part there is little that will consume lots of ink. The book does have book marks but only to the different sections and not very complete like book marking each important item in the book.

The Garden Mage is an Advanced Class for d20 Modern. As one may guess from the name of the class, this is a person who uses magic for plants and that nature. They are a little druidic in nature but the abilities they get are not just copied from that class. Although there does seem to be some need for a bit more creativity in the abilities gained. The class gets spell ability with it, the ability to do more damage to plant creatures, bonuses for skills when focusing them on plants, and some bonus feats.

The book also presents six new spells, four new magical items, and one Garden Mage NPC. All of these are perfectly in theme with the garden mage. My favorite spell here is called Perfect Lawn. This zero level spell protects the lawn and allows it to flourish and is the perfect example of magic in the modern age. It is a simple and very useful spell that people would want to be able to have use of. With the hours I know some people spend on their lawn, I can see this type of spell alone be a money maker for the class.

I really like the quirkiness of the class. It even says how other mages look down on the Garden Mage for their craft is not exactly what a true Wizard would pursue. It makes a better NPC class then a player class I imagine. While the class in itself is nice and unique the abilities they gain are not all that exciting and might have a player lose interest in it. I would have liked to have seen a bit more creativity with the class. The bonus feats and extra damage verse plant creatures just seems more like filler in the class.

Garden Mage does a good job of filling a niche that most people probably did not realize was there. I like that the company took a bit of a chance with putting something out that is a bit away from the usual inn terms of what it covers. The class is creative in concept and offers new perspectives on allies and potential enemies a DM can use.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

The RPG Industry is filled with books that are in a sense reinventing the wheel. That is they take a subject that has been done a dozen times and attempt to put a fresh angel or new idea to it. Many times it turns out to be just another book on an overdone topic. Rarely does one see an RPG book that covers something original. And as Gates of Troy shows it is easy to find something original by looking toward the myths and history of the many peoples of Earth.

Gates of Troy is not a book of historical fact. The author states this almost immediately, but Troy is a subject of myth and legend that is quite famous even in the modern age. Of course with the movie Troy having been released not to long ago that should help in getting the story back into the general knowledge pool of the people.

Gates of Troy is a PDF released by Steam Power Publishing and written by Andrew Kenrick. The pdf comes in a zip file a little less then two megs and the PDF itself is a bit over two megs. It only has forty five pages and It reads as if it could have been longer. The PDF is in color, although most of the colors are browns and tans. There is a pale yellow border with Greek writing on it. It covers one side of the page and with no border on the other side makes it appear there is a lot of white space in the book. The layout is easy to read but the border is a bit distracting. The art is plentiful and looks mostly like clipart of Greek gods and pictures. The PDF is well bookmarked.

The supplement centers on the city of Troy and using it for a fantasy campaign. It is set in the Bronze Age and has some advice on how to simulate that. It would have been beneficial to the reader there was more discussion on what advancements the Bronze Age had and what it did not. It is obvious that some research was done for this book, I would have liked to seen more of that research though make it into the book. A bibliography would have been appreciated as well.

While the topic of Troy does a good job of separating it from the other multitudes of d20 books, I just was left with the need for more. The book I feel does not give enough details to properly run a campaign using the City of Troy. The city is well described and most of the book is devoted to it. Most of the major players in Troy are explained and stated out.

Gates of Troy does a nice job to introduce people to the city of Troy and provide a nice basic framework to run a campaign using the city and its events. I feel that a more detailed approach would have been very beneficial.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Setting books might be my favorite kind of book. I know there have been lots of them coming out in the past few years and that has caused some people to tire of them. But not me. Settings seem to unleash the creativeness of the writers more then most other products. With a setting the writer can set the rules and alter things from the core books with ease. They can define why these changes happen and craft their worlds with creativity and imagination. Setting give writers one of the best opportunities to present something new and different, or something that has been around for a while in a different light. A lot of people want something different from settings but I actually prefer a book with really good details. A few interesting and thought provoking changes can make something that on the service look the Grayhawk be something actually very different. Gazetteer of the Eastern Realms is a setting book, but not a complete setting. IT is one of four books that make up the complete world. It goes into a few countries that make of the eastern part of their world.

Gazetteer of the Eastern Realm is a PDF by Dunham Studios. While not a very well known company they have quietly produced about a dozen PDFs and a nice little selection of books to offer. Most have to do with this world but all of them seem to be easy to use in other places with a little work. This book is written by C Kendrick Dunham. There is a good bit of art in the book ranging from good to about average. There are some nice maps in here as well. The book though has no book marks and no index. While it is only thirty seven pages long, there are feats and other items scattered around the book that would be easier to find with such options.

The area covered seems to mostly be evil nations. There is a goblins realms and lizards swamps for instance. Each though gives a nice overview as well as a history, life and society and geographic features. One thing that is great is adventuring laws. Simple laws that will help adventures to figure out what the place is like. For instance in the Eastern Conglomerate adventurers not part of the army or worshiper of the Destroyer god is illegal. In fact worshipping anyone but the destroyer god happens to be illegal here. Anyone caught doing illegal activity is more then likely going to become a slave for the rest of their life. A few get death, and only the elite and wealthy hope to get off with a steep fine. Each region has regional feats that do a nice job of mixing mechanics with background. I have always found regional feats to be much more interesting then just general feats.

Each region has a nice little map for it. While there is only a very small world map in this product, one can download a free and bigger version from the company?s site. The map is sidewise and not the easiest to find, but it is a nice and useful for figuring out where each of the places is in relation to each other.

This is a nice setting or part of a setting. The balance on the feats and the few classes in here seem pretty good. It has a lot of flavor and interesting countries for adventures to run into and learn about. There are also many neat little ideas to borrow and incorporate into one?s own campaign setting or even another published setting.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>