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S-Class Characters: The Monster Trainer
Publisher: Samurai Sheepdog
by Shane [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 04/10/2024 14:43:10

This isn't the review that I wanted to write for this product. I'm a big fan of Samurai Sheepdog's products in general, and their Mystical: Kingdom of Monsters series in particular. So naturally, I was pleasantly surprised when I saw an "S-Class" upgrade for that supplement's monster trainer class. And for the most part I was very pleased with what was presented...with one MAJOR caveat, which is the reason this review only has 3/5 stars. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Insofar as the S-Class iteration of the monster trainer class itself goes, what's here does an excellent job of improving on the original design. S-Class MT's not only get shield proficiency (not including tower shields) but also better weapon proficiencies as well, being able to use all martial weapons. More substantively, an S-Class MT gets an improved favored enemy progression compared to their original version, along with greater variability in what the "monster growth" special ability can do (along with closing what I suspect was an unintentional limitation with how the original version only applied to captive monsters, and so excluded monsters you'd received via trading or which surrendered voluntarily). There's also some slight clarification on the empathy ability, but the real meat of these upgrades comes from two things: the first is that the S-Class MT gains perks much faster. Whereas the original MT gained one at 4th level and every four levels thereafter (with the final on at 19th, rather than 20th, level), its S-Class counterpart gains its first perk at 3rd level, and every odd-numbered level thereafter. That's almost double the standard number of perks, which is a major (and majorly welcome) boost! The second upgrade is a new ability, called "trainer's edge." More about versatility than power, this lets you get a free skill unlock at 6th and 11th level, based on one skill that a monster of yours has. It's a very welcome addition for adding flavor to the class, as well as indicating the trainer's increased bond with their most favored monsters. Major kudos to Samurai Sheepdog for going for breadth rather than pure power creep here. There are also a (relatively small) selection of potential perks listed, and while most of these are ones that you'll also find in Mystical: Kingdom of Monsters Anniversary Edition, there are four new perks (three standard, and one master perk) based around a new idea: monster fusion. Now, some Googling suggests that this is a Palworld nod, and I think it's awesome that Samurai Sheepdog is taking inspiration from there. The actual fusion rules themselves seem solid, being a relatively quick and easy way to fold a second monster's stats into the first, with subsequent abilities serving to enhance these combinations...all the way up to a permanent fusion being the master perk. One thing that should be mentioned is that, even if you're not a fan of the S-Class iteration of the MT, these perks are technically separate from it. That is to say, there's no reason you can't have a standard MT take the fusion perks if you'd prefer to stick to the more modestly-powered version of the class but still like the idea of mixing your monsters. A minor but not unimportant bit of versatility there, which is something that counts for a lot in my book: developers who give their customers more to work with are the ones who reliably get my money, because they go the extra mile. Which is why the new monsters presented here made me so incredibly sad. To be absolutely clear, it's this next section, which gives us five new monsters (themselves presented as examples of permanently-fused monsters which have now become "standard" creatures that trainers can capture), which is the reason why I rated this product 3/5 stars. More specifically, I gave this such a middling rating because these monsters are written and presented using the "simple monster creation" rules from Pathfinder Unchained. Now, if you're not familiar with those, I don't blame you. My group tends to use Pathfinder Unchained only for its "unchained" classes and its Combat Stamina feat. Everything else is sort of glazed over; I had to go back and re-familiarize myself with the simple monster creation rules, since I'm sure I hadn't looked them over since I first bought the book. The gist of these rules involves eschewing normal monster creation guidelines in favor of a series of abbreviated steps, which let you (relatively) quickly create a new monster for your game...but which result in leaving out some information which is judged to be extraneous. In their own words, these rules "cuts some corners" to give you most, but not all, of a monster's stat block (albeit with some limited guidelines for what to do if you find yourself needing a missing part). All of which is to say, the simple monster creation rules are most likely a godsend for designers writing up new monsters...but that makes it easier for THEM by giving US, the customers, less to work with. Looking at the five new monsters in this book, for instance, I don't know what languages they speak, or what their Intelligence score is. None have any feats, and they all have hit points but no Hit Dice. We're getting less bang for our buck than we would with any other monster book, and that's doubly egregious for a setting where monsters are the raison d'etre. Worse, this appears to be the standard operating procedure for Samurai Sheepdog's Mystical: Kingdom of Monsters products going forward, and for the life of me I can't figure out why. Let that sink in: we're getting what are essentially incomplete monster stat blocks, for a setting all about finding and capturing monsters. Now, again, these incomplete stat blocks aren't crippling. One of the new monsters here has a new power whose duration is based on Hit Dice, even though it has no Hit Dice listed...but if you look at the simple monster rules in Pathfinder Unchained, it says that when this happens, treat the monster's Challenge Rating as the creature's Hit Dice. These are not fatal omissions, but they do severely crimp the utility in these products, making the monsters harder for us to use at the table. The designers seem to have forgotten that just because the simple monster creation rules make things easier for them, it doesn't make things easier for us. I, for one, do not want to have to go back and review the guidelines in Pathfinder Unchained for how to fill in the blanks whenever I come across something that these abbreviated stat blocks don't have. It's like working twice as hard as everyone else in order to take a shortcut. I truly hope that Samurai Sheepdog abandons its plans to use the simple monster creation rules going forward, and instead updates this (and other books) so that its monsters have full stat blocks going forward. Much like how the original Mystical: Kingdom of Monsters book needed three iterations to reach its full potential, the simple monster creation rules are holding the newest M:KoM books back (and are why I haven't yet bought the new Eastrek book).

EDIT: Never let it be said that Samurai Sheepdog doesn't listen to feedback! In response to this review, they went back in and gave us full stats for the new monsters herein, as well as keeping the abbreviated stats for those who prefer them! I have to say that I'm pleasantly surprised, and have updated my review to a full five-stars, as well as picking up the new Eastrek book, which has also received a full-stat version! It's rare to see this level of commitment to excellence from a publisher, and has earned Samurai Sheepdog my business for the foreseeable future!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
S-Class Characters: The Monster Trainer
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Creator Reply:
A well thought out and much appreciated review. I'd love to hear your thoughts on the updated version of this now that we've added all of the relevant, full stats for the monsters.
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Read Magic - Vigor
Publisher: Orphaned Bookworm Productions LLC
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 10/23/2022 15:07:07

One of the perennial complaints about Pathfinder 1E is its heavy reliance on math.

It’s not so much that any of the individual calculations are hard, or so I’m given to understand, but how pervasive they are. Various disparate modifiers for attack bonuses, a profusion of DCs for various checks, and differing formulae for calculating magic item costs all serve to make up a numbers game that, for many people, seems to get in the way of role-playing.

But for a lot of people, myself included, this is a feature rather than a bug. The same way an architect can admire a bridge not just for its aesthetic qualities but also see appreciate the underlying designs that it incorporates, Pathfinder 1E is a game that’s more fun because of the math that its predicated on. Extrapolated outward, they inform the nature of the game world, lending an internal design to the world apart from the purely-narrative aspects. To us, this makes the game more fun, not less.

Connor Bates is clearly one such individual, and Read Magic – Vigor is the proof.

If you haven’t clicked on the full-size preview for the product yet, do so right now and read the Preamble section. It was on the strength of that alone that I purchased this book, and quite frankly it showcases exactly what I mentioned before, with Bates expertly dissecting the problems with the Pathfinder’s infernal healing and celestial healing spells, comparing them t 3.5 suite of vigor spells, and presenting what the solution should be.

Said solution is a plethora of new spells that allow for healing a small, static amount of hit points over a series of rounds. Not only that, but Bates goes one step further, introducing mirror images of those spells which cause small amounts of static damage over a series of rounds. Vigor is here, retooled for Pathfinder, along with tweaked versions of infernal healing and celestial healing. (Said tweaks are all useful as well as flavorful, such as doing away with the presumption that over-use of the latter spells will alter your alignment, making the duration vary more with your caster level, and inputs failure conditions whereby an opposed type of damage can end the drawn-out healing immediately.) And then he adds in even more such spells, such as vigor of the grave and fey healing.

All of these, by the by, offer not only lesser and greater versions, but also mass versions of the lesser, standard, and greater versions. With five different types of healing spells, that’s well over two dozen spells already.

Now, it’s entirely possible that you’re looking at that (or the book’s table of contents) and wondering if it’s worthwhile to have so many spells that do the same thing. Do you really need five different sets of spells that all offer drawn-out healing over a number of rounds? The answer, here, is yes, because those minor differences allow you to present different versions in your campaign by what suits your preference. Do you dislike the aligned nature of celestial and infernal healing, and would prefer a universal type of spell for drawn-out healing? Just use the vigor spells. Should drawn-out healing be presented as something fey, different from divine magic’s cure X wounds spells? Use the fey healing spells instead. It’s this sort of subtle world-building that speaks to aficionados.

And that’s not all. Not only does Bates present a necrosis series of spells as a counterpoint to vigor – dealing damage over time, rather than healing (though you can use them to heal the undead, the same way the vigor spells can damage them) – but there’s also an entire suite of other such drawn-out damage spells as well, presenting options for the type of damage inflicted based around the various weapon damage types (i.e. slashing, bludgeoning, and piercing) as well as elemental types (i.e. acid, cold, electricity, fire, and sonic). Fortunately, Bates provides templates for the standard and greater versions of those spells, as well as the mass versions thereof, rather than individually presenting each one; otherwise we’d be looking at almost fifty new spell entries just for those!

Now, there are one or two minor areas where I could nitpick some of what this book presents. For instance, the class spell lists that these new spells appear on are fairly restricted, at least when you look at the total number of spellcasting classes in Pathfinder 1E. The psychic, for instance, only gets one of the new spells here (inflict crushing pressure), albeit also with its lesser/greater/mass variations, which seemed a little odd, and none of the other occult classes get any of these spells. Ditto for the poor adept, which is perpetually overlooked. I likewise frowned at how there’s a chaotic counterpart to infernal healing and celestial healing (the aforementioned fey healing) but no lawful version thereof...though since I can’t really think of one myself, I can’t hold that against this book very much.

But minor complaints aside, this is an excellent book which deftly patches an area where the official materials from Paizo simply aren’t up to par. Bates has masterfully fixed this, and in so doing opened up new options that work beautifully with the Pathfinder system. The result is something which absolutely deserves a place in your game, whether your players have a dedicated healer or recover all of their hit points from a wand. For the incredibly low asking price, this is more than worth it.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Read Magic - Vigor
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Creator Reply:
Wow what a wonderful and validating review! Like you said there was not a good 'lawful' source to be a counter to feet healing. Protean might have worked but it was a stretch. As for the class availability, the adept rarely crosses my mind! When we do a compilation of all the read magic series, I'll be doing a review of claws because there is also some occult class neglect.
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Simple Classes: Beastspeaker
Publisher: Little Red Goblin Games
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 08/24/2021 07:46:14

Little Red Goblin Games’ “Simple Classes” line is one that I’ve been interested in for a while now. Being old enough to remember back when “class features” were the exception rather than the rule (e.g. it used to be your fighter’s only abilities were that they had more hit points, better saving throws, and a better to-hit bonus than other characters), I was curious as to how LRGG would affect a return to form for Pathfinder 1st Edition. Obviously, there wouldn’t be a lack of class features entirely, but the promise of simplicity without reducing effectiveness was one I wanted to see.

To that end, I elected to go with the Beastspeaker as my entry point for this particular line. The idea of a “master of beasts” in the style of the old Beastmaster movies was one that I couldn’t resist taking a look at. So how did it hold up? Let’s take a closer look…

At seven pages long, the class itself takes up just under three pages, with the rest being given over to the cover, credits, introduction, and OGL. I will say that I liked the introductory text about what a “simple class” is supposed to be. While normal classes are meant to represent a profession or a particular field that one can be trained in, simple classes are far more individualized. In a modern setting, these would be similar to superheroes; individuals with powers and abilities unique to them (even if other characters can achieve similar results with different methods).

I personally find that idea both flavorful and evocative, as it’s a quick way to communicate a clear niche for not just the class presented here, but all of the classes in this line. While you’ll be able to find paladins and wizards and similar classes all over, it makes sense that – in how high-magic most PF1E worlds are – you’ll get misfits whose personal progression is outside the scope of the typical paths other characters follow.

The other takeaway here is that simple classes live up to their designation. The introduction makes it clear that these don’t have “talents,” which are the name for a pool of variable class abilities that characters can pick as they level up, such as a barbarian’s rage powers or an arcanist’s exploits. Instead, simple classes get lots of bonus feats, playing up the theme of individuality.

An extension of that is that this class (and, I strongly suspect, all of the others in the line) have no supporting materials. Don’t expect any archetypes, favored class listings, or feats designed to expand on the class’s abilities here. It’s just the table and the description of the class features.

So with that overview out of the way, what does the beastspeaker look like as a class? Well, the basics are very much taken from the fighter, albeit with some improvements. It has a d10 Hit Die, full BAB progression, generous weapon and armor proficiencies, good Ref and Will saves, and 4 skill points per level (for which I’m very glad, as I’ve long regarded 2 skill points per level for any class as being a mistake) with a fairly broad list of class skills, and no alignment restrictions. The class notes that, despite its martial nature, you’ll want to keep your Charisma moderately high, as several of your abilities rely on it.

Then we come to the class abilities themselves, and this is where the problems start.

Take the 1st level ability, speak with beasts. You’d think this was basically an improved version of the Speak With Animals spell, and yet that spell is never mentioned here. Instead, we’re told that the beastspeaker can communicate with animals as if they shared a language, but that this doesn’t work on animals with an Intelligence score of 1 or 2.

Er, what?

ALL animals have an Intelligence score of only 1 or 2; that’s literally part of their creature type description. How this line got in there I have no idea, but it’s crying out for editing, by which I mean it should be deleted. Nor is that the only problem, as it further cut-and-pastes some of the text from the druid’s wild empathy ability; you know it’s cut-and-pasted because it not only outlines how this functions like a Diplomacy check in terms of adjusting the animal’s attitude but also outlines the mechanics as being 1d20 + beastspeaker class level + the beastspeaker’s Charisma bonus “to determine the wild empathy check result.” That makes it sound like this power IS wild empathy, even though it’s folded into the Speak With Beasts ability. Oh, and then it says this counts as being wild empathy for the purposes of qualifying for feats and other prerequisites.

The intent is very clear here, in that this is meant to be a function of Speak With Beasts that mimics wild empathy (to the point of being wild empathy as far as prerequisites are concerned), but the text needs to be cleaned up. It’s not as bad as saying that the ability to actually talk to animals doesn’t work on animals with animal-level intelligence, but it’s still needlessly messy.

Oh, and it also includes the note about how you can influence the attitude of magical beasts with an Intelligence of 1 or 2 (apparently you can speak to them just fine) with a -4 penalty…and then says that at 3rd level, the beastspeaker can use Speak With Beasts on magical beasts, vermin, and dragons. So does the -4 penalty still apply to magical beasts then? What about the fact that creatures with the vermin type are mindless by nature (i.e. their Intelligence score is “—“)? Does that come into play at all?

So many errors and unclear aspects of this power, even if they’re not hard for a competent GM to fix, is disheartening. The introduction said that simple classes are supposed to be easy for new players to use, but when there are this many errors, that premise is undercut. Nor do things get better as we go on.

Take, for example, the 2nd level ability, which is that you gain a bonus feat. The text says “At 2nd level, the beastspeaker gains a bonus feat in addition to those gained from normal advancement. They must meet all prerequisites for these feats.” That’s the full text; notice how the second sentence switches to plural after the first one is singular? That’s because, according to the class table, the beastspeaker is supposed to gain a bonus feat at every even-numbered level (i.e. 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th, etc.), but you’d never know that from reading the text, which makes it sound like they ONLY gain one at 2nd level. It’s another issue with imprecise language.

Command Beast is gained at 3rd level, and lets a beastspeaker use Dominate Animal a number of times per day equal to their Charisma modifier, using the same modifier to adjust the DC and their class level as their caster level. While it can only target a particular creature with this ability once per day, limiting the daily uses as per their Charisma modifier seems kind of pointless, since they gain the ability to use it at will at 5th level, which is also when they can also use it on magical beasts, dragons, and vermin, with the text flat-out saying this overrides vermin creature’s immunity to mind-affecting effects. I’d say there should probably be an exception in there, saying that this doesn’t work against creatures with the swarm subtype, but that’s just me. As it is, this power has quite a bit of potential for abuse if the beastspeaker starts using this on every qualifying creature in sight; the “only once on each particular creature per day” limitation keeps this from getting out of hand, especially given that Dominate Animal only lasts for 1 round/level (and is only going to have a DC of 13 + Cha. mod…but see below), but be prepared for this to be an encounter-changer if the party is facing a lot of monsters that are vulnerable to this power (e.g. an ancient dragon and its magical beast minions for a boss battle).

Beasthunter, gained at 7th level, gives the beastspeaker a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls against animals, going up by +1 at every 4 levels, with it expanding to magical beasts, dragons, and vermin at 11th level. You can see the theme emerging here. I’d personally have liked to see this also applied to things like skill checks involving qualifying creatures, similar to a ranger’s favored enemy, but I can live without that. But the ability tag shouldn't be (Sp) here; (Ex) would be more appropriate (and should have a space between the tag and the ability name).

Beast Breaker, gained at 9th level, offers a +1 bonus to Diplomacy and Intimidate checks against animals, and also to the DC of Command Beast. It goes up every four levels, and as you probably guessed, also applies against magical beasts, dragons, and vermin starting at 13th level. This one is a bit awkward because it means the DC of Command Beast will be slightly higher against animals than against those other creatures for a few levels. It’s also a bit unwieldy because, as written, this power DOESN’T help with the “wild empathy” ability of Speak With Beasts. That’s got to be an error…another one, I mean. Oh, and this is also tagged as being a spell-like ability when it should almost certainly be Extraordinary.

The final power is Grand Hunter, gained at 20th level, which allows the beastspeaker to auto-confirm critical threats against animals, dragons, magical beasts, and vermin, as well as bumping up their damage multiplier by 1. I suppose I could nitpick the language as to whether or not this power’s damage multiplier is applies only to those creature types or to all critical hits, but here, at least, that seems parsimonious, since it’s clearly meant to apply only to those four creature types. I'll also note the lack of an ability tag (which should probably be extraordinary) here as well.

Taken in total, the beastspeaker is a good idea which had several flaws creep into its execution. This is a shame because all of these could have been easily avoided; how does this book have three editors listed when no one caught all of these errors? The good news is that a capable GM can fix these without any undue difficulty. These are mistakes related to rules-precision, not problems with the underlying ideas, so a few minutes of common-sense examination can easily put this class back on track. I just wish that wasn’t necessary to begin with.

So how to rate this product? Well, the idea is certainly one that deserves five stars, but the pervasive errors, though not crippling, drag this down to a three-star product, though the easily-fixed nature of them mitigates this down to three-and-a-half. That’s enough that I’ll round up, for a final score of four stars overall. If LRGG comes back in and fixes the problems outlined above, I’d be happy to go put that last star back in.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Simple Classes: Beastspeaker
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Class Codex: The Spellwright
Publisher: Fat Goblin Games
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 01/26/2020 15:59:48

One of the most important ideas for any RPG product is that the style (i.e. the idea) and the substance (i.e. the mechanics) need to complement each other. If you have good substance but poor style, you end up with something useful but boring. Good style and bad substance make for a great idea that’s executed poorly. It takes both to make an excellent product.

Class Codex: the Spellwright is a book that has good style and substance to it.

Before we begin, let’s overview the PDF itself: twelve pages long, it has one page each for the front and back covers, one for the credits/ToC/legal, and one for the OGL, leaving us with eight pages of material. There are no bookmarks, but I can’t hold that against a PDF this small. The pages have borders, and we do get bits of the cover illustration used as the occasional interior piece of artwork, but again I can’t fault the PDF for not having a printer-friendly version; there’s simply no need when you’re looking at less than ten pages of stuff that you’d actually print.

In terms of style, what we have here is a spellcaster who uses cards to work their magic. Now, I’ll be honest here: I’m not someone who plays a lot of card-based games, particularly where trading/collectible card games are concerned. So it’s entirely possible that I’m missing out on some of the nuance here. I have a vague understanding of the “trap card” reference in the product description, for instance, but it’s entirely possible that there are some Yu-Gi-Oh or Magic: the Gathering references that I’m missing. Even so, the concept of “card magic” is ubiquitous enough in gaming circles (largely thanks to those two series, as well as several others in the same vein) that I’m familiar with the basic concept. In terms of the idea at play, this one is solid: the cards are the medium with which you utilize your magic.

It’s the substance where we see exactly what this means in the context of Pathfinder First Edition. The spellwright base class is a full-progression arcane spellcaster, utilizing the sorcerer/wizard list for their spells. An Intelligence-based class, they prepare their spells, and have the same BAB and save progressions as a wizard (though I’m quite pleased with them receiving 4 + Int bonus skill points rather than the traditional 2 + Int bonus; I’m of the opinion that 2 is far too few for any class), as well as no armor proficiencies and very few weapon proficiencies. All of that sounds a lot like a wizard, except that they have to prepare their spells on written cards instead of in their minds, wielding them as somatic components when they cast their spells (and, incidentally, using expensive material components when they prepare their spells, rather than cast them), and prepare their spells from a card catalogue instead of a spellbook.

Now, by itself, all of that sounds so much like a standard wizard that you’re probably wondering if this shouldn’t just be an archetype, or maybe even just a flavorful description with no real mechanical changes. But it’s the class features where the spellwright distinguished itself; although it never actually says so, this class comes across almost like a hybrid of the wizard and the magus.

The major way this is true is that spellwrights have an arcane pool, which they can spend to retain not just to retain a spell card after it’s used, but also to retain a scroll when they use the magic in it. It also serves as a power source for several of their “spellwright technique” class features, which they gain at every even-numbered level. More impressively, a spellwright not only gains the ability to cast spells in light armor (at 7th level) and medium armor (at 13th level), but can also add two spells from the cleric or psychic spell lists to his own spell list at every odd-numbered level. If that sounds too powerful, remember that they don’t automatically gain these spells in their card catalogue; they just gain the ability to add them. An enhanced ability to utilize arcane scrolls (choosing one of three possible benefits as a swift action when using them) rounds things out before getting to the capstone, which further increases what they can do with scrolls.

By itself that’s impressive, but it’s the spellwright techniques that present the real meat of the class. Split into twenty-one basic techniques and thirteen greater techniques, these are like rogue talents in that you pick and choose which ones you want as you level up, though you’re unable to select the greater techniques until 10th level and there are some that have others as prerequisites. Here you’ll find abilities such as being able to use your spell cards as daggers, with further techniques to increase their weapon-like abilities. And if that sounds bad for a half-BAB class, there’s a greater technique that allows you to treat your class level as your BAB when wielding your spell cards; this is a genius ability that can potentially change the way you play a spellwright character! And yes, there are spellwright techniques here for making “trap” cards, which basically store a spell in them until their activation conditions go off.

I have to admit that I’m very impressed with the array of spellwright techniques; they cover little things from making your card catalogue very hard to damage to allowing potions to be utilized with nearly the same efficiency as scrolls normally are to utilizing arcane pool points to power arcanist reservoir abilities and vice versa in case you’re playing a multiclass character (and yes, you can use the spellwright’s arcane pool in conjunction with a magus’s arcane pool; this is an inherent part of the arcane pool ability and doesn’t require taking a spellwright technique). There are a lot of variable options here, enough that you can easily play different spellwrights in very different ways (and yes, there are techniques to not only allow you to throw your cards, but charge them with energy, or even a touch-range spell, as well, allowing you to play a Gambit-like character).

It’s after this that we get a few pages of supplementary material, starting with spellwright favored class bonuses for various races. This section made me quirk a brow, because it’s where we start to see the one place where I found fault with this product. There are favored class bonuses for each of the seven Core races, and the three new races from other Golden Glyph Publishing books: the lagos, mineralite, and scyleen (a sidebar openly points out that these are from other GGG books). Now, there’s nothing wrong with a publisher promoting cross-product compatibility; my issue is that more could have been done here. While I don’t expect to see every race from the Advanced Race Guide to be here, the lack of anything outside of the Core races and the publisher’s own was a bit surprising. There’s no spellwright favored class bonuses for, say, aasimars and tieflings? None for catfolk or kitsunes? Dhampirs or changelings? More could have been done.

After this comes ten new mundane items and two magic ones. I’ll compliment the mundane items for being smartly-written: a lot of products would have glossed over the use of the spell cards and card catalogue, but they each get their own entry here, specifying things like their hardness and hit points, how much they cost, etc. Throw in little things like ink, pens, a scrivener’s kit, etc. and this nicely rounds out the class’s tools. The two magic items also nicely cover a niche, as one allows for expanded use of cards, and the other makes new (blank) cards ex nihilo.

A single new spell comes next, a 0-level spell that allows for copying pages. It also nicely rounds out the class, though the pedant in me notes that it’s only on the bard, sorcerer/wizard, and cleric/oracle spell lists. Surely the magus could have used this too? Or the occultist? Or the psychic? This spell is useful and its status as an endlessly-castable 0-level spell doesn’t seem likely to unbalance anything, so why not let other classes have it?

Two new archetypes round the product out. The first is the planescaller, which trades out much of the ability to manipulate scrolls (as well as gaining new spells from the cleric or psychic spell lists) in exchange for being able to use a summon monster spell. This is considerably buffed from the basic version of the spell, however, as it requires only a standard action to cast, remains for 10 minutes per caster level, and the level of the summon monster spell and number of summon monster cards that can be used goes up by one for every two class levels. If that sounds like it’s unbalancing, the power has a limit: it costs one arcane pool point per level of the spell to use this special monster summoning card. The spellwright can also use self-buffing spells (i.e. they target “you”) on monsters summoned this way. Later abilities trade out the use of armor to switch places with your monster when you’re targeted by a spell, and at 20th level can apply the Advanced simple template to these monsters.

I’m of two minds about this particular archetype, if for no other reason than it’s so different from the summoner base class. There’s no use of an eidolon (which is probably a good thing) nor any option to, say, utilize eidolon evolutions on summoned monsters (which seems like a missed opportunity). Ultimately, what you get out of this archetype will depend a lot on if you think the summoner class is something to be avoided or to be emulated.

The second archetype here, the talismanist, is much briefer. It essentially swaps out the spellwrights arcane spells for divine spells, and allows for arcane or psychic spells to be periodically added to their spell list, the same way the base class does for divine or psychic spells. A bit basic, but the variety is nice. Unfortunately, this technically can’t be combined with the planescaller archetype, since both trade out the enhanced understanding ability (i.e. adding a cleric or psychic spell to the base class’s spell list). I’d be tempted to simply handwave this contradiction away, since it’s clear that the talismanist version of this ability (“arcane guidance”) fulfills the same purpose, and so is obviously what’s traded out if you want a combined planescaller talismanist.

That’s where the product ends…and it brings me back to my major complaint from before, because more could have been done here. While saying “it left me wanting more” is usually a compliment, it’s this product’s single biggest weakness, because while the design space it left blank isn’t overwhelming, it is notable. Right off the bat, I can think of several things that should have been included in this product but weren’t.

The biggest offender are feats. There’s simply no excuse for not having a feat called Extra Spellwright Technique here that does what it says on the tin. Go to aonprd.com, click the “Search” feature, set it to search only feats, and have it search for the word “extra.” While there’ll be a lot of mishits, you’ll see that literally every class with a selectable pool of abilities has a feat to let them take more. Extra Discovery. Extra Hex. Extra Rage Power. Extra Rogue Talent. (As written, the Extra Arcane Pool feat, from Ultimate Magic, works for the spellwright just as much as it does for the magus, but it should still have been reprinted here.) How about a feat to let a character (not necessarily just a spellwright) use their spellcasting ability modifier when casting a spell from a scroll (probably a number of times per day equal to their casting stat modifier)? Technically scrolls use the default minimum modifier to set their DC (i.e. they’re treated as if the casting stat modifier was 10 + the spell level), which is going to be hideously low. For a class that focuses on scrolls so much, not having something like this feels like an oversight. Perhaps one to let the bonus from Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus be used with scrolls also? These are just some off-the-cuff ideas, and I’m sure there are other feats that could expand directly on what this class can do, but as of right now there aren’t any.

While not having feats is the big offender among what’s not here, it’s not the only one. Others include presenting this class under the variant multiclassing rules from Pathfinder Unchained, and giving us a simple class template version of it, from the Monster Codex. These are important because they’re two of the easiest ways for GMs to make quick-and-easy NPCs using what’s here, instead of having to build them from the ground up. The former would make it incredibly easy to swap out a few feats from an existing NPC in exchange for some spellwright abilities, whereas the latter is useful if you want to make a higher-level monster into a spellwright without throwing their CR out of whack.

And there’s still design space left unused! Remember the Background Generator tables from Ultimate Campaign? They had class-specific tables that you could use to help figure out who your character was, including determining if they had a story feat or a particular trait; how about one of those for the spellwright? No new traits or story feats would need to be written, just a table of background ideas that coordinate with the ones that we already have (and don’t tread on any of the existing class tables). Likewise, while mythic abilities aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, adding even one new spellwright-specific mythic ability (presumably for the archmage path, though making them universal in order not to pigeonhole a character is viable also) at 1st, 3rd, and 6th tier each would have been a nice way to expand on a spellwright’s options if they’re part of a campaign that’s going in that direction (and now I want to make a “Wrath of the Spellwrighteous” joke).

Ultimately, the spellwright is a great class. It takes a popular idea and brings it to Pathfinder in a way that keeps the style intact while simultaneously grounding it with rock-solid mechanics that not only make it viable, but do so in a way that allows it to be played in several different styles depending on which techniques your character takes. It’s also nicely rounded by the supporting mechanics…but not as much as it should be.

Now, adding in everything I lamented was missing (expanded favored class bonuses, feats, variant multiclassing, a simple class template, a background table, and mythic options) would no doubt increase the size of this book, and probably drive the price up commensurately, but I have a hard time imagining that it wouldn’t be worth it. This class is already a good one, and expanding its options would make it truly great. Hopefully we’ll see a revision at some point in the future.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Class Codex: The Spellwright
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Racial Repository: The Scyleen
Publisher: Fat Goblin Games
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 12/21/2019 15:10:57

Look at this race. Isn’t it keen? A cephalopod-person called a scyleen. Wouldn’t it add to a world, a world that has…everything?

Well, let’s find out.

Racial Repository: The Scyleen is a ten-page supplement for Pathfinder First Edition from Kristopher Cruz’s Golden Glyph Publishing, released via Fat Goblin Games. After one page each for the front and back covers, one page of credits, and one page for the OGL, we’re left with six pages of content in total. I’ll take a moment to talk about the art here: the three full-color pieces do a great job showcasing what typical scyleen look like, and I especially loved the one of a scyleen in an octasuit! The tentacle-borders around each page were a nice touch as well.

What caught my interest right off the bat is that this Racial Repository is also a Starjammer-compatible supplement. While the mechanics here can be near-totally used without any reference to spacefaring settings (the only exceptions are the two new pieces of non-magical equipment, and the race’s “void vulnerability” racial trait), the flavor text is presented from the context of a spacefaring society. In this regard, the scyleen are introduced as being a race of sensuous artists, their long lifespans, unusual but not unattractive physiology, and latent psychic sensitivity making them mysterious without being unapproachable. Their description even contrasts them with the cecaelia from Bestiary 3, noting that they’re different races with no common ancestry.

Now, normally the flavor text of a race is something of an extra, since it can be discarded or altered into whatever’s necessary to reflavor the mechanics in question. But I have to take a moment to applaud just how well the mechanics reflect and complement the flavor text here. Everything I’ve described in the above paragraph is represented via game rules for the scyleen, something that far too many races don’t bother with. Would-be designers should take note of what’s here: this is how you build a race that comes across as unique and interesting, rather than just another collection of generic bonuses.

Nor does this strength stop with the flavor text: the mechanics are tightly-knit and take advantage of the various expansions that have been released for Pathfinder 1E over the years. For example, the scyleen racial traits all have their RP points given, letting the GM see their total allotment (16 RP) and judge accordingly if he wants to use them as a PC race in his or her campaign. Note that while this racial breakdown might seem high, several points relate to aquatic advantages; if your campaign doesn’t spend much time underwater (which is entirely possible, as this race has no water-based dependency), a scyleen won’t seem nearly as powerful as the numbers would otherwise indicate.

But that’s just the bare minimum. We’re also given four alternate racial traits (also with RP values), including one that maximizes their utility if you’re planning on staying above the waves. There are over a half-dozen favored class options, and a new racial archetype (though I’ll note that it doesn’t say it’s restricted “only” to scyleen characters).

I have to take a moment to talk about how much I enjoyed this archetype. The “witch of the depths,” for the witch class (obviously), sacrifices a few hexes in order to be able to make a contract with someone. Doing so allows for a transmutation spell to be permanently laid on them, in exchange for them also suffering from a permanent curse, all active so long as a token of the agreement exists. Now, given the tentacle’d nature of the scyleen, this homage needs no pointing out where it came from. But it’s so brilliantly done, so simply and adroitly presented, that I’m honestly surprised I haven’t seen it before now. This archetype alone is worth the price of purchase, and then some.

New equipment comes next, and as noted this is the only part (besides their race taking damage in a vacuum) that’s not really useable in a high fantasy world. Specifically because the new equipment is a spacesuit suited for their body type, and a machine to extract materials from a body of water. This last one might sound pointless, but the expansive description does a good job pointing out the potential uses, even if they aren’t something that combat-focused players will care about. The ability to purify water while simultaneously gathering potentially-valuable materials in the process is a great bit of flavor for this race, and we’re given just enough game rules to make it viable if someone wants to get into the nitty-gritty of how it works. It’s another example of the details making the overall presentation shine.

A few new feats and new APG race traits round things out. While none wowed me quite as much as some of the earlier material, everything here plays into what’s already established for the scyleen, such as increasing the efficacy of their tentacles at grappling or allowing them to have a heightened empathic bond with a chosen individual. Smartly, the product also remembers to include their starting ages, age categories, and height and weight tables. Bravo there! A lot of products forget those details. The book closes out with a GMG settlement stat block for an example scyleen colony (which I kind of wish had a name, but won’t penalize it for omitting).

Overall, the scyleen is an excellent product in every category. The flavor text fit the mechanics perfectly, the mechanics themselves were excellently constructed, they covered all of the bases that new races should when introduced this late in the PF1 life-cycle, and the entire package covers a niche that’s largely underserved but easily recognizable thanks to its smart focus on a few standout factors for what makes scyleen unique. You should definitely consider making the scyleen…

Part of your (campaign) world.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Racial Repository: The Scyleen
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Hybrid Blood
Publisher: Silver Games LLC
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 07/27/2018 16:31:05

Miscegenation has long been a thorny issue in tabletop role-playing games that involve racial hybrids. The question of why there are half-elves but no half-dwarves, or elf-dwarves for that matter, have long been one of those unanswered questions that has never had a good answer. Most of the time, the answer is a shrug and some utterance of “because that’s how it is,” since the alternative is to either begin charting out every possible combination (a task daunting in its impossibility) or disallowing crossbred characters altogether.

More recently, race-creation systems have been proposed as the answer. Any Pathfinder aficionado, for example, will likely be able to tell you all about the Advanced Race Guide’s use of Race Points (RP) as a means of generating a character of unique parentage. But even then, problems still arise: from issues of stark lists of abilities whose RP costs fail to invoke any ideas about what sort of beings would possess them to an overly-permeable scale of how many RPs a character can have before being “too powerful,” that and similar takes on standardizing the act of custom-race creation tend to be unsatisfying in what they offer.

Then we come to Hybrid Blood, the race-creation supplement from Silver Games, and the problem is solved.

Before I go any further, I need to make some disclaimers. The first and most important is that I have a potential conflict of interest here. Not only am I Patreon supporter of this company, I’ve also worked with the author on several projects. Make of that what you will.

Another thing that needs to be stated upfront is that this book, while it does deal with anthropomorphic characters (i.e. furries), contains absolutely no fetish-fuel whatsoever. Don’t expect anything even remotely suggestive here; the most you’ll find are a tame notation that “beast people” are able to interbreed. The artwork is likewise no more tantalizing than anything you’d find in a contemporary mass-market product. This book is all about being a role-playing game supplement, and nothing else.

Finally, let me note that Hybrid Blood is configured for no less than THREE distinct role-playing games: Pathfinder, Starfinder, and Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition (though the Starfinder material is often folded into Pathfinder). While I know a lot of gamers for whom that’s a huge issue (i.e. no one wants to buy material that isn’t for the game they’re playing), I can’t stress enough just how much the books use of layout and formatting makes this feel like a non-issue. The brilliant use of color-coded backgrounds/headers (always paired with a small two-letter symbol – PF, SF, or 5E – to make sure things are completely clear), completely eliminates any ambiguity and makes it easy for your eyes to instantly be drawn to the section of the page that’s relevant to your interest. The degree to which this mitigates the feeling of wasted space cannot be overstated.

With all of that said, how does Hybrid Blood tackle the topic of custom-race characters? Interestingly, the book presents two different answers to this question. The first is for “beast people” as an overarching race, while the second is present hybrid characters. The two are held as being distinct from each other, but their presentation is exceedingly similar in how they’re built.

For beast people, a standard PC racial write-up is given. The rub lies in the fact that a given beast person needs to pick not one, but two special qualities from a list: one for how they acquire their food, and one for their method of locomotion. This takes us to the book’s answer to the how races are built: by selecting multiple thematic packages of racial qualities.

To put it another way, your beast person character might (after noting the basic racial qualities given under the “beast person” racial outline) take “tooth and claw” for their diet-based quality, which gives them a choice of where they allocate their ability score bonuses and penalties, and gives them natural weapons. They’d then choose “tunneler” for their movement-based quality, potentially modifying their ability score distribution and giving them a burrow speed. Of course, height and weight tables are given, along with a robust selection of feats and traits to round things out.

Then we come to the next section, which takes up roughly three-fourths of the book: hybrid characters.

Hybrid characters, as noted above, are built similarly to beast people characters. The difference is that, while beast people are essentially a single race with some comparatively minor modifications based on their diet and movement, the qualities of a hybrid character have no standardized aspects to them: everything is determined by their construction. In this case, that construction is chosen by taking two “physical quality” packages and one “upbringing quality” package. I have to take a moment to point out the conceptual brilliance in making upbringing be an integral part of building a character this way; this is a (metaphorical) hobgoblin that the tabletop gaming community has struggled with for some time (i.e. “would an elf still be good with a bow if he was raised by dwarves and never taught archery?”), so clearly delineating which parts of a hybrid character are nature and which are nurture is a brilliant move that deserves notable props.

The packages denoting these qualities, both physical and upbringing, make up the bulk of the book, and for a very good reason: there are a LOT of them! Insofar as physical qualities go, the book presents the basic races, Ponyfinder races, Advanced Race Guide races, Starjammer races, and a collection of even more unusual races such as worgs or phoenixes alongside more familiar groups such as dragons or the undead. All for Pathfinder/Starfinder and 5E. Interestingly, the more familiar races are presented as having two physical qualities: “X Blooded” and “X Bodied” (where “X” is the race in question). The former denotes intangible qualities that are nevertheless biological, where the latter are gross physical attributes. This means that, if you take, say, Elf Blooded and Elf Bodied – along with the Raised by Elves upbringing – you’ll essentially have a bog-standard elven character, rather than a hybrid per se.

The book doesn’t end there. It makes sure to denote what you do if your qualities make you have different creature types (i.e. if you’re an Outsider or a Fey, depending on your choices), how this impacts reincarnation, sub-races, and other topics. There are also several new feats, traits, spells, and other character options to complement what’s given here.

I should also note that, while this is technically a Ponyfinder product, there’s very little setting-specific material here. The bulk of what you’ll find is an overview of how the gods of Everglow feel about the beast people, and how beast people tend to view other races. Other than that, you might find the odd reference to Everglow or its gods, but aside from that what’s here is completely setting-independent (save for the Everglow races being among the thematic packages). In this case, I can’t help but feel that this is a plus, since it widens the potential appeal; throw in how many non-pony-related races have material in here (tieflings and goblins and oreads and so many others) and this is essentially a setting-independent book for all intents and purposes.

Having said all of that, it should be obvious that what’s here is not just a stellar product, but one that can honestly claim to have set a new standard in answering an age-old issue among tabletop gamers. The rules here, specifically the hybrid rules, are a race-generation system that allows for myriad potential combinations that’s not only intuitive in its design, but stimulates the imagination far more than a dry listing of mechanical effects. With a layout that lets it easily work across three game systems, this book is one that you need to have in your library if you’ve ever given more than a passing thought to building a custom race.

The bottom line is this: when it comes to making new races, Hybrid Blood is the transfusion your game needs.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Hybrid Blood
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Ponyfinder - Kind Blades and Cruel Divinity
Publisher: Silver Games LLC
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 01/28/2018 20:59:34

Kind Blade and Cruel Divinities is a stand-alone novel set in the Ponyfinder campaign world. A self-contained story, albeit with a potential continuation teased at the end, it tells the tale of a young human male training to become an adventurer in a nation of ponies. Unsurprisingly, adventure ends up finding him.

Before going any further, I need to make a disclaimer: I’m a supporter of the author’s Patreon, as well as having ghost-written a small portion of one of the Ponyfinder sourcebooks. I’ve also used some Ponyfinder material in the course of my own creative writing. All that, plus I consider the author to be a friend of mine. So take this review with whatever grain of salt you feel is appropriate.

With regards to the technical aspects of this book, it’s available in three formats; my review is focused around the PDF format only. In that regard, the book is one hundred seventy pages long (which makes the listing for one hundred thirty rather odd), and doesn’t seem to have the cover art attached for some reason. There are exactly three illustrations to be found, all of supporting cast members, rendered in grayscale. There weren’t any bookmarks here, which feels like an oversight, as it would be helpful to jump from chapter to chapter. But enough technical details, let’s get to the story!

Kind Blade and Cruel Divinities is the story of Christopher King, a young man who’s just journeyed to Viljatown, the capital of the Pony Empire, to enroll in their adventuring school: the Academy of Kind Blades. Told in the first person, we spend quite a bit of time following along as he trains at the Academy, getting to know both the ponies around him and what it means to be an adventurer. Both lessons are thrown into sharp relief as he goes on his first adventure where, appropriately enough, things take an unexpected turn that leads to more than he bargained for. I won’t say anything about the specifics of the plot, save that it gets into the “Cruel Divinities” part of the title.

The character of Christopher King is presented as something of an alternative to what you’d expect from someone actively looking to become an adventurer. Rather than being the brash, ambitious type, he comes across as someone much more reserved, almost to the point of being hesitant. He wants to be an adventurer, but doesn’t seem to have any particular goals beyond that (indeed, when it’s hinted that he’s destined for greater things, he’s less than thrilled). Analytical without being intellectual, his narration is presented in a tone that can border on being stilted, highlighting how he tends to be reactive rather than proactive. Although he’s no fool, Christopher comes across as someone doing his best to manage his circumstances, rather than trying to take control of them; after enrolling at the Academy, he seems content roll with the punches (sometimes literally)…until, perhaps, the very last page, hinting that we’re going to see some character growth if there’s ever a sequel book.

On the flipside, the protagonist’s major flaw isn’t one of character, but one of meta-character. That is, Christopher doesn’t quite function as a “stranger in a strange land” that new readers might require him to, if they’re not already familiar with Ponyfinder. Because Christopher himself is from a town with a mixed population of humans and ponies – along with his fairly passive nature – there are numerous background elements that aren’t expounded upon, and might not make sense unless you’re already familiar with the setting. For example, Christopher takes notice that the mayor of Viljatown is a cow rather than a pony, but when he points this out to other ponies they react with confusion, claiming that he’s mistaken and that the mayor is a pony after all. Why that happens (it’s actually a reference to the specifics of how the krava (cow race) integrated into pony culture, as per their game sourcebook) is never satisfactorily explained in the story.

That’s a flaw because the book quite clearly wants to serve as something of an introductory tale. We spend quite a bit of time following Christopher’s lessons at the Academy, which serve to walk us through the mechanics of how magic and certain other features of adventuring work. The characterization of the ponies around Christopher keep this entertaining even if you’re already familiar with the underlying game mechanics, thankfully. It’s just a shame that this same level of presumed ignorance wasn’t presented with regards to his four-legged classmates, since that’s likely to be the bigger point of uncertainty for those unfamiliar with Ponyfinder.

Overall, the story here is a fun one. Although it could have been stronger, the story manages to do a decent job of introducing readers to the Ponyfinder world while also taking them along on an adventure. The main character isn’t the sort of person you’d expect, but the story manages to lay down just enough breadcrumbs to make it clear that he’s going to become someone different as he continues to go adventuring. Given that, it’ll be interesting to see where the story goes from here.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Ponyfinder - Kind Blades and Cruel Divinity
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Everyman Minis: Mysteries of Passion
Publisher: Rogue Genius Games
by A customer [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 02/17/2017 14:28:27

Deities of love, romance, and sexuality are replete throughout both history and fantasy. As such, the lack of any mystery options for oracle characters in Pathfinder, even across multiple releases, was a void that was crying out to be filled. Everyman Gaming and Rogue Genius Games purport to have the answer with Everyman Minis: Mysteries of Passion. Let’s take a look and see what’s here.

Before anything else, I need to issue a disclaimer: at the time of this writing, the author of this product is running a crowdfunding campaign to publish a book of thematic character options that expand on what’s here, to which I’m financially contributing. That’s not something that’s influencing my review, but I wanted to put it out there anyway.

Mysteries of Passion is seven pages long, with one page for the cover, one for the credits, a page-and-a-half for the OGL, and another page-and-a-half for ads. The remaining two pages are a combination of the introduction, a reprinting of the cover art, and the new material.

I have to take a moment to talk about the cover art, which I found myself liking. A full-color piece that shows two anthropomorphic (i.e. “furry,” to use a loaded term) characters kissing each other, the artwork on the cover is more symbolic of the product than it initially suggests. It’s not just that the two characters are locking in a kiss that helps signify what this book is about, but also how they’re depicted. The alien nature of the characters, not being humans or your typical Tolkien-esque demihumans, helps to highlight what’s more universal, which is that they’re in a romantic embrace. This universality is highlighted by how the pair are androgynous; it’s impossible to tell if they’re both female, both male, male and female, or something else altogether. It’s an excellent way to signal the thematic nature of love that this book deals with.

The book’s crunch opens with a new spell: symbol of debauchery. This is essentially a re-flavored symbol of death spell (having the same spell level and material costs), but causing victims to uncontrollably begin to kiss and grope the nearest conscious creature. I had some problems with this, for two reasons: first, there’s no mechanical effect conveyed for what such a state entails. Are victims of this spell flat-footed? Staggered? Something else? This pretty clearly warrants some sort of condition, but I’m not at all sure what. It says victims may take no other actions, but to what degree can they defend themselves?

My other problem was that this spell doesn’t seem like it warrants having the same level and costs as symbol of death. That is a spell that KILLS characters, whereas this one just makes them lose control of themselves for one round per caster level. Now, you can make the argument that in a fight, being taken out of it – whether by death of being overcome by lust – is mechanically the same, but there’s a problem with that line of reasoning. While death may be a speed bump by the time you’re throwing around 8th-level spells, the cost of coming back from death is at least worth noting, in that it’s a few thousand gp. By contrast, coming back from what this spell inflicts doesn’t cost nearly as much, and so it shouldn’t be so difficult and expensive to cast this spell. I recognize that they needed an 8th-level spell for the Passion mystery, but this one needs more to be worth its level and costs.

The Passion mystery itself carries nine possible abilities, in addition to its class skills, spell list additions, one other power, and final revelation.

The powers here do a fairly good job of showcasing the range of what you’d expect from a mystery themed around love and sexuality, mostly being defensive or buffing in nature, though not always. Awesome beauty acts as a combined sanctuary spell and short-duration fascination ability, for example. Other powers include allowing you to form a bond that lets you monitor the well-being with someone to whom you’re connected, divining a target’s desires, or even polymorph someone as a form of rejection! I can already see the jokes about turning someone into a pig, there.

By far the more notable abilities, however, are ones such as Secrets of Passion, which let you add spells from the wizard or bard spell list to your spells known, so long as they’re enchantment spells with the charm or compulsion sub-schools. I was very glad for this, because it answers one of my major issues with a lot of thematic spellcasters: namely, that class-based spell divisions tend to get in the way of making a spellcaster that has access to the spells that fit their theme. Arcane spellcasters have a LOT of spells revolving around charming and beguiling, and those fit in naturally here. Similarly, although it’s not quite as thematic, being able to add cure or inflict spells via the Fickle Passions ability fits in here as well, and I especially liked how this let you add in mercies or cruelties (depending on whether your chose to heal or harm) on those as well. This level of versatility is enough to make these abilities must-haves, but they’re not unbalancing and fit with the themes of this mystery so well that it honestly wouldn’t have been complete without them. And Shield of Splendor…being able to swap out Dexterity for Charisma for determining AC. ‘nuff said!

The final revelation is themed around mastering aging, which seemed surprising until I realized it was emblematic of “eternal love.” You not only stop aging and become immune to aging attacks, but permanently gain two age-related spell-like abilities, which was unexpected. More notable was that you could share these benefits with someone you’re attracted to (and who is attracted to you) via a kiss, meaning that you can potentially keep someone alive forever so long as “the magic” is still there.

I found myself wishing that this ability could be shared with more than a single creature at a time, something like 3 + Charisma modifier (minimum 1) would have been much better, to my mind. That might sound unbalanced at first blush, but remember that this is only granting immunity to aging penalties and two relatively minor spell-like benefits…and that this is 20th level we’re talking about. Cutting loose and giving out a crazy benefit is expected at this point. Moreover, it strikes me as emblematic of someone that’s become the near-personification of love that they’d have several paramours, since being 20th-level tends to make you a mover and shaker. As it is, this instead calls to mind the “soulmates” idea, which is also thematically appropriate; I just wish it had more mechanical “oomph.”

I should mention that I noticed several small errors cropping up throughout the book, which was rather disheartening. None of these were major problems, but we had things like spells having the wrong superscript initials to show what book they came from, or repeated references to the Passion mystery as the “heart” mystery [insert Captain Planet jokes here]. These are the sorts of things that shouldn’t really exist in a product this brief. It was enough for me to knock a half-star off of the book, particularly since directing someone to the wrong books to look up spells can be a real pain.

Other than that though, what’s here is a quality presentation that does a good job focusing on the myriad aspects of passion, both positive and negative. It’s mechanically solid, and does a great job of offering expansive options, though the final revelation needs a bit more heft to it. With some polish, this would be a 5-star product; as it stands now, it’s a 4.5, rounded down to 4.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Everyman Minis: Mysteries of Passion
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Basilisk Goggles & Wishing Wells
Publisher: Skirmisher Publishing
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 01/31/2016 19:52:13

I’ve always found compendiums of new magic items (or spells) to be among the hardest products to review. That’s because such collections often lack an overarching theme, without which the book is little more than the sum of its parts. When there’s no overall unifying element, it’s difficult to put together exactly what (beyond the technical aspects of the book itself) to comment on.

This was not a problem I had with Fat Goblin Games’ Basilisk Goggles & Wishing Wells.

This (mega-)collection of magic has all of its magic items occupy a particular theme. Or rather, by having a collection of themes, each of which has several magic items. For example, the book has almost a dozen “alien items” that extraterrestrial items which are fueled by spell energy…but also leak radiation while they work. There are over twenty “focusing items,” which convert spells of a particular level (or above) into a set spell(s), etc. Over three dozen such themes are to be found here, not to mention a section of miscellany that doesn’t fit into any other category.

Where the book really shows off its Old School credentials is in just how gonzo some of these themes are. While the expected categories such as “rods” and “weapons” are here, we also get head-scratchingly odd collections of magic items such as “paper lanterns,” “eggs,” and my personal favorite, “spirals.” It’s these unexpected groupings that give the book its charm, and create a sense of organized chaos that typifies Old School games; the rules are just guidelines, and it’s to be expected that you’ll find things that defy your expectations.

It certainly helps that the book comes with a set of random tables at the end, for which you can roll to determine what items you come across. It should be noted that all of these magic items, which are technically for Labyrinth Lord, are presented in such a way as to lean heavily towards system-agnosticism. Not only do they not have XP or GP values, but the book notes up-front that things such as Armor Class adjustments are presented in a one-size-fits-all manner (e.g. whether AC in your game goes up or down, saying that something gives a “4-point bonus” to AC will work either way). For the most part, I appreciated this, since nods towards inter-system compatibility (at least in the OSR) tend to make an easy process even easier.

In terms of the book’s technical aspects, there’s little for me to complain about. There’s an alphabetical appendix of all its magical items that’s hyperlinked to where they appear in the main body of the book. Each section is also bookmarked, as is every item, though I do wish that the bookmarks for the items had been nested under their section bookmarks. With the alphabetical appendix being hyperlinked already, having the bookmarks arranged in the same manner feels somewhat redundant. There also wasn’t a printer-friendly version, but given that the book only has a light border on alternating pages, and one illustration every two or three pages, that’s not really a big strike against it.

Overall, the magic items here are very much in the vein of a “kitchen-sink” kind of game. While not going so far as to become jokes, this book demonstrates what happens when you design magic items for a system where standardization is a dirty word. What’s here is an exercise in creativity, and it reintroduces a lot of the marvel and mystery that every magic item should have.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Basilisk Goggles & Wishing Wells
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Ponyfinder - Campaign Setting
Publisher: Silver Games LLC
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 04/13/2014 16:19:35

Crossovers are something I’ve always enjoyed, and that’s doubly true for bringing characters from my favorite media into role-playing games. There’s an undeniable joy in being able to represent your favorite characters from comics, movies, and television in your campaign.

Said characters usually tend to be superheroes or the cast of various anime, in my experience. While I knew that there were plenty of fans of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic who fell outside of the show’s target demographic, I wouldn’t have thought that there’d be many Pathfinder fans among them, let alone enough to warrant an attempt to bring the former into the latter.

The existence of Silver Games’s Ponyfinder Campaign Setting is a testament to just how wrong I was. While unofficial (in that it doesn’t reference any of MLP:FiM’s intellectual property), this is still THE book for playing ponies in Pathfinder. Let’s take a look and see how well it brings the show to your tabletop.

Before we go any further though, a disclaimer: at the time of this writing, I’ve seen just over a dozen episodes of MLP:FiM (and read the show’s Wikipedia entry). As such, while I have a basic grasp on what it is this book is trying to showcase, there’s a good chance that I’m missing some of the finer points; if you’re a hardcore pony fan, then keep in mind that I may be overlooking something notable from later in the show.

I also need to take a moment to talk about the book’s artwork. I’ve seen plenty of first-offerings from new companies that were clearly operating on a shoe-string art budget, and wow was that not the case here. Ponyfinder is a book that’s resplendent with full-color art! Immediately after the colorful covers is a two-page map of the Everglow campaign world, drawn in a very bright style that makes it pop off the page. Moreover, the interior pages are all set on backgrounds reminiscent of the main Pathfinder books, being lightly-colored in the center of each page but slightly darkening towards the edges, where there are subtle designs in the background.

But far more notable than that are the character illustrations. The book is absolutely stuffed with colorful images of ponies (and other races). These illustrations are remarkably talented, and more than once I found myself smiling at the adorable pictures. Visually, this book knows exactly what to show to its fans.

Of course, all of this art means that the book is about 80 megabytes in size for 120 pages. Personally, my computer had no issues with displaying the images or scrolling through, but that might be an issue for some readers. Moreover, that makes the lack of a printer-friendly version all the more notable. This is similarly true with the book’s lack of search options – the table of contents isn’t hyperlinked, for example, nor are there any PDF bookmarks for ease of navigation. Still, the text is copy-and-paste enabled, so overall the book’s technical achievements are something of a mixed bag.

But enough about that, what about the ponies? Very cogently, the book opens with the first thing most readers will want to see: rules for pony characters.

Presented as a type of fey, full PC racial information is given for standard earth ponies. Smartly, the book doesn’t retread the same ground for other pony types, presenting breeds such as unicorns and pegasi with alternate racial traits, rather than presenting full stat racial stat blocks again and again.

If it had stopped with just the basic three types of ponies, that probably would have been enough for many, if not most, fans. But I have to give Ponyfinder props here – it went the extra mile and then some: there are over a half-dozen other pony breeds presented next, ranging from gem ponies to sea horses to zebras and more!

It doesn’t stop at just mechanics either, there’s a good page and a half of descriptive text regarding the pony race, and each breed has several paragraphs of description. Humorously, the book also discusses the mechanics of a race that can use their forelegs in a somewhat arm-like manner, but lacks fingers (hint: it’s not nearly as burdensome as it sounds – after all, the ponies on the show get along without fingers just fine). There’s also several paragraphs given to describing pony members of each class (although sub-classes such as ninja and samurai are ignored, as is the inquisitor, rather oddly).

A series of pony-specific mechanics follow, including two bloodlines (e.g. Unification, which is focused around bringing the pony tribes together), several class archetypes (ever wondered how a pony would be a gunslinger?), pony-specific evolutions for an eidolon, and quite a few feats for ponies. The last section is of specific note, as it’s here that we see a lot of the more notable aspects of the show brought into game form: a unicorn levitating items with her horn, for example, is a short feat-chain here, as is the way pegasi physically push clouds around, etc.

That’s not the end of it, as the book then moves on to seven other non-pony races that live in the world, such as griffons, sun cats, phoenix wolves, and others. Again, full racial information is presented alongside a discussion of their society, alignment, relationships, etc. Each even has a few (usually just under a half-dozen) race-specific feats presented.

That was the book’s first major section. While it was largely mechanics with a generous dose of expository writing, the second takes a more balanced approach between fluff and crunch. It opens, for example, with the eight gods of the pony pantheon. Deities such as the Sun Queen, the Night Mare, and Princess Luminance are all familiar shout-outs here. We also receive the height/weight and aging tables for the races in the previous chapter (information that I thought for sure would have been overlooked – kudos to the authors there).

I was quite pleased to see rules for ponies as animal companions and familiars presented next. That’s because having ponies as prominent, PC-focused NPCs like these is a great gateway to seeing how well ponies can work in your party if your group is unsure about the idea. Finally, a few optional rules (mostly in regards to how much realism you want regarding how well ponies can manipulate objects) are given.

Everything so far has been high-quality work, but it was the next chapter that truly sold me on Ponyfinder. This section, which highlights the timeline of Everglow, the campaign world, is where the book truly comes into its own.

A relatively young world (it’s entire recorded history spans less than 750 years), Everglow’s history is covered in three broad sections. These are the early days when the Pony Empire was just beginning, the height of the Empire, and after its fall (the latter presented as the default option). After giving us a timeline, each era’s major events are overviewed. Interestingly, the book then presents major factions active in each era (including faction traits) and several era-exclusive rules, such as breeds that are found primarily during that era and no other.

What grabbed me about this section was the tone that it presented. Rather than rigidly sticking to the (almost naively) optimistic tenor of the show, Ponyfinder does a truly excellent job of presenting the ponies as living in a more nuanced world. This isn’t a setting that pretends that everything can be solved with friendship – there are differences of opinion with no clear resolution (e.g. was the early expansion of the Empire the work of a unifier or a conqueror?), wars with evil ponies, and an overall sense of poignancy as the ponies have realized that their best days are behind them with the death of their great Empire, with no clear idea about what that means for them or what they should do about it.

For that alone, I admit that I’m very impressed with Ponyfinder. It’s can be tough to admit that the tenor of the source material needs to changed when changing how it’s presented; actually pulling off such a change without completely alienating the original feeling it evoked is even trickier. But this book pulled it off. I think that the best example of this is the Denial of Destiny feat found in this chapter, which represents a pony that has voluntarily scarred her Brand of Destiny (e.g. her cutie mark) off of her flank, representing her rejection of the role in life that the gods have chosen for her in favor of one she’s chosen for herself. That’s the sort of mature take on a familiar subject that elevates Ponyfinder above simply aping the conventions of MLP:FiM.

Following this are roughly twenty pages that outline the various locations of Everglow, along with several ponies (and groups of ponies) of note. I do wish we’d seen some stat blocks here, as there are no NPC listings to be found, and this would have been a perfect place for them. While I can see the advantage of not setting levels for specific NPCs (such as the Imperial Queen), it’s better to have them and decide not to use them, than to want them and find that you need to make them from scratch.

Several pages of adventure hooks (covering each of the world’s eras) are presented before we are given a chapter full of new mechanics. Here’s where you’ll find equipment meant specifically to be held in the mouth, for example, along with things like the “elements of destiny” magic items, a spell to make hooves sticky (and so grip things better), and quite a few starting traits (including ones specific to certain times and locations).

The book closes out with a bestiary, and while nothing here was bad it felt like something of an afterthought. The deeptide horse has no descriptive text, for instance, and the vanguard inevitable, with its emphasis on punishing liars and oathbreakers, doesn’t feel like its breaking any new ground. It’s a slightly weak ending for the book, though one that’s easy enough to overlook.

I should also take a moment to mention that a few errors did crop up throughout the book, though they were rarely anything more than minor. For example, the alternate racial traits for zebra ponies didn’t have a -2 ability modifier (which every other race had and so I assume was an oversight), or that the deity entries had their domains and subdomains all listed in the same line, rather than separating them.

What was more notable were several areas that a Pathfinder aficionado would likely look at as a missed opportunity. While nothing was lost, per se, by not doing so, there were several areas that could have benefited from additional Pathfinder rules. The various pony racial stats don’t have costs in Race Points (from the Advanced Race Guide) for example, nor do the gods have inquisitions listed (from Ultimate Magic). While the factions do have faction traits, I wonder if they could have benefited from full faction rules (from the Faction Guide), or if the towns listed could have had – rather than just their alignment, government type, and population breakdown – full community stat blocks (from the GameMastery Guide or Ultimate Campaign). Certainly, the fact that the Imperial Queen was an earth pony who became an alicorn is reason enough to create an alicorn mythic path (from Mythic Adventures).

I want to reiterate that I don’t hold any of these exclusions against the book; it’s just that I’m cognizant that it could have presented more than it did. Still, when the worst thing you can say about a book is that it left you wanting more, that’s not too bad a criticism.

The material that is in here though is excellent for what it presents; enough so that I’d call this a 4.5-star book (rounded down). The coverage of the source material is not only thorough, but is evocative of what’s presented in MLP:FiM while still being suitable for a Pathfinder campaign setting. While it seems like a stretch to bridge that gap, Ponyfinder successfully straddles the divide and keeps one hoof planted firmly in each world. That’s something that anypony, er, anybody can appreciate.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Ponyfinder - Campaign Setting
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[PFRPG] - Potion Details Generator
Publisher: Ennead Games
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 10/13/2013 11:43:46

When gamers think of crafting an excellent campaign, we tend to think of grand sweeping epics that strike major archetypes and tell compelling stories. While that’s not untrue, it misses out on the fact that excellence is often found in details; that the little things are often what bring a game world to life. One of the aspects of these little things are the nature of “mundane” magic items – anyone, for example, can chug a healing potion and move on to the next encounter. But it’s something else again to have any details about that potion, what it smells like or what sort of container it’s in.

That’s an area that Ennead Games fills in with its Potion Details Generator.

Sixteen pages long, the Potion Details Generator is just what it sounds like, providing you with various details for your game’s magic potions (and, as the book notes, these apply just as well to oils too). It does this through a series of tables you can roll randomly on, allowing you to generate everything from the color of a potion to the details of its label (if any) and quite a bit more.

The book divides itself into roughly four sections – the first two being the details of the potion’s container, and then the details of the potion itself (not the game effect, but the sensory descriptions of it). Each of these has several sub-sections with tables for rolling up various aspects of the section in question. The container section, for example, has you roll for the material it’s made of, the shape of it, the size, the label, any marking or decorations it might have, and the cap. The potion itself has similar tables for things like the color, smell, taste, thickness, etc.

It’s not stated outright, but the implication that you should just skip a particular table if that aspect of the potion isn’t applicable (e.g. it has no label) is fairly clear.

It’s after these sections that we start getting into the purely optional materials; here we get things that actually affect the game mechanics of the potion. The first of these are two optional details: the potion’s freshness (e.g. the older it is, the less effective it is) and any lag time it may have before the effects kick in.

Side effects come next. A huge table of a hundred possible effects, these mix together mechanical effects with flavor effects. You could have a potion that causes the drinker’s eyes to glow as easily as you could have one that gives you a +2 to initiative. There’s no real rhyme or reason here.

Quirks follow this. The major difference between a quirk and a side effect is explained in the book’s introduction, and tells us that whereas the latter affects the drinker, the former is an odd quality of the potion itself, and has no real effect on the drinker. So here, for example, we’ll find results (on another table with a hundred possibilities) such as the potion container shakes and vibrates until it’s opened, or that the potion turns to dust when drunk (but still has its effect).

The book closes out with an appendix containing three expanded tables for colors, smells, and tastes – each put into a d100 table rather than a d20 from the preceding section.

Overall, the Potion Details Generator is a book that offers quite a bit of development for such an easily-overlooked area. Everything that’s here is useful, and indeed can quite stimulate the imagination of an innovative GM…which sort of leads me to my major complaint about the book, that being what’s not here.

Leaving aside a few technical details (the book has no declaration of Open Game Content nor Product Identity, and the Section 15 of the OGL has no statement for the Potion Details Generator itself), and that the materials for the potion container could have at least suggested a GP value for them (along with a multiplier for the size of the container), the book’s major issue is the omission of the ideas that spring to mind from what’s here.

While it’s tempting to just assume that magic is chaotic enough that every potion will have its details determined randomly, there’s a lot of potential here for fleshing out the game world by making certain details be consistent with certain criteria. Maybe all of the potions produced by a famous archmage are colored deep red, for example. Or maybe all healing potions smell like lilacs. Ideas like these aren’t discussed, and that’s a shame, because that’s where the greatest potential for world-building is to be found – not in the random details of a single potion, but in the consistent details for particular categories of them. That’s where, I think, the book’s offerings are strongest, but this strength is muted because it doesn’t bring this idea up at all.

That said, if a book’s greatest weakness is that it doesn’t take full advantage of its strength, that’s still a comparatively minor weakness. An enterprising GM will still pick up on this immediately, and use what’s here to help generate details for categories of potions, rather than singular ones. The Potion Details Generator is a great tool for helping to flesh out an easily-overlooked area of your campaign. I just wish it told you how to get the most use out of it.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
[PFRPG] - Potion Details Generator
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Wondrous Creations 7: Monstrous
Publisher: gannet games
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 08/03/2013 19:58:03

It’s a sad fact that monsters get the short end of the stick where magic items in Pathfinder are concerned. It’s not that most monsters can’t necessarily use most magic items, per se. Rather, it’s that none of the magic items in the Core Rules – or even in the expansions – speak to monstrous abilities specifically. Sure, anybody can use an item that boosts their Charisma or gives them a higher AC, but where are the items to protect against channeled energy or help heal constructs?

The answer is that they’re found in Wondrous Creations 7: Monstrous, from Gannet Games. This book presents almost four dozen new magic items, all of which put the monsters first. As the title indicates, all of these are wondrous items, all written in the familiar Pathfinder format.

In terms of presentation the book is a spartan affair. There are no illustrations of any kind to be found here. Each of the items receives a sentence or two of description, however, so the text does help to flesh out how each item looks in addition to how it functions.

Said functions are fairly multifaceted, as they vary widely in what sorts of being can use them. Some, for example, are targeted at very narrow ranges, such as the cohesion sphere, which stops oozes from splitting when damaged. Others can be used by almost any sort of creature, such as the pouch of usability, which contains a small magic item that affects whatever’s carrying the pouch (e.g. so a naga can put a ring in there, and receive its effects).

While a few are specialized in being used against creatures of a certain type, the vast majority of these are made to abet monsters. A few have universal enough applicability that anyone can find some use for them, such as medusa syrup, which turns the gear of a petrified creature back to its normal state, while leaving the creature itself still petrified.

Overall, what I enjoyed most about this product was the element of verisimilitude it presents for a Pathfinder game world. Monstrous spellcasters that make items are going to inevitably make some that are specialized towards their needs; it’s here that we get to see such creations. Armor that’s designed to aid flying creatures, for example, or goggles designed to let creatures restrict the always-on nature of their gaze, are something you’d think would be more common. And of course, GMs will get a mildly sadistic kick out of their PCs slaying the monsters only to find magic items that they can’t use.

Show your PCs that there’s more magic in the world than that of men and elves. Some wondrous items are monstrous in what they do.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Wondrous Creations 7: Monstrous
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The Deluxe Guide to Fiend Summoning and Faustian Bargains
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 07/15/2013 15:23:20

The nature of power is that it’s hard to obtain, particularly if you don’t already have it. Because of that, the idea of finding a shortcut to gaining the things you want without having to put in the requisite effort required is a tempting one. If such a measure can be found (and if it works), it’s also virtually always incredibly dangerous.

Occult lore has long stated that such a shortcut is to summon and bind spirits to do your bidding. Pathfinder has similar traditions, though unlike the real world ones these actually function (within the context of the game world). Of course, that doesn’t mean that they’re actually effective in their function.

The problem is that game balance defeats the concept of a quick and easy path to power. Worse, since only spellcasters can summon outsiders to begin with, the fact that they can already use powerful spells sort of defeats the purpose…especially when said outsiders can’t seem to offer anything except “service.” What good is that if they’re just offering to kill things for you (as though adventurers aren’t already well-versed in killing things) or use their spell-like abilities (when spellcasters can already use comparable magic)?

In other words, the entire idea of the Faustian bargain is one that, simply put, doesn’t work in Pathfinder. That’s the problem that the Necromancers of the Northwest set out to fix.

Having just read The Deluxe Guide to Fiend Summoning and Faustian Bargains, I can tell you that they succeeded wildly. Let’s look further and see what this book conjures up.

The book opens, in true Necromancers of the Northwest style, with a few pages of fiction that sets the tone for what’s to come. Following this is an introduction that lays out some of the problems with bargaining with fiends in Pathfinder, such as the balance issues mentioned above, and the general lack of details regarding exactly what the fiend wants in return (e.g. “so why did the vrock want 7,200 gp anyway?” “No idea, maybe he wants to make a sword +2 back home?”).

The Guide lays out a four-step process by which making a deal with a fiend is done. First, the fiend in question must be researched. While it’s easy enough to say that this could be boiled down to a few Knowledge checks, this section denotes the different aspects that the research can cover. Just the fiends name alone isn’t enough, you also need its sigil, and after that you can research various lore about the fiend that will be helpful when summoning and binding it (e.g. it’s tempted by lamb’s blood, but repulsed by roses that bloomed under full moonlight, for example). Of course, this is assuming you didn’t make a mistake in your research…

This leads directly to the summoning part of the process. The summons is fairly difficult to do, as you not only have to beat the DC to summon the fiend, but here is where your efforts to make your ritual elaborate can really help or hurt you, as extra steps made to attract the fiend’s attention translate into bonuses on the attempt.

One thing I quite enjoyed about this part was the repeated notation that the effort expended by the summoner in acquiring and performing these additional steps is a very important part of the process. For example, a summons that requires a human sacrifice would provide a negligible bonus if you kidnapped some 0-level drunk off the streets and killed him in his sleep (or killed a mook in combat that you were going to kill anyway). Whereas going out alone at night and single-handedly defeating a foe who is your fighting equal, without killing him, so that you can drag him back and sacrifice him in a ritual manner is going to earn you a much bigger bonus.

This was a recurring theme throughout the book; various actions can get you specific numerical modifiers, but it’s the effort behind them (and, in some cases, the intent) that make these actions qualify. Trying to cheat the fiend by fulfilling the letter of a bargain without really working at it (or using a loophole) will at best get you nothing, and at worst have dire consequences.

Assuming you manage to perform the summoning (and it’s possible to not only fail, but fail with a severe backlash), then you need to bind the fiend. This is essentially a flipside to the summoning, and is presumed to be researched alongside the summons. If the fiend fails its save against your binding check, then it’s bound (and, interestingly, can’t directly lie, though it tries to bend the truth), and you can now start the bargaining.

The actual process of bargaining is given more of an overview than anything else; instead of focusing on the mechanics for cutting a deal, the book takes a surprisingly in-depth look at the things that a fiend can do for a summoner, and methods of payment that fiends will accept in exchange.

This is where it gets interesting. Fiendish “boons” are quantified into seven categories (such as war, magic, lust, death, etc.) each with three tiers, and each tier having two or three specific books. Different fiends have access to different categories at different tiers that they can grant, alongside a “universal” category that all fiends can grant. (Helpfully, the book notes that fiends can only use these in service to another, and not at will, as they’re powered by the efforts of the summoner; it’s little things like this that made me really enjoy the book.)

These boons run quite the gamut in terms of what’s offered. Virtually all of them avoid being simple retreads of spells (though some refer to spell effects as a shorthand for what they can do). For example, the death 1 book Attract Accident makes it so that the next time a specific creature is threatened with a critical hit, the crit is automatically confirmed and the multiplier is increased by 1…or, if the target doesn’t get into combat within a week, he’ll somehow run afoul of an accident (e.g. a trap) with a CR equal to one-fourth of the fiend’s. Likewise, the Knowledge 3 book Pierce the Veil of Secrecy allows the fiend and its summoner to (make a check to) defeat ANY sort of magical or supernatural concealment effects on a specific target.

Boons are, needless to say, powerful. But they have a cost associated with them…literally, as there are point values for each book. These values come into play in the next section: Payment.

Payment can take many forms (the book says that most fiends would accept most of the forms listed there, though I’d recommend that GMs determine that fiends prefer some much more than others), but all of them are fairly painful for the summoner to part with. Each payment has a cost associated with it, from wealth (the least accepted form of payment, and which has strict guidelines for how much can be used) to your memories (e.g. feats and skill) to human sacrifice, to your own soul. Reneging on these is also discussed, but usually to say it’s exceptionally difficult to pull off. Let the buyer beware, here.

Of course, this wouldn’t be very helpful without some delineation of what fiends could grant what books. The book briefly discusses using existing creatures here, talking about the differences between using specific creatures versus generic ones (e.g. researching a particular succubus versus one in particular), leaving that largely up to the GM. It then presents two long tables of virtually all of the evil outsiders in the three Pathfinder Bestiaries, one for the calling DC for each outsider, and one for the types of boons they can grant.

All of this takes up about a fourth of the book.

The remaining three-quarters of the Guide is where the authors really outdid themselves. Presented there are seventy-two “new” fiends that can be summoned. I put “new” in quotation marks here because these fiends are actually drawn from the Lesser Key of Solomon, a real occult book of demon summoning which also had seventy-two demons described. Each of them is not only given a unique stat block here (with Challenge Ratings ranging from 5 to 25) complete with unique abilities, but also unique boons that only they can grant (in addition to the boons presented earlier). That’s in addition to a description of their background, their home realm, and specifics that can be found in researching them.

The authors even take the time to talk about these entities in contrast with existing planar conventions, discussing various options that can be used to make these fit in with or stand apart from “traditional” demons and devils, etc. The fact that they all have a new subtype with new abilities certainly helps.

Overall, The Deluxe Guide to Fiend Summoning and Faustian Bargains is one of those books that sets itself into the “required” category of game supplements. Not only does this book set a standard in an area of the game that’s always been glossed over, but it pulls double-duty by presenting a plethora of new monsters, which can be used specifically for summonings or otherwise presented as new fiendish antagonists. I didn’t even get to some of the book’s smaller offerings, like the handy one-page sidebar that condenses the rules for research, calling, binding, and bargaining, or the rules on fiendish possession (it’s a form of payment), using planar binding spells in conjunction with these summons, and quite a few more.

The Deluxe Guide to Fiend Summoning and Faustian Bargains brings a fiendish amount of great new material to your game. And you don’t even have to sell your soul for it.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
The Deluxe Guide to Fiend Summoning and Faustian Bargains
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Russ Morrissey's 1d100 Technobabbles
Publisher: EN Publishing
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 07/07/2013 10:44:43

Ah, technobabble, the duct tape of science fiction – when you need to tie an action and a resolution, and hope that people don’t examine the connector too closely, this is what you use. After all, it’s not important that people know what “multi-modal reflection sorting” or “de-polarizing the phase discriminators” actually is; what’s important is that it’s an excuse to move the scene along.

This can often be the case in sci-fi RPGs, where the PCs need to make a particular skill check regarding some futuristic system. When you’re developing a cure for an alien plague, for example, which sounds more fun? Saying that you’ve made the skill roll, or saying that you’ve successfully utilized an astrophysical tetryon mutation? That’s where this product comes in.

Russ Morrissey’s 1d100 Technobabbles is pretty self-explanatory in its title. The brief introduction quickly takes us to the table of technobabbles, which are laid out in no particular order that I can see. Most of these appear to be nouns – that is, these are things that you use, rather than things that you do. Of course, that’s not really a barrier to a creative player, since it’s easy enough to turn a “photonic quantum disturbance” into “I’m disturbing their quantum photons,” etc.

Other than that minor presentation issue, what’s here is, well, about as plausible as any other technobabble you’ve ever heard. More relevant is that it can be surprisingly difficult to come up with good technobabble, especially on the fly. It’s instinctual to want to make sense of things, so coming up with nonsense that sounds at least somewhat plausible can be surprisingly difficult. Having it done here for you can be more helpful than you’d think.

Pick this up and start working on your phased dampening signal today!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Russ Morrissey's 1d100 Technobabbles
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Creator Reply:
Verbs - good suggestion! I'll make sure the sequel contains verbs - manipulate the ambient frequency interference and redirect the nucleonic quantum phenomenon!
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Prestigious Roles: Long Striders (PFRPG)
Publisher: Amora Game
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 06/22/2013 15:47:17

Despite some greater focus than its predecessor gave it, mounted combat is still something of an underrepresented aspect of Pathfinder. Part of this is due to simple issues of logistics, e.g. it’s hard to take your horse down a set of steps and into a dungeon. That said, little attention is also given to areas like tracking enemies over long distances, or having groups of mounted characters who fight together.

Prestigious Roles: Long Striders, from Amora Games, attempts to put some greater focus back on those latter options.

The long strider is a five-level prestige class, meant to be taken at about 7th-level, based on the skill requirements. I personally would have lowered this to about 5th, since the +5 BAB requirement assures that druids and similar characters would lag slightly behind while rewarding mount-focused martial characters (e.g. cavaliers) that wanted to become long striders.

The class requires that you already have an animal companion or mount of some sort, though it need not be one that can be ridden. This latter point is solved in the first level of the prestige class, as it says that you discard an existing animal companion if it can’t be ridden, gaining a more appropriate one.

The long strider (which refers to the character; confusingly, the mount is referred to simply as “strider”), gains a number of abilities – two per level, and three at 1st-level – that enable him and his mount to focus on, as a theme, hunting. Being able to run for hours at a time without tiring, using their Reflex saves for each other, moving at full speed with no Stealth penalty, the long strider is fairly tight in its focus, and players who want to play a sort of “mounted bounty hunter” will find this prestige class very much to their liking.

The major drawback of the class is that its narrow focus cuts both ways; several of the abilities here make very specific presumptions about the type of mount and the type of character being played. For example, one class ability gives the mount the scent ability – if it already had that ability, you gain nothing. Another ability grants a bonus to range when using thrown weapons while mounted. Don’t use thrown weapons? Too bad, you gain nothing then. Being able to do a quick (dis)mount when you and your mount are very different sizes is nice, but doesn’t help you if you and your mount are only one size category apart to begin with.

It’s these limitations that present the greatest hindrance to the class. If you work within the scope it already presents, there’s a lot here for you; deviate even slightly, however, and you’ll start to lose out. It’s a shame that the class didn’t present some alternate options for those characters who had slightly different abilities than the ones outlined above – saying that if your mount already had scent then the range of its scent doubled, for example, would have seriously widened the versatility of what’s here.

That said, the class is still a good one for those who want what it offers. It eschews bland bonus feat options, for example, and each level offers a comparatively great amount of abilities, something wise since few of them contribute to combat directly. As it is, the long strider sets a great pace, but only if you can follow in its footsteps.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Prestigious Roles: Long Striders (PFRPG)
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