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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta $2.49
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Gene B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 02/29/2012 09:34:21

Nicely written. If I want to put something small that should be my choice.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Derek B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 10/30/2011 01:27:43

Admittedly I skipped through most of the write-up about the spartan past, but that doesn't mean I didn't read it. Truthfully I would have preferred that the meat of it was AFTER the class, but that's mostly hearsay.

I liked reading about the hoplite. It's built like a fighter, like a lot of melee classes are, but its got its own special little specialties that put it above the rest, and works well without the necessity of making everyone in the party also be hoplites. However, as great as the class is before it reaches 20th level, once it hits the final level of class and earns its final ability, this class looks very broken to a lot of people. Spartan Unity allows the entire party to do melee attacks as an immediate action, should the hoplite strike his opponent, and should they be adjacent to him. If you have a well rounded team with only a couple of melee people, and the rest ranged, and there's a lot of flanking, this ability isn't that bad. Especially against a medium size creature. Once they're larger to colossal sized, however, you've got at least two people who are getting free attacks. It should be noted that RAW, it allows everyone adjacent to you to hit up to four times around. RAI, I would think it would only be one free action. This ability should be broken down a little better, and explained in greater detail. It'll likely be up to the DM of the game to do the limitations if the class isn't changed in the final release.

What I really enjoyed about this was the archetypes. I love archetypes so much more than the classes themselves. My favourites were the Fighter and the Sorcerer's new bloodline, Warrior's Blood. I see absolute no drawbacks to taking that bloodline. You gain d8 HD, and have 3/4 BAB, and you don't seem to lose any of your spells. It's like previous battle sorcerers from other sources, but way better.

All-in-all, it's a product, but don't expect your DM to allow it into your game any time soon. Especially the Warrior's Blood sorcerer bloodline.



Rating:
[3 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Will M. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 10/16/2011 11:22:25

I downloaded this PDF on suggestion from the publisher. Honestly, I skipped the 'story' bit at the beginning. I just didn't find it interesting.

I found the Introduction to Spartan society to be decently written, but more importantly, to the point. Yes, it was kind of fluff text, but it was fluff text that had a purpose. If you're a more immersive roleplayer, than having that background information is important.

Now we get to the crunch. I'm not sure if Necromancers of the Northwest changed the PDF after the first review, but my PDF quite clearly states that the Skill points are 2+Intelligence modifier. However, even if it didn't say that, as a variant fighter class, Fighters receive 2+Intelligence modifier, so that seems easy enough to port over from the Core Rulebook.

I like the use of tower shields and also Spear Combat as a...well, I'm not sure if it's a class feature or a bonus feat, but either way, I think it works well for the Hoplite because it makes sense historically.

Looking over the list of Disciplines, I don't see anything that stands out as being too powerful or not powerful enough, when taken in the context of taking multiple disciplines over the course of your adventuring career. You get 10 Disciplines with 14 'lesser' Disciplines and 8 Greater Disciplines (which you gain at 10th level) to choose from.

As far as the standard class abilities, though, I was thrown off by the flavor text of the Shield Wall and Phalanx abilities. At 3rd level, you gain Shield Wall, which states "Beginning at 3rd level, the hoplite becomes a expert in fighting in a shield wall formation." At 5th level, you gain Phalanx, which states "Beginning at 5th level, the hoplite learns the skill of fighting in a shield wall." I have nothing against the abilities themselves. They make sense, especially in terms of their power level, but apparently you get to be an expert before learning the skill! That's awesome! Okay, seriously, that's just a proofreading error I think and not that big of a deal.

Following the hoplite class are two pages on how to play the hoplite. Again, decently written and to the point. Between the introduction of the Spartan society and these two pages, I think the player is given ample ideas on how to play the class. The only thing I disliked about the hoplite class is that a lot of the abilities given to the hoplite work best if you have multiple hoplites or multiple shield wearing characters. I think this class would work best if you could have an entire group of hoplites so that you could use the phalanx, but if you have a party that has several different classes, the hoplite may not be able to use its abilities to their best advantage.

Alternate class features. One thing about the barbarian stuck out to me: one argument I've seen against barbarians is their loss of hit points when they are done raging to potentially kill the barbarian due to low hit points. The Withstand Death ability seems to push that more to the forefront, but the higher level version of this ability seems to help with that.

The Bard. Giving up a save-or-die ability for the ability to grant a +4 bonus to attacks, damage, Armor Class, and saving throws really comes down to how the player is playing the Bard. If you're in a large group or a phalanx, with a number of shield users, the armor class of the group is already high, so giving them another +4 is a good thing, as well as the +4 to attack. Who can't use a +4 to damage, as well? As a group, the phalanx might be target by area effect spells, so the +4 to saving throws is important. The Deadly Performance ability that you give up is Will save dependent (10+1/2 the bard's level+the bard's Charisma modifier), and at 20th/epic levels, you're probably going to be running into enemies that beat that saving through or have an ability of their own which prevents death. Ultimately, this comes down to how you play.

The criticism of the Cavalier's Take the Hit ability is unwarranted. Yes, starting at 8th level, the Cavalier can take a blow that would reduce him to 1 hit point instead of knowing him unconscious or killing him. It isn't like this ability completely takes the cavalier out of harm. Multiple foes? Multiple attacks? This ability can be used once a day until 12th level (and ever four levels after gives you another use). So, at 12th level, he can use this ability twice a day, but has to wait one minute between uses.

The Cleric's Battle Blessing ability, at my first glance, is undesirable due to the loss of the Channel Energy ability. However, giving it some thought, the cleric still retains the ability to drop spells for healing and if you have a party with more than one cleric, you could use both of these. Giving your allies a bonus to AC, attack rolls, CMB, and CMD or cursing your enemies for penalties to their AC, attack rolls, CMB, and CMD is a nice ability that scales with level. Very useful if you have one cleric to use this ability and one (or more) to channel energy.

The Druid's abilities, I don't even think I need to talk about because these also come down to how you play the character.

Fighter Exploits. Personally, I probably would not give up the numerous bonus feats for these exploits, but I can see how some players would. At least you can take an exploit to replace one feat but still keep the other feats. One exploit that was written kind of strangely was Sacrificing Strike. I allow an opponent to attack me, automatically dealing damage. However, I also immediately attack automatically "dealing twice his normal Strength damage." As written, that sounds like whatever your Strength modifier, you do twice that in damage, as opposed to what I think it was supposed to be, which was double the strength damage with your weapon.

Monk Durability. This ability is exactly the same as the Evasion ability it replaces, except that it deals with Fortitude saves instead of Reflex saves. At 9th level, instead of gaining Improved Evasion, you receive Evasion instead. If you were playing a game where you were dealing with a lot of poisons or diseases, this might be a worthwhile replacement.

I love the alternate Oracle. It feels like it's the oracle directly out of Greek legend.

Paladin and Rogue alternates give a good feel of the Spartan changes, I think.

I think the Sorcerer got the biggest boost from alternate abilities with the Warrior's Blood bloodline. An increase to d8 instead of d6 for hit dice and proficiency with one martial weapon of the player's choosing, which gives the Sorcerer a much better battlefield presence, especially at lower levels, when spells are a premium. I think that the alternate Sorcerer is much more dangerous than a regular Sorcerer due to increased combat ability.

The traits all make sense and none of them would seem to cause any problems.

Overall, I like this book. Were there some typos or things that could have been written better? Sure, but nothing that took me 'out' of the book. I'm looking forward to using some of the alternate class features when it's time to roll up new characters.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Shane O. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 10/15/2011 13:20:45

Spartans have been in vogue around the game table ever since a certain movie gave us tailor-made gamer quotes like “Tonight we dine in Hell!” and “Spartans! Prepare for glory!” The archetypal real-world warrior culture, the warriors of Sparta are icons for those who want to play a martial class in their Pathfinder game. Canny players and GMs know, however, that there’s more to playing a Spartan warrior than the occasional tagline. That’s where Necromancers of the Northwest’s book, Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta, comes in.

Sons of Sparta comes in two PDFs, one being the main file and the other being the printer-friendly version thereof. The printer-friendly version is notable in that it removes the parchment-colored background that’s in the main file, and does away with a one-page advertisement for other Necromancers of the Northwest products. Otherwise, the two are identical.

The main file is twenty-eight pages long, though there’s one page each for the front and back covers, the OGL, and a page of ads. Full, nested bookmarks are present, so props are due there. However, for whatever reason the copy-and-paste function still returns a lot of gibberish in with the text, making it nigh-unusable. This is slightly better if you copy-and-paste from the printer-friendly version, but it’s still somewhat annoying if you want to copy a lot of what’s here (such as, say, for a character sheet). The few pieces of artwork in the book are public-domain images of Spartan warriors or other pieces that evoke a similar theme.

But enough with the technical overview, let’s review of the meat of the book itself. Onward, to glory!

After the introduction, the book opens with a transcription of a historical conversation between the Persian god-king Xerxes and a deposed Spartan king at the beginning of the Battle of Thermopylae. It’s an evocative story that sets the tone for most of the book.

Subsequent to this, we’re given an overview of historical Sparta itself, outlining things like the social classes of the people who lived there, their religious attitudes, how their economic and political systems worked, etc. Following this, some discussion is given to what Sparta would be like in a fantasy game world, with discussion given to questions of magic, demihumans, and monsters.

If these sound boring, or like wasted space, rest assured that they aren’t. What’s interesting about these is that the “fantasy Sparta” section flows smoothly after the “historical Sparta” one. In other words, both sections work together to present how Sparta would appear in your Pathfinder game, with the two overviews divided but clearly working together to paint a single picture. (And if the idea of putting Sparta in your Pathfinder game seems awkward, it shouldn’t; taking real-world cultures and putting an analogue of them – perhaps with a different name – into a campaign world has a very long tradition in tabletop RPGs.)

Following this, the book presents us with a base class for the archetypal Spartan warrior: the hoplite. It should be pointed out that the base class has all of the necessary information to make it playable (skill points, etc.) but also includes notations for things like their starting gold and usual starting age, which all too often are overlooked when new classes are introduced.

A full-BAB class, the hoplite’s main class feature is the Spartan Discipline ability that functions much like rogue talents in that, at every even level, the hoplite can choose from a list of abilities (with some advanced abilities being selectable at 10th level and above). Having looked closely at these abilities, none of them are particularly over- or underpowered. In fact, a great deal seem to be inspired by existing abilities in other classes, such as being able to re-roll a failed Will save, a +10 increase to base speed, immunity to fear, etc. Admittedly, there were one or two powers that seemed on the high end of the power scale, but only relatively so – yes, a +1 to all attack rolls is generous, but not game-breaking.

The other class features of the hoplite are similarly balanced and colorful. I found it exceptionally appropriate, for example, that hoplites can use the spear and longspear one-handed at 1st level, for instance, since that’s how those spears are handled in real life. Likewise, there are a number of shield-based abilities here as well, mostly gained by being adjacent to an ally – helpfully, these allies do not need to be hoplites themselves (something I was worried would be required). It was also nice to see abilities to make the tower shield more viable in combat (because, in all my years of play, I’ve seen the tower shield used exactly once, by a guy who was all defense and no offense).

I personally would have preferred to see some APG-style follow-up to this class, such as alternate favored class abilities, or some archetypes for this class, but those are extras whose lack of inclusion doesn’t detract from the class. Likewise, the book does provide some extras in terms of looking at what it means to play a hoplite in the game, including how they tend to relate to other classes and races, how NPCs view them, notable (fantasy) hoplites, and even a table of what you know about them on a Knowledge check.

Alternate class featured are provided in the following section, covering twelve classes (all but two of which, the cavalier and the oracle, are Core Rulebook classes). Interestingly, these aren’t presented as archetypes, but rather are collections of alternate class features, something I was slightly disappointed over – I’m of the opinion that alternate class features work better in packages than they do by letting players cherry-pick the best materials. But again, that’s a small complaint.

It’s in the favored class abilities that we see things swing a little wider on the balance scale. Again, I have to stress that none of these are broken nor unplayable – just that there are a relatively scant handful of options that are notably better or worse than existing options. For example, the bard can swap out their 20th-level power, deadly performance, for an ability to grant all allies +4 to their AC, attack and damage rolls, and saves. That’s great for everybody else in the party, but I doubt that the bard would want to give up a save-or-die effect for buffing everybody else, particularly when they already have (less powerful but still not-inconsiderable) buffing abilities. On the other side of the scale, the new sorcerer bloodline has, for its bloodline arcane, the sorcerer using a d8 Hit Die and a ¾ BAB, without having to give anything up. I haven’t playtested that, but it seems too good compared to other bloodlines (in 3.5, when Unearthed Arcana introduced that option, it lowered the sorcerer’s spells per day and spells known by 1 each, for example; though to be fair, 3.5 had a lower power level than Pathfinder does).

Having said that, most of what’s here is great material. The cavalier, for example, has a new order introduced, which among other powers lets them – just a few times per day – survive an otherwise-fatal blow, which instead reduces them to 1 hit point (and can’t be used for 1 minute after it’s been used). Balanced and effective. The cleric can lose channeling healing or harming energy to channel buffs or penalties instead (to their allies or enemies, respectively). The monk can swap out evasion for a power that’s identical but applies to Fort saves instead, etc.

To summarize all of the above, these alternate class abilities allow for a character to be much more martial than they’d otherwise be; in accordance with a character from Sparta.

The book’s last section covers new traits, which was fun to see as traits are one of the new parts of the game that I enjoy the most. Three general traits are presented, along with traits for each of the three social castes in Spartan society.

Again, there are good and bad points to these. Most traits (like feats) that I’ve seen usually provide a small bonus – having them provide too large of a bonus is too generous, while having them provide a bonus and a penalty is flavorful, but not beneficial enough. Again, those are the upper and lower ends of the zeitgeist of trait design, so breaking it may not result in a weaker character, but it makes some of these traits seem, on their face, sub-optimal.

And again, that doesn’t apply to most of these traits, either. Of the eleven traits here, having one that grants proficiency in leather armor, the buckler, and the longspear, for example, is perfectly in line with what traits should do, as is one that gives you a +1 Fort bonus to resist fatigue and a Strength 5 points higher for encumbrance purposes. It’s when a trait has you losing skill points to gain increasing weapon and armor proficiencies that these become sticky.

The traits, it should be noted, are the last section of the book, which is odd because the introduction says there’s also a new prestige class. Perhaps it’s dining in Hell?

Overall, Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta presents a good sourcebook for ideas on having Sparta – or some version thereof – in your game. More than just a new class, its holistic presentation encourages having an entire region like the historical warrior city-state in your campaign world, and does a good job presenting how it’d function in a high-fantasy setting. The new base class is a solid presentation that stands alongside the fighter, paladin, barbarian, and other martial classes in terms of how viable it functions. The alternate class features and traits may require some oversight, but for the most part are great new additions that helps to present how everyone would be in a military nation. If you want a martial character that will fight in the shade, make him one of the Sons of Sparta.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Jim C. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 10/03/2011 02:00:44

I have received a copy of this product as a free download and reviewed it at the publisher's suggestion.

I'd like to see a hoplite class done well, as I've mentioned in regard to another attempt. I'm curious how class features for the barbarian, cavalier, monk, rogue and sorcerer fit into the subject of the work. I won't comment on everything, but just pick up a few points.

The introduction seems a little overstated. The Spartans didn't fight for nor favour democracy, as they were a monarchy supported by an unfree majority (as the section immediately afterwards describes). The classical world raised many famous warriors, not least the Immortals on the opposing side at Thermopylae.

The Hoplite: It might seem appropriate to make this an alternate class to the fighter. Generally, I can see players of other classes being tempted to dip into this for a couple of levels to pick up some of the abilities that perhaps break a few too many assumptions of the game and could have been more limited or deferred to higher levels. I do think it's an advance on Blackdirge's already interesting treatment, earlier mentioned.

Traits: These will need a little work to fit into the Pathfinder framework, which (without presupposing a solution) the author could potentially have covered in only a sentence or two. A lot of them are interesting, though.

This brings together a lot of good information for the gamer who's not an expert in the field (in a similar sense to the various reprints of public-domain works on this site, perhaps) and I certainly wouldn't describe its game content as unplayable, with a little judgement.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Nick H. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 10/02/2011 17:35:09

Son's of Sparta is a nice 28 page book that focuses on giving players more combat options. The book is themed toward ancient Greece's Spartans but still has a fairly universal appeal. The first few pages of this book are dedicated to glossing over some historical context and incorporating Sparta in to a campaign world. The next section offers a new class, the hoplite. The hoplite is a melee fighter that does well in the support area and functioning as part of a unit. As opposed to contrary belief the class is indeed playable and includes both a skill list and a skills points per day below it (located in the top right hand corner of page 6). The next section features alternate class features. Admittedly the first few options, namely the ones for the bard and cavalier, are fairly overpowered, though the barbarian ability withstand death far more so than the far more spoken of cavalier ability, but as the section goes on the abilities become more balanced. Overall the section provides a few interesting options that are fairly nice barring the rather overpowered abilities early in the section, though there are some rather boring options too. The traits section follows and adds a little flavor to the characters if nothing else, but that's all traits are really supposed to do is add some flavor to a character. Over all the book is nice and adds some interesting new options, i personally prefer the oracle archetype and the hoplite class and would call those the highlights but it is fairly polished with only a few balancing issues occurring in some abilities. but these are easily fixed or omitted (the cavalier order seriously becomes balanced if you just flip the 8th and 15th levels abilities to being gained at the others level).I give this 3.5-4 stars. Some options are dull others are intriguing, while others are just too powerful but it is better than a mediocre product and depending on how you use it it can be quite good.(the rating is rounded up)



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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Ancient Warriors: Sons of Sparta
Publisher: Necromancers of the Northwest
by Thilo G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 09/25/2011 14:11:25

This pdf is 28 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page advertisement, 1 page SRD and 1 page back cover, leaving 23 pages of content for the Spartans.

After a short introduction as well as a short historical story, we are introduced to culture, religion and lifestyle of the Spartans and the peculiarities. This not being an historical exercise, the information is rather sketchy, elaborations are expanded to transform Sparta as a nation into a fantasy realm before introducing the spear-wielding Hoplite class. The class gets d10, a good fort-save, full BAB and no spellcasting. No information on how many skill-points per level the hoplite gets, though, essentially being a MAJOR glitch that makes the class, as written unusable.

Which is a pity, as the class uses the disciple/major disciple mechanic you'll know from e.g. SGG's different genius guide classes. We get 14 disciplines to choose from as well as 8 major disciplines. The class focuses, not surprisingly, on cooperative phalanx-formation, spears and tower shields. Unfortunately, though, neither the capstone ability, nor the rather bland disciplines really caught my interest. Even worse, they are not balanced among themselves: Would you rather take a bonus feat or rerolls for ALL diseases and poison-saves? Thought so. The information on playing the hoplites and their lore-sections are ok pieces, but nothing to truly write home about.

The next section deals with alternate lass features. We get 2 Barbarian ones centering on being tough as nails, a level 20 bard performance that grants +4 morale bonus to atk, damage, AC and saves. I may be biased but I consider my Northlands-skald capstone much cooler - the Spartan bard's performance feels like a high-level buff and not like a true level 20-capstone. The new Cavalier order, the order of Lycurgus, is unbalanced to the extreme, gaining an ability at 8th level that prevents the cavalier from being slain and instead drop to 1 HP, regardless of the damage. To add insult to injury, he can use this more often at higher levels.

The cleric's alternate battle blessings feel rather like bardic performances than cleric abilities to me, buffing fighting prowess via a burst of energy. Druids can get a rather bland bonus to survival for resist nature's lure. Fighters can specialize in a particular armor or give up one their bonus feats (one of their defining characteristics) for exploits that are generally a) more powerful (i.e. immunity to charm and compulsion) and b) should have been rather hoplite exclusives, as they detract from the unique feeling of being a Spartan warrior when made available to just about any fighter. Monks (and Rangers) can change evasion for durability, which does essentially the same for fort-based spells and effects and a lame 2 bonus against being nauseated and sickened.

Oracles gets the new mystery of Delphi - which actually is once again an example of the good design NNW is capable of: The oracle is very iconic and the abilities are all recognizable from Greek mythology -nice! Paladins can exchange smite for defensive abilities. The new rogue talents are nothing to write home about and enable the rogues to scavenge from the fighter exploits, further underlining characteristic abilities that enhance the iconicity of classes. Not my cup of tea. Sorcerors get a new bloodline ("Warrior's Blood") that makes you tougher. I'm not sure why a sorceror would take the bloodline, though: It had no truly outstanding power or spell. Finally, the pdf provides 11 new traits, 3 general ones and 3 per upper and middle social class, while the lower class gets 2 traits. The 2 pages of traits are among the best content in this file.

Conclusion: Editing is ok, I only noticed a minor glitch. Formatting, though has us without skills for the central base-class of the product, a devastating error that just should not happen. The pdf is bookmarked and comes with a printer-friendly version. Oh boy. If you're even remotely familiar with Spartan culture and mentality, you won't have too much going for the first couple of pages. The Hoplite base-class unfortunately is unusable as written thanks to the lack of skill points per level in both pdfs and the disciplines feel unbalanced among themselves, offering very weak and very powerful choices. I won't start with the balancing with other classes. The alternate class-features left me cold due to being either unbalanced or bland with the sole exception of the extremely iconic Mystery of Delphi, which will remain the only piece I'll salvage from this pdf. The traits are nice, but geared toward Sparta's class-system and thus only useful if you plan to implement the whole nation. As a historical perspective, the pdf falls short and does not offer any facts apart from the class-system you could not glean from "accurate" sources like 300. As a pure gaming supplement, I can't recommend it either, as both the spear-feats from KQ and 4WFG's strategists & tacticians offer better and more fulfilling takes on the spear-wielding warrior trope, which is a pity as personally I like them. I wanted this to be good, the hoplite be a winner. Unfortunately, I pronounce a final verdict of FAIL and award 1.5 stars, the 0.5 coming from the mystery, the low price and the traits. Nevertheless, I'll round down to one.

Endzeitgeist out.



Rating:
[1 of 5 Stars!]
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