Valus

A Fantasy Role-Playing World Sourcebook
By Ryan Smalley
aka Destan, EN World Story Hour author
Edited by Allan Grohe.
Cover map by Chuck McCann.
Interior maps by Clayton Bunce.
Interior art by Clayton Bunce, Scott Ruggels, Alan McFarlane & Stefan Poag.
A World Born Without Love

The men and women upon that backward isle call themselves Valusians, but in that - as in many things - they display their ignorance. These self-named Valusians are but a pack of mongrels, a mixture of blood and heritage that foments headaches among genealogists everywhere. Only the three Tundreth Clans of Calahen, Cormick, and Larren may truly call themselves Valusians. Why any one of them would want to do so is beyond the scope of this lecture.

- Learned Man Venicus Ratas, Centurion of Apia, Retired
Gazetteer of the 600-mile long sub-continent.

* A dark & brutal world
* High mortality rate
* Gods at war
* 12 powerful religions
* Low- to high-level adventuring
* Two new races



* Variant rules for clerics
* Variant rules for paladins
* Variant clerical magic system
* Valusian feats
* Valusian weapons, narcotics, and flora

With integrated fiction by Destan, popular EN World Story Hour author

Valus
By Ryan Smalley
Different Worlds product number DWP-3001
176 pages, $29.99

Valus is a campaign sourcebook detailing the island of Valus (and surrounding environs) on the world of Ostia Prim, the homebrew campaign featured in EN Worlder Destan's "Sins of our Fathers" Story Hour. (I must admit, I haven't read this Story Hour yet, although I've heard very good things about it and I think I'll be checking it out as a result of having read this book.)

The cover art is a full-color map of Valus by Chuck McCann. As maps go, it's very nicely done; I like the illegible, cramped writing in the margins - it helps make it look more "authentic" somehow. And, of course, while some people might have preferred an action scene or something, I think a map is perfectly natural for a campaign setting book.

The interior art consists of 21 black-and-white illustrations and 7 black-and-white maps by 4 different artists. The art is for the most part pretty good, with a few real gems thrown in for good measure: I love the haughty, sneering expression on the snooty elf on page 30! (That one was done by Scott Ruggels, who also did some of my favorite pieces in this book; I'm unfamiliar with Scott's previous work, but I'll be keeping an eye open from now on.) Whoever did the drawings of the buildings (the city of Tarn Cal on p. 97, the castle and town of Mon Mith on p. 121, the trull enclave at Kesh on p. 134) did a really good job as well. Overall, I don't have a problem with the art, although I was surprised to see so little of it in a book this size, especially considering that most of the last pages of each chapter had considerable white space (in some cases, over three-fourths of the page was blank). Those would have been good places to stick in some extra artwork.

Valus is laid out as follows:

• Introduction: a breakdown of what each chapter will focus on
• Ostia Prim: a brief examination of the part of Ostia Prim where the island of Valus lies, plus a history of the world, the multiple calendar systems used by various folk, a section on languages and alphabets (most Valusians are illiterate), and a look at the peoples of Valus (complete with a chart of common racial epithets!)
• Characters: Races (humans [broken down by different regional cultures], durven [dwarves], drel [two different subraces of elves], half-orcs, halflings, pardadrel [half-elves], pems ["burrow gnomes"], roven [humanoid canines], and trulls [an offshoot of the troll race]); classes (the standard 11, although there are three subcategories of bard); a prestige class (the covenguard); and 7 new feats
• Religion: Divine history, the 12 Risen Gods (who are worshipped as a whole pantheon by the general populace, although clerics must focus on one specific deity), and the Old Faith (who are worshipped by druids)
• Magic: Changes made to clerical magic (restricted spells, ascendant and suppressed powers, bringing back the dead, and cure and inflict spells), and restrictions on summoning and calling spells
• Northern Valus - Hor Valu: Geographic features, sites and settlements, and people and nations of northern Valus
• Central Valus - The Loamlands: Geographic features, sites and settlements, and people and nations of central Valus
• Southern Valus - Luc Valu: Geographic features, sites and settlements, and people and nations of southern Valus
• A Valusian Campaign: Rules for character generation, character advancement and wealth, spells and magic, social classes, monsters, and suggested campaign plots
• Appendix A - Introductory Adventure: a short adventure for four 1st-level PCs, to get the "feel" of a typical Valusian adventure (which tends to focus on humanoids as antagonists and have several shades of gray rather than a typical black-or-white, right-or-wrong setup)
• Appendix B - Custom Items: Custom weapons, fine alcohol, gourmet foods, narcotics, rare furs, and Valusian flora, with suggested prices and availability of each
• Appendix C - Mileage Chart: A chart showing the distance between major cities on Valus

In addition, sprinkled liberally throughout the whole book are little quotes from local inhabitants and printed works from books and journals in the campaign. These are exceptionally well done, and in fact it is these short snippets that, more than anything, have convinced me to go check out Destan's Story Hour - I love his flavorful writing style!

Valus is that rarest of gaming books that finds a very comfortable niche on the "fluff/crunch" spectrum. The background and history of Ostia Prim is a very rich one, filled with all sorts of fascinating details that mesh wonderfully into a unified whole, and the d20 rules and mechanics that flow from this rich background follow logically and consistently. And really, there aren't a whole lot of things that author Ryan Smalley (or "Destan," take your pick) actually changed from the standard D&D rules set. Let's see, off the top of my head, having read through Valus once: clerics must choose one of the 12 Risen Gods to focus on in their worship, and these Risen Gods go through a yearly cycle of waxing and waning in power; as a result, there are things a cleric can only do when his god is at the peak of his power (for example, return life to a dead body; with 12 Risen Gods and 12 months in the year - one month for each god - no matter when your PC happens to die, only the clerics of one particular god can raise or resurrect him). Druids, on the other hand, worship the Dead God-Children, the "original" pantheon who were allegedly slain by the original creator god and whose bodies, when they fell to the prime material plane, created the continents of Ostia Prim. It makes sense, doesn't it, that if druids worship nature, and nature itself is made up of the bodies of a distinct pantheon, that druids would worship that pantheon? Paladins, on the other hand, worship angels, not the gods - and this also makes perfect sense, since the Valusian gods each contain aspects of Good and Evil, whereas the angels (who were created by the gods) are purely good. So, everybody has their own opinions about who should be worshipped, there are good points to each argument, and while the three distinct "camps" all pretty much hate the other camps, it's hard to say who's actually got it right.

There are all sorts of great ideas in Valus. I really like the fact that resurrection is so difficult: when your PC dies, you have to get his body to a cleric of the Risen God who's currently in Ascendancy (at the peak of his powers), and even then it had better be in both the cleric's and the god's best interest to restore you to life, and even then you return bearing a physical mark of your return to life (if the God of Winter restores you, for instance, you may come back with pale skin that's always cool to the touch) and probably owe the cleric and god a big favor, often payable immediately. Tack on the concept that each Risen God has a rival god, and if you die in the wrong month there's no way you're going to get raised anytime soon!

It was nice to see a bit of a shakeup as far as the player character races go; while all of the main Player's Handbook races are there in one form or another, some of them are quite different from the norm. Elves are all extremely haughty, and are actually taller than the average human. Gnomes, called "pems" in Valus, are more fey-like than is the norm. I also appreciate the fact that the new races were each given a favored class that doesn't show up on any of the "standard" race's list (roven are most often rangers, trulls often become monks, pems favor sorcerers), and that there are a lot of "useful only as interesting facts and as roleplaying fodder" features about the new races, like the facts that trulls cannot breathe quietly and vomit uncontrollably if they try to eat fruit or vegetables. On the other hand, while I was glad to see some new names used to differentiate the races from their "standard D&D" names, some of the names Ryan came up with don't do much for me. If you want to call a hill dwarf something completely different from "hill dwarf," I think you could probably do better than "hulldurv." That just sounds like somebody saying "hill dwarf" with a stuffy nose. And for a humanoid dog race, "roven" sounds too similar to "Rover" for me to take seriously.

A big section of Valus is devoted to the geography of the island - a good third of the whole book's 176 pages. This is not surprising in a campaign sourcebook, and I often find those sections to be the dullest parts of campaign sourcebooks (in fact, that's the only part of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting that I still haven't read, despite having owned the book for over two years now). Valus is no different in this respect, but while I found it to be the dullest part of the whole book, it is in fact a necessary one (as is true of all campaign sourcebooks, really - they're a necessary evil!), and I appreciated the little bonuses that Ryan sprinkled throughout these sections. You'll get a couple paragraphs on a city, some more paragraphs on another city elsewhere in the same general area, and then wham! - out of the blue you get a page and a half detailing the strange goings-on a particular religious holiday in a city devoted to the God of War. As it turns out, on the last day of the God of War's Ascendancy, the people of the city of Farthis lock up their homes and abandon their city. A good thing, too, because the celebrants - many of whom have travelled a great distance to participate in the event - spend the whole day revering the God of War by slaughtering everyone they encounter that's not wearing their team's colors (the participants in this day-long battle are split into four different teams). Ryan details all of the rules of the "Farthis Fight," right down to each participant also being given a yellow jersey to quickly don if they suddenly come to their senses and realize "What the hell am I doing in this crazy ritual -- I'll get my fool self killed!" (Of course, anybody in a yellow jersey is a coward, and while you can't kill them, there's nothing stopping you from making their lives miserable as they slink out of town. Just don't expect the God of War to resurrect you if you "dishonor" him by quitting in the middle of a Farthis Fight!)

If I had any problems with Valus, it's in the two areas that I usually find problems, no matter which publisher produced the book in question: proofreading/editing and game stats. This is the first Different Worlds product I've seen, and while I know editor Allan Grohe as "grodog" on the EN World message boards (where he seems like a really nice guy), he could stand to put a bit more effort into the editing - and particularly proofreading - department. (There's no proofreader listed, so I'm going on the assumption that the proofreading is left up to the editor. If I'm wrong about this, Allan, then please forgive the poor assumption on my part.) Valus has what looks to me like a "spellchecker proofreading job" - that is, the book is riddled with errors (hmm, maybe "riddled" is a bit too harsh - "liberally sprinkled," perhaps?), almost all of which form a new word that a spellchecker wouldn't catch. It seems as if running a spellchecker was pretty much the full extent of the proofreading job, as there are far too many errors not to have been gotten caught by someone actually reading through the manuscript. Examples abound: "party" instead of "part," "drear" instead of "dreary, "Thorcian" instead of "Throcian" (as in "from Throce," a region of Ostia Prim), "lead" instead of "led" (this is the single most common mistake of its type in the whole book, showing up no less than 8 times), "affect" instead of "effect," "you" instead of "your," "weight" instead of "weighty," "realties" instead of "realities," "sad" instead of "said," "toches" instead of "torches," "male" instead of "mail," and so on. (Also, is "redound" a word, or do they mean "rebound?" They use it several times, and "rebound" seems to fit in each instance.) There is also a smattering of incorrect apostrophe usage (usually in the pluralization of acronyms, like "DM's" or "PC's), several instances of breaking a word incorrectly between two lines (the rule is to break it between syllables: "role-playing," not "ro-leplaying," and "leaf-lord," not "lea-flord") and some sentences missing words (which, again, wouldn't be picked up by a spellchecking program). While none of this is going to adversely affect your ability to understand the concepts provided in Valus, it doesn't do much for the book's (and game company's) professional appearance. There's definitely some room for improvement in the proofreading department.

As for the editing, I have fewer complaints. However, I believe it's one of the editor's duties to make sure the material is accurate and doesn't conflict with itself, and there is one place in particular where I think something should have been changed. On page 75, discussing the cleric's various abilities during his Risen God's Suppression, it states that a cleric must spend twice as much time preparing his spells, unless he is within an area under the effects of a hallow/unhallow spell cast by himself or a member of his faith. But wait a minute...the spells hallow and unhallow are two of the ones that can only be cast during that Risen God's Ascendancy! Are you following all that? Let me translate, using the standard calendar. I'm a cleric of a particular Risen God, and every January my Risen God is extra powerful, but every July he's at his weakest. So, in July, I have to spend twice as much time as normal to prepare my spells, unless I'm in an area that I've cast a hallow spell on. Of course, since it's July, I can't cast a hallow spell, and neither can any other cleric who worships my Risen God, and neither can any other cleric of 10 of the other 11 Risen Gods who aren't in Ascendancy in July. Worse yet, the only clerics that can cast a hallow spell worship the one Risen God that happens to be my own Risen God's main enemy! So basically, in July I have to spend twice as long preparing my spells, unless I can cast a spell that I can't cast. The only loophole I can see is if I managed to cast a hallow spell in January, followed immediately by a permanence spell, but if that was the intention of the rule it should have been made a bit - no, quite a lot - clearer. (By the way, for the sake of the above argument I ignored the fact that during each of the 10 months that is neither my Risen God's Ascendant nor Suppressed month, there's a week where he's ascendant and another week where he's suppressed, but that doesn't affect the outcome.)

[EDIT: The above paragraph was written based on an incorrect assumption on my part. See the comments below for resolution.]

Finally, there were some problems with the game stats. I'll only mention the ones I'm sure about, but one of the PC creation rules that's different with Valus is that everybody gets a bonus feat at 1st level (besides the normal one you get at 1st level, and in addition to the bonus feat a human gets at 1st level, so yes, a 1st-level human PC in Valus starts off with 3 feats!). However, this rule was not followed with the NPC stats. On the other hand, I'm not really sure if only the PCs get the bonus feat, so I can't really say whether the NPCs got ripped off or if that's the way it's supposed to be. These, however, need fixing for sure:

• p. 161, Lordling Mobray Restan: Flat-footed AC should be 13, not 12 (+3 for studded leather armor). He only has one feat listed, so even if the "Valusian bonus feat" only applies to PCs and not NPCs, he still should have 2 feats - one for being 1st level, and one for being a human.
• p. 161, Sergeant Cargyl: Flat-footed AC should be 12, not 10 (+2 for leather armor).
• p. 161, Hugh, Jak, Moot: These three don't have any feats listed; as 1st-level human commoners, they should have at least 2.
• p. 163, Tavis, Ross: These two don't have any feats listed; as 1st-level human commoners, they should have at least 2.
• p. 163, Linzi, Danwen: These two don't have any feats listed; as 1st-level human commoners, they should have at least 2. Also, their Grapple bonus should be -2, not -3 (+0 BAB, -2 Str).
• p. 164, Burnyc, Deffyd: These three don't have any feats listed; as 1st-level human warriors, they should have at least 2.
• p. 168, Korak'kun, Heavy War Horse Paladin Mount: Hoof attacks should be at +10 melee, not +11 (+6 BAB, +5 Str, -1 size). Bite attacks should be at +5 melee, not +2 (+6 BAB, +5 Str, -1 size, -5 secondary attack). Also, for some reason, both Korak'kun and his paladin master, Beggum Borskborn, have their ability score abbreviations in ALL CAPS, unlike the rest of the statistics. Odd.
• p. 168, Wulfwyn Godricson: He doesn't have any feats listed; as a 1st-level human commoner, he should have at least 2.

Still and all, despite these problems, Valus is in whole a good campaign setting, one that stands apart from most by the flavorful rules changes that makes for a much murkier world than is the norm. When good and evil aren't quite so clear cut, every action must be thought out ahead of time, and consequences will surely follow, one way or the other! It's worth noting that most of the rules tweaks are not only pilferable for other game settings (so you could apply some Valus rules in, say, a Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms campaign), but also largely optional even if you want to run a Valus campaign. For that matter, you could easily insert the entire island of Valus into just about any fantasy game campaign; there's no reason why the Risen Gods couldn't hold sway over just that part of the game world. I give Valus a high "4 (Good)," and if I wasn't such an anal retentive type when it comes to proofreading and game stats it would probably get a low "5 (Superb)." (So if you're not quite so anal retentive as I am - that is, if you're more "normal" - go ahead and consider this a "5." I won't mind.) It's also worth noting that after having described Valus to my D&D players (I DM a "mostly Greyhawk" game), they not only expressed interest in reading my copy of the book but are also leaning toward using it as the basis for our next D&D campaign, once this one finishes up - which, at the rate we play, probably won't be until next summer. (They're particularly intrigued by the notion of playing a band of paladins that are despised by the general populace, and the concept of having a special "guardian angel" that they're attuned to also appeals to them greatly.) All in all, nice work, Ryan - and I'll definitely be giving your Story Hour a read in the near future.

Good review, I'm pretty much totally in agreement with your opinion of it (and you beat me to it, I'm just about finishing up my review of it).

Hallow/Unhallow are instantaneous spells. If cast in January, they will be there indefinitely. Including the God's suppression. I imagine the areas hallowed/unhallowed to a religion would mostly be temples and the like.

Yeah, looking back on it, I see where I made a wrong assumption. Somehow I got it into my head that I'd have to cast the hallow or unhallow as part of my morning spell preparation. Reading over the relevant section again, it doesn't say that at all. Entirely my fault. I won't edit the review to cover my mistake; I'll just 'fess up publicly here that I goofed up.

And while I'm in a confessing mood, "redound" is indeed a word: it means "to have an effect or consequence." I'm going to have to buy a bigger dictionary - or remember to check out www.dictionary.com when I find words my own little dictionary can't handle.

Valus

Campaign settings have always been of interesting in the fantasy market. Setting is one of the few things that every game needs; the problem though has been not everyone needs a published setting. Most people it seems homebrew one, that is create their own setting. Also with the Wizards setting search that went one there area lot more setting in print or in search of getting in print. While everyone needs a setting, few people actually need two. People do borrow rules from setting sand use bit and pieces to enhance their own setting. This may be the most popular way to use a setting. Valus is a new setting and it does have a few things that make it different from the others.

Valus is possible the first setting that originated from EN World. The author, Ryan Smalley aka Destan, has had a very popular story hour posted in the EN World Forums for a while now. It is called Sins of Our Fathers. I have not read the story hour so going into this review I really did not know what to expect. The cover is a really nice shade of blue faded in white with the map of the sub continent on Valus on it. It is important to note that while this is a campaign setting all it covers is this 600 mile long island. Setting it seems usually like to cover a large area with the first book, giving a broad overview of everything. Valus instead does things a bit differently. It covers fewer things but in a great deal more detail. There are still many things for the DM to fill in but over all the setting feels more real then others because of this detail. It really enhances the flavor and feel of the setting. While many people use setting to mine rules from, I believe Valus to be the best to mine ideas. There are a few things done differently in the setting like relations between races, how the gods work, and alterations to a few classes. There are some rule alterations but mostly it is just the ideas that really make the change. It is these ideas that I can easily see people borrowing for their own worlds.

Valus is a paper back book. The binding seems good and durable. It has one hundred and seventy six pages and while that is a little smaller then many campaign setting books, the books does not read as incomplete like some of the others. The book has a good table of contents but no index. I really like to see both in a book because finding things quickly in a book during a gaming session is very important. The art is pretty good but there is not a lot of it. The maps though are well done and it would be great to see these as released on the web so people can print them, mark them up, and use as hand outs. The layout for the most part is good, but at the end of chapters there can be up to three fourths of a blank page. A little more art or something would have really helped limit the extra white space.

The books starts with a short introduction but then gets right into the history and the map. There are a lot of nice little details that I really like. The seasonal epochs are really a cool idea and I like how it is brought to use by the scholars of the world and occasionally their personal thoughts and theories are raised. For instance the current Epoch, the Winter, they say must surely be the final one. Two calendars are presented and they are important. The gods themselves gain and loose power as time goes on. Each god has a month were they are winning the god war and loosing it. During these months the abilities of the gods’ shifts and thus their clerics also are in the similar position.

The races are a nice change from the norm. The races of Valus do not really get along with each other. There is racism and hatred between them. There are a few different type of humans along with elves, dwarves, halflings, and half orcs. But each of them is nicely defined and different enough from the core books to really give them individuality among other settings. There are a few new races presented as well like the Pems, a burrowing gnome, Roven a canine race, and Trulls a variation troll. The ideas in the racial descriptions though are great. There is built in conflict and it seems natural and not forced.

The classes are also a little different. Well, some are just flat out changed. Clerics are recommended to have modified spell lists for instance. Druids are feared as they follow the old faith and not the new gods. And the Paladins have belief in angels and for this most people dislike them. The world that Valus inhabits is a gritty place filled with conflict and troubles.

A majority of the book is on the many different places. There is so much information packed into these locales that it really makes the world seem alive. And through out the book are little snippets of fiction. These really do a great job of pulling the setting together and giving it another level of feelings. The writing through out the whole book is very solid. The ideas are thoughtful, provoking, and complete. They work together as a whole world and not a mish mash of places some setting can feel like.

Valus is a setting for less powerful characters. There are not many high level people wondering around and the amount of treasure that characters have should be less then the DMG suggests. On the back cover one of the points the books makes is a dark and brutal world with a high mortality rate. Valus may not be high fantasy but it really does seem like a place that can have high adventure. It is also more then a great setting book; Valus is also a very good read.

Valus is a recently released d20 campaign setting from Different Worlds Publications (they also just put out the 4th module in the Maze of Zayene series).

What? Another d20 campaign setting? Aren't there enough of those already? While I actually would answer "No" (You can never have too many, if only to borrow ideas from), Valus is a lot different in feel than any other d20 fantasy setting I've seen, and it's exquisitely done. And other than the tone, it's generally not too hard to integrate into any other fantasy setting, as it's mostly set on a 600 mile or so island (though it will take some doing to reconcile the background mythology).


Background

If it's one thing that d20 doesn't really have for fantasy, is gritty, dark settings. How gritty is Valus? Well, the tag line for it is "A World Born Without Love". Okay, that (at least the last 3 words) might sound like a Lifetime TV movie, but the tone, combined with the extensive mythology (which explains the tone), is a far cry from any other d20 setting I've seen.

Yes, there's Midnight, which is sort of Tolkien if Sauron had won. But that's almost cartoon-ish grimness. This has "realistic" grimness, the world is grey instead of black and white, or maybe more accurately, like the real world, it has black and various shades of grey. Some would say it's presumptuous of me, but I would put in Valus in the same group of worlds as Harn and Glorantha (without the ducks, anyway) in terms of "realness". Besides the feel, it has a long history as a gaming world, going back to the mid 80s. So it's fairly old and established, and has had a lot of history take place in it.

Essentially, it's a fantasy world, but it has no "good" gods in it. The line "A World Born Without Love" isn't just a tagline, it's literally true in this case. The gods of this world don't feel love. For anyone or anything, including their worshipers. They view them pretty much only as tools or pawns.

The mythology is a bit complicated and this explanation ended up a little longer than I like, but I think I have to explain it to give you a feel for the world. Basically, the universe started out with one super-powerful god-goddess. Then for some reason, she had children. However, this didn't turn out like she planned, so much like Eric Cartman's mother-father, wanted to perform a post-birth abortion. Unlike Cartman's mother-father, this god-goddess actually ended up killing her children, but in the process, lost her capacity for love.

The corpses of her children turned into the world. But the corpses weren't completely dead. The various bits inside it somehow turned into lesser gods, called the Drimm, and crawled out from within the body. There were a lot of these. They eventually started fighting amongst each other, and over the course of time, whittled themselves down to about 100 or so. Then the god-goddess intervened, not wanting them to destroy themselves completely, moving some of them to the Moon, while leaving the more peaceful ones (she thought) still on the world.

However, this didn't quite work out either. The ones remaining on the world got bored and belligerent, but couldn't fight each other directly (they promised not to, and were afraid of getting smacked by the god-goddess if they did). So they figured out how to use their magical powers to create monsters to do their fighting for them. (Most of them. All except 12, who were too dumb/idiotic to do so). So, this fighting of created monsters goes on for quite some time - the monsters that were made were horrible, essentially demons and devils and the like.

This doesn't last forever. Once again, the god-goddess gets annoyed at all the Pokemon style fighting (the fighting wakes her up), so she sticks all those created monsters into hell (the Abyss) and smacks down all those Drimm that created all the monsters.

All the Drimm except for the 12 loser Drimm that couldn't figure out how to create monsters. Because they behaved (though only because they couldn't create things themselves), the god-goddess took mercy on them, and essentially gave them the god-like powers, including that of creation, that they had lacked. But not trusting them, either, she gave them perfectly balanced powers, and decided to lock them far away in a dimension, and made the Sun as a portal to it. Then she went back to sleep.

The first thing these 12 did, was to create a race of guardians, beings that would watch over the demons and devils that their brethren had created. Because before they were given powers, they were picked on by their brethren. And so developed a fear of their fellows, and the creations - the demons and devils. These guardians were Angels/Archons.

Eventually though, the 12 did start to quarrel among themselves, and start fighting. But because they were so evenly matched, they could never win or lose, and actually gained and lost power/influence on a regular basis.

In the meantime, life had evolved on the planet below. From the seas, much like on earth. Eventually, humans finally showed up. At first intensely curious about the world and it's creation and their role in it, when they eventually learned the truth, and their "gods", they were appalled.

My recap really doesn't do it justice - the book takes 20 pages to explain it. I really found this part fascinating. Rarely in RPGs do you see much of a connection between the tone of the world and the mythology of, which is sort of a disconnect from the real world.

There's not a general feeling of heavy oppression, or impending doom, just a resignation to a fate. The feel reminds of Brian Aldiss's Malachia Tapestry. Or maybe Jack Vance's Dying Earth (the first novel, not the rest, which are silly). Or if you're old enough, the Jimmy Carter presidency, aka the era of Malaise.

As a Gnostic myself, I couldn't help but notice the similarity of the basic background to Gnostic mythology. Even the name of the goddess is similar - Sacifea in this, Sophia in Gnosticism. So I might be a bit biased in liking this, it's not nearly as blatant or annoying a rip off as say, Kult, nor is it a weird misinterpretation like say, Dan Brown's DaVinci Code or a certain book from another game company, just loosely inspired (maybe - could be a coincidence). But most people won't even notice.

Still, though, because of that, I do think Malachia Tapestry is the feel I mean. It's been ages since I read that book, but if I remember correctly, it was set in sort of an alternate universe, where the main religion was that of the Bogomils. I don't know much about the Bogomils, except that they were Dualists (believing in a good and an evil god) and so are generally labeled as "Gnostic". Though it seems they were heavy on the evil god part and light on the "gnosis" part, so they were something of a depressing lot.


Changes/Additions to d20/D&D Rules...


Valus has a fairly long history (15+ years in the real world, I think. I could have sworn I read it first was gamed in in the mid 80s, though now I can't find that) and was originally developed for a game that wasn't D&D. So when it comes to classes and races, it's not 100% D&D, though the changes aren't huge.

The races get changed somewhat. Gnomes are quite different, they are called "Pems" and are sort of magical and reclusive and can change color. Elves are called "Drel" and are more aloof and arrogant than good. A bit Tolkien-ish, but not overly so. Dwarves are called "Durven" and are greedy and crude.

Because it's sort of a grim world, you get a lot of nonconsensual crossbreeding. Besides the normal Half-Orcs and Half-Elves, there are Trulls, which are half-troll, half-human, and Roven, which are half-gnoll, half-human. Though the latter two actually now breed true, and so are now proper species. The stats for the new races seem sound mechanically (maybe too much so, I would probably expect the Trull to be stronger, being essentially part troll, but they only get a +2 strength. Presumably to keep the effective character level at +0).

There's something of an undercurrent of racism between the various races. Most non-human races aren't especially liked (except maybe the Pems) and many human races don't like each other much. A chart has various offensive names used to call each race (none is particularly offensive to modern ears, and most make sense, like calling Dwarves "Stumps". Heck, when I was a kid, all my Dwarf characters were named "Stump". Though largely because I was a big Stump Mitchell fan).

While the setting is not low magic per se, powerful magic isn't very common,so classes get tweaked a bit.

The Cleric probably is altered the most, because of the way the gods work in Valus. The various god's power waxes and wanes regularly, and thus so do the powers of their clerics. Basically, for one month out of the year, plus one week a month, they gain some additional powers, but for a same amount of time in a different part of the year/month, they suffer from some negative effects. The latter can range from losing the ability to read, to smelling like a swamp, to not being able to lie, a few other doozies. There are basically 2 negative and 2 positive effects they suffer from, plus either gaining or losing a spell slot (sort of).

Plus, some spells can only be cast when the Cleric's god is ascendant. Most notably, the spells involving the ressurection of the dead (Raise Dead, Resurrection, etc). Even when the raise dead spell does work, it needs the personal approval of the god of the cleric who casts it. The god will generally ask the character being raised to do something for him or her. And the character who is raised will be marked in some way. Usually some way unpleasant.

Paladins are an interesting sort. Mechanically they are similar to normal D&D paladins, but they are generally outcasts, because instead of worshiping any of the proper gods (not being good, they aren't worth of a paladin), they have sort of a special connection with an Angel or Archon. Sort of like Joan of Arc heard voices from one of the Marys, the Paladin hears the voice of their specific guardian/patron angel.

Bards are tweaked just a teensy bit - they can take a subtype, Skald, Minstrel, or Troubadour. This doesn't affect them much, each subtype is better than the regular bard at something, but worse at something else. Good for flavor.

There's only one prestige class, the "Covenguard", or member of the "Order of the Covenant". Basically, they hate all outsiders, both Demons/Devils and Angels, and do their best to expel them from the world.

As befits this book, they have sort of a complicated history. Apparently the god-goddess of the world gave a unique name (called a "True Name" to everything in the universe, everyone that was and everyone that will be. Fish, people, rocks, gods, demons, angels. Everything.

But to some beings she told the True Name of others. In the case of the angels, she told each one the true name of another so they would work together. In the case of fiends, she told each fiend the name of another so it would try to manipulate that fiend. And the Covenguards were created to exploit this (somewhat) to keep the world safe from extra-planar influences, because the god-goddess didn't want the world to become a battleground for angels and fiends.

On a related note, this also makes the summoning of extra-planar beings more dangerous for spell-casters. The gods generally notice when powerful beings are being summoned or show up on the world, and they don't like it. Do it enough, and the summoner will face divine retribution. This can be any of a number of things, from having to do something, or pay a fine (essentially, it's left up to the GM to decide).


Setting Details/Geography


Valus is sort of shaped like Crete, only a bit crooked. It's basically divided into 3 regions - the two ends, and the middle. Pretty much every site or terrain feature or town on the island gets at least a paragraph of description. Most important places get more detail, a few get a whole lot of detail, including a map of a city with keyed locations.

It makes good use of small bits of prose to set the mood. The author of this book is actually a pretty good fiction writer - he's got a fairly popular "Story Hour" thread over at ENWorld, which basically relates an ongoing campaign in his world.

There are a couple of kingdoms on the west end, one called the Empire of Carrik, the other the Kingdom of Rhelm. Despite the name, the Empire of Carrik is not especially big, but it used to own most of the other parts of the isle (including Rhelm) before losing them in a civil war.

Carrik is ruled like an Empire, though, it's got a triumvirate running things (that is, 3 people)

There's something of a "Cold War" situation between Carrik and Rhelm. Not an out and out war, but most people expect one to come any day, and there is a fair amount of espionage and tension between the two sides.

The middle section of Valus is somewhat desolate. The south part is called the "Loamlands" where there are only a few independent towns and villages. There are 3 Scottish or Celtic like "clans" that live here, the Larrens, the Calahens, and the Cormicks, which are mostly nomadic. Two of the clans don't get along, and have each sided with one of the west Valus countries (though the text is a bit unclear on who has allied with whom).

To the north of the middle section is a large, imposing mountain range, which has some dwarves living in it. 7 different clan of dwarves, actually (unfortunately, no relation to the 7 Dwarves of Snow White fame). They aren't unified, which each clan having very different personalities.

The eastern section of Valus is one kingdom, at least in theory, and is ruled by a fairly competent Queen, but some of her dukes are not the most loyal of vassals. One completely ignores her. Two others are essentially at open war with each other. And one Countess, which is only supposed to give out Letters of Marque to privateers who prety upon enemies of the country, actually pretty much lets people get away with piracy. There's also a burgeoning drug trade, which claimed the life of the Queen's niece (though she was raised form the dead).

Also complicating things is that that area doesn't completely belong to the kingdom. There is one Free City, which is essentially a city of thieves. And one city used to belong to a somewhat neutral power on the main continent, but was invaded by the Queen. This irked the neutral power a lot. Added to this mix is a fairly powerful subterranean dwarven kingdom which is ruled by a fairly stern and fairly amoral tyrant. So there's a fair amount of intrigue in this kingdom.

Valus seems suited for a large variety of styles of games. Intrigue and politics. There's numerous ruins mentioned, so you can do dungeon crawls. There's lots and lots of pirates, so swashbuckling is possible, too. And higher level characters could make their own impression on the place, so they can aspire to be more than just lackeys and errand-people. It's a really nice mix of detail and openness.

There's a short but comprehensive chapter on running a "Valusian" campaign, that is, set solely on the island. It's full of details and adventure seeds and campaign ideas. And various tidbits on Valus that didn't fit into the other sections of the book.

Rounding out the book are 3 appendices.

The first is a short adventure, designed to introduce the characters to Valus and the grayness of it. Works pretty well. More role-playing than combat.

Next is a section on Valusian items new to D&D/d20, including weapons, food, several recreational drugs or narcotics, and plants. The new weapons are solid, mechanically (i.e, not munchkinny) and the drugs are a nice reminder that all is not cheerful on Valus.

Lastly there is a distance chart to and from various places on Valus. Quite handy.


Tangibles/Presentation (Art, layout, etc)

The layout is pretty good. Logical, and things are easy to find. It's an easy book to read, unlike say, the Kalamar setting book which was really dry and boring. It's also just packed with stuff, sometimes I just open it randomly, and come across an interesting detail I had missed.

The art is very good, and does a great job of capturing the setting, from the sneer on the Horadrel (elf) to the somewhat chilling illustration of a paladin starting to get stoned (as in getting rocks thrown at him), to the pathos of a Trull. Also, speaking of elves, it's nice to see them normal looking, without the foot long, anime style ears. The only downside is, there isn't all that much art.

The maps are also excellent. Nice looking, but also clear and easy to read.

For the most part, editing is okay. I noticed a fair amount of problems, like double words or words missing, but nothing too jarring. Certainly not on the scale of a Mongoose book. The only real major editing problem I noticed that was a problem was that it's not clear which clan from the Loamlands is allied to which Western kingdom

The paper is nice and heavy. The typeface used is very legible.



So, if you don't want to start a new campaign in a whole new setting, how easy would it be to adapt Valus to your setting of choice?

Well, not that hard, I think. Most of it's fairly self-contained. There is basically a reference to an outside empire, but you can replace that with any similar powerful empire in your world.

The religion is a bit trickier. But the mythology presented in this, might not necessarily be true for your world, but the people on the island happen to believe it. I mean, look at the real world - pretty much every continent or region had its own religion. A surprisingly large number of them also happen to have fairly well documented "miracles", or at least very weird events. So even though they can't all be right, since they contradict each other, they also happen to produce supernatural events. (I know I'm going to be vaguely worried when A.D. 2012 rolls around, and I'm not a Mayan. Or an Aztec)

So, you could simply make the religion in this, part of the beliefs of just this island. That would actually make a lot of sense, I think.


Final Thoughts

I really really like this. I appreciate the complex mythology. I like the impressive but not overwhelming amount of detail. Though I think I would have liked more hard detail in some things. For instance, physical descriptions of some of the NPCs (it does a good job of covering their personalities and motivations, which is the important thing), and I would have liked to have known the exact size of some of the smaller towns/villages. Nothing major.

A-


Admittedly, I'm something of a sucker for something like this. But I honestly think it's a great book/setting, and anyone looking for a grim, gritty, realistic D&D world will love this. When I said it was the "anti-Eberron", I was joking somewhat, but I do think there is truth to that. From what I've seen of that, Eberron is somewhat comic book-ish (especially the art) and favors style over substance. This is pretty much the opposite in every way.

Even if you just want help fleshing out your own campaign world, this can be a great help, as you can drop Valus into it without too much trouble.

Also, while it is a d20 product, I do think it could easily be adapted to another fantasy rules system pretty easily. HARP for instance.

And lastly, the web page for this has a lot of information, including a Q&A, artwork samples, and the table of contents and introduction from the book itself.

Sometimes I think I’ve read too many books and been involved with too many campaigns. It leaves me a little jaded and feeling that perhaps I shouldn’t be doing reviews. That my point of view is too different from the mainstream to be valid anymore unless the person reading my review has my experiences.

With that in mind, let’s look at Valus, a new campaign setting by En World’s own Ryan Smalley, better known as Destan. Clocking in at 176 black and white pages for $29.99, the Valus has got to work hard to prove itself in a field bursting with campaign settings. Looking at the back, I’d almost think that I was reading an introduction to the Wilderlands by Judges Guild as it notes that this is a dark and brutal world with a high mortality rate and the gods are at war! However, it also notes that it has variant rules for clerics and paladins, as well as some customized information in the area of feats, weapons, narcotics and flora.

Divided into eight chapters with three appendices, the book covers the continent near Valus, as well as the island Valus itself. This includes the races that live upon it, as well as the standard classes and a new prestige class.

The world about the Valus reminds me of dozens of other fantasy settings I’ve read before. The semi-Roman empire of Apia, the norsemen of Gordia and other generic themes that are easy to recognize work well, but they’ve worked well in many campaign settings including the Conan world. Settings that use such common elements are good in that they allow the reader to fill in the blanks and allow the writer to focus on the campaign world and the action going on itself.

In terms of races, there were some renamed, changed in their core style. Humans are not one of the mind you. Instead, like the Wilderlands, Kalamar, and the Scarred Lands, humans are broken up into different ethnicities. Information includes standard physical characteristics, as well as relations, religions and sample names. This allows the GM and players to quickly have a Carrik woman by the name of Rossa meet a Genn male name of Amati-Genn and move on.

For non-humans, we have most of the standards. However, most of them have been renamed. Take Dwarves or Durven. Why the naming convention change happens is beyond me. In most cases the word dwarf is used in the book. Probably because it’s easier to remember. Racial traits that are changed are noted. The Drel, or elves, also have some changes. We have the Horadrel and Gammhedrel, neither of which match the standard elf from the PHB. Another elf variant is mentioned, the morhedrel or delve elves, which aren’t detailed in this section.

The PHB race that takes the biggest hit in my opinion, is the Pems or Burrow Gnomes. These individuals hail from a shy race that keeps to itself and favors the sorcerer class. Fairly hardy and charismatic, they are neither smart nor strong. Because of their reclusive nature, they’re masters of camouflage. An interesting change and to be honest, makes gnomes something other than a dwarf’s poor cousin. Then again, I’ve never liked gnomes.

One of the new race, the Roven, is basically a dog man. No illustration of the creature is to be found in their section, and looking through the book again, I don’t see any illustrations of the Roven. Due to the keen sense and wilderness love, it’s natural that their favored class would be ranger. The Trull on the other hand, is a bit stranger. These individuals are the evolved form of a half-troll after many years of crossbreeding and troll hunting. One of the things that’s different about them, is that they kill with hands and feet and tend towards lawfulness as it was law that allowed them to conquer their darker natures. With those things in mind, it’s easy to see why monk would be their favored class.

One thing the book does a nice job of, is explaining how the core classes fit into the Valus setting. Each class is touched on and game rule changes are noted. Some of these are minor. For example, no one becomes a barbarian after 1st level. It’s an upbringing, not something you just decide one day to min-max your character. For others, it’s a much greater change.

Take the cleric for instance. Here, the cleric has to choose one deity from a group of gods known as the Risen Gods. No philosophies provide power here. Now the cleric can access an alignment domain if her own alignment mates that domain but neutral clerics can take good or evil, but if they take one, they have to take both. Some domains, including Good and Evil, are universal, and joined by War.

In addition, clerics can give up a spell to spontaneously cast a domain spell and still retain the ability to swap out spells for cure (or inflict) spells. Turning is also the same. However, the biggest difference comes not in the section on clerics, where it would be handy to have in one space, but under religion. See, each god has a period of Ascendancy and a period of Suppression. During the former, they have more power and during the latter, less power. For example, a cleric of the god Evios the “known unknown”, can pray for an arcane spell (maximum level dependent upon the cleric), as well as enjoying a +2 bonus to Spellcraft checks when attempting to identify spells being cast. When they are in declime, they have a –1 to attack rolls and a –2 on saving throws against electrical attacks.

While cool, it’s not the first time an author has done something with divinity. Green Ronin has The Book of the Righteous, the Scarred Lands have the Divine and the Defeated, and I’m sure I’m missing others. Regardless, it’s an interesting feature that helps set the clerics of this setting apart from those of other settings in the way that they do their customization.

Some of the problems other classes have in this world stem from the background. See, the Old Faith is still practiced by Druids. Paladins don’t worship gods, but rather, the host of angels that guards the world against demons and devils. This insures that religious conflict is high among the things happening in the world. The bad news though, is that the religious issue isn’t followed for all the classes as the source of a ranger’s spells is left blank. And with the note that no good will powers divine spellcasting, it’s not just coming from nature. That means rangers either worship a god, or they worship the Old Faith, in which case, they’re just as prone to being burnt at the stake as druids.

Once again, my time in playing works against me. I remember the original Temple of Elemental Evil where the Old Faith was on the decline and St. Cuthbert was taking over. I’ve been in campaigns very recently where druids served the titans or the Old Faith, and are battling against the upstart new Gods. It’s a solid and traditional role that clerics and druids often find themselves in. Valus however, kicks it up a few notches as druids are burned alive if they don’t renounce their old faith.

I find that part of the section on classes fails. I get no feel for how sorcerers or wizards work in the Valus. This is a land riddled with illiteracy and people dying young. Not a lot of room in such a place for the bearded old man with his pointy hat or the young sorcerer. For instance, nothing is said as to where the power actually comes from. Nothing is noted about becoming a sorcerer latter in life. It’s just waved under the table.

The Valus is a land of conflict. Much of that comes from the gods. See there was the Mother-Father, Saficea, that gave birth to gods. These young gods battled one another and eventually, Saficea killed them. The corpses became the land of Ostia Prim. When Saficea wept, she created the oceans. But see, as she wept, she left the dead gods her love. So the universe, in essence, has no love because the creator wasted it on her dead children.

From those corpses came the Drimm. Immortal but not all powerful. They too waged war against each other and slowly cut their numbers down in size. Of course they eventually wake up Saficea, who puts those who wish to fight on the moon, while allows those that didn’t, to say on Ostia Prim. Eventually these bad children learned that they could create, and so they made all sorts or new monsters like demons and devils, to fight one another. Some of these near gods though, the Ulma-Drimm, lacked the power of creation and so were given the dunce cap and mocked.

Of course the near gods woke Saficea up again. She when she woke this time, her awakening created numerous demi-planes and voids of nothingness. The Abyss and Hells were created to hold the various monstrous beings that her children created. She then made stars of those who waged war. Those without the power, the Ulma-Drimm, were given true immortality so that they might never die. In addition, they were given the power of creation. Eventually they learn that they gain power from worship.

There’s a lot more to it then that, but those are the big steps. The things that help showcase that a world without love is one that is in serious need of a good Talk Show Host to get everyone to just talk things out. Since Saficea put the gods in a permanent balance of sorts. Each one has a month of ascension and a month of suppression.

Now the religious thing gets into a few other areas. For example, there are some restricted spells that can only be cast during times of Ascendancy. There are also some problems with brining back the dead. Remember, the gods are without love so they’re only going to allow the raising if there’s something in it for them. Often, there are side effects. What’s worse, clerics’ can’t target followers of rival deities with curative magic. This could have some serious implications in a campaign where everyone worships a different god. Nothing like having to kill the party cleric to get another cleric in the group.

Because of the nature of the divine prisons on the demons and devils, the Risen Gods don’t like summoning spells too much either. Every time a summoning spell is used, there’s a chance, the more powerful the creature, the grater the chance, that the gods will notice and punish their errant servant.

By the time we get to Valus itself, there are less than a hundred pages to give life to the setting. Not a bad thing as a lot of the background has been set up through the previous chapters. Each main section, Northern, Central, and Southern, has it’s own map and the maps are fairly detailed. The good news is that everything on the map is at least mentioned. The bad news is it’s not often in great detail.

The sections start off with general information, geographic features, such as coastline and woodlands, waterways and mountains. Information on sites and settlements includes towns and cities and occasionally even maps of said cities. Some like Tarn Cal are renown for their size and their unique features, like the Crown Tower, while others like the Freetown of Ciddry have locations numbered on the map to allow a GM to have a quick home for his campaign.

For those wondering what to do with such a setting, or how to GM it, the author provides a section on what it means to run a Valusian campaign. This includes uses a point buy system, as well as ideas on what to do with the races and classes. It suggests giving starting characters a bonus first level feat, as well as putting characters into more danger than they can handle to not only cull out stupidity, but to improve level advancement.

Perhaps one of the biggest changes is that the game uses a silver standard. This is something that should probably have been mentioned in oh, I don’t know, say chapter one. Character wealth is also lower than a standard game. For some reason, other things that would go well in this chapter, like Valusian weapons, foods, and drugs, gets put into another appendix. As a matter of fact, much of this information should be at the start of the book, no further than the character chapter.

For those still unsure what to do with it, there’s an introductory adventure, Faith’s Decree, which shows the many difficulties in dealing with religious issues, such as when a paladin seeks out a replacement. Remember, in this setting, paladin’s aren’t looked upon with love and trust, but rather, as those who don’t follow the way of the gods.

I think that one problem is that Valus is a little on the expensive side. Not much, but a little. Comparing it to say Races of Stone, a hardcover in full color, is unfair, because that’s a WoTC book. How about Iron Kingdoms Character Guide, a book that costs more, but is twice the size. How about Dragonmech, a hardcover that’s slightly more expensive, but larger, and in hardcover. How about Legends of Excalibur? Well, it is smaller, but both sets of interior covers are used to deliver four separate maps and it’s hardcover. If there were a pull out map like in the Player’s Guide to the Wilderlands, the price would be under.

Funny story. There is a flyer with a larger version of the map. We had these all over our En World booth at Gen Con. I didn’t take one because I thought there’d be one in the book and I don’t associate a utility map with a flyer. My bad but hopefully the larger map will be available for download sometime soon.

I’ve mentioned it before, and I’ll mention it again, art and layout have a huge impact on me. I can’t say that because this is a new product from a company that hasn’t done much in a long time, that it’s okay that the art and layout is only okay. That diminishes books like Poisoncraft, Redhurst, and Denizens of Avadnu. Each of these was the first book from their publisher and each is a professional looking piece. It’s no longer 2001 and the OGL isn’t brand new. Dos this mean that the art is bad? No. There are some great illustrations here. The Gordian Chieftain on page 24 is an impressive piece, as is the illustration of the half-orc mercenary on page 32. However, most of the art is so-so.

Does this mean that things like writing have no impact on me when I read? No. Writing, especially writing that’s entertaining to read is an important aspect for a role-playing game. However, for a campaign setting to have a unique feel of it’s own, art is vital. Dark Sun and Planescape both proved this with their vital imagery that set their campaign tones while Iron Kingdoms has brought that style philosophy to 3rd edition. Thankfully Ryan’s writing is crisp and easy on the eyes, quickly flowing.

His writing doesn’t make the layout any fancier. It’s fairly standard two-column style but at the end of each chapter, it’s almost a blank page like on page 53, 73, 105, 169 and 174, or a half-page like 79 and 143. Add in a page dedicated to Ryan Smalley and a page for the credits, another for the printing information, another for the OGL, another two for the table of contents, and you can see why I think there could be more. The maps are fair but I’ve been spoiled by the cartography of Todd Gamble and Ed Bourelle. The cover map is fantastic, but the interior maps of the cities and towns are something I could do, and I’m not much of an artists.

In the end, Valus isn’t a bad campaign setting by any means. It offers everything that a GM could want in a setting. It’s different from some mainstream settings in that there aren’t a lot of high-powered NPC’s and literacy isn’t the norm along with early death but the true standout point is the role religion plays not only in the background, but in the current day to day affairs. It’s not a new sparkling gem, or an ancient treasure that’s been unearthed and published for the new edition. It’s a D20 campaign with very solid writing behind it that can provide some interesting alternatives for those looking for role playing opportunities.

Valus

Valus is a D20 System fantasy campaign setting written by Ryan Smalley (aka Destan on the ENWorld forums) and published by Different Worlds Publications. The setting was that described in Destan’s story hour on the boards, which was the vehicle that drew the publisher’s attention.

A First Look

Valus is a 176 page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $29.99 US.

The cover of the book has a sky blue background. The front cover features an attractive, detailed colored map of the subcontinent of Valus, created by Chuck McCann. Unfortunately, there is not a larger version of this map to be had in the interior, though the publisher has distributed some flyers regarding the book with a two-page fold out of the map, that you may be able to ask your FLGS to get.

The interior is black-and-white, and features art by Clayton Bunce, Scott ruggels, Alan McFarlane, and Stefan Poeg. The art is competant and evocative, though the interior maps seem simple compared to the cover map. A few included city maps appear hand-drawn.

The book does not use any sort of graphic in the margins. The margins are very thin and the text is very dense, offsetting the at first glance expensive per-page price. A number of text boxes and tables in the book used stylized borders.

The editing is for the most part good, but I did catch a few common editing gaffes (for example, using affect as a noun and not meaning emotion.)

A Deeper Look

Valus itself is a large island (600 miles long) off the shores of a continent to the south. The world that Valus is part of is called Ostia Prim. The first chapter takes a look at the known world, and spends some time discussing the landscape and empires of the mainland. Valus attempts to provide a more realistic take on people and cultures, a bit like Kingdoms of Kalamar. However in stark contrast to this, the geography is intentionally less realistic. The continents are supposed to be the bodies of the creator-god’s children, and the oceans the briny tears of that god, the Father-Mother.

In this first chapter, the author immediately starts painting a picture of a variety of cultures in stark contrast. Each of the various sections of the descriptions of the cultural regions of the mainland relate a few of the more hostile reactions of travelers to the given society, such as the illness of one traveler upon hearing that some stains on a wall are bloodstains from the slashed hands of wives and concubines of powerful men who passed, and who were to join their deceased husband (a practice that uncomfortably parallels a similar controversial practice once practiced in India.)

This first chapter covers each of the different major cultures in the region, including such details as calendars and reckoning of years and languages. The details in this chapter even discuss the disquiet between peoples, and even includes a list of common epithets leveled against various races (note here that races doesn’t necessarily mean races in the D&D sense; many of these races listed are simply different human ethnicities.) The chapter ends with a table describing perceptions and relations between the different ethnic/racial groups, similar to the one for races in the 1e D&D Player’s Handbook.

The second chapter actually turns to making characters. If the first chapter didn’t convince you that this book is a bit off the beaten track for D&D settings, the second one should. Though most races are similar to core races, there are a few minor differences (including names). Appearances and attitudes are discussed at some length. Non-human races have some variations in their abilities from core versions of the same. Humans have the same basic statistics as core humans, but a great deal of attention is paid to spelling out differences in their physical characteristics and attitudes.

An optional rule called heritage levels allows a player to chose to have their character had grown up primarily in a singular culture. There is no level modifier, but the character replaces their favored class of any with a specific class, and gives them a penalty to gather information and diplomacy, but gives them a bonus feat, a save modifier, and a permanent class skill. The text is not clear whether this is supposed to be an additional bonus feat or a selection for their existing feat. If the former, these options seem strong, otherwise they seem weak.

In addition to variants of the traditional core classes, Valus includes two new races, Roven (bestial humanoids) and Trulls (sort of a weak troll or giant).

The character chapter also introduces some significant changes in classes, primarily stemming from changes in the cosmological assumptions about religion and deities. Bards can select mroe specialized variants, skald, troubadour, and minstrel. Clerics (for reasons discussed below) need not match their deity’s alignment (as they don’t have one) and many aspect of their magic are altered (see below.) Paladins receive additional abilities related to their position. All sorcerers gain eschew materials as a bonus feat (a choice Egyptian Adventures: Hamunaptara makes as well) and all wizards can spontaneously cast cantrips.

There is one new prestige class, the covenguard. The covenguard has abilities designed to fight and banish outsiders from the world of Osta Prim; outsiders are considered to be especially offensive to them. The covernguard has their own spellcasting progression and spells, and are good fighters.

Most of the feats are divine in nature, dealing with additional restrictions placed upon divine spellcasters in the setting. For example, the devoted feat allows a cleric to freely apply a metamagic feat to one of their spells during their patron’s ascendancy (see below.)

Religion plays and important part of the makeup of the Valus setting, and some aspects of it are very deep; this summation barely scratches the surface. Most aspects of the cosmology and "divine history" are viewed similarly by different divine casters, but different divine casters draw power from and revere different aspects of divinity. For example, covenguard revere Saficea itself, druids revere the child-gods, clerics revere the risen gods (divine brothers of beings that would become demons and devils), and paladins revere the angelic host.

The setting assumes that there was a creator being, Saficea, the Mother-Father. There could only be one creation, so she was forced to slay her children, the child-gods, who became the continents, and her tears formed the oceans. Being sprung from the corpses that held a spark of the divinity of the child gods called the Drimm. The drimm were forbidden to kill one another, but two factions of these did, and created progeny. When Saficea awoke to their warring, she cast them out. These groups became demons and devils. A third group of Drimm did not war against one another, but Saficea knew that one day they would, so she locked them into a cycle of eternal battle and locked them away from the world in a place to which the sun is the impassible portal. These last group of drimm were then the risen gods, from whom clerics derive their power.

A consequence of the eternal cycle that the risen gods are locked into is that their clerics’ powers wax and wane as the gods do. As a god becomes more powerful in this cycle, a nimbus around the sun shows their color.

The result is, in addition to all the traditional characteristics of deities (aside from alignment), all of the deities have a period of ascendancy and a period of suppression. The period of ascendancy is one month a year and one hek (short 5-day week) a month when they are in ascendancy; the period of suppression is also a month and hek.

Many spells can only be prepared during the time of ascendancy of a cleric’s deity, and the cleric gains other benefits, such as the ability to spontaneously add metamagic effects, cast spells that are normally beyond their abilities, cast orisons spontaneously, and reduced XP cost for spells and item creation.

On the other hand, during the period of suppression, clerics lose access to their highest level non-domain slot, requires double the amount of daily preparation time, suffers a failure chance on high levels spells, and must pay an XP surcharge to item costs and any spell XP costs.

Specific deities also have specific ascendency powers and suppression effects.

Another difference is divinity in Valus is that the risen gods do not have alignments defined. Clerics may be any alignment, and many deities have multiple alignment domains (good and evil on their lists. Clerics may not select domains opposing their own alignment, but a neutral cleric could take both good and evil domains.)

There are a few other rules governing magic. First, the risen gods resent the introduction of the banished drimm back into the world. Summoning spells may draw attention of the gods, which incurs a debt of forgiveness that the character must pay. Second, resurrection or raise dead spells are more limited. In addition to only being allowed during ascendancy, a risen god will often demand an additional cost if it is not in their interests to raise a character from the dead, or outright refuse to grant it. Even if they do grant it, they may somehow mark the character than they raise.

The four remaining chapters discuss the geographical regions of Valus. An exhaustive recounting of the contents of these regions is beyond the scope of this review. The geography is covered in some details, as are the political units and cities, complete with recent history, thumbnails of significant characters, and plot hooks (listed by EL). These plot hooks are more about intelligent races and society than monsters and dungeons.

There are two appendices. The first is a short adventure for 1st level characters, which has them pursuing a kidnapper, and facing a variety of obstacles (many of them noncombat) along the trail. The second appendix features items unique to Valus, including weapons, furs, narcotics, and flora.

Conclusions

Valus is somewhat different than most settings I have read to date. It seems to concentrate on portraying deeper and more believable sociology, more focus on people and societies than dungeons and monsters. That the background and the geography of the setting is so mythic is an odd contrast, making Valus an odd mixture of the methodology of Kingdoms of Kalamar and The Scarred Lands.

I found it refreshing that the setting didn’t feel a need to whitewash some of the uglier aspects of human nature, particularly racism. This adds a strain of believability to the setting. Some groups, however, may be a bit uncomfortable with this aspect of the setting. It does seem like it goes to the opposite extreme with respect to recognizing racism, with rules, situations, and narratives that highlight it at several turns.

Islands seem to be a good candidate to import into an existing world. I’m not sure that this is true of Valus. Most of the setting’s value seems to be had in the context of it’s religion and cosmology assumptions, so unless you are resolved to use the Valus cosmology or adapt it somehow, it seems that you would get less use out it this way.

Overall Grade: B

-Alan D. Kohler

While anything over $25 seems expensive to me, the price for this is actually about par for 176 page softcovers these days, at least from middle to small tier publishers.

For instance, Eden's Fields of Blood is 160 pages and $30. And very flimsy, in terms of paper quality. Valus actually is pretty heavy paper.