Sandstorm - beautifully illustrated?

This beautifully illustrated supplement continues a series of releases that focus on how the environment can affect D&D gameplay in every capacity. Sandstorm contains rules on how to adapt to hazardous hot and arid weather conditions, such as navigating desert terrain and surviving in fierce heat or harsh weather. There are expanded rules for environmental hazards and manipulation of hot weather elements, as well as new spells, feats, magic items, and prestige classes. New monsters associated with deserts and wastelands are included, as well as variants on current monsters. Sandstorm provides enough adventure material included for months of gameplay.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=products/dndacc/177390000

Beautifully illustrated? Now that's interesting. So, the Environ books may be somewhat like the Draconomicon?

It's nice to see that Frostburn isn't the only one planned, though I'm really looking forward to seeing (a) the other books planned and (b) what they actually are!

Cheers!

I hope they'll be worth buying instead of downloading. The punishment for letting out crappy products.

I still cant't get over the fact that at WotC they got the NERVE to think about let alone actually publish PrC's such as in Serpent Kingdoms and 70% from the Planar Handbook. Just give them some spelllikes abilities x/day and progress some crappy ability we stole from another prc from 1 to 3 times per day and call or something cool.

Just can't get over it, god I could make better and more appealing PrC's in 2 days then what they pulled in those 2 supplements in the Feat and PrC chapters. *Shrug*

Crappy

Tell us how you really feel, Forsaken One.

There are expanded rules for environmental hazards and manipulation of hot weather elements...

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Towards the end of last year, I ran a D&D 3.5E session in a desert using the environmental rules in the 3.5E DMG.

I loved it. I think my players did as well. The systems in the DMG 3.5E were just what I needed: evocative and simple, lending themselves to game play.

Some readers will remember the Greyhawk weather tables - detailed, yes, but an absolute pain to use properly. And then there was much crosschecking to find out what they actually meant.

So, that's one reason I'm really looking forward to these environ books.

Cheers!

Hi

Hmmmm, do these rules include how sand gets into every orifice of your body, cloths, weapons/ equipment, food and water?



Scott

Doomed Battalions said:

Hi

Hmmmm, do these rules include how sand gets into every orifice of your body, cloths, weapons/ equipment, food and water?

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A good question, if an uncomfortable one.

We'll have to see!

Cheers!

Hmmmm, do these rules include how sand gets into every orifice of your body, cloths, weapons/ equipment, food and water?

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And what about sunburn?!?! I went to Long Island this weekend and I got fried!

I am definitely interested in this series of books. They'll be a bit costly if you buy them all (I'm assuming there will be more than one) but IMO they are long overdue. I just ordered AEG Wilds because I needed some more info on various wilderness settings.

I hope there is a book on jungles and swamps too.

I still cant't get over the fact that at WotC they got the NERVE to think about let alone actually publish PrC's such as in Serpent Kingdoms and 70% from the Planar Handbook

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I liked the PrC's in SK, especially since most of them were for the bad guys. I'll agree with you on the Planar Hamdbook though. A disappointment.

Well, so far:

Frostburn by Wolfgang Baur, James Jacobs, George Strayton
-- Icy conditions (mountain tops, polar regions), due September 2004

Sandstorm by Bruce R. Cordell, Jennifer Clarke-Wilkes, JD Wiker
-- Really hot conditions (deserts, heatwaves), due March 2005

That's a bunch of different designers - and it doesn't even look at the development teams!

Cheers!

George Strayton is da bomb. I first met him about ten years ago before he was with West End Games; from there he went on to create the Herc/Xena game, then over to the Herc/Xena show, where he was head of marketing and a writer. I consider him a great roleplayer and a very impressive designer, and I'm psyched he's back in the industry.

Piratecat said:

George Strayton is da bomb. I first met him about ten years ago before he was with West End Games; from there he went on to create the Herc/Xena game, then over to the Herc/Xena show, where he was head of marketing and a writer. I consider him a great roleplayer and a very impressive designer, and I'm psyched he's back in the industry.

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Fantastic to hear, Piratecat! I admit that my knowledge of game designers is scanty (apart from a few), and it's great to hear from people who know them and like their work.

You know, I think there's a mentality around here that "We must get it all!" that really isn't how the Wizards people approach it. They understand that quite a lot of people only get the books they are interested in, so they are providing a range of books that can be excellent to different people.

I mean, I'd rather like to "get them all", but the Monster books (Draconomicon, Libris Mortis, Codex Anathema) really don't interest me that much. The monsters really don't get that much attention from me in my games.

On the other hand, the adventure (environmental) setting and the characters' roles are very important to my players and me. So, the Complete series gives my players a lot of options to play with, and the Environ series looks like it will help my DMing - providing more interesting locales for the adventures.

Meanwhile, you have things like the miniatures which don't really expand the game much, but provide useful tools to play it with.

That mentality of "must get it all" can lead to the trap of saying "Wizards is doing badly - I don't like anything they're making!" Although I'm sure it is true for some, if Wizards sell you a couple of products a year, that's not bad!

The assumption here is that they sell enough of each book, and that some people that don't normally buy the books (or post here) will buy books from different series.

Cheers!