Dwarf books comparative review?

[Bhadrak]

Let me just add something real quick. Because these are both "player's options" books, they can be used together pretty well. There is nothing really contradictory and not a lot of overlap between the two, so they are quite complementary.

 

[KnowTheToe]

In support of the dollar and having had the opportuity to view the Badaxe Games book I will definitely only purchase that one. I bought all of the race books in 2E and have read the Dragon Mag issues on races, I definitely do not need to spend $20 to learn about Dwarves, Elves etc.

I see the largest potential problem with them being balance, read the Sultans of Slam thread to see how many of the third party feats and powers can be abused in game breaking mechanics. Some of the applications in that thread are far fetched and would be hard to bring about, but some of them are not all that difficult.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

From the preview of Hammer & Helm, there are new domains and probably a lot of other GM style goodies as well.

I'll second the notion. I am not shy at all in waving GMs away from Heroes of High Favor: DWARVES. This is a book for players, heavy on crunch, light on fluff. The book is specifically designed to be fairly generic so that players can get easy approval from the GM no matter the specifics of his campaign.

Wulf

 

[Bhadrak]

Actually, both books are player's option books. In other words, they're both crunchy without much fluff.

 

[Krug]

Oh no...

"Heroes of High Favor: Dwarves" was the first Badaxe Games book I've bought as it is their first product. The ideas inside seem to be solid, if perhaps a little on the bland side. For a first effort, I give them a big thumbs up and will certainly check out any future products.

As for "Hammer and Helm", I'm a big Green Ronin junkie, so it's only natural that I like it. I think it's a wonderful start to their new Races of Renown series. Now if they'd just hurry up and do one for halflings... (but, no, they've got to do one for Drow first <grumble>).

Argh! You make me want to get both! Argh! Argh! ARGH!

 

[whydirt]

Re: Oh no...

Argh! You make me want to get both! Argh! Argh! ARGH!

They're in cahoots, I tell ya!

 

[JoeGKushner]

One of my friends has Hammer & Helm and it's a great book for Players and GMs. Much more expansive in many dwarven facets of life than the Heroes of High Flavor. New weapons, spells, magic items, pregenerated pantheon. Awesome book.

Heroes much tighter focus on the dwarf as a fighter and some additional feats, rune rules and components for masterwork items.

Unfair to compare the two directly since they're very different books with much different focus.

 

[Nikchick]

In support of the dollar and having had the opportuity to view the Badaxe Games book I will definitely only purchase that one. I bought all of the race books in 2E and have read the Dragon Mag issues on races, I definitely do not need to spend $20 to learn about Dwarves, Elves etc.

You might be amused if you read the back of Hammer & Helm, because we advertise right in the back cover text that if you're looking for stuff like teatises on dwarven beard braiding or wedding rituals, you're looking at the wrong book. Hammer & Helm is crunchy, big time. We definitely wanted to stay away from the "learn about dwarves" angle and instead have positioned the Races of Renown books to be full of material that players can use to customize their characters or that GMs can use to fuel unique allies and adversaries for their games.

I see the largest potential problem with them being balance, read the Sultans of Slam thread to see how many of the third party feats and powers can be abused in game breaking mechanics. Some of the applications in that thread are far fetched and would be hard to bring about, but some of them are not all that difficult.

I don't think you have to worry about Green Ronin products breaking your game. Chris worked in WotC R&D during the development of 3E and Jesse Decker (Dragon Magazine editor by day, Hammer & Helm author by night) has a deep understanding of the D20 rules. I would hope that if there's any company you can trust on the rules, it'd be us.

Nicole