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Exalted Deeds/Vile Darkness - Broken?
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6684334" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Yes, your experienced friend is correct; it's generally agreed that the content in the books is very unbalanced. </p><p></p><p>I personally wouldn't pay for them. I found that there treatment of both good and evil was shallow even by D&D's typically unphilosophical standards, the writing was poor, and very little of the content was usable or demanding to be included in my game. The book in general wasn't helped by the fatuous handling of the 'adult content' which seemed to be more marketing driven than anything else, and the contents just don't serve well as either inspiration for dark fantasy (compare the over the top Lamentations of a Flame Princess, which is at least dark, if not often mature) nor as mature handling of serious but graphic subject matter.</p><p></p><p>Of the two, the Book of Vile Darkness is the better in every way (including for me being the less morally objectionable, go figure), but that's not really saying a lot. The Book of Exalted Deeds is so bad it even looks like it had low production standards. The art is generally inferior and its overall an ugly book. </p><p></p><p>I would like to think that almost any experienced DM could have done better, albeit probably not in what appears to me the product of a very rushed, get it published, we don't care what the quality is, timeframe. The BoED looks like it was rushed out the door by people who were not particularly inspired by the subject matter and who were just phoning it in.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 6684334, member: 4937"] Yes, your experienced friend is correct; it's generally agreed that the content in the books is very unbalanced. I personally wouldn't pay for them. I found that there treatment of both good and evil was shallow even by D&D's typically unphilosophical standards, the writing was poor, and very little of the content was usable or demanding to be included in my game. The book in general wasn't helped by the fatuous handling of the 'adult content' which seemed to be more marketing driven than anything else, and the contents just don't serve well as either inspiration for dark fantasy (compare the over the top Lamentations of a Flame Princess, which is at least dark, if not often mature) nor as mature handling of serious but graphic subject matter. Of the two, the Book of Vile Darkness is the better in every way (including for me being the less morally objectionable, go figure), but that's not really saying a lot. The Book of Exalted Deeds is so bad it even looks like it had low production standards. The art is generally inferior and its overall an ugly book. I would like to think that almost any experienced DM could have done better, albeit probably not in what appears to me the product of a very rushed, get it published, we don't care what the quality is, timeframe. The BoED looks like it was rushed out the door by people who were not particularly inspired by the subject matter and who were just phoning it in. [/QUOTE]
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Exalted Deeds/Vile Darkness - Broken?
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