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Seven Strongholds
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<blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2009108" data-attributes="member: 9860"><p>Beware! This review contains major spoilers.</p><p>This is not a playtest review.</p><p></p><p>Seven Strongholds is Atlas Games' sourcebook of ready-to-run fortresses and follows on in a similar fashion to previous releases such as Backdrops and En Route in providing settings to drop into your campaign.</p><p></p><p>At $20.95 for 128 pages, this is fairly standard pricing for this type of sourcebook and space usage is reasonably good. The art reflects the fact that six different artists were used and ranges from poor to superb, and once more I found David Interdonato's work to be excellent on the whole. I was less than impressed by the front cover by Chris Pepper, which shows elves with very odd body shapes and Star-Trek-vulcan-like faces. I was glad to read Atlas have given David Interdonato a front cover after this poor showing. I was also impressed by Jennifer Meyer's much more effective portrayal of elves within.</p><p></p><p>Maps are pretty good, all scaled and with direction, and clearly keyed. Scales vary with the fortress portrayed, but are kept to 1 square per 5 ft. when indoors.</p><p></p><p>Both the style of writing and the editing are excellent.</p><p></p><p>As the title infers, there are seven strongholds detailed in the sourcebook:</p><p>* The Barrows - a group of gnome mercenaries use a concrete bunker as a base to protect the communities in the area from the monstrous hazards of the subterranean depths which lie beneath. The gnomes grant access to any adventurers willing to pay a hefty tithe. The bunker includes many deadly gnomish traps (fully detailed) in the area leading into the underdeeps, whilst the upper levels contain the living areas of the gnomish mercenaries, including shops for adventuring equipment (at a cost of course). Details of the political machinations going on in the mercenary group are given.</p><p></p><p>* Castle Briar - a living elven fortress comprised of thorny briars which reacts physically to the commands of its elven occupants. As well as offering up a variety of plant-related traps, this chapter has a wealth of ideas for magical fruits and a new deity, The Briar Princess, who responds to the clerics stationed in the castle who worship her. The politics of the fortress are explored through the most important NPCs and there is also a new poison given, which can be inflicted by the castle shooting voleys of pooisoned thorns out of its walls, sending enemies into unconsciousness.</p><p></p><p>* Gloom Keep - this miserable place is actually the location of a dying god of law come to earth, protected by his last few ascetic followers. As well as details of the god's important followers, there is information on the dying god himself, some answers to questions the PCs might have. The fortress where the dying god resides comes replete with various traps, some residual magical effects, six constructed floating spheres which protect the god and rules for the effect of sensing the god first-hand and possible conversations that might occur with the god.</p><p></p><p>* Old Mound Fort - an Iron Age hillfort giving access to ancient treasure-filled ruins beneath. The fortress is controlled by a band of evil bandit halflings, a bunch of backstabbing, double-crossing rogues. They aim to rob and murder the adventurers that come seeking entrance to the ruins beneath the fort, using a basic but effective scam.</p><p></p><p>* Steelface Point - a dwarven fortress protects the mouth of a mountain pass from a goblinoid horde. Even though vastly outnumbered, the dwarves have held their enemies back using missiles which explode to send spells such as fireball and lightning out into the charging hordes. There is an interesting wondrous item that enables the dead owner of a spellbook to make the spells in the spellbook invisible, bargaining in spirit form with its inheritor with the reward being the revealing of the spells, usually in return for resurrecting the wizard. There are also some details on the siege weapons used by the goblinoid hordes.</p><p></p><p>* The Perch - this clifftop fortress is commanded by a new race, the bird-like Psittae. Much of the section is dedicated to information on the Psittae, including their pantheon. The Psittae harass the local populations in the lands below.</p><p></p><p>* Uthront's Fort - a newly constructed motte and bailey castle built by a visionary half-orc, the first of many strongholds that will be part of his planned half-orc barbarian kingdom. The half-orc has gathered a group of half-orc barbarian bandits to his cause who lord it over the 'wretches', gnome and halfling slaves, who are put to work keeping the castle in proper shape. The section introduces a number of new feats, a new creature (a screaming horse) and some magical armour that grants extra feats at the cost of XP.</p><p></p><p>Each fortress begins with an overview of the stronghold, advice for geographical placement in a campaign setting, fairly detailed NPCs with excellent roleplaying information and (as far as I could see) correct stats. Also covered is the layout of the fortress itself including traps, treasure and design features. Each section ends with a few good adventure ideas and, most usefully, ideas for changing the setup of the fortress as portrayed in the preceding information to suit a GMs needs (such as making the halfling bandits at Old Mound Fort good-aligned (really there to help adventurers) or neutral (there to fleece adventurers but not rob and kill them). </p><p></p><p>There is also an index of all d20 rules introduced in the book.</p><p></p><p>Conclusion: </p><p>This is a well-written sourcebook with plenty of adventure ideas, and generic enough to be thrown into most fantasy campaigns (or with alternative ideas to tweak it if not immediately suitable). There are also lots of crunchy bits - traps, magical items, deities, feats, etc. to keep rule-lovers happy. The NPC information is excellent and gives plenty of scope to those GMs who want to explore the roleplaying aspects of the characters in the strongholds. There are some great political setups to involve the PCs in and some fun NPCs to play.</p><p></p><p>My only complaint would be that a couple of the stronghold ideas seemed a bit weak to me, or maybe just didn't appeal to me - Old Mound Fort and the Barrows seemed to follow a similar theme, and the Psittae in The Perch didn't excite me greatly (though there were plenty of original ideas here).</p><p></p><p>So I can't fault the book in either its presentation or its approach. It should be useful and appeal to most GMs out there and is definitely value for money. Its hard to put my finger on why I'm not giving this 5/5 because its such a well-heeled book, but some of the strongholds just didn't grab me by the shirt collar, fling me against the nearest wall and demand to be used in my very next adventure. But some did, and its worth getting for those.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Simon Collins, post: 2009108, member: 9860"] Beware! This review contains major spoilers. This is not a playtest review. Seven Strongholds is Atlas Games' sourcebook of ready-to-run fortresses and follows on in a similar fashion to previous releases such as Backdrops and En Route in providing settings to drop into your campaign. At $20.95 for 128 pages, this is fairly standard pricing for this type of sourcebook and space usage is reasonably good. The art reflects the fact that six different artists were used and ranges from poor to superb, and once more I found David Interdonato's work to be excellent on the whole. I was less than impressed by the front cover by Chris Pepper, which shows elves with very odd body shapes and Star-Trek-vulcan-like faces. I was glad to read Atlas have given David Interdonato a front cover after this poor showing. I was also impressed by Jennifer Meyer's much more effective portrayal of elves within. Maps are pretty good, all scaled and with direction, and clearly keyed. Scales vary with the fortress portrayed, but are kept to 1 square per 5 ft. when indoors. Both the style of writing and the editing are excellent. As the title infers, there are seven strongholds detailed in the sourcebook: * The Barrows - a group of gnome mercenaries use a concrete bunker as a base to protect the communities in the area from the monstrous hazards of the subterranean depths which lie beneath. The gnomes grant access to any adventurers willing to pay a hefty tithe. The bunker includes many deadly gnomish traps (fully detailed) in the area leading into the underdeeps, whilst the upper levels contain the living areas of the gnomish mercenaries, including shops for adventuring equipment (at a cost of course). Details of the political machinations going on in the mercenary group are given. * Castle Briar - a living elven fortress comprised of thorny briars which reacts physically to the commands of its elven occupants. As well as offering up a variety of plant-related traps, this chapter has a wealth of ideas for magical fruits and a new deity, The Briar Princess, who responds to the clerics stationed in the castle who worship her. The politics of the fortress are explored through the most important NPCs and there is also a new poison given, which can be inflicted by the castle shooting voleys of pooisoned thorns out of its walls, sending enemies into unconsciousness. * Gloom Keep - this miserable place is actually the location of a dying god of law come to earth, protected by his last few ascetic followers. As well as details of the god's important followers, there is information on the dying god himself, some answers to questions the PCs might have. The fortress where the dying god resides comes replete with various traps, some residual magical effects, six constructed floating spheres which protect the god and rules for the effect of sensing the god first-hand and possible conversations that might occur with the god. * Old Mound Fort - an Iron Age hillfort giving access to ancient treasure-filled ruins beneath. The fortress is controlled by a band of evil bandit halflings, a bunch of backstabbing, double-crossing rogues. They aim to rob and murder the adventurers that come seeking entrance to the ruins beneath the fort, using a basic but effective scam. * Steelface Point - a dwarven fortress protects the mouth of a mountain pass from a goblinoid horde. Even though vastly outnumbered, the dwarves have held their enemies back using missiles which explode to send spells such as fireball and lightning out into the charging hordes. There is an interesting wondrous item that enables the dead owner of a spellbook to make the spells in the spellbook invisible, bargaining in spirit form with its inheritor with the reward being the revealing of the spells, usually in return for resurrecting the wizard. There are also some details on the siege weapons used by the goblinoid hordes. * The Perch - this clifftop fortress is commanded by a new race, the bird-like Psittae. Much of the section is dedicated to information on the Psittae, including their pantheon. The Psittae harass the local populations in the lands below. * Uthront's Fort - a newly constructed motte and bailey castle built by a visionary half-orc, the first of many strongholds that will be part of his planned half-orc barbarian kingdom. The half-orc has gathered a group of half-orc barbarian bandits to his cause who lord it over the 'wretches', gnome and halfling slaves, who are put to work keeping the castle in proper shape. The section introduces a number of new feats, a new creature (a screaming horse) and some magical armour that grants extra feats at the cost of XP. Each fortress begins with an overview of the stronghold, advice for geographical placement in a campaign setting, fairly detailed NPCs with excellent roleplaying information and (as far as I could see) correct stats. Also covered is the layout of the fortress itself including traps, treasure and design features. Each section ends with a few good adventure ideas and, most usefully, ideas for changing the setup of the fortress as portrayed in the preceding information to suit a GMs needs (such as making the halfling bandits at Old Mound Fort good-aligned (really there to help adventurers) or neutral (there to fleece adventurers but not rob and kill them). There is also an index of all d20 rules introduced in the book. Conclusion: This is a well-written sourcebook with plenty of adventure ideas, and generic enough to be thrown into most fantasy campaigns (or with alternative ideas to tweak it if not immediately suitable). There are also lots of crunchy bits - traps, magical items, deities, feats, etc. to keep rule-lovers happy. The NPC information is excellent and gives plenty of scope to those GMs who want to explore the roleplaying aspects of the characters in the strongholds. There are some great political setups to involve the PCs in and some fun NPCs to play. My only complaint would be that a couple of the stronghold ideas seemed a bit weak to me, or maybe just didn't appeal to me - Old Mound Fort and the Barrows seemed to follow a similar theme, and the Psittae in The Perch didn't excite me greatly (though there were plenty of original ideas here). So I can't fault the book in either its presentation or its approach. It should be useful and appeal to most GMs out there and is definitely value for money. Its hard to put my finger on why I'm not giving this 5/5 because its such a well-heeled book, but some of the strongholds just didn't grab me by the shirt collar, fling me against the nearest wall and demand to be used in my very next adventure. But some did, and its worth getting for those. [/QUOTE]
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