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Xanathar's Guide to Everything
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<blockquote data-quote="MrMockery" data-source="post: 7337606" data-attributes="member: 6937448"><p><strong>3 out of 5 rating for Xanathar's Guide to Everything</strong></p><p></p><p>Lets start with the things I liked shall we:</p><p>I really like what they've added with tools, it's really made a big step into making them a genuine part of the game, rather than just a bit of background for your character.</p><p> It adds a nice variety of things for characters to do, and really gives players a reason to go for more "just a dude" backstories, which I appreciate. It's also genuinely creative and useful for the most part, giving just about every tool an application (though cobblers tools still feel a bit useless, unless your DM is a bastard about footwear). The gambling proficiencies are my personal favourite, they encompass just about everything I'd want to do with them, aside from "win the imaginary game within the imaginary game"</p><p></p><p>The character generation is a bit so-so for me. It has some nice stuff for fleshing out a backstory, but that's not something I've ever noticed as lacking in any of my players. Reminding players that their characters have friends and families from before their career as adventurers is pretty good though.</p><p></p><p>Downtime revisted and complex traps is stuff I'm quite glad to see come in from Unearthed Arcana mostly unchanged. It's functional and has good guidelines and suggestions, and the example traps are pretty good, at least the ones I've seen and tested. Downtimes nice and simple, and pretty hands off for players, though I'd still let them do more detailed things if its good.</p><p></p><p>Other DMs stuff is kinda predictable and while useful, not anything difficult to make yourself or of fantastically high quality. A list of magic items is only more handy than the DMs guide if it includes them in an easy to access way, not if you have to flip though a separate book to find them.</p><p></p><p>The new racial feats are quite nice. Human ones are lackluster but they were always going to be, the others add a variety of pretty fun stuff. I am a big fan of the amount feats let you customise characters so it' always a plus. That does lead me to the below issue however...</p><p></p><p>Subclasses are... ok. They are for the most part, fine. I'm sorry that more of the elemental sorcery classes didn't make it in from UA, but we can't have them all I guess. Sticking with sorcerer for a little longer, every alternate subclass is nearly objectively more powerful than the standard players handbook ones. The Divine Soul is particularly irksome to me, it acts as fuel for the "I'm the chosen one" character my players occasionally make that drives me nuts, it has the same level 14 ability as the Draconic sorcery one, except for a possible change in fly speed and minus all the disadvantages. It also feels like it's encroaching strongly onto cleric territory, because why would you play a cleric or sorcerer when you can play both.</p><p> Stepping on other classes or existing subclasses toes is kind of a theme for the subclasses here. We are introduced to the swordy wizard (though we already had bladesinger), a clericy sorcerer and warlock and a rouge that's really a ranger (and I feel we narrowly missed out on a ranger that's pretty much a rogue). I don't love the grave domain, because it's like the death domain minus the evil (which I guess is the point), and the forge domain is a different enough take on light and knowledge for me to allow it.</p><p> Other than some blurring lines, there are a few classes with frankly weird or just plain near useless. Worst offenders to me are the Horizon Walker Conclave, which just seems way too specific to fit into most campaigns. It's a very hard sell that you'd just be a wandering ranger of a secret order of portal guardians or something, and it's a hard subclass for me to flavour nicely. I have the opposite problem with the hexblade patron: It's not enough. It's not really anything. How do you make a pact with "a force" that has no more flavour then: "sometimes manifests as weapons" and "has something to do with the raven queen." My issue with the raven queen UA was that it is too inflexible, and the hexblade kind of nonsensical. This attempted rewriting of it is kind of a useless middle ground. There's not really anything for a DM to work with here unless there's a book specifically about shadowfell about to come out or that I simply haven't read.</p><p></p><p>Spell list was a little disapointing. A lot of the "new" spells are from the elemental evil expansion, and while the new ones added much needed variety to high level warlock and sorcerer lists, the focus on arcane traditions only adds fuel to the huge mass of spells wizards already get access too, even adding more wizard exclusive spells. It's a pet peeve of mine that sorcerers don't have a single exclusive spell, and I was hoping dragon's breath would be the first, but wizards get that too. Non-Arcane classes tend to miss out in this one, with very few new spells for clerics and druids. Those they did add I quite liked, but there should have been more. And then there's the obvious: Healing Spritiy, or the bit they forgot to read over before pressing publish. A moderately broken healing spell, that really should have been picked up on.</p><p></p><p>Overall, I'm pretty happy with the minor bits of it, the little extra bits that weren't the focus, and the subclasses, about half the big stuff were alright, just let down by a few kinda crappy examples. The spells added are by and large good, but don't focus on where spells are really needed and my god needed a bit more editing.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MrMockery, post: 7337606, member: 6937448"] [b]3 out of 5 rating for Xanathar's Guide to Everything[/b] Lets start with the things I liked shall we: I really like what they've added with tools, it's really made a big step into making them a genuine part of the game, rather than just a bit of background for your character. It adds a nice variety of things for characters to do, and really gives players a reason to go for more "just a dude" backstories, which I appreciate. It's also genuinely creative and useful for the most part, giving just about every tool an application (though cobblers tools still feel a bit useless, unless your DM is a bastard about footwear). The gambling proficiencies are my personal favourite, they encompass just about everything I'd want to do with them, aside from "win the imaginary game within the imaginary game" The character generation is a bit so-so for me. It has some nice stuff for fleshing out a backstory, but that's not something I've ever noticed as lacking in any of my players. Reminding players that their characters have friends and families from before their career as adventurers is pretty good though. Downtime revisted and complex traps is stuff I'm quite glad to see come in from Unearthed Arcana mostly unchanged. It's functional and has good guidelines and suggestions, and the example traps are pretty good, at least the ones I've seen and tested. Downtimes nice and simple, and pretty hands off for players, though I'd still let them do more detailed things if its good. Other DMs stuff is kinda predictable and while useful, not anything difficult to make yourself or of fantastically high quality. A list of magic items is only more handy than the DMs guide if it includes them in an easy to access way, not if you have to flip though a separate book to find them. The new racial feats are quite nice. Human ones are lackluster but they were always going to be, the others add a variety of pretty fun stuff. I am a big fan of the amount feats let you customise characters so it' always a plus. That does lead me to the below issue however... Subclasses are... ok. They are for the most part, fine. I'm sorry that more of the elemental sorcery classes didn't make it in from UA, but we can't have them all I guess. Sticking with sorcerer for a little longer, every alternate subclass is nearly objectively more powerful than the standard players handbook ones. The Divine Soul is particularly irksome to me, it acts as fuel for the "I'm the chosen one" character my players occasionally make that drives me nuts, it has the same level 14 ability as the Draconic sorcery one, except for a possible change in fly speed and minus all the disadvantages. It also feels like it's encroaching strongly onto cleric territory, because why would you play a cleric or sorcerer when you can play both. Stepping on other classes or existing subclasses toes is kind of a theme for the subclasses here. We are introduced to the swordy wizard (though we already had bladesinger), a clericy sorcerer and warlock and a rouge that's really a ranger (and I feel we narrowly missed out on a ranger that's pretty much a rogue). I don't love the grave domain, because it's like the death domain minus the evil (which I guess is the point), and the forge domain is a different enough take on light and knowledge for me to allow it. Other than some blurring lines, there are a few classes with frankly weird or just plain near useless. Worst offenders to me are the Horizon Walker Conclave, which just seems way too specific to fit into most campaigns. It's a very hard sell that you'd just be a wandering ranger of a secret order of portal guardians or something, and it's a hard subclass for me to flavour nicely. I have the opposite problem with the hexblade patron: It's not enough. It's not really anything. How do you make a pact with "a force" that has no more flavour then: "sometimes manifests as weapons" and "has something to do with the raven queen." My issue with the raven queen UA was that it is too inflexible, and the hexblade kind of nonsensical. This attempted rewriting of it is kind of a useless middle ground. There's not really anything for a DM to work with here unless there's a book specifically about shadowfell about to come out or that I simply haven't read. Spell list was a little disapointing. A lot of the "new" spells are from the elemental evil expansion, and while the new ones added much needed variety to high level warlock and sorcerer lists, the focus on arcane traditions only adds fuel to the huge mass of spells wizards already get access too, even adding more wizard exclusive spells. It's a pet peeve of mine that sorcerers don't have a single exclusive spell, and I was hoping dragon's breath would be the first, but wizards get that too. Non-Arcane classes tend to miss out in this one, with very few new spells for clerics and druids. Those they did add I quite liked, but there should have been more. And then there's the obvious: Healing Spritiy, or the bit they forgot to read over before pressing publish. A moderately broken healing spell, that really should have been picked up on. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the minor bits of it, the little extra bits that weren't the focus, and the subclasses, about half the big stuff were alright, just let down by a few kinda crappy examples. The spells added are by and large good, but don't focus on where spells are really needed and my god needed a bit more editing. [/QUOTE]
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