1 out of 5 rating for Guildmasters Guide to Ravnica
As a non-Magic fan,
Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica was always going to have to work to selling me on the setting. I wasn't coming into the product with established affection. However, I am a junkie for neat campaign settings, and every time I read one I end up thinking of two or three campaigns I want to run in that world. WotC has proven me wrong a few times, surprising me with products I was sure I'd be indifferent towards; while I was initially hesitant (and vocally so) I was prepared to be proven wrong and fall in love with the setting.
In general, I'd much rather have a cool product I can praise than to be right. I desperately wanted this product to be good.
But as I read
Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica I found myself left with more questions over the world than I had answers. While I
could play or run in the setting with what I was given, I never felt like I was given enough information to manage the setting or accurately portray it, let alone present it as a living place. I never felt like I was given enough information to understand the world and I would either have to invent large swaths of the setting (defeating the purpose of paying $50 for a campaign setting product) or do further research. Lots of research. Likely necessitating the purchase of additional books.
As a small example, the Izzet League is a Guild of magic/steampunk inventors—as seen by the cover illustration—but I have no idea how widespread their technology is. Is it found everywhere with arc lamp streetlights, flying ships, and trains. Or is that localized to their holdings, and the technology seen as proprietary "Guild secrets"? To me that's essential information as it informs how I describe the setting, the potential weaponry of enemies, and even the setpieces of encounters.
Meanwhile, also I prefer to make my own choices over what I find most interesting in a setting. I like to have a choice, to find some small side area to make my own, or small reference that enflames my imagination. This book doesn't give me that. It provides the absolute minimum details for a single small area (that may or may not be representative of the entire world) and assumes I'm playing a Guild-focused game. When given a single non-choice like that I makes me want to rebel and do a game where the Guilds are in the background.
Now, in fairness, the city proper is given twelve pages of text detailing the neighbourhoods, which is probably comparable to the world lore given to Greyhawk in the
World of Greyhawk folio that launched a hundred campaigns. So you
can very easily run a game just with this book. It just requires some invention and willingness to take liberties with the setting. But if your players are not familiar with the setting, they won't know or care that you're making it all up.
That said, this book feels like it was written for existing fans of Ravnica and
not casual fans looking to learn more about the setting. It was designed for those fans who already know how the world works and just need some specifics. It's a book designed to introduce those fans to D&D. It's almost a conversion guide providing the rules for the current edition.
By this metric, how does the book measure up?
The
Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica certainly gives you the mechanics needed to play in the setting. It doesn't attempt to translate the five schools of magic to D&D (even in a flavourful method) but it gives you everything else. If you are a Magic fan curious about D&D, then this will be a solid purchase, and pair fairly nicely with the Basic Rules, getting you started and playing, with the monsters in that free PDF and this hardcover being all you need to adventure for months.
But if you're not a Magic fan and you just want a new world to play in… this is probably not a good choice. Try the Eberron book on the Dungeon Master's Guild, which is somehow more comprehensive despite being far smaller. Or check out the Midgard Campaign Setting from Kobold Press.
But to me, this book felt incredibly anaemic and probably inferiour in terms of both quantity of lore and mechanics to even the
Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.
Read my full review
here.