John Cooper
Explorer
ACCIDENTS OF BIRTH: DEFORMITIES AND DEFORMITY FEATS
By Chris A. Field
Louis Porter Jr. Design product number LPJ 9797
11-page PDF, $2.25
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats is a short PDF covering a rather interesting niche: the benefits and drawbacks of having a deformed character. As the author mentions in his introductory paragraph, "in a world where dragons and demons can breed true with other species, deformities are as likely to result from magical curses, divine wrath and mad experiments as they are to result from hereditary illnesses, generations of incest, and exposure to toxins during pregnancy." It's worth noting that this PDF is equally useful in D&D/d20 Fantasy and d20 Modern/d20 Future settings.
The cover is simple enough: a close-up of a person's face with mouth wide open, displaying a set of vampirelike fangs. It's a simple yet effective cover, resulting from the stark blacks, whites, yellows, and reds that comprise the whole of the color palette. There is no interior artwork, save for a chunk of the cover reprinted as a frieze along the top of the interior pages.
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats starts out with a brief introduction, then gets right into the good stuff with a "Carrier Gestalt" deformity template, which is a combination of a stunted genius character being carried aloft by a hulking brute character, and the two working in unison. (The best example here would be "Master/Blaster" from the movie "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.") From there, we move on to the "Conjoined Twins" and "Bi-Cephalous" deformity templates, the first being two bodies grown together and the second simply being an otherwise normal body with an extra head. Finally, we get the "Reptilian" deformity template, in which a warm-blooded creature gives birth to a genetic throwback. Each of the four templates seems well done, with logical outgrowths (no pun intended) of having such an aberrant physical makeup.
After the deformity templates, the rest of the PDF is given to 28 new deformity feats, each with either benefits or drawbacks, but usually both. Again, these seem to have been well-thought-out; Chris seems very comfortable working within the d20 system. (The one obvious exception is when he states, in two separate sections, that a character falls unconscious and starts losing hit points when he reaches 0 hit points, when it's actually only when he falls into negative hit points that this occurs.)
Proofreading and editing could have been a bit tighter; as there is no credits page at all in Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats, I have to assume that Chris is wearing all the hats in this operation. In any case, I came up with a two-page list of minor corrections, along the lines of ignoring some of the standard d20 conventions (like italicizing spell names and capitalizing size categories and the names of abilities), as well as the normal assortment of punctuation errors, misspelled words, and the like. (One error type that kept cropping up was Chris' apparent dislike/unfamiliarity with compound words, like "whichever," "adulthood," "dim-witted," "strong-minded," and "off-hand," which he frequently split into two separate words.) As always, I'll send my error list his way, with the hopes that such simple oversights can be speedily corrected.
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats provides an interesting way to create unique characters. While I can see the majority of the information in this PDF being used by DMs to create odd and memorable opponents for the PCs to fight, the deformity feats within these pages could easily be used to create a stand-out-from-the-crowd PC. It's also worth pointing out that some of these "deformity feats" are quite natural and occur in real life; Chris gives us in-game details on such real-life abnormalities as albinoism, epilepsy, and hemophilia as well as the "mutant X-Men" stuff like having a prehensile tail, a serpent-hinged jaw, or web-shooting spinnerettes growing from your arms.
I give Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats a high "3 (Average)," easily bumpable up to a "4 (Good)" after the appropriate amount of polishing is completed. (Those of you unbothered by punctuation and grammar errors may as well consider this a "4" already.)
By Chris A. Field
Louis Porter Jr. Design product number LPJ 9797
11-page PDF, $2.25
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats is a short PDF covering a rather interesting niche: the benefits and drawbacks of having a deformed character. As the author mentions in his introductory paragraph, "in a world where dragons and demons can breed true with other species, deformities are as likely to result from magical curses, divine wrath and mad experiments as they are to result from hereditary illnesses, generations of incest, and exposure to toxins during pregnancy." It's worth noting that this PDF is equally useful in D&D/d20 Fantasy and d20 Modern/d20 Future settings.
The cover is simple enough: a close-up of a person's face with mouth wide open, displaying a set of vampirelike fangs. It's a simple yet effective cover, resulting from the stark blacks, whites, yellows, and reds that comprise the whole of the color palette. There is no interior artwork, save for a chunk of the cover reprinted as a frieze along the top of the interior pages.
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats starts out with a brief introduction, then gets right into the good stuff with a "Carrier Gestalt" deformity template, which is a combination of a stunted genius character being carried aloft by a hulking brute character, and the two working in unison. (The best example here would be "Master/Blaster" from the movie "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.") From there, we move on to the "Conjoined Twins" and "Bi-Cephalous" deformity templates, the first being two bodies grown together and the second simply being an otherwise normal body with an extra head. Finally, we get the "Reptilian" deformity template, in which a warm-blooded creature gives birth to a genetic throwback. Each of the four templates seems well done, with logical outgrowths (no pun intended) of having such an aberrant physical makeup.
After the deformity templates, the rest of the PDF is given to 28 new deformity feats, each with either benefits or drawbacks, but usually both. Again, these seem to have been well-thought-out; Chris seems very comfortable working within the d20 system. (The one obvious exception is when he states, in two separate sections, that a character falls unconscious and starts losing hit points when he reaches 0 hit points, when it's actually only when he falls into negative hit points that this occurs.)
Proofreading and editing could have been a bit tighter; as there is no credits page at all in Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats, I have to assume that Chris is wearing all the hats in this operation. In any case, I came up with a two-page list of minor corrections, along the lines of ignoring some of the standard d20 conventions (like italicizing spell names and capitalizing size categories and the names of abilities), as well as the normal assortment of punctuation errors, misspelled words, and the like. (One error type that kept cropping up was Chris' apparent dislike/unfamiliarity with compound words, like "whichever," "adulthood," "dim-witted," "strong-minded," and "off-hand," which he frequently split into two separate words.) As always, I'll send my error list his way, with the hopes that such simple oversights can be speedily corrected.
Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats provides an interesting way to create unique characters. While I can see the majority of the information in this PDF being used by DMs to create odd and memorable opponents for the PCs to fight, the deformity feats within these pages could easily be used to create a stand-out-from-the-crowd PC. It's also worth pointing out that some of these "deformity feats" are quite natural and occur in real life; Chris gives us in-game details on such real-life abnormalities as albinoism, epilepsy, and hemophilia as well as the "mutant X-Men" stuff like having a prehensile tail, a serpent-hinged jaw, or web-shooting spinnerettes growing from your arms.
I give Accidents of Birth: Deformities and Deformity Feats a high "3 (Average)," easily bumpable up to a "4 (Good)" after the appropriate amount of polishing is completed. (Those of you unbothered by punctuation and grammar errors may as well consider this a "4" already.)
