Advanced Bestiary vs Beast Builder

[BSF]

Obviously it would be best to get both of these fine books. Both have reviews.
Advanced Bestiary
Beast Builder

But let's assume for a moment that you can only afford to purchase one of these ENnie nominated products. Based on reviews, it looks like Advanced Bestiary would be more applicable if you only want to change stock monsters. Beast Builder would be a better choice if you want ot construct a monster from whole cloth.

How true is this assumption? Which book would be best for which need?

Again, if you are a fan, sell me on the book.

 

[Crothian]

Very true.

Advanced Bestiery is for peopole that want variations (and some cool variations are possible) on the creatures you already have. The book is all templates so it needs base creatures supplied.

Beast Builder will take a bit more time to use, but it will allow you to construct the base creature you want to create. And then idealing use Advanced Beastiary to modify it.

I like and use both. They compliment each other nicely.

 

[DragonTurtle]

Beast Builder has a section on Templates and the two books work well together. If you only had the money to purchase one, I would ask what you plan to get from the book.

If you want a quick way to customize your monsters, Advanced Bestiary is a great book, with templates that I would have never thought of. You want a Galleon that turns into a walking siege engine, it is there.

If you want to make each monster count and make sense in your campaign and truly want to create each monster from scratch, then Beast Builder is it.

 

[Qwillion]

get the one that is in print

then save the money till beast builder comes out in print

 

[BSF]

Why in print? Increasingly more of my gaming references are digital. Especially for resources that are predominantly geared toward the GM, I see no special reason to buy a print product.

 

[Garnfellow]

How true is this assumption? Which book would be best for which need?

Your assumption is spot on. Both books are exellent, but Advanced Bestiary probably has more utility.

 

[catsclaw227]

Have any of you read the Deluxe Book of Templates (Revised edition)? That's a pretty darn good book too. I recommend we consider all of them if we are comparing them.

On that note, I dig AB. I haven't read AMS:BB yet, though I am getting it today from drivethrurpg.com.

Any thoughts on the Deluxe Book of Templates (Revised edition)?

Catsclaw

 

[BSF]

Have any of you read the Deluxe Book of Templates (Revised edition)? That's a pretty darn good book too. I recommend we consider all of them if we are comparing them.

On that note, I dig AB. I haven't read AMS:BB yet, though I am getting it today from drivethrurpg.com.

Any thoughts on the Deluxe Book of Templates (Revised edition)?

Catsclaw

I like the Deluxe Book of Templates. Quite a bit of goodness therein. I also wonder about the BESM Monstrous Manual by Guardians of Order. But I was mostly trying to drum up the discussion about the current ENnie nominees since these can be voted on right now, and they can be purchased as PDF at good prices.

But to expand out the discussion beyond that, I like toolkits. I like to be able to change up adversaries in an unexpected way. Of course, I use a lot of humanoid NPCs to try out class combos. But Templates are fun as well. Beast Builder looks interesting for creating the niche monsters that I want for my game.

As an example, I have ressurection magic in my game. But there are some ways to die where you cannot be brought back. One of these is a creature that literally devours your soul. Nasty critter! I also have various sorts of undead that are not in any book. I like to use monsters like this to give my homebrew that extra twist and to totally thwart the metagaming aspect of player knowledge about a given monster. Beast Builder might be helpful in all of these regards.

But a good template book would give me some possibilities as well. Especially since I can use templates to create entire race branches, or to create those strange one-off creatures that are freaky mutants of hybrids.

The old Monsters Handbook from Fantasy Flight games is good. The Deluxe Book of Templates is good. But there are new things coming out and I haven't seen as much buzz on these as I would like.

 

[Andre]

...Advanced Bestiary would be more applicable if you only want to change stock monsters. Beast Builder would be a better choice if you want ot construct a monster from whole cloth.

[Note: I've only seen the demo of Beast Builder]

One thing to consider with BB is the list of special qualities in the back. Using nothing but that list, I'll bet you can quickly modify virtually any creature in minutes. I've done the same myself using an incomplete list compiled by a friend. A few examples:

Dark Grig. Start with a Grig, make the following changes:
• Change alignment to neutral evil
• Change environment to underground
• Add Evil Eye (Su), minus the death effect
• Add Darkvision 60’
• Remove Fiddle special ability
• Change CR to 2

Corrosive Fungus. Start with Phantom Fungus, make the following changes:
• Add two secondary slam attacks, 1d6+1 (tentacles)
• Add Corrosive Slime, Weak (a toned-down version of the ability)
• Add Adhesive
• Change CR to 4

Blink Sneaks. Start with Blink Dog, make the following changes:
• Add Camouflage (Ex)
• Add Sneak Attack (Ex)
• Change CR to 3

Ice Wolves. Start with Winter Wolf, make the following changes:
• Add Icewalking (Ex)
• Add Water Walking (Su) (special effect: ice forms under its paws)

Royal Guard Skeleton (ala Diablo II). Start with Skeleton, make the following changes:
• Add max hit points per hit die
• Add Oversized Weapon (Ex)
• Add Powerful Charge (Ex)
• Add Rush (Ex)
• Change CR to 1

Rastipede. Start with Rast, make the following changes:
• Spider Climb (Ex)
• Remove Flight (Ex)
• Change ground speed to 40 ft.
• Add climb speed 40 ft.

Hellacious Hounds. Start with Hell Hound, make the following changes:
• Add Death Throes (Ex)
• Boost CR to 4

Someone who has BB will have to confirm that such abilities are listed in useful form, e.g., Death Throes, Rush, Powerful Charge, Icewalking, etc. If so, I'd recommend BB for shear flexibility and ease of use.

 

[BSF]

Hmm, that's a good point. Being able to modify existing monsters based on nothing more than plugging in abilities and adjusting the CR is just as good as templating monsters. Obviously creating a dynamic 'template' could be off in the CR without some playtesting. But that degree of flexibility is very nice.