Age of Illusions netbook

[The Great Gray Skwid]

So, I see a lot of referrals from over here...what do y'all think of the new netbook? I'd love some feedback from elsewhere than the Call forums.

(In case you missed the news, you can get it from The Dragon Scepter)

 

[Aleshandre]

Hi-ya Skwid!! Just hangin out and plugging the netbook.

 

[Terraism]

I've read through it - not exhaustively, but relatively well - and my initial reaction is "decent." I did prefer the first netbook, but I think that's probably because it was more grounded in the WoT setting, if that makes sense. The first netbook covered a lot of things that the published book left out. Rather large things. Not surprisingly, my favorite part of this netbook is the rules for breaking a shield - another big book bit, worked out mechanically.

That said, I do like this one, quite a bit. I'm not much of a fan of the first chapter, unfortunately - for a number of reasons. Neither of the backgrounds seemed particularly useful, though there's nothing wrong with them. The hero templates were fine, but I've thought them all unneccessary from the get go. I understand why they were included in the core book (as they expected many first time gamers to pick it up) but here? Meh. The Seaman is my biggest gripe - I don't see any need for the class, as is. The average (hero classed) Atha'an Miere can be more than adequately represented, I think, by wanderers. As a class, I don't see much point to having the seaman be a seaman - at it's core, it's a lightly-armored combatant, with a large number of skills. Similar to the 3.0 ranger, actually - with some ship-based abilities instead of favored enemies. Nothing spectacular. The number of prestige classes, I'm not going to touch - I'm known for frowning on prestige classes, because I'm not a fan of how prevalent they've become (I prefer to represent many things through multiclassing.) Of those I looked at, most seem well done, though. As for the templates - I liked the corrupted template, but not the damane. I consider it more of a RP issue than a mechanical one, but if the latter route is chosen, it works well. (One issue - I'd make the +2 bonus to the primary stat a named - morale, specifically - bonus.)

Of the rest of it, there's a lot of really good stuff. I like most of the new feats - though I haven't read them thoroughly enough to comment on balance. The same goes for the new weaves and wondrous items, though I like the flavour of all of them. The NPCs were interesting, but nothing particularly special, to me anyway. That's more due to a combination of the geek inside saying "no, no, give them these classes" and the fact that I'm not running a "modern" game with it - ours is set quite a ways back in WoT history.

As for the netbook itself, it's put together nicely - I didn't notice many spelling or grammar errors, which is nice. The formatting could use a little work, I'd note, but then, I'm a graphic design major, and notoriously picky. Overall, nice work!

 

[The Great Gray Skwid]

Thanks for the feedback, Terraism. Exactly the kind of constructive criticism I like to get.

I'm particularly glad you liked the breaking a shield rules, as I worked part of them out myself, and was unsure whether to include them until the last moment.

I'm particularly peeved that we missed the unnamed bonus in the Damane template...we tried hard to weed those out. That template raised quite a bit of controversy, and thus the "Editor's note." FWIW, I agree with you, but I still thought others might find it useful.

Go ahead and elaborate on the formatting...it's hard to get qualified criticism on that.

 

[Terraism]

Thanks for the feedback, Terraism. Exactly the kind of constructive criticism I like to get.

Good. 'Cause I'll have more for you, just as soon as I have time to do more reading. But first I need to work my way through The Seige of Ebonring Keep.

I'm particularly glad you liked the breaking a shield rules, as I worked part of them out myself, and was unsure whether to include them until the last moment.

You know what's funny - it's been years since I last read the Wheel of Time books - Winter's Heart had just been released. It fairly well disillusioned me with Jordan - much as I love the world, I'm sick and tired of book after book with no end in sight.

I bought the d20 book when it came out, though, because, as I said, I loved the setting. Loved the book, never got to use it. This year, it finally came up. I didn't have time during the year, but I'm planning on rereading the books this summer. Plus the two that've came out since then. Anyway - the point of this is that I'd forgotten all about the breaking of a shield. So I was doubly happy to see rules for it - reminded me of another keystone.

I'm particularly peeved that we missed the unnamed bonus in the Damane template...we tried hard to weed those out. That template raised quite a bit of controversy, and thus the "Editor's note." FWIW, I agree with you, but I still thought others might find it useful.

Yeah, unnamed bonuses can be sketchy. And it's a hefty sized book, so it's easy to miss a few. It's got less errors than most WotC products, anyway. As far as the template being in there, I understand. I've worked on netbooks before, and I'm well aware of the amount of differing opinions you get from having dozens of people work on it.

Go ahead and elaborate on the formatting...it's hard to get qualified criticism on that.

The first thing that jumps out on me is the column layout - while columns are certainly good things, you've got a problem because, with a number of prestige classes, the abilities table bisects the page. A reader expects to read to the bottom of the page in a column before moving on to the next - breaking over halfway, so that the order is upper left, upper right, lower left, lower right, as opposed to left-right, is distracting. Even after one realizes it, it's the kind of thing that'll subconsciously interfere with reading and material absorbtion.

As a sidenote - if you'd like to contact me, I'm on AIM as Terraism, as well.