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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="trancejeremy" data-source="post: 2010156" data-attributes="member: 924">Bluffside is a city book from Thunderhead games (now part of Mystic Eye Games). It's 144 pages, with a soft glossy cover and pullout map, and priced at $22.95 (I got mine on ebay for $13, though I've been outbid several times previously for it, usually it goes for around $15.)It's supposed to be a generic city, usuable in just about any fantasy/d20 setting, but it's really not very generic. The basic premise was that civilization was destroyed by a meteor a while ago, and Bluffside is built on the crater of where the meteor hit. It's also got Dragon-people, Winged Folk, and other non-standard fantasy races, like steam gnomes and merfolk that have a funny name. So generic it's not. That said, it's a very interesting city. The first ten or so pages gives it's background. In what is probably a first in fantasy, Bluffside was founded by a group of archaeologists, originally as a base camp to explore some ancient ruins. Part of these ruins became part of Bluffside, but the rest was built up like a normal town.As the name implies, it's on a bluffside, at the top of a 500 foot cliff. There's also a city at the bottom of the cliff, floating on the water there. There's a passage up thanks to the work of the Steam Gnomes. The bulk of the book (well, 60 pages or so) describes city locations. These have a standard 'stat block', which tell you the name, a description, info about the owner, a list of regulards, and generally 2 adventure hooks. Places that are restaurants also generally have a menu (a very atmospheric touch)Most of these are fairly interesting places. Not too goofy, no hippies or ananchoristic jokes (like found in a certain other city book), though some of the business names are puns ("The Rested Pipe", "Inn Between", "Take a Bow"). It's not overly seedy, but then again, it's not really meant to be. Though there is a thieves' guild and a couple other criminal syndicates, including one very nasty bunch (slavers).There's about 4 pages devoted to the area outside of Bluffside. This is quite specific and almost certainly won't be suitable for most campaigns.As mentioned, there are several new races introduced. Stats and full write ups are given. The most interesting (I think) are the Nevae, which are essentialy elf cross breeds. Half drow elf, half some other sort of elf.There's a few prestige classes, all of which are good, actually. The Cat Burglar, Bluffside Ranger, Explorer, and Tunnel Fighter. There's also some spells, equipment, and magic items. Nothing really exciting, but nothing bad, either. 30 pages of the book is devoted to stats for prominent NPCs. This is quite nice. One of the downsides of d20 is that characters tend to be stat heavy. So it's nice they've done the work for you. (You can also reuse these stats should you ever need a quick NPC). Although I haven't gone over it with a fine tooth comb, I did notice a few problems in the stats. But nothing too hideous.All in all, this is a pretty neat book. My only real complaints is that contrary to the text on the back of the cover, it really can't "be easily dropped into any d20 fantasy campaigns", since it introduces several new races, some gods, and the whole concept of Bluffside is reliant on a fairly specific history. The back cover also promises huge amounts of web support on their web site, but this seems to have been extremely optimistic. Going there, there is only a few incomplete items.There's not a lot of art and most is of average to poor quality, but the maps are extremely well done (albeit small). They look handdrawn (which I like) and are very well drawn. Much better than the computer-ish looking ones from some companies where all the buildings are exactly carbon copies of each other (The map of the area surrounding Bluffside does look computer generated, though not super fake looking). The pullout map is at a very large scale, so it's probably not all that useful without squinting or a magnifying glass. You might want to make enlargements with a photocopier.B+.  Would be higher if it didn't claim to be completely generic (or plug into any campaign). Quite honestly, while I liked having full stats for so many of the NPCs, I would also have liked more details about their personality.I also have to wonder why there is so much blank space between the various sub-cities or districts of Bluffside. While not quite as silly as having an entire island empty (as in another city sourcebook from another company), there is a lot of space that would almost certainly be used by people in a real city.But, these are fairly minor problems. And it's pokemon free!</blockquote>

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