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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2010830" data-attributes="member: 9860">This is not a playtest review.Bow & Blade is a guidebook to wood elves from Green Ronin.Bow & Blade is a 104-page mono softcover product costing $19.95. Layout is attractive - font is good, there is very little in the way of white space, though there is a single line gap between paragraphs. Margins are average. There is one ad at the back of the book, but it is for a complementary product, The Village of Corwyl, to be released in early 2004. The product will detail a wood elf village and seems to have a very interesting over-arcing plot as well as some fascinating crunchy items including new classes (shamanistic ancestral speaker and elite Terellian knight), 40 detailed NPCs, and more wood elf feats, PrCs, etc. Anyway, back to the product in hand. I'm a great fan of Jennifer Meyer and her art is featured heavily in this product - it is truly superb. The rest of the art ranges from poor to good. Art is mostly appropriate to the textual context but not always. The writing style is concise but engaging. I'm particularly glad Chris Thomasson co-wrote this with Jesse Decker - Chris admits that before he wrote the book that he thought "elves sucked" whilst Jesse seems to be a fan. Coming from this viewpoint should aid in bringing fresh ideas to the wood elf whilst retaining the better aspects of the archetype. Editing is fine with occasional minor errors.Chapter One: The Way Of The ForestThe chapter begins by looking at the role of the wood elf in both general and elven society, before giving a thorough breakdown of the Wood Elf as a race with usual details on personality, religion, alignment, etc., along with racial stats and traits. Several new elf subraces are then offered. The first four are elemental elves - fire, metal, water, and wind. Each have a +3 Level Adjustment to balance some fairly powerful features, though a sidebar gives advice for reducing the powers to get rid of the LA. This is followed by an option to treat wood elves as elemental elves (based on the element of wood), along with an LA of +3. The last elf subrace is the Feral Elf, an offshoot of wood elves, are more primal in nature, with barbarian rage, the ability to shapeshift into a nugaran (like a cross between a wolf and a baboon), have druid/shaman as a favoured class and have an LA of +2. The chapter ends with a description of two wood elf deities - the Lord of the Forest (the wood elf's main deity), Prielghari (an elemental deity), and Worranak (chaotic, destructive nature), as well as a brief discussion of wood elf spirituality and worship.Chapter Two: Skills And FeatsThis chapter starts with some ideas for new uses for existing skills, including how to use the Disguise skill for camouflage, various tricks around the Handle Animal skill to aid the user in scouting, combat and spellcasting, and using Spellcraft to gain access to cross-class spells.Two new feats are introduced - blood magic feats (where spellcasters sacrifice their own blood to power their spells) and soulbond feats (where one being bonds with another to give magical powers and emotional vulnerabilities). Access to Soulbond feats requires a ritual costing money and XP. Nearly 50 new feats follow, which include general feats such as cautious casting (gain AC bonus when casting defensively) and ghost blade (attack incorporeal foes) as well as feats related to blood magic, such as toxic blooded spell (damaging spells deal additional poison damage), and soulbonding, such as soulbond of spell potence (+2 on caster level checks to overcome spell resistance when within 10 ft. of your soulbonded partner). Other feats include inheriting the bloodline of an elemental elf, a few archery-related feats (such as improved rapid shot and the LotR-inspired Stick and Fire, which involves stabbing an enemy with an arrow before firing it) and some cool bardic feats such as spellsinging (which improves a nearby spellcaster's caster level using song, once the bard is at least 9th level). There is a table summarising the feats in a sidebar.The chapter ends with a section on magical and martial arts styles, which grants a combat-style benefit if a series of related feats taken and skill ranks achieved. Examples include Flame Dance, which gives additional damage from fire spells, and Arrows of the Ghost Wood, which gives a sneak attack bonus to ranged shots against flat-footed opponents. Chapter Three: Prestige ClassesSeven new prestige classes are offered:* Initiate of the Ashen Path - 10 levels, must be at least 4th level before accessing, average BAB, good Fort and Will saves. Evil burnt spellcaster specialising in fire magic.* Lifeweaver - 14 levels, must be at least 6th level before accessing, poor BAB, good will saves. Arcane/divine caster gains levels in both existing arcane and divine classes, along with spontaneous cures, amalgamation of class levels for caster level purposes, and the ability to sense life at distance.* Metallurgic Savant - 10 levels, must be at least 7th level before accessing, good BAB and Fort saves. Class features focus on changing the nature of metal, particularly weapons.* Soul Archer - 10 levels, must be at least 6th level, good BAB, Fort and Ref saves. Improves archery through bonding with his bow, which finally becomes a sentient weapon.* Speardancer - 10 levels, three paths - spearbrute, spearghost and spearmind. Must be at least 4th level before accessing, average BAB, save progression varies with path. Gains spear-fighting techniques with advantages dependent on path.* Wildheart Fanatic - 3 levels, must be at least 3rd level to qualify, gains double the rate of BAB, but suffers Cha and Con loss as well as poor saves. Main class feature is barbarian-style Rage, which stacks with standard barbarian's rage.* Wildsinger - 10 levels, must be at least 7th-level before qualifying, average BAB, good Will save. Mixes bard and ranger flavour with songs that affect the wilderness and a bond with the forest.Chapter Four: CreaturesThis chapter includes a handful of creatures of the forest and a template. The creatures include the vicious crocodilian Nugarik, the ethereal Spirit Cat and the mindless Treeskinner Worm. The Children of the Wood are small fey that gain druidic-like spells and other means of affecting their forest homes and which can be played as PCs with the information given (LA +2). Vine-corrupted Creatures are a templated creature that gains tendril attacks, plant traits, and an evil alignment.Chapter Five: Spells & MagicThe chapter begins with spells listed by class, and for fans of the GR's Master Class 'Shaman' and 'Witch', spells are classified appropriately for these classes as well. An additional classification allows elves of any class to gain certain spells that have become quintessentially elven. Two new domains are offered - Wood and Wild, as well as over 30 new spells. These range from 1st to 9th level and include such spells as detect sentience, halt plant, predatory stealth, primal scream, prison of stone, scent, troll arms, and woodland sanctuary, which acts a little like the hallow spell but benefits elves, fey, and animals.Chapter Six: EquipmentThe chapter offers dual grip weapons (requiring exotic weapon proficiency) allowing two different ways of wielding a weapon; the user must take a move action to shift grip and must have a BAB of at least +2 to use the dual grip. Weapons such as the blade bow (a hollow bow with a rapier hidden inside), greatbow (6 ft. high), long knife (thin knife that can also be thrown), bows for horse archers, and the spear-axe are all described. Several types of arrows are also described - boomerang, screaming, and bouncing arrows, as well as a number of alchemical arrows. Five new types of armour are also offered, including armour crafted from lacquered leaves, and specially treated wood. Several new substances are described, including faerie smoke, the poison spellbane (which inhibits spellcasting and spell-like abilities), and askealing leaf (sharp leaves that can be used to craft slashing weapons). The chapter finishes with a selection of new magic items, including such items as armour of maximized healing, chameleon weapons that can shift between two different types of weapon such as a longbow and a longsword, a suffocating arrow, ring of rappelling, an amulet of tree melding, a selection of charms (once-off items of jewellery such as the charm of surprising willpower, which grants a once-off Will bonus as a free action), and sylvan rope, made from the hair of fey.Appendix: Typical NPCsGives full 20-level progression for three typical wood elf NPCs - lifeweaver, knife fighter (ranger/rogue multiclass), and a soul archer.The book ends with a useful two-page index. High Points:The viewpoints of the authors did create the desired effect - new and traditional, and some nice twists to the traditional view as well. The good news for those who are not so keen on wood elves is that there is plenty of stuff in here that is useable in general for elves, and even for other races and classes (note the new spells for the shaman and witch for example). I found the equipment section particularly inspiring, which is usually my least favourite chapter in a book of this kind, and I appreciated that the prestige classes catered for a variety of classes for wood elf PCs. I also liked the soulbond feats, as the benefits were nicely balanced by the disadvantages and added roleplaying spice. Spells were also appropriate, imaginative, and varied, on the whole.Low Points:There were sections where I forgot this was a book about wood elves - interesting stuff, but a 5ft. step away from the matter at hand - this seemed particularly noticeable with the elves, deity, feats, PrC, and spells to do with the elements of fire, water, metal, and wind. This stuff did not seem to gel with the rest of the information on the wood elves to my mind. The blood magic feats were also another aspect where the flavour of the wood elf ran a little thin. Great ideas, just not in keeping with the flavour of the product in my opinion. One idea I was not keen on was the use of the Spellcraft skill to gain access to spells from other classes - I'm not a fan of rules that allow one set of class features to bleed over to another.Conclusion:Well-written, with some great art, and with a plethora of inspiring ideas useable well beyond the confines of the subject matter (sometimes too much so for my liking). The forthcoming Village of Corwyl sourcebook giving a detailed account of a wood elf village should be a valuable companion, and if it is as good quality as this product, will also be a worthwhile buy.</blockquote>

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