JoeGKushner
Adventurer
Cities & Settlements
Written by Jeff Ibach, Jim Sharkey, Philips and Cheryl Vanmater Miner, and Edgar Rosero
Published by Troll Lord Games
http://www.trolllord.com/newsite/d20/1014.html
ISBN: 1-931275335
120 b & w pages
$19.95
Cities & Settlements is one of the last hurrahs from Troll Lord Games for the d20 system. Covering nineteen separate locations, this book ranges from orc strongholds and gnoll camps to dwarven halls and desert camps. Aimed squarely at a DM, a player might also find inspiration in terms of character origin and home.
Written by a wide variety of authors, Jeff Ibach stands out the most to me. Artists include Bryan Swartz and Jason Walton with cover art by David Monette. Interior art is fair. In terms of price, the book fares well against other similarly sized books, even counting the pages lost to advertising. Layout is standard two-column but is very tight to the borders causing a lot of dashes to be used for breaking up words giving it a somewhat ragged appearance. Editing is poor. Spelling is off, tables don’t fully match text descriptions, and some words are missing. In short this is a standard role-playing game product.
Locations start off with a summary and move into a stat block. The block includes the following information; size/type, population, alignment, demographics, gold limit, power center, authority figures, important non player characters, and then moves into more meaty areas with more details. These include history/background, and then moves into general layout/first impression, economy/trade, customs/laws, religion/worship, and then the locations/personas. Ideas on what brings the PC’s are included as well as adventure hooks.
Information is kept generic in most cases. For example, one town has a shrine built by the cleric of the god of strength. Easy enough to put Kord or another god in that place. When things are named, such as a certain drow goddess for Dalnin Quareth, the substitution of ‘official’ material is easily.
There’s a lot of variety to be found here and most DMs should be able to customize the locations quickly. Seeker’s Rest for example, is a place for characters to seek shelter from the storm. In addition, since it’s a monk’s haven with it’s own secrets, it can provide monk players with a home away from home as well as some new sparing partners including an undead master monk and a stone giant monk among others.
For DMs looking to craft their own tales of low level characters coming from a tough and tumble frontier town, Fort Crahluk with it’s half-orc barbarian inhabitants who own land thanks to an arrangement with a paladin lord, will find everything they need. There’s even an ancient locked mound in a stone circle that’s locked. Easily enough for a GM to throw one of his dungeons right there and let the players have at it.
Not all of the locations are dedicated to bringing the characters a place to rest or even a safe house in which to become involved in other’s affairs. Dalnin Quareth for example, is an outpost of drow outcast from their home. While the traditional role of ‘good’ characters would be to quickly put down these drow, a more mercenary or even evil campaign might have the players come under the employment of the house of Quareth with the promise of near unlimited power once they take over their old city.
New game mechanics are covered in the appendices. Appendix A provides some new uses for various skills. A new craft skill, Scrimshaw, for craft, joins Bargain as a new subskill of Diplomacy among others. There are three new feats. Battle Cry gives foes who fail a Will save a morale penalty on their attacks against the speaker. Five Strength Fighting Style increases the DC of a monk’s stunning attack by two while Lunge increases the weapon’s threatened area by five feet. Unfortunately, it also opens up the user to an attack of opportunity from anyone that threatens the user. Useful for those always-fighting opponents who move back five feet.
Appendix B covers prestige classes, but actually starts off with a core class, the bounty hunter. The bounty hunter uses d8 for hit dice, good bab, good ref and will save, four skill points per level with a good set of skills including many social ones as well as physical ones. The basics of the class start off with proficiency with an ‘exotic’ weapon for which the bounty hunter is usually known, as well as track.
As they rise in level, they gain Preceding Reputation, a bonus to Diplomacy and Intimidate Checks. They also gain Hunt’s Desire. This is similar to a ranger’s favored enemy ability in that it grows as the character gains levels, but only effects a specific target, or as the hunter gains in level, a specific group. Add a few other abilities in and the bounty hunter is a solid class.
PrC’s start with the Glider, a master of aerial combat. The Matron Mother is a cleric of a ‘queen-goddess of spiders’ that is a divine spellcaster. The Scaled Guardians are snake cultist that have to be able to summon some type of snake before entering the class. The Ulrich Pikeman is a five level PrC that focuses on making the polearm into an even more dangerous weapon by increasing the critical multiplier, allowing the Pikeman to use the haft as a weapon against adjacent opponents and bonuses against bull rush, overrun and trample checks. The PrC’s close off with the Woodwraith. This is an expert at fighting in wooded areas but has it’s own spell progression list. Not completely without cause as the requirements allow even a non-druid or ranger to enter it, but unlikely since it requires high ranks of Survival as well as Track among others.
Appendix C includes several new spells. Not enough to provide a listing, the spells start off in alphabetical order. Aimed at both types of magic, we have things like Magic Damage Reduction, a 5th level arcane spell that provides damage reduction of 20 that requires the enemy spellcaster to be at least five levels higher then you to Quicksand, a 4th level druid spell that transforms the ground into twenty foot deep quicksand.
The weapons and equipment of Appendix D include some odd pieces like the Bladewing War Glider as well as several new poisons and even new exotic weapons for those bounty hunters. Appendix E includes new magic items. One of the most interesting is Silverbark, a magical wood that requires less experience points to enchant due to it’s nature.
Appendix F introduces new monsters. This includes a variant of the orc, Winter Orc, as well as a PrC for the gnolls, Scout.
The book suffers from ‘okay’. The art isn’t bad, but it’s not stellar. The maps are serviceable, but no one would mistake them for Skeleton Key Games. The writing is solid, but suffers from terrible editing and ragged layout. Despite that, time pressed Dungeon Masters will get the most out of this book. Those who enjoy smaller areas where the players can make huge differences in the lives of the inhabitants, like throps and villages, will enjoy it. I can easily see a DM using this book in conjunction with a partially fleshed out setting like Iron Kingdoms or the Wilderlands of High Fantasy.
Written by Jeff Ibach, Jim Sharkey, Philips and Cheryl Vanmater Miner, and Edgar Rosero
Published by Troll Lord Games
http://www.trolllord.com/newsite/d20/1014.html
ISBN: 1-931275335
120 b & w pages
$19.95
Cities & Settlements is one of the last hurrahs from Troll Lord Games for the d20 system. Covering nineteen separate locations, this book ranges from orc strongholds and gnoll camps to dwarven halls and desert camps. Aimed squarely at a DM, a player might also find inspiration in terms of character origin and home.
Written by a wide variety of authors, Jeff Ibach stands out the most to me. Artists include Bryan Swartz and Jason Walton with cover art by David Monette. Interior art is fair. In terms of price, the book fares well against other similarly sized books, even counting the pages lost to advertising. Layout is standard two-column but is very tight to the borders causing a lot of dashes to be used for breaking up words giving it a somewhat ragged appearance. Editing is poor. Spelling is off, tables don’t fully match text descriptions, and some words are missing. In short this is a standard role-playing game product.
Locations start off with a summary and move into a stat block. The block includes the following information; size/type, population, alignment, demographics, gold limit, power center, authority figures, important non player characters, and then moves into more meaty areas with more details. These include history/background, and then moves into general layout/first impression, economy/trade, customs/laws, religion/worship, and then the locations/personas. Ideas on what brings the PC’s are included as well as adventure hooks.
Information is kept generic in most cases. For example, one town has a shrine built by the cleric of the god of strength. Easy enough to put Kord or another god in that place. When things are named, such as a certain drow goddess for Dalnin Quareth, the substitution of ‘official’ material is easily.
There’s a lot of variety to be found here and most DMs should be able to customize the locations quickly. Seeker’s Rest for example, is a place for characters to seek shelter from the storm. In addition, since it’s a monk’s haven with it’s own secrets, it can provide monk players with a home away from home as well as some new sparing partners including an undead master monk and a stone giant monk among others.
For DMs looking to craft their own tales of low level characters coming from a tough and tumble frontier town, Fort Crahluk with it’s half-orc barbarian inhabitants who own land thanks to an arrangement with a paladin lord, will find everything they need. There’s even an ancient locked mound in a stone circle that’s locked. Easily enough for a GM to throw one of his dungeons right there and let the players have at it.
Not all of the locations are dedicated to bringing the characters a place to rest or even a safe house in which to become involved in other’s affairs. Dalnin Quareth for example, is an outpost of drow outcast from their home. While the traditional role of ‘good’ characters would be to quickly put down these drow, a more mercenary or even evil campaign might have the players come under the employment of the house of Quareth with the promise of near unlimited power once they take over their old city.
New game mechanics are covered in the appendices. Appendix A provides some new uses for various skills. A new craft skill, Scrimshaw, for craft, joins Bargain as a new subskill of Diplomacy among others. There are three new feats. Battle Cry gives foes who fail a Will save a morale penalty on their attacks against the speaker. Five Strength Fighting Style increases the DC of a monk’s stunning attack by two while Lunge increases the weapon’s threatened area by five feet. Unfortunately, it also opens up the user to an attack of opportunity from anyone that threatens the user. Useful for those always-fighting opponents who move back five feet.
Appendix B covers prestige classes, but actually starts off with a core class, the bounty hunter. The bounty hunter uses d8 for hit dice, good bab, good ref and will save, four skill points per level with a good set of skills including many social ones as well as physical ones. The basics of the class start off with proficiency with an ‘exotic’ weapon for which the bounty hunter is usually known, as well as track.
As they rise in level, they gain Preceding Reputation, a bonus to Diplomacy and Intimidate Checks. They also gain Hunt’s Desire. This is similar to a ranger’s favored enemy ability in that it grows as the character gains levels, but only effects a specific target, or as the hunter gains in level, a specific group. Add a few other abilities in and the bounty hunter is a solid class.
PrC’s start with the Glider, a master of aerial combat. The Matron Mother is a cleric of a ‘queen-goddess of spiders’ that is a divine spellcaster. The Scaled Guardians are snake cultist that have to be able to summon some type of snake before entering the class. The Ulrich Pikeman is a five level PrC that focuses on making the polearm into an even more dangerous weapon by increasing the critical multiplier, allowing the Pikeman to use the haft as a weapon against adjacent opponents and bonuses against bull rush, overrun and trample checks. The PrC’s close off with the Woodwraith. This is an expert at fighting in wooded areas but has it’s own spell progression list. Not completely without cause as the requirements allow even a non-druid or ranger to enter it, but unlikely since it requires high ranks of Survival as well as Track among others.
Appendix C includes several new spells. Not enough to provide a listing, the spells start off in alphabetical order. Aimed at both types of magic, we have things like Magic Damage Reduction, a 5th level arcane spell that provides damage reduction of 20 that requires the enemy spellcaster to be at least five levels higher then you to Quicksand, a 4th level druid spell that transforms the ground into twenty foot deep quicksand.
The weapons and equipment of Appendix D include some odd pieces like the Bladewing War Glider as well as several new poisons and even new exotic weapons for those bounty hunters. Appendix E includes new magic items. One of the most interesting is Silverbark, a magical wood that requires less experience points to enchant due to it’s nature.
Appendix F introduces new monsters. This includes a variant of the orc, Winter Orc, as well as a PrC for the gnolls, Scout.
The book suffers from ‘okay’. The art isn’t bad, but it’s not stellar. The maps are serviceable, but no one would mistake them for Skeleton Key Games. The writing is solid, but suffers from terrible editing and ragged layout. Despite that, time pressed Dungeon Masters will get the most out of this book. Those who enjoy smaller areas where the players can make huge differences in the lives of the inhabitants, like throps and villages, will enjoy it. I can easily see a DM using this book in conjunction with a partially fleshed out setting like Iron Kingdoms or the Wilderlands of High Fantasy.
