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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Psion" data-source="post: 2010758" data-attributes="member: 172">Fang & FuryFang & Fury is part of Green Ronin's Races of Reknown series of books focusing on new race options for d20 System fantasy. In this case, the topic race is vampire, a race traditionally reserved for monsters and villains. Fang & Fury is written by Jim Bishop.A First LookFang & Fury is an 80-page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $16.95. This is fairly typical for a book of this size and format.The cover of the book is illustrated by WotC veteran illustrator Todd Lockwood. The cover depicts a pale skinned, white haired woman with exposed cleavage, trickles of blood coming from her mouth revealing her sinister nature.The interior of the book is black and white, and features a strong selection of illustrators: Julian Allen, Andrew Baker, Storn Cook, Jennifer Meyer, and James Ryman.The interior body text is modestly sized, and the leader space is moderately small, though the paragraphs are double spaced. The interior layout is clean and uncomplicated, with good, frequent use of art.A Deeper LookOne of the central edifices of Fang & Fury - introduced in the first chapter of the book - is the vampire scion. The vampire scion is a much down-powered version of the vampire that lacks several characteristics of the core d20 System vampire. The vampire scion lacks the energy drain ability of a vampire, and the blood drain attack is changed from an attack that changes constitution to one that drains hp. Further, the vampire scion lacks many of the defensive characteristics of vampires, such as their rapid healing, damage reduction, and resistance to destruction via mundane methods.The apparent thrust of these changes is to lower their effective character level (ECL) to +2 from +8, making them much more suitable as player characters if the GM is inclined to such a game. Some of these changes seem reasonable, as the d20 System core vampire is sort of a cobbled up version assembled from scraps of myth, literature, and film. However, the one loss that seems the most intolerable to me is the near total scrapping of the vampire's defensive abilities in making the scion. These changes, I feel, make the vampire too fundamentally different from what I would call a vampire.The remainder of the chapter provides some (excellent) discussions of the physiology of the vampire, and variant rules for a number of vampire weaknesses and abilities. The vampire scion is so thoroughly worked into the substrate of the book that if you don't read closely, you may miss the fact that not only are many of these variant rules usable with existing vampires, some of them don't make much sense for use with vampire scions. For example, one rule discusses the vampire weakness of being staked through the heart in some detail; this "weakness" is not a special weakness at all for vampire scions, as they have no special abilities that allow them to come back when "destroyed" by mundane methods. Many comments of many vampire weakness apply to other d20 System vampires, though the book does not make this obvious and it takes a little deduction.Another major difference between vampire scions and standard vampires is that they have an alignment designation of "often chaotic evil" instead of "always chaotic evil", with the caveat that they can never be good. The chapter has a discussion of vampire character personalities based on this convention.The second chapter, Way of the Blood, expands on the first with further notes on both making individual and distinctive vampire characters and making conventions for vampires in the campaign. The beginning of the chapter returns to the books primary focus on its own variant, the scion, with character archetypes and discussions of various classes as vampires.The chapter returns to more generally applicability in a section full of alternative racial concepts. This again is where the book shines with concepts that will baffle jaded veterans. Tires of the same old vampire? Try a vampire who is not, in itself undead, but a creature with undead, sentient blood. Or, try "natural" vampires that have few of the supernatural weakness of vampire. Or you can make vampirism an insidious disease. Each of these variants has both the logic behind the variation and rules for changing the vampire to accommodate the new concept.The Way of the Blood chapter wraps up with some ideas for campaign models involving vampires. Though many of these ideas rely on the PCs being vampires, some of them (some of the more obvious and traditional ones) involve campaigns opposing vampires.The book introduces feats primarily for use by vampires. Again, the scion is the fundamental unspoken assumption behind many of these, but some of them would be useful for other vampires. Some feats like Drain Black Bile and Drain Phlemic Humour rely on the classical medicinal idea that certain fluids it the body could be drained and affect the target's emotional outlook. Many feats improve the vampire's natural attacks and other abilities, and other allow the vampire to disguise itself from mortal or, for those who make war on other vampires, it's kin.Another major mechanical aspect is a selection of nine prestige classes aimed at vampires. Some of them also allow the vampire scion to gain some of the powers commonly attributed to vampires. Some classes do not assume the vampire is undead (and thus have less than d12 HD), in case you are using them with the "natural vampire" discussed earlier.The prestige classes include: -Black Abbot: The black abbot is a divine spellcaster with dark ambitions and a penchant for controlling other undead. Some black abbots sought out vampirism deliberately as a result of their obsession with undeath in their life; others may have been rewarded with vampirism by their dark gods. -Foundlings: Foundlings are elven vampires in the service of the demon queen of dark fey. The foundling has wild shape abilities allowing it the form of bats and wolds (like a standard vampire) and other abilities related to fey and the natural world. -Masqued Player: The masqued player is a sort of eternal undead actor who takes upon the most depraved roles that the stage would call for. The masqued player gains primarily magical abilities that let them enhance their performances and manipulate others. Though interesting, some GMs may find its abilities a bit too metaphorical, such as the Deus Ex Machina ability that gets the masqued player out a scrape. -Nighthawk: The nighthawk is a vampire with optimized speed and stealth abilities. In addition to their enhanced speed and skill, they have their own spell list with spells enhancing their frightful stealth and mobility. -Rag Man: Based upon one of the vampire variants allowing vampires to be created from a suicide, rag men are vampires consumed in madness and whose abilities allow them to spread it to others. -Regent: Another vampire ability that the vampire scion lacks in the domination gaze. The regent is a class designed to restore and add to that ability. Regents are leaders and msters of intimidation and control; they gain a mesmerizing gaze and an aura that can cause a variety of reactions. -Reveler: The reveler is the basis between an alternate theory of vampire advancement. Much like the idea behind the Highlander franchise, the theory goes that vampires only have a limited pool of power and a vampire who slays other vampires can gain power. The reveler represents this in that a vampire can only advance in the class by destroying powerful vampires (compared to itself), but as the reveler progresses, it slowly overcomes many vampire weaknesses and gains other powers. -Scourge: Another prestige class primarily aimed at allowing a vampire scion to regain some abilities of a standard vampire, the scourge is something of a vampric hero that (among other things) gains damage reduction and ability drain abilities as it gains levels. -Vampire Mage: A simple concept, the vampire mage receives new insight into the nature of magic owing to its vampiric nature. In addition to continuing to progress as a spellcaster, the vampire mage slowly gains access to a list of spells that it can cast spontaneously (drawing from its normal spell slots.)Note that each prestige class has a sample character, but the book's preference for showing its own vampire variant shines through, as in no place is the standard vampire used in preference to the scion.New creatures are introduced in the book relating to vampires in some way. Many are templates, though some are other creatures that have some relationship to vampires. For example, a few dark fey are included as potential servants of the foundling prestige class. Giant mosquitoes are included as they sometimes are used by vampires to harass living intruders.New templates fill a variety of roles. For those who aren't happy with just a dracolich, the vampiric dragon template should keep the players quaking in their boots. Blood puppets are mortal servants bound to their vampire masters by means of a blood gift. Daywalker is Bishop's spin on the idea of a dhampir of half-vampire. Similar to blood puppets, Vampric Thralls are animals, beasts, or magical beasts enslaved by vampires by a blood gift.Other mechanical highlights include deities, domains (blood, greed, and mania) and spells for vampires, as well as magic items and artifacts. The appendix also provides lists of "stock NPC" vampire scion characters.ConclusionRating this book is a tough call for me. On one hand, its prestige classes and other mechanics are logical and purposeful, which is something that cannot be said of many classes and other mechanics in other products. Further, there are some great ideas for variant vampires and vampire campaigns in the book.However, while I agree that the core rules vampire could definitely afford to be filtered so it isn't such a hodge podge of abilities, I feel like the vampire scion goes too far in stripping down the vampire to its basics. Further, while many parts of this book are suitable for use with other vampires, the emphasis on the vampire scion is obvious and in some cases the author does not make it clear when a mechanic will be useful for non-scion vampire types.Overall Grade: C+-Alan D. Kohler</blockquote>

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