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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2009575" data-attributes="member: 9860">This is not a playtest review.Common Ground II: Guard Towers, Thieves Guilds and Private Clubs, is the second in a series from Bard's Productions offering a fast generation system for buildings and their occupants.Common Ground II comes in at $11.95 for 48 pages. This is a significant page increase over Common Ground I (which was 32 pages for the same price). In addition to this, the strength of the cover used seems significantly improved, though it is still staplebound. The new price per page brings it into the same ballpark as other 48-page accessories. Space usage is pretty good. Both inside covers are used (for OGL and credits), font size is good (though the overall appearance can be somewhat cramped at times), margins are average, and there is little wasted space (1 full page ad). The internal mono computer-generated art is average, as is the colour cover. There is a central 4-page set of colour maps for each of the location types covered - these are of good quality but there is no scale designated. The writing style is concise and workmanlike, whilst editing is average, with occasional but regular mistakes (including a missing word on a section header - doh!).Like Common Ground I, the sequel offers a restricted set of choices for quickly generating a building and its occupants. This uses a step-by-step choice mechanism, not random generation. Section I: Guard Towers1. Determine Terrain Type - 3 options with points to note and a sidebar detailing travel arrangements and overland movement rates.2. Size and Map of Guard Tower Structure - 3 options with advice, linked to maps in central map sheet.3/4/5. Choose NPC Stats for location occupants dependent on terrain type and size. Lists of generic pre-generated NPC stat blocks.6. Alignment, race, gender, and name choices for NPCs. Stat modifiers and name lists given.7. Stats for doors, locks and traps for the building.Section II: Thieves Guilds1. Choose size - gives advice on numbers and type of occupants dependent on size.2. Choose maps - dependent on size, the appropriate map. Also information on traps with some nice sample trap triggers and examples of passwords.3. Stat blocks for Guild leaders and senior thieves. A sidebar discussing good-aligned guilds.4. Guild's base thieves stat blocks and some ideas for the name of the thieves guild.5. Guild Enforcer stat blocks, with sidebars on street gangs and the use of a variety of races for thieves guild members.6. Swindler stat blocks, with a note on why high-level NPCs are not available for choice (they can disrupt the logic of a campaign setting when created on the fly).7. Alignment, race, gender, and name choices for NPCs. Stat modifiers and name lists given. There is also a sidebar with stats for 11 new poisons.8. Stats for doors, locks and traps for the building.Section III: Private ClubsWe're talking adventurer guild halls, casinos, bordellos, as well as private clubs.1. Choose size and map.2. Choose purpose (guild house/entertainment facility).3. Proprietor and secondary personnel stat blocks - advice on assigning positions/professions. Also stat blocks for 'normals', spellcasters, men-at-arms (with a sidebar about bribes), and tricksters (with a note on hidden skills of NPCs).4. Race, Gender, and Name for NPCs. Stat modifiers and name lists given. There is also a sidebar with some menu price suggestions.5. Stats for doors, locks and traps for the building. There is also a useful sidebar dealing with gambling.The remainder of the accessory gives worksheets for recording the choices you make as you create locations and NPCs on the fly for the three different areas. Conclusion:Like Common Ground I, the major problem with this accessory is the time taken out of a 'live' game to create these locations and their NPCs. This is supposed to be the major use of the accessory, but I just can't see my players hanging around for 5 minutes (a real 5 minutes) whilst I track through the book creating what amounts to a fairly well detailed thieves guild, private club or guard tower. If this was a computerised program, it might be possible to create something quickly enough to not interfere with the flow of the game.I also noticed a couple of problems with stat blocks for the NPCs - if this is where the crux of the accessory lies, then the author should have made 110% sure there were no mistakes in these sections.Like Common Ground I, this may be of some use to pre-game creation of these types of buildings, but there's nothing that any half-decent GM couldn't whip up in an hour. However, this accessory does allow you to significantly cut down the time that this would normally take. Better value in terms of content volume than Common Ground I, but I still question the overall value for money of this type of product, particularly in terms of its stated use.</blockquote>

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