Heroes and Magic Sourcebook

[KDLadage]

updated on 22-NOV-02

Oone games is an interesting little company. Not often does one see a movie trailer for an RPG supplement. They have some good ideas, and most of them are well carried out. I disagree with a few choices they have made, but the fact remains, they do good work. For example:

• the first race offered up is this 12-page PDF download is the Drakand. They are the 'mysterious and wild race' in their settings. Overall, a well written race. However, they are given -1 WIS and -1 INT -- many times have the people at WotC explained why giving an odd-numbered modifier is a bad thing. I tend to agree with WotC on this one. After an e-mail or two, I can see the reasoning that Oone Games has for using the +/-1 modifiers. I still disagree with it, but that is a matter of aesthetics, not a matter of the 'meat' of what they have written.
• in the classes section, we see the Cavalier. Not a bad class, overall, but I see two things that seem off-kilter to me. The first is the 'automatic income' -- this seems to go against the grain of most classes, somehow assuming that they do not get a regular income. Still, I can live with it. The second thing is the fact that of all of the special abilities of a Cavalier, only two are listed on the level-progression chart.

These two examples seem a little odd, when placed against the backdrop of the fine work in the Magical and Clerical section of the booklet. If all of the booklet had been like this, I would have given it a 5. As it is, I drop the rating to a '4.'

 

[Messageboard Golem]

The artwork and layout of this book is excellent and you can't beat the price. (It's free!)
The sourcebook is intended for the fairly low magic Seven Avengers setting that 01games is putting out. But it is a little too specific.
Compared to the standard races, the races presented here are to my eye unbalanced, thus making it difficult to extract for your own campaign world. I don't mind the +/- 1 modifiers since I use the point buy method, for which the problems with odd characteristic modifiers don't occur. It looks like Seven Avengers will be an interesting campaign world, but there is very little here for a DM who is looking for ready-made additions to his own campaign world. As a source of ideas, and for the excellent artwork it is worth a (4/5) since the only cost is electrons and time.

 

[Simon Collins]

Beware! This review contains major spoilers.

Heroes and Magic Sourcebook is an introduction to 0one's world of Arthad in the form of Arthadian races, a new class, and some magic guidelines for the world. It is also an introduction to 0one's Seven Avengers line. It is a free 1.35MB .pdf download from http://www.0onegames.com/

Presentation: The .pdf file is 12 pages long. The first page is an average piece of colour artwork (if slightly cartoony), depicting a scantily-clad woman levitating in the middle of a stone circle, weaving magic around herself. The last page depicts the same scene, except a text overview of the file replaces the woman. The second page contains the OGL and credits and the third page describes the contents. The internal colur artwork is poor and suffers from the same cartoony feel as the first page. The text is relatively dense with little white space (except at the end of the sourcebook where 1/2 page is left comletely blank). In fact, the text in the tables in the sourcebook is almost too small at times. There are several grammatical mistakes in the text and the literary style is very simplistic, though nothing that renders the text unreadable.

Whats Inside: After a brief introduction to Arthad and the raison d'etre for the sourcebook, eight new races are covered: Drakand (black-skinned barbarians who wear magical bone armour), Draman (viking-like guardians of a magical sword), Land People (tall red-haired folk who are caught up in internal disputes between the many duchies that make up the territories of the Land People), Nath (a nation of spies with aquiline features), Randrom (nomadic horsemen), Scinthy (mountain warriors), Svariji (solitary archers), and Zenith (a created barbaric race with shamans who experience magical dreaming). Included in the races section are three tables - one indicating racial ability adjustments, the second giving stats for bone armour (including magical Drakand bone armour), and the third detailing two new weapons (Drakand bone mace and the Scinthy scimitar-like sabrah). Next up is the cavalier class, which essentially replaces the Paladin, since there are no gods in the world of Arthad. Indeed, the Cavalier class is in many respects like the Paladin, in both description and stats, with some subtle differences (the Cavalier has a squire and a monthly income, a little like a mediaeval knight). A table outlines the Cavalier's stat progression although, as noted in previous reviews, several abilities are missing from the table that are described in the text. The next section deals with the magic of Arthad - symmetry (arcane magic) and harmony (divine magic). Magic is very rare in Arthad, and opponents can suffer a morale penalty when facing symmetry magic. Symmetry magic benefits if the caster is near an ancient monument or artifact (known as a symmetry spot) - a feat is included that gives a bonus to sensing symmetry spots. Similar rules exist for harmony, though harmony magic is not reviled like symmetry magic and proponents of harmony gather together in brotherhoods. The vibrations of both types of magic can be sensed by other spellcasters. The sourcebook ends with two examples of brotherhoods.

The Good: First off, its free. Thats a good start. Secondly, the section on magic is inspiring and interesting. The whole sourcebook has moments of interesting tidbits that hook you into wanting to find out more about the world. It allows players to devise characters ready to play in forthcoming Seven Avengers adventures, in what looks to be a setting not too far removed from the world of David Gemmell's Drenai novels, a concept that I find exciting despite its dubious legal implications.

The Bad: The races seem more like human subraces (except perhaps the Zenith) to me and would be more honestly offered as such. The use of +1/-1 ability adjustments prompts this approach even more strongly. The art and the literary style are somewhat jarring at times with the intensity of the description. At the end of the day, this is still just an introduction to a setting, and is limited in its depth.

Conclusion: I'm going to give this a Good rating based purely on the fact that it does what it sets out to do - that is, provide a free introduction to some of the concepts underlying Arthad and the Seven Avengers, and a basis for players to develop charcaters for use in that setting. That aside, there are a few ideas in here that could be modified for use in other settings (I myself am particularly atttracted to the idea of symmetry and harmony spots). Treat the races as human subraces, accept the cavalier as a paladin-replacement and enjoy the stuff on magic. Try and ignore the art and the simplistic literary style.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

A small booklet that helps you create Arthadian characters and learn the way the magic works in 0one Games world. Free to download from the publisher.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

By Bruce Boughner, Guest Reviewer, d20 Magazine Rack and Co-host of Mortality Radio

This review is for Heroes and Magic by 0one Games. Listed as the beginning of The Seven Avengers Saga, this short PDF sourcebook is 24 pages of races, feats and source information for the world of Arthad. The tome contains short descriptions of the 8 races of Arthad and of their respective countries and cultures. One class, a Cavalier variant and 2 Prestige classes with attendant feats and spells are also detailed, along with a world map and one new monster.

The races of Arthad are all human. They are deity-blessed with exceptional ability modifiers and are geared towards specific classes, i.e. one race is a race of rogues, one a warrior race, etc. Wizards and Sorcerers are shunned classes and mostly limited to the aristocracy if at all. Wizardry is shifted over to a leyline/power node type system, while clerics are denied direct contact to the gods, as the gods of Arthad are dead. Clerics, instead must feel the harmony around them in order to produce spell-like effects. They can also derive power from the order-like brotherhoods they belong to. And the effects of the spellcasting of all of them can be felt as waves from a distance by other spellcasters. The new spells in this book are all directly linked to this magic system.

The cavalier variant does not differ much with any other cavalier I have seen, but has some interesting class features. The prestige classes of Living Legend and Shadow Master are very interesting and could adapt with some work to other settings.

The remainder of the book is a gazetteer of Arthad and ends with a map of the continent. The maps’ artwork is reminiscent of the original World of Greyhawk Gazetteer and the interior artwork ranges from very striking to talented amateur.

As a free download, this product is well worth the download time, added to another work or greatly expanded upon would make for a moderate sourcebook for sale.

To see the graded evaluation of this product, go to The Critic's Corner at www.d20zines.com.