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ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Byrons_Ghost" data-source="post: 1239903" data-attributes="member: 7396">I bought it. I like it. Especially the integration of background/flavor text with rules. There's an almost even split between the two, and everything blends together extremely well. Usually when a product tries to balance the two, nothing fits together and it ends up not really pulling off either one.I especially like the way things tie into the different cultures, since it naturally makes sense that they would evolve different styles based need, national character, etc. Plus, there's enough range that I can use rules from the supplement for just about any fantasy setting. I never thought of putting swashbucklers in Ravenloft before this.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f60e.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":cool:" title="Cool    :cool:"  data-smilie="6"data-shortname=":cool:" /> That said, the book wasn't quite what I expected, so I was feeling a little disappointed. I guess I was hoping for more of an actual fencing system to use, instead of a prestige class and feat collection. Now, from a D20 design standpoint this was undoubtedly the way to go, as it's balanced and easily usable with other material. I was just hoping for some variant rules, or something a little different, to set things apart from regular D&D combat.The emphasis on maneuvers and tricks does do that a bit- as you said in the above post, against heavily-armored opponents that would definately be the way to go.One last thing- the prestige class requirements seemed a bit tough to meet. Especially since many of them seem to require multiclassing. Characters will probably have to be 7th or 8th level to qualify for them, which means that anyone in the styles would already be a pretty good combatant. The book- and especially the genre- have references to young students getting in brawls over which style is superior, which doesn't seem to fit with mid-level characters. Of course, it could be argued that by the time a character enters the prestige class, they're closer to a master of the style, but before that they're just fighter/rogues (or whatever). If I ever use this in tabletop (a good possibility, with the next Dragon issue I've been thinking of a Red Steel game), I'd probably come up with some sort of "style progression" leading up to the prestige class, along the lines of martial arts styles in OA and the like. Mostly just a mapped plan to the class requirements, but it would give more of a "training" type feel and less of a "now that I'm X level, I can become this class". That could just be my take on things, though. I'm usually in the minority.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" /> Overall, an excellent job. I would definately keep an eye out for similar or expansion products in the future (hint).</blockquote>

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