Kingdoms of Kalamar: Player's Handbook

[kenjib]

Croth, have you bought or seen the Quenisential Fighter (I know my spellin' sux) would it be worth my time?

It seems to me that AEG's Mercenaries has gotten better feedback here on the boards. I don't own either though so I might be wrong. Maybe someone can compare the two.

In terms of fighters in the Kalamar Player's Guide there are some cool feats and abilities. There are some new combat maneuvers like kick and throw. Some skills have been expanded to give you advantages in combat through analyzing your opponents' fighting technique. There are also some feats. One of the feat chains gives you the ability to frighten your enemies, movement check lets you hold enemies at bay with a reach weapon, etc.

 

[WizarDru]

It seems to me that AEG's Mercenaries has gotten better feedback here on the boards. I don't own either though so I might be wrong. Maybe someone can compare the two.

In terms of fighters in the Kalamar Player's Guide there are some cool feats and abilities. There are some new combat maneuvers like kick and throw. Some skills have been expanded to give you advantages in combat through analyzing your opponents' fighting technique. There are also some feats. One of the feat chains gives you the ability to frighten your enemies, movement check lets you hold enemies at bay with a reach weapon, etc.

A lot of really good ideas, some great skills and feats...and some material that needs a little work. The clerics material and new spells are interesting, but some either need clarification, or some balancing. The scaling spells are interesting, but not well defined.

 

[Crothian]

It seems to me that AEG's Mercenaries has gotten better feedback here on the boards. I don't own either though so I might be wrong. Maybe someone can compare the two.

Mercenaries is another great book. However, a large chunk is about running Mercenaries. It's great if you have that in your campaign, and it will add lots of useful detail. There are new classes in this book with some very well done alr Ranger types. The prestige classes are interesting, my favorite being one that gets a ton of HP. Basically, it's for someone who shows up to a battle first, and keeps the enmy fighting until help shows up. Some of the feats are good, some are just insane in power. Want a feat that gives you max HPs every level? It's in there. The new uses for old skills is well done. AEG and Mongoose have both excelled in this section. THe spells are nice and it includeas somel of them from other AEG one word products.

Both Quint Fighter and Mercs has some great Player and DM info. In terms of writing quality, Mercs has the edge. Both are good books and I'm happy to have them.

 

[Mortaneus]

The new feats are interesting and seem pretty balanced.

Oh, like Irresistable Spell?

Hold that pose...IRRESISTABLE HOLD PERSON!

I'm hungry...IRRESISTABLE POLY OTHER!


IMC, I banned it completely. Especially because of that feat, and the channelling powers. There's a few attack ones in there that REALLY need to give saves.

 

[Crothian]

Oh, like Irresistable Spell?

Hold that pose...IRRESISTABLE HOLD PERSON!

I'm hungry...IRRESISTABLE POLY OTHER!

IMC, I banned it completely. Especially because of that feat, and the channelling powers. There's a few attack ones in there that REALLY need to give saves.

You should really try reading the thread. As it is I did point this out.

They moved away a little from combat feats. There are a few to many +2 to two sill feats for my taste. Irresistable spell is something you need to either limit or get rid of. It's a meta magic feat that gets rid of saves for +4 spell level. But for the most part they feats are interesting and should help any character.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

You should really try reading the thread. As it is I did point this out.

You mentioned Irresistable spell yes. You didn't mention the numerous positive and negative energy feats which are about as balanced as a maul. Let me see, for one turning attempt, I can:
A. Give my friends a bonus to will saves vs. fear equal to my cha bonus for one round/point of cha bonus
or
B. Grant any target within sixty feat of me a number of negative levels equal to my wisdom bonus for ten minutes.

So one is dramatically weaker than remove fear (shorter duration, no ability to grant a new save, usually a smaller bonus), and the other competes with Energy Drain.

Nor did you mention Miser With Magic: Why don't I make an easy spellcraft check so that I can cast spells without losing the prepared slot. Who needs a ring of Wizardry?

A lot of the other feats are more balanced (not that that's very hard) but I'd still think long and hard before allowing anything from the KoK book into my game.

 

[Crothian]

You mentioned Irresistable spell yes. You didn't mention the numerous positive and negative energy feats which are about as balanced as a maul. Let me see, for one turning attempt, I can:
A. Give my friends a bonus to will saves vs. fear equal to my cha bonus for one round/point of cha bonus
or
B. Grant any target within sixty feat of me a number of negative levels equal to my wisdom bonus for ten minutes.

So one is dramatically weaker than remove fear (shorter duration, no ability to grant a new save, usually a smaller bonus), and the other competes with Energy Drain.

Nor did you mention Miser With Magic: Why don't I make an easy spellcraft check so that I can cast spells without losing the prepared slot. Who needs a ring of Wizardry?

You're right. I didn't mention every little thing that might be considered powerful in this book. I didn't realize it was my job to point them all out. Miser with Magic is actually very limited in its use, but that's neither here nor there.

The postiive/negative energy stuff is limited to only certain gods. So, there is a built in limiting system already there.

 

[kenjib]

Nor did you mention Miser With Magic: Why don't I make an easy spellcraft check so that I can cast spells without losing the prepared slot. Who needs a ring of Wizardry?

It's only for a total combined number of spell levels equal to your int bonus per day. Therefore it's a feat that is very useful at low levels, but the spellcraft check offsets this. Then when you get to high levels and the spell check becomes trivial, the feat is much less useful because that small amount of extra power isn't really as great a benefit as some other more scalable feats provide.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Like most books you have to look out for ballance issues. Irresistable spell was mentioned, it was about the only feat that I thought was way too good. There were a few other boarderline ones though. Classes all looked good. Skill section rocked, adding a lot of new functions for skills, and letting you know what knowledge military or knowledge X should do. Spells, eh they were ok, cleric powers wll clerics are ovepowered as is, any benie for them should be looked at closely. Overall an above average book, and a dang fantastic book if in Kalamar. (oh disapointed with the prestige classes a bit)

 

[Sebastian]

The book has a lot to offer conceptually, especially if you are going for a little more medievial flair than the typical D&D campaign.

Both the social templates and the divine impowerment of aristocrats is something that I still remember as being cool and inovative, although I haven't looked at the book in a month.

The finalized part of most rules-related material is pretty bad though. For example, most original feats are either too bad or too god. The balanced feats are reprints from the Wotc Splatbooks.

As it is, I rate the book as 7 for ideas and concepts, with proper development it could have been a 9. Curiously, I concider it more useful as a GM recource than as Player recource.