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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Varianor Abroad" data-source="post: 2567268" data-attributes="member: 12425">Legends of Avadnu RocksReview by Bill CollinsAlexander Marsh Freed, Jeffrey J. Visgaitis and David Bareford wrote this 35-page epic-level monster book from The Inner Circle. Art is by Jason Rosenstock, Robert G. Gallagher, and Jeffrey J. Visgaitis. It retails at $7.00 on RPGNow which is a reasonable price considering the high quality of full color art in the book. (With lesser art and this same short page count, I would think the price too high.) I received a free copy for review purposes. You get both a full-color version and a black and white printer-friendly version, a nice touch.This is part of the Violet Dawn: The Time of the Unravelling line. While that title for the line seems really neat, it’s far too long. I’ve never heard anyone refer to that name - even this volume uses "Avadnu" for shorthand. I keep hearing about Denizens of Avadnu too and got familiar with some of it through Year's Best d20. This seems a worthy companion.The book is divided into new, Epic-level Feats, New Creatures, and Other Epic Creatures (which helps you fit epic monsters into the Violet Dawn setting). I’ve personally only played at epic levels and never been an epic DM, so my experience is limited. (Epic level is definitely a niche market.) That said, there are a couple creatures here that would do really well at lower levels to terrorize a party. Right after the Table of Contents is a very handy Creatures by Type and Creatures by CR listing. The latter is common, but the former is a nice idea. I wish more books did it that way.Chapter I: Epic FeatsEleven new feats comprise this chapter. These are all neat expansions of epic capacity. Here’s where you can tell that the authors know their epic stuff. (Some of these could be core-level feats but for the ELH’s existence. That’s not an issue with this book but the underlying assumptions of epic play.) Really good ideas include Reflective Spell Resistance (which definitely should be epic), Temporary Discorporation, Aligned Breath Weapon (I can see this as non-epic) and Energy Feeder. Planar Harbinger is an interesting feat because it lets a creature bring the traits of its home plane with them. It even has an improved version that increases the radius. The original version seems a bit weak because it’s got a small radius for most creatures. I could see it having been the creatures Reach or double the Reach. I still like the idea of some creature strong enough to bring a portion of its plane with it. Things like this that spark ideas are a good indicator to me of the book’s quality.Some of these feats are used for the monsters in the book, which I also like to see. (Even if a couple entries with the feats aren’t appropriately called out as being in the book.)Chapter II: New CreaturesThe lead-in monster is the Bygone Creature template. This is a genius way to make epic monsters available at non-epic levels, or to foreshadow a monster when entering epic levels. If you have ELH gathering dust on your shelf, this makes the book worth it right there to throw a few challenges at a level 17-20 party. (The example creature is a bygone Uvuduum, CR 21. Ouch.)The other monsters are also excellently done. The authors of the book have a distinct grasp of flavor that leads to good crunch. The dreadspawn’s Wail of Betrayal I could instantly grasp, for example. This means you’ve got a good design. (I see why Denizens made Year’s Best d20.) Some of the abilities and background here are incredibly flavorful and freaky – like the voidspawn ability of the dreadspawn or the way the rotwood animates a new body or even just how the mistji appear to move.The monsters include an Adventure Idea for every entry and an “On Avadnu” section. Either of these could be useful, and this is the sort of thing the better monster books include, so I was pleased to see that here.Nitpicks & Thoughts on MonstersThe Empyrean Sentinels were a cool concept with some odd abilities and one area for improvement. The text never indicates that there are two types of Sentinels (astral and cosmic) until you suddenly hit a paragraph that assumes that you know this. This information could have been placed in the entry text. They have an odd disorientation ability that while a cool idea in principle may well result in their extermination by the party because they lose the ability to act effectively. Even though their pairing ability helps to mitigate this and will surprise PCs. Those nits picked aside, the Sentinels are neat. I like the idea of something that sits there for millennia before activating. Just the thing to surprise PCs with.The Lumina were fun. I got some cool ideas from creatures so good that the Prime Material Plane seems polluted to them. The bestarius entry has many “gee wow!” abilities to throw at your players. The Poison ability is a bit confusing though. Does it grant detect evil, or does it just inform that detect evil helps poisoned creatures identify potential foes? (I also would not have treated this as a poison, but I can see the designer’s point, so it’s just a difference of opinion.) The knossira entry needs better notation on the epic spells – they are listed in the 10th level slot, but epic spells are treated differently for caster purposes. If things work differently in Avadnu – which would be okay by me – that should be noted somewhere. I did like all of the abilities for this creature. They would really freak out a cleric or paladin I think.The rotwood only speak Sylvan. This seemed at first like a neat idea. However, this is technically a disease that’s defined as a huge plant. Why doesn’t it have telepathy, even if it’s never going to use it? For that matter, why does it say it’s a disease and then describes it as a plant? While this is somewhat explained, it’s an odd situation that I would have liked clarified.The penultimate monster, the crimson mokara, lacks a reference to its book of origin. Since I might want to know where to look up the original, it would have been handy to have. This creature and the Scions of Krug lacked the adventure idea that was present for the prior creatures. But, it's very easy to imagine using them in an adventure.Chapter III: Other Epic CreaturesAlthough short, this section on incorporating epic creatures from ELH into Avadnu is a good read. Even those who don’t want to run a campaign in this setting might benefit by taking a look at the imaginative ways that the authors tried to fit creatures into their world. You can sense that there’s a lot more to the story here.Art & LayoutThis book – despite its short size – has a great cover. Color, subject matter and composition are excellent. I had to look twice before I realized how it looked – with a hero facing a truly epic-level challenge. I believe it’s a dreadspawn facing down some PC. Little do they know what they’re up against.This is available in a handy, art-lite version for printing. Which is a good thing since the full color version is gorgeous, but it would use a lot of ink. The layout’s only flaw shows in the color version on screen: the font choice - to my aging, uncoordinated eyes (20/50 and 20/200 respectively) - looks blurry and too thick, like a bad bolding. The monster stat blocks use white on black and are also very hard to read on-screen. A better font choice there would have made it clearer. (But in printing/viewing the art-lite version I did get something quite functional.)The pdf lacks bookmarks. Once upon a time, this was something I ignored since I didn’t know they existed. Now that I’ve gotten used to the idea, I heartily recommend them. It won’t make this a lesser product, but it would be nice to see them in it since they are even handier than a Table of Contents.Each monster does have its own illustration. An excellent selling point. Concluding RemarksMy favorite creatures have to be the dreadspawn, the empyreans, and the Scions of Krug. However, every creature in this book is flavorful and interesting. Since there is so little epic material out there, this stands out even more. The RPGNow ad mentions monster tokens for each creature. There were none in the zip file I received. If the ad is wrong, it should be changed. This didn’t change the book’s rating, but it would be a real nuisance if I were someone who had bought it expecting to use them.This book is definitely worth five stars on a review. The authors put a lot of time, talent and imagination into it. Despite the nits I picked above, I was very impressed by Legends. These are imaginitive, exciting and very different monsters. Check it out folks.</blockquote>

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