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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 4668917" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 94: February 1985 part 2/3Reviews: Mercenaries, Spies and Private eyes gets a second review, rather longer and more favorable than Ken's. Arlen P Walker goes into plenty of detail on it's system. A relation of Tunnels & Trolls, it has a well designed skill system, an emphasis on designing your background over random rolls, fast and furious combat, and plenty of design advice. It also has a dual-stat alliance with Hero games, weirdly. Two modules also get reviewed. The adventure of the jade jaguar was going to be published with the core book, but got made standalone at the last minute. As a result, it's probably a bit small to really stand on it's own two feet. Stormhaven is rather better, with tons of pulp references, and a scenario which can be played in lots of different ways. Another great example of how a second opinion can be very useful. The role of books: Secret of the sixth magic by Lyndon Hardy takes his established world and laws of magic, and starts playing with the formula. Just when you think you know the rules, some bastard goes and changes them on you. And guess who's job it is to save the world in response to this? Muggins here who can't cast a a spell for toffee. Once again, the book gets my wholehearted recommendation, even if it doesn't quite get the reviewers. The land beyond the gate by Lloyd Arthur Eshbach is another story where a protagonist from our world wanders into a fantasy world, finding themselves the centre of a epic destined story. This cliche is kept interesting by lots of enthusiasm and tight pacing and plotting that doesn't leave things on a cliffhanger just to sell more books. Raphael by R A MacAvoy tells the story of the titular angel's tricking by satan, loss of power, and subsequent quest for redemption. It manages to be both philosophical and introspective, and have moments of extreme high power kick-assery. So if you want to know how to run really high power games where the protagonists are among the most powerful creatures in creation, and whatever they do will have serious consequences, this seems like good reading for inspiration. The Darkangel by Meredith Ann Pierce is a vampire story. Like any vampire story, the precise powers and weaknesses of the creature may vary from what you expect. Plenty of other mythical thingies make appearances, but it still manages to retain a folkloric feel to it. The song of the axe by Paul O Williams is set in a postapocalyptic world. Considerably less gonzo and with a better developed setting than gamma world, it manages to be both a self-contained story, and have plenty of references to other stories in the same world. Once again, the reviewer points out how this could be of use in your own games. The harem of Aman Akbar by Elizabeth Scarborough is full of djinn, and contains lots of advice on how to deal with these powerful, but not particularly loyal creatures in a fun arabian romp with plenty of humor and fantastical happenings. Exiles of the Rynth by Carole Nelson Douglas is a good demonstration of what happens when the DM has a plot, but the characters persist in trying to do something else. Tensions are caused, and the game is slowed to a crawl. The result is unsatisfactory, and often feels like filler material. You do not need to make every story a trilogy dear. Just get on with it. My honor is my life: Tracy Hickman introduces us to the Knights of Solamnia. The three organisations that take the proto-prestige class concept of switching classes at certain points like bards and thief acrobats, and stretch it even further. Not that this is mentioned here, as this teaser is entirely rules free, giving us a potted history of the orders and their founders. Despite being a tremendously heroic organization,  they've become exiles, trying to find their place in krynn's war torn post cataclysmic landscape. Oh, the angst. Well, good guys are at their best when they're the underdogs, as the kingpriest and co showed. Or something. Many think Krynns "Neutrality, be thou my good" moral lessons are a bit of a broken aesop, and I can't say I'm entirely in disagreement. This also shows signs of dragonlance's concious attempts to hit buttons for commercial appeal, making what seems appealing initially taste increasingly sour on closer examination. You can't sell me on your supposed heroes that easily, I'm afraid. Creature catalog II: 18 new monsters delivered fresh to your door. Just the thing to terrorize your players with. Be careful unwrapping them, though. Many of them are Ed Greenwood creations, with Roger and Len also getting quite a few contributions in. Belabra are really rather weird looking tentacled creatures. Thankfully, they don't attack with them. They can be trained too, which could have interesting concequences. Giant Betta are, as the name says, giant siamese fighting fish. Like the real thing, they're teritorial buggers, easily set off by bright colours and new smells. As they make bubble nests, they're very useful for underwater adventurers in need of a quick refill. Stealth and stuff is good, because you'll probably piss off druids if you kill them. Bhaergala are one of Ed's great lost gems of weird design and plot hooks aplenty. Virtually every line has some strange bit of flavour, and their abilities are pretty unique as well. Stealing musical instruments, spell reflection, smelling of freshly baked biscuits, these easily mach up to real mythic creatures in sheer idiosyncracy. One I could definitely stand to see some more of, and am very disappointed by future editions treatment of them. Phase Dragons are exactly what they sound like. Phase spiders have some serious competition. Thankfully they don't grow very big compared to most dragons, and aren't that aggressive either. A 100 foot reptile suddenly appearing in front of you would ruin anyones day. Ekrat are nasty little paper eating fae. If your wizard suddenly finds himself missing a spellbook, they might well be responsible. Bad puns are employed in the writing of this entry, which is definitely one that's more annoying than deadly. Have them keep pet rust monsters, and the screwage can be shared around equally. Fireball Flys go boom if you attack them. Ha ha. Like the gas spore, this is a definite play with the expectations of the party monster, only coming at it from the other direction. Laugh? I nearly split my britches. The perfect thing to have hanging around those salamanders and red dragons in their volcanic lairs. Firestar are floating balls of light that absorb energy. There's good spell components in 'em, so cruel adventurers may want to hunt them down. Flamewings are our third fire related monster in a row. They expel methane gas and then use it to set fire to their wings. Um, yeah. You couldn't make it up, could you. Thanks for that. Hurgeon are humanoid hedgehogs. As Good burrowing humanoids, they're pretty unlikely to show up in a game, unless gnomes are involved. They have tricksy magical powers that mean you don't want to despoil nature when they're around. Much mehness. Giant Lightning bugs, like fireball flys, are little pains in the ass, in this case because they're attracted to metal and shock whoever's in it. This also has the chance of removing an item's magic, which would really annoy lots of players. Lillendi are winged snake-women from gladsheim. With a ton of powerful tricks up their sleeve, they can be both good allies and scary enemies. Probably the most famous of the monsters from this collection, they get good write-ups in future editions as well. Well, sex sells. They might not have quite the pervalicious qualities of mariliths, but they can still fuel people's fantasies.</blockquote>

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