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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 2649019" data-attributes="member: 2067">Magic of IncarnumDivine Wind ReviewsThe newest in WotC's line of products introducing new magic rules, Magic of Incarnum follows the model of the Expanded Psionic Handbook like a Siamese twin separated at birth. It introduces a new power source, and the creatures and classes that use that power. Whereas Psionics is the power of the mind over nature and the self, the "Magic of Incarnum" is the ability to shape spiritstuff, soul energy, into physical items for the use of those who learn how to shape it. At First Grok: ALooking at Magic of Incarnum, it follows the type for D&D books. Hardcover, tome-like design (this time looking like rough hide, with coursing blue energy and a central vial of liquid). Filled to the brim with color artwork and high quality layout and design, WotC continues the tradition of setting the bar way too high in their average books for third parties to compete. It's a bit thinner than the Expanded Psionics Handbook, clocking 215 pages, plus character sheets and ads. In chapter structure, it is a mirror of the XPH, with races, classes, "character options" (skills, feats, and racial substitution levels), "soulmelds" (the spells/powers/etc. of the Magic of Incarnum system), "magic" (things to add into already-ongoing systems such as magic and psionics, as well as magic items), Prestige Classes, Monsters, and campaign advice. It also has an epic appendix, and an appendix to help with bookeeping.It looks like it has everything a fan of incarnum could really ask for in setting up their campaign for the stuff, all wrapped up in a pretty little package. If we were to take up juding a book by how nice it looks, Magic of Incarnum would rank right up there with the XPH or the Monster Manuals. It hits all the bases and it's presentation is slick. It doesn't really hold a candle to the more art-intensive WotC works like the Draconomicon, but to ask for every book to be that beautiful would be asking the impossible.After the Surprise Round: D+ When you stop looking at the pretty pictures and start reading the words that frame them, Magic of Incarnum starts to fall apart quickly. Starting on page 4, with the first true words of the book, we are innundated with opaque terminology and awkward newspeak.The words are defined, but the definitions make little sense. We're told Incarnum is a blue mist, for instance. For starters, this means that incarnum isn't really "incarnate" at all -- it's not given flesh form, it's a gas. This jarring, counter-intuitive definition gives a particularly obscure flavor to the text. "Meldshaping" and "Essentia" continue the pattern pretty well, and are equally difficult to understand. Soulmelds are "magical objects" (a non-sequiter in a fantasy world if there ever was one), "a spell effect in physical form" (like a fireball is physical? Like a Protection from Elements is physical?), "worn almost like a physical item." Meldshapers create them. So Incarnum = gassy soulstuff, and Soulmelds = gassy soulstuff made into something physical, Shaping = making Soulmelds. And then there's Essentia, which can be "invested." Essentia is soul energy. Odly enough, Incarnum is soul energy, too. Just, you know, different soul energy. The kind you "shape," not the kind you "invest." And then you have "chakras," which are basically magic item slots, except that soulmelds are "bound" to them.Confused yet? I was. It takes a real effort to understand the meaningless "magical substance"/"power of souls"/"wearing shapes" tongue, and it's not half as intuitive as the psionic version, especially considering that the core rules have no real definition of the nature of a soul or spirit, but MoI uses the terms casually, as if they need no real definition. Spirits are a blue mist? What happened to the Astral Travel of the Spirit to an Outer Plane? The concept raises so many unanswered questions...The concept becomes clearer in Chapter 4, when the daily process of shaping soulmelds, assinging them to a chakra, and investing essentia is actually explained in more detail. And in that light, it's pretty stellar. In the end, you have a flexible magic system not based on a pool of points or slots that you spend on spells or powers, but based on a pool of points that have an opportunity cost. In order to get a cool power, all you have to do is give up a different cool power. By shifting Essentia (which can be done as a swift action) you can increase your AC, increase your ability to hit, give you a higher skill bonus, or even grant spell-like powers. What is truly interesting is when you bind a soulmeld to a chakra, negating the magic item there, but sometimes giving you a truly special kind of power. Of note is how the Totemist can bind soulmelds to her Totem chakra and shift form, gaining an ankheg's mandibles or a girallon's arms. While the flexibilty and design of the Incarnum magic system is choice, it falls on it's face in implementation. There's something pretty cool about making a maks out of the soulstuff of liars and decievers. But then the actual effects are rather mundane: +2 to skill checks? Yippee.... With the exception of the Totemists' powers, the soulmelds don't often give you a new capability, they just give you a bonus on what you can already do. So in many ways, they're the quintessential "floating bonus," which you can apply to some skills, or some AC, or some energy resistance, depending upon what you need at the time (and where you invest essentia). While mechanically useful, it's flavorless and dull. Really, what's the point? If channeling the essences of people's souls just gives you flying sandals, that's a lot of powreful language behind a relatively mundane effect. The concept of Incarnum would have me defining the life and death aspect of the world, not just being more able to climb and jump.This isn't the only place the high concept gets a lukewarm response. The races are amazingly dissapointing, ranging from the transparently ripped-off "new Githyanki/Githzerai" of Skarn and Rilkan (Why reinvent the wheel and make it LESS effective in the process?) to the absolutely uninspired Azurin (They are humans....BUT WITH INCARNUM! WOW!) to the re-treaded Dusklings (small forest humanoids with tribal traditions? Wow, didn't see that one comin'...). The classes are marginally better. The Incarnate is a zealot-type of any extreme alingment, who actually is rather customized by their alignment. The only pain I see in this is that it is quite obviously designed for the minis game. "If you're Good, you'll have a better armor class," and the like. It is also slightly redundant with the cleric, which it is obviousy patterned after. Soulborns are replacement-paladins who are focused on combat, which is fun, but, again, suffers from miniatures pollution, and also is pretty much just "Incarnum Paladin!", which is unnessecary since we already HAVE a paladin. It's called the paladin. Why give us more of the same, slightly different?The totemist is the highlight of the classes and, indeed, the highlight of the book. Using animal spirits to grant powers that are not merely bonuses in most cases means that they actually have a unique and special role that makes them different from a cleric/incarnate or paladin/soulborn (and still distinct enough from the druid). The totemist's flexibility doesn't come at the expense of their style, a problem which plagues every other class in the book. The classes other than totemist are mostly defined by alignment, which is too influenced by the minis game to come off as useful for a normal D&D campaign that might involve less head-to-head challenges. Having two Incarnum-influenced characters who truly get into the role in the party will either lead to in-fighting on par with a Paladin and an Assassin in the same party if they have different alignments, or to a very redundant party starategy as both use the same style of abilities if they have the same alignment.Finishing Move: C-Magic of Incarnum dusts this serving with a sprinkling of feats, spells, and psionic powers designed to be useful in a campaign that uses incarnum. Some of the spells are interesting, but mostly they just re-hash the "nice concept, mundane powers" theme of the book. We're also dissapointed in the chapter on campaign structure, which could have been truly an intriguing examination of the explanation and flavor of Incarnum, but ends up being "Here's some adventure ideas and some locations, you can do the rest!" This leaves Incarnum as largely a flavorless lump defined largely as factions in the minis game. It is a system that works pretty well -- the concept of shifting essentia and bonding chakras are both solid and interesting game mechanics. However, there's no real reason to learn them. The payoff for the investment of time and effort in understanding the incarnum system isn't really worth it in the end. After all that work, you're left with one fun class (totemist) and two mini-tainted classes (soulborn, incarnate) that mirror two already-capable classes (paladin and cleric, respectively). Psionics adds rich new creatures and evocative imagery (thanks in no small part to Dark Sun's influence from second edition, I believe). Incarnum, without the history, without the significance, and with redundancy, confusion, and blandness, simply cannot hope to compare. So this blue mist is all shiny colors and cool patterns, but ultimately, it is soulless. It's a great power, but why anyone would bother to harness it is beyond me.</blockquote>

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