Masters of the Wild

[IronWolf]

The ultimate guide to customizing barbarians, druids, and rangers for Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition, Masters of the Wild contains strategies for creating specific types of characters, as well as advice for Dungeon Masters and players on how these types of characters could impact a campaign world. This volume contains details of skills, feats, and equipment for players who want to play a specific type of character beyond the information available in the Player's Handbook.

 

[KDLadage]

updated on 22-NOV-02

Before I begin, let me say that it really hurts to have to write this review. Up until this point, all of the Class Books (Sword and Fist, Song and Silence, and so on and so forth) I have given a lenient hand to. For the most part, this is due to the fact that I figure much of the book is written to the newbie who might not think of some of the things that the book presents (while a good many of us old timers will have already thought of it, it might not be something we thought to tell the newbie)... so on that mode of thinking, even such things as the Hero Builder's Guidebook are of value -- real, measurable value. Overall, even giving that level of thought, Masters of the Wild is a disappointing volume.

Like most of these volumes, it opens up with a page of Introduction, What this book is not, and How to use this book -- basically a rehash of the material in most of the others. Not bad, overall.

Chapter I is called Nature's Lore and examines the role of the Barbarian, the Druid and the Ranger over the next 13 pages. It covers such topics as When to Rage, choosing your Wild Shape and choosing your Favored Enemy. Interestingly, the single-mindedness of the base class Ranger is admitted in this text, and a variation of the Ranger is provided -- the Urban Ranger; a sort of cross between the Ranger and the Rogue that would be best simulated as a multi-classes Ranger/Rogue than with this odd variation. At least in my opinion.

The Skills section follows, and it is a bit light; then come the feats...

Oh blessed mother of Christ, these feats could not have been playtested. It is just simply impossible. Specifically, I cannot believe that they took more than a few moments considering the implications of Dragon's Toughness, Dwarf's Toughness, and Giant's Toughness -- all of which are made available to Fighters as their Bonus Feats... Strangely, none of these feats require Toughness as a Prerequisite -- a fact that might have balanced them off a bit. Others that I will certainly have to look over before I allow them in any of my games include: Natural Spell (the ability to cast spells while Wild Shaped), Power Critical (automatic Critical threats, once per day), Supernatural Blow (ability to make critical hits against creatures otherwise immune to critical hits), and so on.

The next section, Tools of the Trade is not too bad. The section on Infusions is actually pretty good. In the Animals section, they split the creature charts across non-facing pages again -- one of my pet-peeves.

On page 43, and continuing to page 79, we have 20 Prestige Classes... none of which I feel are very interesting at all. The Eye of Gruumsh is fine, although I believe it was in Dragon before here. The Oozemaster is just plain... well, I'll let you decide that one. The others are just plain boring. And, if one considers the writings that WotC has put out concerning the purpose of Prestige Classes, none of these fit.

The New Spells are next -- they are fine, if less than spectacular. I do like a few of the lower level utility spells...

And that completes the book.

THE CONCLUSION
And so... as much as I would like to give this book a "2" -- it is not that the book is really bad; it is about average. It is just that I had hoped that the level of utility would be at least as good as the previous books. If it did not have the few shining points of light in it, it would get a "2" instead of the "3" I am giving it. But if this trend continues, I fear that some "2" are in the WotC future for these books...

 

[Psion]

Masters of the Wild

Masters of the Wild is the latest - and last - of a line of "classbooks" for the Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition game. Masters of the Wild provides advice and options for barbarians, rangers, and druids, the more nature oriented D&D core classes.

The "classbooks" have been greeted by mixed reviews, and it has been obvious that while they are hot sellers, they have failed to meet the expectations of some. With this in mind, we take a peek inside.

A First Look

Masters of the Wild follows the same formula that the preceding classbooks did: a 96 page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $19.95 US. This is slightly above average for d20 system products with similar page counts or prices.

The cover has the same brown tome look of the other classbooks, emulating the D&D 3e Player's Handbook. The front cover has a picture by Jeff Easley depicting the three iconic D&D characters of the classes covered by the book.

The interior is black and white. The masterful artist of D&D 3e books, Wayne Reynolds, is listed in the credits, but alas he only has a few peices. The majority of the art is done by Dennis Cramer, whose art I personally do not care for. A third artist, David Day, provides a few decorative nature and animal pictures in the book.

As with most supplemental Wizards of the Coast books, the text density is very high, and is arranged in an attractive and readable manner. This serves to help counter the somewhat high price point and delivers a decent value.

A Deeper Look

The book is organized into 6 topical chapters: Nature's Lore, Skills and Feats, Tools of the Trade, Animals, Prestige Classes, and Spells.

Chapter 1: Nature's Lore

The Nature's Lore chapter is primarily concerend with providing insight and analysis of the barbarian, ranger, and druid classes. Each section contains a brief summation of the role the members of the class are likely to play in the game, how they relate to member of other classes, advice on using the classes special abilities, and rules updates and variants. Generally speaking, I didn't find the advice for playing these classes as useful as that provided in the Tome & Blood for mage-type characters.

The druid has rules modifications to the wild shape ability, much akin to the alterations that polymorph self has undergone under official errata.

The ranger offers some variant rules. The first is the idea of an "urban ranger" variant, achieved by making the necessary alterations to the rangers class skills and class abilities. I was not to thrilled with this idea, feeling that the rogue already fills this role rather nicely.

Perhaps the best part of this section is the new ranger favored enemy variant rules. If you don't like the "only evil rangers can take their own race as an enemy", there is another option. If there is a deep division in the race (like surface elf versus drow) you may take that subrace as a favored enemy. This can also apply to (say) human nations with ancient enmity.

Are you disgruntled by the idea your favored enemy bonus isn't so great against undead and constructs? With any favored enemy race (not just those two) you can decide to take a defensive favored enemy bonus instead of an offensive one. This causes the bonus to apply as hide, move silent, and Dodge AC bonuses against the race instead of sense motive, bluff, and attack and
damage rolls. The other skill bonuses apply normally.

The third variant (less useful than the above two, but still interesting) is that you can select any outsider subtype or "no subtype" as options for outsiders as favored enemy. Thus you can take law, evil, air, earth, or whatever.

Chapter 2: Skills and Feats

There are no new skills; Wizards of the Coast knows enough to know that doing so is trouble. New takes are presented on handle animal, hide, and wilderness lore, with the bulk of the material being devoted to handle animal, which provides new tricks that a character can teach animal companion. Now your animal companion can do things like assist your attack, wear armor, or help you with tracking a target.

There are a variety of new feats provided. There are some repeats from other books such as multidexterity (MM) and shadowing (S&S). There is a new sort of feat called a wild feat; wild feats require you have the wild shape ability to take. This can be because the feat is only useful to enhance wild shape (like giving you the ability to cast a spell in a wild shape form), or because it give you access to abilities that normally you cannot learn (for example blindsight, which affords the character the ability to perceive things in darkness, requires the ability to wild shape into a dire bat as a prerequisite).

Possibly the most controversial feats will be the "toughness" feats. There are three enhanced toughness feats: Dwarf's toughness, giant's toughness, and dragon's toughness. Each one requires a higher base fort save to take and give you mote HP. Dwarf's toughness requires a +5 base fortitude save bonus and provides +6 HP. Giant's toughness requires +8 fortitude save and provides +9 HP. Dragon's toughness requres +11 fortitude save and provides +12 HP. I've already heard some grousing about this, but the more I think of it, the more I think that might have been a clever move. The topic of altering the toughness feat to make it more useful to classes with larger HD has come up on several forums I have been a part of, but I have yet to see a more simple and elegant method of relating the HP bonus to the nature of the class taking it.

There are some other feats that are interesting and or useful. Animal defiance and animal control allow the character to turn and rebuke/command animals, respectively. Plant defiance and plant control has a similar effect on plants. Extra rage, extra favored enemy, and extra wild shape extend the character's class abilities.

Chapter 3: Tools of the Trade

The third chapter provides a number of new items. At the top of the list are new weapons, many of which you might find in a primitive culture, such as blowguns and the nagaika (a lash with glass embedded in it.)

The chapter covers a variety of new magic items. Some of new magic items are intended for animal companions, such as the collar of cleverness, which grants the animal with the collar access with new tricks. Another interesting magic item is the standing stone. Each standing stone basically enhances one druid spell when a druid who has learned it secrets touches it. Of course, historical insights show us that druids and standing stones probably had little to do with each other, but then one must consider this is D&D; how many other historical facts have been tossed aside in favor of more popular and fanciful takes on folklore and ancient myth?

A new sort of magic item is introduced, infusions. Infusions work by infusing some herb or other plant with the magic of a druid spell. This is somewhat like a potion or scroll. However, some neat options are provided for foraging for compnents yourself. I found this to be a blast from the past, as I recall old 1e games where our GM let one of my characters forage for plants with magical effects. This is uncharacteristically detailed for 3e, but I actually like it a lot!

Chapter 4: Animals

The fourth chapter is somewhat short, and devoted to the topic of animals, which are a central element in the abilities of rangers and (especially) druids. The first few pages of the chapter are devoted to the handling of animal companions, including advice on handling them in the game and methods for the players to get the best out of them.

The chapter introduces statistic for new animals. First up are some new dire animals, such as toads, hawks, snakes, horses, elk, and elephants. Then a new type of animal is introduced: the legendary animal. The legendary animal is an animal (vice a beast of magical beast), but is actually not much larger than standard members of the given animal species. However this opens up some new options for animal companions and wild shape abilities, though some GMs may feel that the legendary animal is a somewhat contrived solution to the limited nature of animal companions.

Chapter 5: Prestige Classes

This is the chapter almost everyone flipped to first: prestige classes. To generalize, I liked what I saw. Unlike many other classbooks, with this one I was able to immediately identify a number of classes that I had wanted to develop myself because I had a need for them; I was able to cross many classes of my list of prestige classes "to make" list. This to me is a good sign, as it tells me that the book addresses common existing needs.

One additional note: in addition to the three PC classes that many of these are obviously geared toward, many seem to fit adepts well, and one seems to be aimed specifically at adepts.

In summary, the prestige classes are:
- Animal lord: Animal lords are character with an affinity for a specific type of animal. This class receives feats and special abilities surrounding their totem animals.
- Bane of infidels: The bane of infidels is a divine spellcaster, a leading member of a tribe with rather xenophobic tendencies. The bane of infidels gains the ability to bolster his followers as well as boosting spellcasting power by sacrifice.
- Blighter: The blighter is sort of a blackguard of druids; the blighter is an ex-druid who stands against everything that druids stand for. They get a bit of a kicker for not having access to druid spells; they concern themselves with destroying tracts of wilderness. They have their own destructive spell list, and abilities to wild shape into undead forms. Though it could be entirely coincidence, I am given to wonder if this class was inspired by the wasteland druid in AEG's Undead supplement, which had its own ability to wild shape into undead forms.
- Bloodhound: The bloodguard is more or less a ranger specialized in tracking criminals.
- Deepwood sniper: The deepwood sniper is an expert archer. Though somewhat redundant with the Order of the Bow Initiate in Sword & Fist, deepwood sniper is somewhat more of a outdoor hunter archetype.
- Exotic weapon master: a character who can use nearly any exotic weapon with a degree of proficiency. For some reason requires the ability to rage as a class ability.
- Eye of Gruumsh: Orcish champion devoted to Gruumsh. Has only one eye, likes to rage, a few class abilities focused around blinding. Not much to see here.
- Foe Hunter: This flexible class has a simple concept: there is one sort of creature that the character is very good at dealing with. The foe hunter can be a giant hunter, a dragon hunter, or whatever else pleases you fancy. It requires the favored enemy ability, but does not have one of its own. Rather it gets a sneak attack like ability called rancor towards its enemy, damage reduction against its enemy, and even eventually gets death attack (like an assassin) against its enemy.
- Forsaker: The forsaker is a character with a deep distrust of magic. They gain some impressive class abilities, including spell resistance and an inherent ability score modifier at every level, but such benefits are temporarily lost if they ever willingly use magic. They also derive a damage reduction ability from the destruction of magic items. This class is easily one of my least favorite. A character from a tribe that is skittish and paranoid about magic is one thing; a PC running around destroying magic items brings back ill memories of the AD&D 1st edition barbarian. They also have one of the biggest rules oversights of any of the classes. They receive a +1 inherent bonus to any of their ability scores at each level; per the rules such bonuses won't stack, so such a character would, by the letter of the law, only be able to use the first 6 such bonuses, one on each ability score.
- Frenzied Berserker: This class focuses on the frenzy ability of the barbarian. The prestige class has fewer skills and lacks other barbarian class abilities like damage reduction, but gains an enhanced frenzy ability and some frenzy related combat abilities, such as a deathless frenzy that allows the berserker to keep fighting after reaching 0 hp.
- Geomancer: A strange arcane/divine spellcaster combo. To enter this class, you must be able to cast both divine and arcane spells, though the skill requirements make druid the most likely class. The geomancer learns to cast arcane spells in armor as they do with divine spells. They gets a "ley line bonus" to caster level, which is meager compensation for the fact that they are several levels benind in each class since they have to have both. They also become twisted into primal forms as they advance, which grants them some unusual abilities. A very strange class.
- Hexer: The hexer is a shaman-type prestige class; its prerequisites are likely to only allow adepts to take the class, and all of its members are non-human. The hexer's primary ability is a cursing gaze attack, which it gains different variations on as it gains levels.
- King / Queen of the Wild: This class represents a character in tune with one specific sort of terrain... king of the jungle, queen of the desert, you know the type. The class does not have spellcasting abilities, but has a good combat advancement and receives class abilities and feats related to their chosen terrain type.
- Oozemaster: Another unusual class, the oozemaster has an an affinity for oozes and class abilities relating to them.
- Shifter: A character who maximizes their wild-shape or other shapeshifting capabilities. The shifters shape shifting abilities are pretty potent, but they do not receive spellcasting abilities.
- Tamer of Beasts: The tamer of beasts has a slow spellcasting advancement, but a large number of class abilities (and is thus is viable for a ranger as well as a druid character). The tamer of beast has special abilities with animals.
- Tempest: This is a simple prestige class concept; the tempest is a warrior type who focuses two-weapon fighting.
- Verdant lord: As animal lord and tamer of beasts has special abilities with animals, verdant lords have a strong connection to plant life. The class may be a bit strong as they have both good spellcasting advancement and good BAB advancement.
- Watch detective: This class seems like it would have fit better in Song & Silence; apparently the authors are trying to cast rangers in the light of sherrifs and investigators and this would be the logical next step for such a character. The watch detective, as you might guess, is trained at investigating a crime and tracking down the perpetrators.
- Windrider: The windrider is a character with a special bond to a flying mount. In addition to giving the mount enhancements like a paladin, the windrider has class abilities targeted at aerial riding as well as their own spell progression.

It is also noteworthy that in Masters of the Wild, any organizational information is included in this chapter. In other classbooks, organizations have been handled in a separate chapter.

Chapter 6: Spells

The final chapter of the book introduces new spells, primarily for druids and rangers, though some of the spells are cross listed for other classes. The selection of spells is large, but here is a sampling:

- Animal Trick: This low level spell allows the ranger or druid's animal companion to perform a trick that it has not been trained to do.
- Bloodhound: Allows a character the chance to reacquire their quarry if they fail a tracking check.
- Detect Favored Enemy: This spell allows the ranger to detect the presence of one of her favored enemies.
- Nature's Avatar: Bestows significant combat bonuses on an animal companion.
- Regenerate Light/Moderate/Serious/Critical Wounds: This sequence of grants the fast healing ability on the target for a number of rounds.
- True Reincarnate: Much as there is a true resurrection spell, true reincarnate allows the caster to restore a character to life in a new form with no loss of levels and allows the player some choice as to the new body, but there is an experience point cost associated with the spell.

Conclusion

The most noteworthy different between this and the previous classbooks for D&D 3e is that it covers three classes. To accommodate some additional rules and advice material for an additional class, it appears that the sort of background material that the other classbooks feature has been largely excluded. This will likely make the book more valuable to the players but less valuable to the DM. I feel this is a good thing overall, as these books appear to be primarily targeted at the players, and the sort of background material that is excluded is really only useful to a subset of DMs.

Another significant advantage over some of the earlier classbooks is that there is less reliance on Greyhawk-specific organizations and character types. This should increase the flexibility of the book considerably.

Considering these factors, I think I can safely say that Masters of the Wild is the best classbook of the bunch. Tome and Blood was also a fairly strong book in the series, but I think the class selection is somewhat stronger and the spell selection is more interesting.

-Alan D. Kohler

 

[Killer Shrike]

The troubled series of 3e class books come to a close with Masters of the Wild.

As most readers probably already know, each of the previous installments of the series has been marred by some significant flaw. Sword and Fist was inventive and creative, but laced with broken mechanix and editorial errors. Defenders of the Faith was a little more rules-solid but boring and uninteresting. Tome & Blood was rules-solid and had significant additions to the game, but stepped all over the minimal Mary Janes of the Psionicists (the many Meta-Psionic feats which are cloned for wizards in T&B), had some organization and editorial issues, and had some very poor pClasses. Song & Silence turned out to be the most polished product from an editorial and rules standpoint but was thought by many to be content-deprived, with limp prestige classes and not much else to make up for it.

So, how does Masters of the Wild measure up? Well it might just be the best of a mediocre lot. Tome & Blood has heretofore been my pick for the best of the set, but MotW seems more solid typographically (from a cursory read thru), and I didnt notice any of the glaring editorial flaws that were so apparant in several of the past books, plus the organization of the book seems to be better than the others in the set as well. From a content perspective, MotW steps up with a slew of great feats, most of which are actually attainable by most characters (as opposed to some of the feats in Sword & Fist frex), a whopping 20 pClasses, some awesome Druidic spells, variant rules for Rangers (including the Urban Ranger and 3 variants for favored enemy) and Barbarians (Intimidate based on Strength and an Intimidation bonus when raging), some new weapons and magic items, and the obligatory 'advice' on the three classes covered by the book.

In an improvement over the previous class books, MotW is thankfully short on describing Organizations, opening up quality page space for useful additions such as a new category of Animals: Legendary Animals. Also presented is a full page errata'd version of the Druidic Wild Shape (much needed), and an expansion on Animal Tricks rules.

The feats are great. Ill say it again. The feats are great. Even if you discard all other portions of the book, the feats are a great expansion of the core rule set. Some of the feats are retread from other products, but unlike some people I actually prefer the subject-applicable reprint methodology; its so much easier to find things if they are grouped together logically. There are a lot of Rage oriented feats, some Wild Shape oriented feats, an expanded list of Toughness feats with scaling Base Fort requirements that grant correspondingly higher hitpoints. Of course, some of the feats are so-so or of questionable usefulness, but they are many, varied, and flavorful. My fave is Instantaneous Rage, which lets a Rager rage whenever they want, even if its not thier turn yet; thus a Barbarian about to be dropped below 0 hp can choose to Rage for the extra hp on his enemies turn, or if a Barbarian really needs to make a Fort save he can rage for the +2 bonus before he rolls the save; while not massively powerful, it certainly opens up some interesting scenarios for a Barbarian.

The magic items & equipment is actually the weakest part of the book, but the items that are here are on-theme and the addition of a new kind of magic item, the druidic Infusion (similar to potions), along with a pretty cool interpretation of Standing Stones shores it up.

The prestige classes run the gamut, and are mostly useful with only few odd-ball ones such as the Ooze-master to tarnish the tally. With 20 to choose from however, the couple of losers dont stand out as much. Some of the classes seem a tad underpowered unless in a specific terrain, but then they are nature-oriented classes. One strange pClass is the Exotic Weapon Master, which seems much more roguish or fighterish in nature; its only connection to any of the three classes covered in this book is an inexplicable (and unnecessary) prerequisite 'Ability to Rage' despite the class having nothing to do with raging; looks suspiciously like an add-on slipped in to get it printed with a single prereq added to make it look on-theme. The Forsaker is an eyebrow raiser that eschews magic in all form (in fact, thier damage reduction class ability only works if they destroy a magic item worth at least 100gp each day), and inexplicably gets much tougher (a +1 ability score bonus every level). Hmmm.... Anyway, there are some real winners here, including the Frenzied Berserker, the Shifter, Tempest (a Ranger-friendly dual-wielding ass-kicking class), Foe Hunter, Deepwood Sniper, and Bloodhound. Some of the other classes can be easily made good with a little tweaking, such as the above mentioned Exotic Weapon Master (uh....drop the Rage preReq; viola: great general purpose pClass useful to some Rogues and many Fighters).

Finally, a short but solid list of new nature oriented spells wraps up the book.

There are some really great spells in here for a Druid. There is a new chain of Regenerate Wounds spells which grant Fast Healing to a recipient for 10 rounds + 1 round/lvl but only vs damage inflicted during the spells duration; these spells scale identically to Cure spells (ie Regenerate Light, Mod, Serious, Crit). There are several viscious offensive spells such as Thunderswarm and {shudder} Epidemic. Several variant buff spells that grant a flat bonus to one ability at the cost of a flat penalty to another for the duration. A real key spell is Embrace the Wild, a 3rd level spell that allows the caster to take on aspects of a chosen animal without actually changing shape into that animal. There is even a sidebar expanding the Adept spell list.

So; all in all, much better this time around. Im very happy with my purchase of this class book (whereas I regret having shelled out 40 bucks on Defenders of the Faith and Song & Silence), and have even toyed with the idea of playing a Druid since I got it, which is my least favorite class.

I highly recommend its purchase or at least perusal to any D&Der interested in Barbarians, Rangers, or Druids.

 

[Felon]

Won't drive you wild but probably won't send you into a berserk frenzy either.

Masters of the Wild, the official D&D guidebook for barbarians, druids, and rangers, is a mixed bag of ideas for gaming material. Some of them are nifty, some of them are lame, and some even work. Having played with this book for some months now, however, I can tell you Masters of the Wild lacks the polish of thorough-playtesting, so when something in this book does work it's as much a byproduct of chance as design.

CHAPTER ONE: NATURE'S LORE
Like all the guidebooks, the introductory chapter treats the reader to the obligatory hyperbole on how wonderful the featured classes are. Why, to read "The Druid in Perspective", you would think that fighters, clerics, and wizards are superfluous, outmoded concepts. Seems like a bit of a heavy-handed sell considering that the people who bought this book are likely are already fans of the nature-boy classes, but hey, who am I to say that there aren't druids out there who need a boost to their self-esteem?

Each "in perspective" section serves up a perfunctory treatise on how to play each class, for the most part presenting a perspective that is obvious (halflings aren't cut out to be barbarians), overstated (humans are just good at everything!), and occasionally perplexing (elves make great druids, despite their lack of affinity for that career, and indeed one of the racial benefits actually conflicts with the class restrictions).

There are a few variant rules provided in this section, and these variants are representative of what I said before; some sound neat, some sound dumb, and they all sound a little half-baked. The neat: defensive favored enemy bonuses, favoring subraces of your own race. The dumb: the urban ranger (sounds like the name of an SUV), raging intimidation.

CHAPTER TWO: SKILLS AND FEATS
This is where a guidebook should start getting meaty, and on the whole MotW does not disappoint. One of the things I like about 3rd edition is that there's some emphasis given to the role of steeds and other animal companions in a fantasy setting. This chapter provides quite a few new tricks that you can teach an animal, including hunt, track, steal, stalk, and subdue. Heck, you can even teach it to aid your attacks or your tracking checks. Pretty handy stuff, and not just for rangers and druids either. There are also some in-depth rules on how to use Hide to tail someone. Good rules, even though they were just copied-and-pasted from Song and Silence.

The feats section delivers as well. There is a brief mention of "Virtual Feats" that clarifies whether or not a ranger's dual-weapon-wielding talents actually qualify as feats for purposes of meeting the prerequisites of other feats. The feats themselves add some interesting new capabilities to the various classes. Wild feats allow a druid to get more mileage out of his shape-shifting abilities. Rangers receive much-needed attention to their favored enemy class feature, such as a feat that allows them to inflict their bonus damage on opponents that are immune to critical hits, as well as some dual-wielding feats that go beyond Improved Two-Weapon Fighting. Barbarians get the least love, in the form of a few limp feats that add some rather unimpressive perks to raging.

There are also a few good general combat feats in this section as well, and they each are noted as being available to fighters as bonus feats (a step which Sword & Fist didn't bother to take). The most controversial have been the various "Toughness" feats that bestow more hit points than the worthless Toughness feat presented in the PHB, and the Power Critical feat that allows a character to attempt to make an automatic critical hit once a day.

Dwarf's Toughness, Giant's Toughness, and Dragon's Toughness do an adequate job of supplying extra hit points to the front-line tanks (who deserve them the most) while keeping them out of the hands of the back-row spellcasters (who, admittedly, also need them but aren't as entitled to them). I've heard some grousing about the fact the don't require the PHB's Toughness feat as a prerequisite, but the thing to keep in mind is that while fighter's may have feats to burn on puny dime-store feats, barbarians and rangers don't. As for Power Critical, it represents the kind of high-end, heavy-hitting, arse-whomping feat that has been sadly lacking in 3e to date. If you've played warriors over 12th level or so--or if you've happened to read my review of Sword & Fist--then you no doubt are aware of the dearth of decent feats that a warrior faces as he ascends to higher levels, so I'm glad to see something out there for that axe-slinging dwarf or half-orc to latch on to (and prior to 21st-level thank you very much!).

If there's any feat that I find objectionable, it's Extra Rage. The ability to rage multiple times per day is, in my humble opinion, the only strong incentive to stick it out as a barbarian past the first couple of levels--unless you're holding out for damage reduction, which blooms a little late in the career to generate much enticement.

CHAPTER THREE: TOOLS OF THE TRADE
Not a lot to say here, really. A few exotic weapons are offered--nothing major--and that's followed-up with a list of nature-oriented magic items. There are items that grant bonuses to animal companions, and items that improve a character's nature skills. I like the "ease" enhancement that can be added to armor, allowing a character to sleep in it without penalty, and the arrows of curing seem kinda spiffy (although the idea's not a new one).

Oh and there's a long section on creating infusions, which are basically edible scrolls created using the Alchemy skill. Something for bored druids to play around with. No big whoop.

CHAPTER FOUR: ANIMALS
There's some good stuff here. First off, there's a brief but informative primer on what animals make for the best companions. Since this decision isn't as simple and straightforward as, say, "When to rage" (Chapter 2), reading this section can be a real time-saver for someone who doesn't want to pore over the DMG in search of the perfect pet. There's also some info on how finding a pet works in terms of game mechanics, and some details on the strengths and limitations of the bond between human and animal companion.

And best of all, chapter four gives us statistics for lots of new animals, including 6 new dire animals (the most noteworthy being the dire horse) and 8 new critters that fall under a new category, called "legendary animals". Legendary animals are created by deities or nature itself. Designed with high-level druid and ranger adventurers in mind, they have abilities and attributes superior to those of dire animals, yet are of the same size as their mundane counterparts (note: legendary animals are also presented in the Epic-Level Handbook).

There is one thing absent from this chapter that I find disappointing, and that's the lack of any rules for advancing an animal companion so that it gains some levels, thus gaining hit points, base attack bonuses, and increased survivability as your character progresses in level. Instead, the mentality seems to be that once you outgrow your trusted and beloved companion, you abandon it in favor of a newer, sleeker, zippier model.

CHAPTER FIVE: PRESTIGE CLASSES
Here's where MotW's unevenness really starts to show through. There's a real smorgasbord of classes available, but as with most buffets, only a portion of the dishes are worth savoring. Much of it is lukewarm, passable fare. Some is just half-baked slop, and that can ruin the entire meal.

Here are some of the more appetizing prestige classes:

Bloodhound
I'm pleased to see a bounty hunter prestige class making its appearance in MotW. The book would've felt a little incomplete without one. I don't know how much I care for these prestige classes that somehow gain supernatural abilities, with little explanation as to the source of these powers other than "obsessive determination", but I suppose a bounty hunter would be a fairly impotent occupation at higher levels of gameplay without the ability to deal with magic. Bearing that in mind, I commend the overall design of this class, because its creator seems to have all the various angles covered, both mundane and fantastic. A bloodhound can track silently and relentlessly, avoid detection, and overcome all manner of obstacles between himself and his prey. I would be happy if someone could explain what the value of the "Ready and Waiting" ability is. It reads like a hackneyed artifact from the pre-errata Sword & Fist, going to a lot of effort to elaborately describe an ability in such a way that it sounds utterly useless.

Deepwood Sniper
Nice class. Effective, sensible abilities distributed generously but evenly across all ten levels.

Eye of Grumsh
Ah, the muse of inspiration bestowed its gossamer touch upon the Eye of Grumsh--before being promptly rent limb from limb. When I say this class has gross power, I don't mean it's over-the-top. I mean it's disgusting; this guy has the ability to regurgitate stomach acid into his foe's face. That should satisfy some of the half-orcs out there who enjoy a class that's just plain nasty. And he won't be lacking for sheer combat prowess either, with the ability to rage and blindsight.

Foe Hunter
Somebody had their heads screwed on straight when they had the idea to take each major feature of the ranger and branch it off into a prestige class; in the foe hunter's case, the emphasis in on the Favored Enemy ability. It's one of my favorites due to its flexibility. You can use it as a template for giant hunters, dragon hunters, demon hunters, undead hunters...heck, even ooze hunters have a place in the world.

Now for the slop:

Exotic Weapons Master
This class doesn't suffer so much from poor design as it does from poor placement. Obviously, by all rights the Exotic Weapons Master should have been in Sword & Fist, as it's clearly oriented towards fighters. But nobody told Jason Carl that, so he went ahead and wrote Sword & Fist without it. What to do, oh what to do? Eureka! Add a completely gratuitous "ability to rage" prerequisite! It'd be the perfect solution...if it wasn't patently ridiculous! I can accept that each guidebook is going to be authored by different people, but what I find most unacceptable is that there isn't some editor-on-high ensuring that the right material makes it into the right book.

Forsaker
This PC hearkens back to the old 1st-edition barbarian, which was no doubt the source of inspiration. The forsaker rejects magic in all of its forms, and doesn't care too much for the folks who dispense it. To that end, the class receives an ability score bonus every level, and receives an assortment of abilities designed to circumvent some of the problems associated with swearing-off magic (e.g. inability to penetrate damage reduction, lack of magical Armor Class bonuses, etc.). It's a cute idea, but guys and gals let's face it, Dungeons & Dragons characters can not get away with scorning magic. You need wizards to be able to transport you around the world and across dimensional barriers. You need clerics to heal you up, neutralize diseases and poisons, and restore ability score loss, limbs, senses, and levels. Magic is not optional. Moreover, there's a profoundly inane requirement built into the class that requires the forsaker to destroy a few hundred gp worth of magic items in order to maintain his special abilities--and the poor schmuck has to do this every @%$#& day! You wind up with a forsaker toting around quivers full of magic wands for the breaking, or stocking up on bandoliers of positions to be poured down the privy. Stupid much?

Frenzied Berserker
I hereby nominate the frenzied berserker as my candidate for the Prestige-Class-Most-In-Need-of-Erraticization Award of 2002. I am actually playing an epic-level Frenzied Berserker in a campaign. Let me tell you folks something I don't advertise to my DM and cohorts: this class is not merely broken, it's truly most sincerely broken. For starters, a berserker goes into a frenzy whenever he takes damage, and can only avoid it by making a Will save, DC 10 + total damage taken. Let's figure that your average berserker comes from a barbarian background; at 15th level it's quite likely that he's going to have a Will save bonus somewhere around +3 to +5 ). If he suffers even a single point of damage, he has about a 20-30% chance to fly into a frenzy and attacking anyone in sight! So basically, a frenzied berserker PC has to spend his entire life like hemophiliac, supremely careful never to stub his toe, absolutely terrified of getting a paper-cut, and you better believe he buys button-fly jeans! All for fear of receiving that itty-bitty boo-boo that pushes him over the edge, going on a murder spree until his friends are forced to put him down like a rabid dog. If that's not enough to assure you that this class didn't receive one tiny iota of playtesting, let me also direct you to the 4th-level Frenzied Berserker special ability "Deathless Frenzy". This ability keeps a frenzied berserker alive and fighting for as long as his frenzy lasts (Con. modifier + 3 rounds), regardless of how much damage he takes. Let me tell you friends, you have to play with that just to realize how munchkin that is. My dwarven Ftr12/Bar2/FBrzrkr11 character became enslaved during the course of an encounter, and my party slowly realized that they had no way to take me down before I could wipe them out to a man (we're talking 18 rounds). And the part that really stinks is that as bad this ability is for the folks having to deal with a frenzy, it doesn't do the berserker much good either since he'll drop dead as soon as the battle's over. Broken. Half-baked. Ill-conceived. Silly.

Oozemaster
Somebody call an ooze hunter. Oughtta be chucked into the privy with the forsaker's potions. 'Nuff said.

Tempest
Here's a sweet idea for a class that someone spent all of 5-minutes slapping together before they rushed it off to print, thus wasting its potential. The basic idea is pretty juicy: take the two-weapon-fighting style of the ranger and spin it off into its own prestige class. The problem here is, the class receives too few abilities as it advances--just a few quasi-feats stretched thin across ten levels of progression. Characters can receive virtually identical benefits just as easily simply by taking fighter levels. The 8th-level ability "Absolute Ambidexterity" is unique and quite cool, but no special ability is worth going eight levels in a class that's a dud in all other respects.

There are 11 other prestige classes, most of which are worth experimenting with (sometimes I get the feeling that's more than the authors did), so I'll happily edit my review once I get a chance to tool around with them. I do have one question about the hexer class; one of its requirements is the ability to cast lightning bolt as a divine spell. Anyone have any idea how this can be accomplished?

CHAPTER SIX: SPELLS
Reading this section reminds me of why I don't play druids. The general idea behind druid spells, as I gather, is to provide them with some of the cleric's support capability and some of a wizard's offensive capability, but no great amount of either. Well, if someone finds those sort of second-string spells appealing, they might be satisfied with what they find here. Sixteen pages of spells that are pale imitations of other class's spells. For instance, "waterball" is, quite literally, a watered-down fireball and is a 4th-level spell. "Thunderswarm" is a clone of meteor swarm with about 2/3 the damage capacity.

Then there's the "Regenerate wounds" series of spells, which equate to what are known in online role-playing games as a "HOT" (Heal Over Time). But while battles in a computer game can last long enough for a HOT to be meaningful, battles in D&D are relatively short affairs, usually lasting only a few rounds. The same goes for the various poison, disease, and other DOT (Damage Over Time) spells that gradually kill of debilitate a target. Players need their targets dead now, not a few minutes, hours, or days from now.

Still, I can't lambaste MotW for simply maintaining a standard of ineffectuality that was established long ago. On the other hand, I can't give a rave review for simply staying the course either.

CONCLUSION
If you play a druid or ranger MotW is worth having, mainly for the feats and for the prestige classes. There's a plethora of the latter (when compared to the other guidebooks), so with a little luck someone who purchases the book will find at least a couple to their liking. The rules for training and maintaining an animal companion are worth checking out as well. Barbarians will get some use out of a few of the feats, but there just aren't many prestige classes geared towards, and the ones that are desperately need revision.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

Review of Masters of the Wild

Masters of the Wild is, frankly, the best of the Wizards class books. However, while that sounds great, it is not like the competition was very tough. Masters of the Wild is the class book for Barbarians, Druids, and Rangers and I feel it does the best to take these classes and expand upon the possibilities.

Chapter 1 is called Nature’s Lore. It deals with many topics like role-playing these three classes and the different attitudes the basic PHB races have as one of these classes. It also talks about what the class thinks of other classes and ideas for choosing your wild shape or favored enemy. Most of this stuff is ideal for someone new to these classes and new to role-playing. Veterans of the game should still read this chapter at least once as it does have some decent ideas and advice.

Chapter 2 is all about skills and feats. First it expands upon the Handle Animal skill by going into more tricks you can train an animal companion. I like what they did, I just had hoped that they would have had more tricks. The feats are the larger potion of this chapter, and many of them are very specific. For the most part I was not impressed with any of the feats. I think some could make good additions to characters and the wild feats (feats that apply to wild shape) are clearly the strongest of them.

Chapter 3 is Tools of the Trade. The new weapons are interesting and might see some use in campaigns. The magic weapon section was small. I think that nature magical items could be greatly expanded on especially for the favored enemy of the ranger, the wild shape of the Druid, and the rage of the barbarian. All three of these abilities are key to each class, and I’d have liked to see more magical items that build upon them. It introduces an new type of magical item called an infusion.

Chapter 4 is called Animals. There is some good information here and it does help with better role-playing your animal companion and help filling in some of the questions one might have with them. However, I there are areas in this chapter that I really did not like. The first is the limit of animal companions HD. Animal Companions are tough and high-level Druids could get a powerful single animal. However, this new rule really makes the ranger’s companion useless in combat. The other section that I did not like is the Legendary Animals. They are there just to justify a more powerful animal companion. I would have liked to see them be here for a better reason.

Chapter 5 is the Prestige Classes. By now one may have realized that there are a lot of prestige classes in the many d20 books. They are not all created equal. For the most part I think there is a good selection of them in Masters of the Wild. I’ll make a few comments on some of them.

Bane of Infidels: This is a great bad guy prestige class. There is a lot of character in here and I didn’t find it that powerful.

Exotic Weapon Master: I think it’s the worst class I’ve seen. The requirements don’t make sense. And I don’t see how someone can learn to use all exotic weapons as many of them are very alien and difficult to use.

Foe Hunter: A good idea, but not a good write up. The class is great against one type of enemy, but none of its powers work against anyone else.

Forsaker: A very interesting class especially in the magic rich worlds we now have. This is one of the few Prestige Classes that I would actually make a character to fit.

Oozemaster: I may be a little prejudice here, but this is one of the best prestige classes ever. It has great character. The abilities are truly unique. And it takes on of the less liked creature types, the ooze, and it makes them a little more interesting.

Tempest: Another great idea that did not pan on on paper. The requirements are a little weird. The class abilities are mostly feats. However, the descriptive text is one of the best I’ve read.

Chapter 6 is Spells. Now, I’ve never been happy with new spells sections. Rarely are there spells that are interesting and creative. Personally, I think it’s the spells that imbalance the game the fastest. None of the spells here are ones that I liked. While they all have some game use they just didn’t speak to me.

Overall I think it’s a solid book with few things that will disrupt one’s game. This is the book that reading through it gave me the most character ideas both to play and to have as NPCs. For me that is probably the most important thing I can say about any book.

 

[khyron1144]

Let me make a two things clear at the start: My first 3e character was a barbarian and I have a certain fondness for the class, so I bought this mostly with barbarians in mind. Second, I am not familiar with its competition in this area, such as Mongoose's Quintessential Barbarian or Fantasy Flight Games's Path of the Sword, so I can't make a rellevant comparison.


As a source book for barbarians, Masters of the Wild is disapointing. The fluff in the first chapter about how barbarians interact with the other classes and how to role play a barbarian properly and so on, is slightly interesting, but nothing absolutely vital to me.

The second chapter deals with feats and skills. The skills section was okay. The new uses for Handle Animal with new tricks and Wilderness Lore with rules for covering your tracks while being tracked are somewhat relevant to barbarians becuase they're both class skills for barbarians. It did stike me more as material for druids and rangers who get animal companions as a class feature and particularly for ranger's who get the trac feat for free. The rage-related feats were cool. I can see just about everybody taking feats like Extra Rage. Here the problem was mainly with unatity rather than quality, although one feat, Destructive Rage, didn't seem that good to me. I want my barbarian to use his rage to smash skulls, not doors.

The equipment doesn't strike me as very barbarian-oriented. Why would my barbarian choose a caber that might deal damage and break up military formations and requires a feat to use, when he could just use a great axe which does deal damage and breaks up military ranks very effectively by killing the people making up those ranks and a medium size or larger barbarian is automatically proficient with?

The fourth chapter is abou animals. Nothing to interest my barbarian, except potential foes.

The fifth chapter is on prestige classes. My hopes were high going in, but fell off quickly. Here's a breaks down of what's offered:
Animal Lord- a class with affinity for and conrol of a particular type of animal. Unfortunately it requires animal empathy ranks, which disqualifies single-classed barbarians, but I could see building a druid/ barbarian/ bear lord.

Bane of Infidels- a human-sacrificing bad guy divine spell caster. No real potential there for a barbarian.

Blighter- a nature-destroying bad guy fallen druid. Another one with no real potential or a barabarian.

Bloodhound- a character who tacks people down to cpature or kill them. It looks like it was designed mainly with the urban ranger variant class in mind. A barbarian could take it with the proper feat selection, but I can't see why one would.

Deep Wood Sniper- another archer class; this time the focus is on hitting from a distance without being spotted. This one is theoretically available to barbarians, but most barbarians are melee fighters who favor the power attack feat tree over the point blank shot feat tree.

Exotic Weaon Master- A character who, surprise! specializes in using exotic weapons. This one is theoretically a barbarian prestige class, seeing as how it has the rage ability as a prerequisite. However it takes three feats to qualify for it, which become useless once this class is taken to its fullest. It als involves being willing to go down to d10s for hit dice for five levels too. This class would work much better as a fighter prestige class with the rage requirement lifted.

Eye if Gruumsh- a prestige class for half-orcs and orcs. Not bad, but the limited range of races that can take it and the afilliation with an evil god limit its appeal. It's even intended foruse by barbarians.

Foe Hunter- a ranger restige class that takes the favored enemy thing one step further. This is very obviously a ranger class, but I suppose one could be ranger/ barbarian/ foe hunter if one really wanted to.

Forsaker- A character who totally eschews the use of magic. This is theoretically a barbarian class, but it presents serious party harmony problems. One problem is the high level, we're in a hurry let's teleport directly to the adventure location scenario is out of the question for a forsaker. Teleport only affects a willing target, but forsakers will never be willing. This might work as an NPC class, but isn't much good for a PC.

Frenzied Berserker- a barbarian that gets a stronger version of rage, in exchange for the chance of accidentally raging. This is the one barbarian class that I would seriously consider taking. It does however ahve Destructive Rage as a prerequisite, and as I already that one feels like a bit of a non-starter to me, but one bad feat in exchange for super rage isn't a bad trade off, so I guess it evens out.

Geomancer- a spellcaster that blurs the line between arcane and divine magic. This is obviously meant to be used by druid/ arcane spelcaster mulitclasses. It looks cool, but it's not for my barbarian.

Hexer- an enemy humanoid adept prestige class. I have no idea why it's even in this particular book, rather than say, Savage Species.

King/ Queen of the Wild- a character who is very comfortable in a particular type of terrain. This one has potential to be taken by barbarians, but ragner's can qualify just as easily.

Oozemaster- a class with an affinity for oozes. I geuss it could be sort of a druid prestige class, but I think it's one from Tome and Blood that is reprinted here for mysterious reasons.

Shifter- a shapechanging class. This is obviously mostly for druids.

Tamer of Beasts- Dr. Dolittle in D&D. Another one mainly for druids and rangers.

Tempest- the ultimate two weapon fighter. Another one for the rangers.

Verdant Lord- a druid prestige class that eventually becomes a tree.

Watch Detective- another urban ranger. This one's more like a police detective than a free lance bounty hunter.

Wind Rider- a mounted combat specialist. Not much good to a barbarian.

Chapter six is spells. This chapter offers nothing to barbarians.




As a book for barbarians, Masers of the Wild is substandard (I would rate it a 2- pretty bad, with a few very good points). Once you add in rangers and druids, it goes up to average. The druid and ranger prestige classes intrigue me enugh, that I would consider playing one to see what it's like.