By Peter M. Ball
Published by Clockwork Golem Workshop
Pages: 10 + OGL
No bookmarks or TOC
Disclaimer: This is not a playtest review. I did not buy Masterwork Monsters: Kobold Feats and Mutants, it was sent to me for review as part of
Crothian’s Review Project.
The premise behind Masterwork Monsters: Kobold Feats and Mutants is that even though we may not like to admit it, most of us have a soft spot for these little draconic underdogs. With that in mind, the author has sought to expand the usefulness of this particular critter in your game with twenty-four new feats and a customizable template with which to beef up their threat level.
The PDF is small (less than 100 kilobytes) and very short; a mere ten pages in total, not including the Open Game License which takes up the last page. There are no bookmarks, nor is there a Table of Contents, but then again, it’s only ten pages long; how long could it possibly take you to find what you’re looking for? The first page is basically an introduction, and a boxed section of text provides a listing of design assumptions that the author considered while designing the various kobold options. There are two pieces of artwork, three if you include the publisher’s logo, and they are all very minor. I didn’t notice them at all during my first read-through of the PDF, and probably wouldn’t have subsequently had I not inadvertently spied at the bottom of the OGL page a line which reads “Artwork courtesy of JUPITERIMAGES”. There are no art-heavy borders to quickly drain your printer’s ink cartridge; at worst there is a thick, black line separating the header and footer from the main body of the page.
Kobold Feats is the first section, containing two dozen feats listed in alphabetical order. None of the feats strikes me as “must haves”, which is good, because it implies that a reasonable amount of thought went into balancing them. While the feats look like they are designed with the kobold in mind, most aren’t limited to being just for kobolds. Where the author does want to limit access to a particular feat, usually one of the requirements will be that the creature taking the feat must have sorcerer as their race’s favored class. There is a fair amount of variety to them, although as you might expect given the subject matter, they tend to be ones that likely only warriors and sorcerers would generally take, although there are exceptions. For example, I can see a rogue focused on boosting their Use Magic Device skill wanting to take Bloodbind Items, which allows them a temporary +2 boost to the skill in exchange for anointing the item they are trying to activate in a little (1 hp worth) of their own blood. Five of the feats are listed as fighter feats, and one also is a metamagic feat.
The metamagic feat in particular, Magic in the Blood, I find interesting because it introduces a simple and yet flavourful blood-magic mechanic. In exchange for twice a spell’s level worth of hit points in self-inflicted blood-letting, the spell gains +2 to the save DC and a +2 to its caster level for purposes of overcoming spell resistance. Before any warning bells go off, let me add that the feat notes that since the damage represents loss of blood, only natural, non-magical healing will restore the caster to full health.
Kobold Mutants, the second half of the PDF, is taken up by a kobold template called the Arcane Mutant. An Arcane Mutant is basically a kobold which has, either through long-term exposure to various natural effects or through some kind of ritual, gained a number of special qualities. And indeed, a handy table lists twenty-six specific Arcane Mutant special qualities, along with their corresponding adjustments to the creature’s CR. There is quite a bit of variety to the special qualities. Some of the weaker ones grant an extra attack form, whether it be a bite or a claw attack, or a good, solid tail smack. Slightly better qualities grant a small amount of damage reduction, or scent, or blindsight, or maybe even some energy resistances. And on the high end of the scale there are things like a breath weapon to consider adding, or the ability to perform an ethereal jaunt, or possibly even make the kobold’s bite poisonous. The template allows one to mix-and-match up to five of these qualities. Interestingly, none of the qualities add a corresponding boost to the kobold’s hit die, which could lead to some odd results if you go nuts on the toppings, such as a CR 4 kobold which breathes acid, can perform an ethereal jaunt, has fast healing 5, a paralyzing gaze and a poisonous bite, and 4 hp. Clearly, some eye-balling of the final CR is still required. Throw some class levels in there, and kobolds can easily hang in there as viable challenges to your players for quite some time. The section ends with two sample mutant kobold tribes that you can use immediately. The first is a CR 1 tree-climbing variant with a paralyzing gaze, and the second is a CR 2 quick-striking poisonous strain which has more in common with the cobra than with the dragon.
At first the lack of bookmarks and a Table of Contents bothered me, but functionally it doesn’t appear to be a problem. The feats are laid out alphabetically, which is what you would see in the bookmarks anyway, and the template section comes after the feats. Both sections are short enough you’d be hard pressed to get lost. There are a number of small typos, but nothing terribly major. For Deep Diver, the feat description should probably read “… their aquatic nature” instead of “… the aquatic nature”. The table of arcane mutant special qualities lists the Combustion quality as +2/6, whereas the quality description itself gives it as a much more likely +2/3. And the sample Stone Tree Tribe kobold mutation claims to possess the “Petrifying gaze” quality, which I suspect should actually be “Paralyzing gaze”, since the former doesn’t actually exist. Similarly, any other complaints I might have with the product are small and niggling. The Arcane Smite feat introduces a slightly different smite mechanic, and since I’m lazy I don’t want to have to remember yet another smite mechanic. But owing to the modularity of the product, not to mention the concept of feats in general, this is something that is easily dealt with.
My only concerns with the template section stems from how the Challenge Ratings are calculated. The increase to the arcane mutant kobold’s CR provided by the various special qualities are all given in multiples of 1/6th. That is, some are 1/6th, others are 1/3rd, and the rest 2/3rd. However, one is required to add the sum of these to the base value of 1/4, making the calculations a frustrating mess if you happen to hate fractions and fervently wish that grade school was the last you had seen of the wretched things. It probably would have been better to either use a decimal system, or list the fractions all as multiples of 1/12 instead.
But these small complaints are easily outweighed by what was done right, which is to say, everything else. With Kobold Feats and Mutants, kobolds have been given a much-deserved shot of game longevity. The feats section gives DMs, not to mention the occasional kobold player, plenty of new ideas and options to mess around with, and the Kobold Mutants section can easily be used to surprise jaded adventurers who have “been there, done it all, and brought back the monsterhide T-shirt.” Masterwork Monsters: Kobold Feats and Mutants doesn’t offer any frills. It is simple and straight-forward, first explaining what it sets out to do, and then doing it. You get new feats and abilities with which to beef up the kobolds in your campaign, and really, that’s it. But the product truly is an excellent example of substance over style, and for what it is, it delivers in spades. It is a good and solid addition, and in spite of what I may have been thinking when I first read the title, if you’re looking for something to beef up the kobolds in your campaign a little, I recommend it.
Reviewed by Scott Benoit
