Necromancer's Legacy - Bloodlines & Paragons

[HellHound]

Written by: M Jason Parent
Illustrated by: Frank Krug
Pages: 14 + cover, credits & OGL

The Compleat Librum ov Gar’Udok’s Necromantic Artes is the necromantic masterpiece of M. Jason Parent, co-owner of E.N. Publishing. Originally released in PDF in February of 2002, this dark tome was nominated for the Best Rules Supplement ENnie and received honourable mention for another.

But the legacy of the dark necromancer has not truly been uncovered yet. Even now, the core material of the Necromancer’s Legacy is being revised and updated to the current edition rules, and new secrets are being unearthed and added. Whispers of fell arcanists casting magics using the entrails of fallen foes now circulate around the campfires. Tales are told of giant forges brought back from the island nations and used to forge the very souls of enemies and innocents into horrific magical devices. And even now, the blood of the undead seems to flow within the veins of northlanders, with many exhibiting strange affinities and links to fell beasts such as ghouls and vampires.

Necromancer's Legacy - Bloodlines & Paragons explores five of the classic undead introducing a paragon class for each as well as Minor, Intermediate and Major bloodlines for each.

The races covered in this product are: Ghosts, Ghouls, Liches, Mummies and Vampires. Each has a fully detailed paragon class and all three levels of bloodline.

 

[Crothian]

Necromancers Legacy Bloodlines and Paragons

Sometimes there is that one book that you really like and enjoy. Many times it is by an unknown writer or publisher or at the very least just never gets quite the acclaim that it deserves. People seem to forget about it and even yourself just do not get the use out of the book it deserves. So it sits on the book self and you pull it off every once in a while but never quite have it fit in the current game. These type of books make me sad, they have such potential and great creativeness but there is just something intangible keeping them from being used at the table. For myself one of these books is Necromancers Legacy: The book was published in the early years of d20 and while it did get some great acclaim by some people I just do not think it ever got the attention it deserved. But luckily, it has been given new life. Jason Parent the author of the book and part owner of EN Publishing has slowly made expansions for that book. These have been small PDFs but hopefully through them others will go back to their roots and see exactly what the Necromancers Legacy truly is.

Necromancers Legacy: Bloodlines and Paragons is the third in the Necromancer Legacy series. The second was another small PDF called Necromancers Legacy: The Dark Art of Visceromancy. The new PDF is seventeen pages long, comes in a nice on screen and printable format, and is fully book marked. The art and lay out are well done and book has the same sort of look as the rest in the series.

This book is very simple in idea but the presentation and writing are well done. Very simply it takes the idea of paragon classes and bloodlines that first appeared in Unearthed Arcana and expands them for some undead creatures. The paragon class for each one is nice and tight and should be a good option for these creatures. The bloodlines can of course be applied to any creature and it discusses how these undead creatures can even have a bloodline since some of them like ghosts really do not have blood at all. Unlike Unearthed Arcana, this book has three bloodlines all defines for each creature type. Each of them has a minor, intermediate, and major bloodline.

Five undead get further defined here with the paragon classes and bloodlines. The book starts out with ghosts and has a good section on exactly how a ghost even can have a bloodline. Next are ghouls, liches, mummies, and vampires. It covers the basic and most used of the undead creatures. The rules in here are really easy to use and can make that certain undead monster a bit more powerful and unique with the paragon classes, and can make the non player or even player characters a bit mysteries with the powers to be gained from a bloodline that comes from an undead creature.

Necromancers Legacy Bloodlines and Paragons delivers very well in the line of books. It is a bit rules heavier then the original Necromancer’s Legacy, but in combination the three books will really aid and expand on the undead and the people that control them.

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[OaxacanWarrior]

This is my first review here on EN World! I received Necromancer's Legacy as a review copy. The ZIP file comes with two PDF files in it - one for reading and one for printing. The reading PDF is fully bookmarked making for very easy navigation. The print PDF removed the border illustrations to take up less ink.

The PDF is 17 pages long made up of a cover page, credits, 14 pages of content and the OGL. All the artwork is black and white and very appropriate for the subject matter.

This product is a follow-up to Thee Compleat Librum ov Gar’Udok’s Necromantic Artes. It offers a way to show the influence that a very powerful necromantic force can exert on the surrounding undead and living. You do not need to have Gar’Udok’s to use this book, however.

Necromancer’s Legacy – Paragons and Bloodlines presents just that, paragons and bloodlines for five of the classic undead types – ghosts, ghouls, liches, mummies, and vampires. Paragons are basically undead that have accepted and totally embraced their nature. Bloodlines are basically added abilities for characters based on their ancestors’ interaction with undead.

Each paragon is a 3 level class that an undead of that type can take to become more powerful than a standard undead. Each bloodline offers level-based abilities at three different strengths – minor, intermediate, and major. The bloodlines are a great idea to add some flavor to a character, especially at the minor level. The other levels start adding some considerable power so they have to take more levels of the bloodline class to make them balanced with other characters.

Each section is well presented with very interesting game information. Many of them even offer adventure hooks or ideas for campaign areas.

There were a few problems that I noticed in reading through this product. The Intermediate Lich Bloodline on page 11 has Mummy Affinity +2 listed as its 10th level power when it should be Lich Affinity +2. Also, on pages 12 and 14, the text in the bottom left of the page is somewhat obscured by the skull border. These are relatively minor issues.

Overall, I liked this product and will probably use it in my game so I give it 4 stars.