Path of Magic

[Messageboard Golem]

10 unique legendary classes, new options for high-level characters who want to make a true impact on their world
9 new prestige classes, each with a unique organization and guidelines for integrating it with your campaign
More than three dozen new feats, including new metamagic and special feats that enhance the strengths of spellcasting characters
Several alternate core classes that can be used to add flavor to characters from 1st to 20th level
New rules for bardic performance styles that enhance and differentiate bards that dance, sing, chant, or play an instrument
Eldritch staffs, a new type of magic item that grows with its wielder in power and focus
Mystical performances that transform bards from mere bystanders to active participants in the magic being wielded around them
Magical traditions, schools of arcane thought that teach their students unique magical powers and philosophies
New templates describing the benefits and drawbacks for characters who join an organization
Expendable foci, a new type of magic item that helps arcane spellcasters control and shape the raw forces of the magic they wield

 

[Shadeus]

The Path of Magic is the second in FFG's "Path of" series (the first being Path of the Sword). It a hardcover with 171 pages of content. It specifically addresses alternatives for the arcane spellcasting core class: bard, sorcerer, and wizard. Let's take a closer look at the content.

Chapter 1: The Spellcasting Classes

This chapter is broken into three section: Prestige Classes, Legendary Class, and variant Core Classes.

There are eight new prestige classes offered: Arcane Negotiator, Chanter, Force Weaver, Grand Diva, Jester, Ring Sage, Spellbinder, Summoner, and Swamp Witch. Yes, there are actually bard prestige classes in this book! The classes were well balanced and fit very specific niches in a campaign world. What makes this book stand out is a second on each PrC of an example of how it can fit into your campaign world.

There are ten legendary classes offered, as well. If you don't know what a legendary class is, its basically a prestigous prestige class. It is designed to be accessible at 13th-level, so the requirements are step and always include quests. The legendary classes are very powerful, but when you look at them as a whole they are not unbalanced. The LgC offered are: Death Lord, Elemental Lord, Infiltrator, Landwalker, Maestro, Oracle, Puppetmaster, Puzzlemaster, Traveler, and Wizard King.

The final part to this section is the four variant core classes. They are Arcane Engineer (mage with "magic item" implants), the arsenalist (gun-wielding mage), mind weaver (a new, improved sorcerer), and sun mage (mage with healing that can only prepare spell in sunlight). This section was by far the weakest of the entire book. There's editing problems with their spell list, in addition to poor editing within the classes themselves. I felt all four of the variant classes were very unbalanced.

Chapter 2: New Feats

There are 36 new feats, all of which is OGC. Some of the highlights:
- Arcane Shaper (drop a prepared spell for another 2 levels lower)
- Counterspell Riposte (free spell after a successful counterspell)
- Quick Learner (+1 skill point per level)
- Voice of Inner Strength (increased benefit of inspire greatness)

There are several other feats for enhanced bard effects as well as a series of metamagic feats as well.

Chapter 3: Performances of Power

A whole chapter devoted to alternate ways to enhance your bard character. It begins with mystical performances. Path of Magic recognizes that bard spells are not as powerful as wizard spells. Mystical performances are a way for bards to either enhance the spells of allies or impair the spells of enemies. The enhancements take the form the form of metamagic-like effects. The bard must expend a spell slot (which varies depending on the performance) and make a Perform check (DC varying on the effect and bonuses for critical success). Impairing an enemy is a bit more difficult, but follows the same principles. Some of the effects include: Heighten spell, extend spell, spell focus, expand spell and the reverse for enemy spellcasters.

The second half of this chapter expands the bardic music abilities. Essentially they break down bardic music into four categories: singing, dancing, chanting, and instrumental. Singing is already outlined in the PH. By using a feat, a bard can get access to another form of bardic music. Each type of music has 6-7 different abilities depending on which area is selected. The instrumental ones are slightly more powerful, because you can't fight and play an instrument at the same time.
All of these abilities are very well balanced. It offers an amazing new level of flexibility to the bard. If you feel bards are missing something, and Monte Cook's complete re-write isn't your style, I would highly recommending getting Path of Magic for this section alone. It is phenomenal!

Chapter 4: The Spellcaster's World

Similar to what FFG did with Path of the Sword and fighting style, they do something similar for schools of magic. By expending XP, your character can get minor special abilities. There are 10 "lessons" taught within each school. The lower level lessons usually give skill bonuses, while the higher level ones can be somewhat potent. Path of Magic offers seven schools as a sample. Each has a rich background to give DMs a good idea how to create their own.

The middle section of this chapter deals with creating a tower. This would include magical rooms as well as mundane. It provides some good rules for creating powerful towers for PCs and NPCs alike.

The final part details magical organization. It provides guidelines for creating your own as well as several samples. It details ranks within the guild, what benefits there are to being a member as well as its drawbacks.

Chapter 5: Items of Power

The first part of this chapter details expendable foci for enhancing spells. These would include items to absorb the cost of enhancing a spell with a metamagic feat. It also discusses how to create these items.

The second part deals with magical fonts of power. There exists various types of these fonts attuned to specific types of energy. Spellcasters can attune to these fonts and obtain numerous benefits. Of course tapping into a font is kind of like sticking your finger in a light socket full of magical energy. There are some definite drawbacks.

Finally, this section discusses the eldritch staff. It is a interest twist on a magic item that grows with the wizard. Just as with anything else, there is a price to pay. For every benefit you imbue your staff, there is a like drawback to balance it out. It is an excellent concept to bring a wizard character more closely connected with the item.

***************

Overall, Path of Magic is very well written. With the exception of the variant core classes, the book is very well-edited. The chapter on bard music is amazing and I would get this book just for that alone. The legendary classes are an excellent idea for DMs for that arch-villian in the campaign or for players who want to make a name for themselves in the campaign world.

 

[novyet]

Hi, I'm considering buying path of magic, and was wondering, what can you tell me about the 4 variant core clases themselves? What makes them unbalanced? I'm asking because they intrigue me, but the editing errors in that area, kind of put me off.

thanks!

 

[The Sigil]

Path of Magic is a sourcebook for arcane spellcasters from Fantasy Flight Games, and is the second in their "Path of..." Series.

Percent of OGC: Roughly 50% - each section has an introduction denoting that which is and is not OGC. The wording is usually good.

First Impressions: The cover is not flashy, but it is pleasant and adequate. As I leafed through the book, I couldn't help but compare it (favorably) to its WotC equivalent and competitor, Tome & Blood. The interior artwork, as is par for the course with FFG, is simple but relatively clean and (happily) without garish body angles and types lacking in awkward poses. It doesn't have quite the same artistic "feel" as T&B, but on the whole, I thought it was much more diverse - and a much bigger pot of ideas to pull from - than T&B (and is in hardback and is only $5 more).

Initial Annoyances: One of the things that always seems to haunt me about FFG books is the vague impression that the artwork is blown up a little larger than it needs to be (especially because it is lacking in detail - stuff with little detail can be made smaller with no loss of quality) and the nagging feeling that there seems to be more white space than in most other books. On the other hand, the hardcovers have so far proven to be of durable construction and are simple yet elegant.

Chapter Breakdown:

Chapter one begins with the standard fare for splatbooks, a bevy of prestige classes. One of the great things this book does - and I'll mention this right away - is provide a backdrop against which Prestige Classes exist. Remember that Prestige Classes were designed to represent members of a group who receive specific training? FFG did, and I'm glad to see it. Each Prestige Class comes with an accompanying "sample organization" that gives a rationale for the existence of each class. While every organization will not fit into every campaign, it's a good bet that at least one of these organizations could be adapted into any campaign... a Good Thing, IMO. Even the leaders of these organizations get statted up. On the negative side, I'm undecided on whether "full spell progression" in spellcasting Prestige Classes is a good idea; sorcerers and bards essentially give up nothing, while a wizard trades away only possibly a Feat or two in exchange for a mix of new abilities. On the other hand, even "half progression" is probably too slow, as a single-class character rapidly outstrips the PrC character in terms of raw spell-slinging power. I think the answer might be 3/4 progression (i.e., gain a level of progression at the same rate a rogue gains his BAB) but that's a point for another day, I guess. The Prestige Classes here all get full progression, which automatically sets off "balance bells" in my head. The best of the bunch, IMO, was the Arcane Negotiator, which opens up a lot of avenues for the various Summon Monster spells outside of "point the summoned creature at the enemy and tell it to attack." A long overdue role-playing extension... and a logical one at that, since (especially with higher-level Summon Monster spells) you can summon intelligent creatures, there must be uses for them other than cannon fodder. The Ring Sage is an interesting idea that comes off as pretty-well executed, though not necessarily flashy... it is a Prestige class that allows you to break the usual limitation on item slots (though with some restrictions). Maybe I'm a bit esoteric, but I can definitely see some possibilities for this as a PC. The chapter then delves into Legendary Classes - simply a fancy name for "Prestige Classes for High-Level characters." These were introduced in Path of the Sword, and are a little better-developed here, IMO. The "trick" mechanic to Legendary Classes is that at each level, you get to select the benefits of the class from a list of benefits - but the benefits gained are proporionate to the Legendary Class Level at which you select the benefit at and do not increase as you increase in level. For example, if you select an Intelligence-boosting benefit at first level of a Legendary Class, you gain a +1 inherent Int bonus (that does not change as you increase in level). If you wait to select this benefit until obtaining the fifth level of the class, the bonus is instead +5. A simple yet extremely flexible mechanic that allows for great diversity and choice in the powers gained from a class, while still requiring some tradeoffs ("which is better, a +2 Int Bonus and Fire Resistance 5 or a +1 Int Bonus and Fire Resistance 10?"). Most of the Legendary classes are quite good at retaining their focus - for instance, an Elemental Lord's abilities center mostly around the manipulation of the "five standard energy types" (cold, fire, acid, sonic, electricity) - among the abilities that can be gained are bonus spells per day (provided they have the right descriptor), energy substitution (like the Feat), and immunity to various types of energy. I really like the potential synergy between this and a spellcaster using Mongoose's Encyclopedia Arcane: Elementalism book... would make for a truly wicked Elementalist. I think my favorite here was the Puppetmaster... the best way to describe this class is "a Puppetmaster is to Constructs as a Necromancer is to Undead." There are also spins on high-powered bards, necromancers, and summoners as well. The last part of the chapter details variant classes; I was nonplussed by these, though YMMV. These almost seemed to be throw-ins of classes that were built to stand up a little better in melee combat (through higher hp totals) and usually seemed a little on the "too powerful side." Overall, the Prestige Classes were Good to Fair, the Legendary Classes were very good, but the variant classes were so-so at best.

Chapter two is another seemingly mandatory chapter for splatbooks, the Feats chapter. As expected, the Feats run from very good to slightly below average, but do open up a few new possibilities for characters. One of the things I worry about, though, is that there are so many Feats out there that things are getting glutted... the typical character only gets seven Feats through 20 levels, so he'll never have the chance to try them all out. Of all the Feats presented, I think I liked Arcane Expertise the best. This Feat allows a bard to better pull his weight in combat by giving him the ability to burn spells for proficiency in any weapon... since bards aren't exactly combat-oriented in their spell selection, this allows them to use their spells offensively (albeit in an indirect manner). Most bards probably won't have much of a use for metamagic feats and a limited use for item creation feats (they don't gain higher-level spell slots fast enough and their spell selection is not exactly conducive to creating more powerful items), so this is a welcome way for a bard to get some alternative use out of his Feats. This segues nicely into Chapter three...

Chapter three is the chapter for bards. Of all the d20 products out there, this is the second-best thing IMO that I have ever seen for bards (IMO the best thing is my own 70+ page PDF publication, but I'm admittedly biased there). Although it is not immediately presented (and it should be), the Bardic Music class ability is replaced by four (yes four) Feats: Bardic Chanting, Bardic Dancing, Bardic Instrumentals, and Bardic Singing. A bard gains one of these Feats free at first level in lieu of the "normal" class ability ("converting" existing bards IS easy - they are assumed to have Bardic Singing). I am not very keen on this split and the "affinities" they assign to the subsequent abilities.

A minor rant is coming here - IMO the bard is the personification of the "travelling minstrel" who by definition makes his magic through music. Not through dance. Not through juggling. A dancer is an Expert with ranks in Profession: Dancer. A juggler is an Expert with skill ranks in Profession: Juggler. Just because I can "perform" something "artistic" does not make me automatically a "bard." A painter uses Craft: Paint. This has stuck in my craw since we had silly "blade bards" in the Complete Bard's Handbook wherein a "skilled performer with a weapon" was considered a bard (not a fighter). Blah. Chanting is really just a subset of singing - why they even split these up is beyond me... and singing is just the use of a particular instrument (the voice). I really disliked this "splitting" of the bard's music, especially when care was made in the PHB to mention that "music" was a catch-all term for not just singing or using an instrument, but chanting, reciting poetry, and so forth (though it always had a sonic component).

Rant over, back to the review - the abilities themselves are pretty nice - finally, bards are given some options to make them even more useful to their companions. First out of the box are ways for a bard to augment another spellcaster's spells. With a bard augmenting a spellcaster who is casting a spell, the spell's DC can be increased, the range can be increased, and so forth. One of my favorite abilities is the ability to "bounce" a spell off a bard - the bard can act as a sort of "point man/spotter" for spellcasters. If excuted properly, the sorcerer can fling a fireball at the bard (who must be an acceptable target for the sorcerer) and the bard can in turn "redirect" the spell as though he were the original caster - especially useful for adding range to your spells or getting them to turn corners when the opposition takes cover relative to the sorcerer. This does a good option of turning the bard into a viable support option for spellcasters in a group (his PHB ability set - specifically Inspire Confidence and Inspire Courage - already made him excellent support for the fighters and rogues as he upped their combat and skill use abilities). In addition to adding this ability for a bard to buttress his spellcasting compatriots, they have included more ways for a bard to use his Music ability. Included are "discordant chant" (which causes spellcasters to receive a penalty on Concentration checks), the "chant of confinement" (works like a Hold Person spell, provided that the target is under the influence of an "intimidating chant" - the mechanic works similarly to the Fascinate/Suggestion pair in the PHB). Other abilities let Barbarians rage for longer periods (the "Stoking Song") or detect certain kinds of traps ("Resonating Revelation"). I was brought back to my days playing The Bard's Tale on my computer with some of these. Good stuff, even if they are separated out by "affinities" (blech). It ends with a section on "Bardic Troupes," wherein it discusses the ability to create a "spell pool" - basically a large, sworling vortex of energy from which the "soloist" (leader) of the troupe (a bard or arcane caster) can draw energy to fling spells (with a successful Perform check). A nice twist on "cooperative magic."

Chapter four first gives your spellcaster something new to burn XP on - Magical Traditions. Bascially, a character may spend XP, time, and money to learn new tricks (Read: Feats and Pseudo-Feats) that he may apply to his spells. These could be considered "pseudo-classes" wherein a character spends XP to "learn lessons" (and gain attendant benefits) instead of "gaining levels." Each tradition has ten "lessons." For instance, the Arcane Marauders teach "Basic Studies" (+1 circumstance bonus to all Spellcraft rolls) as their first lesson, moving on to lessons such as "the mechanics of magic" (lesson four; reduces spell failure chance in armor by 10%) to "spell wringing" (lesson seven; essentially grants the Still Spell, Silent Spell, or Eschew Components Feat three times per day) to "spellcasting mastery (lesson ten; the character can cast one additional spell per spell level per day). These lessons do not come cheaply, however - a spellcaster must expend a minimum of 22,000 XP to get to the tenth lesson (and possibly more - especially if he wants to learn the lessons quickly). Like the rest of the book, this chapter does not neglect bards; there are lessons for bards to learn as well. The second portion of the chapter deals with the construction of Magical Towers. The rules here are not as detailed as those in the Stronghold Builder's Guidebook, and seem comparable to (though a little different from) the rules presented in the Quintessential Wizard. The chapter ends by touching on "organizations" - social (and to some degree, pragmatic) rewards for the "wizard who has everything." Each organization is comprised of several ranks; the ranks have prerequisites and small perks, though I can easily imagine the larger, un-game-mechanic-related perks to the be social perks arising from the opportunity to "rub elbows" with the arcane elite.

Chapter five adds new magic items to the arsenal of spellslingers. Expendable Foci are a nice idea that is long overdue - magic items that "store" uses of metamagic feats. Simple, yet effective. There is some difficulty involved in using the items (a Spellcraft check is required to avoid losing the energy and taking damage from the feedback - and more importantly, activating the items is a standard action - which makes them considerably less attractive to sorcerers seeking to cast metamagicked spells with a standard action). Happily, there are no new Feats required for Expendable Foci - Craft Ring, Craft Wondrous Item, and Brew Potion are the "base" Feats - a terrific example of pulling as much as possible from the existing system (most people probably would have created a "Craft Expendable Focus" Feat to go with these rules). Bonus points for that little bit of integration. The chapter then delves into "Fonts of Power" - essentially, areas that are magically "aligned" to be friendly towards different types of magic. The drawbacks associated with areas of high power are nice as well - makes it tough for a spellcaster to just "camp out" in the Font (though I suppose he might well build his home around the font and visit it frequently). The last tool added is the Eldritch Staff. I had to compare these rules to the Arcane Nexus rules from Mongoose's Quintessential Wizard. Without spoiling too much, I'll just say that an Eldritch Staff should be of far greater utility to a higher-level mage than an Arcane Nexus, while an Arcane Nexus would be a better choice for a lower-level mage. The forcing of narrow focus (for every power the Staff grants, a limitation or drawback is introduced), randomness in power growth (a no-no for Feat-based stuff and Item Creation - one person's stuff should not work better just because he rolled more fortunately), and associated quirkiness of Eldritch Staves also turned me off a bit. The Arcane Nexus struck me more as a tool - though a limited one, especially to higher-level casters - while the Eldritch Staff struck me as far more defining and limiting. This is both good and bad... Eldritch Staves do a better job "scaling" their powers but forcing limitations on players is not always a good thing. I guess what I'm trying to say is I have very mixed feelings about Eldritch Staves. I think it's a wonderful idea, but I am not 100% sure I like the way "balances" were built in. They seem a little too limiting compared to the power granted.

Presentation: Presentation is clean and slick, just like the rest of FFG's hardcovers. The cover itself is a little understated, but I can live with that - I think it looks rather nice. I'm not a great fan of the interior style of artwork, but it is technically adequateand does not strike me as particularly bad. The index, while not quite comprehensive, is still very useful, and I appreciate its presence. The Table of Contents, on the other hand, is deplorably sparse - one entry for each chapter? I expect a little more than that. Different sections within a chapter are not always well-separated, either. FFG's content is very good, but their execution is a bit lacking - they need to be a little bit better organized, IMO (you may note that I had similar concerns with Spells & Spellcraft). The look of the book is clean but unexciting - there are too many little section sub-headers and all use the same font. While I liked the content and it was well-written, the "look and feel" of the pages themselves came off as quite dry (the content was not dry, for the most part). I don't need flashy graphics and borders, but the text seems cut up into blocks by the plethora of sub-headers - and sometimes the cuts were unneeded (and sometimes there were places where cuts were needed but did not occur).

Conclusion: On the whole, a very useful book - much more so than Tome and Blood. The concepts are executed well and there are a lot more of them. The depth that was missing in Spells & Spellcraft is in here, and it really shows. There are a few balance issues here and there, but on the whole, this book is a worthy addition to the shelf of any GM or PC on the sheer amount of tools it throws out there for you. And if you're in the market for a print product that spruces up the bard, well, there's not a print product out there that I've seen that does as much for the bard as this one (we won't even mention Song & Silence). Presentation issues (both the vague impression that there was a lot of white space and that the pages "looked" dry even if they didn't read that way) keep me from grading this one as Excellent, but it is quite good. Also, it didn't quite knock my socks off with a high "wow" factor, which I think is the mark of an excellent product. It's a little better than a straight "4" - I would give it about a 4.3, which rounds to 4 here.

--The Sigil
October 16, 2002

 

[jeffh]

I'm not the author of the review, but the variant core classes seem a bit overpowered. The Sun Mage is the very picture of the uberclass with both high-powered combat magic and strong healing that Monte Cook warned against creating in the DMG. And all of them have very nearly the same spell ability as a Wizard or Sorcerer, several good abilities those classes don't have, and in some cases better hit dice and/or better skills, while giving up next to nothing that the standard Wiz or Sorc gets. The ideas are kind of cool but they are a little overpowered, methinks.

However, chapter three is well worth getting the book for and there is plenty of usable stuff in the other chapters as well. The Traditions from chapter four will likely see use in my next campaign, as will the material on Expendable Foci and Eldritch Staffs in chapter five and many of the feats in chapter two. That's a lot of good material. I consider the book very nearly a must have, and I have barely even looked at the first chapter except for the core classes. (I'm always looking for cool new core classes, but my eyes glaze over at the sight of a prestige class now - it's not that I dislike them but I have over two hundred of the buggers!)

I think it's really cool and kind of daring that FFG did a magic supplement without a single new spell in it! I guess they saw that as Spells And Spellcraft's job.

 

[novyet]

Cool, then I'll defintely be picking this one up once I get paid again. Thanks!

 

[Arnwyn]

You must not like the Perform skill in the PHB, then...

 

[The Sigil]

To be honest, I nitpick the PHB about "Dance" and "Juggling" being types of performance. I'm not so sure where I'd put "dance" - you can be a good dancer without a lot of Dexterity, I suppose, but it seems reasonable to me that an effective juggler must have a high Dexterity score in order to put on a "good" performance.

I know that people will argue that you have to have a high Dexterity to play an instrument, but the big part of "moving" an audience is the Charisma attribute - how well you can project emotions onto others. A technically inferior but passionate and emotional musician can move audiences more that a technically impeccable rendition of a work can.

But juggling? It seems to me that this is altogether too tied up in hand-eye coordination to allow Charisma to be the ruling attribute.

The short answer to your question is, "yeah, pretty much."

 

[Psion]

"IMO the bard is the personification of the "travelling minstrel" who by definition makes his magic through music."

I really disagree with this notion. It is this notion that has caused most bard supplements to be a dismal failure IMO. BoEM and Song and Silence both try to hoe the same row and in doing so add little variety to the all-too-narrow-as-it-is bard. Path of Magic is the first book that has really tried to push the boundaries of the bard back, which goes a long way towards making the bard a class that has a credible role in a game. The celtic spellsinger is too narrow a concept to deserve a core class, IMO. Expaning the class out to a knowledgable jack of all trades and master of people skills makes it a playable class.

" I know that people will argue that you have to have a high Dexterity to play an instrument, but the big part of "moving" an audience is the Charisma attribute - how well you can project emotions onto others."

Entertaining jugglers have to work the audience as well.

That said, to me it really doesn't matter if you use profession or perform; you would still use the same bardic ability rules. Further, even if you do think juggling should use dex, just use dexterity instead of charisma when juggling. The DMG explicitly suggests such things.

 

[Simon Collins]

This is not a playtest review.

Path Of Magic is the seventh volume in Fantasy Flight Games' Legends & Lairs series, and a companion volume to Path Of The Sword. This volume provides new rules and advice for arcane spellcasters.

Path Of Magic comes in at $24.95 for a 176-page hardcover book, fairly good for its type and size in terms of volume content. Like Path Of The Sword, Path Of Magic has a largish font but margins are small and there is little wasted space (though there are 3 pages of ads at the back). Mono internal art is good to superb - the cover is again reminiscent of the core rulebook covers. The writing style is fairly average, focusing more on mechanics than atmosphere. Editing seems good.

Chapter One: The Spellcasting Classes, begins with a number of 10-level prestige classes accompanied by an organization:
* Arcane Negotiator - summons extraplanar allies that can bestow game advantages. The School Of The Unbroken Circle is an organisation dedicated to conjuring and summoning.
* Chanter - bard-like chanting abilities. Aaramaskillis is a dwarven organisation of chanters that worships the dwarven god Alapantin.
* Force Weaver - specialists in force energy. The Sons Of Thunder are a group of elite humanoid wizards.
* Grand Deva - singing specialist. The Honorable Sodality Of Cantatrices is dedicated to gaining power through social channels and attempts to advance individual members to gain positions of authority.
* Jester - juggling, luck, and madness abilities. The Benevolent Order is a group dedicated to the god of trickery.
* Ring Sage - specialists with magical rings. The Ring Sages are a group of mages attemting to atone for their forebears' sins.
* Spellbinder - specialists in enchantment magic. The Companions Of The Penetrating Gaze are a group of such specialists.
* Summoner - specialists in summoning and dismissal. Garju and Daughters are a business that sells summoned creatures.
* Swamp Witch - archetypal witch with abilities with prophecy, nature, and potions. Children Of The Swamp is a coven of witches dedicated to prophecy and divination.

Like Path Of The Sword, Path Of Magic offers more legendary classes, a high-level prestige class (5-levels only, all of which must be taken one after the other) designed for a unique individual with a legendary destiny. They must fulfill dire quests before taking up their mantle:
* Death Lord - master of undead hordes and necromantic specialist.
* Elemental Lord - ditto, but for elementals.
* Infiltrator - master spy.
* Landwalker - nature specialist, with a dire familiar.
* Maestro - a great leader of men who uses arcane magic to influence others.
* Oracle - enlightened visionary.
* Puppetmaster - master of constructs.
* Puzzlemaster - specialist in enigmatic riddles and inspiration.
* The Traveller - extra-planar traveller.
* Wizard King - obsessed with the concept of magic and its workings, specialists in magic mastery and metamagic.

There are also some 20-level classes offered, which are variants of the core classes:
* Arcane Engineer - a wizard who uses tech to enhance herself.
* The Arsenalist - alchemist specialising in gunpowder.
* Mind Weaver - cross between a wizard, sorcerer and psion.
* Sun Mage - uses sun to power internal spell 'battery', specialist in fire spells.

Chapter Two: New Feats, offers 36 feats for arcane spellcasters. There is a mixture of general feats (such as Deceptive Casting, Reduced Spell Failure, and Superior Familiar), Item Creation feats (linked to new rules in chapter 5), metamagic feats (such as counterspell riposte, which allows an immediate spellcasting attack following a successful counterspell action), and Special Feats (such as Additional Spell, Arcane Strike (deliver a touch spell via a melee attack with any weapon), and a number of bardic feats related to rules in chapter 3).

Chapter Three: Bards: Performances Of Power, looks at four new performance-related powers using singing, instruments, chants, and dance. These powers are based on a Perform skill check, and can be used to augment allies' spells and impair enemy spells, and gives variations on bardic music abilities for bardic characters who wish to specialise in a certain area such as chanting, or dance. Some discussion and rules are given for bardic troupes, when a group of bards combine their performance skills to produce enhanced magical effects, using a spell pool mechanic.

Chapter Four: The Spellcaster's World, offers a number of Schools - these are magical traditions that teach specific magical techniques. Each tradition comprises ten lessons, each one giving more powerful game advantages as one learns new lessons, at the cost of XP and time, with a certain minimum level.
* The Stormweavers - weather mages who can conjure storm elementals.
* Arcane Marauders - sea pirates who specialise in negating magic, with magic.
* The Galvanar Spellmasters - a school dedicated to the academic study of magic.
* Telwar Pyros - specialists in fire and explosions, through alchemy and magic.
* Celestial Chorus - school that tecahes ancient and mysterious songs as a means to magical power.
* Snakebrine's School For Witches And Warlocks - academy teaching a varied range of skills, very Harry Potter-ish!
* Carharte Timekeepers - specialists in time magic.

The next section in the chapter looks at magical towers, giving advice and costs for building the tower, its rooms, and any accompanying magical effects. The effects of the tower are enhanced by an Energy Conversion Chamber, which uses the power of the spellcaster's most treasured possessions to energise the magical effects of the tower, after being attuned to the owner.

The following section offers some arcane organisations. Each organisation is based on a template, which can also be used to decribe your self-created organisations. The template discusses ranks, membership requirements, benefits, drawbacks, and causes for expulsion.
* The Bringers - an organisation dedicated to finding new potential sorcerers.
* The Guild Of Alchemists - specialists in Alchemy, and a ruling body for alchemists.
* The Royal Society Of Singers And Storytellers - a group of bards who works for a king.
* The Sanguine Society - sorcerers who believe their dragon heritage gives them the right to rule others.
* The Wayfarers - loose band of immoral wandering minstrels and performers.
* The Wizards' Guild - archetypal guild for wizards

Chapter Five: Items Of Power, begins by introducing the concept of expendable foci - items that are charged with certain levels of metamagic energy. A command word releases the metamagic energy, which can then be used to power a spell. Three types - rings, talismans, and potions are described. The energy released must be used quickly to power a spell, otherwise it has a tendency to burst into 'manafire' - magical energy that backlashes on the caster. Rules are given for creating expendable foci.

The next section looks at fonts of power - the sources of magical energy in a campaign setting (e.g. graveyards and battlefields for necromantic energy, extra-planar gates for planar energy, etc.). These fonts can be accessed by arcane spellcasters to power up spells if they are near the source. Several suggestion are made for balancing this power with some drawbacks. There are guidelines given to create fonts of power and energy types for the GM's own campaign setting, with four examples - elemental, necromantic, and planar energies and fonts, as well as The Soldiri Family Bloodline, a group of sorcerous assassins with magical energy in their veins. Each energy type has a spell list accompanying it, and guidelines are given for creating your own spell lists to match your energies and fonts of power.

The next section in the chapter looks at the Eldritch Staff - these are powerful staves that are enhanced over time by their owners to specialise in maximising the power of certian types of magic. A detailed creation system is laid out for these types of staves.

The book ends with an index.

Conclusion:
Path Of Magic is a collection of mostly good ideas for enhancing and varying arcane magic in a campaign setting. Like any book of this type, only a limited amount of these ideas are going to be used. The number of things from the description above that interest you will define if the book is worth your money.