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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Psion" data-source="post: 2009954" data-attributes="member: 172">Plot & PoisonPlot & Poison is the third in Green Ronin's Races of Reknown series of books,  adding options and source material to various d20 System races. Plot and Poison, in particular, deals with the infamous drow elves.Plot & Poison is written by Matthew Sernett, whose name you may recognize from the editorial pages of Dragon magazine.A First LookPlot & Poison is a 160 page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $24.95. This is fairly reasonable for a book of this size.The cover illustration is by WotC alumni artist Todd Lockwood, perhaps best known for his dragon illustrations in the D&D 3e Monster Manual. The picture is very well done and depicts a drow woman flanked by two male drow warriors in a cavernous environment. As part of the OGL interlink series of books, the cover of the book is matched to that of Paradigm's upcoming Unveiled Masters: The Essential Guide to Mind FlayersThe interior is black-and-white and features Mike Vilardi, Toren "Macbin" Atkinson, Ilya Ashtrakhan, Drew Baker, David Griffith, and Marcio Fiorito. The art varies from mediocre to excellent.The interior text is very small, but double spacing is used between paragraphs.A Deeper LookPlot & Poison is organized into eight chapters and two appendices.The first chapter is an introduction to the book. As with earlier books, the book does not come out and say "this is the way it is." Rather, it presents a number of ideas to spark the DM's imagination, and muses over different ways that they can be used, such as the issue of which drow subraces in the book are to be used, variants such as surface drow, use as PCs or NPCs, and different ways that their abilities and backgrounds can be tweaked to make drow unique.A general outline is given for the default drow race (almost) as it appears in the core rules. As Green Ronin cannot draw on wizards IP, most of the specific conventions beyond what is available in the Monster Manual are slightly different that exists in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, which has all but stolen the whole concept of dark elves from the D&D core. This includes aspects such as society, attitude, and names. The chapter even has a breif name glossary with a self-consistent language created for drow names.Racial statistics are provided for the basic drow here that doesn't quite match up with the core drow. The drow race provided here is not subject to the same sexual dimorphism as the core drow. Both genders of drow have the same favored class (wizard) and neither have a modifier to charisma.A few new drow subraces are introduced here: half-drow, aquatic drow, drey, spiderlings, and vudipax. Drey are fierce violent drow with a few of the more "classical" traits of drow, i.e., they are sexually dimorphous, are chaotic evil (unlike the 3e drow which has a general alignment of neutral evil), and have ability score ranges that seem to reflect those presented in the original entry for the drow years ago. Spiderlings resemble small driders, created by experimentation on halflings. Vudipax are drow endowed with batlike wings; also the result of failed experiements, vudipax lack the intellect of their drow cousins.This chapter contains a menagerie of ideas for what drow civilization would be like, highlighting how differently they might view things such as child-rearing. Ideas are provided for things such as what a variety of different drow cities would look like, ranging from crevasse dwellings to cities built around great natural pillars (much as in Monte Cook's Queen of Lies published by Fiery Dragon.)The second chapter covers religion and the deities of the drow. Again, as most material on drow deities in WotC's intellectual property, you won't see too much that is familiar beyond the ubiquitous "spider queen."As with the official D&D drow, the deity of the Drow herein is known as the Spider Queen. However, this spider queen is not exactly Lolth; Green Ronin has their own spin on what she might be like. For example, Green Ronin's Spider Queen is neutral evil, like the 3e drow are.The Spider Queen is served by eight demi-gods called the Claws of the Spider Queen. Each of the Claws corresponds to one of the eight schools of magic under the d20 System, and have related domains.There are also three renegade deities that do not serve the Spider Queen. Arrachnovoloth is an earth deity that was never a drow nor given his power by the Spider Queen. Rather, he was once a powerful outsider that dwelled in the underdark whose exploits made him a legend and soon lulled drow worshippers into his cult.Nyarleth was originally an outcast drow who rallied other such outcasts to her side. The Spider Queen bribed her with divine power to cease her conquests. Still beholden to the Spider Queen, she also hates her. Nyarleth is a patron of rage and battle, and the patron of the savage drey drow.Skuttle is a mysterious deity of stealth and secrecy.The third chapter introduces some new creatures of the underdark. This includes Monster Manual style statistics blocks for the new subraces mentioned earlier, in addition to some other entries.New templates include the half-drow, the broken soul, the drider, and the verminoid. is the tortured husk of a former worshipper of Dezmer, the demigod of pain. The drider allows you to make a spider-like creature from a variety of base creatures. While satisfactory, I think I slightly prefer the drider template on the WotC website to the one here. The verminoid is another example of the drow's affinity for vermin; it makes a montrous humanoid out of a vermin.The repertoire of vermin is expanded with monstrous leeches and slugs in a variety of sizes. Other new creatures include the living web, the scry warden, and the evocation spirit. The living web are a new type of ooze created by the Spider Queen. The scry warden are incorporeal outsiders that prey on victims with knowledge of scrying magic. The evocation spirit is a creation of Xarcon, the drow god of destruction.The fourth chapter presents new prestige classes for the drow. Many of them are disciples of the eight claws, exemplifying the eight schools of magic. The prestige classes are: -Blessed of Xarcon: Devoted to the drow god of destruction, the Blessed of Xarcon are experts in evocation magic. The class misses out on a few levels of spellcasting in exchange for class abilities that boost the character's abilities and defense against evocation spells. -Creature Cultist: Creature cultists are drow that have come to admire and emulate fearsome underdark creatures. A short (5-level) class, the creature cultist receives abilities depending on the creature that the cultist has chosen as a totem. -Dark Dancer: Dark Dancers are devotees of one of a few drow deities who combine the art of dance with a deadly fighting style. -Darksight Slayer: Building on the drow darkvision and darkness abilities, the darksight slayer is a specialized assassin that is at home in the darkness. -Deepsinger: The deepsinger is a bard variant in tune with the voices of the earth. There is little to discourage wizards or sorcerers from entering this class, which has moderate combat abilities and d6 HD. -Dominant: Devotees of Dezemer, the drow deity of pain, the dominant are specialized torturers and slavers. Dominants improve in spellcasting at a full rate and have moderate combat abilities in addition to their special abilities, which again may be a bit strong for arcane spellcasters. -Dweomer Defender: Devotees of Bronozek, the drow god of protection, Dweomer Defender is an expert with abjuration magic. -Fate Weaver: Devotees of the Spider Queen, the fate weaver gains access to addition fate related spells, and at each level they gain spell specialization boosting their DC and saves against the spell. -Master Summoner: Another spell-school related specialist, the master summoner has class ability improving the effects of their conjuration spells. -Spell Addict: The spell addict is a conceptually edgy concept. It is a short (5 level) class that gains not one but two spellcasting levels at some class levels, and one at even levels, giving the class a faster than normal spellcasting advancement. However, the spell addict has a class ability that makes their spellcasting dangerous to the addict. I find this conceptually iffy, as gaining three extra spellcasting levels is far too profound a boon to be compensated for by a weakness that can be minimized by maxing out the characters concetration bonus. The concept could possibly work if the character received other benefits (such as effective casting level of spells and DC) instead of true spellcasting levels. -Submissive: Another disciple of the god of pain, submissives are essentially slaves that revel in pain and submission. The submissive's abilities make them tough and loyal servants. -Talion Apostle: The talion apostle are disciples of the drow goddess of undeath. Unlike other school specialist prestige classes, the talion apostle advance in spellcasting rather slowly. They gain monk-like abilities and abilities to rebuke undead, and other necromantic abilities. -Transmorph: The transmorph is a fairly straightforward example of one of the specialist style prestige classes. The transmorph gains boosted abilities with transmutation spells, and has a number of specialized spells that he is particularly good at. -Unseen sniper: A fairly straightforward class appropriate to drow, the unseen sniper has class abilities allowing them to attack with range weapons with deadly accuracy and remain unseen. -Vermin outrider: The vermin outrider is a short (5 level) class specializing in the use of monstrous vermin as mounts. -Vile tormenter: Though similar in concept to the dominant in that they are specialized in inflicting pain, the vile tormentor is trained to inflict this pain on an enemy in combat vice a captive.A few of these classes seem like they are a little giving to arcane spellcasters. An interesting optioanal rule is preseted in a sidebar that proposes that spellcasting PrCs can be balanced with different spellcasting classes by dictating the character's attack, save, and hp advancement for a level according to the class in which they take the spellcasting advancement. Though this would add more bookkeeping, it seems like a clever method to balance prestige classes. However, if you do not use this optional rule, some classes seem a bit unbalanced as written.The fifth chapter covers skills and feats. The skills section is fairly breif, presenting a few new skill categories and new uses for skills like animal empathy (which includes rules for applying the skill to vermin and defines animal mimicry as a use.)The feats section is pretty meaty, introducing dozens of new spells. Many of the feats have some interesting concepts and mechanics, though some are a little questionable.There is a whole new category of item creation feats, verminous item creation feats. These feats allow the character to create a living magic item out of vermin.Though the basic concept is interesting, there is more to these feats than the alien nature of the items that they create. The feats for verminous item creation are arranged into a feat chain. The basic feat is craft single use item. Higher feats in the chain include craft multiple use item, craft uses-per-day item, and craft unlimited use item. Even if the idea of verminous items does not appeal to you, if the way that the core rules sorts out item creation feats bothers you, remodeling them after the verminous item creation feats may appeal to you.The remaining feats vary widely, including general feats (primarily combat-related feats), drow feats (most of which enhance the use of drow spell-like abilities), metamagic feats, and a new category of feats called meta-item creation feats (which change characteristics of item created by the character.) I don't think a new category was needed for this last category; many d20 System books have feats that do similar things and simply call such feats general feats.One of the more interesting but nonetheless questionable sets of feats I found were the nullify magic metamagic feats. These feats can be applied to any spell that dispels or nullifies magic, and acts to limits the effects to some specific magic. In the case of spells like dispel magic these seem appropriate. However, the descriptions specifically include antimagic shell, which seems very abusive. The thought of an antimagic shell that only affects the spells of enemies (even if you do need to be epic level to cast it) seems totally horrifying where game balance is concerned.Finally, the chapter includes a set of martial arts styles. These styles operate identically to those in Oriental Adventures: if you have all of the prerequisite feats, you gain a special benefit for free. One major departure from OA's is that some of these styles are not focused on physical combat, but spellcasting.The sixth chapter includes a variety of nonmagical equipment.A short section covers nonmagical verminous equipment. Some of the items are weapons and armor with additional uses; others are strictly limited to some special functions. For example, the jump shield is a shield that the user can also stand on to propel him into the air, and the clacker is a devices that makes noise disruptive to blindsight.Given the violent nature of drow, some weapons and armor are in order. This includes such things as the (finessable) double short-sword, the bladed buckler, the repeating hand crossbow, and web armor.Other items appropriate for drow (and other segments of the campaign) include poisons, slaves, vermin mounts, and alchemical items. One more general contribution is a set of rules for creating alchemical items with spell-like effects.Chapter six includes new spells and variant rules for magic. Variant rules include rules for item creation, allowing such things as having servants pay XP costs for items, as well as paying XP costs with sacrifices. Though this seems interesting and appropriate, the amount of XP granted by blood sacrifice (250 xp times CR) seems a bit generous.The major rules addition, however, is the section on power components. This is not simply limited to power components to defray XP costs as the DMG power component rules work. In addition to paying XP costs, a number of other functions are available under these rules, such as modifying spell effects or replacing the spell requirement for a magic item. A nice list of sample power components and their effects is included, and should be nice for campaigns beyond the underdark.There are a flurry of new domains available, 26 in all, including 8 that correspond to the d20 System schools of magic. In some cases, I wish that they would have copied some domains that appeared in other products that were similar to domains they presented here, if for no other reason than reduce the proliferation of domains.Most of the spells seem interesting and reasonable. A few seem either too high or too low in level, though. For example, infernal whip conjures a whip of force that inflicts random spell effects on the target; this seems not to warrant a 9th level spell. On the other hand, lightsight (which defrays the drow's light vulnerability) seems like a reasonable spell, but perhaps too useful for a 0-level spell.The eighth chapter introduces new magic items, including the complete rules for verminous items described earlier. Several options are provided for introducing these rules into your game; you can introduce them as-is, use these rules for standard items, or shift the tone to create other types of items.Most of the new items presented here have rules for creation as both verminous and normal items.The book has two appendices and an index. The first appendix is a collection of tables from the book. The second appendix includes two stock NPCs with levels from 1 to 20, in a format similar to the NPCs in the DMG (save that these are multiclassed) and in earlier Races of Reknown books. One is a weapon master (multiclass rogue/fighter/ranger) and a mage-priest.ConclusionThere were a few items presented in this book that I wouldn't use unaltered. For example, though I really like the concept of the spell addict class and the nullify magic feats, I could not see using them as written in the game.That said, save this few glitches, I rather liked Plot and Poison. It is a very meaty book with a wealth of both ideas and game material for a campaign. I have always liked using Drow as villains, and this book adds a fresh spin to these perhaps overused villains. I particularly liked the new pantheon, which was a great "familiar but different" take on the Spider Queen and other drow figures (and for those who prefer not to pollute their campaigns with PI setting elements, the deity names and statistics are open content.)Best yet, many of the elements introduced here such as the power component and verminous item rules invite themselves to be used in the general campaign vice just for drow.Grade: A--Alan D. Kohler</blockquote>

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