John Cooper
Explorer
Power Classes IX - Pirate
By August Hahn
Mongoose Publishing product number MGP 1109
16 half-sized pages, $2.95
I have no doubt that as the 9th book in Mongoose's inexpensive "Power Classes" line, each one providing a new 20-level character class, Pirate was one of the most eagerly-anticipated in the series. As far as I'm concerned, it's also one of the most disappointing.
The cover is nice, though, again a joint effort between Nathan Webb (who draws the figure) and Scott Clark (who does the background effects). This time, Nathan provides us with a typical pirate wearing typical pirate garb: he's got the pirate hat, the pirate coat (with large, turned-up cuffs), the turned-over pirate boots (with the legs of his pirate breeches tucked inside), and even some traditional pirate weapons: the inevitable cutlass, plus several pistols (and even what looks like a flintlock rifle slung on his back!). To drive home the fact that this is a fantasy supplement, though, the traditional pirate's parrot has been replaced by a winged humanoid with leathery wings and blue skin - maybe an imp, maybe a water mephit, maybe a homunculus. His hands are veiny, his beard scruffy, and his expression disdainful. Overall, a very nice offering from Nathan.
Nathan also provides the three black-and-white interior illustrations. On page 4, he has a half-orc pirate with all of the stereotypical pirate trappings: peg leg, hook hand, eye patch, golden earrings, battle-notched cutlass. Very nicely done. On page 12 we get a pirate helmsman at the wheel, again wearing pirate-traditional clothes complete with a cutlass at the hip. Finally, on page 15 we have a nicely-done treasure chest filled with loot, and the corpse of a pirate who must have just dug it up (as evidenced by the shovel trapped underneath his body). There are two things that bothered me about this piece: first, the perspective on his left arm seems off - rather than looking like it's further away from the viewer, it looks like it's stunted and deformed; and second, there's an upright sword sticking up from behind the treasure chest, but if this is what killed the pirate he must have died from blood loss when he was stabbed in his foot, because that's where it looks like he'd have gotten stabbed. I do like the anchor tattoo on his right arm, though - it's an appropriate detail making the overall picture that much more believable.
As for the pirate class itself, it's okay- up to a point (16th level, as a matter of fact). Anyone who has read my review of Book of the Sea already knows my views about Pirate, as the pirate class provided in Book of the Sea was taken directly - word for word, it looks like - from this book! Of course, Book of the Sea is one of Mongoose's more recent books, while Pirate was released before the advent of the 3.5 rules, so this product was written as a standalone work and then later incorporated into the "Classic Play" book. (Come to think of it, this also explains why "Pick Pocket" shows up in the 3.5 Book of the Sea.) In any case, to reiterate my problems with the pirate class that I first read in Book of the Sea, at higher levels the pirate starts manifesting the Water domain spells, only they aren't really spells, they're even better: they can't be interrupted, work fine even inside an antimagic field, and completely bypass all spell resistance! Does that sound like something your typical pirate can do? No, it didn't seem that way to me, either.
Another problem with Pirate has nothing to do with my dislike of grafting weird "better than normal magic" non-spells onto the standard pirate is that a 16-page book really isn't enough to do a pirate class justice, especially when those 16 pages are really just 8 pages folded lengthwise. Sure, there's enough room to detail the class abilities (as admittedly was done here), but to really do a pirate justice, you really need rules about ships, and deck plans, and naval combat, and so on, and there's not enough room for any of that here. (The most we get are details on the cutlass.) Imagine playing a pirate PC, only without being on a ship. Not much of a piratey feel, is it? And, of course, if you buy a book with full seafaring rules, chances are it comes with its own pirate class, making this book rather superfluous.
All in all, Pirate is my least-favorite of the "Power Class" books to date. I give it a "2 (Poor)." Now if you'll excuse me, I need to pop over to my review of Book of the Sea and apologize to Gareth Hanrahan, who was undeservedly on the receiving end of my pirate class rant, when it turns out he wasn't even responsible for its inclusion in his book.
By August Hahn
Mongoose Publishing product number MGP 1109
16 half-sized pages, $2.95
I have no doubt that as the 9th book in Mongoose's inexpensive "Power Classes" line, each one providing a new 20-level character class, Pirate was one of the most eagerly-anticipated in the series. As far as I'm concerned, it's also one of the most disappointing.
The cover is nice, though, again a joint effort between Nathan Webb (who draws the figure) and Scott Clark (who does the background effects). This time, Nathan provides us with a typical pirate wearing typical pirate garb: he's got the pirate hat, the pirate coat (with large, turned-up cuffs), the turned-over pirate boots (with the legs of his pirate breeches tucked inside), and even some traditional pirate weapons: the inevitable cutlass, plus several pistols (and even what looks like a flintlock rifle slung on his back!). To drive home the fact that this is a fantasy supplement, though, the traditional pirate's parrot has been replaced by a winged humanoid with leathery wings and blue skin - maybe an imp, maybe a water mephit, maybe a homunculus. His hands are veiny, his beard scruffy, and his expression disdainful. Overall, a very nice offering from Nathan.
Nathan also provides the three black-and-white interior illustrations. On page 4, he has a half-orc pirate with all of the stereotypical pirate trappings: peg leg, hook hand, eye patch, golden earrings, battle-notched cutlass. Very nicely done. On page 12 we get a pirate helmsman at the wheel, again wearing pirate-traditional clothes complete with a cutlass at the hip. Finally, on page 15 we have a nicely-done treasure chest filled with loot, and the corpse of a pirate who must have just dug it up (as evidenced by the shovel trapped underneath his body). There are two things that bothered me about this piece: first, the perspective on his left arm seems off - rather than looking like it's further away from the viewer, it looks like it's stunted and deformed; and second, there's an upright sword sticking up from behind the treasure chest, but if this is what killed the pirate he must have died from blood loss when he was stabbed in his foot, because that's where it looks like he'd have gotten stabbed. I do like the anchor tattoo on his right arm, though - it's an appropriate detail making the overall picture that much more believable.
As for the pirate class itself, it's okay- up to a point (16th level, as a matter of fact). Anyone who has read my review of Book of the Sea already knows my views about Pirate, as the pirate class provided in Book of the Sea was taken directly - word for word, it looks like - from this book! Of course, Book of the Sea is one of Mongoose's more recent books, while Pirate was released before the advent of the 3.5 rules, so this product was written as a standalone work and then later incorporated into the "Classic Play" book. (Come to think of it, this also explains why "Pick Pocket" shows up in the 3.5 Book of the Sea.) In any case, to reiterate my problems with the pirate class that I first read in Book of the Sea, at higher levels the pirate starts manifesting the Water domain spells, only they aren't really spells, they're even better: they can't be interrupted, work fine even inside an antimagic field, and completely bypass all spell resistance! Does that sound like something your typical pirate can do? No, it didn't seem that way to me, either.
Another problem with Pirate has nothing to do with my dislike of grafting weird "better than normal magic" non-spells onto the standard pirate is that a 16-page book really isn't enough to do a pirate class justice, especially when those 16 pages are really just 8 pages folded lengthwise. Sure, there's enough room to detail the class abilities (as admittedly was done here), but to really do a pirate justice, you really need rules about ships, and deck plans, and naval combat, and so on, and there's not enough room for any of that here. (The most we get are details on the cutlass.) Imagine playing a pirate PC, only without being on a ship. Not much of a piratey feel, is it? And, of course, if you buy a book with full seafaring rules, chances are it comes with its own pirate class, making this book rather superfluous.
All in all, Pirate is my least-favorite of the "Power Class" books to date. I give it a "2 (Poor)." Now if you'll excuse me, I need to pop over to my review of Book of the Sea and apologize to Gareth Hanrahan, who was undeservedly on the receiving end of my pirate class rant, when it turns out he wasn't even responsible for its inclusion in his book.
