Professions: Game Enhancement is a 10-page, full color PDF from Alea Publishing Group, written by Joshua Raynack, that details a professions system that can be added onto any d20 fantasy game. The PDF has a nice, clean layout, and the editing was solid — I spotted no major typos, outside the occasional misplaced comma. My one concern here is that the layout bears a strong passing resemblance to the layout used by Wizards of the Coast on some of its web enhancements. Finally, the product includes two nice pieces of art, both paintings, although I'm not quite sure who to praise, as the credits don't list an author.
I very much like the idea of adding a professions system onto the standard d20 rules, as it gives characters depth and can help add to a backstory. It explains what they were doing until they started training in their adventuring class and contextualizes their actions and personality. When I saw this PDF I was intrigued, as I hoped it could fill a need in my games that I've never filled to my own satisfaction. Add on the rules for crafting and I was doubly interested.
After reading it, however, I found the PDF's contents to be very disappointing. For starters, the craft rules are a truncated version of the rules presented in Unearthed Arcana (which is not cited in the products Section 15), which I wasn't overly fond of there and I'm not overly fond of here. In my opinion, it just adds more book-keeping to a game with a lot of book-keeping already. Most of the feats found later in the product are tied into this system and come out of Unearthed Arcana as well, save for the Master Craftsman feats, which essentially improve masterwork items one more step. So a character with Master Crafstman (Armorsmithing) would craft masterwork armor that reduces the armor check penalty by 2, rather than by 1 (masterwork chain created thusly would have an armor check penalty of 0). I wonder about the value of these feats as opposed to other feats, and how likely it is that a character would want to pursue a feat chain that made him better at making items in the standard game, with its magical economy and all, but I could see these being put to good use in a game where magic is limited and money hard to come by (Midnight, I'm looking at you).
I found the professions listed and the mechanics used for them to be very problematic and inelegant. Basically, a character takes a profession at level 1 (and only level 1) and receives a certain benefit balanced with a certain amount of negative experience points. For instance, an apothecary would receive a +2 competence bonus to saves against poisons and drugs but would start with -250 xp. Although the mechanic is fairly clever and somewhat mimics buying off a level adjustment, I often found the value of the benefit to be far less than the cost in experience points. For example, a character with the lumberjack profession gains a +2 bonus (no type listed) to Bluff, Listen, Sense Motive, Spot, and Survival checks against plants and a +2 to weapon damage against plants, too, but starts with -750 xp, which would put him at least 500 xp behind his friend that happened to be fortunate enough to be an apothecary before adventuring. On top of this, the bonuses that he gains from having cut down trees for a living won't nearly come into play as often or be as useful as the bonuses to saves against drugs and poison. And for me, that's a big problem. I'm not necessarily a balance hawk, but I do believe that all options should be relatively equally attractive within a certain range, and I feel like a lot of these abilities aren't even close to being equally attractive. Compare being a farmer (proficient with scythes and sickles and all common meals are free) with being a locksmith (Disable Device and Open Locks are class skills) at a difference of 50 xp in the cost (-150 xp vs. -200 xp). Add in the vagueness of the free common meal and where they're coming from and why they're free, and there's a whole host of problems to deal with. A player will want his free meals, but there's almost no legitimate reason to grant them to him unless he actually happens to be working on a farm that he owns. This isn't to say that I disliked all the professions, as I rather liked translator, but even when I liked the idea, the mechanics were off or vague. The translator gets a +2 competence bonus to Intelligence for purposes of determining starting languages according to the PDF, which probably means that he gets one extra language (my reading) but could be read to mean an additional two languages. Point is, why not just say the character gains an extra language instead of creating a typed bonus when it isn't really needed?
Ultimately, this was my problem with the product — it doesn't add on easily without introducing a bunch of other issues and things to consider. I really wanted to like this product, too, as it looks sharp and professional (my earlier concerns aside) and really fills a need for my home game. I just don't find the mechanics to be particularly balanced or elegant and wouldn't want the hassle of adding a system that was neither onto my existing game.
Score: 2 (nice art and a good idea, but bad execution and unbalanced mechanics).
