Review: Advanced Players Manual (Long)

[Garnfellow]

Rather unhappy with the inclusion of the Cry Havoc mass combat rules...

Incidentally, am I the only one who gave a thumbs down to Cry Havoc in a review? (I gave it 2 out of 5).

Cheers!

That's about what I would have given it, too. Cry Havoc remains in a perpetual tie with Dragonlords of Melnibone as my most disappointing d20 purchase of all time. And it's not that Cry Havoc was badly edited, or had terrible art, or even broken design elements. It was just . . . clunky. And uninspiring.

 

[BryonD]

What I meant was that since the Psychic Handbook is already out, do we really need this information in here?

Do they include the PrCs and other goods from that book? Is it exactly the same thing? I just don't like trying to compare X with Y on a line by line basis and wonder how much is a straight reprint as opposed to an update. The psychic was 3.5 already.

It is just the class, skills and feats.
However, errata is updated.

No, I don't think it was needed. It kinda screams page filler to me. Which is really weird considering how delayed this product was.

 

[BryonD]

Ah, good old mass combat. It's not an easy thing to handle and heck, Green Ronin's done it enough times that I have to wonder why they went with Cry Havoc. Testament and Black Company have mass combat.

Also, the Advanced GM's Guide blurb says it has a "quick resolution" mass combat system.
One company having different mass combat systems in different lines is one thing. But have two different systems in the same line seems really whacked.

 

[Samurai]

All in all, it sounds rather disappointing. Another stat is not really needed, and would require every creature and character to be modified. The race construction rules sound interesting, probably the best part of the book from the description. New classes and PrCs are expected, and these sound ok, but I have too many already. I only use Alignment as a rough guideline, if at all, so a much more precise alignment system doesn't do anything for me. I already have mass combat rules (not Cry Havoc), but I've never heard great things about that particular version. From what I know of it, the CH mass combat system is far more complex than I'm likely to use. New spells...? Like classes, I have plenty already. The Psychic sounds good, and I don't already have that book, but why reprint material if it isn't revised or updated? If a revision wasn't needed, just point people to that other book... and if they were really interested, they probably have that book already, meaning the pages are wasted as duplicated material.

From what I've read here, I probably won't be buying this book, which is sad, as I was really looking forward to it when I first heard about it. I bought Unearthed Arcana and the S&S Advanced Players Guide, and enjoy them both, but this sounds like too much stuff I either don't need or wasn't interested in enough to buy the 1st time it was printed...

 

[Crothian]

The luck stat does not have to make one redo everything in existance. Firtst of all, it would have little to no meaning for NPCs or most monsters. It rarely matters if these secondary or worse characters get lucky and have certain coincidences around them. It is really a PC oriented stat.

 

[MerricB]

The Warpriest is a divine caster. He only has spells that go up to sixth level but does cast spontaneously from a few spells known. They gain the ability to turn undead but at seventh level and turn as a cleric of six levels lower so that might not be a very effective ability for them. They do gain some abilities like weapon specialization and a deflection bonus to their armor class making them a bit more combat oriented then a normal cleric.

I must say... why bother? The Cleric is already a "warpriest", and the Fighter/Cleric seems to allow everything else the class gets. Turn Undead at 6 levels lower is just an excuse for taking Divine Feats - otherwise it is an absolutely useless ability.

There must be something I'm missing - what else does it get, Crothian?

Cheers!

 

[BryonD]

The more I look at the product, the more disappointed I become.

Honestly, it just comes off as a splat book without a theme. And it is fairly decent as that. But I really expected something more thoughtful than that. The Luck attribute and Scaled Alignments are in the vein of what I was hoping for, but neither of them seem to offer any great motivation to use them.

The other stuff is just standard fare. Which I don't mind in general. But it seems there is so much more they could have offered. Reading Black Company I kept wishing they would tweak some things there for D&D. For example, the awesome expansion of masterwork weapons would be a boon to most any D&D game and offers nice options for lower magic. Yes, it is already published and doesn't need much work to be adpated straight from Black Company, but it would have been better than Cry Havok. And is the kind of thing I was expecting to see. I did like the short tweaks/expansions to skills, but a lot of that is either reprint or fairly obvious.

I really like the Eldritch Weaver. The other classes are all fine, but don't do much for me.

I don't think Crothian's description of the Spellmaster really does it justice. It can cast spells up to 9th level. It can cast a small number of spells up to 6th level fairly quickly and safely every day. But once those are used up, or for any spells over level 6, they can still cast them slowly and with some risk of self-harm if they miscast. A 9th level spell will take them around 15 minutes to cast (technically "gathering power"). But they can "hold" a few spells. So he can have (up to) Five 9th level spells good to go if he spends 75 minutes prepping up and doesn't botch any rolls (1d20+Class level + Wis Mod vs DC33 for 9th level spells). He'll make most of those checks, but a failure will smack him for 1d6+18 damage and if he fails by 5 or more, tack on 1d6 CON damage.

It is interesting that the class can theoretically cast fireball AND cure serious wounds both as a 1st level character. However, it is not at all pratical and completely in the DM's hands to limit access to such spells at that point. Even if they did have it they need to make a DC21 check rolling 1d20+1+Wis Mod. Failure will hit them for 1d6+6, which will be quite rough on their 1d6 hit points. heh. Thus, as crazy as it may sound, it isn't really going to be a threat.

It is an interesting experiment in total revamp of the spell system. I don't think it is broken, but it may certainly be abusable. However, I'm not so sure it would be fun. Which is kinda important.

I do think the spells in this book are compelling and well done. At least on one reading. I think it is the best part of the book (already having the psy book)

I paid the PDF price and don't feel short changed. It was certainly worth that.
But I really thought it could have been a lot more and it isn't.

 

[BryonD]

I must say... why bother? The Cleric is already a "warpriest", and the Fighter/Cleric seems to allow everything else the class gets. Turn Undead at 6 levels lower is just an excuse for taking Divine Feats - otherwise it is an absolutely useless ability.

There must be something I'm missing - what else does it get, Crothian?

Cheers!

You've pretty much got it.

They can do this "I'm Jesus, touch me to get healed" thing, which just kinda changes the way they go about healing. And they can get a deflection bonus to AC while they do that (a whole 1 round worth).

Thats pretty much it. Other than those trivial tweaks it doesn't cover any ground that a Fighter/Cleric doesn't already have.

 

[BryonD]

Another stat is not really needed, and would require every creature and character to be modified.

I still think the system could have been better developed. But this isn't actually true.
The way the Luck attribute works, it is easy to assume that the vast majority of PCs/NPCs have a 10 Luck as is. Which has exactly no effect. So it does bolt on without disrupting the status quo.

Not saying it is needed or anything. But it doesn't rock the boat.

 

[Crothian]

I must say... why bother? The Cleric is already a "warpriest", and the Fighter/Cleric seems to allow everything else the class gets. Turn Undead at 6 levels lower is just an excuse for taking Divine Feats - otherwise it is an absolutely useless ability.

There must be something I'm missing - what else does it get, Crothian?

Cheers!

Ya, they get more then I listed. I can't go about copying everything each class does into areview, it just isn't feasible. The Warpriest get dice bonus to AC, weapon specialization, and other divine powers. the diveine power allows them to hear or inflict so many times perday a certain dice of damage.