Spells & Spellcraft

[Messageboard Golem]

Spells & Spellcraft is the fourth volume in Fantasy Flight’s Legends & Lairs line of d20 System sourcebooks. This 176-page hardcover book will offer scores of new arcane and divine spells, new feats, rules for alchemical research and arcane libraries, and rules for new magical traditions. Spells & Spellcraft will be an invaluable resource for both players of spellcasting characters and DMs looking to expand the boundaries of magic in their campaigns.

 

[drnuncheon]

Time once again for another hardback from Fantasy Flight Games, and although it wasn't the Dragonstar Galaxy Guide that I'd been waiting for, it was the book from them that I was looking forward to the next most: Spells and Spellcraft.

I'm a sucker for magic, I know it. I've got the entire run of Mongoose's Encyclopedia Arcane series, I've got Sword & Sorcery's Relics and Rituals, Malhavoc's Book of Eldritch Might I & II, WOTC's Magic of Faerun and Tome and Blood...I have almost as much fun looking through books of arcane secrets as most wizard characters.

So how is Spells and Spellcraft compared to this rather hefty competition? In my mind, it gives Magic of Faerun a run for its money, and since that is probably my favorite of the books above that is some worthy praise indeed. Like Magic of Faerun or the Books of Eldritch Might, Spells and Spellcraft is a grab-bag of magical techniques and variants, not simply a compilation of spells and magic items.

Spells and Spellcraft is 176 pages, hardbound, with the near-ubiquitous "tome" cover that so many companies have chosen to use, making it fit in with both the WOTC core books and earlier books in the Legends and Lairs series. The interior is black & white, with fairly thick pages. The font is a little larger than WOTC standard, but the book doesn't have a lot of extraneous and unneccesary whitespace, meaning it's stll got a decent density of information.

Now, on to the contents.


Chapter One: Spells

As with any book of magic, there are a selection of new spells. I was gratified to see that the spells from the Seafarer's Handbook were not reprinted, meaning there's more new stuff. New stuff is always good. My biggest complaint with this section is that the Sorcerer/Wizard spell list is not organized by school, making it much harder to handle specialist wizards. The spells are presented for all the core spellcasting classes, although the paladin and ranger lists are fairly scant.

For the most part, the spells seem fairly balanced, although a few (like claws of the demon and ghoul pack) probably need to be tweaked (or errata'ed) - they seem a bit high in power compared to similar spells in other sources. The new spells range from ones so simple you wonder why they hadn't been created before (like quill, which summons a writing pen for you) to the strange but imaginative dramatic visage (which does everything but give you a soundtrack). A couple of spells from older editions make appearances here as well, like dig.


Chapter Two: The Craft of Magic

Nice as the spells are, this chapter is what really begins the meat of the book for me - a selection of alternate rules and variants to bring more detail into magic. It begins with a section on arcane libraries and magical research, including a more detailed set of rules for researching new spells. These replace the optional rules from the DMG rather than augmenting them - the Spellcraft roll is significantly more difficult in Spells and Spellcraft - but the increased detail and ways to get bonuses prevent it from being an unreachable goal. There are also suggestions for other uses of arcane research - discovering the properties of a magic item, for instance, or developing a new metamagic or item creation feat.

Next is a section for the spontaneous casters: bards and sorcerers. There are small variants here for both classes - nothing on the level of what Monte cook did in Book of Eldritch Might II - which can add small bits of flavor to your character. For instance, now there can be a mechanical difference between a bard who uses song and one who uses dance...or juggling! Similarly, sorcerers can have the blood of different creatures running through their veins - perhaps the fey rather than a dragon. My biggest problem with this section was that it didn't go far enough. Why would a dancing or juggling bard have countersong? Still, the tweaks are great ideas and they definitely got me thinking. There's also two pages of additional feats focused on these casters, like bloodburn (which lets a sorcerer pay for a power boost with hit point damage) and improvise counterspell. These feats definitely underscore the nature of sorcery as opposed to wizardry - that is, they make it feel more like you are mucking about with the raw forces of magic. Good job. There's also a rather disturbing ritual called 'Cleanse the Taint' offered up for wizards who distrust the abilities of sorcerers. It's a kind of ritual seen fairly often in fantasy fiction, that separates a person from their source of magical power.

After that is a short section on new uses for old skills. There are a few surprises in the choices of skills here = Balance, for example - but the new uses are well done and hardly unbalancing. (5 ranks of Balance gives you a synergy bonus to Concentration, if your Concentration checks are because of unsteady/uneven footing.) Others give minor bonuses to certain spells - Sense Motive, for example, can make it harder to resist a cleric's discern lies spell.

Ceremonies and Rituals follow this. This is a regrettably all too short section detailing divine ceremonies. The idea is fascinating - making certain effects available through rituals rather than spellcasting - but there isn't enough detail given for me to fully feel comfortable desiging my own. Sample rituals are given for all core divine casters, including a solitary prayer for guidance, a ritual to raise the dead (somewhere between raise dead and true ressurrection in power, it needs the whole body but does not cause XP loss), summoning an exceptional animal companion for a druid, a paladin's atonement ceremony, and a ranger ceremony that allows one to temporarily take on a new favored enemy. All are very flavorful and would encourage roleplaying at the very least.


Chapter Three: New Types of Magic

Moving on to the even larger variants, we find a new type of magic item called a ward. In effect a magical location, wards let those within them cast certain spells, if they are in possession of a keystone. Fasicnating, if not exactly what I expected. (I was thinking more along the lines of magical traps.) There's also a discussion of intelligent wards.

After that is a new type of magic: Chaos Magic. This is somewhere between Mongoose's Chaos Magic and Natural 20's Wild Spellcraft in both versatility and randomness. Like Natural 20's offering it builds on the existing spells rather than creating a wholly new system of magic - but at the same time each chaos spell is made up of six others, and exactly which of the six occurs is random, as is whether it gains a harmful or beneficial 'mutation' (such as a change in casting time, duration, etc.) Chaos casters gain 'control points' with which they can bump their result up by one (only once per roll).

A short section describes the new feat of cooperative magic, which is what it sounds like: two casters (and only two, sadly) working together, casting the same spell for increased effect. Unfortunately, like most feats of this type, it seems to offer too little for the cost (a feat each, and Concentration checks) - many times the casters would be better off casting their spells separately.

The section on Religion discusses different ways to classify religions and the relationships that divine casters have with their gods, providing some interesting ideas beyond the standard polytheistic pantheons of most D&D settings. There are three clerical variants: the Small Gods Disciple, who worships a lesser power and is limited in power - but who can request a direct intercession from their deity; Theurgists, who give up domain special abilities in return for the ability to choose spells from any domain (this could be unbalancing, and it might be best to limit them to filling their domain slot in this manner); and Animists, who give up their domains in exchange for the ability to ask the local spirits for favors.

Place Magic discusses arcane nexuses and shrines - locations where magic is affected in unusual ways. In general they are lists of ideas rather than an actual system, but they may spawn some interesting locations for your games.


Chapter Four: The Mundane made Magical

Perhaps the most interesting chapter of all, this goes into detail about several areas of interest to spellcasters: Alchemy, Constructs, Familiars, and Magical materials. Like the variants in Chapter Two, these are small changes that can add a lot of flavor to your games.

First up is Alchemy, which does for that skill what the Arcane Libraries section did for magical research. Several new types of labs are included, like the field lab and the production lab, with varying effects. There's a failure table for alchemy mishaps (so you too can blow up your laboratory) and several new alchemical items like concentration pie and firebane parchment. Several of the items require skills other than alchemy to create - a thunder arrow requires a fletcher as well, for instance.

Constructs are next. While it is of course not as detailed as Mongoose's Constructs (how could it be?), the short section here ought to be fine for anyone that does not want the level of detail in that work. Unfortunately the example constructs given have the wrong stat blocks - they are a reprint of the coral golem from Seafarer's Handbook - but the publisher has promised errata ASAP.

Next are magical materials - not only for weapons and armor like the three in the DMG, but for other items as well. Some materials boost the efficiency of items like wands or staffs if they are incorporated into the design of the item, while others, like dream items, are considerably stranger.

Last is a section expanding familiars, opening up new types: constructs, elementals, parasites, planar, and undead - each with their own benefits and drawbacks. There is a section on NPC reactions to familiars (for some reason, walking around with a zombie squirrel on your shoulder seems to disturb some people) and rules for improving your existing familiar through the expenditure of XP - letting you add abilities like Alternate Form or Winged Flight. There are also stat blocks for 2 dozen new familiars. My favorite is the grimoire - an animated spellbook.


Chapter Five: Magic Items

The book returns to more familiar territory now, with some magic items. But first there's some more variants. There is a new type of item called a glyph egg - which amounts to a magical hand grenade. Following that is a discussion of 'personal growth items' - an awful name for a great concept, that being a magic item that grows with the character. This has been discussed in an issue of Dragon before, but it's still a good idea. Relics are also discussed, being differentiated from artifacts in that they are generally not deliberately created - and are far harder to control.

After that is the expected list of new magic items - mostly wondrous items ranging from skill boosters (gloves of the rogue) to new types of ioun stones.


Overall this is an excellent book, providing more detail for some core skills and plenty of variants for additional flavor. There are some errors that will need to be errataed and a few places where balance may be an issue, but overall it is a fine work and definitely worthwhile if you want to give some extra flavor to magic in your campaigns. This would be a 4.5 if EN World allowed such a rating, but as it is I need to go with a 4.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

Just curious there Dr. How does Rituals in S&S compare to ritual casting and TRUE rituals in R&R? I'm just wondering how much was borrowed or used since it IS OGC.

 

[drnuncheon]

S&Sc rituals are completely different from True Rituals in R&R. (In fact, I didn't notice any OGC borrowed from other books offhand.)

S&Sc rituals are limited to divine casters, and they are not the way to cast 'spells of earthshaking power' that R&R rituals are. Instead they are more angled at a roleplaying bent: there's a description of an atonement ritual, a paladin's level-gaining ritual, etc. Some mimic the effect of existing spells (but with added effect) like the raising the dead ritual, others have no game effect at all (but a huge roleplaying effect!), like the druidic 'Planting in a Sacred Grove' ritual.

Very different focus, very different rules.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

So in other words, nothing to compare in terms of power level or spell casting abilities. Huh. Well still doesn't deter me from picking this up. Might improve a few things for some sorcerous stuff in my SL campaign.

 

[Clint]

Spells and Spellcraft is a book from Fantasy Filght Games describing new spells, magic systems, and items.

Physical Description / Criteria for Review:
This 176-page hardcover book has a color cover and black and white interiors. The cover is attractive without being flashy, in the style of other Fantasy Flight games, which are a derivative of the Core Rulebooks. I paid cover price, $25.
My fantasy campaign has magic elements, and sections appropriate to the game have been playtested.

To adore:
* The new rules systems described are completely modular, allowing addition of any or all of the suggestions without having to overhaul an existing campaign. This allows much of the book to be taken or left. All books should be this good at this.

To love:
* The spell section is great. The spells look balanced and interesting. There is a small feeling of Diablo II in the spells, mostly the 'new' necromantic ones.
* Like other Fantasy Flight hardcovers, the book is attractive and feels great in the hands in a way that's hard to describe.

To like:
* The black and white interior art is of good quality.
* Magical Library subsection is good, providing a simple and clean system for generating library stats, personal book collection stats, and even physical description of each book.
* Arcane Research subsection is good, expands largely on the general D&D arcane research concept by providing tools descriptions and discussing related concepts like outside funding and hiring specialists to help with research.
* Taint and Tune subsection is good, divided into two sections: Bardic Magic and Sorcerous Magic. The Bardic Magic part is very short, touching briefly on alternate magic systems for bards, such as dancing, juggling, and storytelling. The Sorcerous Magic section discusses possible causes for sorcerous magic to insert flavor into the world. Following these two section is a list of sorcerous feats shared by both Bards and Sorcerors, which add interesting options for spontaneous arcane casters.
* The "Old Skills, New Uses" section is nice and crunchy.
* The Ward Magic system hangs the whole of concept of location-based protection off of one feat, like item creation. This Ward system is basically an area-based wand, which has charges. The system is simple and logical. A list detailing the spells eligible for such warding is given, along with examples of wards with numerous effects. Recharging wards is also hidden in the text.
* The Cooperative Magic system is simple and useful, once again using a single feat, which provides multiple spellcasters casting the same spell in concert the ability to use a single Metamagic feat for that spell. I like that this doesn't add a complex system, just a feat and listed effects. It's nice.
* The Magical Material section is interesting and complete. It describes how to make basic items out of fantastic materials, including Craft checks, rarity of materials, and effect on the game these materials would have. Also discussed is how to include these concepts in a variety of magic settings.
* The Familiars section is solid, giving a plethora of options on how to expand the concept of a familiar to constructs, elementals, outsiders, etc. Very detailed and complete.

To note:
* Chaos Magic is a simple and small addition to arcane magic. Each chaos spell is really a list of six thematically-related spells. Each time a caster tries to cast a Chaos Spell, some permutation of one of the spells on the list comes out. This section suffers from its length; only three pages, allowing only thirteen chaos spells to be given as examples. While guidelines are given to create more, I don't want to worry about balancing new creations: I want more examples to use.
* The Religion section starts by discussing how to assemble a pantheon, which is serviceable, but I feel that I've read this a million times in other places. The new "small gods" section is somewhat interesting, describing a system where worshippers supply faith-power to a semidivine monster/character. I think that they got the scale wrong. A CR 14 small god needs two hundred thousand worshippers? We wouldn't have any real gods in my world, if a sub-demigod took that many worshippers. There is also no discussion of transition between "real gods" and "small gods". It feels like it would be a workable and interesting system conceptually if you tore out "real" gods and had only "small gods".
* The Alchemy section was fine, but was more of the same. Useful, if you like Alchemy.
* The Glyph Eggs section introduces the concept of a magical grenade (a thrown, one-shot magical item). While the rules are complete and seem to be balanced, I felt that the inspiration for the item was weak. In the right world, it would work, though.
* One of the pages is an advertisement. The inside covers are blank. Put the advertisement there, give us more content. One more page of Chaos Magic examples would have made that section likable.

To dislike:
* The Ceremonies and Rituals subsection is frustrating. It deals with Ritual Magic; magic that channels multiple spellcasters toward a single effect. However, the rules bits are fluffy and poorly described. The book gives a basic framework with some examples to expand on, but never lays out a hard system of how to balance rituals in the game. They introduce a Ritual Level mechanic which they then don't use in their own examples. An example level 6 ritual gives the short example of "boost an ability score". For how long? How much? This is what this section feels like.
* Place Magic is really soft on rules. The concept of holy places and arcane nexuses is interesting, but no rules are given on how to create one, how to balance them, or how to destroy them. "This is the concept, here are some things that Places of Power might do, have fun."
* The Construct section could have been GREAT, but desperately needs some editing and proofreading. It's the most inconsistent section of the book. The guts of the system are fantastic, allowing creation of constructs of all sizes and materials. However, the section labels are wrong, and the whole process of creating a construct is blocky and non-intuitive. No distilled step-by-step process, just follow along the strange text. Add some huge errors: 1) No section on how to assign CR to created constructs. 2) The only example is creating an Animated Rope and then making a Rope Golem, but the Rope Golem stats are given twice, instead of showing stats for each. This is our only example of how to use this whole section. Plus, in the example, they add the ability of "immune to slashing weapons"... to a Rope Golem! Say what?
* Personal Growth Items seem broken in concept. Arcanist creates a basic magic item for low cost, anyone who holds the item can expend gold and XP to improve it, without item creation feats. It requires rethinking all magic items... why would anyone make an item the normal way? This isn't bad, but not really touched on in the text. It also lacks a concrete, start-to-finish example, which is frustrating.
* The Relic system describes how to insert powerful holy items (on the scale of artifacts) in your world. It seems interesting, but isn't a simple system. A Relic Power Level, some kind of ranking system, is introduced but is only used except as a cap of how many powers you can cram into an item. Aside from Ego, a powered-up intelligent item system, I couldn't figure out what this system added that the DMG item-creation rules didn't give you.
* The standard Magic Items section is uneven. While there are some good, if bland, entries, there are uneven ones as well. The Shield of Zabeth is +1, but "becomes +4 in the hands of a fighter". So is that when a character is fighting, or when someone who can take Weapon Specialization wields it? Other items suffer from similar gaffes. Also, many of the creation costs seemed to be approximations, rather than hard computations.

To hate:
* The Table of Contents page is low quality. It takes up a whole page, but passes on very little information. Each of the five major sections is listed, one for each chapter, for a total of five entries to help you navigate a 176 page book. Since there are so many disparate topics discussed in this book, ten minutes spent creating a Table of Contents would have been nice. For example, Chapter Two (The Craft of Magic) has five distinct, unrelated subsections: Arcane Libraries, Magical Research, Taint and Tune, Old Skills New Uses, Ceremonies and Rituals. If you like one of those subsections, prepare to search for it every time you pick up the book.
* The Index is stretched to two pages by lousy formatting and a too-large font. This was especially frustrating, because some sections really wanted that extra page for more examples or rules.

Conclusion:
Spells and Spellcraft is really hit and miss. The ideas throughout the book are Superb, but too many sections are rushed and amateurish. If there were a revision of this book that cleaned up the problems I mention, it would get a Superb. If you can easily afford to spend $25 to not use the whole book, and don't mind extra elbow grease to mine the incomplete sections for material, it's a Good buy. But because every DM is not looking for extra work to use products, and I'm one of them, I give it an Average. Take the good, forget the rest.

 

[d20Dwarf]

Thanks for the review, Clint! I"d like to post the link to the S&S errata page, which has among other things the stats for both the animated rope and the rope golem.

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/llsserrata.html

Wil Upchurch
Fantasy Flight Games

 

[Simon Collins]

This is not a playtest review.

Spells & Spellcraft is another in FFG's Legends & Lairs series, concentrating on extending and extrapolating on the rules presented in the Core Rulebooks.

S&S is a 176-page hardcover accessory. Coming in at $24.95 this is fairly good pricing for its size and type. Though the font size is fairly large comparatively to other books, there is fairly good use of space.

Artwork is very good on the whole, whilst the front cover again imitates the Core Rulebook look that has been the feature of previous releases in the Legends & Lairs series. The quality of writing is pretty standard. Editing is good.

Chapter One: Spells, offers over 100 new spells for all spellcasting classes. Examples include:
* The atmospheric 'Aura of Darkness', a 2nd-level evil cleric spell that creates a zone of evil power surrounding the cleric which grants effects much like a bless spell in a 10-ft. radius.
* The utilitarian 'Dig' spell, which can also harm earth elementals and the like.
* The potentially annoying 'Gandar's Chatterbox'(Brd 2, Sor/Wiz 3), which causes inanimate objects to chatter inanely and non-stop, interrupting spellcasting.
On the whole, there is a mixed bunch of spells here - some good, some boring but useful, and some that would have been better left out.

Chapter Two: The Craft Of Magic, begins with a discussion of arcane libraries. Most of the information here is common sense for mediaeval times but there are tables giving an idea of how large a library might be, the types of books to be found within, and the difficulty of tracking down a rare book. There is also a table and some discussion of the cost and content of a library developed by a PC, and a short example of an elven NPC, an expert bookhunter.

The chapter continues with a detailed discussion of magical research. This covers the cost of outfitting and renting a laboratory, some tools of the trade (such as necromancer's scissors), special components for new spells (such as a griffon feather or a dragon scale), different types of experts that can be employed to aid the research process, and the uses of magical research (with costs, time, and Spellcraft DCs for creating new spells, new metamagic or item creation feats, and analysis of magic items or new materials).

The next section offers up some variant rules for bards and sorcerers. These optional rules break bard's spellcasting into four styles - music, dancing, juggling and storytelling, and give some minor amendments for each style (e.g. jugglers can't use the Still Spell feat). The sorcerer optional rules define the type of blood that taints the sorcerer's veins - dragon, fey, giant, demon - and apply some advantages and disadvantages to each (e.g. +2 to Intimidate and Bluff, -2 to Handle Animal, Ride, and Animal Empathy for Dragonblood sorcerers).

There are also 7 new feats (e.g. absorb spell, favored instrument), some suggestions for new uses of old skills, and a new skill: Knowledge (Psychology).

The next section deals with ceremonies and rituals. After giving some ideas of the way in which ceremonies and rituals are used, a number of examples are given for each divine spellcasting class. The ritual/ceremony requires a Spellcraft skill check, modified by its effects and the number of casters taking part. The rituals and ceremonies cover such areas as divine guidance, raising dead, curing lycanthropy, exorcism, summoning an animal companion, atonement for a fallen paladin, and purifying the land. Rituals and ceremonies are measured in terms of hours, the more complex ones taking more than 12 hours.

Chapter Three: New Types Of Magic, begins by offering three new spellcasting options - Ward Magic (semi-permanent areas of magical effect created by tying Abjuration and/or Divination spells to a particular location - 50 charges only), Chaos Magic (somewhat similar to wild magic from 2e but randomly generates one of a limited selection of spells as well as a beneficial or harmful mutation, the caster has limited control over the mutation, and it requires the Chaos Magic feat), and Cooperative Magic (two casters can apply a Metamagic feat to a spell, even if they don't have that feat). The chapter goes on to discuss religion, and focuses on 'small gods', outsiders who may grant some spells to worshippers within strict limits (restricted cleric level, restricted location of influence). There is a brief description of an Animist, a cut-down version of a shaman, who requests the aid of spirits.

The chapter ends with a discussion of place magic - arcane nexuses and shrines. Arcane nexuses are natural places of power that boost specific aspects of arcane magic and limit it in other ways, whilst shrines are places of power created by a deity or a deity's clerics and followers, and affect divine magic.

Chapter Four: The Mundane Made Magical, begins by focusing on Alchemy, looking at labs, courses, mishaps, alchemical items and new metal alloys. There are then some detailed rules for creating Constructs, with a useful example. A number of new magical materials are then given (new fantasy metals, wood, animal parts, plants, etc.) which are designed to add more flavour to a campaign world and/or limit the easy production of magical items by making the rare material a prerequisite in item construction. The chapter ends with a discussion of familiars - improving the power of a familiar by transferring the character's own XP to it, and giving a number of new familiars (including some new creatures).

Chapter Five: Magic Items, begins with a new magic item - a glyph egg, much like a spell grenade. The next type of item dealt with is Personal Growth Items. These items come in two types - recovered-power (items that have powers that are discovered as the wielder grows in power) and customized (wielders channel powers into the item as they grow in power). The wielder can either bond with the item or research it to unleash these abilities. This process requires gold and time (for research) or XP (for bonding) as payment for awakening the powers of the item. Rules for creating, limiting and personalising these items are given, along with a few examples. The chapter also introduces another new type of magic item - relics, much like artifacts but with intelligence and purpose (often divinely influenced). The chapter and book end with a number of new magic items. There is also an index.

Conclusion:
This tome offers a heap of new ideas for arcane and divine magic, though the focus is on arcane. Some of the ideas were original, some of the ideas were good, whilst some were old hat or poorly delivered. The book is a perfect example of the adage 'You can't please all of the people all of the time' - there is something here for most people (I particularly liked the Personal Growth Items, the concept of ceremonies and rituals, and the uses of new magical materials) but much that will not appeal (I wasn't fired up by the sections on arcane libraries and laboratories).

The most disappointing thing was the amount of exposition in the book, a feature of previous FFG releases and one which they can't seem to ditch - paragraphs or even pages stating the obvious and posing unanswered questions. However, the two or three ideas that most people will glean from the book could be inspirational enough to be worth the cost as they would bring a unique feel to magic in the campaign world. The book would have scored better had there been less exposition and more time spent expanding some of the rules sections that seemed a little bit rushed and light (such as the Animist, and nexuses and shrines).

In the section on new magical materials the book states "The items introduced in this section should be integrated into an existing campaign carefully, both for reasons of verisimilitude and game balance." The same could be said of the book as a whole - it works best when a few choice ideas are carefully integrated into a campaign world. Few GMs will want to do more than this. If one thinks of Spells & Spellcraft as a pot of ideas to dip into every now and then for a choice tidbit, then it merits the score I have given it. Those expecting to find an entire book of ideas they can use will likely be disappointed.

 

[Psion]

Spells and Spellcraft

Spells and Spellcraft is the fourth of FFG's hardbound supplement style Legends & Lairs books targeted and generic d20 system fantasy, following Traps & Treachery, Mythic Races, and Seafarer's Handbook. Spells & Spellcraft provides new option for magic in such a game, useful for both players and GMs.

A First Look

Spells & Spellcraft is a 176 page book priced at $24.95 US. The interior typeface and leader space are a bit larger than average.

The cover is blue, with the iron-shod tome look with a design similar to the previous books in the Legends & Lairs series. The front cover has a stylized scroll with a glowing rune on it inside a rune-encrusted circle, against the backdrop of a collage of some of the various pieces of artwork from the interior rendered on a parchment-like background.

The interior art is black and white, and generally of good quality. Interior artists include Andy Braise (whose style you may recognize from the FFG's Dragonstar Starfarer's Handbook), Mitch Cotie, David Griffith (who you may recognize from various Mongoose titles), Eric Lofgren (FFG and Mongoose alumni) and Tyler Walpole.

A Deeper Look

The book is divided into five chapters. The table of contents only lists the chapters, and not specific topics. Fortunately, there is an index.

Chapter 1: Spells

As you might expect for a book with spells in the title, there is a whole chapter devoted to new spells. The writeups are a bit more like those in the Players Handbook than in Sword & Sorcery Studios' Relics & Rituals in that they provide no flavor text, which can be good of bad depending on how much you value such things. A number of the new spells are listed for existing domains,a practice which Relics & Rituals also engages in. Unlike that book, Spells & Spellcraft at least gives you some indication on how to handle this: you can either allow the player to pick one or other of the spells and domain spells or domain spells at your discretion. That may be very obvious, but it is more guidance than Relics & Rituals gave.

The selection of spells includes many combat appropriate ones. However, there is also a fair selection of noncombat and utility spells.

Some example spells include:

- Animate Images: Creates animated objects out of images. Similar to a "shadow conjuration" version of animate object.
- Bandersnatch: Traps a sack so that someone reaching a hand in is shrunk down and trapped in the sack.
- Chameleon Skin: Gives one-half concealment and +20 to hide checks. I thought the bonus was a bit high; the ring of chameleon power and robe of blending only provide +15 bonuses.
- Command Construct: A powerful high-level spell that allows you to steal control of a construct. The spell does not state that it in any way bypasses a golem's normal immunity, which makes it seem a bit less powerful. It does have a modestly expensive material component, but it seems like an XP cost might have been appropriate.
- Conjurer's Toolbelt: An example of the utility spells in the book, this cantrip conjures a tool of some sort.
- Disruption Missile: One of a variety of spells that bolster the arcane spellcaster's ability against undead, disruption missile creates bolts of positive energy that damage undead.
- Dramatic Visage: A multipurpose illusion spell, dramatic visage creates special effects around the target. This can be of use in combat, conversation (where it affects intimidation, bluff, and diplomacy checks), or performances.
- Felonious Friend I and II: These two spells summon a force similar to an unseen servant that can perform various skills. Felonious Friend I can prick pockets. Felonious Friend II can disable device and open locks.
- Malediction of Razors: Shoots blades of force that cause bleeding (like a wounding weapon) in addition to the base damage.
- Pulsing Fireball: Similar to a fireball, except the fireball repeats every round for 5 rounds, though subsequent bursts are successively weaker.
- Restore Book: Given a part of a book, restore book restores the entire volume.
- Syron's Energy Armor: Undead creatures contacting the subject of the spell suffer positive energy damage.
- Zone of Visibility: Creatures in the area of effect lose the effects of invisibility, hide checks, and obscuring mist. I think this spell was a little too close to invisibility purge.

Overall, this is an interesting and useful selection of spells. There were a few that I would have raised a level, but no spells struck me as blatantly abusive.

Chapter 2: The Craft of Magic

This chapter provides a number of resources for spellcasters. The chapter is divided into a number of topical sections.

The first two sections, Arcane Libraries and Magical Research, do not expand upon the scope of the existing rules, but rather provide more detailed rules to address details that a GM might otherwise wing. These rules sections discuss the building and classification of libraries and labratories, finding books, employing experts to assist in research, and other details of libraries and laboratories.

The next section, Taint and Tune, begins to nudge back the boundaries of the existing rules a little. This section provides variant rules for handling bards ("tune") and sorcerers ("taint"). The bardic magic section assumes that bards can use one of a variety of magical methods, and the bard as depicted in the d20 system core rules represents just one variant, the bard that uses music as part of their magic. New methods presented include dancing, juggling, and storytelling. Each of these has advantages and drawbacks compared to traditional bards. For example, a juggling bardic spellcaster receives a bonus with thrown weapons, but their version of spellcasting is easier to disrupt. I like the variants presented here compared with other attempts at refining the bard by d20 system publishers.

The sorcerer variants build on the idea that sorcery is the result of an unusual bloodline. The standard per the book is assumed to be "faintblood", i.e., regardless of the character's heritage, the bloodline is so faint that it causes no appreciable changes from the sorcerer as described in the d20 system core rules. Characters with stronger bloodlines must select the type from dragon, fey, giant, or demon, each with their own advantages and drawbacks. For example, demon-blooded sorcerers get a minor fire or cold resistance and a +1 natural armor bonus, but receive penalties on their saving throws against aligned magic.

In addition to these variants, a number of new feats are provided to help individualize your sorcerer. For example, the Bloodburn allows a character to increase the effective caster level of a spells by inflicting damage on themself.

The chapter provides a brief listing of some new uses for existing skills. Overall, the expansions seem reasonable. For example, balance can be used to assist in concentration checks where precarious footing threatens to disrupt a spell. A new knowledge skill is provided, psychology.

The last section of the chapter covers ceremonies and rituals. A system is provided for describing rituals and ceremonies in game terms (including such things as caster level and spellcraft DC required to perform the ceremony) , and a number of sample ceremonies are described. Many ceremonies are tacked on to actions that did not have any prior requirements, as well as events such are weddings that have no prior treatment. The game effect of ceremonies seem vague at best, and I don't feel that the ceremonies and rituals dovetail neatly with the system in the same way that the rituals in Relics & Rituals do.

Chapter 3: New Types of Magic

The third chapter throws out a bundle of new optional systems and magic items for PCs and Gms.

The first new type of magic is Ward Magic. A ward basically uses the item creation rules, using the new item creation feat weave wards. Wards are basically item enchantments (using abjuration or divination spells) that are applied to locations. Wards can be activated by bearers of ward tokens, small items attuned to the ward. Low level spells can be activated by anyone attuned to the token, but higher level abilities require a spellcaster to activate.

One point of curiosity regarding the weave wards feat is that it specifies an arcane spellcaster as a prerequisite. Later, it mentions divine wards (which seems reasonable.) I wonder why the feat specifies that the caster must be arcane.

The second new type of magic is Choas Magic. To use chaos magic, the an arcane spellcaster must take the appropriate feat. A character with the feat may select chaos spells in place of normal spells. Chaos spells are essentially a list of normal spells assembled around a common theme. For example, the invocation of dreams is a chaos spell assembled in place of a 3rd level spell and consists of "offensive" mind-affecting spells: daze, detect thoughts, dream, nightmare, sleep, and suggestion. When cast, the spell effect that actually takes place is rolled randomly on a chart included in the book. The table selects the effect, and has a chance of causing helpful or harmful variations in the effect.

Cooperative Magic is a method of casting that requires two casters to have the appropriate feat. In some ways, the cooperative effort doesn't help too much – some effects are determined by the average of the casters' levels. However, the DC is heightened and the casters may add one of a short list of metamagic feats for free. In general, I must say I preferred the combined casting approach in Sword & Sorcery Studios' Relics & Rituals.

The section on religion examines a few alternate options for divine spellcasters. Perhaps most interesting is the small gods system. Small gods are creatures with CRs from 5 to 24 and with a sizable body of followers. Small gods can grant power to divine spellcasters, but the level of ability they can grant is limited by the god's CR and the number of followers. The book suggests that outsiders could be small gods, but an example shows an elemental, and I could see dragons filling this role as well. This is one of the neatest and best executed ideas in the book, and it clears the way for cults devoted to demons and dragons.

Another divine spellcasting variant is the theurgist. Theurgists are clerics that are devoted to multiple deities. Theurgists can select domain spells from any domain. However, theurgists lack any domain abilities.

Animists are characters who have a special relationship with various spirits in the world. A druid or cleric may become an animist priest in exchange for certain abilities, or any character may use the spirit friend feat. Characters with this ability gain a number of spiritual awareness points they can use each day; these points can be exchanged for favors from the spirits.

Place Magic purports that there are two special types of places that contain arcane or divine magical power; these are referred to as nexuses and shrines respectively. The rules for these places are not hard and fast; this section merely provides examples and suggestions. For example, arcane nexuses might automatically apply metamagic feats to spells of a given school, prevent scrying, or allow casting of spells without use of a slot. A shrine might be treated as hallowed, provide bonuses to knowledge (religion) rolls, or heal followers of the deity the shrine is devoted to.

Chapter 4: The Mundane Made Magical

The fourth chapter encompasses a few topics not directly related to spellcasting: alchemy, constructs, magical materials, and familiars.

The alchemy section includes a number of new alchemical items in the same vein as those presented in the players handbook. It also includes rules for alchemical mishaps and combining the use of alchemy with other skills, as well as a smattering of new metal alloys such as frost steel and moon silver.

The constructs section provides a system for building constructs from scratch using any material the caster wishes. You are given a variety of base forms according to size and then tweak the attributes according to the material that it is made of. It is not as complex and accomodating as Mongoose Publishing's Constructs book is, but is easier to use.

Two sample constructs are included, animated rope and rope golem, but the statistics blocks are incorrect. FFG has posted the correct statistics on their website.

The magical materials chapter provides a variety of substances that can be used as components of magic items or having special properties all by themselves. For example, armor forged of silentsteel does not provide the normal penalties to move silent checks. A system is provided for finding and harvesting these items, according to the rarity and type of the material.

The familiar section expands upon a spellcaster's options with familiars. Casters may take advantage of familiar types other than animals, such as elemental and constructs. Unlike WotC's Tome & Blood, there is not cost in feats to acquire these special familiars (though as a GM I would be inclined to use the T&B feat in conjunction with these rules.) Instead, there is a caster level prerequisite and other requirements to acquire such familiars.

The familiar section includes a section on improving familiars. A variety of special qualities can be added to a familiar, at the cost of XP.

A variety of new exotic new creatures are introduced for use as familiars. Your sorcerer or wizard can have intelligent construct spellbooks, ghostly vipers, celestial songbirds, or grassy elementals as familairs.

Finally, the familiar section provides a brief system for handling NPC reactions according to the character's familiar type. Obviously, undead or parasite familiars pose a few problems when interacting with more polite society.

Chapter 5: Magic Items

The last chapter covers magic items. It introduces three new types of items as well as a selection of new standard magic items.

The first new type of item is the glyph eggs. Put simply, glyph eggs are magical grenades. Glyph eggs contain a certain spell, and unleash this spell when the egg is shattered. Essentially, this makes glyph eggs a bit like potions in that they can be used by anyone, but they typically contain area effect spells rather than personal effect spells.

There is a new feat to craft glyph eggs. However, it only mentions being able to craft eggs that contain spells up to third level, though the list of available spells for glyph eggs goes up to 9th level. It turns out that a feat was omitted from the book to allow creation of higher level glyph eggs; this feat is listed in the errata on the FFG website.

The second new type of item is the personal growth item. Personal growth items are items with a rich history that grows with the characters. As the character gains experience, they may spend money or experience to enhance the item. The item may acquire quirks as they grow, mitigating the cost to the character, but potentially making the items more colorful to deal with.

On the surface, this is a neat idea, but I don't like some of the mechanics behind it. For example, the GM may split the character's cost in advancing the item between the listed gp and xp cost. The problem is, per the rules, that's not an even tradeoff. The "exchange rate" between gold and experience is 5:1, not 25:1 as you might guess from looking at the item creation procedures.

Relics are items created by gods or outsiders that the faithful can use. Similar to personal growth items, they can be activated by the expenditure of experience. Relics are usually items of religious significance.

Finally, a number of new standard items are introduced, such as oil of animation (animates an object it is applied to), rings that provide metamagic, and the grotesque mask, facestealer.

Conclusion

This book is packed with ideas for use in a game. I was especially fond of the variant bards and the small gods rules. Many of the ideas and rules presented are by necessity much less detailed than those in rulebooks dedicated to the subject, but if you aren't looking for quite as detailed treatment of those topics, the fact that so many such topics are covered could make this book worth your while.

As stated, there were a few places that I felt the rules treatment lack a little in the execution, such as the personal growth items. Further, I found the spells a little bland. It is likely that this book may be a little costly for the use you get out of it if you only use a few of the ideas from the book.

This book should appeal to those that are looking for more details in a campaign, looking for those looking to inject a little bit of mystery into their campaign, or for those looking to add more muted magic systems to a low magic setting.

-Alan D, Kohler

 

[The Sigil]

Spells & Spellcraft is something of a "generalist" book that deals with magic (mostly arcane magic) in the d20 system, published by Fantasy Flight Games.

Percent of OGC: Around 50% (scattered throughout the book, and there is a considerable amount of rules-crunchy stuff in here)

First Impressions: This book covers a ton of ground. There are (of course) new spells, but the book goes farther than that. It adds a lot of tools to the spellcaster's toolbox (well, to wizards and sorcerers anyway), but does not detail these tools particularly well. While the scope of the book is rather broad, the treatment of each individual subject is usually rather shallow, something that I must admit disappointed me. I feel that would have been better to go into more depth on each topic and either expand the book or split it into two rather than try to cram as many ideas as possible into a single book. That said, I found that the ideas that were well-developed were almost always very good.

Initial Annoyances: In addition to the uneven depth at which material is covered, I had the vague impression that there was a lot of white space in the book. Furthermore, the material smacked of being created by several authors independently and was not well-integrated (some portions of the book seemed to cover the same ground in different ways). Finally, the lack of an index was somewhat annoying.

Chapter Breakdown:

Chapter 1 is simply a collection of spells, mostly for wizards/sorcerers, but with a few spells for other classes mixed in. The spells run the gamut from "high-explosive" combat spells to "role-play-conducive" utility spells. Nothing stuck out immediately as terribly unbalanced except for "pulsing fireball" (which did set off balance alarms in my head - think of a fireball that bursts... then bursts again with less power the following round... then bursts again with even less power... you get the idea), and there weren't any spells that knocked my socks off for originality, but there were definitely some good twists presented. My favorite was "disruption missile" - a spell that uses positive energy to blast undead creatures. A nice counterpoint to necromancy spells, IMO.

Chapter 2 begins presenting alternate rules for spellcasters. While most of these were nice and were welcome additions to the system, I couldn't help feeling that this was one of the "shallower" chapters in the book - by which I mean not that the concepts were bad or vapid, but rather that the concepts presented were not explored in nearly the detail they should have been. The classification of libraries, laboratories, and so forth was nice, but I felt it deserved a little more detail than it got. Granted, I didn't expect the level of detail found in Ink & Quill, but the rules in this section were sparse at best. I found "taint and tune" to be almost a complete waste of time... except for the sorcerous "Bloodburn" feat, it's just a "bonus here" with a "penalty there" system. Nothing really groundbreaking there and, unfortunately, rife for abuse in the hands of the wrong players. Variants for the bard (such as a juggler) seem to have been added as an afterthought and took me back to the silliness of the Complete Bard's Handbook wherein a bard's abilities could be done through "juggling" or worse (thankfully this book didn't reprise this one) "exceedingly flashy use of weapons." Come on. Maybe I'm in the minority, but for me, Bard does not equal "any kind of Entertainer" - rather, Bard equals the classic fantasy archetype of "Minstrel" - someone who uses music and song and a great knowledge of the world to affect people and who truly is a jack of all trades. Someone who specializes in Performances relying upon manual dexterity (such as juggling) is called an Expert with a Skill Focus in Profession: Juggler. But I digress. Finally, there is sthe section on "ceremonies and rituals." Since Psion put it much better than I can, I hope he won't mind me quoting him... "The game effect of ceremonies seem vague at best, and I don't feel that the ceremonies and rituals dovetail neatly with the system in the same way that the rituals in Relics & Rituals do." Amen to that.

Chapter 3 discusses new types of magic. Thumbs up to the section on Wards - basically, areas keyed to an item that can be used to activate spells in the area. More importantly, weaker spells can be activated by non-spellcasters (e.g., a guard could use something like "detect magic" or "detect invisibility" at a city gate). While Wards are only useful for high-fantasy settings, it struck me that this was the ideal way for political leaders in a fantasy world to harness the magical resources of resident wizards on a full-time basis - while not inconveniencing the wizard himself with full-time work. I would imagine that most wizards would be amenable to constructing a ward that lets the city watch throw "detect magic" spells and stop by every month to recharge it rather than be stuck sitting in the barracks with a bunch of unwashed and unkempt and uneducated city guardsmen so that he can cast detect magic in person when needed. Thumbs up to the section on "local" gods - powerful creatures that are worshipped but are not themselves divine. This makes a wonderful way to implement cults - especially those based around a powerful creature such as a dragon or a powerful fey - by providing a means for clerics of the "cult" to receive spells without having to rationalize which "real" deity is providing those spells. Thumbs down to the section on Cooperative Magic, which is clunkier than the rules in the earlier publication Relics & Rituals (though I thought the R&R rules were a bit underpowered myself). Thumbs down on the Theurgist, too - theurgists get their domain spell list expanded (to any domain) but lack domain abilities. I felt this could be abused and makes the class feel more like a "cleric who would like to be a wizard in armor." It just didn't suit my tastes at all. "Place magic" was a nice touch but not all that exciting - it seemed to quantify rules that most DM's would have already Rule 0'd - not exciting, but a slight thumbs up for quantifying things. I am still undecided about Animists but leaning towards thumbs down... I have a certain dislike of systems that add MORE points to keep track of... between attack bonuses and hit points and spell slots and so on there's already plenty to keep track of in D&D. Make things drain something that's already in the system, don't add ANOTHER system.

Chapter 4 presents more things that a spellcaster can add to his bag of tricks. This, to me, was the highlight of the book. A few alchemical items are presented (I liked the treatment of these, for what it's worth - both "game effects" and "background/flavor text" were provided to help show how these items fit into high fantasy) and gives some good rules-crunchy stuff to make "practical alchemy" a little more quantifiable. The rules are not quite as detailed as Alchemy & Herbalists, but again, I don't expect that level of detail, as A&H is entirely focused on that one single area. There is a section on building constructs - which I feel was the "weakest link" in this chapter, as it is the least detailed and I found that Mongoose's "Constructs," released at about the same time, was better-suited to the "Build-A-Construct" concept. There just wasn't enough detail given to constructs here to make the system really "live." The "magical materials" section was one that I felt really could have been combined with the alchemy stuff or the magical items in the next section, but the presentation *was* solid. My favorite of these was "wraithspoor" - the "ectoplasmic remains" (my term) that occasionally remain when a wraith is killed can be worked into steel to give an otherwise nonmagical weapon the "ghost touch" property. Great synthesis of flavor text and game mechanics there. However, the crown jewel in this section - at least in my opinion - was the section on enhancing a spellcaster's familiar. By spending XP, a wizard/sorcerer can grant his familiar certain abilities - from Energy Resistance to Flying to Fast Healing - and some of these can be shared with the master if the familiar is within five feet. I probably could have done without the "Cute" special quality, though (Will save to attack the familiar because, "aw, it's sooooo cute"). Familiars often seem to be seen as "tagalongs" and easy targets if you want to seriously screw a spellcaster. With these rules, the familiar can become a far more potent and important ally to a spellcaster (especially that familiar that shares its Fast Healing: 1 ability). Suddenly, familiars are no longer the toad you drag with you for that extra 1 hp per level. A great addition to the system! Introducing new types of familiars (parasites - like a leech - and undead familiars) and discussing how people react to familiars (especially the new, "disgusting" ones) is a nice touch, too.

Chapter 5 is the requisite section on magic items. It introduces glyph eggs, which are essentially grenades that throw spells. Basically, "thrown potions with area effects." Personal Growth Items are items that "level" with the character. I am not too thrilled with the rules on this one - I thought the "Levelled Items" mechanics presented in Dragon Magazine (can't recall which issue) were cleaner and better-balanced. (Of course, both of these systems are adaptations of the Earthdawn system, but that's another discussion entirely). Of a similar vein are "relics" which are essentially experience-point-activated items that can only be used by those of a certain alignment/faith. I liked this idea a little bit better... the item that only the truly faithful and truly magnificent (read: with XP to burn) can wield effectively. To wrap up, the book introduces new magic items. I still think the "magical materials" should have been placed here, but I guess that's just me.

Presentation: Presentation is nice - this is an attractive, slick hardback, with decent-to-slightly-above-average artwork inside. I couldn't get the vague feeling that there was an excess of white space out of my head, though, which is especially disappointing considering I felt that a lot of these ideas could go from "fair" to "fantastic" with a little more treatment.

Conclusion: This is definitely a mixed bag. But it's a BIG mixed bag, meaning there is a lot of good stuff to find in here. Because there is so much, it will not compete with a "specialty" product if you are looking only for a certain subject (e.g., its treatment of Constructs is not as good as Mongoose's "Constructs" book and its treatment of Alchemy is nowhere near that found in "Alchemy & Herbalists") but that's to be expected. If you are looking for a product that can be used in a lot of different ways, this is probably a good one for you. There probably should have been more depth in many places, but across the board nothing stuck out as horrible. If you have the money and/or shelf space for a generalist book of ideas relating to d20 magic that don't require a lot of work to integrate into a campaign, this is a worthy addition to your bookshelf. If you're looking to bolster your familiar, get this book at once. If you want rather detailed or rather radical departures from the basic d20 rules, this supplement probably isn't for you. It gets a rating of "average." It has a few REALLY good points, but they aren't enough to lift it above the overall feel of "solid, but unspectacular." And IMO, the "solid, but unspectacular" product is the definition of average. That said, I can't say I'm unhappy with my purchase. It's one of the best "average" books out there and is on the absolute borderline of "good."

--The Sigil
Oct. 11, 2002