Thanks Nightfall. I only look in on WotC's site sporadically myself. And it looks like the poster
Entropic Shadow has now put together a pretty decent breakdown of the book. I'll just repost the whole thing for you guys...
Classes:
Crusader - Interesting tank class. It has the ability to delay damage and get attack and damage bonuses for doing so. Gains Die Hard and Mettle eventually. Pretty good taken to level 20, not sure what I would do with it multiclass wise.
Swordsage - The monk of the martial adepts. Gets the most manuevers and manuevers per encounter of any of the martial adept classes. Has wisdom to AC in light armor and wisdom to damage in certain circumstances. Despite the medium BAB, I think this is probably the best class to dip into for manuevers and stances.
Warblade - Interesting class. Gets bonus feats and a bunch of Int based abilities as class features. I foresee warblade/swashbuckler builds on this board shortly after the book is released everywhere.
Other than class abilities, the classes differentiate themselves by what martial paths they have access too. Crusader has 3, 1 unique to it. Swordsage has 6, 3 unique, and warblade has 5, 1 unique.
Prestige Classes:
First of all, I have to say they did a good job designing the prestige classes. It is easy enough to meet the manuever requirements with feats, and your abilities progress even if you use that method. It was a nice difference from the confusion of the Anima Mage.
Bloodclaw Master - Devastating two-weapon fighter. It slowly gets rid of the typical two weapon penalties, both attack and damage. Has limited pounce and rend abilities. Good for Shifters, as they get slightly different class abilities than the other races do. Warblade or swordsage into this class and Weretouched Master could be a powerful build.
Bloodstrom Blade - Throwing expert. Has abilities that put Strength based throwing feats completely to shame. Master Thrower and Hulker Hurler probably have a lot to compliment this class with.
Deepstone Sentinel - Another Dwarven tank PrC. This one seperates itself from the others by reshaping the battlefield. You can't qualify for it before 11th level, so its tricks are fairly high level. Probably good mixed with Dwarven Defender and Knight
Eternal Blade - Elven martial adept PrC. Has a few Int based abilities, but seemed very blah to me over all. I am sure the CO geniuses will find some use for it though.
Jade Phoenix Mage - Arcane/Martial Adept. Almost the perfect figher-mage, IMO. It has martial abilities that make its magic work better and can burn spell slots to make its martial abilities better. Only problem is that it loses 2 caster levels. If you are willing to expend the feats, you can get into it without losing a caster level, however.
Master of Nine - The best way to gain access to all 9 martial paths. Swordsage 15/ Master of Nine 5 will net the most manuevers known, manuevers per encounter, and stances known.
Ruby Knight Vindicator - This is the divine caster hybrid class, though it is specific to Wee Jas. Kind of a assassin paladin thug. It does a few neat things with turning attempts, like gain additional swift actions. Not sure what to make of it overall.
Shadow Sun Ninja - Monk/Martial Adept hybrid. Has a bunch of abilities focused on darkness and light in contrast. Seems to fight best in perfect darkness. Progresses Flurry, which is always good.
Feats of Note:
Divine Spirit - Swift action to heal is always good.
Martial Stance - Gain a stance. Fighter Bonus.
Martial Study - Gain a manuever. Fighter Bonus. Also good because it nets you a class skill when you take it, based on what manuever you choose. In particular, I am thinking of gaining Jump for totemists by taking a Tiger Claw manuever.
Shadow Trickster - Bonus to illusion DCs and some precision damage types. I am sure Shadowcraft Mage is going to love this.
Snap Kick - A kind of half power flurry that can trigger off of a standard action. The initial attack or attacks require that you be armed, so probably good for those that only dipped into monk.
Stone Power - A power attack replacement feat. Lower attack bonus for temporary HP. Not sure how useful
Superior Unarmed Strike - Monk-like Unarmed Damage progression (though not as good) for the cost of a feat, or treat your monk level as higher for unarmed damage.
Tactical Feats - Not sure if any of them are worth mentioning, but there is a tactical feat for each style.
Styles:
And now the fun stuff.
Desert Wind - Fire damage, mobility, and speed. Probably good for scouts, dervishes, and other mobility types.
Devoted Spirit - Alignment based and healing abilities. They worded the healing abilities very carefully so you can't just smack your cohort to gain life after a battle.
Diamond Mind - Diamond Mind masters don't make saving throws. They make concentration checks. Sometime they don't make damage rolls. They make concentration checks. When they do make damage rolls, they use concentration checks to multiply the damage. This is one of my favorite paths, and is great for duelist type characters.
Iron Heart - Has a lot of status effecting strikes and interesting counters. Overall this style seems to be about slamming the enemy as hard as you can.
Setting Sun - All about the counters. Tries to turn an enemy's attacks and movements against him. Has a lot of throws as well.
Shadow Hand - Has a bunch of abilities focused on hiding, concealment, and attacking flat-footed opponents. Generally useful, but suffers some of the same problems that rogues face. I expect to see this path in the next generation of Multi-Pounce builds, as it has standard action, move action, and swift action teleport abilities. Since manuevers refresh after every combat, you have a lot of endurance when it comes to multi-pouncing.
Stone Dragon - Defensive manuevers and hard hitting attacks. It is the only path common to all three martial adept classes. Has the disadvantage of having to be in contact with the ground to use.
Tiger Claw - You leap around and rend people, preferably with two weapons. Seem like it will be good for totemists. Possibly fantastic for lancer types, if a first level manuever works the way I think it does. It might be possible to trigger Battle Jump after you have full attacked or charged.
White Raven - Motivational group bonuses and charge attacks. Probably good for bards, marshals, and the like, as they are doing the same sort of thing already. Having bard levels and White Raven manuevers lets you qualify for the Song of the White Raven feat, which quickens Inspire Courage and lets some of the martial adept classes stack with bard levels for determining its bonuses.
Misc.
The skills you can pick up with Martial Study are: Tumble, Intimidate, Concentration, Balance, Sense Motive, Hide, Jump, and Diplomacy.
Each style has some associated weapons, but you are in no way required to use them. From what I can tell at least. They can be beneficial to use if you have a spare feat to burn. Up your damage and save DCs a bit.
Anyone can get a few maneuvers and stances through feats, which are in fact Fighter Bonus Feats. PrCs can progress said feats to gain even more abilities. Fighters still have more staying power in a single fight then the martial adepts, as their abilities are generally usable at will, so I would say they stack up pretty well.
And now for a few more notable maneuvers:
Flashing Sun - Desert Wind 2. Basically Flurry of Blows with any weapon.
Holocaust Cloak – Desert Wind 3. Stance. Not really all that impressive, I just need to build a half-giant who uses this and claims to have Dread Pirate levels.
Desert Tempest – Desert Wind 6. Move and attack any enemy you pass adjacent to. Screams skirmish damage to me.
Aura of Chaos – Devoted Spirit 6. Stance. Reroll and add when you roll the maximum on a melee damage die.
Aura of Perfect Order – Devoted Spirit 6. Stance. Take 11 on a single d20 roll a round.
Defensive Rebuke – Devoted Spirit 3. Forces an enemy to attack you on their turn or draw an AoO. Combine with the Defensive Sweep feat and a knight’s or deepstone sentinel’s ability to make terrain difficult, and laugh.
Only new weapons are the legacy weapons, one for each style (one is redone from Weapons of Legacy).
As far as proficiencies, armor and shields vary from class to class. They range from rogue like to fighter like. All get martial weapons, though the some of the martial adepts aren't real big on ranged weapons, and don't get proficiencies in martial ones.
As for maneuver mechanics...
Each martial adept class gains a set number of manuevers and stances. They also have a number for how many they can have prepared at a given time. Prestige classes and feats can add to all of these numbers. Manuevers have pre-reqs that have to be met in order to take them. Most the time this is just a number of manuevers from the same style.
Preparation takes no rest, and about 5 minutes of time. Stances are constant effects that you can switch as a swift action. Every other manuever requires an action ranging from immediate to full-round. You regain them at the end of an encounter, assuming you have a few minutes rest. Each class also has a method of regaining them in the heat of combat.
Q: So if I want to use the same maneuver multiple times within a single encounter, do I prepare multiple copies, just as with spells?
A: Thats what it looks like. Unlike spells, you aren't required to prepare lower level ones. You could stock up on 12 copies of your level 9 maneuvers.
And speaking of maneuvers, I did find another one to note. Diamond Mind, 7th level. Avalance of Blades. Basically, you take a full round action to hit your enemy, and you keep attacking at an increasing penalty until you miss or until your opponent drops. So the question is: how high can we make our attack bonus for a single round? I might have to check out Tleilaxu Ghola's Kalashtar Duelist again.
Q: What, if anything, synergizes well with power attack in ToB? That's the staple means of gaining damage for any warrior build.
A: Strangely, I didn't really notice anything that worked well with power attack. There are a few things that up your to hit bonus, and those are always good for PA, but mostly the damaging strikes add some amount of d6s (Like a 20d6 rend ), and some overcome DR. Not a specific type of DR, just DR in general.
Q: How high are the penalties? Is it just me, or would this synergize very well with the feat from PHBII that gives you +1 cumulative for each attack after the first that hits with a bludgeoning weapon. Depending on the penalties for the maneuver, you could get a prepetual attack until the enemey drops with a high enough starting Attack bonus.
A: The penalty is -4 each time, which is at least better than your normal full-attack. Good catch on the Crushing Strike, though. That will certainly help.
Q: Can you give us a quick sampling of some of the other high-level maneuvers / stances?
A: Lets see.
Time Stands Still (Diamond Mind 9) allows two full attack actions.
Strike of Righteous Vitality (Devoted Spirit 9) heals you or an ally when you successfully attack. I mean Heal as in the spell.
Five-Shadow Creeping Ice Enervation Strike (Shadow Hand 9), in addition to having a great overly complicated martial arts name, does damage, ability damage (str, dex, con, or all three) and a few other nasty effects.
Feral Death Blow (Tiger Claw 9) is an instant kill or 20d6 extra damage.
War Master's Charge (White Raven 9) lets you and your allies all charge the same opponent at the same time.
Thats a sampling of the top.
Enjoy (I haven't even read it all myself yet!).
More to come...
I still think though it's not as horrible as people think it might be. We'll just have to wait and see when I go to pick it up. 
