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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2008866" data-attributes="member: 9860">Beware! This review contains major spoilers.This is not a playtest review.Price: $34.95Page Count: 256Price per page: About 14 cents per page - about average for this size of product.Format: HardcoverExternal Artwork: An average piece of artwork showing a dragon chasing an armoured knight beneath a portico.Additional Page Use: The first eight pages are either blank, or contain credits, contents and a note from the authors regarding expansion of the setting. The last four pages are blank or have ads and the OGL. The inside covers are both blank. In addition, each section title takes up a full page. The back page contains a brief overview of the sourcebook on a mock black vellum background. Internal Artwork: The art ranges from poor to good, the best stuff coming from Jason Walton.Maps: The maps are fairly average, with some non-standard scaling on the indoor maps.Page Layout: Text density is average, margins are good and there is little in the way of white space, except in the adventure by Gary Gygax, where, the tex density is also above average. Text Style: The writing style is a little awkward and at times verbose. There are regular editing errors including spelling mistakes and even repeated paragraphs which interfere with the ease of use of the book.Whats Inside: The History Of The World (42 pages) is a lengthy tract. It is quite Tolkienesque in style - somewhat formal, old-fashioned and stilted. And very detailed. As explained in the Authors Note at the beginning, the world of Erde is strongly influenced by mediaeval Europe, and this is noticeable in the large amount of German-sounding words. The style and use of language gives the history an epic, legendary feel. There are plenty of seeds for adventure ideas here, but its heavy going to read. The history covers from the beginning of the world of Erde (created by the All-Father), includes the history of the dwarves, the coming of the goblins, the lengthy goblin-dwarf wars, the death of the All-Father and the birth of Unklar (the nightmare of the All-Father), the Age of Man, the Age of Heroes and the fall into utter darkness (known as Winter Dark) after the Catalyst Wars, the Winter Dark Wars (as heroes fought to rescue the land from Unklar's dark grip) adn finally to the defeat of Unklar and the beginning of After Winter Dark, the campaign setting for the world of Erde.Of The Cosmos And The Gods (10 pages) deals with cosmology, the most noteworthy aspect being that when the All-Father died, his mind shattered, opening gates and portals to a number of other planes, here called the multiverse. The Dreaming Sea, an odd sea affected by the dreams and nightmares of the peoples of Erde is also briefly described, before the section discusses climate and the calendar. Three types of gods are worshipped on Erde: Eternals (the most powerful gods, of which there are 10), Spirits (18 of them, lesser deities), and Immortals (heroes and villains from recent history who have risen to godhood - 9 of them, with 3 more on the verge of godhood). There is another categorisation into supreme deities, greater deities, lesser deities, minor deities, and heroes/villains, with consecutively lesser amount of domains to offer priests, although strangely domains are not dealt with in this section, but 150 pages later under spells. This section has some interesting gods and some adventure seeds acn be teased from between the lines. A sidebar also deals with a code for Confessor Knights, paladins who worship St. Luther ( a god who stars in the Troll Lord adventure, The Malady of Kings). The Kingdoms Of Erde (72 pages) varies in the type of information it deals with for each kingdom, sometimes concentrating on place, other times on famous people or the nature of society or politics. However, the majority of each section is taken up with further detailed history of each kingdom. Most kingdoms are given two pages, though the more important kingdoms receive three or four pages. Each kingdom is assigned an economic status, depicting its level of trade and industry, and the type of items it trades, using a quick-reference icon system. The kingdoms are heavily influenced by historical societies, particularly German and French mediaeval ones. But there are also influences from England, Scandinavia, Rome, Egypt, and Greece. Notes On The Geographies (28 pages) deals with the geography of Erde, and is broken down into six areas, each section describes the major geographical features of each area. This is an interesting section with lots of good adventure seeds if one reads between the lines. The places are kept relatively brief and interesting, and detail mainly forests, mountains and rivers - each with their own little twist to them. The section ends with a piece of flavour text regarding knights and their habits.Search For A Lost City (10 pages) is a short adventure written by Gary Gygax (maybe in return for naming one of the kingdoms Gaxmoor??!!). It is designed for characters of levels 1-2 and is a very basic introductory scenario. Whilst searching for the mysterious city of Gaxmoor, the PC stay overnight in a farmer's barn. They encounter an angry bull and can use the bull to help them escape a concerted attack on the farmstead by a large band of gnolls looking for food.The Player's Handbook (34 pages) deals with player-orientated information, including:Races and Languages: Changes to the standard races include a breakdown of elves into twilight elves, wild elves, wood elves, and high elves (which confusingly is also a character class). In addition, the Half-Faerie race is introduced (actually pretty similar to a Half-Elf). Halflings have an expanded set of favoured classes and have some extra skills. Several of the races have a change in ability scores, most of which incorporate a +1/-1 bonus/penalty within the changes. A Height, Weight and Age table is given, and there is a discussion of the new languages of Erde.Classes Orders & Guilds: This section introduces a new character class, High Elf, which is confusingly described as both a new race and a new class at the same time. New prestige classes are Holy Defender of the Flame (essentially a paladin), Primal Druid (essentially a Druid), and Watcher In The Wood (a ranger with druid abilities). Twenty Guilds and Orders are described, some extremely brief whilst others take half a page up. Fairly standard stuff including assassin guilds, paladin orders, forest defenders and sorcerous guilds.Equipment & Economy: This section includes an explanation of the economic icon system used in the Kingdoms section, as well as introducing some new weapons and armour, including cannon, muskets and pistols.Spells: The domains of the gods are given here along with 40 new spells specific to the world of Erde, and 3 new domains (Command, Confession, and Dream).The DMs Handbook (26 pages) details 40 new magic items for the world of Erde (quite a few of them are fairly major artifacts), 17 new monsters (including Dark Faerie, Dream Warriors, and Troll Lords) and a new template - Orinsu - a spirit that can animate bodies or objects.The book ends with a piece of flavour text, a chronology, an index, a re-statement of the Icon system for economies and a small political map of Erde.The High Points: Probably the most interesting sections of this sourcebook are the ones on the geography (which has a number of potential adventure seeds hidden within the text and some interesting locations) and the section on deities (which again could be plundered for ideas). Some of the internal art is pretty good as is the layout design.The Low Points: There is just far too much boring history in this book. The author has a limited understanding of the use of the d20 rules in terms of design (there are some real howlers, most notable of which is the high elf character class/new race). There are various pieces of information which are badly misplaced (i.e. in the wrong section). Text is repeated, there are too many elementary editing mistakes, and the writing style was stilted and awkward.Conclusion: There has obviously been a huge amount of work put into this book so it is a real shame that there is very little about which I can be positive. This sourcebook needs less history (a LOT less history), and more adventure ideas (perhaps an expanded section on geography not just detailing forests, mountains and rivers but some more original settings). Probably most noticeable of all to the majority of gamers will be the basic mistakes in design in the Players section. There is some interesting stuff here, but its not worth the time or the money to find the few needles in this muddled haystack.</blockquote>

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