MEG Hal said:
All the reviews have given it high marks, waiting for a ENWorld review
A busted ankle kept me off the 'puter for a few weeks but I am trying to get one done for you.
And here it is....when they get the product added to the review section I will post it properly.
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Pantheon & Pagan Faiths is a comprehensive (208 pages) treatment of the divine aspects of the world of Gothos.
The copy I have for review is PDF.
First things first, jumping right out of the gate I noted that Pagan Faiths takes a more earthy feel to divinity. What does that mean exactly? It means that while there are some panthionestic elements common to fantasy role-playing games, Pagan Faiths went a step beyond that and integrated these faiths both panthionestic and paganistic. There are schisms, gods fallen from the favor of their kin, outsiders who seek to unseat the upstart Pantheon, witches, druids, and more - all intertwined into a cohesive cosmological whole. Most settings have divinity that resembles a jigsaw puzzle [this group goes here and that groups goes over here and never the twain shall meet] but Pagan Faiths is more a tapestry with threads that run throughout the whole.
There are several new rules sections but these are largely optional. Most of these rules additions involve some additional bookkeeping but are clean and simple so they should not involve that much work. The piety system is a great add-on to any game. Basically, the more a divine character works towards the goals of his patron the more he will be rewarded with powers like turning. Clerics now have a measurable scale to illustrate how well or poorly they are doing and when they are really bad they enter the illustrious ranks of the heretical.
In addition to the piety system, there are several other features to make your holy character stand out such as taking a true path or special domains.
The first thing I ever read about Gothos was a little PDF they did way back when to hoopla surrounding 3E was just starting and it centered on highly flavorful but slightly out of focus spellcasters. It is good to see that they continue in that tradition. This book adds two new base classes that fill a nice niche - the shaman, and the witch. On top of those, the book has several prestige classes to fill many of the classical roles for divine characters. Class wise, this book offers the player several unique ways to tailor his character in into exactly what is desired.
Another innovative aspect in the feats section is the birth sign. This type of feat gives insight to the type of person character is DESTINED to become. Characters can choose to ignore their birth sign but doing so carries a cost [Players can opt out of birth signs by not choosing one of these feats at 1st level but they seem like great fun.]
Rules Note: Character aspects seemed well balanced but this was not a playtest. Nothing jumped out at me as broken.
I have only skimmed the spells section so I won't comment on the scads of them.
The last section of the book is the most impressive. It is a detailed listing of the gods and pantheons of Gothos. It is reminiscent of the Powers & Pantheons series in second edition - more than Deities for third. Each god gets a little block description of area of influence, alignment, domain, special domains, etc… After that we get into the good stuff. A brief description of the divine being, copious notes on dogma of the faith, notes on the type of characters who follow this god, alternate forms, holy places, festivals, wonderful stat blocks and descriptions of a few notable players in the gods faith. After the NPCs comes the history, current conflicts, a nice section of rituals, relics, and exclusive spells and finally the section on each god concludes with some notes on clerics and specialty priests. A great read.
The last feature of the book is a large index.
Art notes: I liked much of the art in the book which was at least standard but for some reason the holy symbols just did not appeal to me.
I waffled on giving a 4 or 5 star rating eventually settling on 4 based on the specifity to the world of Gothos. This book is a gold mine but most people will have to tweak things to get them to work in their homebrew or other setting.
That's it for me.
Randy Madden ~ Eosin the Red
