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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Melan" data-source="post: 2010448" data-attributes="member: 1713">The Tome of HorrorsTo be honest, when I first heard of Necromancer's new monster book, I approached the idea with some amount of trepidation and concern. Before that, Necromancer was solely a publisher of adventures, and while Necropolis, Gary Gygax's excellent adventure module contained a well done appndix of Aegyptian monsters, I wasn't sure how it would turn out in the end.Fortunately, the end result is an excellent resource for most DMs. At $30 for a 328 page hardcover, Tome of Horrors is very competitively priced compared to many other books. Production values are mostly good. The B&W interior illustrations are usually good, even though I expected better. The lack of colour may be a turnoff to some - as an old school DM, I welcomed them wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, the book is hardly perfect: some batches were made with an inferior binding and are prone to falling apart. Necromancer offers free replacements for them, but taking it to a binder shouldn't be to costly, either.The Tome's main attraction are the monsters. The majority of them are converted from older monster manuals - especially the original Monster Manual II and Fiend Folio. There is also a selection of new creations by Scott Greene and Erica Balsley, plus others from Necromancer's modules. I especially appreciated Scott's attention to plantlike monsters - they are often overshadowed by undead or demonkind. Speaking of demonkind, they are present in great quantities, from the lowest ones to several powerful demon princes and devil lords. In addition to the old standbys (like Orcus, "The Faceless Lord" - Juiblex in disguise, Geryon, Kostchie and so forth), many are new and make their debut in this book: the froglike Tsathogga, Lucifer (whose Hp modifier is a wonder of monster engineering) and multiple lesser lords, many of whom are retainers and underlings of the aforementioned notabilities. The Demodands (who were called "Gehreleths" in 2e, if my memory of cheesy names doesn't fail me) and the Daemons make a comeback, too - including their master, Charon.The Tome also offers animals which were missing in the MM. They may not be as exciting as, say, the Flumph or the Flail Snail, but they may come up more often in your game. I still don't understand how WotC could overlook Giant Frogs (or Giant Killer Frogs, or Giant Abyssal Frogs, etc.) or the various and sundry crustaceans of bygone editions.Like other monster collections, Tome of Horrors has its fair share of templates. Of these, the Dire template is the most usable to me, but there are several more - the Foo Creature, the Abomination, the Bleeding Horror, the Beast of Chaos, Skeleton Warrior, Slime Zombie, Therianthrope (this includes jacklaweres, wolfweres, assweres and other miscellaneous weirdness), Thessalmonster and Yellow Musk Zombie. Most templates come with a selection of detailed samples, a welcome addition in my book.There is also an appendix on poisonous snakes. The appendix definitely ups the danger level of these serpentine creatures - now their bite has nasty side effects like internal bleeding or tissue damage. Since snakes are too wimpy in D&D anyway, this is a good thing - of course, all of the appendix is completely optional.Finally, there is a listing of challenge ratings and a legal appendix which offers detailed instructions on how to reuse the creatures of the book in your own d20 publications. This little bonus, along with the way Necromancer Games credited the creators of each and every monster, speaks volumes of their attention to quality and excellence. Subsequent editions of the work should pay a bit more attention to credit (some are falsely attributed to Monster Manul II, when they were originally derived from TSR modules), and a breakdown of monsters by types would be most welcome as well.In conclusion, I consider Tome of Horrors to be one of the better d20 products to date. While some creatures were later duplicated in WotC manuals, most notably Fiend Folio, the variety and the execution of the monsters more than lives up to the book's minor failings.</blockquote>

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