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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2008935" data-attributes="member: 9860">This is not a playtest review.Undead is an AEG sourcebook focused on undead and undeath, including feats, prestige classes, spells, magic items, domains, etc., as well as non-rules information such as roleplaying advice.At $20 for a 128-page book and with no major layout problems, this appears good value for money based purely on amount of content.The art ranges from poor to good, with most internal art being mediocre. The writing is a little dry and verbose. Editing is poor, with regular and numerous mistakes.Chapter One: 'That Which Cannot Live, That Which Cannot Die', looks at the nature of undeath from somewhat of a philosophical perspective. It mainly discusses the general types of undead and looks at their interaction with the negative energy plane, as well as exploring the role of religion in relation to undead. The section also includes some sidebars giving seed ideas for possible campaigns, such as a religious organization of undead that seeks to control the kingdom by converting those in power to undead beings. This chapter seemed a little disorganised to me, and contained a lot of information that anybody with some experience of RPGs would already know as standard. The information that was comparatively original could have done with being expanded further - the section at the end of the chapter regarding returning an undead to true life is a good example: sentences like "several curative and purifying spells must be cast upon the corpse" and "the preparation of several unique and costly embalming liquids are involved in this process" left me wanting much more - which spells? how much are the embalming fluids? But this chapter teases without delivering the goods. The campaign ideas were the most interesting aspect.Chapter Two: 'Hunters Of The Dead', is a rules-heavy chapter featuring mainly prestige classes. The chapter begins with a new skill - Craft (Autopsy) which functions in a similar way to the Gather Information skill, with higher DCs for more obscure information. There is also a brief discussion of new uses for old skills - Heal to prevent undead rising, Knowledge (Religion) for proper burial rites, and Spellcraft to ascertain how long an animate dead spell has been functioning and if the undead is still under its master's control. Personally, I felt that autopsy would have been better as a new use for Heal, rather than a new Craft skill. A Knowledge (Undead) skill, using something like the Creature Knowledge skill from Gaslight Press' 'Gryphon's Legacy', could have covered all three of the 'new uses for old skills' ideas. There are five new feats:* Death Angel - gives the ability for critical hits and sneak attacks on undead. Pretty powerful for a feat you could gain at 1st level.* Pure-hearted - if you make a Fort save against an undead attempting to deal you a negative level, you do 2d6 damage back to the undead in positive energy backlash. Again, pretty powerful for a feat you could gain at 1st level.* Show Of Faith - limited Turn Undead for non-clerics. Available for 1st-level characters. The limits to this (you can only turn a number of Hit Dice of undead equal to your level, effect lasts only for a number of minutes equal to your Wisdom modifier, can't destroy undead, undead don't flee - only held at bay) make it not as overpowered as first appears.* Sixth Sense - detects invisible or non-corporeal creatures. This would have been better as an alternative use for the Scry skill, as an additional power from this feat is that you can detect scrying, which the Scry skill should really cover. Sloppy.* Stout-hearted - +4 bonus to saves against level loss. This seems more balanced than some of the other feats.The main thrust of the chapter are the fourteen prestige classes:* Champion Of The Dead - evil generals who lead undead armies for their masters.* Chirurgeon - grafts flesh, bone and tissue to create undead and flesh golems.* The Dying - dying from an undead curse or disease with no chance of cure.* The Exorcist - concentrates on protecting others from the undead.* Faith Hunter - vampire hunter.* Hunter Of The Fallen - your basic hunter of the undead.* Knights Of The Eternal Eye - literally, undying loyalty to a cause - undead who rise to perform a quest but slowly turn to evil.* Paladins Of The Pale - paladins particularly effective against undead.* Puppet - a mortal servitor of an undead master, given powers by the undead master.* Raider - someone who steals from the lairs of intelligent undead.* The Risen - creatures that rise from death to fulfill a dying wish, but turn towards evil as they progress.* Sacred Theurgist - arcane magic user who specialises in destroying undead.* The Unbeating Heart - cultists of evil death gods.* Wasteland Druid - a druidic type who can shapechange into undead, and has some necromantic powers. The prestige classes are nicely split between NPC-orientated and PC-orientated, cover a wide variety of takes on undead and undead hunters (though there is some overlap between prestige classes), and present some useful ideas for villains for GMs to throw at the PCs. The PC-orientated classes also strike a balance between the archetypal hunters (e.g. Faith Hunter) and the unusual ones (e.g. The Dying). I particularly liked the archetypal Hunter Of The Fallen, which should fit very nicely into any standard fantasy campaign. There were a few rules issues (e.g. one can achieve the Raider prestige class by 3rd level, and some other issues already noted by Psion in his review of this product).However, overall the prestige classes were interesting and well thought out. If Prestige Classes aren't your cup of tea though, they do take up a large part of the book. I also would have liked to have seen more detailed information on roleplaying these prestige classes.The chapter ends with some descriptions of various equipment that can be used by the undead hunter such as holy symbol, stake, garlic, mirror, wood-tipped arrows, etc. There is also a new poison, ghoul toxin, discussed - which induces paralysis.Chapter Three: 'Beyond The Flesh', looks at religion and magic related to Undead. Some deities, both evil and good, and dealing with both death and undeath, are introduced including domains and typical worshippers for each. Three new domains (Rulership, Spirit, and Undead) are presented along with domains from the PHB and AEG's Evil sourcebook. Nineteen new spells are offered up, including powerful spells such as mass animation, relevant spells to the subject matter such as restful death (prevents undead rising), and a few twists on old spells such as heal undead (a stronger version of inflict serious wounds). The section on magic items deals with both items for and against undead and include some nice atmospheric detail as well as the description and standard stats.  The section on artifacts is introduced with the history of a lich called Ahksar, obsessed with the study of death and undeath, and the collection and creation of artifacts that reflected his penchant. Each artifact relates to Ahksar in some way, but could be modified for use in any campaign, with GM discretion as to the power of these items.Chapter Four: 'More Than Flesh', charts eight undead archetypes, giving advice on skill and feat choices, and roleplaying tips:* Avenging - think of the film The Crow - thats the avenging undead archetype* Free Ghoul - a mercenary type* Ghostly Advisor - think of Obi-Wan Kenobi's ghostly appearances to Luke in the later Star Wars films* Guardian Mummy - discussion of a mummy's obsession for treasure* Mad Wraith - insane archetype that can apply to other incorporeal undead* Power-hungry Lich - the role of leader for the lich* Vampire - a discussion of the vampire template in relation to the archetype* Zombie Servitor - a discussion of the quiet rebellion of an undead slaveThe discussions focus mainly on roleplaying background and advice for undead PCs, but on the whole could equally apply to a well-detailed NPC. There are no statistics for any of these archetypes. It seems a shame that the level of roleplaying advice here could not have been applied to the prestige classes, and more information provided in this section about statistically creating and developing undead PCs for an unusual all-undead campaign. As a GM, I was also disappointed that there wasn't more ideas for undead as nemeses for the PCs. There are a number of sidebars scattered throughpout this chapter giving further campaign and adventure ideas. There is also a rather nebulous discussion of the difference between flesh golems and zombies.Chapter Five: 'Beyond The Pale', discusses undead campaigns, where one or more PCs are undead. It looks at campaign themes such as the idea that everyone in the world is undead. It also discusses how the PCs came to be undead, various settings (mainly levels of magic, and temporal period), and different locations (city, ruin, wilderness). A lot of questions are posed, presumably in an attempt to get the GM thinking instead of providing easy answers. I found this to be too nebulous and a little annoying. If I buy a book, it's to get ideas and twist them for my own use, so I expect that if questions are posed, answers are given - even if I don't agree with the answer, it can spark off my own ideas.Chapter Six: 'Secrets Of Undeath', deals with the process required to become a lich or a mummy. It uses flavour text to portray each aspect of the ritual process, with a discussion of the elements portrayed following. Useful for PCs who wish to become liches or mummies themselves, and may spark a couple of adventure ideas, but this chapter is very narrow in focus and limited in its usability.Conclusion: As Undead are one of my favourite creature types, I had high expectations of this book. I was particularly interested from a GMing point of view in ideas for using undead as villains, with perhaps a few well-developed NPCs and a welter of adventure and campaign ideas for using these undead villains. I was disappointed. I expected the usual feats, prestige classes, spells, and magic items. I was not disappointed. I did not expect a lot of nebulous chatter and annoying open-ended, unanswered questions or a lack of organization to the information provided. I was disappointed again.I did enjoy some of the unusual ideas for adventures and campaigns stashed away in the sidebars scattered throughout the text (though these are adventure and campaign concepts or lead-ins). The Prestige Classes, although only a few were actually of use to me, seemed balanced and well-presented (although the roleplaying information used for the archetypes in Chapter Four would have been a welcome addition). Some of the other game information was a little weak (I was not particularly impressed with the skills or feats - I was more impressed with Defenders of the Faith with regard to Undead-related skills and feats).Overall, there were some positive things to take from the book, but it could have been so much more.</blockquote>

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