This is an ‘unofficial’ review as it’s a product I bought because I love Warcraft. With that in mind, let me tell you, if you’re looking for a nice looking collection of monsters for your 3.5 fantasy RPG, this is it. If you’re not impressed with art or Warcraft and want more creatures per page, the layout of this book may turn you away.
The book is broken up into three chapters and three appendices. Chapter one covers the standard creatures of Azeroth, many of which already have official D&D counterparts like the basilisk, centaur, dyrad, gnoll, kobold, naga, ogre, phoenix, satyr and others. The thing is these are Warcraft versions. Here, the gnolls are broken up into assassin, brute, poacher and warden. The ogres have a two-headed version, the ogre magus that casts spells.
Now in terms of layout, looking over the gnoll, it seems pretty 3.5. It’s got number of squares, breakdown of armor class into base (with modifiers), touch, and flat-footed. Base attack and grapple get a separate line from full attack. Challenge rating and level adjustment are noted, as are racial attributes. The only thing that may be off is that the level adjustment doesn’t have a ECL, just a level adjustment so people who don’t know that you add the racial hit dice to the level adjustment may be a little confused.
Each entry has a description for the GM to read, a description for GMs to customize, often a bit on the society, combat, and where necessary, game stats for members of the race. One race that popped up here that is nothing like its d20 standard counterpart is the troll. We get a nice variety of trolls, humanoids that have some intelligence in a primitive society, like dark, forest, ice, and jungle.
One of the things I was looking forward to were the specific creatures from Warcraft. Things like the Murloc, creatures that remind me of the Deep Ones or perhaps even the Sea Devils. They have cousins who’ve been corrupted by the demonic forces of the setting, The Burning Legion, named Mur’gul. Much more powerful creatures.
Another favorite of mine are the Reventants. These were ‘foot soldiers for the malefic Old Gods when the world was young’. There are several varieties; Death, Fire, Frost, Ice, and Lightning. Anyone whose looking for a good old floating suit of animated armor has a few options here.
Now chapter two covers the Burning Legion. Nice thing about this section is there are a lot of powerful enemies. Take the Pit Lord. These are the things that the orcs were enslaved by. These are very nasty creatures that use two-bladed swords. They’re kind of like a centaur but demonic and winged. Another favorite of mine is the old Infernal. Picture a meteor that is covered in fire in humanoid fore. Pretty cool stuff.
Chapter Three Covers the Undead Scourge. Lots of templates here including; Banshee, Crypt Fiend, Forsaken, Ghost, Ghoul, Lich, Shade, Skeletal Mage, Skeletal Warrior, Withered, Wraith, and Zombie. Some of these are independent undead and others are Scourge. Each includes a sample, but more samples would make this section much easier to use.
In addition to the numerous templates, we’ve got things like abominations. These are large constructs that are crafted from the bodies of the dead. Dire Gargoyles are also full detailed. Not quite so fearsome but dangerous for lower level parties.
The most useful part of this chapter is Salient Powers. These are different abilities that the GM can add to his monsters like Corruptive Touch, adding acid damage to their melee attacks, or Fearsome Speed where the creature gets more movement and an extra move action per round. Each one has a type (Ex) or (Su) as well as a CR Adjustment. Makes for a nice variety in your monsters.
Now in the appendices, we have animals and vermin, villains of warcraft and other monsters in warcraft. The first section covers the standard and not so standard creatures like elk, forest spiders, bears and wolves. The villains section on the other hand, presents some of the most powerful NPCs I’ve ever seen. Illidan Stormrage, the blind demon hunter, is a 20th-level Sorcerer, 8th Level Rogue, and 7th Level Fighter. That’s one of the problems with detailing one of the characters before all of the sourcebooks are out. While he’s formidable, he’s no demon hunter.
Of course he pales in comparison to The Lich King. He clocks in at a massive CR of 50. Perhaps it’s because he can cast spells as a 14th level healer or a 20th level wizard? Perhaps it’s because he uses numerous artifacts like Frostmourne, the Helm of Domination and the Plate of the Damned. Each one more powerful than pretty much any standard weapon, each one tuned to the Lich King himself. In other words, this is one person you don’t want to mess with.
The final nice touch is a little something I have to imagine that they did for the fans. Appendix three covers other monsters from various Sword & Sorcery books in the Warcraft setting. This includes the Monster Manual, Creature Collection Revised, Creature Collection II and The Tome of Horrors. It’s just a little bit of information like how the creature fits into the setting like with the demons and giant eagles but it’s a nice touch.
The biggest problem I have with the book is the space that I consider wasted. Pages that are almost all black except for a wide screen illustration or screen shot from the game. Between the foreword and the chapters, between each of the chapters and between the chapters and the appendices, two page spreads. It’s good art but is it really necessary? The price tag isn’t bad at $29.99 and the layout itself isn’t bad with the white space.
The art is handled by some of the best in the business for most of the creatures. There are very few I thought, “What the hell where they thinking?” unlike Creature Collection and a few other books by SSS. The following artists were used; Carlo Arellano, Samwise Didier, David Griffiths, Roman Kenney, Michel and Rene Koiter, Chris Metzen, Bill Petras, Justin Thavirat and Ru Weerasuriya. Lots of talent went into this book.
For the world of Warcraft or those GMs looking for more exotic monsters, the Manual of Monsters does a good job of illustrating new horrors for your game.
