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<blockquote data-quote="trancejeremy" data-source="post: 2009890" data-attributes="member: 924"><p>The Way of the Dead is the Harrowed splatbook for Deadlands d20. It's not quite a classbook, since Harrowed is essentially a template - a Harrowed is basically a normal character that died, but was reanimated thanks to an evil spirit or demon.</p><p></p><p>Unlike previous Deadlands d20 splatbooks, this is 96 pages and a whopping $20, though thank goodness I only paid $8 for it used. And like previous Deadlands 20 books, it's fairly poor in terms of physical quality, full of recycled art, and and has large margins. (To be fair, I usually recyle that line when I write a review of a Pinnacle product). I swear, I think I've seen some of the art is just about every DL d20 product. This one picture of a woman about to flip a card for instance (Even people who don't have any other DL products can tell some of the art is recycled because in many instances the artist put the year next to his signature). </p><p></p><p>The first couple pages are recycled from the original Deadlands rulebook. Basically, it's a story in which a famous Deadlands NPC (the Prospector) talks to a Harrowed (one which may have just come to it's senses). In the original book, it was a great way to introduce the reader to the setting of Deadlands. Here, it's pretty much just filler to explain who the Prospector is. After that, there's a lot more fluff, about 20 pags in total, until we get to some meat.</p><p></p><p>Harrowed generally have special powers, and there are lots of different ones. About 20 pages is devoted to them. There's not really any sort of balance to them, they range in useful from Cat Eyes, which lets the Harrowed see better in the dark, to a few different powers that allow the Harrowed to almost instantly kill people (provided they don't resist). This isn't necessarily bad, but it's something the GM has to watch out for.</p><p></p><p>After that, is about 10 pages of fluff on various organizations/groups and how they feel about the Harrowed. </p><p></p><p>Then is more fluff, mostly, and stuff repeated from the Deadlands d20 book. This goes on and on, seemingly, though some is background material new to me (info on just who the Prospector is), and some actually has some gaming relevence.</p><p></p><p>This goes on and on and on seemingly endlessly until the included scenario. It's pretty short, around 20 pages, and is aimed at Harrowed/dead characters. And begining ones. It's a pretty gruesome adventure, though it doesn't get that graphic. Still, probably not something you want to run for children or hippies. </p><p></p><p>Lastly, there are some brief conversion rules to convert regular Deadlands characters to Deadlands d20 characters, which I think also shows up on their website. Despite what they say, it's really not that hard to converted one from regular Deadlands to Deadlands d20. Most DL characters are built around a certain archetype, and most of these made it to DL d20 in the form of classes. </p><p></p><p>All in all, an okay product. Would have been better if it were cheaper, had original art, smaller margins (and less white space in general), less fluff, but as you never really see that in Deadlands d20 products, it's to be expected. So it gets a slightly below average grade of C-.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="trancejeremy, post: 2009890, member: 924"] The Way of the Dead is the Harrowed splatbook for Deadlands d20. It's not quite a classbook, since Harrowed is essentially a template - a Harrowed is basically a normal character that died, but was reanimated thanks to an evil spirit or demon. Unlike previous Deadlands d20 splatbooks, this is 96 pages and a whopping $20, though thank goodness I only paid $8 for it used. And like previous Deadlands 20 books, it's fairly poor in terms of physical quality, full of recycled art, and and has large margins. (To be fair, I usually recyle that line when I write a review of a Pinnacle product). I swear, I think I've seen some of the art is just about every DL d20 product. This one picture of a woman about to flip a card for instance (Even people who don't have any other DL products can tell some of the art is recycled because in many instances the artist put the year next to his signature). The first couple pages are recycled from the original Deadlands rulebook. Basically, it's a story in which a famous Deadlands NPC (the Prospector) talks to a Harrowed (one which may have just come to it's senses). In the original book, it was a great way to introduce the reader to the setting of Deadlands. Here, it's pretty much just filler to explain who the Prospector is. After that, there's a lot more fluff, about 20 pags in total, until we get to some meat. Harrowed generally have special powers, and there are lots of different ones. About 20 pages is devoted to them. There's not really any sort of balance to them, they range in useful from Cat Eyes, which lets the Harrowed see better in the dark, to a few different powers that allow the Harrowed to almost instantly kill people (provided they don't resist). This isn't necessarily bad, but it's something the GM has to watch out for. After that, is about 10 pages of fluff on various organizations/groups and how they feel about the Harrowed. Then is more fluff, mostly, and stuff repeated from the Deadlands d20 book. This goes on and on, seemingly, though some is background material new to me (info on just who the Prospector is), and some actually has some gaming relevence. This goes on and on and on seemingly endlessly until the included scenario. It's pretty short, around 20 pages, and is aimed at Harrowed/dead characters. And begining ones. It's a pretty gruesome adventure, though it doesn't get that graphic. Still, probably not something you want to run for children or hippies. Lastly, there are some brief conversion rules to convert regular Deadlands characters to Deadlands d20 characters, which I think also shows up on their website. Despite what they say, it's really not that hard to converted one from regular Deadlands to Deadlands d20. Most DL characters are built around a certain archetype, and most of these made it to DL d20 in the form of classes. All in all, an okay product. Would have been better if it were cheaper, had original art, smaller margins (and less white space in general), less fluff, but as you never really see that in Deadlands d20 products, it's to be expected. So it gets a slightly below average grade of C-. [/QUOTE]
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