What are the 10 most important d20/OGL books?

[ashockney]

10 Most Important d20/OGL Books

I used my own bookshelves as the guide, so I just may never have experienced some of the other recommendations:

In roughly chronological order:

1. Creature Collection - what's this? Hm, no Monster Manual yet, so...
2. Relics and Rituals - simply awesome, and showed what "could be"
3. Spycraft - d20 + Modern and done cool, not a bad combo
4. Mutants and Masterminds - pushed the boundaries on the OGL
5. Book of the Righteous - just wow. thanks for showing us fluff done right...
6. Monsternomicon - I remember watching the WoTC staff marvelling at this book during Origins. Push out the boundaries on monster design.
7. A Magical Medevil Society: Western Europe - no stats, no problem
8. Arcana Unearthed: loved the content, pushing races, classes, and spells
9. World's Largest Dungeon: this game threw down the gauntlet to players everywhere - 1e style
10. Iron Heroes - 4e before we knew it, totally pushed the boundaries on classes, feats, and the environment as a challenge

Thank you, OGL!

Were it my "next" 3e campaign, what would be the 10 essential books from my collection I'd be likely to use?

1. SRD
2. Ptolus
3. Arcana Evolved
4. A Magical Medeival Society: Western Europe
5. Gary Gygax's World Builder
6. Complete Book of Eldritch Might
7. Tome of Horrors
8. Seven Strongholds
9. Seven Cities
10. World's Largest Dungeon

Greatest bang for the buck here, and would combine together to make for a sweet campaign with plenty of resouces to draw upon to inspire players, inspire the gamemaster, and pull from existing materials for challenges and encounters.

 

[catsclaw227]

Very interesting story about the "Advanced" series, Chris. I bought all three in hardback, if it's any consolation. I wonder how the Sword & Sorcery equivalent products did? Didn't they come out a few months before?

My list is a lot like the others:

For game "supplements"
Book of the Righteous
Complete Book of Eldritch Might
Dynasties & Demagogues
Crime & Punishment
Advanced Bestiary
Phil Reed's (Ronin Arts) 101 and "A Dozen... " series'
Book of Fiends
Arcana Evolved
Denizens of Avadnu

Settings and Sourcebooks
Ptolus
Wilderlands of High Fantasy
Lost City of Barakus (OK, so it's an adventure too, but it's a good source book too).
Bard's Gate
Banewarrens
Oathbound
Freeport and all it's stuff
Bluffside
Warlords of the Accordlands (four book set)
Midnight
Aerith (sp?) - Known World from Goodman Games

Adventures
Age of Worms
Drow War Series from Mongoose
Rappan Athuk, Reloaded
Tomb of Abysthor
A few of the Goodman DCCs
A bunch of Necro adventures.... many are very good

 

[Mark]

Wowser, Chris. That's quite the perfect storm. If it makes you feel any better, just yesterday for the gameday (Chicago Gameday XXI) I utilized both Dungeons of Doom and Advanced Bestiary to anchor the scenario I created. It went over great. Thanks!

If I added ten more to make a top 20 it would include Blue Devil's Poisoncraft, as mentioned above, as well as Green Ronin's Dungeons of Doom and Medieval Player's Handbook. People should definitely take advantage of your current sale -

http://www.enworld.org/forum/publis...-rpg-stimulus-package-offers-great-deals.html

 

[pawsplay]

Ten most important?

#1 The Foundation, no question one of the most "important" books

#2 and #3 Tome of Horrors and Creature Collection were both significant releases, definitely expanding the concept of a "monster manuel" and in CC's case, demonstrating what could be done with variant settings

#4 Midnight, I'm not personally a fan, but it certainly made a splash

#5 Ultimate Feats, once of the most comprehensive attempts to collect OGL material in one place, and also a sign that the glut of mechanical crunch beasts was nearing critical mass

#6 Book of Erotic Fantasy, for reasons outlined above... actually forced a change in the d20 license

#7 Mutants & Masterminds, demonstrating that good promotion and good design could more than make up for the lack of a d20 logo

#8 Aberrant d20, the quintessential example for how not to create a d20 port of a game, as uninteresting as it was disasterous, despite the involvement of many talented people

#9 The Pocket Player's Handbook, harbinger that WotC did not truly appreciate what they had in the first place.

#10 Conan, while flawed, definitely raised the bar for innovation and demonstrated the combined power of a known milieu with the OGL fanbase

 

[SolitonMan]

Very interesting story about the "Advanced" series, Chris. I bought all three in hardback, if it's any consolation.

Ditto. They're three of my favorite d20 books, and earlier today prior to getting to this thread I was pondering how to use an eldritch weaver as an unusual adversary for my players. I still want to run a game with a dread lich titan as the BBEG.

I'm so sorry to hear about the trouble they caused for Green Ronin, so I'm going to take a trip to your web site and find some items to expand my collection.