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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Messageboard Golem" data-source="post: 2011074" data-attributes="member: 18387">When the Sky Falls is an event book the details the crash of a meteorite into your campaign world. Everything you need for this event is detailed here, from organizations to Prestige Classes. This PDF is broken down into eight chapters as follows.Chapter One “The Impact Site” is all about the three types of meteorites ( Mundane, Thaumaturic which are charged with vast amounts of magic, and Engram Arks which are parts of destroyed worlds filled with memories) and what happens when each strikes the planet weather on land or in the sea. Also included here are five different types of Engrams, each with its own color and geared towards a certain type. The types are skill based, arcane based, divine based, psionicly based and special, each one has a description of what it does along with a few examples of that color. Engrams are the memories of a destroyed race and grant different bonuses to their specific type. This is also where you will find out what happens to the area of impact, weather changes, and other effects in the area. There are also details about what materials can be gathered from an impact site and what possible uses they have. Most of the materials can be used in the forging of weapons and armors- these materials grant different bonuses to the items forged with them.Chapter “Two Integrating the Event” goes into detail with various ways to get the PCs involved in the event. Also included are two organizations for your use. Each organization (Sky Callers and Astronomers) has been fully detailed out for your use, including histories, NPCs and goals. One of the strangest ideas is the Arcanosphere. The Arcanosphere is the energy that magic comes from. Included is a detailed list of what changes can be made to the Arcanosphere and how it affects the different schools of magic weather in a positive or negative way. These changes range from a small shift in power levels which are temporary to changing the school permanently. Most of these changes have to deal with changing the power level with witch the spell is cast. For example a positive temporary change to the evocation school results in the ability of the caster to deal max damage on a spell up to three times per day. While a negative permanent change to the same school means that all evocation spells cast are considered one level lower. There are two new domains included here (Psychic and Nightmare); to go with these two domains are two new entities that can be used as gods. The new entities are the Dark Plea and Vengeful Sky. The Dark Plea is the destroyer or worlds and is the cause of Engram Arks, while the vengeful sky is a force of nature. Chapter Three “Prestige Classes” details four new PRCs. These are the Astronomer, Engram Adept, Lord of Silence, and Ruin Priest. The Astronomer uses astromancy (the manipulation of the magical energy that results from a meteorite strike) to power his spells. The Engram Adept has the ability to use more engrams than any other person, some of their abilities include not needing to eat, sleep, etc. The Lords of Silence are my personal favorites- they use silence as a weapon. My favorite ability that they have is the Clasp of the Void. This ability surrounds an enemy in a void (no air or sound) and the next second collapses and releases that enemy into the normal atmosphere again doing a descent amount of damage in the process. While only being able to use this ability once a day it is still a cool ability. The final PRC is the Ruin Priest, he worships the Dark Plea and his ultimate goal is to bring down a meteorite on the world. Chapter Four “Feats” lists twelve new feats broken down into two paths. The first path is Astromancy; the second is the path of the Star Emblem. Of the twelve new feats half of them belong to the Astromancy path with the rest belonging to the Star Emblem path. The Astromancy path leans towards spellcasters, meaning the prerequisites needed for the feats along this path require spellcaster levels, while the Star Emblem path leans towards the fighter types by requiring a higher base attack bonus. Chapter Five “Spells” has thirty eight new spells for your use. The majority of spells (twenty or so) deal with engrams so if you plan on using them in your campaign then you will get the most use out of this chapter. While there should be more spells of a general variety this chapter does a good job. It starts out with a full sheet listing all of the spells broken down by spell level and class (Bard, Wizard, Etc.).Chapter Six “Afterfall Magic Items” introduces two new weapon qualities (Starshine and Voidwrought), three specific weapons using said qualities, two new staves, four wondrous items and two new artifacts. The ability Starshine adds extra damage on critical hits while the Voidwrought ability adds bonuses to attack and damage. All of the items in this chapter have some sort of tie in with other sections. Some of the items described here can be a little unbalancing if given out to the PCs without some thought.Chapter Seven “Monsters” describes six new creatures for your PCs to fight. The CRs range from CR 3 to CR 17. Each creature is fully detailed including a picture. All of the monsters mentioned is previous chapters are here. The problem I have with this chapter is once again half of the creatures are for use with the Engram Ark, Not a major problem but if you don’t use the Engram Ark it takes a little thought as to how and why these creatures  are encountered. Chapter Eight “I Found It In The Crater” expands five of the ideas presented in chapter one. Each one of the expanded ideas offers enough information for a GM to create a full adventure. I think this chapter is one of the most useful for a GM that wants to use When the Sky Falls but does not have all the preparation time to come up with everything.Overall if you are looking for a book describing an event that will shake up your world and players this is for you. If not than you could still use some aspects of the book with a little thought, while the majority of the book describes and assumes you will use the event in the current timeline of you campaign world there is enough information here for using this event in the past or future.  My main problem with this book is that there is too much information for the Engram Ark. While the Ark is the most interesting of the meteor types, if you do not use it than there is too much information that you can’t use without a little modifying.   Otherwise this is a good book that will allow you to change parts of your world without having to start a new campaign. The ideas presented here are well done and make the impact of the meteor a major event or a small event as the GM see fit.</blockquote>

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