Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Messageboard Golem" data-source="post: 2009911" data-attributes="member: 18387">By Morgan {TempesT} Grover, Executive Director d20 Magazine RackSizing Up the Target Whispers of Death, by Steven Gilman, is a 32-page electronic file (PDF) from Sundered Blade Games and sells for $5. The Web Enhancement for this product is also available for free.First Blood Whispers of Death: A guidebook for Assassin Characters is a just what it states. This sourcebook starts right out with a quick recap of the assassin PrC abilities, which you will need to know to use the book fully. After this it details 5 new prestige classes. A mask is a master of disguise and diplomacy, the slayer is more of a brute warrior, and the sniper excels at long distance assassinations. The next section has 11 new feats for your use. Most of these look pretty balanced, but I can see instances where shadow mastery or stealth mastery may become a bit "over-usefull". These feats allow you to always take 10 on hide or move silently. Even when circumstances would not allow it. These are not over balanced, but can find "over usefulness". The next section describes new equipment. This includes 1 new armor type, 2 new crossbows, and several new misc. gear equipment, such as footpads and darksuits. Assassin Styles is next. This is a really interesting idea. I have seen other things like it before, but not exactly the same. In total there are 6 different assassin styles. These styles allow a character to learn bits of other class styles, while not actually multiclassing, or taking a PrC. Each style has 5 ranks of learning, and each ranks costs a certain amount of XP, time to learn, and a required class level. Every assassin charges for his services, and the next section take this into account. A table is setup showing how much an assassin of a certain level would charge to take out an individual based on the individuals CR. This can be useful at times, and saves the work for the DM. Assassin guilds are fairly common, bet seldom known. 4 such guilds are described. Each guild has a character path that can be followed, describing what to take at each level to fit within their ranks. The shadowblade guild also describes a gauntlet that any would-be members must defeat before being considered. Assassin magic always helps the killers in need, and 8 new spells are described. 5 new magical properties / items are also described, to help in their quests. Sundered Games also added in the assassin PrC from the DMG to help make things easier and convenient. This gets rid of the need for that book at the table in this case. Added benefits? How about a character sheet designed for assassin characters? Or 4 basic NPC's? You got it. They end off by giving an exclusive preview to the bow master PrC, from an upcoming sourcebook. This was really great, since the class is mentioned in WoD several times, and use in one of the paths. Critical Hits Flavor. This book changes the simple "assassin" into one full of flavor. With 5 prestige classes, 6 styles, and 4 character paths, nearly any type of assassin you can think of can be achieved. Political, disguised, divine, ninjas, snipers, thugs, and more. Critical Misses The only thing that seems to be a miss is the artwork. And that is because there is none. Well, let me rephrase that, there is one small picture of a bottle spilling out smoke. Artwork really enhances a products feel, and helps to get a feeling across. But this is minor, considering SBG added plenty of crunchy bits in place of the artwork. And since it is a PDF, I would rather have crunchy bits instead of artwork taking up ink anyway. Coup de Grace This is a solid product, and has me wanting more. There is now a web enhancement available with a bit of new stuff and errata that if fairly useful as well. If your any fan of assassins, as a player or NPC this book can give them some great feel, and get away from the basic stereotypes. In turn this can be implemented with GR's Assassin Handbook for some really great ideas.To see the graded evaluation of this product, go to Fast Tracks at <a href="http://www.d20zines.com" target="_blank">www.d20zines.com.</a></blockquote>

Verification