Review - Pathfinder Setting Distant Worlds

This is the book I had been waiting for!!! From the time I first read about the additional planets of the Golarion Solar System, I was excited to know more! As a fan of Burrough's Red Planet books, I wanted to know about Akiton and the other planets, now the Pathfinder Campaign Setting supplement "Distant Worlds" brings more to light. 

Overview: This is a perfect bound, full-color 64 page supplement produced by Paizo Publishing, LLC for the Pathfinder Role-Playing Game system. Available in print and PDF formats. Written by James Stutter.

Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Distant Worlds (PFRPG)
Paizo Publishing, LLCGolarion is the primary world of the Pathfinder campaign setting, but it is not alone. Far beyond its lands and seas, sister worlds revolve around the same sun, their residents connected by magical portals or ships of terrifying magic and technology. Now take your game off-planet and explore these weird new worlds for yourself!This book offers a detailed introduction to the science-fantasy worlds of Golarion’s solar system, each complete with its own mysterious locations and cultures. Discover how your swords and spells match up against the trench dwellers of the Red Planet or the angelic Sarcesians who soar between asteroids. Research the mysterious origins of the sealed world-ship of Apostae, or hunt vortex sharks in the freezing seas of Kalo-Mahoi. Though strange and new, each of these worlds uses the same Pathfinder Roleplaying Game rules as Golarion itself.

Within this 64-page book, you’ll find:

• Gazetteers of every planet and major moon in Golarion’s system, from the steamy jungles of Castrovel and the machine-ruled rock of Aballon to post-apocalyptic Eox and divided Verces, where one side is always day and the other night. Plus, uncover information on the residents of the sun, Golarion’s moon, the asteroid belt called the Diaspora, the dark regions beyond mysterious Aucturn, and more!

• Introductions to the major cultures inhabiting the system. Will you join Castrovel’s beautiful Lashunta, fight beside the four-armed giants of Akiton, study with the hyper-evolved Contemplatives of Ashok, petition the undead Bone Sages of Eox, or face down the insectile legions of the Forever Queen?

• Easy new rules for adventuring on other planets, including discussions on gravity, temperature, time, vacuum, and traveling between worlds.

• Adventure hooks for every world, tailored for GMs currently playing on Golarion.

• Six brand-new alien monsters, from intelligent dragonkin who bond with humanoids to the great oma space-whales and amorphous, blimplike Brethedans.

Distant Worlds is intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Pathfinder campaign setting, but can easily be used in any fantasy game setting.
ISBN-13: 978-1-60125-403-0

Quick Impression: As I look through the book it's actually quite difficult to not stop and read, as the images draw me in, I WANT to read the book from cover to cover immediately. I was drawn to stop at multiple places within the book, just because something caught my eye. The artwork is awesome, especially since each planet is presented in full-color.

Main Review: Here we go, whether you want to run a game using a space faring Spelljammer variant, or a Stargate style game, this books provides the framework needed for either. The Sun and each of the 12 solar system locations. Each solar body is broken down into 5 sections; a planetary stat block with size, mass, gravity, atmosphere and orbit; an basic description section, adventuring, gazetteer, and adventure hooks. Each planet is very distinct as was laid out in the Inner Sea World Guide. Castrovel being the original home of the elves, Akiton is the analogue for Burrough's Red Planet, complete with four-armed giants. Verces is a fun tidally locked planet that reminds me of the Jack of Shadows world by Zelazny. Eox the world of the Bone Sages.  The section finishes off with the Constellations, The Cosmic Caravan (providing a full astrology), Cynosure, the Ice Belt and most importantly The Dark Tapestry, which provides for the nameless horrors of the void, those of the Mythos.
   Stellar adventures section covers Travel, via portals, spells or vessels; Environment, atmosphere and vacuum, gravity, temperature and time (length of day). Two new spells and a magic item, the Pressure Suit are also presented in this section.
   The final section is Aliens. The bestiary of the Solar System. It starts off listing existing creatures in the environments. It finishes with six new creatures.

Artwork: Most of the artwork is incredible, some of it is just decent. My personal favorite is the picture of Merisiel in the mystic space suit. The inside cover is a full sheet solar system view. Each of the planets (including Golarion's moon is laid out with an image of the planet (typically a dual hemisphere image, but in the case of the gas giants, it shows moons above the surface), and an additional image, typically a humanoid, but there is some variation. As there's a constellation listing, I wish that they had deemed it wise to create a constellation image as well. There are several other pieces, I especially like the image of The Seraph in the stellar travel section. Cover art by Kerim Beyit. Interior art by Raven Mimura, Scott Purdy, Mike Sass, and Ilker Serdar Yildiz.

Cost: The print version costs $19.99 and the PDF version runs $13.99

Value: This supplement expands the entire solar system, giving plenty of background for spacefaring adventures.

Epic Rating: 

Quick Review - Seeker of Secrets

Happy
Holidays
to
ALL!

Another quick review of a book I quite enjoy:

Pathfinder Chronicles: Seekers of Secrets—A Guide to the Pathfinder Society (PFRPG)
Paizo Publishing, LLC

At long last, the gates of the Grand Lodge have been thrown open, offering an inside glimpse of the Pathfinder Society! Packed with information about the most famous group of explorers on Golarion, this 64-page sourcebook is a must for any campaign that involves the Society, whether as employers or rivals.

Inside, you’ll find:
• How to join the Pathfinder Society, and the rights and responsibilities of Society members
• The origin and secrets histories of the Pathfinder Society
• A detailed gazetteer covering the Pathfinder Society’s reception and activities in every nation of the Inner Sea Region
• Detailed maps and descriptions of the Grand Lodge of Absalom and the Society’s newest lodge in Magnimar, plus profiles of 15 high-ranking and notorious Pathfinders
• Thirteen new kinds of mystical ioun stones, three new variants for each type, and rules on how to implant these bizarre magic items into living flesh
• Rules for the mysterious compasses known as wayfinders, and how their ancient magic interacts with ioun stones
• Three new Pathfinder prestige classes, along with sample characters for each
• New feats and spells to help characters uncover ancient secrets—and protect their own!

This book is fully legal for play in Pathfinder Society Organized Play, Paizo’s massive world-wide organized play campaign. To learn more about Pathfinder Society Organized Play, visit paizo.com/pathfindersociety!
By Tim Hitchcock, Erik Mona, James L. Sutter, and Russ Taylor
ISBN-13: 978-1-60125-178-7

Seeker of Secrets

Pathfinder Chronicles, produced by Paizo Inc, for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. This is one of the 64 page perfect bound Pathfinder Chronicles book.

This was the first of the Pathfinder Society guides that was required for Pathfinder Society gamemasters; it has since been usurped by the Pathfinder Society Field Guide.

This book gives lots of fluff, lots of background information, for running or playing in a Pathfinder Society campaign. The book is broken into 3 chapters. The first 24 pages cover "Welcome to the Pathfinder Society", this is mostly background information, with some crunch thrown in, in the form of 3 feats and 6 spells. The background information covers everything from joining the Society, duties, and training; to how the society operates and is seen around the world of Golarion. A Bit of Crunchy fluff is the 15 important figures of the Pathfinder Society scattered throughout the book, from Venture-Captains to the Master of Swords. The last bit of the chapter is the 402 year timeline.

The second chapter, "Where Secrets Sleep", primarily concerns itself with the different lodges around Golarion. The map of the Grand Lodge in Absalom is particularly gorgeous, as well as Heidmarch manor. While this chapter contains lots of information, it's definitely directed toward Pathfinder Society GMs. 

This 3rd and final chapter is "Tools of the Trade" This is the crunchy chapter, this is where the book introduces a few mundane items, and some magic items; but most importantly it expands the Ioun Stone entry, bringing several new cuts, and qualities to the stone, in addition they now interact with Wayfinders (See Inner Sea World Guide), to create additional effects. The last part of the chapter deals with Common Pathfinder Society prestige classes, three of them, the Pathfinder Delver, Pathfinder Savant and the Student of War. The Pathfinder Delver is a hybrid rogue/bard without the spells; or spell advancement, this is a real shame as the Prestige Class would have been much more enticing had it had a partial spell progression, since it also had no sneak attack it takes away far too much to be of real use. The Pathfinder Savant is a very good PrC, designed for PFS play, as it is a 7 level PrC, and you can enter it at 6th, meaning you can proceed to the final level of the PrC in PFS play. The class gives up a level  of spellcasting, not too bad, as the class grants lots of UMD based bonuses, and the ability to add non-class spells to your spell list is a great boon. The caster requirements only require the ability to cast 2nd level spells, so  it's easy to enter with a variety of classes, any can qualify though paladins and rangers won't be able to proceed to max PrC level. The final PrC is the Student of War. The Student of War Prestige class is for the intelligent melee combatant. It gives up the standard class powers for 4+int skills, and some decent powers, not optimized for PFS as you can only make 7th level, and the 2 best abilities are at 8th and 10th. 

Cost/Value: The standard $19.99 price that all the 64 page Pathfinder Campaign Setting/Chronicles books cost. This particular one is valuable to people playing in a Pathfinder Society game. I know I'll b eusing it for my PFS characters to enhance my Wayfinder. IF you're playing a Pathfinder Society Game, this can be an invaluable resource; even though much has been updated by Pathfinder Society Field Guide (also an invaluable resource).  90% overall rating.

OK so this wasn't as quick a review as I thought it was going to be...but, still a good book.

Quick Review - Pathfinder Campaign Setting - Inner Sea Magic

Inner Sea Magic

A World of Magic!
From the tortured sands of the Mana Wastes, where magic is as likely to tear you apart as it is to not work at all, to the perpetually frozen northern nation of Irrisen where the winter witches rule, magic is a part of life in the Inner Sea region. Whether it is wielded by benevolent clerics to keep their allies fighting the good fight or unleashed by wizards in the form of scorching blasts of fire, magic can be the difference between life or death. Or, as in so many cases, the cause of life or death.

Inner Sea Magic explores the role of magic within this vast and varied region. Within this 64-page book, you will find:
• A who’s-who of powerful and famous spellcasters from throughout the Inner Sea region
• Details on four types of magical schools—arcane academies, spellcaster’s guilds, monasteries, and secret societies—along with rules for joining and studying with such organizations
• Rules for several types of specialized or variant magic, including the chaotic power of primal magic, the secrets of shadowcasting, the traditions of Thassilonian sin magic, and the wonders of Varisian tattoo magic
• Two new oracle mysteries (the primal-magic wielding spellscar mystery and the sinister Outer Rifts mystery)
• More than a dozen new archetypes for all sorts of spellcasters, including the black-blooded oracle, the Razmiran priest, the shadowcaster wizard, the tattooed sorcerer, and the winter witch
• Two new prestige classes—the cyphermage and the divine scion
• Dozens of new spells, from Aroden’s spellward to zone of foul flames!

Inner Sea Magic is intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Pathfinder campaign setting, but can easily be used in any fantasy game setting.
by Jesse Benner, Jason Nelson, Sean K Reynolds, Owen K.C. Stephens, and Russ Taylor
ISBN-13: 978-1-60125-360-6

Quick Look: Published by Paizo Publishing for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.The book is broken into 5 sections, Magic of the Inner Sea, Variant Magic, Magic Schools, Spellcasters of the Inner Sea and Spells. As one of Paizo's standard Campaign Setting books, this one is a cool 64 pages, only 2 pages of wasted space, the index and OGL, on the first and last page respectively.

The first section starts out slow, but don't let this deter you, it primarily covers the areas and their magic, then covers the most well-known casters in the region, from Eando Kline to Baba Yaga.

The Variant magic section is pretty good, it covers the False Divine Magic of the Razmiran; The Fleshwarping magic primarily practiced by the drow; Primal Magic is the equivalent of the old Wild Magic, though primal magic is a more fitting name to me. Next comes the Riffle Scrolls featured in the Prince of Wolves book. Shadowcasting makes its appearance in Pathfinder as series of 4 feats. Tattoo magic as flaunted by its iconic representative, Seoni, the first part of this is the Inscribe magical tattoo feat and three magical tattoo magic items. The last of the covered magics is the Thassilonian Magic, the sin based magic of the Rune Lords.

Schools of Magic: A Bunch of new organizations based around the different schools of magic. Mechanically the schools don't make you different, but thematically, there are lots of Role-play interactions, and solid rewards that the schools offer.

Spellcasters of the Inner Sea: This is the meat of the product. With a nice amount of archetypes, many of which I feel should have been in Ultimate Magic instead of some of the weaker archetypes in that book.
This book also contains two prestige classes; The Cyphermage and Divine Scion, both solid Prestige Classes.  Archetypes include:
Black Blooded Oracle (oracle) An archetype that revolves around the blood, which is a curse and a boon.
Chelish Diva (bard) This is my favorite of the book, as it takes the Cheliax love of opera and brings it into a fun, flavorful archeytpe, that gains medium and heavy armor proficiency at 5 and 11 in addition to two diva specific performances.
Crypt Breaker (alchemist): An Osirion based alchemist with powers specialized for tomb robbing, and combating the common tomb foes, undead and constructs. And trap finding, which replaces brew potion, making this a great PFS Alchemist.
Dawnflower Dervish (bard):  Another Dawnflower Dervish archetype, this one being for bards. I personally have no problem with same named archeytpes for different classes. So if you want to play a Sarenrae worshiping bard, that twirls across the battlefield...this is she. (Note: this would make a nice Bladesinger for elves as well.
First Worlder (summoner): Another of my favorites, this archetype brings a couple of neat changes; fey based summon nature's ally, and a fey eidolon!
Hidden Priest (cleric): A priest that hides divine magic under the guise of arcane magic to escape persecution.
Mendevian Priest (cleric): This cleric class is designed to combat demons at the Worldwound, with heavy armor and tactical feats, it's a group oriented archetype.
Nimrathi Irregular (ranger): A ranger that is focused on stealth magic at the cost of heavier armor. The archetype also grants access to a single druidic spell per day.
Oenopion Researcher (alchemist) An alchemist with a slight twist on their mutagens, plus some later acid resistance.
Primalist (wizard): This is a gimme addition to the already fun alternate of primal magic. It makes them better overall, especially when it comes to primal effects.
Razmiran Priest (sorceror): The true power behind the false god. Much needed archetype for GMs using Razmiran false priests.
Shadowcaster (wizard): Another good addition to the new variant spell casters. Bonus spells and the ability to create more powerful shadow magic make this archetype solid.
Spire Defender (magus): The new class that's lacking archetypes, this one unfortunately falls short, removing the armors from his normal abilities, however he gains the normal abilities if he burns the feat or multiclasses (bit later for medium/heavy), but gains combat expertise and dodge as bonus feats, which might make it worthwhile for certain feat heavy concepts.
Sword of Valor (paladin): An Iomedae themed archetype, with initiative bonuses, the ability to grant temp HP with a channel, and the awesome ability to cause their opponent to surrender (under suggestion) after a smite evil.
Tattoed Sorcerer (sorcerer): Seoni and her ever familiar Varisian Tattoes, as probably the most pictured Iconic, this is an obvious arcehtype. It has some cool abilities, but at the cost of bloodline powers.
Tempest Druid (druid...duh): This is a storm based druid archetype, complete with trident. No animal companion, but lots of nice alternate abilities.
Vampire Hunter (inquisitor): As monster hunters to begin with, this archetype shouldn't be a surprise (and could easily be converted into a Lycan Hunter also). Abilities include, sun strike, giving a weapon sunlight damage bonuses, which even affect oozes and fungus based creatures.
Varisian Pilgrim (cleric): A wandering cleric, as traveler is a popular domain this becomes a no-brainer for those who love the travel domain, but want to worship another god. As a Varisian, they gain the ability to perform a Harrowing at 8th level.
Winter Witch (witch): This is the conversion for the Irrisen witches, as seen in Elaine Cunningham's Winter Witch novel. More powerful with ice magic, and lacking the ability to cast fire magic, these witches are pretty formidable opponents for either players or GMs.

Spells: The final section of this book is the spells. What magic book could be released without new spells? Well not this one. My personal favorite is the Bladed Dash spell (and greater version), which allows an 30 foot move with an attack on the way (greater allows attacks on every creature passed).

What magic book could be made with magic items? Um, this one, not a single magic item to be had. Guess we'll have to wait for Ultimate Equipment.


Artwork: Gorgeous artwork as usual. The cover is by Alex Aparin, gorgeous colors, though the perspective lines are off.

Usefulness? Must have if you play in Golarion. Many useful options if you play Pathfinder Society as well.

Cost: $19.99 for print version. $13.99 for the PDF version.

Value:  EPIC! at $20, it's almost worth more than Ultimate Magic in my opinion. This is the kind of book I want to see more of. As archetypes are the best thing in Paizo's Pathfinder conversion, I want more more more. I would have liked to see some magic items, but, I'm impressed enough by the rest of the book, that it would have been icing on an already delicious cake. I'd give it a 98%.

Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Inner Sea Magic

WOW! WOW WOW! We picked this up at Game Towne yesterday.

I'll be doing a full review of this supplement later, but for now, all I have to say is this is better than Ultimate Magic. Shadowcasters, Winter Witches, and Tattooed Sorcerers! So many Archetypes that are awesome! This book is chock full of crunch, I think it's the crunchiest book Paizo has done even.

Though I feel the Vampire Hunter (inquisitor archetype) should have been in Ultimate Magic it's a great book.