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griffrat
Commander
3506 Posts
    
 | | 05/05/2005 11:53 AM |
| | recovered topic 3283 | |
Ambassador of FUN!!! | |
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griffrat
Commander
3506 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 11:53 AM |
| Pat, as to the titles I have a question for you. Are you looking to these books from a players’ perspective or as the DM? I ask because from my DM perspective Libris Mortis and Lords of Madness are indispensable for ideas and monsters. The others are hit and miss as far as my DM style as I tend to use feats and such things from the core books. So players can’t say that I am being unfair or using something that might be broken. If any of my players are reading this I said TEND…[}:)]
Sandstorm and Frostburn have some really great supplemental things in them that add flavor to specific enviorments and regions. Also they strike fear into the hearts of players who have actually read them....
For my players I have opened up all the other books for feats and prestige classes but no spells unless first okayed by me. As to the the ranking I would think the following from me as a player.
1 Complete Warrior
2 Complete Divine
3 Complete Arcane
4 Complete Adventurer ( I don’t have this although another buddy of mine has said rave things about it)
5 Libris Mortis/Lords of Madness
edited for the frostburn and sandstorm comment
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PatEllis15
Commander
4463 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 12:23 PM |
| I'm looking at how valuable they are for the "game".
Fluff vs crunch, balance vs munchkiny
I generally have Frostburn and Sandstorm at the bottom of my list (well Sandstorm is higher, but only because I want the tiles!) because they seem awfully specialized.
Thanks again...
Pat E | |
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Satsujin Kingyo
Underboss
1247 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 1:20 PM |
| quote:
Originally posted by PatEllis15
Yep, another one of these...
I too am trying to jump start my campaign a bit. We are now 5th level, and I want to get some more options into the campaign.
I'm looking at the following books:
Complete Warrior
Complete Arcane
Complete Adventurer
Complete Divine
Frostburn
Sandstorm
Libris Mortis
Lords of Madness
Please rate on a 1-10 scale. I'm VERY concerned by unbalanced skills, feats and prestige classes. Bang for the buck, how much info can be easily pulled and used is a big factor as well.
Your help is appreciated.
Pat E
Complete Warrior- 5 (Average book, base classes leave something to be desired)
Complete Divine- 6 (Average book with lots of fluff)
Complete Arcane- 10 (Warlock, expanded metamagic, awesome new spells, buy NOW)
Complete Adventurer- 7 (Would get higher, but the ascetic feats are munchkin)
Frostburn- 2 (MONOTONE)
Sandstorm- 6 (At least the new creatures are really cool)
Libris Mortis- 9 (AMAZING book helpful to players and DMs alike)
Lords of Madness- 10 (Rivals Draconomicon in terms of excellence)
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CarrionCrawler
Underboss
1760 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 1:46 PM |
| I have put them into my order of enjoyment.
Complete Adventurer--10 useful and the best complete book
Complete Arcane--8 second best complete book
Complete Warrior--7 it has the most stuff for combat. period
Libris Mortis--9 very useful to both players and DMs alike
Lords of Madness--5 great for DMs or anyone that likes Aberrations
Frostburn--6 wonderful for adding an icy element to any character or campaign.
Sandstorm--6 there are less PrCs than FB, but still a great book
Complete Divine--4 I only liked it for the spirit shaman core class, the pretige classes weren't that great nor the "magic items"
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Lab Monkey
Commander
4136 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 3:28 PM |
| I'll bite... Please keep in mind that PrCs rarely get used in my campaign so I don't focus heavily on them. However I do tend to read the books cover to cover.
Complete Warrior: 8 (really breaths some life into the fighter with the tactical and style feats. There are some nice extras in the back, warrior tornaments, etc. Crunchy bits: PrCs like the Dervish (insanely good).
Complete Arcane: 8 (love it. Favorite part are the draconic feats for sorcerers. Lots of new fun spells, some pretty well balanced PrCs, interesting RPG material in the back (arcane duals and constests, organizations, etc.).
Complete Adventurer: 9 Arguably the best of the complete series. Very well balanced and carefully considered.
Complete Divine: 6 My least favorite in this series, but still good. There are a few PCs that some will agrue break the bank (Radient Servant of Pelor). Great for giving your PCs some options on how to develop undead turning.
Frostburn: 5 (may go up once I've spent some time with this). I just don't find it's bang for the buck to be very high.
Sandstorm: [:(] Don't have this on yet. Should have purchased this before Frostburn as I'm starting my PCs in a desert setting.
Libris Mortis: 7 great for building necromancer NPCs, undead monsters or undead hunting PCs or even undead PCs. Lots of new spells, including summon undead and lots of undead related feats. One of my players is drawing heavily from this material for his 1/2 vampire (new template) ranger.
Lords of Madness: [:(] Don't have this on yet, but I want it.
In general, I've found most of the new (3.5) material to be very balanced and not overly munchkin-y. There are of course exceptions, but in general I'm happy with the recent suppliments.
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Kiirnodel
Sergeant
484 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 4:19 PM |
| Complete Warrior: 7/10 I really like this one, but I think the core classes are a bit...bleh... and the prestige classes focused too much on crunch than flavor (though some did)
Complete Arcane: 9/10 This one is worth it, lots of fluff. New spells if you didn't like Tome and Blood, the spellsword looks so much fun :) The flavorish flavor is soooooooooooooo cooool, I just like how they related to me a lot...I guess...so.
Complete Adventurer: 9/10 This one hit everyone quite well, almsot any class can use it, DMs can use it, the fluff is kickarse in this one, I especially like the Rogue/Paladin...teehee!
Complete Divine: 7/10 I actually like this book with the prestige classes ideas offered, I think they kind of screwed the favored soul by dropping turn undead and then giving a lot of feats taht have that as a prerequisite. However the book was good just not...my favorite.
Frostburn: 7/10 I really like this one as my campaign setting I've made centers in this kind of area, the new creatures, new rules make it easier for me to say BLAH happens rather than...hmmm...what would teh DC for that be?
The excluded books I do not own.
I like fluff over crunch, and on a side note, my favorite book was the masterpiece known as the Draconomicon, I wuv it! [:)] | |
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Monsoon28
Underboss
2313 Posts
Toronto
| | 05/05/2005 4:42 PM |
| Complete Warrior 8/10 just alot of goodness for the players, plenty of options.
Complete Divine 6.5/10 a bit weak especially in comparison to the other complete books, but a step up from Defenders of the Faith.
Complete Arcane 8/10 some excellent feats/PrC/spells. The new classes are nice but I'm thinking of making the Warlock a NPC class only.
Complete Adventurer 9/10 possibly the most useful book no matter what your char. class.
Frostburn 7/10 some good info also ways useful unless your campaign is in a constantly warm climate. Also the new monsters were nice! *caveat* But I still haven't gone through this book from cover to cover.
Sandstorm don't have the book but from my impressions at the bookstore not as interesting to me as Frostburn.
Libris Mortis 8.5/10 good book useful to both Player's and Dm's alike, if your planning to have a lot of undead in your campaigns this one is probably a must have. (and who does like having a lot of undead in there campaign?[)])
Lords of Madness sorry haven't seen enough of it so make a solid judgement. | |
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Iksander
Underboss
1010 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 5:51 PM |
| I actually quite like Libris Mortis even if it's a stupid name.
A lot of the critters are pretty nice if you like undead. Interesting twists on old themes and whatnot. Some are just rehashed ghosts or zombies or boosted ghouls, etc. which is boring, but others like the skulking cyst are cool.
For the most part, I'd recommend it if you're into undead, but as a general purchase, I would say give it a miss. | |
Bite me. | |
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AesophDarkfable
Warlord
5628 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 7:13 PM |
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Complete Warrior- Solid all around. Nothing spectacular, good fluff in the end. A few broken feats but overall balanced. 7/10
Complete Arcane- Awesome book all around. Great spells and updates of old prestige classes 9/10
Complete Adventurer- I love this book. A class or two I think is broken, but most are solid. Good for all classes! 10/10
Complete Divine- I like this book more than most, but mainly because I am a cleric junky. Great feats.. spells are mediocre. 7/10
Frostburn- Only barely looked at. What I saw I liked (frost monk thing espically) but not worth it unless your glacier campaign
Sandstorm- Really like some aspects, but overall unless your going to whole campaign a desert, not worth it.
Libris Mortis- Dont own, looked at, looks great lots of flunch
Lords of Madness- Dont own havent looked at.
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MerricB
Underboss
2353 Posts
Australia
| | 05/05/2005 7:36 PM |
| Complete Warrior - 9/10
Complete Arcane - 8/10
Complete Adventurer - 8/10
Complete Divine - 7/10
Frostburn - 7/10
Sandstorm - 7/10
Libris Mortis - 6/10
Lords of Madness - 5/10
The ratings are greatly affected by general usefulness - I don't think Lords of Madness is a bad book by any stretch, but you really have to have a campaign focussing about Aberrations to make it useful.
Frostburn and Sandstorm are both great books, but they do presuppose play in a particular environment (although parts of them are usable in regular dungeons).
The Complete series is very good indeed, though Complete Divine has the most problems.
Cheers! | |
Merric Blackman
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IanB
Commander
3112 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 7:57 PM |
| The Complete... books are in my mind the best stuff they've released in 3.5. I'd rate them all 7 or higher.
Frostburn and Sandstorm are pretty limited - there is a lot of good stuff in there, but unless your games feature a lot of desert or arctic type adventuring (or you WANT them to) they're not really necessary. 6 (going up to 8 if you are running or want to run a campaign really centered on this stuff.)
Libris Mortis is the weakest in the creature type series so far, in my opinion. It doesn't really hold a candle to Draconomicon, and I found most of the new monsters in it to be fairly unimpressive. 5.
Lords of Madness in general is much better. There's some space that in 99% of games is going to be just wasted (internal anatomy of the grell, anyone?) but in general it is much better done than Libris Mortis. 7.
I would rate most of the books here ahead of the Races of ... series, which range from about a 2 (Races of Destiny) to about a 5 (Races of Stone.) I haven't checked out Races of Eberron, though. | |
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MerricB
Underboss
2353 Posts
Australia
| | 05/05/2005 8:46 PM |
| Races of Stone 6/10
Races of Destiny 4/10
Races of the Wild 6/10
Races of Eberron 8/10 (for Eberron campaigns)
Cheers! | |
Merric Blackman
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glauron
Underboss
1379 Posts
Sydney, Australia
| | 05/05/2005 9:11 PM |
| quote:
Originally posted by MerricB
Races of Stone 6/10
Races of Destiny 4/10
Races of the Wild 6/10
Races of Eberron 8/10 (for Eberron campaigns)
Cheers!
This works for me. I'd go with your Complete rankings too except I favor divine classes so give that 9/10. And since I love Eberron (aberrations keep popping up) and Divine I also rate the books that cover the things they fight quite highly.
Complete Warrior - 9/10
Complete Arcane - 8/10
Complete Adventurer - 8/10
Complete Divine - 9/10
Frostburn - do not have, but looked good
Sandstorm - not seen
Libris Mortis - 8/10
Lords of Madness - 7/10
Cheers
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Testament
Underboss
1397 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 9:45 PM |
| Complete Warrior - 9/10. Something for everyone! After all, all the classes get into fights. Deserves kudos for giving Fighters their dignity back, and spicing up combat with the Tactical feats. Great balance too, nothing really broken.
Complete Divine - 6/10. AKA The Complete(ly) Broken. Many overpowered spells (Spikes, Murderous Mist), horribly broken feats (Divine Metamagic, Persistent Spell) and PrCs (Radiant Servant of Pelor, AKA Cleric Plus). Quite a bit of other good material though, Wild Feats and the other Divine Feats are fun. Doomed from the start given the setting intrinsic nature of Divine characters.
Complete Arcane - 8.5/10. Excellent book, includes the Warlock and Warmage, two of the best new base classes to appear thus far. New twists on metamagic, like Born of the Three Thunders and Black Lore of Moil were fun, as were some of the other Metamagics (Explosive Spell is just fun!). My only beef is that it could be considered the Complete Conjurer, given that the new spells make them the best blasters, since so many spells are in the wrong school! How do you Conjure force anyway?! Nothing that a smart GM can't fix though.
Complete Adventurer - 9.5/10. Only because I feel it doesn't reach 10/10. Really, this book is GREAT. The PrCs are intriguing, and many help to make multiclassing viable. The supposedly broken Ascetic and Devoted lines of feats AREN'T so (with one exception that proves the Testament Theorem*), they help to make otherwise HORRIBLY WEAK multiclass builds work. Something for every class, much like Complete Warrior.
Will return later with more!
* Testament Theorem: That a dedicated build will break anything. The example here is a Paladin/Ranger/Halfling Outrider on a Dire Weasel. It deals d4 unsaveable con damage a round after a spirited charge, and the rider protects it with Mounted Combat. | |
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Ben Webster
Warrior
204 Posts
Brisbane, Australia
| | 05/05/2005 11:10 PM |
| As a DM.
Both Libris Mortis and Lords of Madness are rated highly by me.
Libris Mortis 10/10
Lords of Madness 10/10
The Forstburn and Sandstorm I might find handy if i played in the enviroments they were meant for. If I had a desert or ice adventure I would purchase them.
Sandstorm 5/10
Forstburn 5/10
The Complete books. These do not interest me at all. I am not sure if I want any of the splat books in my game. IMHO an excuse for players to further twist rules to make PC's even more formidiable (monkey grip which I hear so much about).
Complete Books 0/10
However many of you have rated Complate Adventurer quite highly. So I might have a look at it.
Ben. | |
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Testament
Underboss
1397 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 11:16 PM |
| Ben, I have two things to say.
1. Monkey Grip stinks. You can use an upsized weapon, ooooh, wow. Gotta find one first, large swords aren't just lying around!
2. Goose & Gander law. They use it on you, hit 'em back with your NPCs. | |
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Kiirnodel
Sergeant
484 Posts
| | 05/05/2005 11:42 PM |
| Yeah, I think at most +3.5 damage for -2 to hit really blows... considering weapon specialization is considered underpowered...bleh.... this relatively sucks.
I'm with Testament here. | |
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Testament
Underboss
1397 Posts
| | 05/06/2005 12:00 AM |
| Libris Mortis (The Book of Bad Latin): 7/10. Not enough here. It could have been a much better book, but as it is, its still quite good. Some fantastic feats and monsters in here for a horror loving GM, or for a campaign that features lots of necromancy and undead. Too much art by T. Baxa hurts it in the looks department.
Lord of Madness: 8.5/10. Wonderfully creepy book, although I wish it was called Codex Anathema, as originally planned. The information on the Mind Flayers especially is great, and having stats for an Elder Brain is a real bonus. Any book that gives more info on Aboleths and how to use one has to be good. The only problem is that 1. its a book that should be used sparingly, and 2. its not readily Eberron compatible, and considering how major abberations are there, the lack of even sidebars on how this fits in there is an odd oversight. | |
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| The Defenestrator
AesophDarkfable
Warlord
5628 Posts
| | 05/06/2005 1:19 AM |
| quote:
Originally posted by Testament
[i]* Testament Theorem: That a dedicated build will break anything. The example here is a Paladin/Ranger/Halfling Outrider on a Dire Weasel. It deals d4 unsaveable con damage a round after a spirited charge, and the rider protects it with Mounted Combat.
Amen. I can break any class with a dedicated build and more so if you give me 12-20 levels to play with. If you tell me hey Im starting a game and you can make a 17th level char. IT will be broke. I guarentee that if I started the same char from first level it would be vastly different and nowhere near as powerful. | |
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IanB
Commander
3112 Posts
| | 05/06/2005 3:45 AM |
| | Hm, I recall there being a short section in LoM on fitting it into Eberron. | |
Anson on WotC boards | |
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PatEllis15
Commander
4463 Posts
| | 05/06/2005 12:18 PM |
| Thanks for all the input.
Seems like general concensus is that Complete Adventurer is a must have, followed by arcane and warrior. Skip Divine...
Libris Mortis gets the thumbs up, and I know I'll end up buying Sandstorm just for the tiles...
Pat E | |
"Games evolve. Otherwise we'd still be pushing rocks around the dirt. What do you think the cavemen said when some dude showed up with sticks?" - Chairman7w | |
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Mr Ruffles
Sneak
165 Posts
| | 05/07/2005 3:32 AM |
| I would go with...
9/10 Complete Adventurer - Has a lot that any class can make use of.
10/10 Libris Mortis - A ton of cool things for undead bad guys. And a bunch of stuff to make a sweet cleric even if not in a heavy undead setting (I like playing clerics the most myself).
8/10 Complete Warrior, Complete Arcane, & Complete Divine - All are very good to help expand to basic class.
7/10 Lords of Madness - Aberrations are some great monsters to toss at your PCs and from what I seen of the book, it can flush out a great bad guy or make a great foe of the aberrations (if playing Eberron I would rate this higher).
4/10 Frostburn & Sandstorm - Unless your game is taking a lot to all of the time in a cold or hot climate I don't see the need for the books.
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Lady-Bast
Warrior
242 Posts
Central Illinois
| | 05/08/2005 3:03 PM |
| All of the Complete books have one or two things that are pretty "Broke" in them that would have to just be rejected.
Complete Warrior - 6
Complete Arcane - 6
Complete Adventurer - 5 (the swift actions are just not needed and are an added complication to the game)
Complete Divine - 7
Libris Mortis - 3 - Not really alot unless you want to run a campaign based on Undead. (Half Ghoul characters and such.)
Lords of Madness - 9 - Great stuff. Can be used in any campaign.
Sandstorm and Frostburn - both are them are valued based upon what kind of campaign setting you want to use.
Not on your list but the book of Exalted deeds and the Book of Vile darkness are worth picking up, but they both have at least a couple of broken things in them.... A monk with a vow of poverty for instance.
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