2 comments about Vampire: The Requiem Dice Set.

1. I have this set of dice and I'm very pleased with them. The dice themselves feel good in your hand, with a pleasing weight and texture that I've noticed myself and also had friends I was gaming with who used them comment on.
   
   That said, the bag that comes with the dice is nice to have, but not of particularly impressive quality if you're a stickler for that kind of thing.
   
   Play with these dice in the New World of Darkness setting is very easy, as the numbers that ordinarily mean a success (8, 9, and 0) are highlighted to make it easy to see how you did at a glance.
   
   If you want to use them as regular d10s, or for the old World of Darkness, it IS slightly more difficult to read the numbers 1-7 because they're in black on black-and-red dice (8, 9, and 0 are in silver). It's really not difficult enough to matter, but worth mentioning. I doubt I'd have even thought of it as difficult, except for the contrast with the ease of reading the silver "success" numbers.



2. This is a bag of 10 sided dice for use with Vampire: the Requiem. If you are new to the Storyteller system, you probably need a lot more d10s than you already have lying around. The color is marbled red and black, with black for successes (8-10). The successes are easy to read, but failure numbers (1-7) kind of blend in; the color of the dice themselves is quite attractive. The bag is red felt with the Vampire logo (fanged skull) painted on. If you, like me, have an unreasonable need to roll dice for characters that is pertinent to their species (mortals/vampire/werewolf/mage) then these will do nicely.

5 comments about D&D Basic Game (Dungeon & Dragons Roleplaying Game: Core Rules).

1. Ok I was a little nervous after purchasing it, thinking it would be bad. When it arrived. I forgot about my video games, and just played this over and over. This box includes 4 tiles, 16 minatures which includes 4 heros, 7 dice (Dice would be much more expensive bought anywhere else), Quick Start Rules (If you have someone who played D&D in "their time" just have them explain it), First Adventure Book, and Advanced Rule Book. I suggest purchasing this with the expanded minatures, and the Master's guide so you won't get confused along the way. I have written some adventures, and it really gets you thinking (probably a good gift for parents who have kids who love RPGs, because it is like a video game in a way. So if you get this, you won't regret it.



2. The 2004 (3rd ed) is still a good primer to introduce those new to boardless games to the greatest RPG ever invented. This boxed set has everything you need to play, but less pregenerated adventures than the previous boxed sets. You will hook newcomers on this amazing world of adventure and imagination, then discover you'll soon want evern more options than this set can provide (which was WIZARDS' plan in the first place). The hardcover D&D Player's handbook gives you the complete rules, with more race, spells etc.
   This set comes with16 nice painted miniatures (4 heroes and the rest monsters) better than the punch-outs of the earlier set.
   The set has 4 pre-genterated character sheets to start play immediately, along with the standard 7 dice, quick start rules, a small first adventure book and "advanced" rulebook, 4 double-sided map tiles for generating dungeons and combat. Also this set has monster stat card very handy for handling combat without constant pageturning. The set lists for ages 12 and up, but a good reader of 8 (along with an adult guide) would love this set.
   
   (...)



3. This box set has miniatures and dice coupled with a good price that is where the pros ends. The game tiles are cool but not necessary for a boardless board game. Most disapointingly it lacks a good rule book and the rules it does provide are woefully inadequate. There is another boxed set that is much better with a real (albeit softcover)rulebook. Keep searching it is much better.



4. I bought this game two years ago and am now an avid player of DnD. Buy this and when you need more, buy the core DnD rulebooks. Dungeons and dragons can be a wonderful hobby that I at least have grown to love. I now play Dungeons and Dragons with four other people. It has expanded my social group and inspires me to create worlds and characters of my own imagination rather than play on the computer and watch TV.
   
   For parents:
   Want to get your kids away from the TV set? Buy them this game. I am 14 years old and watch about 1/2 an hour a day. Now, getting away from Television.
   
   As mentioned in other reviews, DnD is not an "evil" game. It uses magic, but what is the definition of magic? Something that we don't understand. Magic in DnD are things like Magic Missile which is a blue ball of force that shoots from your hands and damages your opponents. Play this game and have fun. I did. :-)



5. I bought this because I'm looking for more simple rules for D&D so I can start a new campaign with my 8 year old daughter & girlfriend's 10 year old daughter. It was exciting to get maps, miniatures, and dice in one box, but Wizards of the Coast has a similar set without miniatures that has different content in the box. It would be nice if they would lable the miniatures box "for skirmish or d&d" and the other box "for d&d", or perhaps just find a way to merge the two products. in order to interest new customers in the most beloved roleplaying fantasy game, it makes sense to make things easier and have less confusion in the marketplace. This product, and the competing product, both from WotC, make things more confusing for the uninitiated. This was the same with TSR when I was 12 and first got into D&D -- sad to see they haven't changed much in 20 years.

3 comments about The Keeper's Companion: Blasphemous Knowledge, Forbidden Secrets: A Core Book for Keepers, Vol. 1 (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, #2388).

1. One of the very nice things about the Call of Cthulhu role playing game from Chaosium is that they rarely publish pure junk or something that doesn't have something useful within its pages, somewhere. The Keeper's Companion is just one of those books, yes, it contains material from the main rules and Cthulhu Now, but expands upon it, it is also laid out in a clear fashion that makes finding things easy. The first section, "Good Cthulhu Hunting", is mainly sage advice for players and written with tongue firmly in cheek, but also makes a good deal of sense as a sort of `Dos and Don'ts' section. It is followed by a section for Keepers, a sort of thirteen ways to improve your game. Again, common sense advice for the foolish GM who might have let his investigators keep the repeating laser cannon they found in the last adventure.

   Call of Cthulhu is best played, not people who know the genre cold, but rather by novices who understand the mechanics, not the genre. Lovecraft's world is a mundane one, intruded upon by the not-so-mundane, whether it be something relatively minor as an encounter with a solitary Deep One or a sanity-blasting encounter with Yog-Sothoth, the all-in-one god, it is the character's imperiled peace of mind which will be steadily chipped away by the stuff of nightmares and that which mankind is best to ought not know. Players kept in the dark, fed only what they need or discover on their own, are the best players of all.

   There follows the advice section, pages on books of the occult, most or all are actual books, some of which can be found on Amazon, but that you would be better of not reading. Exciting sounding tomes like `The Book of the Dead' or the `Golden Bough' are deadly dull and won't do anything except upset your parents and Tipper Gore. However, it is a nice lexicon for GMs who may want to throw non-Mythos books at their players from time to time. Following that is a handy little section on languages, real and Mythos-related, and their origins. It also includes some badly drawn examples of things like Mi-Go runes and R'lyeh glyphs.

   The next section is an expanded and detailed listing of those oh-so-wonderful mind melting pages of actual Mythos tomes- those great books that burn through your sanity, but also give you spells your characters can use. It also adds a few new spells and creatures taken from additional stories written by other authors. Next up is Arcane Antiquities, which is basically magic items and happily it bears little or no resemblance to the back of the AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide. Magic items in Call of Cthulhu are extremely rare. There are a couple of mirrors, a dagger, a ring, and a few other odd devices, so don't expect any +4 swords of dimensional shambler slaying.

   Let's face it, cults make life interesting. Even in real life cults provide annual entertainment with their suicidal comet worshiping antics. In Call of Cthulhu they are a somewhat less self-destructive and instead are bent on summon up some moldering nightmare to screw with mankind's mojo. Cultists are great fun, both for Keppers and player alike. As bad as it was, the guys resurrecting Imhotep in the The Mummy Returns were great, if comical and somewhat inept, examples of cultists. Cultists can come in any flavor and hardly need to be justified since they're nuts.

   Forensics has always been a hobby of mine. One of the aspects of Call of Cthulhu I have always admired is their inclusion of real world details to really give Keepers and players a sense of how it all works. While Cthulhu Now pretty much gives anyone a brief history of forensics, from the first documented coroner inquests in England right up to DNA evidence- it's all here as well in easy to read and understand terms, complete with bibliography. From the ways people die to firearms and drugs, it's all distilled down into a handy reference.

   From the mundane we arrive at Alien Races, a collection of beings and their origins from Deep Ones to the fungi from Yuggoth to the Voormis of the Hyperborea, this section gives the reader a little more detail than the standard entries in the creatures section in the main rule book. Next is Mysterious Places and includes Atlantis (bleah!), Hyperborea, unknown Kadath, Lemuria (also bleah!), unfortunately, they only give us a scant three paragraphs on R'lyeh, the sunken city and tomb of Great Cthulhu. Finally, the last section is on Skills, adds some new ones and explains all in great detail.

   All in all a welcome addition to my growing Call of Cthulhu collection, a game that I have played for nearly twenty years. I miss the late eighties/early nineties covers and don't much care for the cover art. However, this is a good addition for Keepers who may want to add a little more detail to their campaigns. Like most of Chaosium's publications, it is well researched and exceptionally well written while being very readable, fun and occasionally funny. It may lack detail in some places, and this is probably it's only real flaw- the alien creatures and places section could have had a little more meat in them, but other than that it's a solid addition...




2. I got this as a gift for my son-in-law. I have no knowledge of the book itself other than the person for whom it was purchased seems to like it very much. For me it served its purpose very well.



3. Very good source of information. Contains detailed information about occult and Mythos books, artifacts, forensic medicine and more. There are also some alternate rules that look interesting (I haven't tried them yet). This book is not a "must have" but I think you will not regret if you buy it - contains lots of new details that make every game more interesting.

5 comments about Stronghold Builder's Guidebook (Dungeons & Dragons d20 3.0 Fantasy Roleplaying).

1. I bought this book a while ago and have found it informative and useful. The system devised for this book on keep construction is easy to learn and use quickly. Players simply purchase construction "units", which can be any type, ranging from armories, bedrooms, kitchens, temples, etc., then draw/place the units on a map accordingly. This makes the details of creating and building a keep to a minimum, and standardizing tasks so that they are not so mundane.
   
   Other information I found useful was the commentary on working keeps into your campaign as bases of operations, using NPCs and staff to maintain your keep, and defending your keep from enemies.
   
   An essential book if you're a player or DM looking to build or add a keep to your campaign.



2. This is a great resource for handling all the DM and player based questions for building and refurbishing keeps, castles, and even villages. There's little that does work for 3.5
   
   Also look for the dragon magazine article that went along with this. I'm sure it can be ordered from paizo.com.



3. At first glance, this book is a valuable resource for anyone wanting to build their own castle, keep, or even manor house out in the countryside. It has a great deal of information and makes it relatively simple for whatever you're doing.
   
   And then you try to use it.
   
   It seems that whoever wrote this book doesn't own a copy of the basic Player's Handbook, since even a basic tavern for a rough-and-tumble crowd costs over 20,000 gold, when you can buy two galleons for the same price. Heaven forbid you should want to serve wine - that makes it almost 40,000. My players yelled at me when I first started trying to use these figures, and rightly so.
   
   This book could have been a lot more than it was made to be. As it is, it simply isn't scaled to the economy given in the core books. It could serve as a point of inspiration for a DM's own material, but that's it.



4. This is one of those books that should not be judged by it's cover! The publishers were given a good product by the authors and then undersold it with the lame back cover (refer to the editorial review above - it's word for word).
   
   Anyway, the book breaks down into the following five chapters:
   1. Building a Stronghold
   2. Stronghold Components
   3. Strongholds in Your Campaign
   4. Example Strongholds
   5. Lists of tables
   
   The best chapters are by far 1 & 2.
   
   First the bad bits: Chapter 3 has some interesting information on attacking and capturing strongholds - but most of the information was self-evident. The biggest problem here was that the economics of a stronghold were glossed over. A simple table showing income say for various trade goods would've sufficed. But overall this is a small complaint, because a good GM can use the information presented to fill in those sorts of gaps if they are important enough. Often this sort of micro-management is frowned at by players, but I know some who enjoy this aspect of the game.
   
   The second bad bit is Chapter 4. Really quite pointless in my humble opinion. The chapter details five 'sample' strongholds, but couldn't be further from the truth if they tried! Except for the 'Cheap Keep', the rest are so exotic as to be ridiculous. I appreciate that building a stronghold is a high character-level activity and that by 9 - 10th level characters usually have substantial resources and even bigger ideas but this chapter was bordering on the silly.
   
   On to the 'crunchy' bits of the book. Chapter One takes you through the steps of building your stronghold. No additional details are presented, just the basic building block steps that you have to take. So when you get buried in all the detail, you can come back to this chapter to re-orientate yourself. This chapter shows that the rules are robust and functional in thier own right, although have no relationship to the prices mentioned in the players handbook.
   
   A previous reviewer took a very dim view of this aspect because of the costs to establish a tavern using these rules would be in the area of 20,000gp (while I have some sympathy with his/her frustration, it should be put into context) These are rules for building a brand new structure in the wilderness, not for taking over an existing building in a metropolis. I've always thought the prices in the PH were silly, so my vote comes down in favour of the Stronghold guidebook.
   
   Chapter two details all of the components that make up the interior and exterior of your stronghold. This is a very detailed chapter, with maps for just about every component. While this is and of itself a very good part of the book I have big gripe about it. When first reading the book, I thought great, I can photocopy the maps and use them to build the interior of castiles (friendly or hostile). But on further inspection found the maps not to be in scale to each other! What's the point of providing a scale for individual maps that only relate to the items within a paticular room? This chapter does have the handy addition of listing what staff normally go with this type of room and so you can build your staff up from the ground level, knowing what each staff member does, rather than being given, say 200 staff and not knowing what Person A does differently from Person ZZ. Combine this with the staff chart on page 42 and you can have a very detailed staff list.
   
   If WotC were to release a castle interiors set to their dungeon tiles expansion then this problem would be solved, but until then, the maps look nice, but are otherwise useless.
   
   I would like to address another complaint raised by another reviewer. The previous reviewer complained about repetition in the book. i.e. the entry of Bedroom Suite, Fancy was the same as Bedroom Suite, Luxury. Having read the book again, this is simply not true. Each description is different (although in some instances there are superficial similarities).
   
   Overall, the book deserves its four stars and with a little tweaking of the PH price charts you can integrate this guidebook into your campaign without having your players shout at you (like a previous reviewer!).
   
   Enjoy.



5. This is a great resource for dungeon masters who are looking to breathe some more life and depth into their games. It also has very good rules for player characters who wish to build their own strongholds. In the right kind of game, I'd go so far as to call this a core supplement.
   
   First, the price and length are right. The book is long enough, without introducing lots of new systems and mechanics which you'll never see again. It gives you practical information on strongholds in the game both as a player and a dungeon master, without getting bogged down in lots of needless detail.
   
   To respond to another reviewer, I really like the detailed descriptions about the difference between a Basic, Fancy and Luxury Bedrooms. Most of the time, a player-designed stronghold is a location for roleplaying encounters and fluff. Going into rich (but concise) descriptions is important because that's what the rooms are there for. For a DM, this is even more important. When the players are exploring an abandoned castle (or raiding an occupied one), the SBG gives you good fluff text for each room the players as about. When you write your own modules, this is important.
   
   I ought to expand on the rule mechanics point, because I think that it's important. Supplements are often crammed with new systems. The problem with this is that you'll never see the new system anywhere else. The feats are dead-end, the items and skills are situational, and the systems are ignored by future supplements. This is pretty much intentional since you can't demand that every player buys every book. Heroes of Battle is a perfect example of a supplement like this: not much fluff, plenty of "crunchy" material, totally useless for most games. The Stronghold Builder's Guidebook is great because it resists the temptation to create a new system when you can just reference an existing core mechanic. So long after so-called "better" supplements went permanently on my shelf, SBG remains relevant, compatible and useful.
   
   The book handles most contingencies a DM will run into. If the players have free labor, or use magic to speed things up, or tries to use the stronghold as a business venture, the DM is ready with answers.
   
   One VERY nice thing about this book is that while it was written for 3.0, it pretty much works out of the box in a 3.5 campaign. The only strike against it is that with D&D4.0 coming out in Summer 2007, there's little reason to be buying D&D products until then at all.

4 comments about d20 Cyberscape : A d20 Modern Supplement (d20 Campaigns: d20 Modern).

1. This is a pretty good supplement that gives the rules for cybernetics and cybernetic attachments for characters in a modern or future game. It goes from basic skill upgrades to flying. It has a bunch of different ways it helps to balance the upgrades by exp penalties, having to take feats, etc. So it's definitely worth getting for the cost.



2. This book is great for anyone wanting to run a Shadowrun-esque type of campaign. This book shows that the official Shadowrun game (I forget who's putting it out now) would've been killer under the d20 rules. Regardless though, if you've ever played Shadowrun you'll be able to recreate the setting with this book.



3. As a general fan of the cyberpunk genre I really must applaud this book. Cyberpunk 2020 fans and Shadowrun fans will both have bits of this book to smile about. I have bought books from both games and while Cyberspace in actually trumps neither, this is a great volume to convert either or both those systems to D20 rules. The section on alternative cybertech is actually quite intrigueing. It's almost converting cybernetics to other time periods by allowing for magic to provide for some of the technology involved. Basically it's all the computer and cybernetic rules that they couldn't squeeze into Future. Still it's a worthwhile addition to any D20 Future libary.



4. This book has a lot of great new cybernetic stuff in it (new classes, a gadget system for cybernetic attachments, new hardware,etc.), but it creates a system that doesn't mesh well with the original d20 Future chapter on cybernetics. I like my rules cut-and-dried and ready to go, but this supplement isn't readily compatable with the original d20 Future rules. If you want cybernetics to play a major role in your world you will definitely want to buy this supplement, but be prepared to make some decisions.

2 comments about Geonosis and the Outer Rim Worlds (Star Wars Roleplaying Game: Rules Supplements).

1. After a wait of several months, gamers finally have a new SWRPG sourcebook in the form of Geonosis and the Outer Rim Worlds. If you've read Coruscant and the Core Worlds then you know the pattern that this sourcebook follows as well. While there are some gaps, players and GM's will probably be slightly more interested in this sourcebook than its older sibling, because as we all know, most of the actual action in the Star Wars universe takes place in the Outer Rim!

   Let's cover the aesthetics first. As usual, the SWRPG team has given us another attractive book. The image of a Republic gunship blasting its way through the sky is pretty darn cool. Between the covers this book is full-color throughout with a large amount of quality original artwork. There are a handful of photos this time as well. In short, it just feels like a Star Wars sourcebook.

   On to the content. The book's main focus is on 29 Outer Rim worlds. Each planet receives an overview which includes vital statistics, a basic description, a short history, a description of its people (if any), and a selection of important locations. Each planet also has a GM-only section that includes a few adventure ideas, new NPCs, and any new races, creatures, or equipment. Note that there are no new feats or prestige classes at all. Minor worlds like Roon and Kintan receive an average of 5 pages of attention, while major worlds like Geonosis and Kamino receive 8-11 pages each. Again, keep in mind that each entry is a generous but broad overview, not an exhaustive description.

   Most worlds, like Bespin, Dathomir, and Ossus have appeared in the movies or novels at some point. Some worlds seem to be brand new. However, three notable worlds are missing entirely: Hoth, Naboo, and Tatooine. Sure, Hoth doesn't have a lot going on, but a page or two would have been nice for the sake of completeness. The authors also explain that Naboo and Tatooine were left out because they already have their own sourcebooks. And they do- but they were (in my opinion) mediocre sourcebooks that are now years out of print. I understand the logic, but it's not an omission I care for. On the other hand, the authors state in the foreward that they may produce a second volume on the Outer Rim if there is sufficient interest. I hope they do.

   I also found it interesting that the table of contents lists the NPC's, creatures, equipment, and other extras by page number, and not in alphabetical order. That's not a choice that I would have gone with, but everything is still listed by category as well, so locating an entry is still easy enough.

   As a player, the main thing I like about this sourcebook is how sharply the worlds contrast with each other. That makes for excellent character background material. As a GM, I really liked the adventure hooks. The authors have taken the hooks a step further by linking some of the worlds together for two-part adventure ideas. That was a nice touch.

   There are also 86 new NPCs (each with a personality and background, and most linked to a specific planet), 15 new species, 10 new pieces of equipment, 10 new vehicles, 1 new starship, 28 new creatures, and 1 new droid. The vast array of new NPCs and creatures in particular seem to provide a wealth of options for roleplaying, combat, or just as a spur for new ideas.

   And oh yes... there are many maps as well. Compared to previous books, map quality has really improved. The maps are bigger than they have been, and finally, every single one actually has a key! In fact, the map of the Great Temple on Yavin IV takes up a whole page and is perfect for anyone running a Rebellion or New Jedi Order campaign.

   Overall, despite a few flaws and ommissions, Geonosis and the Outer Rim Worlds is a good, solid reference. Players will like it for its wide array of background material, and GMs will also appreciate the ready-made worlds, adventure hooks, NPCs, and creatures. In short, this is fertile soil for any campaign that ventures into the Outer Rim.




2. Its a good book for any star wars rpger.

3 comments about Malleus Monstrorum: Creatures, Gods, & Forbidden Knowledge: Roleplaying Game Guide (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game).

1. of this amazing collection of CoC beasties. I don't play CoC currently, but this book is so useful that it's worth having and converting d20 to CoC is fairly simple.



2. I play Call of Cthulhu by Chaosium and this resource book is great for Keepers to draw from. Enough monsters and Old ones for any investigation. BRP is easy to convert to D20 so those folks into that will have no problem throwing into a D20 scenario/campaign. The most notable thing outside the content is the art work. Seems to take old photos/Ads/Artwork and splice mythos flavor into it. I recently used an avatar of nylarthotep in the book in one of my games with fun results. Makes designing encounters easier and fun.



3. At my heart im a D&D players and love monster books. In the last few years I have gotten in Lovecrafts works and have begun to pick up the games books by chaosium. Then I found this little gem.
   A collection of almost evey God, Old one, Elder, monster and normal animal from Chaosiums books. Im sure there are more, but that only means there will be a Malleus Monstrorum II.
   THe Lore is well written and the book is made of good quality, though I wish there was a Hardcover.
   My only complaint is there werent enough pictures of the beasties to give me a good idea of what they looked like, only a vague description. Now I have pretty good imagination but an imagincation usually needs something to go off of. And This is where the product fails. It doesnt give you enough of a physical description. The lack of pictures would have been fine if replaced by some great descriptions.
   Overall though this is a great book. Any Lovecraft fan should buy this book, evne if you do not play the game.

3 comments about H.P. Lovecraft's Arkham: Unveiling the Legend-Haunted City (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, Chaosium # 8803).

1. The wonderful thing about roleplaying games are their endless possibilities for action- one can literally do anything within the framework of the rules; the only limit is the glass ceiling of your imagination. Though there IS the limitation put forth by the necessities of playing a particular module or campaign- if the game takes place in Canada, it is probably a good idea to go there and not to Somalia. With this book, all limitations are gone.
   
   The homebase of H.P. Lovecraft's Call of Cthulhu investigators is in all probability Arkham, perhaps being their place of employement or residence. With this new Sourcebook, H.P. Lovecraft's Arkham, we now have a literal blueprint of the town. Who lives where, what is the criminal underground like, what are the industries and buisnesses, public transporation, what do the govement and police consist of, etc. It literally creates an entire world for the player to exist in.
   
   We have not even bothered to play any of the game scenarious at the back because just existing in the town and creating our own situations have been fascinating enough. For example, we had the investigators encounter and befriend an underground movement of Anarchist whom attempted to unionize the immigrant factory workers, wipe out the Arkham govement, simultanously blew up the three power stations in the town and the water tower, did battle with the national guard and took over!
   
   There is literally endless possibilities for play. Think Grand Theft Auto times a thousand. The book is brilliant and besides having the original Call of Cthulhu sourcebook, I see this book as being absolutly essential. There are gangs and cults and underground movements and plenty of beasts and forbidden tomes and strange people and places to go and situations to become involved in, besides ones that the Storyteller creates herself. Included is also information on the Miskatonic University and its professors, campus, and library.
   
   Also included is information pertaining to the surrounding area around Arkham for those Investigators brave enough to leave town, for, indeed, there is much that is truly monsterous writhing about the periphery.
   
   Although I see this book as essential, if you dig it, there are other simular and exciting books for those wishing to expand your play world- there is H.P. Lovecraft's Kingsport, H.P. Lovecraft's Dunwich, and Escape From Innsmouth. Thus opening up the possibility to wander throughout four complete, though completly unique and hideously decadent, towns all within reach of each other. I can't wait for the release of the hardcover Miskatonic University sourcebook.



2. First, let me say that this is a huge book. At 250 pages, you are really getting your money's worth. The town info is great, lots of useful characters, and the scenarios are excellent. I do have some complaints - the layout is more primitive than the other books, especially the neighborhood maps. On the other end of the scale, all the portraits are computer generated. First, it looks pretty hokey (maybe CGI was not as good back then?); second, the facial proportions are wrong for many of the people. This isn't a big deal for, say, Dunwich, but Arkham is somewhat repesctable and misproportioned faces just clashes with the attempted realism of CGI.
   
   The standard layout of these books is to have a story by HPL featuring the town, to discuss town history, to break down the town into neighborhoods and show each one in detail, and then to have scenarios.
   
   The opening story is "Dreams in the Witch House", which is probably the best available. I really like opening these books with a story by HPL - it is a reminder of how the whole thing got started. The neighborhoods take up a lot of space and describe a great many people, places, and things to meet in Arkham. I wish they would have spent some time talking about architecture in the town history section - I still don't know the difference between "gable" and "gambrel". Some real problems: street names are not clearly marked on the neighborhood maps, even when they are referred to. The combined map is not reprinted in the neighborhood section, nor is each neighborhood map shown as one piece; we only see fragments at a time. I think the Kingsport sourcebook does this best, so I assume that the layout people were still pefecting their craft at this early stage. As always, the town directory is helpful considering especially that there are so many entries that an index is needed to quickly find anything. All of the scenarios are great, although one ("the Hills Rise Wild") really would have been better in the Dunwich book, which was short on good scenarios.
   
   Also included is a tear-out map of Arkham on very nice paper, and an issue of THE ARKHAM ADVERTISER, which also becomes a handout.
   
   In all, this is a very informative sourcebook, with plenty of people, places, and things for investigators to explore. The only drawback, besides the poor maps, is that the spooky atmosphere was not convreyed very well. Reading the other sourcebooks, I definitely felt the atmosphere; Arkham didn't do that for me. It could have been better, but was still great.



3. Great book with a map inside that you can tear out. I used this book exclusively for a CoC group I ran for a whole year long. I really appreciated the block to block set up with the various places of import and the mythos related possibilities. This is a great place to have players start from and explore.

5 comments about Deluxe Dungeon Master's Screen (Dungeon & Dragons Fantasy Roleplaying Accessory).

1. Generally my opinion is that a screen is a screen is a screen. However, this screen is actually better than most. I like the landscape, 4-panel format because it means I can see and be seen over the screen, while it still hides my map, my notepad and my dice rolls. It also has a better center of gravity since it is lower and wider, which means it almost never falls over, even when struck by a handful of dice or my marauding 18-month old. That is not a claim that most portrait-oriented screens can make.
   
   Is the screen a black-out room and cone of silence rolled into one? Of course not. If you need the full height of the older-styled 11" screens, this one won't work for you. But really, if you are playing with people who can't keep their eyes off the occasional flash of paper behind the DM's screen, don't blame the screen; get new friends.
   
   For my part, the most important part is that WoTC (a company I don't think much of normally) actually gave some thought to what was on the screen. The inside is well thought out, with useful charts and tables easy to hand. Easily the best part is the full listing of all actions, and whether they are free, standard, or movement equivalent, and whether they provoke an Attack of Opportunity or not. The table with hardness ratings for standard items is also useful for those spur-of-the-moment actions when the PCs want to break down a random door, chop that chest open, or split a table in two.
   
   Normally I wouldn't bother to review a screen, but this one has such an unfairly low rating that I almost feel sorry for it. It's a good product; I use it in every session, it keeps the players' eyes off the important stuff, and it's durable enough that even after 2 years of use it's in quite good shape. If for some reason you don't have a screen already, you could do a lot worse than this one.



2. The charts selected for the inside of the screen are surprisingly useful; basically, they selected a lot of the things that most frequently come into play during a dungeon crawl, but that most people wouldn't bother to learn or remember. Things like various item and material hardnesses, common modifiers to AC, various types of actions and whether they provoke Attacks of Opportunity, skills, movement penaltes, light, and auras for both magic and evil/good. The creators were thoughtful enough to include the book and page number for various charts in case you need to get more info. On the downside, as other reviews mentioned it is surprisingly short for a screen, and pretty high-priced considering what you get. Yeah, yeah; you get a bonus D20 modern screen. Wow. I'd say that seven bucks would be a more reasonable price; five if it didn't come with a D20 modern screen.



3. We ordered this a month ago. We kept waiting and checking.. not shipped yet. Wait some more, not shipped yet. The item said "usually ships in 1 to 2 weeks" however, in 4 weeks, still "not shipped yet". Recomend if you want this, to buy it somewhere else. We ended up canceling this order and getting it somewhere else. Amazon doesn't know how to ship this particualr item.



4. Cool looking, but you could do without them. Nice quick info on inside, but again could do without.



5. The tables include:
   
   -Equipment hardness/hitpoints
   -Substance hardness/hitpoints
   -Break/Burst DCs
   -Items affected by magical attacks
   -Size and AC of objects
   -Object hardness/hitpoints
   -Wall stats
   -Door stats
   -Turning undead
   -Increase/Decrease weapon damage by size
   -Attack roll modifiers
   -AC modifiers
   -Influencing NPC attitudes
   -Missing w/ a thrown weapon figure
   -Climb check DCs
   -Listen check DCs
   -Combat Actions (AoO)
   -Concentration Check DCs
   -Skills list (Armor check, AoO)
   -Ability modifiers
   -Movement and Distance
   -Hampered movement
   -Armored/Encumbered speeds
   -Max distance for spot checks
   -Detect Magic stats
   -Detect Evil stats
   -Light sources and illumination
   
   While the list is comprehensive, I was looking for some random encounter tables, oh well. The screen is short and while I didn't think that would be an issue, it is. I'm now paperclipping the D20 Modern screen (which has a few D&D relevant things on it, but not many) on top of the D&D one (they're the same size exactly).

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