Customer Reviews

Champions of Valor (Dungeon & Dragons d20 3.5 Fantasy Roleplaying, Forgotten Realms Setting)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I wanted to like this book, really. I thought it was supposed to be a Book of Exalted Deeds for the Forgotten Realms, sort of like how Champions of Ruin was a Book of Vile Darkness for the Realms. And surely, surely it'd have something usable for all classes, right?

I was so completely and utterly wrong. I'm so glad this was purchased with a gift certificate.

First, the introduction points out that it's for "valorous" heroes...not necessarily good, as they define "valorous" to mean "fights evil things", which can be stretched to include evil priests fighting other evil priests. Granted, there isn't much of that, but there's more about Neutral characters and organizations than I think appropriate.

Second, while there is a great deal of useful information for paladins, I challenge you to find anything for a good rogue. At all. No feats, no substitution levels, nothing. It's terribly disappointing.

Now, there are a few good things. There is a plethora of substitution levels, which are used to differentiate members of a class in an organization from those who aren't. This is a nice use of them, and it's a real shame that half of these are paladins of one form or another. The fluff's nice, and I hear a lot of people like the information on the various horse breeds in the back.

On the other hand, this continues the use of the fat, bloated, 4-page prestige class format, as well as the fat, bloated, corpulent magic item description format. Because there's nothing more useful than two pages of history for a +3 outsider bane greatsword, and I just so need fully half of the prestige classes in the book devoted to characters with flying mounts.

Bottom line, this has very limited utility and portability. It's great if you're playing a paladin in the Forgotten Realms who wants a flying mount, but if not, try and convince your friend to buy it. Don't waste your money.

Champions of Valor is the counterpart of Champions of Ruin, a Forgotten Realms supplement published by Wizards during the summer. Champions of Ruin is not needed to use this book, however.

This book presents the reader with several options for valiant characters in the Forgotten Realms. New spells, feats, substitution levels, organisations are all included to give your character an edge.

However, this book is something more than just "new rules for good characters". This book is only worth something if "you take it seriuosly", in other words, DMs should take care and require a considerable effort of role-playing from characters who use this book. Being valiant is not equal to getting a +2 sacred bonus on your AC, it means that you take part in an organisation, you help the poor, accept missions where you risk your life for free, etc.

This book has much to offer for players, but also for DMs who wish to create a good aligned NPC. I would say it is mostly for experienced DMs and players, beginners should be cautious about incorporating the contents of this book into the game before getting at least some experience with role-playing.

As usual for Forgotten Realms products, it is beautifully illustrated and edited. The cover picture is quite unique, I did not like the picture first, but now I think that it was a good choice to reflect the contents of the book.

I not only received this book in great timely manner from the shipper, but have thoroughly enjoyed the richness it has added to my games. I needed a role model to create an avatar for a deity from, and this book helped greatly.

Good book, very interesting for the genre. I will get a lot of use out of it

Awesome book. I like the way it integrates some of the "Races of" races into the Faerun campaign. This was the 4th from the last book I needed to complete my Forgotten Realms campain collection. I ordered Champions of Ruin at the same time as this, so I only need two more books! I also like some of the valorious regional feats in the book.