Customer Reviews

Heroes of Battle (Dungeons & Dragons d20 3.5 Fantasy Roleplaying, Rules Supplement)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have been running adventures for D&D for years that follow more the style of game represented herein, not delving into dungeons on a regular basis but rather encounters in the world. A battlefield campaign is a great idea and Wizards did an excellent job of giving guildlines and rules for running these. The section on victory and recognition points, as well as promotion and decorations is by far my favorite out of this book. While not terribly large for a hard-back this book is packed with information ranging from the 60-minute army to a few new prestige classes (all five-level and very useful) and some new magical items and weapon/armor properties.

If you want to run a game of D&D that doesn't focus on crawling around in ancient ruins or goblin-holes all the time, but instead focuses on the glory and frightfulnes of war and surface skirmshes then this will be an excellent adition to your gaming books.

I give this 5 stars because its one of very few DnD books by Wizards of the Coast that's come out in the past two years that I read from cover to cover. It interested me. A lot of the other titles they've released lately have been the sort of material you pick and choose; sometimes avoiding large sections of altogether, like the race books they released earlier this year. So I guess I'm rating in comparison to other DnD books.
It's not the most amazing or ground-breaking stuff, but it's a different take on the game than most of us choose to use. I guess it was inspiring to me. I've been DMing now for about 20 years, and though I've done a lot of what's in this book on my own at times, I really enjoyed reading it, and I think this book needed to be produced for those who want to run a battle based campaign and didn't know where to start.
A warning, though. If you're looking for feats, races, classes, prestige classes, etc.... this is not that type of book. That being said, I'm glad. Most other DnD books of late have been only those things with a little fluff to make it all part of a theme. This book is good for any DM.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks there's nothing more epic and exciting in a RPG than war. Well this book does a pretty good job of laying the groundwork for a campaign based around battles. It's not all straightforward battlefield stuff either, a lot has to do with different tactics during war.
Things like cutting the enemy's supply lines, battlefield espionage, siege weapons, arrow volleys, etc. It also has what is definitely the best and simplest system for battlefield morale that I've seen (and it's compatable with the D&D miniatures rules) and explains how Leadership and one's rank in the military play into things.
Most of the feats and prestige classes are boring (though the combat medic is excellent) and some of the spells are very interesting. Overall it is an excellent resource.
The only reason I am giving it 4 stars is that it's all very situational, and in a standard campaign none of this will get used. For a campaign that involves medieval warfare and big battles, it earns its pricetag, which I can say for less and less of WoTC's product line of late.

This book has been vital to my weekly D&D game. The book rises and falls on the idea of epic clashes between giant armies that your players influence. The Victory Point system is increadible, it has really helped my players to get into the game. It lets even low level charactes feel that they are vital. It is easy for the players to fall out of the spotlight in a giant army, this book makes that a thing of the past.

The prestige classes don't over run the book and that is a rarity in some of these supplements...a welcome rarity.

A surprising aspect of the book is the appendix which gives you monster stats for monsters of different ranks. (Orc general, drow priestess)

This book is almost as important as the Player's Handbook if you are running a war themed campaign.

"Heroes of Battle" (HoB) is the first in the Genre series for D&D. It is designed to aid the players take their game into the middle of a war.

The focus in on the actions of the Player Characters during a mass combat and on what effect they might have on the course of that combat. As a result, if you want rules for armies meeting each other, you will be disappointed. HoB isn't interested in that.

Instead, HoB asks the DM to determine the course of the battle in advance - assuming the PCs have no effect on the battle. Then it shows the DM how to use that information to provide an adventure for the PCs in the middle of the battle, and thus to have an effect on the overall battle. Based on how successful the PCs are during their adventure, then they can change the course of the battle according to guidelines given in the book.

HoB gives good advice on the subject, but eventually it will be down to the DM to make decisions on what occurs. I think this approach is wholly admirable and successful. I look forward to including it in future games.

A small number of new rules and rewards are presented to make running battlefield adventure easier; they generally serve their purpose.

Players are likely to find the book less interesting. The four new prestige classes are good, and the Teamwork Benefits add an interesting dimension to the game. However, most of the feats are generally too focussed on use in battle campaigns for regular campaign play and most of the book really is designed for the DM.

One interesting point: I think the opening chapters of this book are the most readable of any in the 3rd edition D&D line: very personable and entertaining. This surprised me, and I commend it greatly.

The book really doesn't go much into the effects of magic on the battlefield - or indeed, what the course of a normal battle might be like. That is left up to the imagination of the DM. I would have liked a little more advice on this subject, but it does not detract overmuch from what is a solid book.

I didn't know it. I've substitute improvisation, miniatures rules, everything in its place. I didn't know this gap existed in my gaming repertoire before this book showed up on my doorstep. It was only when I opened it and skimmed the table of contents for concepts that I suddenly realized that this was it. The book I was waiting for. I almost didn't want to read it. I have no particular history with David Noonan, Will McDermott or Stephen Schubert. Maybe I've read books by them before, but they've never appeared on my radar. Wizards can put out some uneven stuff, so I wasn't sure if I even dared read it. I mean, here's a book I didn't even know I waited for and when it shows up, Bruce Cordell had nothing to do with it.

I skimmed it once very quickly. I'm a bad speed reader, but I can get the general gist of a book fast. What I found prodded me to go onward, so I started snatching at random bits that seemed to solve long standing problems in my games. I read more carefully now, probing, sussing out potential problems, trying not to get my hopes up.

So what was the answer? Did I like it? Well, to know that you'll have to skip to the end. I'm not sacrificing my own sense of drama for someone I haven't even met.

You know, even though this is a review, that last line begs for an emoticon.

Ah, well, you'll just have to take my sly humor as read and push on. You really have no choice. Go ahead. Keep reading. I dare you.
So the book starts with your standard chapter one fare. This is a book about adventures on a battlefield. What does that mean? Well, you know. Adventures. On a battlefield. We're in chapter one, so we'll go slow, but try to keep up. (My sarcasm).

So we talk about pacing, planning a campaign, general advice. Nothing here is earthshattering. Most of it is guidance in subjects like how to handle downtime in the middle of Agincourt. How militaries are organized. What a Frenchman originally meant when he called someone a "lieutenant."

From there, we move on to chapter two, and the book begins to pick up. Here they teach you how to design a battlefield (they start with remedial studies) then move on to flow charts. Now the flowchart idea for an adventure isn't exactly earthshattering, but just glancing at their two example flowcharts is enough to set straight any confusion you have about what a battle might look like from the POV of a few confused characters. Personally, this was the single biggest advantage of the book for me. Suddenly I can see clearly why so many of my past battlefields lacked luster.

The chapter doesn't end there, however. Next it teaches you how to build the enemy army in 60 minutes. Then it talks about encounter maps. Then it introduces the concept of victory points and explains how to use them to influence the battle.

Basically, you predetermine the battle outcome. This is what will happen if the PC were never even there. Then you base a best and worse case scenario on how much you think the PCs can matter in the battle. Then you use their victory points the PC's earn on the field to determine where in that specturm of possible outcomes the battle eventually falls. It's simple and its elegant and there's nothing about the system that is tied to the D&D rules. That's the biggest beauty of the book. So much of it could be used with any game system.

Next we have chapter three. Here we explore specific battlefield encounters with examples. Then we have specific example units. Then we discuss experience. So this chapter is only useful to you if you play D&D, but honestly, you got almost everything you needed in chapter two. We're into bonus material now, and we're only up to page 62.

The next chapter is a mix of D&D specific info. You could adapt some of it to other games of course. It has rules like how to handle siege engines and aerial bombardment and arrow volleys. We also deal with morale checks and commander ratings and radii, but after that we're into non game-specific materials again.

The chapter introduces a way to abstract strategic advantages to help determine who has the upper hand on the battlefield in the big view. We get into specific victory point allotments , how many points to assign to cutting a supply line, for instance. Then we wrap up with a method of handling battlefield recognition such as promotion and medals.
Chapter five deals with the military character. Now, if you've read any of my reviews, you probably know I'm going to be upset by all the prestige classes. You're right. WotC is out of control. We need to have an intervention.

The rest of the chapter is various D&D specific rules. We treat with skill applications and new feats. The best section of this chapter are the teamwork rules. In too many games, you send your characters to some sort of training an unless you want to force the players to multiclass into a level of fighter, assuming they have the xp. You really gain nothing from the experience. I've always hated that. The teamwork rules, however, fix that. These are specific tasks and abilities that require no allocation of precious character advancement resources like feats or skills. Do you want the benefits of training as heavy cavalry? Well assuming your team leader meets his prerequisites (some handle animal, some more ride, mounted combat and trample) and the team members all meet their minimum requirements as well (A single rank in ride), the characters need only train together for a time. After that, they can act as a unit and gain benefits such as stopping opponents from avoiding your overruns. One of the nice bits in here is that each teamwork benefit has a list of tips at the end. These alert the DM to potential rules he might want to brush up on or things he might want to consider. Some of it is obvious, but it's nice nevertheless.

Next we have the obligatory chapter on magic, which was fine (spell glut is almost as bad as prestige class glut, though). The book then wraps up with sample armies, sample soldiers and battlefield steeds.

You skipped to the end, didn't you? Well that's all right. I loved this book. At least a third of it is useful in any campaign and much of the rest can be converted with a little work. This book might not have as big an impact on your campaigns. Maybe you've been doing fantastic battlefield adventures for years. But if you haven't, this book can help remake your game. I'd recommend it for anyone whose game, even now, has the dark and fervent whisperings of war.

Now go back and read the rest of this review.

Honestly, I've never ran or been involved in a campaign where anyone really fet the need to have hard core rules to resloving large scale battles. Battles of this type were always a bit secondary to the adventures of the player characters. Sure, you may take place in a large scale battle but the outcome was generally decided by the DM. Still if you crave a rule for everything I supposed you could do much worse than this latest WOC supplement.

This supplement for the DM puts the PC's in the midst of these battles and shows the DM how to determine the outcome...soft of...Ultimately the DM will have to decide who is to win the battle. Chapters included are:

The War Campaign which provides a general background on running large scale battles and their primary differences over standard dungeon warfare, as well as the pacing and flow of battles of these types, again over the everyday hack-n-slash adventure.

In Chapter two on Building Adventures, the book instructs the DM on constructing a battle including developing timelines and flowcharts and working out how the various PCs can affect the outcome of a battle, if at all. It also presents terrain factors as well and amounts to somewhat of a board war game in its scope. This is all a bit more complicated than most DMs are used to. Chapter 3 on Battle Field encounters provides sample encounters complete with maps. Ok but not terribly exciting.

Chapter Four's "Rules of War" really gets down to the nuts and bolts of running battles taking into account large scale attacks from archers, siege engines, etc. Also covered is the aura of the field commanders. Like any great military leader, commanders with strong auras can affect and help their troops in battle or rally them to victory. This is a pretty nice touch. Commanders can even earn points to gain promotions.

Chapter five "The military character" will probably be the most popular chapter as it contains new feats and new prestige classes such as the Dread Commando, legendary leader, and War Weaver which is a new type of combat mage. The final chapter deals with the use of magic in war including new spells and new magic items.

As with most WOC products the book is well written and illustrated. The index and appendices are well done. But this again falls under the banner of overkill to me. It seems WOC wants to have a supplement for virtually every situation, every type of terrain or area you could ever possibly encounter. Jeez does anyone remember when all you needed was a Monster manual, Players Handbook, DM's Guide and a little imagination?

I cannot say that this is perfect. Quite the contrary, it has its flaws like other D&D books. Spelling errors overlooked, it is a very solid book with interesting ideas and a different perspective on wars within an adventure or campain. There are plenty of ideas in this book for well over one hundred or so ideas for an interesting game with your friends, family, or whoever you play D&D with. Prestige Classes were made with the greatest prescision in mind to allow for the most broad range of classes for any player type and for any playing style. Now instead of making up how a war scene would go, the DM now has a guide to push PC's through a well written adventure or campain. Where this book falls short is the lack of encounter ideas. It is not a suppliment for the monster manuel in any respect. Rather it enhances it slightly to create a war-like feel that does its job but nothing further than that. But that aside, it does what the title says and if you are interested in creating a war campain or adventure, Heroes of Battle should satisfy most gamers needs thoughroughly; although there will be the few DM's who find its contents a tad shallow.

Generally speaking, I dislike books that have adventure ideas and other DM material. Usually I am just looking for the 'meat' as in new monsters, spells, feats, etc...This book was an exception. I wanted to take the campaign in a little bit different direction than the norm, and thought a battlefield oriented game might be novel. This book has quiet a bit of ideas for adventures and scenarios related to large scale warfare. I found the sample ideas to be both creative and interesting. I would definately recommend the book if you are going to run that type of game. If you don't plan on running that type of game this book will have much less value to you.

My games usually have a large scale conflict between kingdoms as the backdrop for the players. The moment I held this book in my hands in the local book store I knew I wanted it. It is essential for any DM that will be working with large scale conflicts. I found it quite fun in the following few weeks to gather my group around a tactical map of the area and plan out which units will be moving where and what will be the best defense against the enemy hordes...