Customer Reviews

Primal Power: A 4th Edition D&D Supplement

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

 

 

It seems clear that as time goes on, the developers at Wizards of the Coast are becoming more comfortable with the 4th Edition system, especially the roles they have in mind for each class, and are more comfortable with evolving them in interesting ways.

In primal power, we see the barbarian evolve from what was quite possibly the lowest AC class in the game to a high AC class (via Hide Expertise) that is capable of limited amounts of marking and otherwise acting as an off-tank. Some foolish people I've talked with online think this is the end of the world ("Barbarians were balanced before!" they cry), but as someone who has played a barbarian in the RPGA since it was in the playtest phase, I can say this is a welcome change - making barbarians either run around in heavy armor (which is out of character for them) or just trivially easy to kill (their temporary hit point regeneration was never high enough to deal with much incoming damage). If you've ever watched Conan, you know that barbarians are supposed to run around in fur and yet still be inexplicably hard to kill. The changes in Primal Power put them where they should be.

Likewise, they've given druids a new option which makes them difficult to kill, giving these leaders a new niche to fill as well. Druids in 4e have been suffering from a lack of unity of design, and while this new option is welcome, it still doesn't answer the essential question of what it is a druid is supposed to do, or bring to a team. Is he the guy that entangles enemies in plant roots? Or the guy who becomes a cat and tries to scratch people with his claws?

In a similar vein, Wardens have been given a new role as well: off-healers. They can pop off a nice heal once or twice per combat without compromising their essential nature as "area effect defenders", giving them a clear niche in the game, and serving as a nice alternative to Paladins as a defender class that can provide supplemental healing in a leader-light party.

Shamans? Nobody understands why shamans exist, or what they're supposed to do, but they still have their invisible mobile walls and have been given some new options which reduces some of the tough limits shamans faced when trying to be primary healers.

Overall, it's nice to see WOTC getting into its groove a little more, after a rough start with a pretty bad PHB1 and not-well-thought-out early offerings like the Battlerage Vigor fighter and Righteous Wrath of Tempus paladin. Hopefully between a final draft of hybrids (which offer a lot of promise in restoring flexibility in character creation to the player) and expanded roles for classes in books like these, 4th edition D&D will feel less like a straitjacket to its players.

The artwork is amazing, the organization excellent, and I love the new Warden class. Overall, Primal Power is a great addition to Dungeons and Dragons.

While I really like the content of this book, creating a new primal character can be a bit difficult. Let's say you are making an Elf Druid. You need Player's Handbooks 1 and 2 plus Primal Power to fully flesh that character out. However, this isn't much different than it used to be where you had a spearate book for elves, and a separate one for druids. At least you get access to several races and classes in this book.

This is a awsome book, the best "Power book" released so far.

Why it is so great?

1. All the classes have fun new builds, like the shoutting barbarian, and the swarm druid
2. Besides the new options for players there are a lot of roleplay tips and fluff to play around
3. The side bars are amazing
4. The art is on par with all other 4e books

So, Primal Power is a book that any player must have, especialy those playing primal character, and is a nice source of info for the DM's as well.

I like to play barbarians and shamans, so this was a great book to buy. I use the Character generator and so didn't necessarily need the extra character options. What I did find incredibly useful was the detailed descriptions of how each of the classes interacts with the spirits of the primal world. This book really helped me properly role-play my characters. Worth every penny.

Wotc has created many player books for 4th edition. The books are well made and beautiful. For me I question the utility of these types of books. I subscribe to DnDi for the character builder. If you do this, the player oriented books are not necessary. It is primarily a book of new builds for characters, so it would not be an enjoyable read for that purpose. If you do not subscribe to dndi or like to have the book, the wotc materials are top notch.

A great complement for Primal Class characters. It has a complete explanation about Primal personalities fighters who protect nature and use their power to unleash nature Wrath.

I have a Shaman, so I use this book quite a bit. Lots of additional powers, feats, paths, etc

my only complaint is having to buy these books to get class info, when they really should be in the Player's Handbook.

The quality of the book, however, is top notch.

Quite a good book. Very nice feats, new class specialty s for all 4 primal classes. if you plan to play a druid, shaman, warden, or barbarian this book is an excellent tool.

4th edition: and attempt to make D&D into a video game on paper. Another in the never slowing line of manuals with way too much verbiage and too little real content. And there will be more coming that will make creating a character class even more spread out and difficult without an encyclopedia-sized cross-reference to find all of the pertinent information....