Customer Reviews

Unearthed Arcana (Dungeons & Dragons d20 3.5 Fantasy Roleplaying)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Overall, I'm pleased that I bought this one, though it is far from perfect. Perhaps the Hit-or-Miss quality of the text, though, is derived not so much from poor conception or execution, but rather from the opposite; after all, this text attempts to collect some of the more interesting "house rules" variants out there, and by definition, different variants would seem to appeal to different gamer-geeks.

Cool Things:

--sections on "reducing level adjustments" (buying off LA with XP later on) and "bloodlines" (adding a touch of bizarre ancestry to a PC) are well thought out.

--in terms of class variants, some of the wizards are decent, but the paladin (i.e. of any alignment) really shines.

--the "character traits" (personal quirks added at generation, a la *Fallout*) and "character flaws" (taking penalties at generation to add bonus feats, a la White Wolf) are long overdue to this system; the "spelltouched feats" (adding event-specific magical abilities) are also fertile.

--the "defense bonus" variant (a level-contingent statistic like attack bonus), "armor as damage reduction" (self-explanatory?), and "damage conversion" (armor changes lethal damage to non-lethal) are all great; the "variable modifiers" variant (instead of BAB +4, say, one would instead add d8 to the standard d20 roll) is also smart.

--many of the magic variants are useful, such as "summon monster variants" (individualized or themed lists), "metamagic components" (such feats have costs in this case), "item familiars" (why not? there's tons of intelligent constructs otherwise), and "incantations" (complex magickes that can be cast by anyone).

--the final section, about campaigns, really delivers; here, we get rules for "contacts" (a la White Wolf), "Reputation" (yeah, like in *Baldur's Gate*), "Honor" (which would seem to be self-explanatory), "Taint" (evil corrupts, after all), and "sanity" (yes, that nearly perfect stat from *Call of Cthulhu*).

Holistically, the text displays the same sub-par attention to editing as other WotC releases, and the artwork varies considerably in quality (compare the "Paladin of Tyranny" on 53 to the gamer-geek group on 134, for instance). I tend to consider the rest of the text uninteresting for my purposes, though others will surely, and with good reason, find such items useful. And that diversity is precisely the value of the text overall. (It is fair to note in this connection that nothing is particularly badly done, though the "racial paragon classes" are a bit too ubermenschy for my political taste--the game already suffers from a tolkienesque proto-fascistic racialism as it stands; no need to make it even more arriere garde.) The text might be a bit pricey, however, if one ends up using merely one third of the rules contained herein. That said, I'd note that the rules for sanity alone justify the (reduced amazon.com) expense for me.

I'll agree with a few other reviewers that the price can seem high, and much of the content is available elsewhere. However, if you're no longer a HS/university student long on time, short on money, I think the book is well worth it. With a personal life, career, family and home, I don't have the time I used to have, so having this nice little compilation of options (some are very similar to ones already in use by my group) is worth the $20some I spent on it. I'd rather spend my precious free time creating a good adventure for my players than on creating optional systems for everything, and that also goes for scouring the web and bookshelves for the tweaks and options in this one book. It's like going to Jiffy Lube; sure I can change my own oil, but for $20 I'll go across the street and hit the bank, get a coffee and otherwise enjoy my free time while they handle it :)
I'm sure someone will flame me for being lazy or uncreative, but hey, my time, my money, my game. But if you're like me and struggle to find the time to do the big stuff (adventures, plots, maps, NPCs, backstory) as it is, this book is likely going to work for you.

- First: Don't buy at full price. Some Amazon marketplace sellers are selling this as low as $9. I was expecting disappointment based on the low-balled price, but I was wrong!

- Second: Don't confuse this with TSR AD&D 1st Ed Unearthed Arcana or Sword & Sorcery Arcana Unearthed. Both cool books.

- Third: Don't read the Amazon description. It makes you think this book is all about strongholds for some reason...

- A minor annoyance is that WOTC already have a DMG2 released and a Player's Handbook 2 planned, and the material herein would be better placed/organized into a larger 500+ page Player's Handbook and larger 500+ page DMG respectively or just merge all these things entirely. Monte Cook did it with a huge Arcana Evolved. Why can't WOTC do this? Why all the individual books (this one is barely 200+ pages)? It's stupid to flip through 100 different books to see all the different classes and races available, make 1 race book, 1 class book and so on...Everyone else is doing it (Moongoose, Green Ronin) but WOTC. I think Hasbro has enough money.

- Its variants, house rules, and draws from a variety of sources and influences old and new as others have suggested. You have race variants (desert elf, aquatic gnome, etc. not terribly exciting), class variants (new paladins, etc., cool), Gestalt classes vs. multi-classes (nice), many "Bloodline" race-types (a succubus mates with a human creating a human with some demon bonuses - very interesting), Character traits and flaws, item familiars (very cool), insanity (which goes back to the original AD&D DMG 1st Ed), Rep and Honor (goes back to original AD&D Oriental Adventures 1st ED), Spell points instead of Spell memorization (fire and forget method) (many people use this spell pt house rule), the racial Paragon (sort of like a Prestige Race). On and on. Very neat stuff...

Criticism that this book has contradictory rules or not-well-thought-out cohesiveness is missing the point. I like this book more than the regular DMG or PHB.

Unearthed Arcana opens with these words and no phrase has ever been more appropriate. This is not a standard core rule book, where the DM can just say yay or nay on whether or not they're using the material. Unearthed Arcana is not even trying to be that kind of book. Unearthed Arcana is a collection of dozens (hundreds, if you count like a marketer) optional rules, many of which conflict with one another. This book has something for everybody and everything for nobody.

If you buy this book thinking your getting another normal core rule book, you're probably not going to like it. If you buy this book hoping to find individual rules to liven your campaign, you'll probably like it very much.

Chapter 1 contains racial rules. These rules are the most niche oriented of the book. For instance, the first section involves environmental racial variants (like desert elves). Honestly, I don't think I'll ever use these unless I do an extremely theme oriented campaign (like a home grown Dark Sun). This is followed by elemental variants, which are even more niche-like (air elves). Then come bloodlines, which are fairly interesting, if you allow this sort of thing. Bloodlines allow you to introduce racial traits without saying a character is half something. If great great grandmama had strange thing for minotaurs or demons, these rules can help your character reflect that (and give the family something not to talk about). Finally, this chapter finishes with what most will think is its most useful section, the racial paragons. These are three-level prestige classes which grant bonuses that emulate the most stereotypical traits of a race (Stonecutting and constitution for dwarves, for example).

Chapter 2 is all about the classes. This starts with variant classes, which are your base classes, tweaked somewhat. For instance, the cloistered cleric is a variant class that drops some of the cleric abilities (it lowers the hit die, for instance) to grant such abilities as Lore and the Knowledge domain. These are actually quite interesting. This is followed by an extensive section on variant specialist wizards and then rules for spontaneous divine casters then variant rules for various class abilities, such as turning undead and the barbarian's rage. Next is the prestige class section, but in this section, they take three base classes (Bard, Paladin and Ranger) and they present them as prestige classes. This will be particularly handy for games where, for instance, a person must petition to a holy order to become a paladin. Next come Gestalt characters, which are essentially characters that have two classes at once (as opposed to multi-classing) for games where there aren't enough players to cover all the class bases (are you starting to see why no one can use all these rules at once?). Finally come the generic classes, which are a way to step away from all the class complexity and get down to four very basic choices.

Wow. Seems like a lot doesn't it. We just finished page 78.

Chapter 3 is building characters, and no, this doesn't have the old Unearthed Arcana's stat rolling system. It starts with alterative skill systems and rules for complex skill checks. Then it moves onto character traits (which are like advantages in other games). Next comes . . . you guessed it . . . character flaws. Next come spelltouched feats for those characters that have had a lot of exposure to certain spells. This is followed by rules for grouping weapons by type for the sake of weapon group proficiencies. Next comes a set of alternate rules for crafting items (magical or otherwise) during campaign down time. Finally comes background rules, for representing skills a character had before becoming an adventurer.

Is your head spinning yet? Mine is.

Next comes Chapter 4: Adventuring. This is where things really start contradicting themselves. It starts with class defense bonuses, like in Star Wars, and moves into armor Damage Reduction. Then it moves into rules for having armor convert damage instead of stopping it outright. Then it moves into an injury system that negates the use of hit points completely. But wait. Then it bring hit points back in the form of vitality and wound damage (like in Star Wars again). Next it goes back to the original hit point system, but allows for a character to have "reserve points" which essentially allow them to heal very quickly. Then it moves on to alternate rules for massive damage while throwing out a rule for dodging when it isn't your turn (a page layout nonsequitur). Next come new death or dying rules (which look a lot like the rules for dying in the vitality points section, but we're back to hit points, now, remember?) Then we move on to action points, which characters can spend during a game to help save their proverbial bacon. Next comes combat facing rules (which I've been waiting for forever) with some extremely ineffective luck rules thrown in a sidebar. But wait! Maybe you're an old GURPS player. We better throw in hex rules as well. Speaking of GURPS, who cares if this is D20. Let's take out the d20 from the game and have the player's roll 3d6s instead. Speaking of that, lets have the players roll all the dice, taking the load off the DM. And, and, and . . .

Oh. I guess that chapter ends there.

On to Chapter 5, because we've barely even touched . . . Magic. Lets start with rules that give a character a magic ratting, based on all their multiclassing, instead of a straight spellcaster level. Hey, rogues pick up stuff about magic too. Then lets introduce the concept of themed summoning lists, because it's always embarrassing the summon an amphibian on the lip of an active volcano. While we're at it, let's let characters throw money at the problem of metamagicked spells instead of increasing the spell slots (and drop in a rule about metamagic and sorcerers while we're at it). Wait! That reminds us. We have all these new possible spontaneous casters now. Lets put in metamagic rules for them and a second optional rules for sorcerers, to boot. Speaking of spontaneous casting. How about spell points? A lot of people play Rolemaster, don't they? Speaking of that, lets have characters recharge between spells, eliminating the hard cap on spells per day entirely. You know, I've stopped mentioning the side bars completely now. Still, I have momentum, so lets move on to legendary weapons, which increase in power with the character (new prestige classes in here). You know, that sounds kinda like a familiar, so lets throw in familiars that are items. Now let's shift gears and throw in rules for ritual magic (we'll call them incantations). Since we've now brought magic into the hands of even nonspellcasters, lets finish up with . . .

. . . .Chapter 6: Campaigns.
In case we hadn't, you know, done enough to shake up your game.
Let's start with new rules for contacts, but contacts need to have opinions of the characters, so we'll move onto reputation rules. Hey, didn't reputation first come from Oriental Adventures? Yeah, let's throw in honor too. You know with honor comes the opposite, so we should have taint rules as well and if we're going to have tainted characters we'll need, you guessed it, tainted prestige classes. Wow. I'm starting to lose it here. I think we need rules for sanity! That was a little much, so we'll change tracks again, this time attacking the concept of prerequisites. How do you know if a character has the toughness feat? Let's base prerequisites on tests instead. While we're breaking free of molds, how about XP awards that aren't based on level? That sounds good so lets turn the page to . . .

. . . the afterword? Are we done already? I'm barely even started.
I don't know if you became as exhausted reading this as I did writing it, but now you should have some idea what's in store in Unearthed Arcana. Some of these rules are very good. Some of them are stupid. I doubt anyone will completely agree on which are which, and I think that was their attention. The biggest thing to keep in mind is to watch how these rules interact. For instance, if you use vitality points or the death and dying rules, character death is based on fortitude saves, so you best make sure your rules keep those from getting out of control. If you have one gestalt character you better have everyone play gestalt characters. Also, don't try to integrate rules which oppose one another too greatly, like the injury rules and vitality points, unless you want to play with real world insanity as well.

The biggest drawback of this book is you're going to waste money. No one can use more than half of these rules at a time without verging on the ridiculous, so unless you have an extremely high turnover on campaigns, it will take years to use the whole book. Meanwhile, you're paying for development, paper and color ink that you're not using. But If that doesn't bother you, this is the book for you.

Ok, its time to start a new campaign and I've played everything there is to play (aside from the myriad of prestige classes that don't interest me). What am I going to play you ask yourself for hours. If you have ever had this problem, like me, probably because you've been playing D&D for far too long, this book is your savior, plain and simple.

Back in second edition there was a game called Player's Option, if you recall, and it gave you a good deal of freedom to customize your character. This book goes well beyond that. Its actually quite interesting. There are little tweaks for all sorts of races due to climate or elementally based races. Follow this up with a lot of variants for classes which are basically swapping a few things in and out in most cases, sometimes losing a trait from one class and gaining another, while some are new. In my opinion, this adds a lot more depth to the game because if you do want to play one of the 10,000 prestige classes, it gives you more than one avenue to get to them. If you do not like prestige classes, then this gives you more options than the dozen or so base classes that currently exist. I would particularly recommend this if you're fond of playing Specialist Wizards (in which case this is a MUST), Barbarians, Monks, or have ever wanted to see a quality representation of an "Anti-paladin." This may be the section of the book you most commonly use, and that would be mostly at character creation.

There are some feats, which are so-so on the usefulness scale but are just so very interesting and characterful. Then, traits to make your character more attuned to how you envision his personality, and flaws to give him special vulnerabilities (and of course there is a benefit to them as well). Its an interesting section to say the least but after that you get into some very wild and, indeed, very fun options, including a variant on weapon proficiency based on weapon groups, variants on armor systems, D&D without levels, and even D&D without hit-points. All I can say is, despite how crazy that sounds, someone obviously put a good deal of thought into it since it is at least mostly viable.

Basically, if you're bored with D&D sometimes, this book is curry powder. It would DEFINITELY spice things up again.

Let me start out by saying: this was a great book. I'm really glad WotC decided to publish it.

The book cut up into 6 main parts:

Races. This section was pretty well done. It offeres subraces for most of the standard PHB races for different environments and even some examples of planar-bases races (such as the Fire elf or the Water halfling). They also introduce a system that essentially lets you play creatures with a LA from ECL 1 on. There are a fair number of Bloodlines in this chapter, covering everything from the Doppleganger to the Dragons. What I think is particulary nice about the bloodlines is that there are varrying strengths (so a character with a celestial for a grandfather and another with a celestial for a great great great great grandfather arn't necesarily gonna have the same signs).

Classes. Variants galore. There is so much awesome stuff packed in this (relatively short) chapter that I just couldn't do it justice here. Every core class is covered, and many posible class feature changes are printed as well. And yes, there *are* Prestige Class versions of the Bard, Ranger, and Paladin (as well as a Chaotic Good paladin!). But really, you'd have to read this yourself to get the whole picture.

Characters. The [Spelltouched] feat is introduced (essentially, you can take a feat to gain powers related to a spell that has been cast on you at some point), as are different skill systems (and an entierly new system for Craft). Traits (little feat-like abilities that are taken primarily at 1st level and offer a roughly equal positive and negative bonuses) and Flaws (major negatives that you can take in exchange for an extra feat at first level) are in this chapter, and a new system for weapon proficiancy (weapon groups) is also here. At the end of it are a bunch of tables that you can roll for inspiration about your character's background.

Adventuring. There are a boatload of varient rules here, some about armor (one system has Armor provide less AC in exchange for some DR; another has armor convert lethal damage into nonlethal; and yet another provides a system of a level-based Defense bonus, reminiscent of d20 Modern, as is much of this charpter. Example: Action Points). There are roughly 4 Alternate Hit Point systems, some better fitted for low magic campaigns than standard DnD. There's even a section about Combat Facing, although personally I think that's much more complicated than necessary.

Magic. Like the Classes chapter, this section is so good that it's probably wisest just to see it for yourself. Spell Points (See: Psionics), Legendary Weapons, Summon Mosnter variants, Item Familiars, a long list of components for spells that you can use to give them metamagics without increaseing their spell slot level, and even Incantations can be found in this chapter.

Campaigns. This section is probably most interesting to DMs since the majority of it is a major component to add to a campaign. Short list: Reputation, Honor Points (in both numerical and immaterial form), a Taint system (far too complicated to go into here. Basically, you becomes physically corrupted and gain power therefrom), Sanity system (very well thought out, highly comprehensive. Will fit great in any campaign with a "dark" feeling. Talk to your players before institution this because it can radically change the way they have to play), Test-Based Prerequisites (to get into PrCs. Example: the Shadowdancer must dance well enough to impress a judge and then sucessfully escape the theatre from several dozen gaurds without directly attacking them), and a simpler way of awarding XP.

The book ends with a few pages discussing possible extraplanar varaints, and then gives a few pages that list the variants offered in the book (the idea is that the DM photocopies these pages off and check-marks the things he will be useing so the players know what's pre-approved and what will be left out).

All in all, an excellent book that I suggest every DnD group buys.

Most of the material available in UA is available in other places, either in free Net material or in material already published in other supplements, albeit changed to fit D&D3.5 and in one convenient place.

But the sticker shock alone for such a thin book should scare most people off.

What we have here is a collection of "House Rules" from a variety of campaigns. Some of them you will find useful, others not so -- everyone's tastes differ, so what one person likes, others will loath. One of the greatest problems I find is that the impact of many of the rules are not well thought out. A prime example of this is the Vitality/Wound Points system (available as a free sample at the Wizards of the Coast site). First of all, despite the promise of "One Shot, One Kill", this is not at all the case -- a character may be reduced to 0 Wounds (never below this point), at which point you make rolls to /see/ if you are /dying/. Nope, not dead, just potentially dying. Equally, the W/VP rules make absolutely no reference to magic at all except in terms of healing. Does this mean that magic never does Wound damage? That it does it to a smaller extent? If it can effect Wounds, is there a new limitation on how many dice may be rolled for a fireball or magic missile? Many unanswered questions abound. Conversely there is also a long discussion of Hexes vs. Squares for battle boards. But why? Is it so difficult to figure out the conversion of one set of space indicators to another? Here authors go overboard with examples on something that is terribly simple to explain. Then there are the Paragon Classes which are, to say generously, /borrowed/ from Monte Cooks "Arcana Unearthed", but with the odd twist that you can be the Paragon of Half-Orcs or Half-Elves. How does one become the Best of the Bloodline of a mixed bloodline? This makes neither logical nor internal game sense.

Overall, like most of the 3.5 retool, I find the product overpriced, overhyped, and half-baked. The print quality is good, the editing about on par with most gamebooks (a few glaring errors, but not as many as something from Mongoose), and the illos the standard mix of very good (insane wizard on p199) to vastly mediocre (human of brass dragon lineage on p22) to unintentionally comical (ambush on p212) to plain awful (decorated soldier on p183).

Is it worth it?

Depends on what you need. If you are a completist, yes. If you have no other source for ideas or are desperate to fit into a convetions rules, yes. If you have access to the internet and can surf through a few D&D sites, probably not -- you'll gain all of this material for free if you just look around a bit.

I admit it. When it comes to Dungeons and Dragons I could never leave well enough alone. Aparently neither could the compilers of this cornocopia-like compendium of house rules and alternate systems for everyone's favorite RPG. For all those out there looking to spice up or revitalize your Dungeons and Dragons experience, this is your resource. Reading trough, one wonders if it is humanly possible to find time to use and apreciate all the options found within. Perhaps that is the true beauty of the thing: that the options persist in being inexahustable. With such a resource one never needs fear falling into any kind of hack-and-slash RPG rut. Game getting trite? Mix in healthy dose of Unearthed Arcana and Hey-Presto! You've got an entirely new game going! I recomend this supplement for all Dungeons and Dragons RPGers who belive that the game could be so much more.

This book is excellent for all spellcasters, whether its druids, wizards, clerics or sorcerers its a great book for all. Don't listen to the people who say its useless, this is an awesome book with all sorts of variants, tips for character building, and prestiege classes. There are many tips for specialized wizards. For you DM's out there, there's rules about insanity, drug addiction, and mental disorders for when you get pissed off at your players. There's also some interesting variants for running campaigns if you don't like some of the things in the DM's guide. Personally I liked the "Recharge Magic" section. It is a cure for the wizard not being able to cast spontaneously , while still keeping his wide selection of spells. For those bored with the common races there are plenty of different races, such as desert elf and paragon dwarf. With 9 pages of nothing but metamagic components(for more powerful spell abillities)its hard to ignore I think this book is a must have for all spellcasters and DMs alike.With so many variants its hard not to love the book.

Unearthed Arcana is all about variants. It does not really create anything new, and it "borrows" from other games, but that's a feature, not a mistake. I really enjoyed the variant spellcasters, racial paragons, flaws (un-feats), and taint. The section on mental illness had bits that were just a little too realistic for my taste. While I can't imagine working paraphilias or bulemia into a campaign, using a fantasied-up psychosis as a symptom of taint has potential.

Overall, I definitely liked it.