Customer Reviews

d20 Menace Manual: A d20 Modern Supplement

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

 

 

I bought this more on a whim but it has restarted my interest in d20 Modern. The book has three main sections which bear mentioning. First up is the critter book. No matter what kind of game you play critters are absolutely essential. There's something for virtually everyone in the first section. Alternity fans rejoice! You will old friends and foes in here as the Fraal return and are expanded slightly to make them available to UFO conspiracy enthusiasts as the enigmatic Greys. Weren are back as sasquatch with an interesting explanation on why their here. The weird winged humanoids have also returned to meet and in some cases become PCs. Next is a bunch of cardboard cut-outs for a given GM to play with in stock NPCs and they even gave some sample teams to possible use. Finally there is a faction book with real and made up organizations. Among the intriguing new comers are an extreme terrorist organization loosely based on Al-Qaeda and a bunch of would be world conquerors (Cooobraaaa! Whoops, wrong game ;)) as well as the American agencies CIA and FBI. Anyone interested in more adversaries and possible allies of any d20 Modern type campaign would be well served by this book. There are suggestions for some of the groups in the suggested campaigns or if you want to design your own campaign, this gives some more options, something that is always warranted.

I thought this was a well-written, well-made book. It has a ton of information on so many different organizations that you should never run out of bad guys, though it would be fun to try. In addition to the info on the many organizations it has it's own monster manual. It would be nice to have picture of all the different baddies but there are only so many pages I guess. All in all I think this book would be very helpful to most campaigns.

Menace Manual is utterly full of all that you need to run a d20 Modern game filled with monsters, mobsters, and mayhem. It has beasts, undead, organizations, and lots and lots of imagination fodder. This product will get your mind going to jumpstart your modern campaign.

The d20 Menace Manual is the d20 equivalent of a D&D Monster Manual and, in a way, that's exactly what it is. There are some excellent creatures in here, especially from an urban legends standpoint. There is Spring Heeled Jack as a Jumping Jack Demon, the Loch Ness Monster as a Plesiosaur, and Mothmen as well...the Mothman. However, one of the problems for me is that, despite the relatively high number of creatures you get for the price, there are absolutely no rules for playing AS them. That's right; no playing as Bigfoot with a shotgun for you, unless you want to come up with your own rules for it. However, a single creature stands out for me that makes this book a buy, and that is the Bogeyman. The Bogeyman is a template that can be applied to any humanoid. Essetnially, it becomes nearly impossible to kill. After dying from anything at all, it is capable of getting back up in just a few in game turns. Obviously, this can lead to many "slasher" themed games, which is such an interesting concept that I felt I should put it as a pro. Also, most of the alien species from d20 Future are reprinted here, so if you don't want a future themed game, but still want to battle little green men, this book could possibly save you some money.

Obviously, the majority of this book revolves around aliens, demons, and other such creatures that doesn't exist in real life. However, the last third of the book is entirely based around GM NPCs, and giving them stats. To me, this chapter is a big hackneyed, as basic templates for such characters, especially minor characters, are already printed in the original d20 Modern rulebook. It is nice to have a pre-made SWAT team member on the fly, but nearly pointless if you would just put some forethought into your games.

Overall, very little to actually complain about. 4/5 stars.

This rules supplement gives various alien races, monsters and organizations for a modern pulp game.

Few of the ideas are very original, there's an even corporation, an evil government conspiracy, an evil drug cartel and other standard choices. But it's solid and gives GMs a lot to work with.

Got the book, read it, and now it sits on my game-shelf for the rest of eternity. Waste of time and resources!!!