I’m a lot like your daughter when it comes to subclasses, I usually take to them for their thematic style even if they are mechanically weak...except the Rune Knight..which I’m going to be playing soon. I asked the DM if I could replace the “it’s from Giants” with “it’s from the Shadow realm”. Both the Frost and Cloud runes lend themselves so well to a Rogue build that Shadow runes seemed like a better fit. As for the ability scores I’m on the fence. For DDAL where nearly everyone feels the need to min-max...it makes sense. For a campaign I’d probably go PHB. Though I have used it to make an Orc wizard.
Yay, a new Game Geeks! You're the best Kurt - Also, I respect that, while you had obvious issues with the book, you didn't just dump all over it. I wish that other people who review RPG stuff were like you.
I give this a solid 7/10. I love the subclasses but still wish they weren't so divided between psionic and pet classes. The dm stuff was ok, fine, but not as useful as Xanathar's.
For me personally, I felt this book was to address issues people on Twitter had about not conforming to stereotypes. Which in all honesty I feel you could always just speak to your DM about changing things. Whereas now it is almost an obligation to DM's now to allow the players to put points into whatever slots they want. As a little nitpick. Did not have the nicest collectors cover either.
I totally agree at how meh this book generally is. It doesn't seem to have a consistency to its content. You're also not wrong about the ability scores. Glad you said it.
Honestly, your review is not very surprising. As far as I have seen, this book is very much a love it or leave it kind of thing. Now, I fall very much on the love-it side of things, but I do appreciate how your own leave-it reaction takes the form of valid criticisms, opinions, and questions as opposed to blind rage.
You hit the nail on the head, Kurt: the ability score changes simultaneously makes races meaningless and Humans pointless, as that ability score flexibility was their only real advantage. and sadly, it looks like this is the standard going forward.
Since you asked Mr. Wiegel, I'm in the same camp as your daughter, and I like that there are options for giving non-magic classes a bit of magical ability a le' the Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster. I kind of wish there were more/better non-magical options for those who like those, but I don't have an objective issue with it. I also like the idea of adding psionic subclasses, but I think the Mystic class itself is kind of overpowered. As for the Rune Knight, I like the idea of it--I really love the idea of runic or "symbol magic"--but the lore needs a little work. In my homebrew setting, I've changed it to being something popularized by dwarves that then spread to other races. I'm fine with the new, more optional approach to stats. I really enjoyed Arcanist Press' "Ancestry and Cultures" books, and one of the most compelling arguments they make is "Why would a character of X race have the same stats as all the others if they grew up in Y society?" It allows character creation to be a more nuanced and imaginative, and I like that a lot.
My main problem is some this material was put to book before. Artificer did not need to have all four paths in here, as three of them were in Eberron: Shadows of the Last War. Same goes with the Druid's Circle of Spores and Cleric's Order Domain which were in Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica. Those sections scream of mining the Unearthed Arcana for materials, without remembering that they were printed elsewhere. Is there precedence of that happening before? Yes, but the main difference is that Races of Eberron for 3.5 added something else to the mix besides "Here are these options, without the world context that supports them." Otherwise this is a good continuation from Xanathar's Guide in terms of keeping options open to the players and GMs.
I think the Rune Knight is best imagined as the sort of sons of odin viking style gameplay, where you write the runes on your weapons and armor as a means to appease odin and thor and similar, and in so doing they give you the power of the elements. But that's just my take on it.
It's a book for people that can't find the fun in being underpowered. They exist in every sphere, but they don't usually get a whole supplement to appease them.
This is honestly the kind of book I've come to dread. Books that just add a lot more rules and classes and stuff to a game. As a GM I find it tiring to have to deal with these kinds of books when players get hold of them, as it just becomes more to keep track of. It's not necessarily that the content of the book is bad or poorly balanced or too crunchy on its own, but when you've got players who want to bring in rules, classes, traits or whatever from a lot of different sources it can easily make game mastering feel like work, but at the same time it can feel crummy to say no to their ideas, particularly when they're genuinely good ideas.
Be thankful you're playing in 5e and not 3rd or 3.5. With Tasha's and Xanathar's we're seeing this kind of book about once ever two and a half years. Back in the days of 3rd edition I could walk into any book store and see a new one of these kinds of splat books every month and a half. And each one of those books had a minimum of 20 pages of new feats, 30 pages of new prestige classes, and towards the end they all had at least 3 new base classes.
If it make you feel better I’m a millennial/zoomer (born late 1995 so don’t know which) and fucking love Greyhawk, I’ve read all the old sourcebooks and I know exactly who Iggwilv is.
I think Tasha's dealt with, in my opinion, a valid complaint, when it came to 5th Ed, and that was the limited character creation choices. Yes, Xanathar's added some, but it still felt sparse, when compared to its big competitor, that being Pathfinder 2nd Ed, which had a far great array of options, for both Classes, and Races. Now, you can be more inventive and creative with your characters, without having to home brew everything, and that is always a positive.
I'm still waiting for 5E to bring back Dark Sun. Speaking of if you happen to have a copy of 2e dark Sun and want to review it for us totes cool if you do.
@@Radiotomb I like pathfinder, I think 3.5 was getting a little broad but it was much better that 4 or 5. I read up on the druid and it really is something cool.
The ability score thing is an option, so you don't have to do it for your game. Matter of fact, the whole book is optional. I'm okay with these things as options. I think whenever the next edition comes out flexible ability bonuses it'll be the standard. By that time I'll probably be done with d&d, or just stay with 5e. I appreciate you also adding your daughter's POV. It's really fair of you. I like the way you covered this book.
First of off glad to see you back and seemingly doing well. I am an old schooler like yourself but I disagree on the book. I put this book a little under Xanathars in being good which is to say it is good and needed in 5E. I like the change to racial stats to me it never made sense that say dwarves could r be great wizards (who was crafting all those awesome dwarven magical items?) or that elves could not be good barbarians (Remember the Wolf Riders from Elfquest?) or that a gnome couldn't be a decent cleric (any race that had deities should be able to be one). I suspect when 6E comes out this lineage system will be the norm. Secondly I think this book was partially put out to correct some issues in the PHB. For example the rangers class features in the PHB had some issues that Tasha's fixes. Also between Xanathar's, Tasha's, and the PHB every class should now have an equal amount of subclasses. The only downside I see to this book is that I would have preferred a more robust psionics systems but at least now we have one and I will take one over none. The DMG section is not as robust as in Xanathar's but that book covered so much this book didn't need to be.
Realistically, being able to put your +2's and +1's wherever you want does one thing. It let's you pick up feats early without worrying about carrying a low mainstat all the way to tier 3 and 4 level ranges. Every player already puts their highest rolled or point bought stat in their class' main stat anyway. Playing against type and against racial over generalizations should be a good thing. Rune Knight fits into high and pervasive magic campaigns. It's a fighter that has picked up a few magic tricks along their journey to augment their combat skills. Along with gathering powerful magic armor and weapons, the rune knight also gathers and unlocks the secrets of ancient mystic sigils to gain the powers of giants and titans. In a low or no magic campaign rune knight fits in about as well as eldritch knight. Objectively, the most important part of this book is the upgrades to ranger. Off the top of my head I can think of 6 character concepts/builds that would gain a world of benefits from a 3 level dip into ranger, or even going ranger for 10 to 12 levels and taking dips in other classes. Before Tasha's the number of ranger dips I considered when brainstorming new characters was zero.
No interest in the removal of racial bonuses for me, part of the fun of that, at least for me, was playing against type, which would now be meaningless. But hey, everything's optional and I've kind of got sick of 5e anyway, so doesn't affect me, hopefully some people do enjoy this product.
"subclasses" a class in old school D&D was supposed to represent your occupation, ethnicity, and general psychology; human fighter who is lawful good, kind of thing. The more junk that gets added to turn PCs into mini-fantasy "medieval" superheroes, the less appeal any form of contemporary D&D has. So, I don't do much D&D in the first place, but this really pushes the game away from me that much further.
If everything has magic, then magic is no longer special and worthless. I never got much into D&D because of the mixing of historic periods, mythologies and just a lack of context of where things like dragons and orcs came from, and how there was no knightly class but a bastardization of French or Gallic paladins -- a political rank, not a religious office, and certainly not one with any magic associated with it. I like old school D&D where some people were different, some people had magical stuff, and most other people didn't. The game's been so bastardized that I'm glad I mostly avoided it.
Meh. 5e wasn't made for roleplaying anyway, it was made to take some of that sweet, sweet moolah away from Games Workshop in the overpriced miniatures market.
