"Go to the sign of Marvel's Axe, a dubious inn on the edge of the Thieves Quarter, in the City of Greyhawk, and look to your own wrist. If you perceive a bracelet and dangling dice, watch for the next throw in the war between Law and Chaos and be prepared to follow the compelling geas." -Signal

Friday, January 27, 2012

AEG - Wilds, Return to the Grave

Wilds is the last of the AEG books that I will be reviewing unless I add the  missing ones in my collection and get around to scanning them for inventory. I  am sure this will happen so I should say the last for a period of time. The collection ends well though as I like Wilds overall.

The Wilderness Survival Guide that released for 1e AD&D is the best thing that  this book could be compared to. It looks at six different specific types of  environments and goes over them in some level of detail. The book starts by  having an overview of outdoor survival. This section is perhaps the best because  it is not specific and addresses concerns that the DM, and as a result, the  players might have dealing with the great outdoors. It deals with the ideas of  building the ecology from the ground up as well as specific advice on how to  build outdoor adventures and encounters. This chapter also added the section on  new uses for old skills and well as new skills and feats.

The specific chapters on the different environments each add a ranger that is  specific to that type of environments. I am not ill disposed to this idea but it  is not something that I would really ever see allowing as a character class but  that is just me. The chapters provide an overview of the specific environment  and what the players might encounter. There are then feats specific to that  environment provided as well as new spells and monsters. There are of course  also a varying number of new prestige classes added for each as well. The environments discussed in the book are:

Desert
Forest
Jungle
Marshes
Mountains
Tundra

As I said I found this book to be in the upper half of all the AEG books I have  been able to look over. I think it may just be that I am partial to the hex  crawl idea and can see more direct usability for the information in the book  than perhaps in others. As with the other books these can be found at a  reasonable cost in the secondary market and suggest any DM interested in outdoor  adventures grab s copy of this.


Published: 2003
Pages: 176

From the publisher:

The wild frontiers of demon-haunted forests, sun-blasted deserts, windswept  glaciers, and rolling plains are now open for adventure with this exciting d20  sourcebook. Features include guidelines for constructing wilderness adventures,  complete with ready-made encounters, new creatures, rules for weather, and other  effects unique to the outdoor environment, plus new prestige classes, feats, and  skills tailored to exploring the wilderness.


From the back of the book:

Go Beyond the Dungeon

This sourcebook expands the venues of adventure, presenting an array of hostile  environments for your wilderness campaigns. From the tundra's deadly cold to the  desert's searing heat, the wilderness offers dangers and threats that make an  angry ogre or hungry troll look like a pushover. With the rules and advice  outlined here, DMs can design adventures that emphasize the environment's  daunting challenges and strange, wondrous realms.

Leave the dungeons behind.

The Wilds Await:
*Over 80 new feats
*Nearly two dozen prestige classes
*New ranger classes for each environment
*40 new spells
*26 monsters
*New rules for six different environments 




Spell:

Return to the Grave


Level: Fourth
Range: 9"
Duration: Instantaneous
Area of Effect: 6" Radius
Components: V,S
Casting Time: 2 Segments
Saving Throw: Negates

This spell allows the magic user to act as a poor mans cleric when it comes to  ridding a party of undead. When the spell is cast it will cause the affected  undead to return to the location of their demise.

The undead who fail the save will immediately turn and proceed to move as directly  as possible to the location in which they died or became undead. They will  continue to make their way to that point for a period of time equal to one turn  plus the caster's level in rounds. Those who make their save will not leave but  will suffer one point of damage per level of the caster.

Disclaimer: The spells that you will see, for how ever long the write ups last,  were all written up or conceived of back in the 80's so the terminology may not  appropriate for anything other than 1e and depending on how well I did back then  it may be slightly off for that as well. If there is any duplication of spells  that exist now it is most likely I wrote mine first :) Please feel free to  comment on them but try not to be too hard on me. If anyone wishes to use these  in anything they print please let me know in advance and all I ask is proper  credit.

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