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If you want to fully exploit the Force in your game, and you don't want to make it all up on the fly or buy scores of suppliments, then you need to hunt down a copy of this book. (If you're actually going to run a campaign set in this era, you must have this book; there is no sense in reinventing the wheel, as it were.) All of the published Force powers are in this book, and so are a complete set of rules for Force skills and Force powers; this compliation is what makes this book so highly valued by fans of the game.

As the title suggests, this book is an RPG companion to the Dark Horse graphic novel series of the same name. This also makes the book part of the Expanded Universe- for what such status is worth. Inside you will find all of the beasts, characters, locations, and technology seen in the series. All of them have statistical descriptions to go with the text, and these will take some of you folks by surprise when you first read them.

Hyperspace travel in this era is _slow!_ The fastest hyperdrive has a rating of "x7"; couple this with the lower base travel time, and a PC will spend months in hyperspace at a time. Shield technology isn't quite what it is in Darth Vader's time, and neither are blasters. The structure of the Jedi Order is nothing like we saw in _The Phantom Menace_, and the same applies to the Sith. (Continuity is preserved, however, due to the multiple millenia between "Tales" and the last sight of the Sith Order as mentioned in TPM; it is assumed that there was a lot of change between the two periods.) What exists reminds me of First Age Middle-Earth; it's epic, it's majestic, and much more mythological than anything in the films.

This feel does see a mechanical manifestation, in the form of the collected Force powers. In the time of Darth Vader, only Palpatine approached the epic power of the Sith of antiquity- and then, only in the "Dark Empire" series. Those Sith sorcerors fry their foes with Force Lightning, crush enemy worlds with Force Storms, and sap their foes' strength with webs of Dark Side power. The Jedi Masters of the era are no slouches; they use Battle Meditation to force their foes to fight each other, Beast Languages to turn mighty animals into allies, and Enhanced Coordination to better push the odds into their favor. It's like playing a Middle-Earth campaign set during the First Age, when you're used to the Third Age.

The book is easy to read, use, and and reference. Chapter One has the background information for this era's events. Yes, this includes the summaries of the stories told in "Tales of the Jedi" as well as all of the information about the state of the galaxy in this period of time. Chapter Two describes all of the Jedi characters in the series, and this includes the statistics. Chapter Three covers all Jedi Force powers. Chapters Four and Five do the same for the Sith. Chapter Six covers the "neutrals"--neither Jedi nor Sith--in the series. Chapter Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, and Eleven cover (respectively) species, creatures, vehicles & starships, technology, and sites seen in the series. Chapter Twelve is the GM/campaigning chapter, and Chapter Thirteen is a solo adventure. Some period character templates are in the back; most of them are varient Jedi templates.

The book is also pretty to look at. Dark Horse artwork from the series is on the cover, in the black-and-white pages, and featured in two color plate sections. If you saw it in a comic, it's probably in this book somewhere. As with the Dark Empire Sourcebook, this book is an excellant example of when and how to recycle existing artwork. The placement is a bit excessive on the surface, but every piece used fits into the book; here, the art serves the text very, very well.

As I said above, the book is easy to read and use. While this book has the typos that plague all RPG materials, they are kept to a bare minimum. Not once did I run into a vague piece of text, and neither did I run into any contradictory material. The rules for using the powers were clear, clean, and consistant.

The only bad thing I have to say regard the character descriptions, and even then I have to say that it's just my opinion: the "apprentice" Force users must be used by players with hot dice, burn through Force/Character Points like a fire through a dry brush, or exploit every rule advantage at hand. Otherwise they'd never use some (or all) of the powers given to them as the series shows it. Their Force skills--as written--aren't high enough to reliably replay those scenes as depicted.

If that's all that's bad, then West End did something right. I must get my own copy, and as soon as I possibly can. (Yep, I borrowed a copy so I could review it.) I'd place this as one of the Must Have products for the Star Wars RPG, along with the Special Edition Trilogy Sourcebook and the Revised & Expanded GM Screen.

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Tales of the Jedi Companion
Author: George R. Strayton Category: game Company/Publisher: West End Games Line: Star Wars Cost: $25 (US) Page count: 178 pages ISBN: 0-87431-289-2 SKU: WEG40082 Playtest Review by Bradford C. Walker on 12/06/99. Genre tags: Fantasy Science_fiction Space	If you want to fully exploit the Force in your game, and you don't want to make it all up on the fly or buy scores of suppliments, then you need to hunt down a copy of this book. (If you're actually going to run a campaign set in this era, you must have this book; there is no sense in reinventing the wheel, as it were.) All of the published Force powers are in this book, and so are a complete set of rules for Force skills and Force powers; this compliation is what makes this book so highly valued by fans of the game. As the title suggests, this book is an RPG companion to the Dark Horse graphic novel series of the same name. This also makes the book part of the Expanded Universe- for what such status is worth. Inside you will find all of the beasts, characters, locations, and technology seen in the series. All of them have statistical descriptions to go with the text, and these will take some of you folks by surprise when you first read them. Hyperspace travel in this era is _slow!_ The fastest hyperdrive has a rating of "x7"; couple this with the lower base travel time, and a PC will spend months in hyperspace at a time. Shield technology isn't quite what it is in Darth Vader's time, and neither are blasters. The structure of the Jedi Order is nothing like we saw in _The Phantom Menace_, and the same applies to the Sith. (Continuity is preserved, however, due to the multiple millenia between "Tales" and the last sight of the Sith Order as mentioned in TPM; it is assumed that there was a lot of change between the two periods.) What exists reminds me of First Age Middle-Earth; it's epic, it's majestic, and much more mythological than anything in the films. This feel does see a mechanical manifestation, in the form of the collected Force powers. In the time of Darth Vader, only Palpatine approached the epic power of the Sith of antiquity- and then, only in the "Dark Empire" series. Those Sith sorcerors fry their foes with Force Lightning, crush enemy worlds with Force Storms, and sap their foes' strength with webs of Dark Side power. The Jedi Masters of the era are no slouches; they use Battle Meditation to force their foes to fight each other, Beast Languages to turn mighty animals into allies, and Enhanced Coordination to better push the odds into their favor. It's like playing a Middle-Earth campaign set during the First Age, when you're used to the Third Age. The book is easy to read, use, and and reference. Chapter One has the background information for this era's events. Yes, this includes the summaries of the stories told in "Tales of the Jedi" as well as all of the information about the state of the galaxy in this period of time. Chapter Two describes all of the Jedi characters in the series, and this includes the statistics. Chapter Three covers all Jedi Force powers. Chapters Four and Five do the same for the Sith. Chapter Six covers the "neutrals"--neither Jedi nor Sith--in the series. Chapter Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, and Eleven cover (respectively) species, creatures, vehicles & starships, technology, and sites seen in the series. Chapter Twelve is the GM/campaigning chapter, and Chapter Thirteen is a solo adventure. Some period character templates are in the back; most of them are varient Jedi templates. The book is also pretty to look at. Dark Horse artwork from the series is on the cover, in the black-and-white pages, and featured in two color plate sections. If you saw it in a comic, it's probably in this book somewhere. As with the Dark Empire Sourcebook, this book is an excellant example of when and how to recycle existing artwork. The placement is a bit excessive on the surface, but every piece used fits into the book; here, the art serves the text very, very well. As I said above, the book is easy to read and use. While this book has the typos that plague all RPG materials, they are kept to a bare minimum. Not once did I run into a vague piece of text, and neither did I run into any contradictory material. The rules for using the powers were clear, clean, and consistant. The only bad thing I have to say regard the character descriptions, and even then I have to say that it's just my opinion: the "apprentice" Force users must be used by players with hot dice, burn through Force/Character Points like a fire through a dry brush, or exploit every rule advantage at hand. Otherwise they'd never use some (or all) of the powers given to them as the series shows it. Their Force skills--as written--aren't high enough to reliably replay those scenes as depicted. If that's all that's bad, then West End did something right. I must get my own copy, and as soon as I possibly can. (Yep, I borrowed a copy so I could review it.) I'd place this as one of the Must Have products for the Star Wars RPG, along with the Special Edition Trilogy Sourcebook and the Revised & Expanded GM Screen. Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Tales of the Jedi Companion