The Inside Scoop on Gaming

Defenders of the Faith (DotF from now on) is a supplement for Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition, featuring new equipment, prestige classes, and spells almost exclusively for paladins and clerics.

After reading the whole book, my overall impression about it is that I liked it but I could've gone along playing D&D without it just fine. It's just a book that's not compulsory or very useful. Still, it has some good things about it; but not sufficient ones.

Starting by evaluating it's appearance: It's dull. Dull, dull, dull, dull. Although it has a good cover, inside the book you step into pictures that are just... not exciting at all.

There are exceptions, though: some pictures I just loved them! Pictures from page 17 (a divine agent slashing a demon or whatever) and page 75 (the war priest), were very pleasant to look at, and still they're nothing special. The rest of the book is presented with dull pictures with dull motives (specially the pictures of the prestige classes).

And as if it wasn't enough, the book lacks a good disposition of text: it's so boring to read! Some pages are full, full, full of text, with no pictures/spaces at all! As a result, I didn't even bother to read certain parts of the book.

Though, it isn't painful to read... so I award the book with "Needs work" at the Style category.

And now, for the contents: what do we have? (I'll skip some negligible parts)

- Chapter 1:

- Playing an effective cleric: This part describes what uses a cleric may have for a party, and the tips that may be used to maximize his utility/power. It has some ideas that may have not been noticed by some players, but otherwise it's usefulness is questionable.

- Playing an effective paladin: This part of the book is much more interesting than the former one. In addition to what the former chapter describes, It also describes more acuratelly what the code really is (no, paladins don't need chastity belts), it proposes other possible mounts for paladins (really cool, specially the dragon mounts).

- Other religion issues (divine interventions, fallen clerics, etc.) Various parts describe other cleric issues: like for example, how may the turn undead ability be channeled, how may divine intervention be used (I personally don't like what they suggest), how may a fallen clerics be accepted into a new deity, and etc. There's nothing relevant in this part per se.

- New feats: Now this is what I liked most about the book. Here are described some neat feats, most of them requiring turn undead ability...

- Magic Gear: Some nice items, nothing special.

- Chapter 2:

This chapter is dedicated to describing the mentality of each church (the churches are broke down by allignment), and then describes shortly each of the PHB's churches' mentalities. There are also some religious organizations described in this part...

I confess: I haven't read well this part. But that's because there's nothing that's very useful in this part. It serves to consolidate your vision on churches's alignments, and as for the organizations... as they're from Greyhawk (if I'm not mistaken), then those should've been put into a Greyhawk supplement , not in this generic book.

And finally, the chapter ends with some guidelines on how to run your own church (probably not necessary for most of the folks, but still a bit useful).

- Chapter 3: Prestige Classes

This is, for me, the better part of the book. Or at least it should've been. Here are described all prestige classes that your cleric/paladin, or in some cases other class may evolute into.

And what do we have here? A load of dull prestige classes.

It's sad that almost half of the prestige classes are only small variations from a standard cleric/paladin, evolving normally his spells with only some minor abilities to boot.

I'll describe each class separately.

- Church Inquisitor: A cleric specialized into fighting evil, corruptions, and lies. It is almost a standard cleric, with some immunities (to charms, dominations) and some anti-illusion abilities. Boring!

- Consecrated Harrier: A divine head-hunter. The church commands him to seek his prey, he gets loads of bonuses against it/him and, on higher levels, his prey has an hard time hiding from him. It gets some minor spells, and overall I think it's a funny class.

- Contemplative: A cleric that becomes more attuned with his deity. He's a cleric as usual (gains spells normally), plus he gets some immunities from nature itself (he gains some monk-like immunities thru the levels: immunity to poison, magic resistance, doesn't age normally, and turns into an outsider later). Opens up some DM possibilities, but it isn't very interesting.

- Divine Oracle: The name says it all! It gains spells normally, and gets some uncanny dodges, evasion, and stuff, simbolizing his foreseeing of the future. Pretty boring on it's whole.

- Holy Liberator: Almost Exactly as a paladin, but is Chaotic GOod. There's not much to say besides that...

- Hospitaler: HUgh! The worst of the classes in this book. It evolutes spells as usual, gains bonus feats for no good reason, and removes disease, and lays on hands. Boring boring boring

- Hunter of the Dead: I personally liked this class. It's kind of obvious what he is, and he has some funny abilities: smite undead, when they kill an undead it's killed for good (no vampire coming back!), turns undead (dah!), and gets some minor spells. What I really liked was the prerequisite "Scar of Unlife": to become an hunter of the Dead the PC must have been level or ability drained by undead in the past. Sweet!

- Knight of the Chalice: Kind of paladins centered on killing demons. It's a nice class, though it is TOO DAMN CENTERED ON KILLING THOSE FREAKING DEMONS. Every special ability of this Knight is related to Demons: don't expect him to be so good if there aren't demons around.

- Knight of the Middle Circle: Another kind of paladin, this one has some near-useless spells, and true strikes and stuff. ALMOST interesting.

- Master of Shrouds: Bah, this one sucks. He evolutes his cleric spells as usual, and gets some (near useless) undead summoning, and the best part is that the undead frequently may turn on his master. Yay!

- Sacred Exorcist: It evolutes spells as usual, gains some dispel evil and stuff, boring, boring, boring.

- Sacred Fist: This one I like! It's a divine spellcaster monk (it has some minor spells), fights like a monk but has abilities that are very different from that of the monk.

- Templar: The most fighter-ish class of the book. It gains some minor spells (resembles that of the paladin), gains weapon specialization, DR, and Smites (like those of the Destruction domain). It's a nice class to play with. - Warpriest: In my opinion, oughta be a very funny class to play with: it sacrifices better spellcasting for some combat spell-like abilities. The 10th lvl ability, implacable foe, oughta be fun: every ally fights till they reach -20 HP... eheh!

Chapter 4: New Spells

This chapter gives away some new spells for paladins, clerics, and even druids and rangers. Most of the spells add something useful to the clerics, and some are outright funny, like Zeal (basically allows you to avoid enemies and their attacks until you reach your chosen target) or Divine Sacrifice (sacrifice HP for more damage, for paladins).

This chapter also gives some new domains, Prestige Domains. They are called that way because they are only accesible through most of the prestige classes of these books: now that's a pity, because few people would play with those classes and so many of these domains shall never see the sun of the light.... and there are some funny domains, like the Madness domain (almost every spell from it is a new one), or the DOmination domain (even nastier domination spells, like a PERMANENT domination).

Finally, at the end of the book, there are some monstruous deities described. Nothing very special here... unless you're interested in, for example, knowing that the god of the kuo-toa is called Bliddoolpoolp (can you spell that?).

My overall impression of the book: It has some uses, but few. Overall, I think I wasted a bit my money - buy it only if you're collecting all of the books of this genre (Sword and Fist, Tome and Blood, etc.).

Still... it's not totally useless, though it isn't useful as well.

Defenders of the Faith
Defenders of the Faith Playtest Review by Psycho on 30/10/01 Style: 2 (Needs Work) Substance: 3 (Average) Not as good as it might have been, but it has some ideas for DMs and players. Product: Defenders of the Faith Author: Rich Redman and James Wyatt Category: RPG Company/Publisher: Wizards of the Coast Line: Dungeons & Dragons Cost: $19.95 (U.S) Page count: 96 Year published: 2001 ISBN: SKU: WTC11840 Comp copy?: no Playtest Review by Psycho on 30/10/01 Genre tags: Fantasy	Defenders of the Faith (DotF from now on) is a supplement for Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition, featuring new equipment, prestige classes, and spells almost exclusively for paladins and clerics. After reading the whole book, my overall impression about it is that I liked it but I could've gone along playing D&D without it just fine. It's just a book that's not compulsory or very useful. Still, it has some good things about it; but not sufficient ones. Starting by evaluating it's appearance: It's dull. Dull, dull, dull, dull. Although it has a good cover, inside the book you step into pictures that are just... not exciting at all. There are exceptions, though: some pictures I just loved them! Pictures from page 17 (a divine agent slashing a demon or whatever) and page 75 (the war priest), were very pleasant to look at, and still they're nothing special. The rest of the book is presented with dull pictures with dull motives (specially the pictures of the prestige classes). And as if it wasn't enough, the book lacks a good disposition of text: it's so boring to read! Some pages are full, full, full of text, with no pictures/spaces at all! As a result, I didn't even bother to read certain parts of the book. Though, it isn't painful to read... so I award the book with "Needs work" at the Style category. And now, for the contents: what do we have? (I'll skip some negligible parts) - Chapter 1: - Playing an effective cleric: This part describes what uses a cleric may have for a party, and the tips that may be used to maximize his utility/power. It has some ideas that may have not been noticed by some players, but otherwise it's usefulness is questionable. - Playing an effective paladin: This part of the book is much more interesting than the former one. In addition to what the former chapter describes, It also describes more acuratelly what the code really is (no, paladins don't need chastity belts), it proposes other possible mounts for paladins (really cool, specially the dragon mounts). - Other religion issues (divine interventions, fallen clerics, etc.) Various parts describe other cleric issues: like for example, how may the turn undead ability be channeled, how may divine intervention be used (I personally don't like what they suggest), how may a fallen clerics be accepted into a new deity, and etc. There's nothing relevant in this part per se. - New feats: Now this is what I liked most about the book. Here are described some neat feats, most of them requiring turn undead ability... - Magic Gear: Some nice items, nothing special. - Chapter 2: This chapter is dedicated to describing the mentality of each church (the churches are broke down by allignment), and then describes shortly each of the PHB's churches' mentalities. There are also some religious organizations described in this part... I confess: I haven't read well this part. But that's because there's nothing that's very useful in this part. It serves to consolidate your vision on churches's alignments, and as for the organizations... as they're from Greyhawk (if I'm not mistaken), then those should've been put into a Greyhawk supplement , not in this generic book. And finally, the chapter ends with some guidelines on how to run your own church (probably not necessary for most of the folks, but still a bit useful). - Chapter 3: Prestige Classes This is, for me, the better part of the book. Or at least it should've been. Here are described all prestige classes that your cleric/paladin, or in some cases other class may evolute into. And what do we have here? A load of dull prestige classes. It's sad that almost half of the prestige classes are only small variations from a standard cleric/paladin, evolving normally his spells with only some minor abilities to boot. I'll describe each class separately. - Church Inquisitor: A cleric specialized into fighting evil, corruptions, and lies. It is almost a standard cleric, with some immunities (to charms, dominations) and some anti-illusion abilities. Boring! - Consecrated Harrier: A divine head-hunter. The church commands him to seek his prey, he gets loads of bonuses against it/him and, on higher levels, his prey has an hard time hiding from him. It gets some minor spells, and overall I think it's a funny class. - Contemplative: A cleric that becomes more attuned with his deity. He's a cleric as usual (gains spells normally), plus he gets some immunities from nature itself (he gains some monk-like immunities thru the levels: immunity to poison, magic resistance, doesn't age normally, and turns into an outsider later). Opens up some DM possibilities, but it isn't very interesting. - Divine Oracle: The name says it all! It gains spells normally, and gets some uncanny dodges, evasion, and stuff, simbolizing his foreseeing of the future. Pretty boring on it's whole. - Holy Liberator: Almost Exactly as a paladin, but is Chaotic GOod. There's not much to say besides that... - Hospitaler: HUgh! The worst of the classes in this book. It evolutes spells as usual, gains bonus feats for no good reason, and removes disease, and lays on hands. Boring boring boring - Hunter of the Dead: I personally liked this class. It's kind of obvious what he is, and he has some funny abilities: smite undead, when they kill an undead it's killed for good (no vampire coming back!), turns undead (dah!), and gets some minor spells. What I really liked was the prerequisite "Scar of Unlife": to become an hunter of the Dead the PC must have been level or ability drained by undead in the past. Sweet! - Knight of the Chalice: Kind of paladins centered on killing demons. It's a nice class, though it is TOO DAMN CENTERED ON KILLING THOSE FREAKING DEMONS. Every special ability of this Knight is related to Demons: don't expect him to be so good if there aren't demons around. - Knight of the Middle Circle: Another kind of paladin, this one has some near-useless spells, and true strikes and stuff. ALMOST interesting. - Master of Shrouds: Bah, this one sucks. He evolutes his cleric spells as usual, and gets some (near useless) undead summoning, and the best part is that the undead frequently may turn on his master. Yay! - Sacred Exorcist: It evolutes spells as usual, gains some dispel evil and stuff, boring, boring, boring. - Sacred Fist: This one I like! It's a divine spellcaster monk (it has some minor spells), fights like a monk but has abilities that are very different from that of the monk. - Templar: The most fighter-ish class of the book. It gains some minor spells (resembles that of the paladin), gains weapon specialization, DR, and Smites (like those of the Destruction domain). It's a nice class to play with. - Warpriest: In my opinion, oughta be a very funny class to play with: it sacrifices better spellcasting for some combat spell-like abilities. The 10th lvl ability, implacable foe, oughta be fun: every ally fights till they reach -20 HP... eheh! Chapter 4: New Spells This chapter gives away some new spells for paladins, clerics, and even druids and rangers. Most of the spells add something useful to the clerics, and some are outright funny, like Zeal (basically allows you to avoid enemies and their attacks until you reach your chosen target) or Divine Sacrifice (sacrifice HP for more damage, for paladins). This chapter also gives some new domains, Prestige Domains. They are called that way because they are only accesible through most of the prestige classes of these books: now that's a pity, because few people would play with those classes and so many of these domains shall never see the sun of the light.... and there are some funny domains, like the Madness domain (almost every spell from it is a new one), or the DOmination domain (even nastier domination spells, like a PERMANENT domination). Finally, at the end of the book, there are some monstruous deities described. Nothing very special here... unless you're interested in, for example, knowing that the god of the kuo-toa is called Bliddoolpoolp (can you spell that?). My overall impression of the book: It has some uses, but few. Overall, I think I wasted a bit my money - buy it only if you're collecting all of the books of this genre (Sword and Fist, Tome and Blood, etc.). Still... it's not totally useless, though it isn't useful as well.