Song and Silence joins the growing list of class sourcebooks for Dungeons & Dragons' third edition rules. Covering bards and rogues this time around, it offers ten new Prestige Classes, 26 new Feats, several sample rogues' guilds and bardic colleges, information on poisons, musical instruments, and trap construction, detection and elimination. They also manage to jam a small selection of new spells for Assassins and Bards into the book as well.
First Impression: The book is fairly packed with info, and stacks up well against previous class books. The Prestige Classes are fairly useless, as usual, but the rules clarification, feats, equipment and trap information sections are surprisingly extensive.
Chapter 1 - Prestige Classes
This chapter is definitely for the rogues. Of the ten presented prestige classes, only one (the Virtuoso) realistically pertains to bards rather than rogues. The Virtuoso class is not a particularly attractive one for PCs as described, and seems more like an NPC flavor class than anything else.
Of the remaining classes, "Fang of Lolth" is obviously an NPC class, as no PC is likely to take it. It probably should be a template rather than a Prestige Class, as it involves the character transforming into a monstrous spider. The Drider template recently released on Wizards' website is more interesting than this Prestige Class, and presented better as well.
"Dungeon Delver" is an almost unneccessary Prestige Class, unless you are interested in creating an anti-trap drone. It is one of those completely unrealistic archetypes that, unless all you do is dungeon crawl, you're better off without.
"Dread Pirate," "Outlaw of the Crimson Road," and "Vigilante" are more interesting classes, demonstrating the "color" capabilities of the Prestige Class concept fairly well. The first two have some unique reputation-linked abilities, while the Vigilante has a sense for criminal acts being committed and various abilities to help him mete out justice.
"Temple Raider of Olidammara" gives an example of thieves with a higher calling (albeit one that involves stealing from the temples of rival deities).
"Royal Explorer" and "Spymaster" veer closer to the Bard/Rogue line, and are also more distinct classes in their own right than most of the rest presented in this book.
Finally, the classic Thief-Acrobat rounds out the Prestige Classes, with a nice skill and ability set and significant combat abilities.
Chapter 2 - Skills and Feats
This section begins with "A Primer on Poison" which is both too short and too uninformative to match the rest of the section. However, "Do it Yourself Traps" offers a ton of information on building, detecting and disabling traps, including Challenge Ratings and dozens of sample traps. This section helps fill the gap on challenges for rogues very efficiently.
"New Ways to Use Skills" presents some useful exposition on skills such as Hide and Pick Pocket, with rules for shadowing people, sniping, and concealing weapons.
The new feats are quite varied, with several "Social" feats breaking some new ground. "Alluring," "Charalatan," and "Persuasive" all lend themselves well to roleplaying the slick con man or spy.
A number of feats help the previously-disadvantaged bard class, including Metamagic-like feats such as "Lingering Song" and "Extra Music." "Requiem" is an interesting feat, allowing bards' spells with mind-affecting components to work on the normally immune undead.
The remaining feats are mainly fairly run of the mill combat and acrobatic feats which are mainly useful for their surprise factor.
Chapter 3 - Bard and Rogue Equipment
This chapter begins with the best section in the book, Bards and their Instruments. It offers an extensive, illustrated list of musical instruments, including effects and characteristics unique to each one. It greatly enhances a bard player's ability to flesh out his character with solid, game-affecting style choices.
The rest of the chapter pales a bit, with some mildly interesting magic items and a number of weapons and pieces of equipment to facilitate or impede strangling and being strangled. Nothing particularly stands out, though the equipment list is useful and well-illustrated.
Chapter 4 - Organizations for Bards and Rogues
Another well-done chapter, this gives brief but detailed descriptions of ten types of rogues' guilds and a number of bardic colleges. Each guild and college type is accompanied by several scenario hooks and ideas for PC involvement with the group. All-in-all, this section seems far more useful than Tome and Blood's multi-page treatment of a single mage guild. The bardic colleges help greatly in expanding the scope of the class in the world at large.
Chapter 5 - You and the World Around You
This section is fairly dry, though useful as a source of ideas for fleshing out a character. Most players and DMs will be more interested in the information on special combat options, particularly the detailed discusson on flanking and sneak attacks.
Chapter 6 - New Spells
This chapter is a bit light, considering how much space was devoted to traps earlier in the book. The spells are fairly ordinary, with few standouts. It's mainly of use to bards, as their spell list benefits greatly from expansion.
Aside from the description of an Assassins' Guild in Chapter 4, the few spells presented here are the only real new information for assassins in the book.
Overall:
Easily the best class book so far for Third Edition, this book is a must for players of bards and rogues and for DMs as well. Similar to the expansion of monks in Sword and Fist, the bard class can really benefit from the material within. The book would have benefitted by trimming some of the Prestige Classes in favor of some of the short-changed sections, particularly the spell list and poisons primer.
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