“The Codex of Erde” is a nicely sized hardcover book which functions as both a fantasy campaign setting and a rulebook for the World of Erde, the default fantasy setting that is used in all of the Troll Lord Games adventure modules. Also, as of this writing, a special is on where if you order the book direct from Troll Lord Games you can not only get it for $30.00 but you can get the $5.00 color poster map for free – talk about a bargain!
This book is definitely an improvement from the 24-page setting soft cover book, The After Winter Dark Fantasy Campaign Setting. Obviously, if you are a bit skittish about taking the plunge (even with the sale going on right now), you can always “test the water” by buying this older, smaller version for $5.00. Anyhow, as Monty Python would say, I’ll get on with it.
The front cover art appears to be a painting of a knight fighting against a huge dragon. It’s probably not really a painting, but the style is unknown to me. The 3D effect really happens here. In other words, I think it was an excellent job by Doug Kovacs. While the interior art wasn’t in color, it had a sort of “old school” feel to it that I couldn’t help but respect.
The book starts off by taking forty-some pages describing the history of the world of Erde. Inzae, the Inner World of Erde, is briefly mentioned. That is fine with me since most of the Troll Lord Games modules deal with Erde anyhow, and incorporating the information contained here into the modules appears easy to any DM who owns the Death on the Treklant Trilogy modules. To sum up, there was a big war against goblins and dwarves. Then, an evil god ruled the world – and was vanquished. So, the heroes start out with the world in a state of revival. The author waxes on poetically here and makes this a very enjoyable read.
Next, the book takes twelve pages giving a description of the universe, the calendar used, and information on the many deities that the World of Erde has. It’s details like these that really get me, and I have to say that the book handles these parts well, although more information on the tenets and religious practices on the various faiths would be appreciated. The holy symbols, like the regional totems, are nifty.
Now, the meat of the product is definitely a description of the world itself – taking up taking up over a hundred pages. While I’ve seen more detailed world information, I’ve also seen less. All in all, the detail is good. Each section of the world is explained in enough detail, yet it still allows the DM room to do what he wants to do with the history given him. More importantly, it allows the heroes to become the central characters in the story of the world, rather than have a bunch of high level NPCs being constantly being ran into everywhere the group goes. Also worth noting is that each section of the world has an “EC rating”, which is short for Economy rating. The rating is used to track what can be reasonably found for sale in the area. This is a swell idea. Within this part of the book are also black and white maps, so if you don’t catch the sale in time or you don’t want to spend $5.00 U.S. to buy the color map, you can still got something to work with.
The next part is an introductory adventure of eleven pages written by Gary Gygax. If you are reading this review, then you most likely know that Mr. Gygax created the original role-playing game, Dungeons and Dragons. It’s very cool that he’s back at it. The adventure, “Search for a Lost City” has the PCs – you guessed it – searching for a lost city. There are accurate CG maps, the flavor text is both bold and plentiful, and the full-page art piece on page 177 is right on. And, if that wasn’t enough, this adventure turns out the be a springboard adventure for an upcoming 96 page module by Ernie and Luke Gygax called “The Lost City of Gaxmoor” due out in January, 2002. Getting this adventure written by THE man himself was a big plus for me. Here’s to hoping he’s got a lot of ink left in his pen.
Next up we have 35 pages for players. Within here we have descriptions of the races, languages, prestige classes, guilds, equipment, economy and spells.
Races – Humans, Dwarves, Gnomes, Half-Elves, and Half-Orcs are the same as far as statistics are concerned. However, Elves are definitely different – one could even say improved upon – than the elves given in the Player’s Handbook. There are High Elves (which is both a race and a class – a novel concept), Twilight Elves (dark elves), Wild Elves, and Wood Elves. There is also a new race called the Half-Faerie (what you get when an elf and a faerie interbreed). While they, like the standard races, don’t have statistical changes, they do have differences from the standard knowledge one has of these races. Halflings are very different – they are now a nomadic people that are endangered to become extinct thanks to the evil god’s reign, during which halflings were hunted for sport. Height, weight, and age charts are also given.
The language list is better than the one given in the Player’s Handbook, with a paragraph description for each telling of the history of the language.
Prestige classes include Holy Defender of the Flame (uber-paladin, although other classes may take it up), Primal Druid (uber-druid, although other classes may take it up), and Watcher in the Wood (uber-ranger). This is a cool option for high-level PCs who wish to multi-class later on but don’t want to multi into a straight paladin or druid class.
The guilds and orders section has a good group of clubs to join if the PCs want to be a part of something big. All have cool names like The Asylum, Muddles Inc., Cult of the Sword and Vale Knights.
In the Equipment and Economy chapter, the electrum piece is brought back to Dungeons and Dragons. Also, since this setting takes place during Erde’s renaissance, you naturally have available to you pistols, muskets, grenades and cannons complete with statistics so you can shout “It’s coming right at us!” and fire to your heart’s content. The biggest improvement to the game contained in this section, however, is the helmets. Rules are given to improve your Armor Class rating for your head if you have a helmet on. This makes perfect sense and is a most welcome addition.
This player’s section wraps up with a chapter on spells. Here you will find a list of the clerical domains that each deity has as well as new spells for a spell casting classes.
The book finishes up with a DM section of thirty pages giving new magic items, new monsters and a detailed timeline for all of Erde’s calendars. The magic items are all good with history and descriptions given. The new monsters that really stand out are the Lesser Chimaera (sp?), Dark Faerie, Eldritch Goblin, Hobgoblin (twice as powerful as the one in the Monster Manual), Lore Drake, Miiween (female snow faeries) and Troll Lord (a monster so cool they named the company after it – heh).
To wrap up, this book gives you what it’s supposed to – a world of epic adventure. I also believe that, even if Troll Lord Games come out with companion books, they will not be as necessary as they are in other RPG lines and settings. Here is a product that can stand on its own, and that is what a campaign setting book should do.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)