I was a little leery of Constructs when I first saw it. The previous books in the Encyclopaedia Arcane tend to be on the overpowered side. Sure, the players will eventually be destroyed by the demons, necromantic energy, wild surge, etc…, but in the meanwhile, they can do some damage to the game and outshine their co-players who are the same level. This book is fairly well balanced and is easy to use, consisting mostly of materials and types of constructs that the caster can build.
While it has no chapters, the book is broken up into different sections. The first is an introduction to what constructs are, the second, the drawing board, the third, the artisan’s craft, the fourth, building a better construct, the fifth, construct abilities, the sixth, maintenance, the seventh, help for game masters, the eighth, designer’s notes, and the end, of course, the OGL/D20 license.
Constructs are basically broken up into three types in this book: Golems, automata, and simulacra. The first is the standard big unstoppable brute, the second, specialized units, and the third, organic monstrosities that are mere copies of a living creature.
The methods used to craft said creatures are broken down in the Drawing Board. Each creature is assigned a certain number of construction points based on material used, number of feats, or deficiencies (anti-feats), special abilities, and body rating. The user must also have certain feats for each type of construct, as well as specific spells and skills per type. There is an example of golem construction which takes all the elements, including some specialized functions such as extra legs and feats, and shows how much it costs, as well as what the experience point necessary for imbuing the golem with life. Of course, the user must still make a research and craft DC to insure that his creature is alive.
The artisan’s Craft is a section devoted to the different materials and types of golems. Instead of being arranged by caster level, or by material, it’s arranged from strongest to weakest per section. It starts off with golems, which range from materials including wood, bone, and even adamant, and goes into different types of automata, like assassins, sentries, and of course, the ever impressive champions. The simulacra are different in that they are actually templates, which are based off the type of simulacrum the caster is crafting. These range from homunculus, the standard, to the elite mimeoi, which is a perfect copy of a creature with some augmented abilities.
Building A Better Construct provides the reader with different feats and abilities that can be incorporated into his golem. Of course, these increase the cost and construction point totals, but powerful wizards can have very customized creations. One of the feats is Core Feat, which allows the caster to imbue his creation with certain feats from the Player’s Handbook. Unique feats for the constructs are also included like Additional Special Ability Slot, a feat that grants the construct additional slots for special abilities, which are covered latter. Extra Legs, Arms, and other limbs are considered feats here, so those who want to craft that Iron Spider now can with ease. One of the interesting aspects of this chapter is the Deficiencies, or Anti-Feats. These limitations make crafting the construct easier and include little imperfections like no legs, no arms, and the ever popular weak spot, an area where the construct isn’t quite so heavily fortified.
The section on construct weapons is useful not only for these creatures, but any monster that’s larger than the standard M that most humanoids are. A quick table provides the GM with weapon damaged based on size. Unfortunately, not all dice combinations are covered like the ever-popular 2d6 of the Greatsword. I’d just use the next column up though where 2d6 for a Large creature becomes 2d8 for a Huge creature.
Construct Abilities are similar to feats but are much more powerful. These range from the ability to use various breath weapons, broken down in a table, to special abilities like Burrow or Cling to Surface. (Yeah, I’ve got that Iron Spider on my mind. I know.) Using these special abilities can provide the GM with lots of opportunities to make his players cringe in fear every time they see a construct. Will it have the ability to shrug off energy based attacks via Energy Immunity? Will it have the ability to blend in with the background through a Chameleon Field? Will acid or electricity dance from it’s fingers? Of course, the caster must follow the requirements here, which are spells that the caster must have available to cast and if said spells have components, then those needs must be meet too.
The section on Maintenance provides the reader with information on what the Craft DC to repair a golem is, as well as how much time, money and experience points it cost to rebuild a destroyed creation.
The section, Help for Game Masters, provides the GM with brief bits of info as to how society might look upon a construct master and what to do when the constructs start doing all the work. There could’ve been more information on using this material as world building in terms of using constructs for mundane chores but page counts must be obeyed.
Designer’s Notes, while useful from a fan boy point of view, should be left for the web site.
Art ranges from fantastic to below average. No truly bad pieces and quite a few impressive ones. The book is set up in standard format, two columns of text with fair density. The interior front cover has the head of a construct, probably a homunculi or some sort, in full color no less, and the rear interior cover is a checklist process for the three types of constructs. Let’s here it for no advertising!
Surprisingly enough, there isn’t really anything overwhelming about this book. The process is simple, easy to use and follows the Core Rules closely in terms of average power for these creatures. Thankfully, Mongoose didn’t try to let players have such powerful creatures at low level. The lowest level creature can be started at 7th level, not before.
The book feels a little short though. There are numerous elements for golem construction that didn’t make it into the book, such as glass, silver, iron, and copper. A few pages of standard monster manual entries for said golems would’ve went a long way in helping GMs utilize these ideas right away as well. In addition, a table that provided the reader with a breakdown of minimal level, necessary skills and feats, would’ve been nice too. Can you say potential web enhancement? I knew you could.
These are fairly minor issues though and shouldn’t prevent any GM intent on crushing his party, or any player intent on having the ultimate in home security, from picking up this book.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)