Sword and Fist is the first of the five "class books" for Dungeons & Dragons produced by Wizards of the Coast. It provides new feats, prestige classes and equipment aimed mainly at expanding the abilities of fighters and monks, as well as giving hints on playing those classes. It also has a few sample organisations that might prove useful in detailing a group's individual campaign.
One of the biggest problems that any class book has is this: what is the target audience? Do you aim the book at newer players, and thus alienate the more experienced players? Do you aim the book at more experienced players, and thus make it hard for the new player to use? Or do you try and provide a mix of information - some of which will help the newer players, and other parts that will help the experienced players? It is this latter route that Sword and Fist has taken, and it is, I believe, the correct route to take. After all, you can never be sure when advice for a new player may also prove useful for an experienced player.
The book is divided into five chapters:
Feats and Skills details 31 new feats, 6 new subareas of the Knowledge skill, and expands upon the usage of four existing skills: Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information and Sense Motive.
The new feats vary in quality, and a few (Expert Tactician!) were extremely badly described in the original printing of Sword & Fist - corrected versions exist in errata available on the Wizards webpage. In general, however, the new feats are pretty useful and provide further areas where you can specialise your fighter or monk; other classes will probably also find some of them useful. A few noteworthy feats:
- Hold the Line, which allows you to make Attacks of Opportunity on a charging opponent.
- Monkey Grip, which allows characters to use two-handed weapons in one hand, though at a penalty.
- Rapid Reload, which improves the rate of fire of crossbows.
- Zen Archery, which allows missile fire bonuses by Wisdom modifier instead of Dexterity - a nice idea that makes me think that the Force must be with that archer.
One nice thing about the feats is that a fair number of them are aimed at providing further options to the monk, a class that I felt had few feats particularly useful for it in the core rules.
A couple of feats, such as Dirty Fighting, which provides a minor bonus to damage at the cost of forfeiting all your additional attacks in the turn, seem extremely weak. They are definitely in the minority, however.
Prestige Classes details 19 new prestige classes. As one might expect from a bunch of prestige classes, they are likely not all going to be useful in your campaign. Some of them are quite generic: the Cavalier, the Duelist and and the Gladiator, whilst others are almost painfully specific: the Fist of Hextor and the Knight Protector of the Great Kingdom.
I have personally found these prestige classes to be excellent value. Although only the Order of the Bow Initiate has actually been used in my game, I can easily see characters that would use almost any of the others. As one might expect from a Wizards' product, they seem fairly well balanced, although again there are some problems that had to be corrected with errata.
The list of Prestige Classes is as follows:
- Cavalier - a knight
- Devoted Defender - a kind of bodyguard
- Drunken Master - a martial artist with supernatural abilities gained from the bottle
- Duelist - a swashbuckling fighter
- Fist of Hextor - devoted templars of the evil God of War
- Ghostwalker - hard to explain, but this is really a solo adventurer prestige class. It oozes character, and is one of my favourite prestige classes in the book.
- Gladiator - you know, they fight in the arena
- Halfling Outrider - they ride wardogs, and they protect halfling settlements
- Knight Protector of the Great Kingdom - a knight variant, this class are devoted to the dream of restoring a kingdom that has mostly fallen
- Lasher - a whip specialist
- Master of Chains - a spiked chain specialist
- Master Samurai - the oriental noble warrior
- Ninja of the Crescent Moon - a mercenary rogue character that is suited for monks.
- Order of the Bow Initiate - a bow specialist, skilled in sniper action
- Ravager - a devotee of the god of slaughter
- Red Avenger - a monk devoted to settling an old score
- Tribal Protector - the battlefield champion of a humanoid race
- Warmaster - a trained leader of armies
- Weapon Master - taking specialisation in a weapon to the limit
Worldly Matters is concerned primarily with the role-playing of a fighter or monk character, including notes on racial choices and possible organisations.
The organisations: the Fists of Hextor, the Knight Protectors of the Great Kingdom, the Knights of the Watch, the Ravagers and the Red Avengers, are generally taken from the World of Greyhawk setting. I found most of the descriptions to be quite evocative and useful for my own Greyhawk campaign, but the ideas presented should be useful for non-Greyhawk campaigns as well. Some adaptation notes are given.
No new rules mechanics are given - this is all role-playing and flavour information.
The Game with the Game concerns itself mostly with the mechanics of playing the game, and is of most use to newer players, especially those needing tactical advice for the play of 3E with miniatures.
I feel that the two combat examples given I are superfluous, however the section that clarifies various rules and suggests new variant rules is very useful.
Tools of the Trade, the final chapter, details about twenty new weapons, none of which really interested me. The new Magic Items section gives good value, however. Especially catching my eye are the dancing shield, the bow of true arrows, and the amulet of mighty fists - the latter giving monks a magical bonus to hit and damage with their unarmed strikes, something that really should have been included in the DMG, and is very welcome here.
The chapter also contains information on chariots, including a few new feats that can be used by those skilled in fighting from them, and finally eight strongholds: the Border Tower, the Elven Canopy Tower, the Lighthouse Keep, the Gnome Bridge Keep, the Bailey Castle, the Dwarven Plateau Castle, the Monks' Temple, and the Gladiatorial Arena. All the strongholds have floor-plans, descriptions and costs.
Conclusion
Looking over the book, I believe it provides pretty good value for its cost. Although there are a couple of really horrible feats, most of the feats work well and experience with the game has shown how useful some of them can be: Hold the Line, Knock Down, Power Lunge and Rapid Reload being the best in my estimation. The Prestige Classes are extremely good. I like the rest of the book - being role-playing and world-detailing advice, as well as mechanical advice for newer players - but you might not find it that useful.
I did feel a little let down by Sword and Fist, but I can't say why. Perhaps I was just looking for something really special, when instead of concentrating on something esoteric, the book instead gave information that was more likely to be useful to the majority of players. In the end, I think it is a good supplement to the D&D game, without quite managing to be a great one.
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