The Inside Scoop on Gaming

Readers wanting an unspoiled look at this novella may want to venture elsewhere, as spoilers may be present.

Since I’ve already addressed my concerns about authorship shifts in other reviews of this series, I’ll only mention it again it in passing here (for those just joining us), it seems the authors of the series bear the same pseudonym, but varying degrees of writing styles.

Oath of Nerull is the third book in a series of books highlighting the new game engine of the Dungeons & Dragons game. Hopefully, the series is unconnected and doesn’t keep continuity with the previous novel’s events—as an Iconic character featured in the novella dies.

This volume opens with a fight scene; cultist-monks of Nerull are battling, poorly, with a human monk and dwarven cleric. Ember (Iconic monk) and Brek (Iconic cleric) quickly dispatch the cultists and try to warn Ember’s Order chapterhouse about the looming cultist threat. Too late, of course, causing the pair to journey to the Order’s main monastery.

Along the way they pick up Nebin and Hennet, who are competing in the Duel Arcane, which is held in the same city as the Order’s monastery. Hennet becomes enamored to Ember, developing a nice subplot for the story.

Though the characters end up spoiling the plans of the cult, one of the Iconics falls in saving Nebin’s life. Brek the dwarf dies at the hands of an abyssal creature and is entombed at the Order.

This novella was good, I found myself laughing at the dueling dyad of Nebin and Hennet—who have already been traveling together for some time before this story takes place. Those scenes offered history to the story that the other volumes in the series had missed. The romance subplot was good, mainly for the insight offered into Hennet’s character.

The book graphically relates some of the concepts for sorcerer characters, some which might have been hard to pull out of the rulebooks themselves. The arcane dueling was well played, and gave me ideas for setting an arcane duel styled scenario up for my gaming group.

The book’s length makes the pacing quick, but in some places I felt confused over which creature was being described. This confusion lapsed along to the fighting style names that Ember and some of her opponents were using. With such a brevity of pages, some of the details that could have been, were merely curtailed. I enjoyed the book, and feel with the success of the series line that the page count may grow as more veteran authors come to write for the line (and get their name attached to the book).

Oath of Nerull
Oath of Nerull Capsule Review by Alex deMorris on 10/11/02 Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 3 (Average) Third volume in the “Iconics Seires” strives to take the story further then its length allows, by giving readers some insight into usage of game mechanics and game rules that may have otherwise been occluded. Product: Oath of Nerull Author: T. H. Lain Category: Novel Company/Publisher: Wizards of the Coast Line: Dungeons & Dragons Cost: 5.99 Page count: 192 Year published: 2002 ISBN: 0-7869-2851-4 SKU: Comp copy?: no Capsule Review by Alex deMorris on 10/11/02 Genre tags: Fantasy	Readers wanting an unspoiled look at this novella may want to venture elsewhere, as spoilers may be present. Since I’ve already addressed my concerns about authorship shifts in other reviews of this series, I’ll only mention it again it in passing here (for those just joining us), it seems the authors of the series bear the same pseudonym, but varying degrees of writing styles. Oath of Nerull is the third book in a series of books highlighting the new game engine of the Dungeons & Dragons game. Hopefully, the series is unconnected and doesn’t keep continuity with the previous novel’s events—as an Iconic character featured in the novella dies. This volume opens with a fight scene; cultist-monks of Nerull are battling, poorly, with a human monk and dwarven cleric. Ember (Iconic monk) and Brek (Iconic cleric) quickly dispatch the cultists and try to warn Ember’s Order chapterhouse about the looming cultist threat. Too late, of course, causing the pair to journey to the Order’s main monastery. Along the way they pick up Nebin and Hennet, who are competing in the Duel Arcane, which is held in the same city as the Order’s monastery. Hennet becomes enamored to Ember, developing a nice subplot for the story. Though the characters end up spoiling the plans of the cult, one of the Iconics falls in saving Nebin’s life. Brek the dwarf dies at the hands of an abyssal creature and is entombed at the Order. This novella was good, I found myself laughing at the dueling dyad of Nebin and Hennet—who have already been traveling together for some time before this story takes place. Those scenes offered history to the story that the other volumes in the series had missed. The romance subplot was good, mainly for the insight offered into Hennet’s character. The book graphically relates some of the concepts for sorcerer characters, some which might have been hard to pull out of the rulebooks themselves. The arcane dueling was well played, and gave me ideas for setting an arcane duel styled scenario up for my gaming group. The book’s length makes the pacing quick, but in some places I felt confused over which creature was being described. This confusion lapsed along to the fighting style names that Ember and some of her opponents were using. With such a brevity of pages, some of the details that could have been, were merely curtailed. I enjoyed the book, and feel with the success of the series line that the page count may grow as more veteran authors come to write for the line (and get their name attached to the book).