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Complete Divine is, like Complete Warrior before it, a revision of previously published optional rules for divine spell-casters. Perhaps its most significant flaw is that it doesn't revise or change enough to justify its expense.
Following the format established by Complete Warrior, the first chapter introduces -- or rather, re-introduces -- new core classes. These are the favored soul, a spontaneous divine spell-caster whose abilities are closely tied to his or her deity (previously introduced in Miniatures Handbook), the shugenja, an elementally-associated spell-caster (adapted from the class of the same name in Oriental Adventures, in turn based on the main spellcasters of AEG's Legend of the Five Rings) and the spirit shaman, original to this book, having little resemblance to the shaman class of Oriental Adventures.
Instead, spirit shamans are somewhat reminiscent of the shamanic spellcasters of Shadowrun, leavened with elements of the druids of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. A spirit shaman casts spells as a druid, but does so spontaneously. Unlike other spontaneous spell casters, however, the spirit shaman is able to retrieve different spells each day, rather than having a fixed spell list. As a trade off, the class has the lowest number of "spells known" of any class, having a maximum of three spells per level available.
Another difference between the class and the "standard" druid is that the spirit shaman has a spirit guide rather than an animal companion. The spirit ally is a purely mental/spiritual creature, incapable of affecting the world, though it does grant the spirit shaman Alertness as well as justifying certain class features. (All the examples of guides are animal spirits, but it would be relatively easy to have characters whose spirit guides are ancestor spirits or spirits of place.) Spirit shamans are also able to deal with spirit creatures (defined, for the purpose of the class, as all fey, elementals, incorporeal undead, and creatures defined as spirits in other texts) much as a cleric deals with undead. Ultimately, at 20th level, the spirit shaman becomes a spirit himself, much as a 20th level monk becomes an outsider.
I think this class is a great improvement over the Oriental Adventures shaman, which had too many martial arts abilities for me to feel comfortable using it in non-Asian style milieux. Unfortunately, the shugenja is exactly the opposite, being too similar to the original class, with which I have issues. While it seems to be an excellent translation of the L5R spellcaster, that itself presents a problem -- from what I understand of Rokugan, that world setting has about as much to do with real world Asian cultures as the sort of fantasy lambasted in Diana Wynne Jones' Tough Guide to Fantasyland has to do with the reality of life in Medieval Europe. Basically, I am biased towards a historically- or legendarily-based fantasy, and the shugenja's elementalist worldview doesn't really square with my understanding of Asian mysticism. The reader may have his or her own views on the matter.
One concept that featured in Complete Warrior is the idea of variants of original core classes to make them more suitable for a campaign that focuses on the book's subject. In the former case, this was served by introducing non-spellcasting versions of the paladin and ranger, who receive spell-like abilities instead of spells. (Some readers had problems with them, but I admit that it pleases me with its suggestion that these abilities represent blessings granted to members of these classes rather than miracles which they can call down at will.) Unfortunately, this idea isn't followed up in the current book, which is a pity as a divine spell-casting version of the bard would have been quite interesting, returning that class to its 1st Edition roots. (Granted, such variants appear in Unearthed Arcana, but a different view on the subject might have been interesting.)
A final quibble with the first chapter is that the figures portrayed as examples of these three classes don't match with the starting packages given for them, in contrast to the example of the Players Handbook. Also, none of them include information on which starting age brackets these characters should fall into (I assume the same as sorcerer, cleric, and druid, respectively) or how much starting gold a character who doesn't use the starting package should receive. The latter was also a problem in Complete Warrior. Hopefully, those responsible for the forthcoming Complete Arcane will take note of this.
The second chapter concerns itself with prestige classes. I decline to spend a lot of time on this subject, since the majority of these classes are revised and reprinted from Defenders of the Faith (church inquisitor, consecrated harrier, contemplative, divine oracle, holy liberator, hospitaler, pious templar, sacred exorcist, sacred fist, and warpriest) Masters of the Wild (blighter, geomancer), Song and Silence (temple raider of Olidammara) Oriental Adventures (void disciple), The Book of Vile Darkness (ur-priest), Powers and Pantheons (stormlord) and an issue of Dragon (radiant servant of Pelor, shining blade of Heironeous). Suffice it to say that these classes are largely unchanged, though they may have been adjusted to make them less game balance breaking. (I can't really tell that without a playtest, of course.)
However, there are a few intriguing new prestige classes: the black flame zealot, a sort of combination of the hashisheen cult with the Arabic view of Zoroastrian fire worship, but one which isn't automatically evil; the entropomancer, a class which worships oblivion and has the ability to summon fragments of a sphere of annihilation to do all kinds of fun stuff; the evangelist, unfortunately the only five-level class in the book, for characters who want to be able to convert rather than kill; the rainbow servant, divine or arcane spellcasters trained by couatls to have similar abilities to the creatures; and the seeker of the misty isle, the obligatory elf class.
Accompanying each class description is an example character who belongs to the class, based on the class' illustration. Unfortunately, each example is just stats, without any role-playing or personality notes, making them a bit harder to introduce into a campaign without a bit more work. On the other hand, the author did something rather clever with the example character for the black flame zealot class, adding a set of stats that demonstrate what the character is like when given a chance to prepare for a confrontation. But that's the only character in the book who gets that treatment, sadly. Still, most of the class descriptions give suggestions for how these characters could be adapted for different sorts of campaign settings, such as alternate divine patrons for those tied to core D&D deities, and notably suggesting that the rainbow servant can be used as the basis for any sort of spellcaster benefiting from training by a creature.
The next chapter deals with new feats, though it is titled "Supplemental Rules". There's a lesson in that, I think. Again, most of these were introduced in previous rules supplements, though there are some new and interesting ones. The definition of "Wild Feat", introduced in Master of the Wild has been expanded, as some of them now represent the ability to use an animal's power (a boar's ferocity, an eagle's wings, and so forth) regardless of your current form in exchange for a use of wild shape ability. This seems like a quite intriguing concept.
On the other hand, I have a bit of trouble with the feats Spontaneous Healer, Spontaneous Summoner, and Spontaneous Wounder, each of which allows a non-clerical (or non-druidical) spellcaster to swap spells or spell slots for cure, inflict or summon nature's ally spells. These feats basically allow a character to use a key ability of another class without multiclassing, and can turn multiclass spellcasters into true curing (etc.) machines. Still, they could be quite useful in campaigns that use the generic classes variant from Unearthed Arcana.
The next chapter, "Magic Items", focuses particularly on the new class of magic item known as relics, items which are only useful for characters who take a feat called True Believer, dedicating themselves to a specific deity. This is rather appropriate, as these are some rather powerful items, more along the lines of the Ark of the Covenant or the Holy Grail than the historically-inspired examples of relics (such as the bones of a saint) in The Book of Exalted Deeds. As well, there are some new staves presented after the discussion of relics.
The next chapter, "Deities", is the one with which I have the most problems. It includes descriptions of the quests, prayers, temples, rites and relics appropriate to the core D&D gods -- those from the Player's Handbook with the additions of Bahamut, Kurtulmak, Lolth and Tiamat. (What I'd like to know is, why isn't the goblin deity Maglubiyet considered significant enough to be on this list?) Each deity is also given a herald (the creature which the deity sends to the material plane to intervene in affairs) and allies (which are sent in response to planar ally spells. Following that is a series of shorter descriptions of other significant deities from the Greyhawk setting, just listing divine status (demi, lesser, intermediate, greater) alignment, portfolio, favored weapon and domains, as well as a table of non-human deities with the same data. (Here is where you can find Maglubiyet. No respect, I tell you.)
Frankly, I feel this entire section could have been junked without losing anything. A chapter on how to build one's own pantheon (not, I emphasize, the one from Deities and Demigods) would have been much more appropriate for a book which is supposedly about options for original campaigns, instead of re-presenting only slightly updated information from The Living Greyhawk Gazzeteer. Adding to the annoyance is the fact that the passage on the deity Zuoken contradicts what is related about him from the Expanded Psionics Handbook, and the table presents Magubliyet (yes, I'm obsessed, what about it?), a neutral evil deity, as granting access to the domain of Chaos.
The next chapter redeems matters somewhat, by presenting ideas about the afterlife and religious structures. While many players will disregard this section as being about as significant as the sections in Complete Warrior on types of warfare, mercenary warfare and tournament battles, would-be DMs should not be so quick to ignore the ideas here. The notes on religious sects and schisms are particularly intriguing.
And last, of course, is a large section of new spells, again largely revised and reprinted from previous texts. I decline to even start examining them to offer comments.
The artwork is, with a few exceptions, simply illustrative. Most of the full page illios aren't terribly well-done, with the dramatic exception of Wayne Reynolds portrait of Tiamat in all her hellish glory, which I'd definitely purchase as a poster if the opportunity arose. Anther example of good art include Tom Baxa's portrait of an archetypal ur-priest, who looks like an oh-so-evil version of Samuel L. Jackson with Fu Manchu moustaches. Sprinkled through the text are small maps of sample temples or shrines dedicated to core D&D deities. These could be quite useful, but I have to wonder what an assassin is doing in a temple of Olidammara ...
In short, while the book is slightly above average in terms of style, it is just a bit below average in terms of substance. There is just too much reprinted material that isn't sufficiently changed from the original presentations to merit its reproduction here. I'm glad that I purchased it, but I do think it was a bit overpriced.
I look forward to commentary on this, my first published RPG review. That probably reveals a seriously masochistic side to my personality.
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