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Classes
The book keeps up the series theme of three new base classes, and all of them are interesting. There's nothing as revolutionary as the warlock, but it does help to break up the rogue's monopoly on skill use. The ninja specialises in stealthy killing, using ki to power his more exotic abilities. The scout exists to move fast and, well, scout. The spellthief's role is also fairly well stated in the name. All three classes gain at least one ability every level, and they have a fairly healthily spaced out progression of new abilities as well. Although there's enough to do in these classes to keep you single classed, ninja/monks, scout/rangers and spellthief/rogues are all particularly viable combinations.
The three classes are all well themed, all interesting and all have unusual powers you can't pick up elsewhere. There are no p-particularly poor aspects to them, so they get two thumbs up.
The next chapter moves onto prestige classes, which is the favourite part of the book for some and the least favourite of others. There are a good deal of reprints, as one might expect, although in many cases the new art is a great deal worse than the original. The chapter has a chronic lack of focus - there are three druid prestige classes squeezed in that should have appeared in Complete Divine, the Fochlucan Lyrist would have been better in Complete Arcane, the Maester (a magic item crafter) definitely should have been in Complete Arcane, and the Tempest and Wild Plains Outrider should be in Complete Warrior. Their inclusion in this book feels mostly like padding. Although the druid classes are interesting, and the Maester class would be great without its restriction to gnomes, the other aforementioned classes are unremarkable.
Of the other classes in the chapter, the Bloodhound and Vigilante (both reprints) are especially good, and might easily apply to the same character. It's hard to resist the temptation to make a ninja/dread pirate, but perhaps that's just me. There are seven classes in this chapter which are tied to specific organisations, and they take full advantage of that later in the book.
Personally speaking, I find very few of these classes as compelling as the ones in the other Complete books. There are surprisingly few options for rogues, perhaps because they largely used them up in the other books.
Skills and Feats
The skills and feats chapter again is home to some interesting material, and some throwaway material. There are good new ways to combine skill rolls, which encourage co-operation within the party, and a big list of new uses for existing skill. The feats section includes interesting/useful (delete as applicable) feats such as Appraise Magic Value, which allows you to identify the properties of magic items, and Dive for Cover, which gives you a second chance at a Reflex save but knocks you prone. There are several feats that give you a minor benefit and allow you to multiclass between a restricted class and some other class. Some of them are interesting, but they're a little overdone, especially considering that the book's focus isn't directed at monks and paladins. The description of the Danger Sense feat has changed since Miniatures Handbook from "You are one twitchy mother goose" to "You are one twitchy individual", which is somewhat odd. There are more than a few feats here reprinted from Miniatures Handbook. Once again, it feels like heavy filler.
At the end of the chapter are bardic music feats and wild feats. Again, they're okay, but they're nothing special.
Tools of the Trade
No, they didn't use that horribly clichéd header, and yes, I did. It was bad of me.
The first thing we're treated to in this chapter is an array of new exotic weapons that give bonuses in specific situations. They have little to do with the 'skilled' characters the book is aimed at, but they're not uninteresting, even if their mild bonuses do make it hard to justify the expense of an Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat.
The chapter moves onto alchemical items, all of which provide a bonus to one skill or another. This is exactly the sort of item that ought to be in this book, and though they're not revolutionary, they're a nice enough addition, and a boon to anyone who frequently uses the Craft (alchemy) skill. Alchemical capsules, the items that follow, are like potions and oils. Some can be instantly ingested for mild skill benefits, and others can be applied to weapons (though we only get four of these).
Next comes a huge list of items that grant bonuses to various skills. I can't help but wonder if they might have been better off creating a single item called 'skill kit' that provides a +2 bonus to a skill of your choice. After these, there are a slew of bardic instruments, which provide a minor benefit that's counterweighed by a minor drawback (in some cases).
Naturally, the chapter closes with a selection of new magic items. It's not a good sign that I can't remember any of these from my initial read of the book before flicking back to the chapter to write the review. Most of the original items give small bonuses to skills. It fits the book's theme, but it's also pretty dull. Jumping caltrops are classy, thought I believe they're reprinted from Arms and Equipment Guide.
Spells
The spells section. Once again, I can't remember any good stuff in here. Let's flick to the section and have a look. It opens with the customary explanation of Swift and Immediate actions that's getting reprinted in every single supplement going at the moment. Considering they were introduced in the very first 3.5 supplement, these really should have been able to work their way into the revised PHB.
Thankfully, my inability to remember the cool content is because of my shoddy memory rather than a total absence of cool content. Allegro (a bard spell, natch) speeds up your allies. arrow mind, a 1st level ranger/wizard spell, allows you to make attacks of opportunity with your bow. Arrow storm allows you to fire at every opponent within one range increment, distract assailant renders an opponent temporarily flat-footed, and my personal favourite, insidious rhythm, gets a catchy tune stuck in your victim's head and penalises their concentration checks. The other spells in the chapter largely aren't too bad but aren't quite as inspiring.
Just as you think the book is picking up, the next chapter knocks it right back out of your sails.
Organisations
Oh, god no. The last... 29 pages of the book (the epic level section excepted) are given to descriptions of a series of organisations you can drop into your campaign. Quite why these should be the province of skilful characters is somewhat beyond me. The entire chapter reads like Lords of Darkness, with the serial numbers filed off. Problem is, it's the serial numbers that are important. If an organisation is going to be interesting, it needs goals, plans, leaders, and ties to the world they're placed in. These don't have any of those. What they do have is a brief overview of the organisation, how to join them, what characters gain from joining them, roleplaying suggestions (not as useful as they sound), a description of a typical member, what prestige classes they're tied to (i.e. the ones you saw with their name on earlier in the book), some 'Lore of the Guild' (a plot seed the DM can't use if the player's read the book and knows the organisation his character's going to be a member of, which is hardly unreasonable), suggestions for campaign revolving around the organisation and a stat block of a random member. The stat block's the real killer. It's not tied to anything in the text. Apparently they still needed filler for their filler.
The worst bit, of course, is the fact that if you're a player and not a DM, this chapter means 15% of the book is completely unusable by you, as well as the prestige classes they're tied to unless the DM wants to lift the organisation restriction. That I find really unpleasant, even as a DM. DMs might be able to fit these into their campaign as is, but they're just not interesting enough to be worth adapting, but if you don't, you've lost a whole lot of book.
At the end of the section is details on how to build an organisation of your own - a lot of random tables you can pick and choose bits from. There's a long section on what alignment the organisation might be and how that affects it that doesn't give you much more than is in the Player's Handbook. After it goes through tables for size, location, type, alignment and NPC class levels, step six is 'Flesh out the details'. Great. So you do have to do it yourself then. As far as I'm concerned, that rather invalidates the purpose of the section.
Bizarrely, the epic level section, which is handy filler in the other books, is squeezed onto the last three and a half pages in this one, which raises the question of whether someone felt the organisations bit was important content for the book. The epic feats here are almost all skill based, which is true to the theme but not hugely interesting. Most are reprints from the Epic Level Handbook, of course, but there are a couple of new ones.
Conclusion
I feel like I've unfairly panned this book here, but really, it's nothing undeserved. The book struggles with a dull theme, sticks to it where possible and branches out into wholly unrelated stuff when it runs out of that. The base classes are good, the spells are good, and there's the odd gem scattered around the other chapters, but really, if I wasn't a completist collector, I'd be Ebaying the book now. Style, I give three. There are some brilliant bits of art (the vigilante comes to mind), but most of the reprinted prestige classes are shipped with frankly poor art. Overall, it's not too bad, though not a patch on Heroes of Battle or Lords of Madness. For content, I give a two. There are some things you should like, but the majority you can ignore.
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