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I am reviewing the Weapons of the Gods Companion because I was asked to do so by one of its authors. Additionally I playtested a part of it. And finally I am a moderator on the Eos Press forums.
Three strikes, you're out! Obviously this isn't going to be a fair review, right?
Well, don't worry. I loathe so-called “reviews” that are nothing more than concealed advertisements. Blatantly biased reviews are just as bad. And I also don't believe that I'd be able to fool anyone with a disclaimer like this on top. So, all ye who can give me the benefit of the doubt, read on and see if I can be properly critical of this product.
The book itself
I'm working with the pre-release pdf version, but the physical book itself will be a 204 page hardcover. Just as with the main rulebook the Companion features lots of art from the original comic, which may be a turn-off if you don't like Chinese kung fu super-people. In fact, the art is a little bit more over the top this time around, as it seemingly draws from later on in the comic book timeline. The very first piece of art features a man with one of the silliest masks ever, as well as some sort of spider-scorpion-snake-monster. And there's also several pictures sprinkled around with a dragon-fish airship. Yeah. That said, if you're one of those people who liked the unusual style and absurd designs of the comic (like me) you're in for a treat, because art-wise the Companion is nicely filled with some good pieces.
There is a table of contents and an index. An amusing note on the latter is that it has an entry named 'Winning'. This actually refers to a rules section describing the Great Game (a mass conflict system, see below), but the thought of a gamer picking up an RPG supplement and trying to find how to win the game and actually finding something in the index is amusing. It probably should have been placed underneath the 'Great Game, How To Play' entry. So the index isn't quite perfect, but overall seems decent enough.
Chapter 1, the Jade Book: Thrashing Minister
Thrashing Minister is Eos Press' answer to fans wanting some more detailed descriptions of the world of Weapons of the Gods. This is a single but important city that could easily be the setting for an entire campaign.
First we're giving some useful packages, collections of loresheets and advantages that simulate a character background. Want to be a member of one of Thrashing Minister's gangs? Look up what the book recommends you'd buy, complete with total cost listed. Nothing mandatory of course, but a welcome guideline. Next are basic pointers on the city; history, culture, economy, the usual. Also some new loresheets specific to this city are provided. Next is a map and description of every district, again with loresheets.
Overall Thrashing Minister has all the traditional bits and pieces of a city meant to run a game in. A corrupt government, plenty of gangs, lots of trade, as well as mysteries and problems to occupy a young band of heroes with. On top of that it also has unique elements you'd only expect in a Weapons of the Gods game, like a market with strong feng shui that brings luck to the people in it (and can be tapped into by those with the proper know-how – a loresheet), a brothel with kung fu prostitutes that fight off Hell Clan attempts to control it, and demon alchemists performing dark experiments in their search to bring immortality to Yue Guan, the plotting barbarian king.
Chapter 2, the Crimson Book: new God-Weapons
The new Weapons presented here are divided in two sections. The first six were created by fans once upon a time on the Eos Press forums, with the best being rewarded with official publication. Next are four Weapons (with rumors regarding a fifth one) about Weapons tied to Thrashing Minister.
All Weapons are described in much more detail than those in the main rulebook with full descriptions and history, as befitting such relics of power. I contributed as a fan on the first section, so I'm unsuitable to comment on the quality of those, but the latter few seem good with plenty of ideas for adventure.
Chapter 3, the Gold Book: the Great Game
This chapter introduces a new sub-system, nicknamed the Great Game, that handles mass conflict of any type you can imagine. You could use it to handle civil wars, gangs fighting over city blocks, courtiers currying for favor with the emperor, a magistrate trying to weed out corruption in a city, popularity contests, doctors fighting off a plague, or anything else you'd care to imagine.
The basics are quite simple: make a map of the "battlefield" and designate the players in the conflict and their goals. Resources of each player are symbolized by something called Stones, which can be tokens or simply notes on a piece of scrap paper really. These Stones represent people working for you, money, charisma, ethical sway, or even unique advantages. Let's look at the last example I mentioned, the doctors fighting off an outbreak of a plague in a city. One Stone could represent trained nurses and another could be simple laborers that carry off corpses and burn their remains (these would be two Force Stones, which represent people working for you). If you've got money and the ears of the rulers you could fund a project for better sanitation (represented by an Influence Stone). If you've got a good Courtier on your side he could convince people to observe better hygiene (a Will Stone). Your funky God-Weapon is probably useless in this kind of conflict, so it's ignored – unless you have God's Ruler, a Weapon with legendary healing powers, which would a unique and powerful advantage (a Treasure Stone).
In this example the Sage would assign your opponent with Stones of its own, like a Polluted Well or the like. On your turn you'd want to place your Influence Stone to that well's location and engage it in a sort of combat, attempting to improve the city's facilities. If you lost the well proves to be rotten to the core and you exhausted your resources to clean it up. Bad news for the citizens! But if you win in the end, the well is purified and no longer can oppose your efforts to clean up that section of the battlefield.
This is of course just a crude example. The full rules are tactical yet easy to use and can get as complex like a tangled web when multiple factions are opposing eachother, with alliances swiftly made and broken all the time. Which is of course the entire idea.
My only gripe here is that this chapter could've been written a bit more clearer, though it's not as bad as the notorious Secret Arts section in the main rulebook. The rules for hurt Stones are given about 12 pages before you're told how to hurt Stones to begin with for instance. Not a crippling problem, but slightly annoying since you'll flip back and forth a few times on your first read.
Chapter 4, the White Book: kung fu
First in this chapter is kung fu creation, how to make your own costum styles as a Sage or even player in-game. Central here is the Million-Style Manual, essentially a pointbuy system to assign effects to techniques. The points you have to spend per technique depend on that technique's level, any drawbacks there might be, whether the style utilizes the proper kind of chi for what it does, and whether the style is common, uncommon, or rare.
It's a useful system to have at one's disposal. Almost everybody will want to have a kung fu style not from the book, and this system provides a good measuring stick to retain balance. A concern I have is that, like all pointbuy systems really, it requires a wary Sage to keep an eye out for abuses and loopholes. It's too easy to simply point at the charts and claim everything is fine when you've really only taken some flaws that hardly apply to you. It's a tool for the Sage, not a gospel that will always be correct. I also fear all costum styles after a while will start to look alike, drawing from the same exhaustive list and buying the same most-bang-for-your-bucks effects. Time will tell. Both can and should be prevented by smart and mature users.
Next come new kung fu styles, eight common, eight uncommon, four rare, and three formless techniques. All have been made with the Million-Style Manual rules, with several spelling out explicitly how for the sake of serving as examples. Most of these new style focus on areas underrepresented by those in the main rulebook, with many being unarmed styles, several being ranged, and some being purely defensive or entirely esoteric like Eight Diagram Fist, which is based upon the trigrams (page 295-296 of the main rulebook).
One style irks me to no end though, and that is Heaven-Earth Sun & Moon Saber. No, not because of the name. It's a common style that is devoted exclusively to the weapon with the same name. Only problem is that this weapon is neither detailed in the main rulebook nor in the Companion. I'm sure it's somewhere on the Eos Press forums, but it should've been in a sidebar on the same page as the style itself. It's an oversight that renders the style as written useless unless the reader is willing to go through some digging, which he frankly shouldn't have to do if you ask me.
Chapter 5, the Silver Book: Thrashing Minister and the Great Game
What do you get when chapters 1 and 3 get together and have a child? Chapter 5.
There's two purposes being served here. On the one hand it's a very extensive example on how to use the Great Game, using a battlefield that the reader by now should already be very familiar with. It's written in an easy, walkthrough kind of style that shows step by step how to set up a Great Game. On the other hand it is the icing on the cake for those who wish to actually use Thrashing Minister city to hold their campaign, with extra information on the various factions and their goals and resources.
Extra
Appendix A lists the most important errata, for those who have not downloaded that from the Eos Press website. Appendix B is a quick and dirty guide for statting out organizations, handy for those events when the players involve a faction into the Great Game the Sage didn't account for in advance.
Evaluation
Style: Overall I'm quite pleased with how this book turned out. I didn't notice any glaring errors in spelling or grammar, the art pleased me (but that won't be universal I know), and chapter 5 was perfect for making the Great Game rules *click* into place in my head, as well as making Thrashing Minister easier to use. The lack of the heaven-earth sun & moon saber is disappointing though. I can't give it higher than a 4 because of that.
Substance: Like a swiss army knife the Companion offers something for everyone. Whether you just want more toys and kung fu to fight with or are ready to take your political schemes to another level, the Companion should deliver what you want in spades and in quality. Of course, there's always people who don't need all of the contents. If you don't use Thrashing Minister about 45 pages of the book are nice if ultimately unusable reading material. So although I personally think highly of each chapter, the fact is that some will be a waste for some buyers. Although I'd love to give substance a 5, I can't justify more than a 4 here either.
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