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The screen itself is a four-panel affair, with full-color art on the outside and charts and references inside. White Wolf does not typically make the mistake of putting important reference information on the outside of a screen, and this gladly doesn't happen here, either. I like maps or evocative graphics on the outside of the screen, which is pretty much what we always get from White Wolf. The art is identical to that on the promotional poster for the game itself, so it will be reasonably familiar to many, and includes renderings of a number of the iconic Solar characters. It's a good piece, and provides a good visual tie to the game's feel, without being too overtly mangaesque for my own tastes.
The cardstock is reasonably sturdy — not so hefty as the three-panel Shadowrun 3 screen, but not as flimsy as, say, the D&D3 screen.
Personally, I like large GM screens. I've made my own for various games, in fact, when I've considered the official screens inadequate. Four panels makes for a reasonable screen, allowing me to conceal a couple of books, dice rolls, and handy beverages easily. Three-panel screens tend to be too small for this, unless they're set up so that players can easily peer around them. Which, really, defeats the purpose of using a screen at all. I look forward to the day when I finally run Nobilis and can get by with a manila folder for concealing notes instead of a screen.
The Storyteller's Companion book contains five sections, the first of which is an introduction containing a short FAQ — something that frankly should be a freebie on the web page, but which, at two pages, I can live with here. The opening fiction pieces present in the main Exalted rulebook are absent here, which I must (shockingly) admit to finding a bit disappointing, considering how well-written and evocative the flavor stuff in the main book was. This is a rare and wondrous thing.
The first chapter of the book is eighteen pages on the Scarlet Empire — the Realm of the Dragon-Blooded. It begins with an overview of life from the Terrestrial Exalted's perspective. It has interesting snippets on titles and names, and is, like the Exalted core book, loaded with plot hooks and nifty ideas. The last ten pages of the chapter provide some mechanical details on the Dragon-Blooded, including a good number of sample Charms. I'll be curious to see how much of this material is repeated in the Dragon-Blooded hardcover, which is next in the stack of Exalted product I plan to read.
Chapter Two provides more detail on the Celestial Exalted — the Lunars, Sidereals and Abyssals that will no doubt be important players in most Solar campaigns. There are not covered in quite as much detail as the Dragon-Blooded, but the Lunars get 7 pages, the Sidereals get 8, and the Abyssals 6, and all of this is written in just as dense a style as the setting material from the Exalted core book, so there's a lot of information, including a handful of sample Charms for each type.
Both of the first two chapters are a good example of the kind of material that should go into a supplement like this; information that should not be freely available to players, and would have cluttered an already-packed core rulebook with what could well have been too much information.
Chapter Three provides additional detail on Spirits and the Spirit Courts, as well as on Elementals and Demons. Spirit Charms for these are again provided, supplementing those in the core book. Considering that Eclipse Caste Solars can learn Spirit Charms, I found the mix of material here to be just about perfect. The basic Spirit Charms, which an Eclipse might reasonably expect to learn without too much trouble, are in the main book, and more specific and powerful ones provided here. The material on the Sprit Courts is, again, evocative and absolutely riddled with campaign hooks and story ideas.
The last section is a short 4 pages of new artifacts. Considering how short the section is, there's no good reason four of the six artifacts detailed couldn't have gone in the core book. The Ghost Cesti belong here, along with the expanded Spirit information, and the Eye of Autochthon is certainly something to keep out of PC hands until a long way into a campaign. The Eye of Autochthon is really, really cool, by the way, and gives another hint of the nature of the Exalted cosmology. The Singing Staff is also very nifty, a great example of an item well-suited to Exalted that one would be unlikely to see in another game.
This is a very solid product, but there's nothing here that's going to blow anyone's doors off and sell them on the game. It's certainly a necessity for any Exalted GM, not so much for the screen as for the expanded background on the Realm and the Spirit Courts, and the crunchy bits on the other Exalted types.
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