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When I first heard this product announced, I was intrigued. It's the exact sort of product I like - an adventure set in or around a very detailed village or town. The more I heard about it, the more I was interested. So I was happy to get a chance to review a preview copy (which is apparently finished except the printing).

The Hamlet of Thumble is the first product from Open World Press. It's a combination adventure and sourcebook. It's 64 pages, softcover, and priced at the now standard $14.95. The cover art is by one of my favorite artists, Storn Cook (he used to illustrate a lot of the Star Wars RPG books from West End Games), though it's framed to look like the old classic TSR modules.

Thumble is a hamlet comprised totally of halflings. While the 3rd edition of D&D made halflings into kender (in personality if not name), these halflings are like the ones you'd find in original D&D. Only perhaps a bit more rustic. The feeling I get is similar to that of Mayberry from the Andy Griffith show. (In fact, one of the halflings is named "Opee"). Actually, after first hearing about this product, getting excited, then hearing it was a village full of Halfings, I thought "Oh no!", as I don't like the hyperactive sort of halfling that was introduced in 3e (ie, Kender) - they're like small Jerry Lewises, and I'm not French. But these sort of halflings I like...

The halflings of Thumble are extensively detailed. You get d20 stat blocks for more halflings than you probably ever imagined possible, and those that don't have stat blocks, have names. But beyond that, you also get info about their personality, their interests, their physical stats, including of all things, their eye color. (What, no blood type?). Many even have quotes, or things they might say. The attention to detail is impressive. The end result makes Thumble a living, breathing place. It feels real.

Thumble is set in it's own campaign setting, "World of Whitethorn", but is fairly setting independant (more so than many supposedly generic villages or cities), and so can be dropped into most settings very easily. You might lose a extra layer of plot in the adventure, but nothing major.

As to the actual adventure itself, it's very non-linear. There are two basic options, one for good PCs, one for evil PCs. The one for good PCs is much more fleshed out, as they are presumably visiting Thumble to solve their problems. But first they need to visit various inhabitants and find out just what the trouble is. If they're evil, well, they will mostly be the ones causing the troubles (The scenario where the PCs are evil is also a lot less straight-forward to run), so the GM will have to figure out how the inhabitants of Thumble will respond (though some guidelines are given).

As a result of the detailed info about Thumble, and the non-linearity, and the amount of extra info, the adventure itself is pretty short. Though the length really depends on how much role-playing you want to do with inhabitants of the village. I personally hate rail-roaded adventures, so I prefer short, wide open adventures, to a long, rail-roaded one.

Actually solving Thumble's problem is something of a moral dilemna for good PCs. The threat bothering Thumble doesn't seem all that bad (I'm not sure if they've even killed any of the villagers, yet), and is perhaps the classic D&D dilemna caused by alignment (often argued about on usenet and role playing message boards everywhere).

There are also a couple side encounters that could be very perilous to the PCs, at least low level ones (which this module is aimed at). And one of these also poses a moral dilemna. So the whole thing is very thinking (but not puzzle) heavy and roleplaying heavy, with a moderate amount of combat (though for Evil PCs, it's like more combat heavy, though even then they'll have to use their wits to scare away the inhabitants of Thumble, as opposed to killing them all).

The maps are hand drawn, and are very nice looking (I was afraid they would be computer generated, which I hate). The art is also pretty good, though most the pictures are either of somewhat folksy looking halflings or the critters menacing them. So if you're looking for pinups of Lidda look-alikes, look elsewhere.

Thumble, and the adventure involving it, is really only about half the product. There's a lot of additional rules material, including new core classes, lots of new spells, new feats, info in integrating dreams, a reputation system, and a advantage/disadvantage system. And some general GMing advice.

Three new d20 core classes are introduced, the Cavalier, the Shaman, and the Witch. I'm a big fan of new core classes, in particular, the Witch. There are several other takes on the Witch class, and I own many of them. I've always thought Witches should be mysterious - by having so many different ones available, your players never know what to expect, exactly, when they encounter one.

One of the problems I sometimes have with new core classes, is they are often poorly designed, or break various d20 conventions, like having non-standard base attack bonus or save progressions, or are completely out of balance with other core classes. I was a bit worried when I learned Mystic Eye Games was affiliated with this product (I like their stuff, but their core classes always have problems), but thankfully, the classes are all well designed, well balanced, and all use standard d20 progressions.

The Witch is very close to the sorcerer, only with a more limited spell list, and several special powers (most shape shifting). Seems pretty good, except their knowledge of spells is a bit limited, about one less than a sorcerer of a similar level. This makes them even more specialized or narrow than a sorcerer.

The Shaman is something of a nature-worshipping class, but it deals with spirits. It's fairly similar to the Druid, but the special abilities are related to animal spirits.

The Cavalier is really a knight, that is, someone who is an expert at fighting heavyily armored on horseback with a lance, but the name is presumably an homage to the old Cavalier class from 1st Edition AD&D (and originally in Dragon). Unlike that old class, this one is actually balanced. While it's better than the normal core classes at fighting on horseback, it's inferior to the fighter as a general all around combatant, most notably because they are forbidden to use ranged weapons (against their code of honor).

The advantage/disadvantage system is pretty simple. Basically, each PC gets one advantage or special ability, and one weakness to balance it. I've never been crazy about advantage/disadvantage systems, because I've always thought weaknesses, should be role-playing based, not game-mechanic based. The advantages, or special abilities, are more powerful than feats. So, really, depends on how powerful you want PCs to be. I wouldn't use it myself, though.

The other new rules are also generally fairly simple, but fairly well thought out.

Lastly, there are some GMing tips, most of which I readily agree with. Also both some "Good" and "Evil" pregenerated characters, complete with basic personality. This could be very useful for those new to role-playing, though the non-linear nature of the adventure could be a bit daunting to a first time GM.

All in all, this is a great product - the amount of stuff packed into it is amazing (I'm sure there's a lot I've missed mentioning). While some might find Thumble a bit too quaint (if you're angst ridden, wear a lot of black, and listen to the Cure, this likely isn't for you), I enjoyed it a lot. But as mentioned, products like these are just about my favorites. And this really isn't so much just an adventure, as a sourcebook, so it has long term value, as both a village you can drop into your game (which should also work in non-d20 games that have short people), and as a rules supplement. It's also occasionally very funny. I give it an A.

It should be out in July, released starting at Gen-Con, and will be 3.5 compatible.

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