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Into The Green

Into the Green is a somewhat unusual d20 sourcebook from Bastion Press. Unusual because of it's subject matter. It's about "green" environments, specifically temperate forests, woods, plains, and jungles. The only other sourcebooks I can think of that were dedicated to a type of environment was a series of books from Game Lords for Traveller, and those were for exotic enviroments.

It's softcover, 96 pages, and priced at $22.95. It's written by Thomas Knauss, but there are a lot of additional people in the credits (I believe they mostly contributed monsters)

Each terrain (Forest, Woods, Plains, Jungle) gets it's own chapter, and follows the same basic format. There's a detailed explanation of what it is. There is a section of a dozen or so common plants and a similar number (but slightly fewer) of common animals. Lastly there is a selection of new monsters/critters for that terrain.

The description of each terrain is very vivid. While it can get a bit flowery at times, the writing style is very evocative and does a good job of setting the mood and painting a mental picture. For instance, as part of the description of the Jungle terrain, "...nature's unspoiled elements collide, fashioning a magnificent kaleidoscope of dazzling colors and incomparable beauty.". There is a very in depth explanation of what each type is, clearly describing the ecosystem and differentiating it from other types. I now know exactly what a Forest is vs. a Woods.

The plants are given a long paragraph each. There's a lot of flavor text, describing the plant , what it looks like, what it's useful for (often what it tastes like), ending with a bit of game info (generally the Difficulty Class of finding it using a Wilderness Lore check). It seems to mostly be real world plants, for instance, bananas, coconuts, rattan, mustard, oak, teak, etc, with some fantasy ones thrown in. The fantasy ones are not too outlandish for the most part, though one has a very amusing effect on gnomes.

Animals generally follow the same style as plants. They also tend to be largely real, with some fictional ones thrown in. No combat stats are provided, but they're not generally needed.

I found this to be the most interesting part of the book. The writer has a wry and almost spritely style in describing the plants and animals that is amusing and enjoyable to read. It's also full of fairly interesting triva. For instance, the you learn what Tarantula tastes like (not like chicken...). On the other, some most people already known. For instance, it mentions that black bears really like honey (and there is a 2% chance of encountering a bear within 60 feet of a bee hive). This is also not a book to read while hungry - some of the descriptions of the culinary aspects of the plants and animals can make your stomach rumble and mouth water.

There's some info on dangers of each terrain - most notably the weather and disease. Most types of weather are covered. Hurricanes, blizzards, thunderstorms, tornadoes, etc, all are detailed in game terms. So are diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, common allergies, and even something that seems a lot like HIV/AIDS.

The rest of the chapter about each terrain (about half the chapter) is on new monsters, which are fully statted and described. These are generally hit and miss, though for me, they were mostly miss. There are lots of variations on treants, some new fey, some tree spirits. There are some new regular animals, such as the Tigon. One monster comes from another source - the Grass Cloaker is from "The Village of Briarton" by Gold Rush Games.

The best part of the monsters are the adventure/campaign hooks for each monster. A lot of the new monsters are weird enough that their use is not real obvious at first, having the campaign hooks really gives you a good handle on how to use them.

The only real drawback to the terrain sections is that it would have been nice if there were an indicator as to which items are real and which are fictional, so this could be used in one of the many non-fantasy d20 games that are out there. While things like the skunk and the honey loving black bear are pretty obviously real, and things like the druken sloth are not, for plants and insects it's not so obvious. Is the Spiraled Beech real? Or the Red Dog? Neither is obviously magical, but both have odd names.

The same can be said for the various diseases included in the game. Things like Malaria and Yellow Fever are obviously real, and could be very useful for any d20 game set in a jungle, be it fantasy or sci-fi or real world. But what about Spotted Fever? It sounds real, but some of the symptons seem fake (that it's victims actually see spots).

After the four terrain types is a section on new equipment. There are some new qualities (for magic items), but the meat of the chapter is new substances, generally either derived from plants or animals or useful against them.

They range from buffalo (or bison) chips to opium to all sorts of scents. As most of the substances can be made by someone with herbalism or alchemy skill, they are very useful for filling out inventories of alchemists, herbalists, witches, and the like.

The last chapter is on new spells. It's pretty short at 6 pages, and as you might guess, the spells are all nature related. Probably thrown in for comic purposes is "Crop Circle", though unlike real crop circles, it actually cuts down grass (and has some potential as an attack spell, sort of like a mini blade barrier). Another example is a spell I really wish I had, "Antihistamine", which clears up allergies.

The book ends with a variety of tables. Tables for generating weather, tables for generating encounters, and a listing of poison. The layout is a bit jumbled, but the tables work pretty well. But like most random encounter tables, some encounters could easily overwhelm or bore a party, as the challenge rating varies quite a bit.

This is apparently the first Bastion Press book that is in black and white instead of full color. While some might think this might be for the worse, I actually think it looks better. Some in the color art in earlier Bastion products looked a bit comic book-ish, which isn't to my taste. There's not a huge amount of art in the book, either, so it can look a bit spartan at times. But the art is generally excellent.

I especially like the cover (there's a nice jpg of it on the product page at Bastion's website) . It features an elfin looking elf, which is something of a rarity - most elves in the 3E era look like monstrosities from anime. (While the cover is in color, it's all in shades of green, for the most part. Neat looking).

There's really very little wrong with the book, except the subject matter won't appeal to everyone, and the price is higher than most books its size. It does really need an index, too, it can be very hard to find a specific plant or disease, especially if you don't remember which terrain it is in.

If you want to the put the Forest into the Ranger (or Druid or Witch), then this book is for you. It's also pretty useful if you happen to have a character that is into herbalism. It's probably going to be overlooked by most as it's a 3rd edition book released around the time D&D 3.5 comes up, and because it's not a particularly "sexy" book, but it's definitely useful for most d20 fantasy games. (It also has some minor ties to the Oathbound setting, so fans of that might get a useful kernal or two). B