Review of Fantasy Hero Grimoire II

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Review of Fantasy Hero Grimoire II

This is the sort of book you only buy if you're already invested in not only the Hero system, but Fantasy Hero as well. I suppose the question then is whether or not it makes for a good buy on its own, at all, or whether you would want the earlier Grimoire first.

The books makes the claim of giving us hundreds of new spells in ten categories. Those categories, a little about them, and the number of spells found in each are as follows:

Arcanomancy: spells that deal in magical energy itself, such as the ability to dispel magic, detect it, increase it, alter it, drain it, and so on. The chapter notes the similarity in theme between this and the Wizardry chapter of the first Grimoire, but lists itself as somewhat distinct and more powerful. Overall though, with only two spells above 100 active points this is possibly one of the lowest power chapters in the Grimoire II. offensive: 9, defensive: 3, sensory: 1

Areomancy: spells for warfare. The chapter is definitely high power, with spells reminiscent of Champions more so than Fantasy Hero in terms of scale. But then, to get magic that will work on a mass scale you have to do that sort of thing, and your war mage is likely to need a very tight focus in order to be effective on as few points as a Fantasy Hero character gets. Many of these spells are by their nature not the sort of things you want in the hands of the average PC, consider a 2 1/2d6 RKA with a 14" radius moving around across the battlefield - now put it in dungeon crawl with otherwise starting characters. The mage with it would probably not be effective otherwise though. Keep this chapter for NPCs and veteran PCs who have moved up to Dragons or greater threats. offensive: 19, defensive: 8, movement:4, sensory: 2

Black Magic: This is the chapter for villainous magic, and it begins with a section on selling the soul. The chapter features spells on disease, curses, dark rituals, and dealing with evil beings. There's at least one spell in here with over 450 Active Points. As a chapter for major villains however, it works. offensive: 16, defensive: 4, movement: 2, sensory: 2, miscellaneous: 3

Chaos Magic: lists itself as manipulating raw chaos. One of the spells confused me a bit - Chaos Infusion makes you super strong but also berserk, yet the side effect for the berserk is listed as a -0 limitation - by my count it would be at least a -1/2 (15 active always happens). As for the other spells many of them are over 100 active points, and they seem to encompass ideas of changing the nature of things, inducing insanity, causing damage, protecting oneself from chaos and order, or finding the order in things as a weak point. offensive: 9, defensive: 1, sensory: 1

Monster Magic: This section gives spells designed for three types of monsters. The dragon spells are fitting - allowing to look human, hide their hoards, fly faster, and other effects. The giant spells include one that answers the age old question of where to get that super sized loincloth (an enlarge object spell - and NO, that's not an object and not what we're talking about here), as well as just why nobody saw that castle up there until Jack climbed the beanstalk, and few other handy items. The troll spells are a little odd, perhaps coming from a mythos I'm not familiar with - but are interesting nonetheless. The chapter is high power, but in comparison to some of the rest of book, actually low power. dragon: 7, giant: 6, troll: 4

Naming Magic: Spells that work around the idea of calling out the 'true name' of something to affect it. Most of the spells look pretty much like stuff you'd see anywhere else, with the incantations limitation added in. In genre, it seems true names usually make a spell more powerful or allow you to summon or control. The chapter does have one animal summoning spell and one Mind Control spell. As for an Aid spell to make magic more powerful if you know the target's true name - that's in the first grimoire and this chapter refers you to that spell as well. offensive: 5, defensive: 2, movement: 1, miscellaneous: 2

Professional Magic: Craft, merchant, rogue, and warrior spells. Most of this chapter has very low active points, and it is filled with handy tricks for common people, as well as a few adventurer tools like 'True Aim' (similar to DnD's True Strike) which gives you a boost on your next attack roll. craftsman and merchant: 7, rogue: 10, warrior: 4

Rune Magic: Written magic, Either runes left and in effect until destroyed or triggered, or written and working until they fade. They're structured well, and the blood rune option (wherein you must use your own blood to write them) is interesting. A few of them are quite powerful, but there are some reasonable entries. Midway through the chapter seems to end because a page is half blank, but it doesn't, and on the next page you merely have the next type of runes. offensive: 11, defensive: 3, movement: 1, sensory: 4, miscellaneous: 4

Shamanism: Seems to be the -BIG- chapter of this book with 41 spells. The chapter starts with a number of spells to summon up 400+ point creatures and spirits of different varieties. That means those creatures will have 250 more points than the average PC or equal challenge NPC. It then moves on to spells designed to deal with hostile spirits, bring forth the spirit in objects, travel among spirits or by spiritual means, and so on. Finally we have the totem spells - which are themed to a specific animal totem and allow you to get your shaman to take on some of the nature of her totem spirit. The most powerful of the totem spells was the mouse, at 40 active points, making it a bit more Fantasy Hero ready than some other sections. spirit-summoning: 8, offensive: 4, defensive: 2, movement: 2, sensory: 4, miscellaneous: 5, totem: 16

Song Magic: Performance spells - mostly of a curious combat focused nature rather than charming and entertaining like the DnD Bards do. Most of the spells are reasonable in active points, though one breaks 150, another 240, and a third 330. offensive: 12, defensive: 1, miscellaneous: 3

While I didn't run the numbers for it, each spell has a number of customizing options, as a rough guess they seem to average about 12 to 15 of them per spell. They include things like upping the power, downing the power, modifying the casting roll, silencing, quickening, and so on. Some of those are the kinds of options that seem superfluous - like weaker or stronger versions or noting alternative special effects. Others such as ritual versions or versions with side effects, delayed effects, concentration and so on will genuinely adjust how the spell plays out. Overall the options are the same kinds of adjustments DnD players see in metamagic feats, and if you want that kind of ability in Hero you could do it with Naked Modifiers or Variable Advantages, then use these options as a selection guide.

Grimoires: There is a wealth of ideas in this book, some of them quite interesting. You could get it without the first Grimoire but it is a look at 'the unusual arcanas' so you would probably do best buying them in order.

Power Level: Many of the spells in this book have very high active point costs, 60, 70, or 100 or more. Some even several hundred. Limitations bring some of them down, but not all, and a 15d6 Mind Control, no matter how far you bring it down with limitations, is still no laughing matter in a Heroic level game (nor even in a super hero game). A lot of them will simply not work with beginning characters. That's not a bad thing in and of itself, you will want things for when the PCs are up there, but nothing about the book tells you this until you start to read the details.

Generally the offensive magic comes up highest. Sensory and movement spells tend to more reasonable, defensive somewhere in between.

You will definitely need to think twice before letting several of them into the hands of player's PCs. The power level of this book might make it more of an NPC resource or Champions resource than PC Fantasy Hero resource.

Visual / Graphic Design Grimoire II has my favorite Hero system cover. Yes, I know it's female and I know gamers are so afraid of their own sexuality that they feel an irrational need to attack any art featuring an attractive woman, but I still insist this is a cover to remember. And not because of the attractiveness of the center character. There is an amazing level of dynamic energy in this cover, done with impressive skill and attention to mood. The line work in the inking, the lighting, shadowing, coloring, and so on are very evocative of what the book is about. It's a magical cover of a mage in mid casting for a book about spells. And yes, 'sex sells' and if you think there's something wrong with that you need to get out of wonderland or Oz or wherever you've bee lost. The interior design is standard fair for Hero, more evocative of the Sidekick style of layout than the Hero core rule book style. It's functional but not pretty or anything else. Data is easy to find and easy to deal with, but not unusual or special in any way - not evocative of any mood. The art is good and fitting, but not amazing like the cover. My favorites are pages 2/132, 35, and 115. The last of those has a very interesting shadowy mood to it.

Overall If you want a book of spells for a Champions game the offensive items in this book will be ideal -though some are high even for that- but for Heroic powered games many of them are just too much. Some of the movement and sensory spells could be used as is, but the combat magic will more than likely need adjustment. When the spells in the game are doing 5d6 killing or more, and the weapons 1 to 2d6, the disparity will be quite unsettling. With work you can adjust them down, but it might be hard to just open the book and pull from it for ready to play magic. This is not the book you can just hand the players and say 'here; pick your spells.'

The ideas are very good, they just need to be down scaled to Heroic.

Style and Substance - Rating the book For style I would give the book a 4 out of 5. Largely on the strength of the cover. The design is nothing special, and the interior art is only a little above the usual par. On substance I rate the book at 3. The ideas are very solid and very interesting, definitely the stuff you want to see, but they're too powerfully built. You can't just open the book and use it for the typical 150 point Fantasy Hero game. To use this book in Fantasy Hero will take a lot of work, which was not what I expected when I bought it. I expected a ready to use list of Heroic power level spells. That problem cuts what would have been a 5 down to a 3.

I recommend the book, but with the note that it is a tool for fantasy development and not a ready to use plug in for a campaign.