Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

Depends on how well it was done - and within reason of course. If they wanted to give me the 4E book of humanoids with an in depth look at Orcs, Goblins, Hpobgoblins and Quicklings I'd give them my money for that.

In the same vein I've no problem dishing out some cash for a book devoted to Evil Dragons (and won't mind if I get one devoted to Good ones either - if its done well).

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

I just can't wait to hear about how the new options are better than existing options and that the power-levels are starting to get 'off'. Min-maxers, powergamers, and munchkins will rejoice! The End is coming......again!

In the same vein I've no problem dishing out some cash for a book devoted to Evil Dragons (and won't mind if I get one devoted to Good ones either - if its done well).

Unfortunately, this book has been done, at least twice... I'm thinking at least four times in 3.5e. Draconomicon(I own), Book of Dragons(I've seen, mostly art/story), the Monster Manual, and one other.

I'm not entirely sure how much more detail you can get into when discussing 5 monsters (traditional chromatic). We already know: What they eat. Where they eat. How they hunt. Where they live. How long does it take to hatch. Whether you can train one and how long. How big they grow, at what age and all the stats that come with said age. What they're immune to. What they breath, how many times, and at what interval. A brief synopsis, long drawn-out story, and a witty anecdote. Dragon based Feats, skills, abilities... not for 4E, but it has been done.

Quite honestly unless it's a pop-up book where foil enhanced dragons shoot out of the book forcing me to make a reflex save to avoid being stabbed in the eye AND a fortitude save to avoid peeing my pants, I think I'll pass much like everything else that is 4E.

You want a good book about Dragons, grab the 'DRACONOMICON(3.5E) 2003'. Despite the D&D stats it tells you more than you would ever want/need to know about alot more than just 5-8 evil dragons. I seriously doubt the Draconomicon needed to be splinted into 2-5 seperate books, but I probably would've thought that about the "Player's Handbook and Classes"... so much for that thought.

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

Exactly, was about to say the same thing. But you forget that it's ok because Paizo = God. WoTC = Satan. As long as we keep that in mind then everything sorta sorts itself out ;p

Michael Brisbois wrote:

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

Exactly, was about to say the same thing. But you forget that it's ok because Paizo = God. WoTC = Satan. As long as we keep that in mind then everything sorta sorts itself out ;p

It makes me sad that everytime I come to this site, formerly my favorite gaming-related site, I seem to be let down.

Eh you can filter out pretty quick who's baggin on WoTC just for the sake of it. There are still tons of people who are objective enough to look at everything on the table. I think the community is still tops.

The joys of inflation. 3e Draconomicon - 288 pages. 4e Draconomicon I - 256 pages. Same price, 32 fewer pages.

Then again, you could look at it as "Dragons are so important that they need almost twice as many pages to really do justice to for this edition." Of course I think even WotC's supporters would admit the idea is almost certainly "hey, the Draconomicon sold a ton in 3e - we should make 2 of 'em in 4e."

Also, Tiamat is NASTY. Just plain nasty. Though being the first actually statted out 4e god, she should be.

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

Classic Monsters Revisited is a Fluff Heavy and Crunch Light Book.

Draconomion 3.5 had some good Fluff but was Crunch Heavy.

I guess -I do not have the 4th Ed. Draconomicon- that this book is Crunch Heavy and Fluff light if it is like the 4th Ed. MM.

Therefore I think that a comparison is difficult.

But you forget that it's ok because Paizo = God. WoTC = Satan. As long as we keep that in mind then everything sorta sorts itself out ;p

Can I use this quote as a sig? :-)

Can I use this quote as a sig? :-)

Yeah but it's mandatory to fly it around the 4th edition forums a few times to break it in! ^0^

Anyone actually had a chance to look at this yet or better still own it? I'm curious about the fluff to crunch ratio although much as I usually prefer fluff over crunch owning the 3.5 Draconomicon I think I've probably got all the dragon related fluff I need.

Edit- As for the whole Draconomicon vs. Dragons revisited thing I think both are trying to go for different despite both focusing on dragons. Paizo is trying to re invogorate and intergrate dragons into its campaign world while Draconomicon is the first big outing for them in 4E. That being said the 3.5 Draconimicon was more than enough info on dragons for me so why WotC feel the need to effectively double that with two books (at least) is beyond me. It'll be interesting to see what they do with them that for sure.

Anyone actually had a chance to look at this yet or better still own it? I'm curious about the fluff to crunch ratio although much as I usually prefer fluff over crunch owning the 3.5 Draconomicon I think I've probably got all the dragon related fluff I need.

Blasphemer!

;-)

I bought this book and it is crunch heavy. That said, the art is very good, and the 4e stats for the new chromatics (Brown, Grey, and Purple) was appreciated. As a side note, the "new" chromatics are in fact the dragons that used to be called Sand = Brown, Fang = Grey, Deep = Purple. So all of them have seen stats in 3.5 at one time or another. Some of the other draconic creatures are nice. The ecology stuff is a lot of reprint material from the 3.5 draconomicon, so that part isn't as useful the second time around. That said, for new players coming into 4e (a major goal of the new edition is getting new younger players), getting some of the 3.5 Draconomicon stuff repackaged for 4e is not a bad idea.

On the whole I would probably rate the book around 4 out of 5 stars. It wasn't so good it made me question how my life was complete without it, but it was a good book. Solid stats with good art. Nothing mind blowing (besides Tiamat's stats which are just brutal in 4e). On the whole I would recommend this book. It like Martial power is crunch heavy, but that is what I want when I buy a monster book/class expansion book.

I think the cover art for this is simply abysmal. If I were buying the book on the cover alone, I wouldn't.

I bought this book and it is crunch heavy. That said, the art is very good, and the 4e stats for the new chromatics (Brown, Grey, and Purple) was appreciated. As a side note, the "new" chromatics are in fact the dragons that used to be called Sand = Brown, Fang = Grey, Deep = Purple. So all of them have seen stats in 3.5 at one time or another. Some of the other draconic creatures are nice. The ecology stuff is a lot of reprint material from the 3.5 draconomicon, so that part isn't as useful the second time around. That said, for new players coming into 4e (a major goal of the new edition is getting new younger players), getting some of the 3.5 Draconomicon stuff repackaged for 4e is not a bad idea.

On the whole I would probably rate the book around 4 out of 5 stars. It wasn't so good it made me question how my life was complete without it, but it was a good book. Solid stats with good art. Nothing mind blowing (besides Tiamat's stats which are just brutal in 4e). On the whole I would recommend this book. It like Martial power is crunch heavy, but that is what I want when I buy a monster book/class expansion book.

I agree, speaking as an owner of this book.

*********
I also have to add, while I missed the chance to be a "Charter Member", I have been a total Paizoan since Pathfinder #1. I pour a lot of money into Paizo every single month.

And.. I also sort of like 4E, and I bought a couple 4E books, like this one. That's not a crime.

The whole anti-4E thing has gotten really passive aggressive. When its not passive, its just twice as annoying.

Pathfinder is alive and well, and pretty secure. People like me are seeing to that. So we can stop the snarking any time now.

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

yep I didn't buy that one either.

Michael Brisbois wrote:

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

Exactly, was about to say the same thing. But you forget that it's ok because Paizo = God. WoTC = Satan. As long as we keep that in mind then everything sorta sorts itself out ;p

Well if this comment is directed at myself then I'm upset at you. Very extremely upset,nearly mad. I never said paizo was god, indeed I worship a big rock I tie to the ground with ropes, you know so it won't fly off to heaven. Oh and wotc is not satan, not at all. They made/make some good stuff. I just think this book is an example of cash cowing. You know, make a quick buck buy selling our old books again repackaged! yay! You see, that kind of thing. So I think you people need to take that big 4th edition/3rd edition chip off your shoulder and stop automatically attacking anybody who even MIGHT have run down 4.0. That's insane! I never once said anything about 4.0 being bad! I don't care about editions, I play what I want to, and I don't care about other people's fun, you guys can have whatever game you like to play. I don't play it myself but I also don't play monopoly and I hear from reliable sources that it's quite fun and popular.

I think the cover art for this is simply abysmal. If I were buying the book on the cover alone, I wouldn't.

Yeah I must confess the cover art did not blow me away. Still if the interior art is goof then thats the important thing. The change from deep, fang to purple, brown sounds interesting. I'm not entirely sold on adding chromatics willy-nilly but at the same time there have been a lot of dragons created and codifying them further does seem like a wise thing and a good thing to do during an edition change.

Out of interest what does the crunch focus on? New dragon stats? Additional character powers? More levels of power for dragons(I hope so I miss all the age categories)?

Michael Brisbois wrote:

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

yep I didn't buy that one either.

Yeah but you probably didn't decide to take a jab at 'em about it either. We got Dragons Revisited coming up in February. Here I'll link it up so you can let everyone know what ya think of the business model.

http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/paizo/products/v5748btpy84b9

I like cheese.

Deep = Purple.

Hmmmm.

Smoke on the water?

This book rocks for DMs. It's got a chapter that seems to be pretty close to a repeat from the 3rd edition draconomicon of the physiology/psychology of dragons. I skimmed it and I'll go through it again if I get hard up for something to read, but the next few chapters made the book easily worth $40 (in my opinion, of course. I figure this book will give me 5 encounters [saves 5 hours there], plus will save me another maybe 5 hours by providing some new monsters that I don't have to create on my own. Right there, I figure I'm paying, at most $4 per hour of saved time. I pay more than that per hour at the drop off laundromat, and I pay more than $40 for a nice dinner with the girlfriend, so any way I look at it this book is a good deal).

There are about 10 dragon lairs fully statted out. Each one has about 2 encounters fully mapped and statted, complete with traps, skill challenges, monsters, minions, and, of course, a dragon. These lairs are pretty effectively designed to give the terrain advantage squarely to the dragon, which is what you should expect. There is a "DM's toolbox" type of chapter that talks about creating and customizing dragons, creating their lairs, creating their hordes, and building really solid dragon-related encounters and adventures.

As pointed out above, there are three new dragon types (= 12 new monsters) and there are about 20 or so new monsters also included in the book. I think there were two or three dragon-themed artifacts, also.

If you're not playing 4e, this book doesn't have much for you. That should go without saying at this point, but I see a lot of people who still continue to be stupefied by that fact.

If you are playing 4e, I recommend this book. Dragons are just so much fun to run in 4e that this book lets you keep them fresh and interesting for a while. Not to detract from 3rd edition, which was a fine game that my group and I thoroughly enjoyed for 8 years, but 4e dragons are so much more fearsome, easy to run, and easy to create that I anticipate they will return to the forefront as classic D&D monsters.

aylengyr wrote:

Michael Brisbois wrote:

aylengyr wrote:

Ah the joy of new business models, I think every monster in the monster manual should be printed up separately in their own $40 book. Think of the possibilities! Man I think that's awesome don't you?

While it wasn't $40.00 US, isn't the "business model" you deride above similar to Classic Monsters Revisited?

yep I didn't buy that one either.

Yeah but you probably didn't decide to take a jab at 'em about it either. We got Dragons Revisited coming up in February. Here I'll link it up so you can let everyone know what ya think of the business model.

http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/paizo/products/v5748btpy84b9

Ok well at first I posted a lot of stuff about how what you said really made me mad. But I retract my comment in the spirit of brotherly love and all that. However you sir are indeed pushing me. I don't like personal attacks, or insults for that matter. I am an old fashoned man and I usually do something about it. However I forgive you in this case. However I will admit to you sir that I should have added more to my review. However after reading this book, I was compelled to say what I said about it, for good or ill. If you have something constructive to add, I invite you to do so, but just insulting me on the forum is not going to fly.

Jeremy Mac Donald wrote:

In the same vein I've no problem dishing out some cash for a book devoted to Evil Dragons (and won't mind if I get one devoted to Good ones either - if its done well).

Unfortunately, this book has been done, at least twice... I'm thinking at least four times in 3.5e. Draconomicon(I own), Book of Dragons(I've seen, mostly art/story), the Monster Manual, and one other.

I'm not entirely sure how much more detail you can get into when discussing 5 monsters (traditional chromatic). We already know: What they eat. Where they eat. How they hunt. Where they live. How long does it take to hatch. Whether you can train one and how long. How big they grow, at what age and all the stats that come with said age. What they're immune to. What they breath, how many times, and at what interval. A brief synopsis, long drawn-out story, and a witty anecdote. Dragon based Feats, skills, abilities... not for 4E, but it has been done.

Quite honestly unless it's a pop-up book where foil enhanced dragons shoot out of the book forcing me to make a reflex save to avoid being stabbed in the eye AND a fortitude save to avoid peeing my pants, I think I'll pass much like everything else that is 4E.

You want a good book about Dragons, grab the 'DRACONOMICON(3.5E) 2003'. Despite the D&D stats it tells you more than you would ever want/need to know about alot more than just 5-8 evil dragons. I seriously doubt the Draconomicon needed to be splinted into 2-5 seperate books, but I probably would've thought that about the "Player's Handbook and Classes"... so much for that thought.

I actually prefer some of the 2nd edition material on Dragons compared to the 3.5 Draconomicon. While I liked many of the Dragon feats in Draconomicon I just never found myself cracking that book open for anything else. I've also generally had some issues with 3.5 Dragons in general, between fluff that says that their fear effect is non-magical (but still requires a save) and Dragons general power level I think 3.5 Dragons were a step back from the excellent monsters presented in 2nd edition.

In particular 3.5 Dragons have been made too powerful. The problem is a Dragon, fundamentally, does not have many powerful tactics available to it. Basically a powerful suite of physical attacks a breath weapon and some spells that are far, far, below what players of the appropriate level for the Dragons CR are using. The result is that by the time your even approaching the real potent Dragons, the big ones that that have been alive for a thousand years or more the party just does not have that much to fear from the creature. It'll never pin them down to do a full attack and they'll be all over the sky so it won't be able to catch more then one with its breath weapon. Even if they do the players will probably be immune to that type of energy and even the Dragons last resort of grappling won't work because they'll have freedom of movement or a way to teleport out of the dragons grasp.

Basically you don't get to the really potent dragons until the party is nearly 20th (and often well beyond 20th) and by that time the dragon is just over matched because the players have well worn counters for what is really a fairly limited amount of options available to a Dragon.

So how many heads does Tiamat have now!?!? I do like the knew direction 4E took with the addition of Iron and Adamantine dragons to spice up the metallics. The reworked Green dragon is great simply because it finally means that poison is a damage type again! but seriously, how many books on dragons can there be before all of the fluff and crunch is exhausted and repeated. I don t think that there will be too many preorders for this one. I d wager most people will take a look in person to see it its worth the investment. my 2 cents is concepts like these should be put into periodicals (virtual or paper) and have its contents displayed slowly over time. why hit the gaming community for a fast $40 when you could slowly milk us a few dollars a month for such a "well documented" subject. A chromatic dragon a month and they could have built up there subscription base and forgone the whole book publishing costs