Test your courage against the most infamous foes of myth and legend! Bestiary 3 presents hundreds of monsters for use in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. Within this book you’ll find demiliches and demodands, grave knights and goblin snakes, norns and nephilim, imperial dragons and unfettered eidolons, and so much more! Yet not every creature needs to be an enemy, as winged garudas, crafty tanukis, and leonine lammasus all wait to join your party and answer the call of glory.
The Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 3 is the third indispensable volume of monsters for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and serves as a companion to the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook and Pathfinder RPG Bestiary. This imaginative tabletop game builds upon more than 10 years of system development and an Open Playtest featuring more than 50,000 gamers to create a cutting-edge RPG experience that brings the all-time bestselling set of fantasy rules into the new millennium.
The Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 3 includes:
More than 300 different monsters
Classic terrors from myth and literature, from the frumious bandersnatch and the righteous valkyrie to the cunning dybbuk and elusive kappa
Hordes of new creatures you can construct, grow, or summon to aid your party in its adventures
New player-friendly races to let you adventure as canny ratfolk, genie-blooded sulis, and more
New familiars, animal companions, and other allies
Challenges for any adventure and every level of play
Some of the strangest and most beloved creatures from fantasy roleplaying history and the Pathfinder campaign setting
Hosts of new templates and variants
Appendices to aid in monster navigation, including lists by Challenge Rating, monster type, and habitat
Expanded universal monster rules to simplify special attacks, defenses, and qualities
This is probably my favorite of the Bestiaries so far, the content covers many iconic monsters from editions past, and stuff from the Adventure Paths. With great Asian flair for the Tian Xia world guide that is coming up, as well as many incredible monsters that have never graced the pages of a monster guide but are very welcome.
Although I'm generally opposed to the concept of core book "sequels," the content in 'Bestiary 3' is top notch. Whereas it took me some time to realize the usefulness of the monsters presented in 'Bestiary 2' (extraplanar/dimensional encounters rarely play a role in my campaigns), I immediately recognized many of the creatures in 'Bestiary 3' as either "iconic" or interesting variations on an established monster class.
As is to be expected, this book is well laid out and the illustrations are (mostly) top notch - Paizo rarely disappoints here! The Pathfinder Campaign Setting is still missing a few iconic monsters (mostly due to WotC's draconic licensing practices), but this volume (and the two which preceded it) gives GMs a huge variety of creatures to populate their encounters.
If I could make any suggestions for future 'Bestiary' volumes, the first would be to expand upon the lore provided - I realize it would likely halve the number of creatures included per book, but a two page spread (even for "simple" creatures like oozes) might help a GM find a place for a given creature within his campaign setting. Also, better illustrating a creature's size (perhaps even graphically) would be useful - general size classifications only go so far, and being able to see a silhouette of a given entry next to a human-sized creature would give both GMs and players a clear understanding of exactly how big a monster is (this was employed beautifully in an old FASA publication for Shadowrun: 'Paranormal Animals of North America' by Nigel Findley). Again, these are just suggestions on ways to improve an otherwise outstanding collection of Bestiaries. Keep up the good work!
An excellent monster book, strong mythological presence (from various cultures). Probably even better than Bestiary 2. And it has the flumph! (this is a good thing, well its worth a page) If you're looking for a monster book for some critters outside of the real core you would well to pick this up.
Apparently, bestiaries are the strongest point of Paizo, since, as opposed to the "Ultimate" line, their quality is not decreased from the core books. I would dare to say it is actually improved.
The book contains monsters inspired by several cultures, and is a delightful little travel in folklore other than a very good RPG supplement.
Creatures qualities and special attacks are effective and diverse (with few exceptions), from a wisely added double bite attack, to more complex and GM-inspiring out and in- combat powers.
Animals and vermins are well made, and the preistoric ones are more diverse than the usual "more dinosaurs" (but fear not, dinosaurs fan will not be disappointed).
Fey are very good, even if I wished some more high CR ones (but, hellooo, Norn!). Few aberrations, H.P. Lovercraft inspired, definitively removed my mind flayer nostalgia. Great love for the nagas too.
Plants are scary. Undeads are SCARIER, and you will love the new dreadful templates added.
Monstrous humanoids and magical beasts come in different shapes and exotic powers.
Oozes are finally interesting! Even an ooze-hater like me found entries able to intrigue me.
Constructs are excellent. We find some clerical domain based ones, golems able to do more than just bash the enemy, and a brand new category incredibly cool.
Dragons come with several minor ones, the oriental sovereign (mixed feelings) and new, awesome linnorms.
Outsiders are the true gem of this bestiary, expecially fiends. New fiend families are introduced to us, expanding previous single monsters (Kyton, Oni, Rakshasa) in whole families and introducing Asuras, Divs ad Demodands. Paladins have hands full! I needed them so much for my setting, expecially Divs wich seems tailor-made for a specific roles for my infernal legions.
Completely different Outsiders are the guardians Kami. If you do not want to use oriental material, change their background in druidic or whatever spirit guardians is very easy.
My only big remarks are about the powers of the Hekatonkheires titan, quite "meh" for a CR 24 monster in my humble opinion.
Moreover, some monster type is strange. Why the yuki-no-ona is undead? That is a good chance lost for a middle-CR fey.
Said this, good job! Keep this pace, and I will buy up to bestiary 20 :)
The variety is great, and overall the book is up to usual Paizo quality (as in, pretty darn good). However, I am giving this book 4 stars instead of 5 because of the massive ammount of new categoris of fiends: Asuras, Demodands, Divs, Kytons, Oni, Rakshasa - all new categories of fiends that join the ranks of devils, demons, and daemons from previous books. It is a bit overwhelming to have that many new types of fiends in a single book.
Let me get to the problem I have with Bestiary 3: some of the monsters you've seen before. They were in the Bonus Bestiary book that you could have downloaded free along with your purchase of Bestiary 1. I didn't see anything there that had been changed from the bonus book, so when you take those out, I sort of feel the new materials you are getting aren't worth the $9.99 for the download. I suppose I can see why they are in the book for the print version.
But the new monsters are fairly good. I really like the clockwork monsters, they seem to be the best designed monsters. The reuse of previously seen monsters doesn't deter me from purchasing the book.
This book was amazing.
If you're not really in a position to drop the $40 for the hardcover, do yourself a favor and at least grab the PDF; you won't regret it.
I don't.
Pros
-A great mix of cultures, from Inuit to Hindu, the mythology is incredible.
-Hordes of norse beasties (As I'm running a Norse-themed game, I thought I would point this out)
-Lots of pale-love, from the Dinosaur lord and fossil golem to 4 new dinos and 4 new megafauna
- Adds some tech to the game with clockworks and cannon golems
-beautiful art, it really brings the monsters to life
-BEHEMOTHS
cons
-catfolk
-no new proteans
-no art for spinosaurus
-too many monsters that are briefly mentioned, but not included (like holocaust behemoths) which makes me impatient for next year
-chinese and Japanese creatures have an artwork style that clashes with the other creatures
however, the pros far outweigh the cons, so five stars all around
I love Monster books and I love that Paizo loves them as well and it shows. This is the third one for them and not surprising it stands up to the others. This book has much to offer such as new playable races, familiars, animal companions, and plethera of creatures new and old, familiar and exotic. Lets start with the playanle races such as Catfolk(love that picture), Suli(genie blooded), Vanra(monkey race), Ratfolk(finally), and the Vishkanya(poisonous exotic humaniods). We get several new familiars like the Harbinger archon and new animal companions such as the Kangaroo. There are also many monsters from varius cultures like the Kirin, Akhlut, Ahuizotl, Norns, Valkyries, Hekatonkheires, Tanuki, Gorynych, Simurgh, and many more such diverse creatures. There are many new or expanted types of evil outsiders like Oni, Azura, Divs, Rakshasas, Demodands, and Kytons. New types of dragons such the asian Imperial dragons and more Linorms, Drakes, and few surprises such as the Faerie dragon. There are new Fey such as the Atomie, Bogeyman, Nixie, Rusalka and a fey creature template. Monsters from classic liturature such as the Bandersnatch and Jubjub bird are welcomed surprises as well. I could praise this book all day but I will focus on my nitpicks and issues to round out my review. My biggest disapointment with the book was the Sprite, no fey, especially one of my favorites, should be weaker(CR1/3) and dumber (Int6)then a Mite. Also the Atomie, Gourd Leshy, Leaf Leshy(also the soulbound doll but that is a Beastairy2 issue) would have made good familiars and the Porcupine and skunk(regular and giant) would have been good animal companions. Most my other problins are just some artist issues like the face design for the Atomie so no big deal. In closing, Paizo has once again, given us a good Beastairy and I hope many more to come.
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