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Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Magnimar, City of Monuments

4.70/5 (based on 11 ratings)
Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Magnimar, City of Monuments
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Known as the City of Monuments for its jaw-dropping skyline of ancient ruins, magnificent towers, and stunning sculptures, Magnimar embodies the spirit of the frontier realm of Varisia more than any other city. But life in the City of Monuments can be an adventure all its own. With strange monsters lurking amid the city’s ancient foundations, bands of thieves battling for control over the city’s alleys, and the decadent attitudes of its oldest families, Magnimar lies at a crossroads. Will it succeed despite the obstacles thrown in its path, or is the City of Monuments doomed to crumble under the pressure of its own runaway success?

Magnimar, City of Monuments provides a detailed guide to one of the most popular cities in the Pathfinder campaign setting, the perfect base between adventures or setting of an entire urban campaign. Inside this book you’ll find:

  • An expansive gazetteer of Magnimar’s nine districts, from the marble-lined streets of the Alabaster District to the blood-drenched alleys of Underbridge.
  • Notes on the plans and plots of dozens of Magnimar’s most famous and infamous movers and shakers, from heads of government to criminal masterminds.
  • Revelations about the city’s deadliest mysteries, insights into the cults that plot amid its shadows, reports on the monsters that hunt beneath its streets, and other secrets.
  • Allies and enemies for all sorts of adventures, including healers and hell-raisers suitable for any type of campaign.
  • Stat blocks for a wide variety of Magnimar’s denizens, whether they be citizens, angelic guardians, or gigantic monsters that haunt the city’s fears and legends.
  • Dozens of connections to adventures set within Varisia, such as the Rise of the Runelords and Shattered Star Adventure Paths.

Magnimar, City of Monuments is intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Pathfinder campaign setting, but can easily be used in any fantasy game.

By Adam Daigle and James Jacobs.

ISBN-13: 978-1-60125-446-7

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4.70/5 (based on 11 ratings)

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Overall great supplement

4/5 —

Overall great supplement. I'm using Magnimar in a campaign and this has some great content in it. I bought it from drivethru and easily skimmed through it in no time.

Only removing a star because of two reasons:

There's clearly a disconnect for the writers on their directions around the city especially for which way is north in Magnimar. For example, Ordellia is clearly west of the Yondabakari river on the map, but the text refers to it as to the south on more than one occasion.

The other issue, is the table of contents literally only has three items and there's no index. So if you buy this, do yourself a favour and get a sticky note with the pages for each district. And the city map is the very last page.

Good overview of a natural homebase for PCs

4/5 —

Magnimar, City of Monuments is the first book I've picked up in Paizo's line of campaign setting books for the Pathfinder role-playing game (I'm running an adventure path in which the PCs are likely to visit). The book is out of print now, so I secured my copy from a used-book seller (PDFs can be bought from paizo.com). The first thing that stands out is the cover--fantastic! One of my favorite pieces of art from the game, and something that would make a cool poster. On the interior front cover is a map of the city, showing its division into nine different districts. The book is then divided into three main parts.

The first main part consists of sections on each of the districts and has a smaller map of just that district (which is why the main map on the inside front cover is done at a very high level of abstraction). The district sections include a separate stat block which is a nice touch and then includes capsule descriptions of a handful of prominent locations. Occasional sidebars are throughout the book, such as "Nine Famous Magnimarians" or "Thieves and Thugs of Magnimar". I frankly found the district sections a bit boring to read straight through, but I think as a reference and game preparation aid they would be quite useful. Most importantly, they detail one of the things that sets Magnimar apart from other cities in Golarion: the presence of ancient monuments (dating to the time of Thassilon) which, if the correct rituals are performed by the PCs, give them temporary mechanical bonuses. It's a great way to tie the city's history into something that your players will care about because the flavour is matched with bonus crunch. Before I get to the last two parts of the book, I'll again praise the artwork: the interior pictures of NPCs and important buildings are gorgeous. Just look at the Forever Man on p. 46 and try to suppress adventure ideas!

The second part is titled "Plots and Perils". It includes brief overviews on the hinterlands around Magnimar, the city's sewers, a villainous organization called the Midnight Dawn, and, most importantly, the Irespan--the ancient, enormous bridge whose remnants conceal secrets from thousands of years ago. For a campaign set in Magnimar, the Irespan would be a natural site of adventure and has enough to interest PCs for some time.

The third part, "Denizens", includes something I appreciate: random encounter tables, separated by day and night, for different parts of Magnimar. I do wish there'd be a guide on how often one should roll on the tables, but I guess that's left to GM discretion. Next, there are descriptions and stat blocks for monsters and NPC types: Angelic Guardians, Aspis Agents, City Guards and Captains, Mystery Cultists, Night Scale Assassins, Sczarni Thugs, Shifty Nobles, and Shoanti Gladiators, Shriezyx (the spider monsters featured on the cover), Swamp Barracudas (again, great artwork), the Vyrdrach (a gargantuan creature that can capsize large ships), and, last, a celestial called a Yamah.

Discussion by commenters on the Paizo site correctly notes that the table of contents for the book could be much improved (it only has three entries, one for each of the big parts of the book) and that the book is lacking an index. These things can be an editorial chore when deadlines loom, but they make a big difference in how useful a product is in the middle of a gaming session--no one wants to sit and wait for the GM to flip through to find that one inn they wanted to describe for the PCs.

All in all though, I was quite happy with the book. Magnimar seems like a fairly "safe" place for PCs to visit, but has enough adventure lurking right outside (or underneath, or overhead) that it could serve well as the centre of a campaign. It'll certainly help me with the adventure path as well. I'm looking forward to reading the other books detailing cities in Varisia.

Enough substance for a whole campaign setting

5/5 —

This material is the best city I've ever read. The history, the introduction, the various districts - all well written, full of adventure hooks and a plethora of exiting npc's.

Only thing I miss, are a bit more detailing on the map. Perhaps the zoom in on the districts could've been with street names...

This volume however, combines everything good, and supplements other stories that take place in Magnimar in a tremendous way.

I bought and read it as a suppl. to my RotR campaign - and really enjoy

Rise of the Runelords minor spoiler:

the background story of the Brotherhood of Seven, the mills on Kivers Islet history, the nursery rhyme for the clocktower etc... GOOD WORK!

5/5 —

I've reviewed this on RPGGeek.com.

You can read it here.

4/5 —

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Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

Just announced! Product image is a mockup, and will change prior to publication.
Dark Archive

Firsties!!!

Been waiting for this book.
Shadow Lodge
Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

WANT
Silver Crusade
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

GIVE
Dark Archive
2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Nice but I don't want to wait that long.

You had me at robust bestairy.
Paizo Employee Director of Game Development

Hey! Lookie there!

Magnimar has always been an interesting city to me

im kind of digging that cover
Contributor
Adam Daigle wrote:

Hey! Lookie there!

Nice score Daigle!

Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 4

Congrats Adam!

Well it's about time.
I wanted this when the Korvosa book came out. : )

Oh awesome. Can't wait!
Dark Archive

Finally Magnimar! Whoo-boy, and it's written by Daigle & Jacobs (TM)! (not to be confused with the infamous duo of medieval highwayman bearing the same name) :)

I can't wait for this one...

Cool!

I can always use some world building material and I like information on monsters, culrues, sights to see, etc. so of course I will be getting this one.
Liberty's Edge

About time! With how slowly my RotRL game has been going it will be out by the time they get to Magnimar.

I wanted this book after having read Skin Saw Murders for the first time oh so long ago. I even said as much back then a couple of times.
I'm pretty happy to see it. (I knew you guys would eventually release it, it's just too cool not to.)
Silver Crusade

Want!!!!
The Exchange
3 people marked this as a favorite.

Nice. This will go well with the Korvosa & Kaer Maga books I already have. Now all we need is a Riddleport book and all 4 of Varisia's city states will have been covered.
Brakkart wrote:
Nice. This will go well with the Korvosa & Kaer Maga books I already have. Now all we need is a Riddleport book and all 4 of Varisia's city states will have been covered.

I second this. I'd love to see a book covering Riddleport as well; heck, an updated and expanded gazetteer of Varisia would delight me.

Scarab Sages
Pathfinder Maps Subscriber

Yes, a Riddleport book would be awesome... Great idea.
Liberty's Edge
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Happy to see this; I'm currently running a game set in Magnimar, exploring the Irespan. Having extra material for the game in July will be useful (be better if it were NOW, but I can't have everything, I guess *sniff*.)
Scarab Sages

Nice! I haven't seen a big city book since Kaer Maga - "City of Strangers", which I luv muchly - so I welcome this new one to add to the collection :-)
Grand Lodge

I too have been running a campaign in Magnimar. I always seem to be too early to the party. This would have been very useful. I wish I had started the campaign a year later. *weeps in beer* At least it is Guiness.

Later,

Mazra
Brakkart wrote:
Nice. This will go well with the Korvosa & Kaer Maga books I already have. Now all we need is a Riddleport book and all 4 of Varisia's city states will have been covered.

Don't forget Janderhoff and Urglin.

*sigh* this book will be coming out just as my party will be leaving Magnimar.

But I'll be buying it anyway!
Dark Archive

I'm just hoping this has SOME information on the GolemWorks factory. Been wanting this ever since.
Paizo Employee Creative Director
3 people marked this as a favorite.
Mathwei ap Niall wrote:

I'm just hoping this has SOME information on the GolemWorks factory. Been wanting this ever since.

There will indeed be some info on the Golemworks. Including a new construct and the properties of Irespan stone for building golems!

Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 4

I delight in the GolemWorks news too!
Jim Groves wrote:
I delight in the GolemWorks news too!

I'm right there with you on that, good sir! The Golemworks actually factors in quite heavily with the RotR campaign I'm running right now (which we only play about once a month), so I'm incredibly psyched about this!

Paizo Employee Creative Director

In the "managing expectations" category... I'll note that there's actually NOT a huge amount of information about the Golemworks in the book—there's more than we've ever published before, but there's a LOT more than Golemworks going on in Magnimar that we need to cover.

Just peeked at the entry for the Golemworks itself. It's 411 words long, which is one of the longer gazetteer entries in the book. Stuff like the new construct and the Irespan qualities are NOT included in that 411 words, though... so there's more than just a half page of info about the Golemworks in all.

Not a heck of a lot of crunch though. We aren't doing an entry for the Golemworks as a school like what we did in Inner Sea Magic, for example.
Silver Crusade

After seeing it mentioned elsewhere, how much info is probably going to be here for the Empyreal Lords? Will it be an exploration of the Empyreals we know about already, a reveal of other Empytreals, etc?

Been wanting more on those guys for a long time, and I was surprised to hear that they were going to get a boost in the Magnimar book of all places! :)
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 4

It's still better than a fleeting reference though! We didn't know if it was ever going to see the light of day.

Case in point: the magesmiths of Janderhoff(?)
Those poor suckers got mentioned along with the hellknights, but they just never caught fire like the hellknights did. (Pun unintentional)

So 411 with a small side order of crunch doesn't sound bad at all. Consider my expectations managed! :D
Paizo Employee Creative Director
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Mikaze wrote:

After seeing it mentioned elsewhere, how much info is probably going to be here for the Empyreal Lords? Will it be an exploration of the Empyreals we know about already, a reveal of other Empytreals, etc?

Been wanting more on those guys for a long time, and I was surprised to hear that they were going to get a boost in the Magnimar book of all places! :)

There's a sidebar (about 300 words) that presents details on 3 new empyreal lords who are among the six worshiped in Magnimar. The empyreal lords have an influence throughout Magnimar, so there'll be bits and pieces of stuff about them woven into the entire book here and there—often pretty subtly, but often not. The bestiary will include a new azata, and will include stats for a "mystery cultist" who is a worshiper of one of the empyreal lords.

Since the concept of empyreal lords was first introduced in Pathfinder #2's article about Magnimar, and since there's angel stuff woven into the deep history of the city, it made sense to me to explore the concept further in this book.
Silver Crusade
James Jacobs wrote:
Mikaze wrote:

After seeing it mentioned elsewhere, how much info is probably going to be here for the Empyreal Lords? Will it be an exploration of the Empyreals we know about already, a reveal of other Empytreals, etc?

Been wanting more on those guys for a long time, and I was surprised to hear that they were going to get a boost in the Magnimar book of all places! :)

There's a sidebar (about 300 words) that presents details on 3 new empyreal lords who are among the six worshiped in Magnimar. The empyreal lords have an influence throughout Magnimar, so there'll be bits and pieces of stuff about them woven into the entire book here and there—often pretty subtly, but often not. The bestiary will include a new azata, and will include stats for a "mystery cultist" who is a worshiper of one of the empyreal lords.

Since the concept of empyreal lords was first introduced in Pathfinder #2's article about Magnimar, and since there's angel stuff woven into the deep history of the city, it made sense to me to explore the concept further in this book.

YES! :D

And thanks!
Paizo Employee Creative Director
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Mikaze wrote:

YES! :D

And thanks!

In fact...

Spoiler:
Almost every monument in Magnimar is in some way blessed by the Empyreal Lords so that people can meditate or pray or otherwise interact with them to gain various temporary blessings based in some way on the monument's history... as an example of how the Empyreal Lords' influence is woven through this book's contents...
Silver Crusade

Very much looking forward to the cultural effects those have. :)
Scarab Sages
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, PF Special Edition Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber

I sure hope this does well enough to pave the way for some angel books!
Silver Crusade

Oh July, how you taunt me. This sounds incredible, all!

Cheers!
Silver Crusade

Will there be a poster map?

love Magnimar. Just thought it never got it's due in the AP.

thx
Paizo Employee Creative Director

No poster map in this book, but there will be in the Shattered Star Map Folio.
Scarab Sages
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, PF Special Edition Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber

So, who are the Empyreal lords in this?
Sczarni

If you're not running the relevant adventure paths why Magnimar, why this book? Why would someone choose this city book over another?

Thanks
Paizo Employee Creative Director
Smoke_Jaguar wrote:

If you're not running the relevant adventure paths why Magnimar, why this book? Why would someone choose this city book over another?

Thanks

The vast majority of the "adventure hooks" in this book are NOT for an established Adventure Path. AKA: If you want to build your own urban campaign, Magnimar can serve as the baseline for that campaign.

Asgetrion wrote:

Finally Magnimar! Whoo-boy, and it's written by Daigle & Jacobs (TM)! (not to be confused with the infamous duo of medieval highwayman bearing the same name) :)

I can't wait for this one...

You've just inspired me to insert a Daigle & Jacobs NPC duo in all my games (like Final Fantasy's Biggs and Wedge, themselves inspired from Star Wars)…

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

I've updated the cover image and product description to match the finished product.

It's the spider-things from the Irespan - nice cover! Go Seoni!

Nice cover.

Angelic guardians and Gigantic monsters, sweet.
RuyanVe wrote:
It's the spider-things from the Irespan - nice cover! Go Seoni!

They're called Shriezyx and were statted up in Dungeons of Golarion. Complements of a past Runelord of Wrath's fleshwarping experiments. Seoni's making an excellent choice using fire magic...

Vic Wertz wrote:
I've updated the cover image and product description to match the finished product.

who is the artist?

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