I love new races. For me, they are part of what make a setting unique and cool. This pdf presents a new race called the Wyrd. These guys reminds me of the 'gentle giant' type, with inborn magic and resistances. They actually reminded me a lot of the wilders from The Wheel of Time series (especially in appearances).

This pdf makes use of a narrator called Deimos Invincible Fox (one of the Wyrd), something that I haven't seen before in other products. But is this good? I would have to say yes and no. The writing is certainly good and I liked reading the thoughts of Deimos, but it also seems to limit the knowledge that the reader gets. We get a very personal oppinion about the Wyrd, and not a useful overview of the race. Also, there are times when this makes absolutely no sense, like when Deimos have to explain the alignment of his race... who in their right mind would label themselves with True Neutral? Why not describe the mindset of the Wyrd, with the narrator's own words and then the reader can make up his mind what kind of alignment they are, or even better, write a sidebar which complements the narrator's words. Personally, I would have preferred that the product had no narrator but a couple of cool sidebars instead, with the narrator's view.

Personally, I am not a big fan of the whole paragon class system, but the race class seems balanced, if not a little boring. How about some abilities that say a bit more about the race and help define how they develop? I have not seen a lot of paragon classes, so I am not sure if this is how they are supposed to work. I know that Purple Duck Games' Cyclop and Medusa pdfs had a few more signature abilities.

The rest of the pdf presents a series of feats, 11 to be precise. There were a few that I liked (like the mage/wyrd feats), but also a few that made no sense, like the Mystical Grace feat. I mean, why gain bonus hit points based on which feats you take (metamagic and item creation)? We also get a new sorceror bloodline (Oni), the Whispering Advisor prestige class and nine new spells. I liked most of the spells, which seemed balanced and flavored.

Overall, while the Wyrd seem a little too neutral (and bland) to me, they seem balanced. In this product, you get a lot of material for your money, which is nice, and the material presented are focused on the Wyrd (with a few feat exceptions). I didn't find a lot of typos and layout mistakes, which is also a plus. I am going to settle on 3.5 stars, rounded down for the purpose of this format.

The other reviews have been quite extensive, so I'm going to keep it short and sweet:
The Wyrd are cool, especially for a setting that has ties with an oriental continent/culture.

The race per se is really imaginative, although I'm not sure whether I'd use them as PCs - they seem to be quite strong, at least for my rather low-powered, rare magic campaign.

The paragon-class is cool and captures the eastern fantasy-flick-flair nicely.

The PrC is awesome - I could see myself playing this class.
The new Spells are cool, too.

Why only 4 stars? They are kinda hard to implement and seem to be a bit stronger than the core races. Plus: While there are a lot of allusions to Questhaven, I have nor yet managed to piece everything together. A sourcebook on the city would be awesome and would help to make this pdf even cooler. *nudgenudge* ;)

EDIT: If you have an oriental campaign or a high-fantasy campaign and need a power-behind-the-throne villain-build, be sure to check "Wyrds" out. The PrC alone is worth the price of the pdf.

The concept of elf/oni is kind of cool. Its also not something that seems like it would be common. The support material for this races, including a PrC and a Paragon class, are really solid. I really liked that this was reworked as a standard race instead of trying to shoehorn the original +6 LA race into Pathfinder.

That having been said, with a strong Asian flavor and a hard origin to make common, these guys aren't going to be easily dropped into just any campaign, unless you are making a PC or NPC that just happens to be a unique being, but then you lose out on using a lot of the strong background material.

If you have an "unexplored land" that might work for the origin of this race, it may not be quite as hard to use them. But if too much is established about how common Oni are and where and how elves interact with others, its a little trickier.

Despite that, its a good read, and its interesting enough that the material at least makes you want to try to make them fit into a campaign, because its such a unique concept and so well realized and fleshed out here.

Take my three stars as more of a measure of general utility rather than specific quality. Its solid design and a satisfying read.

The Wyrd are an interesting race. As scions of ogres and elves, they are a creation of two worlds, with a rich and varied history all their own. Their way of life is both exotic and unusual, as their culture depends on certain social mores to maintain stability.

As I read the material, there were times where I felt these cultural mores were both compelling and a bit repugnant. And I mean that in a good way. For instance, the Wyrd never forgive a slight, no matter how minor. They go out of their way to record such slights in a book that they keep on their person at all times. While that kind of behavior is alien to me, I was really happy to see that kind of social trait mentioned in the book. It set the Wyrd apart from the standard races. Sure, it might be said that dwarves never forget a slight. But with the Wyrd you can guarantee you will pay for anything they perceive as a personal affront.

It should be noted that the Wyrd have an Asian flavor to them. But that shouldn't prevent you from using them in your game unless you are a purist. Golarion, in fact, can easily host them in a number of areas. Most notably, Absalom, Qadira and Katapesh would all be good places to place a significant contingent of this race.

Mechanically the material seemed fairly sound, though I would need to utilize it just to make sure. There are some interesting and effective abilities, to be sure, but nothing I would say is overwhelming in its own right. If this material was mixed with sources outside of the Pathfinder core, I am sure there could be some combination that would be quite effective. But that is hardly reason to let this great book pass you by.

While I was not so excited about the Wyrd as I was with the Ironborn, this book is still something I could see using in my campaigns. In some ways, I would want to homebrew a whole region or country around them, to really showcase their differences. And I intend to do just that with my new homebrew setting. But simply inserting them into an established setting would be painless and effective.