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Evocative City Sites: Clockwork Tower
From Rite Publishing
Published 2010

Note: This was a review copy received, I did not have to purchase it.

Evocative City Sites: Clockwork Tower is the first product in this line I have seen. Weighing in at 16 megs downloaded, a total of 41 pages of which 11 are crunch and fluff, 24 pages are the printable maps, and the rest are credits and OGL notice. For a total of $2.99 there is a great amount of data there. If you consider the cost of a print document this size, which could easily be double or more the cost, it is worth the price. The content has decent value to it. There are nice production values, simple border enhancing the presentation without murdering your printer cartridge at the same time.

Now onto some details on the location detailed, The Clockwork Tower. When I was offered a free product to review I selected this one based solely on the title, Clockwork Tower. My fascination with this genre of gaming/fiction continues and I hoped this would be a very worthy addition.
It does not fall on its face, but it was not what I thought it might be. Part location description, part almost vignette adventure, it delivered on most of what I might have expected.

It opens with some flavor text, partly fiction partly descriptive, which leads immediately into game crunch text, without a pause. This was a touch jarring to me, accustomed to such elements being distinct and separate usually in a game support. In this case fiction leads into crunch, leads into description then back into fiction within the span of a few pages. Once past that, and more crunch in sidebars, all flowing together. At that point I wanted a little more organization and little more separation of the different parts. Interspersed are small maps of the Tower as well as the several encounters that are possible inside there.

Artwork is nice in the product, several pieces of clipart that work well, one illo did not completely match the encounter description which is a very minor quibble. Considering the state of the industry where products far outstrip the available artists, I still consider this a fine product from the visual support standpoint.

The main character in the tower uses a class I have not heard of before, Inspired Maker. Not having the source material means I cannot use or advance The Spinning Duchess any farther in that class. However there are enough notes and details in the character writeup to allow me to use the character without any issues. For a CR15 NPC, having a total of 37 hp and a AC of 16 makes for a squishy in the MMORPG perspective. With a construct bodyguard to run interference, still it would not be a fair fight at all. A 28 INT and extensive spell list will only go so far. The bodyguard coming in at 66 hp and AC 21 for CR 13 this creature will last a lot longer than it's creator will.

There is one new magic item, a pair of goggles that allows the wearer to find out if a course of action will lead to good, bad, or indifferent results 3 times a day. This is a goldmine for a GM to gently direct the PCs into courses of action that will advance the plot or storyline without being too overt or having them feel railroaded.

For me, I would not use it as is. Instead I would ignore one central premise and instead use the owner of the tower as a recurring NPC or a potential patron for player characters to interact with. That would mean ignoring the 6 plot hooks provided on page 7 of the book.

Last comments deal with the maps. They are divided up into quarters of each floor of the Clockwork Tower. This makes for easy in printing, I would have liked a small key to which page or section goes where. However the smaller versions of each map in the main text allowed me to piece them together, making this a nuisance at the worst.

In the final opinion, it is worth the price I would have paid for it. I like the product, and while I would not use it as recommended, it has some ideas I would not have come up with on my own, making it useful to me. I recommend purchasing Evocative City Sites: Clockwork Tower from Rite Publishing.

Note: This review differs slightly from the one on RPG DriveThru in an error in my review was pointed out to me. I did edit this review, I am unable to edit that review. With that said, I like this product and I will be getting more of their City Sites.

In Review:
Note: I received a promotional copy. That said I would have been more than glad with the price asked if I had paid for it sight unseen.

The facts on the physical construction
It is 9 pages long consisting of the following sheets
Full color cover
Title Page
Introduction and Sample page
Sheet 1 - Armor, Shields & Weapons
Sheet 2 - Coins, Currency, Gems & Jewelry
Sheet 3 - Miscellaneous Treasure
Sheet 4 - ______________________________
OGL License

All of the sheets have a very plain white background, save the cover and title page. Very easy and self explanatory, even so there is an example on how the use is envisioned.
The first three Sheets are essentially the same columns for data and information. The main change is the title. The fourth sheet has the same columns but nothing is named, so you can customize it in moments.
As a PDF if you wanted to, you can print the sheets and hand write, or use the typewriter function in Adobe Reader and Customize (which changes the font look) for Sheet 4 that way and not save the changes to the file, preserving the integrity of the original one.

This is one of those products that are simple, easy and one where you say, why didn’t I think of that years ago and do it myself. The only other place I recall seeing something similar is in the old Rogues Gallery product from the original TSR Company, where you could record campaign details, encounters, etc. This is a product that is so simple but one that is needed to make gaming life easier.

Even though it is billed as a Player Aid, I am much more likely to use it as a GM to aid me in tracking who has what, helping distribute Experience points, etc. The blank sheet is going to get re-purposed as an encounter tracker as well.

So in the final analysis, for the cost, it is more than worth the money spent to get the product. Add it onto another order and at $1.25 that is less than a Grande Coffee and you will not even notice the price in my opinion.