Do not just stand there and slug it out with your opponent. Learn to use combat maneuvers! Even if you do not have the feat, you can still try it. You are only going to provoke an attack of opportunity. Hey, didn't that stupid barbarian already use up that dragon's attack of opportunity for the round? You could prevent the dragon from using its breath weapon, or maybe that nasty bite attack. Maybe you want to grapple your opponent, pick him up, and actually throw him into another opponent! In addition, you could pull a rope-a-dope on that charmed friend of yours and then choke or sap him into submission rather than having to kill him. Come and learn at the feet of the Masters of the Arts—learn the Secrets of Martial Mastery.
Within the pages of this tome, you will find:
25+ new combat maneuvers
25+ new feats
The Master of the Arts Prestige Class
Author: Steven D. Russell
Artist: Joe Calkins
Pages: 13
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This pdf is 18 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD and two pages of advertisements.
That leaves us with 13 pages of content, let’s get it on.
The Secrets of Martial Mastery contains a plethora of new combat maneuvers akin to classics like feint and bull rush. (7 pages) The new maneuvers are:
Arm Lock – Deals unarmed damage and causes sickened effect. Initiated in a grapple.
Blind Opponent – You attempt to blind your opponent for 1 or more rounds. (By throwing sand in their face, poking their eyes etc.)
Bypass Armor – You exploit a weak spot in their armor, if you succeed they lose their armor vs your next attack. Surprisingly, this also works against natural armor
Confuse Opponent – You attempt to hit the opponent in a way that is dazes/confuses them. Deals half damage and causes brief confusion.
Corps-à-Corps – You lock weapons with the opponent and move close to them, setting them up for other combat maneuvers.
Create Opening – Lowers the opponent’s AC for your next attack.
Cut Clothing – Do the Zorro! Cut clothing off your opponent, carve your name, attack items etc. – Mages will hate this one.
Disorient Opponent – If this attack works, the enemy takes a -2 to attack, INT and several skill checks based on movement for a short amount of time.
Entangle Opponent – You use an object to entangle your opponent by ropes, cutting branches, throwing furniture etc.
Enemy Cover – You move into the blind spot of e.g. other enemies by moving with the opponent targeted, using your foe as cover against themselves and their allies.
Force Movement – Force an opponent to move 5-10ft in the direction of your choosing without having to run him over.
Garrote Opponent – You strangle the enemy from behind, assassin-style. The attack is sufficiently lethal, causes damage and eventually forces the target to save or fall unconscious and die.
Hinder Natural Attack – You strike at a natural weapon, making your foe unable to use that specific attack for 1 or more rounds.
Hinder Special Ability – Works just like Hinder Natural Attack, but thankfully only works when there is an obvious attack like a breath weapon, webs and the like.
Impede Movement – The little brother of the good ol’ classic “Sever Sinews” - your attack lowers the movement of the enemy by 5ft on a success.
Joint Strike – In contrast to the others, this one is rather bland, it does 1 point of ability damage to STR or DEX.
Low Blow – Strike at the vital areas of male/female anatomy to really make your enemy appreciate you. If you’re successful, the target is dazed for 1 or more rounds. Obviously doesn’t work against all critters out there.
Nauseate Opponent – Karate-chop to the ear or similar attacks cause the victim to be nauseated for 1 or more rounds.
Paralyze Opponent – If you are successful, you can paralyze your opponent briefly.
Parry Attack – This blocks the next incoming melee attack by your chosen target by using one of your AoOs.
Rope-a-Dope –Tire out your opponent for a brief amount of time by applying pressure while keeping your defensive stance.
Sacrificial Critical – Open yourself wide for an automatic crit by your enemy to get an attack that automatically threatens a critical hit if successful.
Sap – A successful hit with this maneuver causes your enemy to save or be knocked unconscious for a brief amount of time, potentially long enough to capture him/her/it.
Scar Opponent – The stuff revenge-stories are made of, this humiliation deals 1 point of damage and a scar that can only be healed by magic. [GREAT for low-magic campaigns or if the DM rules that the scar remains even if the damage is healed…]
Seize Massive Attack – As part of a readied action, you attempt to latch onto a large or larger creature. Ever wanted to latch onto a charging Gorgon or a swooping dragon with one hand while desperately trying to hack it to pieces? There you go.
Taunt Opponent – The “Yo mama!” of combat maneuvers, this causes the targets to attack you for one or more rounds in a fit of rage, potentially ignoring your meek fireball-casting sorcerer-buddy.
Throw Opponent – Initiated as a part of a grapple, you throw an opponent 5ft or more, doing 1d6+STR damage and fling them potentially off of cliffs, balconies, etc.
Torment Opponent – Inflict a traumatizing blow on your enemy, causing massive pain and leaving them with -4 to attack rolls and some skill checks.
Unbalance Opponent – You try to knock your foe off balance, leaving him without DEX-mod for 1 or more rounds or hamper his REF-save.
While some of the maneuvers might seem strong, they are balanced by saves, half damage and a limited amount of time for their effects. All maneuvers have additional effects if you beat the opponent by 10+ or fail by an equal margin.
New Feats (3.5 pages): After the maneuvers, we get a whole bunch of new feats, one general “Improved [Combat maneuver]”-feat-template and several non-generic “Greater”-variants of the maneuvers. Taunt Opponent, Hinder Special Ability, Corps-à-Corps and Arm Lock don’t get their own “Greater”-version though.
Finally, we get a new prestige class, the Master of the Arts, that gets two and a half pages:
The class has d10, 4+INT skills, good BAB, medium FORT save, bad REF and WIL saves and details a teacher of combat maneuvers who can both utilize maneuvers, deflect arrows and the like and even control his/her inflicted damage for training/capture/ whatever purposes. The class also features a short glossary of Questhaven.
Conclusion:
The b/w-art ranges from fair to “meh” and is partly public domain, I found one editing glitch (double sentence) and 2 typos in the book, but not enough to severely detract from its appeal. Why? Because it is so concisely written and because, even though it is setting-neutral, made me envision or remember all the times when I have already house-ruled situations like the ones the maneuvers address. Combat should be exciting, dynamic and cool and fighter-types should have more options than “I attack with power attack +3” and “I trip. Again.” If you’re like me and love swashbuckling, Errol Flynn style, if you are into martial artist flicks from the east, hell, if you just simply want more options for your fighters that are not necessarily just more feats, more options for any character that is even remotely martially bent, this pdf is for you. For the cheap price of 3 bucks, you get a file that is guaranteed to enrich your gaming experience in a more than positive way. Due to the cheap price that almost makes up for the minor editing glitches, I’ll rate this file 4.5 stars, for the purpose of this platform rounded up to 5.
The Secrets of Martial Mastery by Rite Publishing.
This product is 18 pages long. Cover, credits. (2 pages)
Chapter 1: Combat Maneuvers (7 pages)
There is 29 new combat maneuvers in this section. They work just like the current ones in the Pathfinder RPG.
Arm lock – does unarmed dmg and causes sickened effect. Alternate grapple attack.
Blind Opponent – you attempt to blind your opponent for 1 or more rounds. (throwing sand in their face as a example)
Bypass Armor – you look for a weak spot in their armor, if you succeed they lose their armor vs your next attack.
Confuse Opponent – you attempt to hit them in a way that is dazes/confuses them. Half dmg and causes confuses briefly.
Corps a Corps – you lock weapons with them. Gain a bonus on next attack.
Create Opening – lowers their AC vs your next attack.
Cut Clothing – seen zorro? Same thing, cut clothing off you opponent or care your name etc.
Disorient Opponent – if it works the enemy takes a -2 to attack rolls, int and several skill checks for a short bit.
Entangle Opponent – you use a object to entangle your opponent, toss a chair in their way etc.
Enemy Cover – you move into their blind spot and moving with them. Using them as cover against themselves and their allies. (best way to describe it briefly)
Force Movement – force a opponent to move 5-10ft in the direction you choose.
Garrote Opponent – you strangle them from behind. Cause dmg and has save or fall unconscious and eventually die.
Hinder Natural Attack – you strike at a creatures natural weapon, making them unable to use that attack for 1 or more rounds.
Hinder Special Ability – works like natural attack but only works when there is a obvious attack, breath weapon, eye beams etc. Things with no obvious source of attack are immune.
Impede Movement – you attack lowering their movement by 5ft on success.
Joint Strike – does 1 point of ability damage to str or dex.
Low Blow – you strike their... if successful target is dazed for 1 or more rounds.
Nauseate Opponent – a attack that causes nauseate effect for 1 or more rounds.
Paralyze Opponent – if successful can paralyze opponent briefly.
Parry Attack – This blocks the next melee attack, it also uses up one of your AoO's as well.
Rope-a-Dope – you attempt to tire you opponent out, causing a exhausted effect briefly.
Sacrificial Critical – you allow foe to automatic hit, threatens and confirms a crit if they choose, if they do you automatic hit and threatens crit back. You must still confirm crit.
Sap – hit causes save or be knocked unconscious briefly.
Scar Opponent – cause 1 point of damage and a scar that can only be healed by magic.
Seize Massive Attack – you attempt to latch onto a large or larger creatures attack. Such as leap onto the side of a rhino as it tries to gore you.
Taunt Opponent – can cause target to attack you for one or more rounds in a fit of anger.
Throw Opponent – throw a opponent 5ft or more, doing 1d6+str in dmg.
Torment Opponent – attack them in a vital and cause massive pain leaving them with -4 to attack roll and some skill checks.
Unbalance Opponent – you attempt to knock them off balance leaving them with out dex mod for 1 or more rounds.
Virtually all the maneuvers deal half damage, only last 1 round unless you succeed by a wide margin and most leave you open to major counter attack with out feats.
Chapter 2: Feats (3 1/2 pages)
There is 27 new feats in this section. One of which has a version for each maneuver(see below) so really
Improve (blank) – A catch all feat for any of the previous maneuvers. The effect is the same for all of them, so Rite Publishing decided to save space and only put in one feat description with a note about you need the feat for each maneuver.
There is a Greater feat for each of the maneuvers except. Taunt Opponent, Hinder Special Ability, Corps a Corps and Arm Lock.
Chapter 3: Master of the Arts (2 ½ pages)
A new prestige class. D10, 4 skills, all weapons, all armor and shields except tower, full BaB. This is a 10 level PrC, that gets a bonus feat at 2nd and every other level. The bonus feat must be filled with feats for combat maneuvers. Other class abilities.
Training Expertise – able to do full non-lethal dmg with weapons.
Asses Battle – Adds Int mod to initiative.
Combat Virtuoso - +2 to CMB and CMD
Trained Reactions – Get the deflect arrow feat while armed or unarmed.
Secrets of the Art – Never provokes a AoO while preforming maneuvers.
It finishes with OGL and 2 pages of ads of upcoming products. (3 pages)
Closing Thoughts, I really liked this book. The art work was fair, the production values was top notch as we have come to expect from Rite Publishing. I think this is something Melee characters have been needing for awhile. It gives them a lot more options in combat and adds in more tactics. Conan by Mongoose had things like this in concept and I always used many of them in D20 games. I do hope Rite Publishing makes a follow up book to this adding more. I really couldn't find any faults in this product. I didn't notice any errors. I have not play tested these but they look fairly balanced on just reading them. So with that I am giving it a 5 star review. If you are looking for more options for melee characters I recommend this.
End has alot going on, I am just pleased that he found the time to review it, Drivethru sends me an email making me aware when a review is posted which usually means he posted it here, enworld and on RpgAggression
End has alot going on, I am just pleased that he found the time to review it, Drivethru sends me an email making me aware when a review is posted which usually means he posted it here, enworld and on RpgAggression
Yes you get a email but other people don't. So i posted to draw attention to the fact their is a new review.
As for End I know he has stuff going on, but I like picking on him. It's what I do. I mean would you all respect me in the morning if I was nice? sheesh.
