Too early for Christmas? Nah!
DISCLAIMER: This review is based on a free PDF provided by the author and the publisher, which in no way had an influence on the final score.
Introduction
Under Azoth Games, James Ray released a new book under the Akashic Tales line of products, this time focusing on many winter legends. Can the author maintain the quality of line? Read on!
What’s inside?
18 pages of content (not counting covers, ads etc.) for 3.50 bucks (nice!), which include:
-A short but nice introduction that mentions classic source material (like the wise men, krampus, and others), plus etymology (a passion of mine).
-The Gifts of Winter Pageantry veil set which includes 6 veils, all of them new. Before I tackle the veils, I have to mention that under normal circumstances, no akashic class can access the full array, even when some of the veils are open to ALL classes but Rajah (interesting).
Holly crown is a head, headband and body veil open to the most caster-y classes, and gives bonuses to certain Fort and Will saves plus temporary HP with essence increasing all, the head bind increasing your healing powers, the headband bind let’s your allies benefit from the save bonuses, and the body veil makes you really tough and difficult to kill, plus one of the other bind’s benefits. Mantle of the Horned Judge is a hands, wrists and body veil that lets you trap “naughty” ones in an extradimensional space via using grapple rules, and the creature inside can try to free itself every round. This is a very flavorful ability that is wish was more thorough. Even if the ability has a cooldown and the trapped creature can try to escape every round, is there a limit on the creatures inside? What happens if the mantle’s shaper teleports? Can you designate an ally as naughty and so they can “travel for free” or be a nasty surprise? Can you decide to autofail the save? Is there a limit on the number of creatures inside? How about size? I double-checked Pathfinder’s grappling rules and there is no penalty of grappling colossal creatures. Sure, most probably you will fail the opposed check, but the possibility exists. Anyway, the base durations of the entrapment is just one round, but that increases by 1 for every two points of essence invested; The hands bind gives the ability a short range, the wrists bind does the same plus damages those inside with magical bludgeoning damage, and the body bind giving you the “punish the naughty” ability of the Krampus himself! A great, flavorful veil that could use some extra clarifications and restrictions.
The Mantle of the Jolly Saint is a chest veil that gives you bonuses to Stealth and Sense Motive checks, with essence increasing the bonuses and with 3 or more giving you vanish and see alignment spell-like abilities, and OF COURSE the chest bind gives you a magical sleigh with reindeer that also has bag of holding-like cargo space AND protects the passengers from the elements, and by burning essence in a special, almost daylong way, you can GREATLY augment the speed of the sleigh. AWESOME! Reindeer Harness is a shoulders veil gives you a teamwork feat from a small list, and essence can only be bound to, and not invested in, the veil to share feats with allies, an in a synergy move the author gave extra benefits to classes that already share teamwork feats. If at least 5 essence are bound, you gain another feat. Binding the veil gives you an average magical flight speed that improves in maneuverability and speed if your movement would end next to an ally. AND allies that gained a feat can also fly! Cool and flavorful!
The Guiding Star is a headband veil that gives sacred bonuses to Kn. Geography and Survival checks and with a moment of concentration can guide you “East”, and the veil mentions some interactions where there is no “East”. The headband bind can make the star guide you and a couple of allies to a place of importance. A flavorful veil that has very specific uses, which is not a bad thing. We finish the veil section with The Whiteout, a storm veil that hampers movement (with enough essence), sight and sound-dependent abilities to those inside, and essence increases the penalties and even makes verbal spellcasting increase in spell failure. When bound, the storm can disorient those caught and can even make them shaken. A great storm veil that debuffs instead of damage those inside The Whiteout.
-5 character options: The Aurora zodiac orbit gain essence like a Lunar, but instead of veils, they are a craft class with many bonuses for crafting items, and have an akashic attack that does modest damage, and can heal objects (but no mention of constructs… which can be argued are creatures and not objects); they cannot shape champions and are bad at manifesting signs, but can summon more than one version the same constellation as long as it has different forms, can do so at range and already worn, and their capstone gives them the AWESOME ability of not being able to be fully destroyed as long as one of their crafts survive (liches must be jealous). The Chef radiant archetype specializes in creating akashic recipes, originally introduced in another book, and learns one for every 3 ranks in an appropriate skill (Profession, Chef and Craft: beverages are provided as examples). Their akashic bond functions differently for them, and they can gain an ability called “Panacea and Poison” that gives two abilities and replaces the 4th level vivification, but can also be gained later instead of a vivification.
The King of Misrule fisherking archetype. They have a divine presence instead of arcane; allies in their Saturnal Realm, an ability gained instead of Blessed Land, gain temporary HPs as long as the King is not attacked, since when that happens, opponents start to magically bleed. They also gain a cool, unique hex called Crown of Unreason, that basically confuses those hexed but can make them dance and party instead of babble and also has some exclusive benefits when shaped as a “peerless hex”. The Magush vizier archetype converts them into kind of priests, makes their veiweaving more divine than arcane (wisdom-based), gives them access to only two paths (the Scholar and the Mage, but gives them an extra ability at 7th level), and instead of plain DC increases, get a more focused (and flavorful) ability that increases the DC of fire and positive energy veils, but also increases their healing and damage. Finally, they lose access to the twinveil rings ability in favor of being able to shape a divinatory veil along another one in any veil slot. Flavorful rework of the class! We finish the section with the new Path of the Mage for viziers, who lets them dabble in constellation summoning, and even makes them better than zodiacs in some cases! Great for constellations fans that want to try a non-zodiac constellation user!
-6 akashic recipes: All of them have a “Christmas” motif, and they range from modest to strong. Since they give the eater a magical ability, this is a great way to give the taste (pun fully intended) of a powerful ability to a low level character.
-5 new feats: Astrology gives you limited access to the prognostication occult skill unlock, while Aurora Armaments lets you add your akashic torch damage to a single attack. Fly in Formation is a teamwork feat that is very useful to creatures that fly in flocks, or characters that fly through the Reindeer Harness veil. Reindeer Form is an akashic feat unique to the new Tuktu race, which gives you access to an animal form by taking essence burn. Share the Load is another teamwork feat, which not only increases strength for carrying capacity but also gives you the supernatural ability to drag and reposition creatures as if you were bigger, as long as you are next to a teammate.
-Tuktu akashic race: This reindeer folk have great physiques but are not that bright. They get several abilities (with two of them being essence receptacles), and most of them make them great at arctic travel. The section includes details like height, weight and age categorie, favored class bonuses (many akashic classes here), alternate racial traits, and Tuktu race traits.
-Reference and Bonus Content: The Chef’s Armory veil that lets you prepare akashic recipes, plus a new reduced akashic portions variant rule and a new trophy (actual name, a glitch?) that lets you harvest plant creatures for useful components.
Of Note: The veils, while cool, are not the star of the product (well, maybe the Guiding Star is in a sense). The new zodiac orbit is great for players that like to buff their companions, and the new vizier stuff is REALLY good, useful for an akashic only campaign, since the Magush archetype can replace clerics.
Anything wrong?: The source material might not fit in certain fantasy worlds. Also, the details of one veil (which can be easily added).
What I want: Seeing how Halloween and Christmas inspired a book, I would like to see holidays from other non-european derived holidays. How about New Year? Saint Valentine? Tons of possibilities! Also, I would have liked to see at least one of those storm veil synergies with The Whiteout and another cold storm veil, of which there are many.
What cool things did this inspire?: It would be fun to make an adventure where the players take the role of Saint Nicholas and his Tuktu adventuring party that want to fulfil their role while evading baddies. Having to escape from them instead of just battling would be awesome!
Do I recommend it?: If you are into Christmas (like most of the world) and want to add some of it to your games, then yeah! Even if not, the new class options are very useful. If you are a Scrooge who hates Christmas, subtract one from the final score. 5 Guiding Stars from this reviewer.