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I've always loved the feel of dungeon punk weird west, so this book is naturally up my alley. I also love plant ancestries, so ghoran is sooooo welcome, and vishkanya makes it a lot easier for me to make a mechanically rewarding poisoner, so yay!
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I appreciated that it was a mature setting with opportunities for conflict.
Mwangi Expanse kinda felt like a splat where everyone was holding hands and singing campfire songs while making friendship bracelets.
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I appreciated that it was a mature setting with opportunities for conflict.
Mwangi Expanse kinda felt like a splat where everyone was holding hands and singing campfire songs while making friendship bracelets.
Ah yes, with such cozy summer vacation places like [checks notes] tyrannical Mzali, cutthroat Bloodcove, violent Usaro, unstable Vidrian, and all the jungle ruins crawling with demons and cruel fey and monsters.
I love both regions, and it's true that the Impossible Lands have a darker tone than the Mwangi Expanse, but it's not all sunshine and roses on the western coast either.
Anyway, to get on topic:
I appreciate how the Impossible Lands put all the fun and bizarre Pathfinder elements (including many of the weirder classes and ancestries) in one spot and make it all work. It's where the (in my opinion unfairly) maligned idea of an adventuring party of 'freaks' (nonhuman ancestries, odd versatile heritages, classes that stray far from the European fantasy mold) not only fits, but borders on 'normal'.
And of course, all of that exists against a novel cultural blend of East African and South Asian inspirations (not something you often see together), and some pretty complex narrative conflicts, with a whole cold war brewing, social inequalities and injustices in major cities, and colonial legacies everywhere you go.
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Danger, Will Robinson! Here there be trolls!
I haven't finished it yet, but I'm loving Impossible Lands. Great ancestries, with enough page count to make them rich and exciting options; fantastic adventuring locations with a radically different feel from anything else you'll find in the Inner Sea; just all-around great stuff.
I think it's neck-in-neck with the Mwangi Expanse book for my favorite book in the Lost Omens line.
I've found the book to be very interesting and informative.
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I appreciated that it was a mature setting with opportunities for conflict.
Mwangi Expanse kinda felt like a splat where everyone was holding hands and singing campfire songs while making friendship bracelets.
I actually felt the opposite: the Mwangi Expanse had a ton of adventures I immediately wanted to run (revolution in Mzali, demon-hunting in Nagisa and Usaro, anti-colonial spy stuff in Vidrian’s employ, running trade caravans out of Kibwe), while I’ve struggled to imagine how I’d get the Impossible Lands to the table.
The latter was absolutely a fun read, but definitely didn’t leap out screaming “adventure!” in the same way for me. There’s locales I’d love to visit… but not a lot of places I can easily imagine swinging a sword around in.
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As a massive Geb fan, I knew that I was going to enjoy this book but I was honestly shocked I found myself enjoying reading about the non-Geb locations like Nex which so perfectly built up the intended "extreme-high fantasy magi-punk" aesthetic it is going for with everywhere looking amazing but under the surface completely filled with deep set (well, in Ecanus' case, not that deep) systemic woes. Oenopion especially is just pleading for an intrigue-heavy campaign dealing with the various evil groups in the city and ending with leading a revolution there; and I mean who DOESN'T want to have a giant sentient ooze hive-mind act as a quest-giver NPC?
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I found a lot of enjoyment flipping through the pages and stopping on the esoteric images and their labels with no descriptions on that page or the next (they're in there but the ones you had to flip a couple of pages to find it) like seeing the map of Ecanus and just seeing "The Awful" or "The Bath" in Oenopion.
To be fair, they do often have context next to them, just not openly signposted. For example, over a third of the page which the image of The Bath is on is actually dedicated to it--it's just that it also covers other stuff just being a quick first introduction to the city. But yes I very much do see your point, I very much got a quite similar vibe flipping through places like Ecanus and going "ok what is that please I need an explanation".
My first read through was good. Now that I'm doing a more in-depth read for the videos I'm making, I'm failing to keep them shorter videos even while skipping lots of things to give people reason to buy it. So much interesting stuff to talk about.