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NeoExodus is a fascinating and radical departure from the standard quasi-medieval fantasy setting. If you want a different sort of campaign world, this will fulfil that need. Equally, it is a great resource if you want to add some exotic and unexpected material to your campaign world.
NeoExodus: A House Divided Campaign Setting is a 166-page PDF (159-pages if you remove the cover, credits, OGL page and ads) designed by Jean-Philipe ‘JP’ Chapleau with Louis Porter, Jr and published by Louis Porter Jr Design. This is core setting book for the NeoExodus line.
The layout is a standard page in two columns with the strange NeoExodus font used as section headers. The cover is full color as is much of the interior art. It has no index but a comprehensive table of contents and is extensively book-marked.
It begins with 15-pages of history of the world which sets the grand backdrop for the setting. It then moves into describing the world itself, emphasizing the features that set NeoExodus apart from the mainstream of fantasy settings, such things as: magic is common and widely used and that the world is full of new unique races (more on them later). This section hits the pieces of NeoExodus that are inspiring for adventure and campaign, the transit network, nefarious organizations, places, unique hazards and plot hooks.
Next it moves into the mechanics, starting with the races unique to the NeoExodus setting and unique they are including: the rat-like Cavians who share a psionic hivemind, the crystal skinned-Cynean scholars, the humanoid plant Dalreans, and many more, providing a major contrast to the ‘traditional’ fantasy RPG races. Nine new races in all along with information on the various nationalities of humans provide a wealth of interesting play opportunities. But because some of the races are so far outside the norm, a Games Masters should familiarize themselves with the unusual traits of the races before allowing them in play.
The following chapter is Heroes of NeoExodus which covers the details needed for character creation, starting with the religions of the world. This is followed by class options and archetypes for the campaign. Languages of the world are noted. Then there are six Prestige Classes, four of which are extremely combat focused, but all are tied into the setting and help to flesh out how the world functions.
Feats and Magic comes next with a wealth of both. However, many of the feats are tied directly to the various races of NeoExodus making them less immediately useful for other settings but several interesting ideas there all the same. The spells include a new subtype, First Ones, that calls upon the inner darkness of the caster making them powerful but potentially corrupting to use. The Necromantic spells are especially interesting (and often creepy) though the power level on a few of the spells seems off, they are quite useful both as written and as inspiration (but again, a GM’s will want to review these spells before allowing them). This section concludes with new armor, weapons and equipment, alchemical items and poisons, magical items and books and tomes (which have a very clever mechanic associated with them).
The last section is Terrors of NeoExodus, an introduction to the monster and dangers of the world including a variety of templates. Some of them are quite intriguing including a set of battle golems fielded by the powers of the world.
Lastly there are a set of useful forms including NeoExodus framed character sheets, combat trackers and more.
Disclosure: As a featured reviewer for RPGNow/DriveThroughRPG, I received my copy of this product for free from the publisher for the purpose of this review.
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It's a small collection of banners and tile ads for your web page, to promote 3rd-Party Pathfinder content publishers. You could make your own.
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What it does: Intermediary Classes (IC) takes 7 advanced classes and provides 9 "set-up" classes for them. In spite of the name, these are not necessarily intermediary between a class and an advanced class. In fact, most intermediary classes described here will need to be taken at Level 1 with a full background reflecting that.
Specifics
Three of IC classes related to the Soldier. These all make good sense and two are well thought through. There is the Boot, for regular grunts, the Junior Officer, for regular commissioned ranks, and the Irregular for the very many soldiers of the world that are not from regular backgrounds. This latter class is perhaps not as well thought through and probably says more about America's current mindset than about an objectively-built Irregular class. However, still useful stuff.
The other six have one-to-one relationships with: Investigator; Field Medic; Negotiator; Bodyguard; Field Scientist; and Martial Artist.
In my opinion, some of these make odd choices and there are other advanced classes that could well have done with an intermediary build. For example, there are so many very accessible real-world means to build martial arts skills, is there really such a need for a "Blue Collar Badass" as an intermediary class to get there? Or again, there are so many real-world means to become a negotiator, why pick Trader as the intermediary class? Why not the much more specialized law enforcement/legal/psychology background to build a class around? As a final example, creating a Bouncer intermediary class (for Bodyguard) is a very odd pick because Stan & co. have already given us a Bouncer build in one of their supplements.
Pros
Much of what I've said is negative but don't get me wrong: I really like the idea and the classes that work are great ways to get to advanced classes. For GMs or players that know they need a Soldier, but don't know much about the background a soldier must have, any of the first three ICs are excellent. Again, if you know you want a Field Medic specialist, the ER Intern may be just the ticket. I think the author has generally achieved a good balance between strengths and weaknesses. In future, other advanced classes may benefit from the same set-ups.
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Another quality clip art collections from LPJ Design. As I've said before, it is hard to go wrong with the art of Storn Cook, and the $10 price tag makes it entry price for someone who may not otherwise be able to afford full-color art from this artist. The pictures in this collection would be good for use as cover elements, or even character illustrations.
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The Image Portfolio series is a very solid resource for high quality "stock" art that individuals are licensed to use in their own (self/small press-published) products for free. Not a bad deal for $10. The main trouble I find with this is that the print resolution available is going to limit a lot of the detail in Storn Cooks' beautiful artwork. The 300 dpi print size is approximately 2" x 2.5", which should be a reasonably sized spot illstration for a 5.5" x 8.5" page layout (as one might expect self/small-press publishers to use), but definitely still on the small side. I'm also surprised that the document is password protected and cannot be imported directly into layout applications, which seems antithetical to the intended usability. I would have expected that the included license language reasonably covers the legal rights granted and retained by the seller. All in all, I'm satisfied with the quality of the artwork and the license agreements of this package, but not the hindrances to its intended use.
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This is a great resource for Pathfinder or any of the OGL-based games that use spells. You could also use it for old-school RPGs as well. It is very simple and well-designed, with plenty of space for recording appropriate details.
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I like this product very much. My only issue is I prefer to conserve my color ink and when I print this without color I could not get the gray to print. The main issue with this was along the top of the columns.
Other than that I find this is going to be immensely useful for my spell-slingers as it will free up a lot of hassle on keeping spells straight.
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This is a great product! It follows the cardinal rule of quality design: SIMPLER IS BETTER! Just a place to record your character's spells, with a handy check box to show which spells have been used for the day. The list allows you to organize your spells in any way that works best for you -- by level, by school of magic for arcane spells, or domain for divine spells, or in any other way that you wish. There are no categories given. This is only a "good" thing if you are the sort of person who prefers to let others do your thinking for you. Most RPGers that I know, particularly those who prefer to play spellcasters, do NOT fall into that category. Each line for a spell has blanks for: Spell Name, Level, Domain/School, and Effect (to include Range, Target, Duration, Save and SR. There's also a handy chart across the top to keep up with your character's Spells Known, Spells per Day, and Spell Save DC for each level of spells that he/she knows. In short, I LIKE IT!
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An interesting piece of enlightened self-interest... but a good way of making the point that the best game systems, past and present, thrive when there is a lot of excitement and buzz, and many people writing for that system with multiple publishers involved.
I was quite surprised when one of my players sidled up the other day with a feat he wanted to take, seeming rather embarassed that it was from a third party publisher not Paizo. Some of the best snippets I've seen, for those who like feats and spells and such like, have come from third parties... never mind if you fancy a whole new setting - here's looking at you, NeoExodus :)
If you enjoy playing Pathfinder, you do yourself a disservice if you ignore the wider community of resources. Now I'll have to figure out where best to put this banner on my site, but it is a valid reminder that I hope people who drop by to read my reviews will take on board.
Thanks, Louis. Peace.
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This is a good clipart resource. Paying $10 for five pieces of art by someone of the caliber, and reputation, of Storn Cook is a bargain. These pieces all have a modern /espionage feel to them, and would probably be useful for a number of projects. I recommend the quality of this art whole-heartedly.
I do have two negatives. First, I don't think that clipart PDFs should be watermarked. This can end up causing glitches in the final PDFs used, and because of that I usually end up converting the PDFs to other formats as a work around. Second, this file was passworded, which meant that I couldn't place it into InDesign to use it in a book. That's actually more of an issue because buying clip art doesn't help if you can't use it. There was a copy and paste work around, but it would be so much easier if this were a clean PDF. These technical issues, however, do not take away from the quality of the art.
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Last of a series of "graphics" bundle I (hoped) wanted to use on a big project, this page portfolio is nothing exceptional.
Amateurish and unispired, the work is still competent.
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I love this and have used in several games tho I hope they udpate this for the witch, alch, summoner and the magus.
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My full review is here: http://canadianrpgguy.blogspot.com/2011/11/review-trade-rout
es-expanded-caravan.html
I guess my take on this supplement is different from the other reviewers. I didn't find this supplement to be much use. It repeats material found in The Jade Regent Player's Guide and the amount of new information just doesn't warrant the price. This was my first LPJ purchase.
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These cards are a definite life saver for getting Initiatives in place for your gaming group, and also saves the hassle for the GM when trying to do things such as stealth and perception rolls for traps and such. The amount of information granted on these cards gives you a very quick look at the necessary numbers, and also makes it so that you do not have to look up your monsters or important NPCs every time they get into some kind of combat.
I have been using these since they were released on the site here, and heartily recommend them to anyone who plays any kind of game where Initiative is a key factor.
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As a fan of Initiative Cards I think this are really useful and should be used anytime you can.
And you can't beat the price, too.
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![Page Portfolio 1 Bundle [BUNDLE]](images/85/79287-thumb100.jpg)
