Advanced Player's Guide (Sword and Sorcery Studios)

Rating:
Summary: Very nice content....
Review: .... But they are not kidding when they say its for the advanced player. This book is filled with alternate rules for criticals, fumbles, combat, magic, and core classes. Of course if has a handfull of prestige classes but it also has "Elite Classes." Elite Classes are pretige classes that have much higher requirements to enter, usually requiring your character to be 12th, at least. The new core classes are mostly alternate spell casters, complete with enough new spells to fill out thier spell lists. It also contains a different set of epic rules, though it is not as thorough as the epic rules published by WotC. The alternate magic system, mana, is nice for those that dont like the idea of only being able to cast X spells of a certain level perday.
One section in this book I think deserves 6 stars deals with "town" building. Communities have stats, skills, feats, and levels like characters. This provides "guidance" on what sort of atmosphere, goods, and services you could expect to find in a town of X size. For example, a town of 200 people will have 15 stat points to spend (to buy stats above 8) in 6 stats. Also, the town will have two class levels that might include military, arcane, religious, and civilian. Each gives access to different community skills and feats. The town "Torms Retreat" might be Military level 1 and Religous level 1 with the appropriate effects. These levels and along with other factors determine town wealth and reputation. Very cool.