2/19/2011 8:47:02 AM
Saeth
Posts: 6
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So my shiny new copy of Eclipse arrived. Just some personal observations and thoughts here:
Style
- The choice to present to information as a sort of journal story is perfect. It makes it hard not to read through the entire book in one sitting.
- I really like that each city is carefully crafted with very different feelings. I like that several big cities get a lot of focus due to local importance. Adding holidays, guilds, important people and locations is critical to helping the DM run a game. The level of detail present in this book is perfect, something which a lot of settings fail at doing (usually because they’re too worried about crunch). Don't let anyone tell you this is too much fluff because it's not.
- The section on Colopitiron is splendid. I think it’s good we’re seeing how he shapes the way of life for ordinary people, as well what his personality is like. I hope each of the FHFF get this kind of attention.
Races
- The defensive techniques section (p. 24), like Polly Picker's section is ridiculously fun. I keep finding myself guessing which race is writing these sections (if it isn’t stated). They give first hand examples of how a race thinks about a topic while presenting useful info. I was surprised to see a Nightling taking a census, because it’s a lot of work!
- Deep Fey are my favorite race thus far. For one, it’s the sort of race we need to see, one connected to the land created by the FHFF. As such, they should have a particularly special place in their hearts. I hope we see more types Fey representing the main focus of each of the lands.
- Molice tie with Ceptu for my second favorite race simply because they aren’t anthromorphs. I want to see more non-anthro creatures as races. Also more non animal-based races like living dreams that require a sleeper to exist and only communicate via dreams, or a race of sentient colors. A tiny part of me is hoping for some kind of monkey-bird (Pirates of Darkwater).
Classes
- The dancer class just strikes me as silly. I don’t think I’d let a PC be this class simply because I can’t see anyone playing it without falling off into absurdity. This could just be my group.
Problems
- The font on pages 24-26 is missing the apostrophe character (hence the rectangle of doom).
- Graphic designer gripe: The font used for Polly Picker’s section is a display font, not a body font. Display fonts are designed to be used at 14 pt. or larger with small amounts of text. They should never be used for paragraph (body) text because they’re too difficult for the human eye to pick up on. Actually, the smallest size body text should ever be is 10 pt. For a printed medium, the ideal font is a serif font (such as Times New Roman). For a computer monitor the ideal font is a sans-serif (such as Ariel). Serifs are the wings at the ends of characters that help the eye recognize a particular character quickly.
In the future I’m hoping we get a look at life in the oceans. It’s hard to find a good campaign book for aquatic and amphibious species.
edited by Saeth on 2/19/2011
edited by Saeth on 2/19/2011
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2/19/2011 9:23:55 PM
ToddM
Administrator
Posts: 44
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wow thanks for taking the time to give us your impressions and thoughts. I totally love the Deep Fey as well i played one during testing and they are just so cool. you may notice that out of the entire group that accompany C on his journey only the deep fey lives and only he ever gets a name.
I am an artist and a writer so the graphic design stuff is just a duty that fell on me and i do it from the point of view of an artist, so the advice is well taken and i will apply it to future produces, thanks again
Todd
by the by if you want really cool races, off the path and wild in there inception, pray we get to do the Sky campaign setting. There is over 40 major races all ready detailed and drawn and they are amazing.
edited by ToddM on 2/19/2011
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2/22/2011 6:43:33 PM
Paul Grosse
Posts: 38
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Into the Blue by Bastion is good for aquatic info. FFG also had a good one that I can't remember off the top of my head.
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Paul "Yes that Paul" Grosse
PCGen BoD -PR Silverback & LST Chimp
Forums: Nylan (or Nylanfs)
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2/22/2011 11:49:33 PM
Paulon
Posts: 34
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Would that be the Legends and Lairs Seafarer's Handbook? Sadly it doesn't seem to be available as a PDF. FFG's taken a lot of their older stuff down from OneBookShelf, though I don't recall if this one was ever available there.
For Pathfinder there's also Alluria Publishing's Cerulean Seas which has a fair bit on underwater adventuring and good reviews, and Sunken Empires from Open Design.
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2/23/2011 6:40:26 PM
Greg Dent
Administrator
Posts: 195
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Glad you liked the book! Funny thing is I was worried there was not enough "Fluff" in there to really cover everything. There is certainly room for more if we have the time.
We (me mostly) spent a lot of time with different fonts trying to find ones that looked handwritten in the style of the setting and were still readable. We succeeded with a few, the problem is we had too many different hands and not enough good fonts. Some in particular looked good on screen but then turned out too small when the book came out. I'm hoping to fix up some of this in the ebook.
Trivia for you! We actually made two of our own fonts for this book. One is made from my handwriting, and one is Anne's which we used for her "lover's diary" piece. My handwriting font ended up on our t-shirts too. Actually, I gave everyone involved in this project sheets to create a font, but most didn't feel like filling it all out.
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President, Epidemic Books
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11/14/2011 11:52:54 AM
Fenryx
Posts: 25
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I just ordered Eclipse and am anxiously awaiting to see what it looks like, especially if the Dover are included under the races section. I am a gamer who is part of the anthropomorphic community so races like them are much appreciated. And for the one that wants to think the Ceptu are not anthromorphs, I hate to break this to you but they are. Unless I am greatly mistaken we are talking, and I just pulled out my 3E HC of Oathbound to make sure, Ceptu are anthropomorphic jellyfish. That is the view of the overacrching community of those who prefer anthropomorphic characters. In fact it is races like that I prefer to play personally. Although I may look into creating more races of that type for campaigns I will run personally.
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