Today I have three products again that work well with each other, but this time they are not by the same author.
These products all deal with the area of the Forgotten Realms known as "The Unapproachable East" and Rashemen in particular. This is of course one of the strengths of doing a product for the DMSGuild as opposed to doing it via the OGL; the ability to access Wizard's IP to use.
While that is certainly attractive in some cases, I much prefer to use the OGL. But if these authors had then we not have these products.
Again, here are my rules for these reviews of this series.
The Great Dale Campaign GuideThis one is huge and has ten authors. The pdf and hardcover book fills it's 144 pages with full-color art and details on all sorts of details on the Great Dale section of the Unapproachable East. This book actually rivals such books from WotC like The Sword Coast guide and the Icewind Dale. This book covers the people of the lands with new classes (sub-classes), new backgrounds, new feats as well as new spells and magic items. The lands are covered with geography, history, factions, friends, and foes. There are guides for playing in the lands as well. The author's introduction sets the stage for the book AND I think it also a good selling point for why people would want to use the DMSGuild rules over the OGL.
In the case of this book it works well. I also appreciate that authors not only took the time to properly credit the artists, the obtained commissions for some art as well. This more than justifies the $19.95 price tag for the PDF. It is also one of the few DMSGuild books I would want as a hardcover too. If I played in the Realms more. If I ever get a Realms 5e going then this will be on my list for getting the hardcover version.
While the Witches of Rashemen are mentioned, there is no "Witch" class. Plenty of Warlock and Wizard sub-classes though.
Spells of the Unapproachable East
This is a modest PDF that punches above its weight class. It gives us 13 pages of 5e style spells that are conversions of earlier spells from the Unapproacble East area. A few I recognized from Unapproachable East (3.5) and from Spellbound (2e). No art, but 39 spells that were not part of the D&D 5 corpus at the time the PDF was made. All of that for just a PWYW of $0.50. Not to bad really.
Again, no Witch class in this one. But plenty of spells.
Homebrewed Class: Wychlaran Witch
Ah! Now here is what I have been wanting. You can't write about witches in D&D as long as I have and not come across the Wychlaran Witch, the Witches of Rashemen. It was one of the reasons I finally put down my Greyhawk books to see what this "young upstart" of the Forgotten Realms was about.
This PDF is modest, only 8 pages, written by Bryan Williams. It covers the Wychlaran Witch class as a full class. It covers the class and all the class features, but it is missing the advancement tables and spells per level. It looks and reads like it should be akin to a sub-class of the Sorcerer, and that works to a degree, still I would have liked to see the table. There is a section on new equipment, which is good, and 13 new spells. I supposed the advantage to this particular PDF is if you have a Witch class you like you can use this in conjunction with it to create a more witch-y Wychlaran. So that is a bonus in it's favor.
Also the PDF is PWYW with a listed price of $0, but I say use my guideline of ¢10 per page and give the author ¢80 (or ¢60 for the actual content). For less than...well just about everything, you can have a class and some new spells.
