Game: The Slayer’s Guide to Amazons
Publisher: Mongoose Publishing
Series: d20
Reviewer: Wyrdmaster
Review Dated: 19th, December 2001
Reviewer’s Rating: 7/10 [ Good ]
Total Score: 7
Average Score: 7.00
Amazons. Yes. Amazons. The race of warrior women who run wild through the deepest, darkest and most dangerous jungles while dressed mainly with spear and bow and the occasional strategically placed scrap of clothing. Those Amazons. The busy writers at Mongoose Publishing have put pen to paper and produced a Slayer’s Guide to Amazons.
I thought, at first, that I’d been sold a book that was falling apart at the seam. The middle pages appeared to be totally loose. Ah, but wait. They’re supposed to be loose. Why yes, this book on the exotic fighting femme’s comes with its very own four page high centrefold. Nymphia the Amazon! I can see the testosterone bubbling teenage roleplayers racing off to the shops already. I can hear groans of dismay from every one else. Hold up though. Wait a minute. Yes, the book is full of pictures of scantily clad ladies. Yes, the predictable fertility rites are there in the book. I’m not even going to attempt to take a high-brow or straight laced approach for this review. I can tell you that the book is well written and does attempt to provide some positive and practical ways to include Amazons in your sensible game.
If you’re not familiar with the Slayers’ Guide series then you might be surprised to discover that the book is not a total hack and slash, statistic and characteristic number crunch, munchkin heaven. The book starts off with a physiological over review to the Amazon race, detailing where and why they differ from the run of the mill human race and then goes into both habitat and society. The society section is well presented; although I can’t really credit it with too many points for being original, I am glad it managed to succinctly include the traditional maiden-woman-hag tri-aspects that so universally prevail in female orientated mythology.
Space is then given to the racial traits of the Amazons. By this point in the book it is likely that you’ve pretty much come over to the idea that the Amazons are a different enough “race”. I did arch an eyebrow at the suggestion that Barbarians are a prohibited class for the Amazonian race though. Surely they are nothing but barbaric? The Ranger class is pushed forward as the most likely class instead. The book previous suggests that the less-than-lovely ladies think dimly on matters arcane and that sorcereress are likely to be banished from the tribe. We’re left to deal with the spells that Dungeons and Dragons Rangers start to develop. The Amazon classes are not entirely lost in the Ranger trap though. Space is found in the 32 page book for the Priestesses of the Amazon’s moon goddess and for the Red Guard prestige class, at least, I assume it’s a prestige class. I appreciated the way that each of these two classes had been previously woven into the stories and text in the book. I get disgruntled when all of a sudden the author announces “Oh yes, this culture has this type of warrior. Here’s the stats for them,” after never having mentioned it before and then never mentioning it again. The two classes here are not dropped on you from no where, in fact, you might very well be hoping they are going to be mentioned as you near the end of the book.
Finally the book presents (as all the Slayer’s Guides seem to do) plot hooks by which you can wrangle encounters with the race into your adventures and a quick and easy sample set of Amazon NPCs.
Yeah, so as way of conclusion I will say that the book does happen to be full of pretty pictures and I am sure it will inspire many a school boy to stay late after class and spend a couple of hours in their roleplaying games club. On the other hand, the book is well written, presented and bound. I think there is just enough in it to make an Amazon encounter tempting. My suggestions on that – keep the Amazons as the enemy, I bet your players will find lots of ways to forgive them for all sorts of barbaric evil and so they’ll make delicious re-occurring villains. Besides, given the extremely competitive price for the book (on par with .pdf downloads) it is unlikely that you’ll end up cursing yourself for wasting your money.
