Book of Vile Darkness: Dungeons & Dragons Accessory (D&D Accessory) [ハードカバー]

Let me preface this review by saying that I am not going to address the moral and ethical implications of this book. If you want in on that debate, visit any of the major D&D message boards. Instead, I'm going to review the BoVD on its merits, or lack thereof, as I would with any other accessory. So, without further adieu...

ART & LAYOUT: WotC continues with their book covers that resemble a "real" fantasy text. The Book of Vile Darkness (BoVD) certainly gets across the feel that it's a tome of evil. As a note, the cover you see on Amazon right now is not the published cover for the book. The real cover looks much cooler. Within, the pages look marked by fire and brimstone around the edges. The actual artwork itself varies in quality as with most of WotC's products. Much of it is very skillful and well done (Goblin Pits). But, just drawing tons of blood & gore doesn't make a drawing cool (Kythons). There are also more topless females in this book than in any other WotC product to date. Interpret that how you will. (This accessory would have gotten 5 stars if the art was consistantly strong throughout.)

CONTENT: Again, time for a preface. I'm a big Monte Cook fan. I think he makes some of the most brilliant D&D 3E products available. In some ways, this book is his greatest achievement yet. Why? He writes about evil, possession, curses, disease, torture, vile magic, and more, in an objective fashion, without glorifying it, rather putting into it d20 terms that you can use to enhance your game. That takes a phenomenal amount of tact - and I think he succeeds. Now onto what you'll find within:

* The Nature of Evil: My favorite section. This is the theory behind evil that allow for DMs to generate villains with realistic (albeit deranged) goals and motivations. What the heck drives these maniacs to such extremes? Here we examine psychology, fetishes, and what exactly is considered an "evil act". Keep in mind, we're talking evil in the D&D sense - a tangible thing you can sense with spells. We also get new vile races, example villains, and malign sites.

* Variant rules for possession, sacrifice, curses, diseases, and all aspects of evil.

* Evil equipment including torture devices (yikes), drugs, poisons, you get the idea. All the talk of "experimentation" gives me shivers, as it will for your PCs.

* Evil-only feats.

* Prestige classes: Another one of my favorite sections. You want a truly memorable villain? Start here. I sent a Vermin Lord after my PCs last night and they were looking at each other like "oh my god, what IS this thing." DMs like those moments.

* Magic: For those that have checked out Mr. Cook's Books of Eldritch Might, you know he can invent some of those most innovative spells & magic items. The BoVD is no exception. Wild, scary stuff. Your PCs will be left wide-eyed. BTW, there are many variant rules for [evil] spells and such, so these aren't only new, but altogether different in many ways from the Player's Handbook spells.

* Lords of Evil: Stats for the Demon Princess and Arch Devils. There are also stats for some lesser baddies. The princes are roughly demigod level in power, so for practical purposes, only a very high-level group would tackle them. However, they could plague a lower level group from behind the scenes just fine.

SUMMARY: If your game is rated PG or G, be very cautious about introducing aspects of the BoVD - You probably don't even want to buy this book. For the rest of you: Don't feel the need to throw the whole book into the mix at once. Used sparingly, the BoVD will definitely help DMs create memorable villains that the heroes will want to see go down and go down hard! Remember, even being vile should be fun when it comes to playing D&D!

This book was a long-time coming to veteran gamers like myself. Not just evil...but vile evil, pure evil. And were not talking player characters running amok, were talking a book that probably is not even suitable for kids or inexperienced gamers. It's definitely geared towards the mature as it pulls no punches in dealing with the essence of evil. It even states it's intended for mature audiences in the introduction so don't discount the warning as mere rhetoric. This is Hellraiser type evil...mean, nasty, and vicious and boy is it fun to read. Even if you don't incorporate this into your settings or campaigns it's worth reading anyway.

The book stars out by defining the nature of evil, at least in terms of a D&D environment before delving into such topics as vile gods and races, creating villains, torture, sacrifices, curses, etc. The book also introduces us to the "Vile feats" for your evil character, although as the book says they are intended for NPCs but with a little modification and approval of your DM, well, you know...

The book introduces several prestige classes including such things as Demonologist, Lifedrinker, Soul Eater, Vermin Lord, as well as disciples or Thralls of various Arch Devils or Demon Lords. The book also features a number of new spells, magic items, artifacts, and monsters. But the thing many long time gamers like myself have looked forward to is the revamping of the Arch Dukes of Hell and Demonlords from the very first old Monster Manual. Asmodeus, Bel, Dispater, Orcus, Demogorgon...they are all here and done the way they always should have been where even ultra-high level PCs will think twice about trying to take these guys on.

Can you use PC's with this book? Clearly it's designed for DM's only and as such presents quite a new challenged for players. I personally prefer it as a DM source only as I'm old fashioned and I prefer players to be good and battle evil and this book provides a wealth of evil. Like most WOC products the art is uniformly good although not spectacular. A welcome addition for the DM

I'm serious. The only person who can get anything remotely useful out of this is a DM. Players, unless they're in a "Hey, we're bad guys" campaign, have nothing remotely resembling a reason to have it.

Then again, I picked it up. And a mild case of nausea, to boot.

This is the sourcebook on evil and villainy for D&D. It includes descriptions of evil acts, what constitutes evil, ideas on making villains, feats and prestige classes and equipment for villains, lots of new spells, and a lot of new-to-3e monsters as well, including the demon princes.

The good...er, outstanding parts: It has a high production value, and it's clear that they've put a lot of thought into this. (The author's foreword: "I'm not a bad guy. Really.") It's also easy to make bad guys your PCs will want to stomp. Some of the equipment, properly rinsed in holy water after filing the serial numbers off, would be great for regular PCs.

The bad...er, negative: Way too many of the prestige classes are devotees of the demon princes and archdevils; that's boring. The corrupt spells (really Evil spells that any caster can use) are kind of stupid; they inflict heinous attribute damage on the caster and don't do enough damage. One of the villains, the Dread Emperor, has a suggested attack pattern that's impossible (just try to cast four spells in one round without being in epic levels...you have a standard action to cast Haste, cast a regular spell with the partial action from haste, and then one quickened spell/round), this from the system guru. That unnerves me a little bit. Finally, the demon princes and archdevils are, if anything, too weak.

So, in the final analysis, it's okay, and definitely worth a look, but don't even bother if you're a player. It's not at all useful for those, and not even that interesting. And, if you're the type that's easily offended by descriptions or depictions of gore, then, by all means, stay as far away from this as you can.