I had wondered how long it would take for someone to release a "technically it's Forgotten Realms, but sorta not really" product, and I see that it was "a few days."
I loved Spelljammer back-in-the-day, and was sad it never got full support during either the 3rd or 4th editions era (though at least the Beyond the Moons website offered official unofficial 3rd ed rules: http://www.spelljammer.org/) and then there was a Polyhedron magazine article for Shadow of the Spider Moon that was pretty good (http://www.andycollins.net/Projects/Spelljammer/Spelljammer.htm).
Now, original Realmspace book for Spelljammer this is not (available online though: http://www.dndclassics.com/product/17259/SJR2-Realmspace-2e?it=1&filters=0_0_44701) Not that that was "the best" Spelljammer book or anything, but the production quality was pretty solid at least on that book and compared to this. If I understand the DMsGuild's rules though, you might be able to even pull some materials from that old text and use it freely in a new book like this one.
And while Spelljammer.org did have a section on Realmspace (http://www.spelljammer.org/worlds/Realmspace/) they didn't "update" the timeline which is something THIS book does do.
I'd need to compare the specifics of the text to all the various texts of Realmspace (in the original book and others, etc.) but it seems like the author, Johnny Tek, has good ideas but not the greatest execution.
I paid a $1 for the book, and in support of his ideas, I'm fine with that. His ideas and even the simple sketches and illustrations (I'm guessing they are his own) are clean and neat, though they lack much impact. His layout and graphic design leave much to be desired, as the actual text is badly spaced and spread out and even the use of the page layout seems to be something like landscape, two column, with LOTS of white space (no background, etc.). At a guess, he used Word to do the set up or at least it feels like it.
The text was also 100% fluff. It seems pretty good fluff, for that matter, but I'd love to see at least an attempt at rules for Spelljamming, even just handwave level "how to handle it" in 5th edition.
I really hope this is just "first attempt" by Johnny Tek, and I hope you'll consider doing follow up work. If you can, get a simple background/template/layout from either DMsGuild or popover to RPGNow.com/DriveThurRPG and pick up some kind of ready made cover, interiors, and maybe some stock art and then consider adding some mechancis for things-related-to-spelljamming.
Nice appetizer, but I want a meal.
|