System Sourcebooks

System - Sourcebooks
I'll keep this page updated with the various approved D&D 5th Edition sourcebooks and supplemental materials that we'll be using for the game. Please let me know if there's other material you'd like me to consider, and I'll review it. Keep in mind that I'll probably be using additional sources (like the various monster manuals) for challenges, and NPCs.

Wizards of the Coast

 * Player's Handbook - The least you need to know to play the game. Character classes, spells, player races, equipment, feats, and skills. Dragonborn, Tieflings, Half Elves and Half Orcs are not player races, and are not known to the surface races of Daera. The Ranger character class in the PHB has been replaced by the Unearthed Arcana: Revised Ranger. (See below)
 * Dungeon Master's Guide - a few extra things like magic items, traps, and terrible things to do to players
 * Elemental Evil Player's Companion - lots of fun elemental-based spells and some other player options. Ignore the stuff about player races. The aarakocra, deep gnomes (svirfneblin), genasi (half-genies), and goliaths do not exist on Daera, despite how cool some of them (goliaths) are.

Unearthed Arcana - Unearthed Arcana is playtest material that Wizards of the Coast has made available as PDFs on their websites. Some of it is great - almost necessary. Some of it is hot garbage, or just plain doesn't fit the world we're playing in. Here's the stuff I'm cool with:
 * Unearthed Arcana: Cleric - adds Forge, Grave and Protection domains.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Feats - Some nice options for weapon and skill specialization. Ignore Warhammer Master because 1. That's not how warhammers work and 2. The feat is used as an example of bad feat design.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Feats for Races - Most of these feats are fun and flavorful options. Obviously, ignore the feats for races that don't exist on Daera.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Feats for Skills - All of these feats are terrific. Enjoy!
 * Unearthed Arcana: Gothic Heroes - I just watched Castlevania on Netflix, so I'm mostly okay with this. The Revenant player race is right out, but the Monster Hunter Fighter archetype and Inquisitive Rogue archetypes are cool with me.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Mystic - this is a rough one. The Mystic class has an entirely separate way of performing magical effects than any other class in the game - psionics, and is basically six difference character classes in one as the different mystic orders are pretty different from one another in function and outlook. Still, it's pretty cool. I think we can make it work.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Revised Class Options - The druid, fighter and warlock options are great for player characters. The Conquest Paladin option is great for evil NPCs.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Revised Ranger - This replaces the Ranger character class in the main book.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Revised Subclasses - The Arcane Archer is the best of the bunch. The rest are fine.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Starter Spells - Yes! 100% solid choices.
 * Unearthed Arcana: Warlock and Wizard - There are a bunch of fun options for the warlock, but the Lore Mastery arcane tradition for the Wizard is not allowed. I hope to see a better version of it in future Unearthed Arcana, because the concept is very cool.

Legends of Writh

 * Archivist Character Class - this is a 100% perfect translation of the D&D 3.5 character class. Very well done.