Dungeons & Dragons Spelljammer: Adventures in Space (D&D Campaign Collection - Adventure, Setting, Monster Book, Map, and DM Screen)

What you get: A 3 book set(64 pages each) the Astral Adventurers Guide, Boo's Astral Menagerie, and the adventure Light of Xaryxis, plus a 4 panel DM screen, and a large, double sided map of The Rock of Bral, a city built on the top and bottom of a huge asteroid. All in a slipcase, and all of it illustrated with some beautifully rendered artwork inside and out.At first I was leery of this new edition of Spelljammer, but I find this to be a nice addition to the 5E library. I will warn anyone looking for a carbon copy of the 2E Spelljammer rules, this IS NOT that! It's 5E's rules keeping things fast so you the DM, and your group, can get to the fun and action, not Fantasy Starfleet Battles. Consider yourself warned!This Spelljammer keeps with 5E's theory of 'keep it simple" and gives you 6 new playable Races, a couple new Backgrounds, Boo's Astral Menagerie gives you 39 new critters to add to the fun, and many with multiple stat blocks showing off certain variants, like Giff Shipmate, Shock Trooper, etc. An easy to understand definition of "Wildspace" aka Space as we know it, that area that surrounds the planets of our solar system, just a bit weirder(never you mind that gigantic space whale floating off the starboard bow!). The Astral Sea and its affect on those who live & travel through it, and how Wildspace and the Astral Sea are connected. Plus, how DMs can create their own unique "setting-space" by using the two mentioned in the adventure Light of Xaryxis, as guides. Couple it with the info from Chapter #2 of the DMG on Creating a Multiverse, and you've got all you need to create new worlds for your Player Characters to explore, plunder, and survive, the skies are not the limit any longer.The included adventure, Light of Xaryxis, is meant for characters of 5th level. You can use the Starter Kit or Essentials Kit to build your PCs up to 5th level, or your own homebrew adventures. If you want to jump in right away, they give guidelines for making 5th level PCs to begin quickly. The world setting you start from doesn't really matter, the PCs just need to be in a port town when you begin the first session. Then things get interesting fast! The adventure is broken into 4 Sections, with 3 chapters each, getting you off world, and hopefully on your way to saving your homeworld.If you're truly looking for a naval combat game in Space, as I said before, that's not what this is, but there's nothing stopping you from using the original 2E rules for any specific, large scale tactical combat, if that's what you want, or I would highly suggest you pick up a copy of 5E's Ghosts of Saltmarsh, which is a nautically themed series of 7 adventures, but more importantly, it has a section on ship combat, upgrading ships, etc. I preferably, would simply keep to 5E's idea as I see it, treating each ship like a PC, just on a grander scale. You determine encounter distance, initiative, and then assign your crew to weapons or whatever tasks need doing before things get too dicey. Once your ships are close enough to start slinging spells or character-size weapons at each other, then you're playing as normal, person to person. As it is, you're given 16 ships with deck plans, from the generic Space Galleon to the dreaded MindFlayer's Nautiloid, more than enough to keep your players hopping from ship to ship, looking for that special one to call their own.All in all I like it, as I have little time these days to mess around with a ton of minutiae, that if handed out, gets skipped over for some random sparkly nugget of info a PC finds odd. This new Spelljammer gives me what I need to whip up something quick, keep it fun and as detailed, dramatic or over the top as I want, and any game item that can do that, I consider money well spent. Yes, you'll have to do some work as far as planning wildspace systems, but that's the fun of DMing, and just think of the weirdness you can throw at your players, and they'll love you for it.So I say go for it and grab a copy! It's my opinion you'll love it once you're group's survived its first encounter with a Space Clown raiding party, Solar Dragon, or even a Cosmic Horror.....Wildspace is aptly named. But, they'll have a grand tale worth a few free meals back on Bral.... if they make it back!

It came in good condition and has beutiful art all around. I wish the main selling point was the astral plain rules and systems instead of the campaign, and I would have preferred all three books to be either combined as one or have the two rules and gameplay be together and the campaign to be on its own. The campaign is only 60 pages so it's a bit short, but to my surprise has a lot in each chapter despite being short, and unlike some longer books, doesn't require the dm to fill in the blanks or pressure players to advance. It is a bit campy like an older sci-fi movie, but it is both intentional and works quite well. The rules and systems it are interesting and worthwhile if you ever want to use the astral plane and space for your campaign, and despite all of the three books being hardcover and the dm screen it only cost a few dollars more than a normal source/campaign book and I believe it is worth the purchase.

This is hands down one of the most open and free-building modules I think Wizards of the Coast has ever released. Its completely open to both the players and the DM to determine what their Austral Plain is like, how combat will play out, and what kind of story's will be told.Some may chose for it to be a lawless frontier, filled with pirate's and raiders all searching for lost treasures and powers and fighting whoever stands in there way. Some may chose to craft a plain of political chaos, where systems of worlds teeter on brink of civil-war where words are more powerful then swords (in some cases). Or perhaps it's a completely new plain filled with settlers and explores charting the strange new space, and seeing what secrets it has to offer.The point is that this so called "unimaginative" module is nothing more than what 5th edition of D&D has evolved into. A system where DM's have complete control over every aspect of the game and requires more imaginative and critical world building without relying on existing material.If a party wishes to have a classic game in where quest leads to combat and story where everything is left to the chance of a dice role then go for it. Its business as usual. If you'r a group coming from say Call of Cthulhu who prefers role playing over combat, and that dice roles determine the path of the story rather than events than this system is perfect for you. As it allows for a pure RP narrative to be told without the need to sacrifice the core gameplay elements.My favorite part is the bit being left out by bad reviewers. Now Spelljammers was originally released as a 2nd edition expansion back in the Advance D&D days. Now putting aside the unrealistic expectations of it not being a rework of that system (which no one said it would be), what people are leaving out is that due to the vague and open langue of the 5th edition version, you can grandfather in elements from the 2nd edition Spelljammer with ZERO issues.You want the world and universe crafting guide/system from the 2nd edition rather than having to do it yourself? Then use it. You want your Helm's (your ships control center) from 2nd edition because you believe there should be a cost to using a ship or that it goes better with your party or story. Then do it. You want the 20 page ship combat system (for whatever insane reason), then USE IT. This is not like other modules where in doing so would create mechanical and rule conflicts. This is a complete and open system to shape however you and your players want it to be.To sum up my long rant/review, this is a good module. For (at the time of writing this) $41 this is a stupidly good deal. Gettin a campaign, monster and players guide with a new DM screen and fully illustrated and colored map of the new major city is really good for both veterans of the game and new players alike. If you are a player of DM who prefers to play off existing worlds and lore with a fine set of rules, then this isn't the module for you, nor any 5th edition modules going forward.