Hello, I’ve recently downloaded (again!) after so many years the Book of Skelos pdf from the pledgemanager.
I’m pleased to have seen some changes (Layout and errata) in the Mesmerism part of the book (p.83-87).
Well done!
I stil have not read it carefully again (to properly notice what is really changed) but I appreciate that you worked again on this part.
In any case, can you please give us a list of all the errata/typos of this book?
Book of Skelos is an important book for this game but it has always been ridden with too many typos/errors.
As a backer I have the old printing and I would like to have a list to see where are all wrong rules.
Reading the old copy and comparing it with the new one is difficult indeed.
Which version of the PDF do you have?
The old one was: The Book of Skelos 20171011.pdf
The current one in Pledgemanager is: The Book of Skelos 20180326.pdf
Is there a more current one than this more than four years old version?
There are only a few changes, mostly errata like the missing XP costs for Necromancy and other Talents, the replacement of “Willpower” (which was a Skill in Mutant Chronicles 3 under the Attribute Mental Strength, in Conan it is Discipline under the Attribute Willpower) with Discipline.
The Mesmerism problem got adressed back then:
The original text:
In addition
to putting subjects in a mesmeric trance, the Master of the
Mind gains an additional die of Momentum per rank when
using any Personality skills or the Sorcery skill to perform
acts of mesmerism, and can re-roll one Effect die per rank
of the talent when using mesmerism.
Furthermore, the Master of the Mind grants a discount of 1
Momentum per rank when casting the Enslave sorcery spell.
Was replaced by:
This talent
allows the user to put subjects in a mesmeric trance, and
each rank lets the mesmerist roll +1d20 on mesmerism tests,
reroll 1CD when rolling damage from Displays, and provides
+1 Momentum when using the Enslave spell.
That makes this Talent more in line with the Conan 2d20 rules, but still is a kind of Enslave without risking the spellcasting.
Other problems like the overpowered Necromancy or the (not as much, but also) overpowered Herbalism were not addressed.
It is still the primary source book I don’t allow in my Conan campaigns.
It’s the one on the pledgemanager (The Book of Skelos 20180326).
By the way, we still do not have the list in the official, published errata right?
I noticed the difference in the Mesmerism layout, and Herbalism seems also to have some different layout (possibly they deleted something or changed words).
However, I feel I do not want to read the whole thing again, and it would be nice to know the exact list of changes they made.
By this way I feel that this new text for the “Master of the Mind” talent is also partly problematic, as the character was already “allowed to put subjects in a mesmeric trance” with the Mesmerist talent (a prerequisite of Master of the Mind).
Mostly they moved some paragraphs because some headlines had been reformatted. So some paragraphs moved to the next page - sometimes compensated by reducing the size of an illustration.
(Yes, I did a PDF diff on the files.)
Yes, it is still overpowered compared to all the hassle a character has to go through to get the Enslave spell, and Mesmerism has less risk than the spell, too.
But not as (still) broken as Necromancy.
I run Conan games for PCs with several thousand XP, some with over 10000 XP, and even without any of the problematic source book add-ons those characters are in superhero power level. With some of the add-ons in The Book of Skelos, you get that kind of power creep even earlier in the XP ranking.
Banning source books for my campaigns is not a thing I do lightly, but The Book of Skelos is one that will not find a place in my campaigns.