Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Find a type on the 7e Proof Edition PDF? Share them here so Chaosium can get them cleared up before print!
sjaffe
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by sjaffe » Thu Aug 14, 2014 10:28 pm

Keeper's Book, Page 46, the Cash and Assets table seems a little bizarre to me. I realize it's supposed to be a guideline but it seems... off even as a guideline. For example, in the 1920s section, it lists the Credit Rating range of 10-49 as having $500-$2450 in assets. The next Credit Rating range begins at 50 with assets of $25,000. What about everyone in between?? In the 1920s, I'm sure there were people having between $2450 and $25,000 in savings and other assets, even before the Crash! There's a similar jump between every level in both the 1920s table and the "modern" table and it makes no sense to me. And, based on the "modern" table, I'd be qualified as "rich" based on my bank account (cash) yet I'm definitely NOT rich. The whole table just seems kind of whacko.

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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by jonsp » Fri Aug 15, 2014 7:14 am

Investigator's Handbook, p.44, second column, under SIZ. "Size helps determine hit points and damage bonus and build." Should probably be: "Size helps determine hit points, damage bonus, and build."

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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by jonsp » Fri Aug 15, 2014 7:29 am

Investigator's Handbook, p.45, second column, last paragraph under EDU. "Note: From hereon ..." Obviously should be: "Note: From here on ..."

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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by jonsp » Fri Aug 15, 2014 7:34 am

Keeper's Handbook, p.20. The white text is extremely hard to read against the background image.

Magnus Nordlander
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by Magnus Nordlander » Sat Aug 16, 2014 1:58 am

sjaffe wrote:Keeper's Book, Page 46, the Cash and Assets table seems a little bizarre to me. I realize it's supposed to be a guideline but it seems... off even as a guideline. For example, in the 1920s section, it lists the Credit Rating range of 10-49 as having $500-$2450 in assets. The next Credit Rating range begins at 50 with assets of $25,000. What about everyone in between?? In the 1920s, I'm sure there were people having between $2450 and $25,000 in savings and other assets, even before the Crash! There's a similar jump between every level in both the 1920s table and the "modern" table and it makes no sense to me. And, based on the "modern" table, I'd be qualified as "rich" based on my bank account (cash) yet I'm definitely NOT rich. The whole table just seems kind of whacko.
I agree that the jumps are a bit weird, but I don't think that the "you'd be qualified as rich" thing is a problem. The thing is that a rich character doesn't just have $36,000 in cash, they also have $36M in assets and is able to spend $5000 without much issue, i.e. it's all of the above, not one of the above.

sjaffe
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by sjaffe » Sat Aug 16, 2014 1:27 pm

The entry on p. 232 of the Keeper's book for the Pnakotic Manuscripts is... incomplete. It doesn't mention that the 5 bound known copies are only partial copies of the whole work, or that they are translations (possibly poor ones) of the Greek work, or that the original was held by the people of Lomar. What's written there is very short and possibly misleading and definitely not true to the writings of Lovecraft.

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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by Zirrrus » Sat Aug 16, 2014 3:29 pm

I agree that the chapter "cover" pages need a bit of work to make them look even better.

First thing: the chapter number and the chapter title should be easily distinguishable, which is a problem with (for example) chapter 3 of the investigator's guide, which just reads: "Chapter Three Creating Investigators", the font being all the same size. I think changing the number to a (maybe roman?) numeral would add a bit of difference, as well as decreasing the "Chapter X" font size. Another (or additional) measure could be adding small symbols to front and end of that, or just a colon. Example:
~ Chapter III ~
Creating
Investigators

Another problem on the same page is simply the placement of the text. The s is right in that poor woman's face! :s(


The quotes are a nice touch, but often quite hard to read so that the only thing they accomplish is obscuring the (brilliant!) art. Changing the font to a more easily readable one, placing it in a dark and not visually "noisy" place or maybe even removing them could be solutions. Losing the quotes would be sad but might simply make the intro pages look much better.

------

Keeper's book, page 116, top box, line 2 says:
"(see Cover and concealment, page)"
With neither a page number or @@ placeholder.

Storm Knight
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by Storm Knight » Sun Aug 17, 2014 12:35 am

Keeper's book:
*The use of end marks would be nice flair at the end of chapters.
*For readability ease, you may have to respace/re-kern the columns so the text in both columns of the page are at the same level at the top and the bottom. Seen this problem throughout the book. Just adds some neatness to the overall text, IMHO.
*I see that you are using a bit more of the UK form of punctuation (US here.) I am too used to seeing punctuation marks save for the occasional colon inside quotation marks, brackets, and parentheses. I see more UK form throughout the book, and it is uneasy to read. I am too used to using Perdue's OWL site for references regarding punctuation.

Pg 14, C2: The sentence "All fail to notice..." should be in parenthesis and italicized.
Pg14, C2: The sentence "Paula wants to very much..." italics and parenthesis
Pg15, C1: "Garrie rolls a 4..." italics and parenthesis
Pg15, C1: "They do, with various results." italics and parenthesis
Pg15, C1: "Joe, Arnold..." italics and parenthesis
Pg15, C2: "The Keeper..." italics and parenthesis
Pg16, Side note: "The Haunting" should be in quotes or italics
Pg16, C2: "Paula also fails the roll." italics and parenthesis
Pg16, C2: "Paula rolls a 04..." italics and parenthesis
Pg19, C1: Should "1D4 and another 1D4" be in parenthesis instead of brackets?
Pg19, C1: The sentence could read better as: "The notation "Damage Bonus (or DB,)..."
Pg22, C1: Comma inside parenthesis of (HPL,)
Pg22, C1-2 and Pg23, C2 Some of the quotation marks don't match the font around the titles of the stories. Looks more like code font rather than styled in the same manner as the rest of the text.
Pg23, C2: I see that you are italicizing the novels/novellas, and using quotes for the short stories in the text. "At the Mountains of Madness" was italicized earlier in the text, and is in quotes here.


Also, is there a chance to put Call of Cthulhu, the story back into one of the books?

grey
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by grey » Sun Aug 17, 2014 10:14 am

Don't know if this is already mentioned, but investigators handbook chapter 1 double page picture is missing chapter name with only a "P" showing

sjaffe
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Re: Kickstarter Proof Reviews Here

Post by sjaffe » Sun Aug 17, 2014 2:16 pm

On page 263 of the Keeper's book, in the section on Bind spells, it says: "Each cast of the binding costs 1 Sanity point but no magic points. ... One option open to the caster is to invest a number of magic points equal to one-fifth of the summoned creature’s POW to gain a bonus die on the opposed POW roll to bind the monster."

This seems kind of strange, and possibly even silly to me. The first point is that first it says that the binding doesn't cost any magic points, and then it says that the caster can invest magic points. Is that an optional addition to the spell casting? Or should that read "invest a number of Sanity points"?

Secondly, how does the caster know the POW of the creature being summoned, in advance of it being summoned? Most of the creatures have a variable POW so how do you know in advance the POW of the being that comes? This is somewhat silly. I could see something along the lines of the caster being able to invest additional points (sanity or magic - whichever you meant) in the HOPE of gaining a bonus die, but it really depends on the randomly rolled POW for the creature that responds. It's not something that the caster can possibly know in advance.

And I'll repeat a complaint I've mentioned before: each of the descriptions of the Bind spell for the various creatures talks about using an enchanted blade, or enchanted whistle, or enchanted pipes, or something else enchanted but there's no enchant spell described. People coming on the 7th edition books as their first entry into the game will be hopelessly confused.

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