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What our customer's say!

"Great", I love the 4th ed. all I can say is that flows smooth when played, is fast and easy to develop and understand (even for my 6 year old son) forget the hundreds of tables and modifiers of 3.5, D&D4 is far better than that edition.

"Great for beginners, a bit of a retread for seasoned DMs", This is NOT a review of 4th Edition D&D Rules.

The new Dungeon Master's Guide (DMG) is a very useful reference for new and seasoned DMs alike. Similar to the 3.5 DMG, the 4E DMG is mostly devoted to teaching GMs the black art of creating the adventure and running a game. This may come naturally to seasoned and as such the book is of somewhat less value to those folks.

The book's most easily stated purpose can be found in the title of the first chapter: How To Be A DM. This theme is echoed throughout the book as it goes on to provide reams of inspiration for any DM looking to craft a memorable play experience.

The first three chapters are devoted almost entirely to those folks who are DMing for their first time and want to put their best foot forward. The middling chapters provide guidelines for constructing the actual content of a game: Encounters, Adventures and Campaigns. The final chapters focus on the rules minutae of creating monsters, dealing with environmental hazards and construction of entire worlds. It also presents a completely developed town and area to start your players out in if you so choose. You can also use this area as a useful example when designing your own worlds.

Naturally, however, even experienced DMs would be wise to take a look over this book as it contains numerous useful nuggets of information and guidelines on structuring well paced 4E adventures. It's a great refresher for any DM - especially those who think they know it all. Seasoned D&D DMs are, in my humble experience, usually very thickheaded. They have ONE way they like to run their game and they actively ignore any ideas to the contrary. Every DM has his "way" that he follows like a religion and is very closed off to change or feedback. I am guilty of this myself to some degree, but I try to always remember that I am there to make the game fun for my players. I think some DMs miss these points and these are the type of folks that won't like most of this book.

(FYI, these are most of the people giving this book 1 Star reviews, as they clearly have no grasp of the purpose of this book and are just using Amazon to vent their frustrations with what they perceive the rules are lacking. What these folks are missing is that the rules aren't as important as having fun at the table.)

The bulk of the rules type stuff is contained in the last half of the book. These chapters contain rules on rewarding players, various environmental factors, artifacts, world-forging, monster-making and random dungeons/encounters. For those thickheaded DMs, this is mostly the stuff you will pay for as it constitutes the bulk of what you will need to make 4E adventures. Another interesting thing I personally noticed about the monster creation sections is how easy it would be to "fake" a monster on the fly if the DM needs it. Very cool indeed.

This book's stated purpose is to teach someone how to be a good DM. Truth be told, there are exceedingly few "good" DMs out there and newbie DMs can be advised that if you follow the guidelines in this book then you can't go wrong. With the exception of some seemingly forgotten items like constructing Minions, this book otherwise fulfills it's purpose completely and admirably. The 4E DMG stands as an awesome reminder of what D&D is all about: having fun!

"useful but lackluster", This DMG is a decent read and somewhat interesting. I have allot respect for James Wyatt however find this edition to be pretty much a snore. It has a lot of good points to consider when running a 4.0 game, however its more of a book of systems to keep a game on track rather than a cool guide for bringing your world to life.



"Greatly Improved My Game", I had been running a game for about a year when I picked up the 4th Edition Dungeon Master's Guide. I have to say, it improved my game tremendously, and I highly recommend it, especially to relatively new dungeon masters. Here's why.

The book provided the guidance I needed without getting in my way. No assumptions were made about my DMing style, or the style and motivations of my players. Instead, the authors recognized D&D as a flexible game played by very diverse people, and provided advice to make the game work for everyone.

There is a section on the different archetypes of players and what their strengths, needs, and motivations are. I swear in my group I have one of each, and could never quite figure out how to deal with that. The DMG didn't pass judgment and say my power gamer was bad and how to force him to be more like my storyteller, it gave tips on keeping everyone happy but keeping them from stepping on each other's toes.

The encounter design section not only talks about how to make balanced encounters, but also how to make them interesting. There are ideas about terrain, monster roles, and hazards that help a lot. Last night, an encounter I previously would have done as "3 goblins pop out from behind a tree and whack you with swords" turned into a flaming arrow whizzing past them, setting trees behind them on fire and scaring their horses tied to the trees. They look up in time to see another flaming arrow coming from a single but powerful-looking hobgoblin sniper high in another stand of trees, and the arrow promptly sets one of the party members on fire. The melee fighters ended up trying to chop down the tree he was in, which I didn't expect, but I figured it's a large wooden object and quickly flipped to a page in the DMG that told me about how difficult it should be. A lot of advice scattered throughout the book combined to make it a much more interesting encounter than I previously would have done.

There are also sections on improvisation and what to do about actions the rules don't cover. A lot of people have complained about the lack of specific rules for things like craft and trapmaking, but I found I preferred using the general guidelines laid out in the book. There were less rules for me to keep track of, it sped up the game by not having to look up obscure rules all the time, but it was still easy to scale the difficulty as appropriate.

The one thing I dislike about the book is the huge number of mechanical mistakes. Almost all of these have been fixed in an errata which is freely downloadable from the website, but it is still annoying to have to consult the errata when something doesn't seem right.


"D &D is DEAD", I have been playing Dungeons and Dragons since the first boxed set and I have looked forward to each new version and this is no exception. Each new version has tried to improve on the core Dungeon and Dragon experience until now. This new version is not really a new version but an entirely new game with very little of the flavor or magic feeling of the original. Now it feels more like a version of WOW or another of the online games. I am not knocking the online games they can be great if that is what you want to play but if you are looking for an intense good old fashioned role playing session with a group of your friends this new version is not for you unless you are under 12. If you are an experienced role player I would suggest that you save your money and stick to 3.5 there should be a lot of second hand material for that around and several other good companies are still supporting it like Necromancer Games. I wish those people bought Dungeons and Dragons as they know what D&D should feel like. Also look for the games put out by pazzio publishing the company that used to put out the Dragon and Dungeon. In short if you are a veteran of the Dungeons and Dragons and enjoyed the old game save your money or better yet spend it elsceware there are a lot of fine games out there unfortunately this company is no longer make such products.

Read this reviews before You buy...

"Best DMG yet...even if you aren't sure about 4th edition", If you despise 4th edition and all that it stands for, then this review obviously isn't for you.


However, if you do like 4th edition, or even if you are like me and not yet sold on its merits, this book is worth considering--it's actually the best DMG ever published.

I know that's a big claim--and nothing will ever match the joy of reading the 1st edition DMG, learning about surprise rounds, experience points, campaign building and the myriad magical items available to me (including intelligent swords and the Hand of Vecna.)

But gaming has evolved over the years, and companies have decided that the core rules should be in a player's guide, and that only the behind-the-scenes tools for running a game should be in the gamemaster's guide.

This means that "gamemaster guides" exist to:
- Teach new gamers how to run a game
- Provide insights for using the game system to tell stories
- Provide the "inside information" into the game.

The risk of this, of course, is that these guides can be (and often are) dry and/or useless. The 4th edition DMG, however, handles all these elements extremely well, and is fun to read.


The rest of this review addresses how the 4th edition DMG handles these points, in detail:

*** Teach new gamers how to run the game:
The new DMG is obviously written to show MMORPG players how to run a pen-and-paper game. At times, this becomes a bit much, such as the "tip" that index cards should be given out that help players keep track of their list of quests. (To their credit, stopped short of suggesting that ?'s and !'s over the heads of NPC's be used to show players who to talk to.)

But that obvious issue aside, the book provides solid insights. There is a section on different player archetypes, how they tend to interact with (and get enjoyment from) the game, and how you can set things up to engage them. There are comments on what makes good adventures, and how to build them from the blocks provided by 4th edition. There are sections that deal with GM fairness, problems that arise, and how best to solve them. These are all invaluable to a new GM, and frankly, a worthy read to veterans.


*** Provide Insights for using the game sytem:
This is where this book absolutely shines, and why any GM considering a 4th edition game should buy and read the book.

There are chapters on creating campaigns, explaining the different ways you can create long or short stories that bring a sense of accomplishment to the table. They explain pros and cons of the multi-year monstrosity, and the short single-purpose campaign, and several other types. They show how campaigns can be lengthened, or shortened by XP mods, with some guides on how long a campaign will take. (They specifically show how to get campaigns to fit in a school year, which was a good touch.)

There is a section on creating adventures: in dungeons, in cities, in the wilderness--and they provide insights in how to make each work, and how to walk the line between keeping the game moving and giving the players free choice.

There are numerous ways it covers the creation of encounters, which were my favorite part of the book. Non combat encounters, building up fair encounters, the use of monster roles, space and terrain, creating new monster types and modifying existing monsters to up/down scale them. These were all exceptionally well done, and have frankly modified my 3rd edition GM style.

*** Provide the "inside information" into the game:
This is a fun, though light, piece of this book. Artifacts and relics are covered, of course--though more as how they operate in 4th edition, rather than long lists of them. There is also coverage of poisons and diseases--which are more interesting than in any previous edition. And there are sections on the economy of D&D, which is more specific that I'd like, but does allow game economies scale from 1st through 30th level without bogging down the players. And of course, there is solid coverage of the planes, including what they represent as game elements, and who they are appropriate for.

Of course, there is the "fluff"...the stuff publishers put into GM guides to fill them out. In this case, even the fluff is well done. The dungeon at the end of the book was clearly fluff, and I almost skipped over it. But then I went back and read it...figuring that at the very least, I couldn't comment on it in my review if I hadn't read it. As it turns out, it really isn't fluff, so much as a recap--pulling everything the book has tried to show you into a 4-encounter case study.


In summary...I repeat: Best DMG ever published, and well worth consideration even if you are a veteran GM.

"STILL MORE GARBAGE", I was terribly upset with the idea of online play. I always thought that Warcraft had that down. Why not leave it to the pros. I enjoy role playing with my friends; however, let's face it, the people that play this may not be the people I want to hang out with. That's just one of the many quarrels I have with this particular version of the game. Some of the other are too many of the rules that were good about 3.5 have changed. Over all, it's terrible; everything that was good about 3.0 has changed, and I believe that this big, steaming, heaping, nutty brown pile deserves to be flushed. I give it an overrated ONE out of FIVE. But bear in mind I can't give it a zero; unfortunately, Amazon won't let me. .000001/5

P.S. I'm going to play Warcraft.


"Wow, it's actually a guide for DMs", I'm not gonna delve into the 3.5 vs 4ed debate or anything, but I do want to point out that they finally made the DMG an optional purchase. Previous DMGs have held "behind the scenes" rules that necessitated buying them, but this one really is just a guidebook for DMs. There's very little in here that you can't find in the PHB. It's worth reading for the skill challenge rules, but other than that, only one person in your group really needs this book.

That's kinda refreshing.

"Completely new version of the D&D Rules", 4th Edition D&D is a refreshing new edition of the rules.
They have streamlined a lot of the play to make it faster and easier on the DM. Combat seems to flow better and since you're not mired down in the rules it seems more exciting. My only complaint is that it feels like they withheld some options like certain Classes/Skills/Feats/Spells. I'm sure they will release Add-On after Add-On to take care of that though.

"A worthy successor", As I noted in my review of the PHB, 4e is a worthy successor to 3.5, but it isn't a must have. If you are just starting in D&D, 4e is the way to go, but if you are happy with your 3.5 or earlier campaign, there is no big rush to end it and switch.

This edition of the DMG is focussed on designing and running good encounters, campaings and game. Specifics such as Magic Items have been moved out of the DMG and into the PHB, which is good since in the end players need to access that information. Oh, there is still specifics for less common aspects of combat, but the emphasis is on running a fun game.

For some, the DMG (and 4e in general) may be a bit heavy on defining specific roles, but the roles can be good tools for building a better game. Where the PHB classifies character roles, the DMG talks about player roles - not in terms of what to force your players into, but in terms of classifying how different people play the game so you can make sure you are giving everyone what they play to get. To old hands, these classifications may be obvious and intuitive, but they certainly can help many DMs create a better game for all.

The DMG also defines monster roles and ways of building good encounters by using monsters filling a mix of roles. It also gives structure to non-combat skill challenges.

For me, one of the big successes was in combat encounter building. In 3.0 & 3.5, combining monsters of different challenge ratings (CRs) to a final encounter rating (ER) was difficult. You could do it, but it wasn't straight forward. It was much easier to use a bunch of the same monster. Even then, you had to look up the ER for each different character level involved to determine the XP awarded.

In 4e, each monster has a role and a fixed XP ammount and you just pick monsters to fill the roles you want and have the total XP you want for the encounter, which is divided equally among the player characters. This makes it much easier to use a variety of monsters for a more interesting encounter.