Your Whispering Homunculus
Your Whispering Homunculus is an epic fantasy reference book for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game written by Richard Pett and published by Open Design.
By Lawrence “darth_kwan_doh” Grabowski
Your Whispering Homunculus is a compilation of articles from Kobold Quarterly by the same name. It is 169 pages of charts and game ideas for Pathfinder. At the beginning of each chapter there is a brief discussion between the Whispering Homunculus and his master. Their story is more fully explained in their very own entry. In addition to the material from Kobold Quarterly, it includes new entries from Richard Pett as well as guest spots by Greg Vaughan and Michael Kortes.
OVERALL
The aforementioned charts take a variety of forms. There are random charts for NPC generation, general adventure ideas, and new templates with adventure ideas. It also includes a wide variety of miscellaneous lists, ranging from “One Hundred Useless Objects” to “Twenty Malfunctioning or Disappointing Magics,” and, perhaps most interesting, there are variations of existing monsters, like the hydra basilisk.
RATINGS
Publication Quality: 9 out of 10
The book starts off with a cover that might be better described as “The Mischievous Homunculus,” rather than the whispering one. To me, the art looks back to earlier RPG covers. When coupled with the rather minimalist style of the inside of the book, the whole package is pleasing on the eye and easy to read. There were some odd blank pages separating some of the articles, which was a little strange. That small complaint aside, it looks great.
Mechanics: 10 out of 10
There are few mechanics in the book relative to the actual number of pages, but they are fairly interesting. The mechanics for non-standard horses and dogs is particularly interesting. It takes things like animal companions and gives them grades of quality, thus increasing the value of animals with positive traits. The variant monsters are also quite interesting. Their mechanics are laid out in a useful fashion and add interesting twists to existing monsters, like the aforementioned hydra basilisk. The rules for templates allow for similar variations on existing ideas, but have their rules presented in two forms, Quick and Rebuild. The former allows for on-the-fly modification, like when you suddenly realize how great a trollkin displacer beast would be, while the latter gets into the nitty gritty of the design, for your BBEG for example.
Value Add: 9 out of 10
If you are into charts and lists of ideas, this book is huge. As mentioned, it is tailored for use in a Pathfinder game. However, the utility of the book extends well beyond its intended use for Pathfinder. With very little effort, most of the ideas can be directly transferred to or re-skinned for use in any number of game systems. Although they don’t transfer well, the new templates and variant monsters are especially interesting for the ease with which they can add spice to an apparently run-of-the-mill adventure. After all, who wouldn’t want to see the look on their players’ faces after they tried to walk out of the orc cave only to find all the orcs had come back to life?
Overall: 9 out of 10
Your Whispering Homunculus is a solid addition to any GM’s idea library. I love how the majority of chart entries can be used as an adventure seed, regardless of its original intent. I also found myself wanting to know if the Homunculus was ultimately successful at his attempts to master magic. It was something of a chore to power through the whole book to write the review in a timely fashion, but I would have greatly enjoyed reading it at a more leisurely pace. I don’t play as much Pathfinder as I would like, but the monster variants and templates have definitely raised my interest in the system a few notches.
Enough of what I liked about it though. There are so many cool charts. What was everyone else’s favorite?
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