Pathfinder Player Companion: Monster Hunter's Handbook

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Pretty much every PC is going to fight against "monsters" at some point in their career. The Monster Hunter's Handbook, in a two-page introduction explains how "monsters" is a pretty broad term, and that for the purposes of the book, it's being applied to "creatures of primal dread and devastation such as black puddings, froghemoths, purple worms, wyverns, or even the terrifying Tarrasque." More specifically, the book will mostly focus on creature type like aberrations, animals, fey, magical beasts, oozes, and outsiders (not constructs, humanoids, plants, or vermin). The introduction includes four brief backgrounds for monster hunter characters (Challenger, Scholar, Stalker, and Survivor) and an associated trait for each one. The traits are all useful and very well done--the one for the Scholar, for example, gives you an extra piece of information when you identify creatures of some types, while the one for the Stalker gives a PC a limited type of the scent special ability against a particular creature type.The front cover is great--remohraz are nasty--and the image is reproduced as the inside back cover (sans text). The inside front cover has capsule descriptions of monster-hunting organizations in Golarion: the Duskwardens, Fort Longjaw, the Knights of Ozem, the Pathfinder Society, the Order of the Pike, and the Mendevian Crusaders. There are references to other books with more information on each of these, and it's a good way to help players better integrate their characters into the campaign setting.The body of the book is a series of two-page-long sections on a variety of topics. The interior artwork is fantastic.* "Hunting Monsters" contains general tips and suggestions for tracking and finding creatures of different types in Pathfinder, with good suggestions of spells, abilities, and archetypes from other books that make the task easier. I always appreciate little "cheat sheets" like this that gather information on a particular topic in one place, because there's just *so much* material for Pathfinder out there. The section also has four new feats designed for hunters, rangers, and slayers--they look ok.* "Aberrations" contains some general tips for fighting them, and also suggests feats and special abilities for builds focussed on hunting them. It goes through common aberrations by name (like chokers and will-o'-wisps) and why they're dangerous. The section introduces two new archetypes: the Abolisher (for Inquisitors) and the Green Scourge (for Druids). They look okay. There are two new feats, one of which (Resisting Grappler) looks great--it gives you an attack of opportunity if you're the subject of a grapple attempt by a creature with the grab special ability (and so many monsters have that!).* "Animals" also has general tips, and then introduces a a trio of "Bull-Catcher" style feats. I found them pretty unimpressive. There are a couple of other feats and rogue talents of all things. My favorite new feat in this section is Pacify Animal, which allows a character to use their wild empathy against a hostile animal (which is usually when it would be most useful).*"Fey" talks about the creatures' special defences and trickiness before introducing two new archetypes: Defender of the True World (for Druids) and Luring Piper (for Bards). The Luring Piper is a "Pied Piper" concept and does look to be pretty effective against fey.* "Magical Beasts" contains tips, but less useful ones since magical beasts are such a diverse collection of creatures with little in common. The section has a new Cavalier archetype called Disciple of the Pike and a new order called Order of the Hero. I really like the archetype as it gives a pikeman alternative to the traditional mounted Cavalier. The new order is solid as well.*"Monstrous Humanoids" contains the usual tips and seven new feats. A couple of the feats involve disguising yourself as a monster, something we all made fun of a player for doing years ago. Mea culpa!* "Oozes" has a hilarious picture of the Iconic Alchemist trying to stuff one in a jar. Speaking of Alchemists, there's a new Oozemaster archetype that sounds kind of fun (though it gives up a lot). There are also new Alchemist Discoveries, one of which (Splitting Mutagen) could be pretty powerful!* "Outsiders" focuses on creatures apart from the usual devils and demons. There's a new Paladin archetype ("Banishing Warden") and a few new feats. One of the feats, Anatomical Savant, is potentially cool--it gives you a chance to land critical hits against creatures that are normally immune to them!* "Other Monsters" has general tips for fighting things like constructs, dragons, plants, undead, and vermin. This is the only four-page-long section in the book, and contains several new feats that are really good. I particularly like Creature Focus which essentially gives you the Ranger's Favored Enemy feature.* "Trophies" contains feats for collecting monster parts and using them to craft magic items. It actually turned out to be fairly interesting. The section also introduces a new archetype, Psychodermist (for Occultists) that builds on the trophy idea. It has a pretty good feel, and I could imagine trying it out sometime.* "Monster-Hunting Gear" has a collection of very minor (but cheap) items, most of which provide small bonuses to skill checks in very specific situations. Still, there are a couple of interesting ones.* "Magic Items" introduces several new ones. I like the detecting dart (hit someone with it and you can track them for 24 hours) and the nest revealer (locates creatures of a specific type within 10 miles).* "Monster-Hunting Spells" is the last section. Lots of good ones here!Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by the Monster Hunter's Handbook. There's a ton of clever, useful, and balanced new spells, class features, and magic items. The tips on fighting monsters of different types would be useful to a relatively new Pathfinder player, and here's a lot here that helps even experienced players build their PCs to specialise in fighting monsters of particular types.