Places of Power: Visionary’s Perch (5e)

This installment of the Places of Power-series clocks in at 11 pages, 1 page front cover, 2 pages of advertisement, 1 page back cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, leaving us with 5 pages of content, so let’s take a look!

Amidst storm-tossed waters most dangerous, surrounded by pirate- and shark-infested waters of the Sapphire Sea, there rises a tower from a scraggy shore, one that houses an oracle most peculiar. As PCs with the required Intelligence check may find out, this seeress is actually an ancient cyclops, the last of a conquered people, watched over by the elves that elves that once destroyed her people.

The style of dressing and bearing of the militaristic elves that guard this gilded cage is provided for our convenience. The marketplace-section is absent from the 5e version.

As always in this by now time-honored series, we do also receive 6 sample events that can help ignite action or adventures, while a 6-entry-spanning table contains whispers and rumors that serve a similar function and may add some serious local color and flair to the environment in question – provided the PCs meet the respective Charisma checks.

The map deserves special mention this time around, for it covers three tiny islands on rocky crags, connected via bridges over storm-tossed waters, with the first representing the arrival area, the second the base of the elves and the third containing aforementioned eponymous perch; this contains the seeress Eudonia’s tower, a greenhouse and yet another watch post. It should also be noted that a truly wondrous and amazing b/w-rendition of the location makes for one amazing visual representation of this magical place, where Eudonia, perhaps the last of her kind, spends her days. Her personality and mannerisms are further elucidated in a nice, fluffy NPC-write-up and she is also represented in a really impressive piece of b/w-artwork. While she is trying to avoid harm, it can be surmised that in the long-term, her plan is to regain her freedom once more…and each and every quest for her insights may bring her closer to this goal…

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are very good, I noticed no serious glitches. Layout adheres to raging Swan Press’ elegant two-column b/w-standard and the pdf comes fully bookmarked for your convenience. The b/w-artworks in this one, by William McAusland, Justin Russell and Maciej Zagorski deserve special mention – they are amazing pieces. The pdf comes in two versions, one optimized for screen-use and one optimized to be printed out. The cartography by Maciej Zagorski is well-made and in b/w. Supporters of Raging Swan Press’ patreon can get access to a player-friendly, key-less version of the map, at least to my knowledge.

Jacob W. Michaels’ “Visionary’s Perch” is AMAZING. While the pdf suggests that inclusion in a nautical/pirate campaign would be easy, I can easily see this work in any campaign: Find the legendary seeress to gain the crucial knowledge required? That trope’s as old as time…but it works here. The perch is wondrous and the strangeness and alien allure is contrasted sharply by the militaristic elves, which allows the GM to weave the plot in a variety of different angles. Hostile or benign or anything in-between, this place has a lot to offer and breathes a surprising depth of themes; whether high fantasy or sword & sorcery, pseudo-Greek or Tolkienesque, with only a minimum of reskins, even the elves could be replaced with e.g. myrmidons. My one complaint here would be that I would have loved to see a couple of sample esoteric prices to pay for the gifts of the seeress, but that’s mostly cosmetic – still, considering that the 5e version loses the marketplace, the bonus content would have been nice, which makes its absence weigh slightly more in this iteration. While most characters are represented by NPC-statblocks from the classic 3 D&D core-books, I am a bit disappointed that we don’t get a sample statblock for one of the characters like Eudonia. Hence, my final verdict will clock in at 4.5 stars, though I will still round up for this version. If you have the luxury of choice, the PFRPG-offering provides slightly more content due to featuring a marketplace.

You can get this nice, inexpensive supplement here on OBS!

You can support Raging Swan Press directly here on patreon!

Endzeitgeist out.

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