Knights & Knaves Alehouse

Thank you for those very informative photographs, Chainsaw.

Geoffrey wrote:Thank you for those very informative photographs, Chainsaw.

No problem. I went back and added a few more shots from the interiors of the books as well. As others have said, the page layout has changed a little bit, but, at least in this case, nothing material.

I have to say that it does feel good to own these nice new copies. The art looks really good, although you can see some very fine pixelation in what used to be line art. Overall, these really do look fantastic. My only complaint is the substitute font on the title page of the DMG.

Geoffrey wrote:Thank you for those very informative photographs, Chainsaw.

Yes, those are great photos. Thanks!

Thanks for the pics, Donovan. Some random impressions:

- My hunch is the the different paper stock made the art darker when it was printed, probably.
- I'm surprised that the DMG looks so much thinner, but it's almost not noticeable at all on the PHB and MM.
- I noticed that they removed the printing information from the title pages (which was probably wrong anyway ), and added that funky 666xxxwhateverxxx number across the bottom

I'm not seeing the "shimmer" effect you mentioned; it is that the covers are somewhat glossy too?

grodog wrote:I'm not seeing the "shimmer" effect you mentioned; it is that the covers are somewhat glossy too?

It's hard to see without waving the books around. The efreet's sword, the idol's fire and eyes and the dragon's claws and horns have a "coating" or "finish" that makes them shimmer a little in the light. It's subtle enough to be neat but not distracting or gaudy.

The DMG doesn't feel that much thinner. Maybe a bad camera angle.

What is the level title of a 5th level cleric in the reprint?

Sexay! I'll let William Blake speak for me here :

Terrex wrote:What is the level title of a 5th level cleric in the reprint?

That was in one of the pics TRP posted: it's blank

What's the story behind that level title? Appropriately enough, I am drawing a blank here.

I noticed they spelled "armour" wrong in every instance, and since I just cannot stand that sort of editorial sloppiness I am going to have to pass on these otherwise very attractive volumes.

Melan wrote:What's the story behind that level title? Appropriately enough, I am drawing a blank here.

In the earliest printings of the PHB, it's "Perfect" but should be "Prefect." However, when they tried to fix it in the third printing (when the endpapers were still orange/goldenrod), it was left out completely, and was blank in the subsequent printings Info @ http://www.acaeum.com/library/errata_phb.html The error also appears on the DM Screen as "Perfect" on both the 3/3 panels and 4/2 panels versions.

Damn, Chainsaw, your original 1e books look pretty pristine!

The reason I don’t like the glossy paper is that it makes it much harder to pencil things in. I haven’t tested that, but I assume. I wonder if that would have even occurred to the fine people at WotC.

Picked my copies up yesterday from the FLGS. It was a surprisingly pleasant experience. They had several copies of each book on the shelf and the clerk actually knew what I was talking about when I asked him if they had them.

The books look good. The covers, especially, make them feel like something worth treating with care.

Falconer wrote:Damn, Chainsaw, your original 1e books look pretty pristine!

Why thank you... I have 2-3 great quality copies of each (that I keep tucked away for myself later in life, my kids, etc) and 5-6 more beaten up copies (for daily use, throwing my backpack, taking to conventions, loaning to new players, etc). I figured it would be unfair to compare the reprints with play copies, so I broke out the real deal. You know, new vs new.

The reason I don’t like the glossy paper is that it makes it much harder to pencil things in. I haven’t tested that, but I assume.

I totally agree and found this to be a problem with the 4E books (also the pages started falling out after six months of use). I will say that this gloss feels more modest than the one in the 4E books (maybe the color pages required a thicker gloss?), so these might accept pencil better. I'll do an experiment tonight and post a pic.