RPG Review: Zweihander Core Rulebook (Hardback)

I’ve previously reviewed the Zweihander PDF, and was super excited to receive a copy of the absolutely massive hardback from Daniel Fox. This review is going to be a combination of reviewing the physical book, as well as covering things I didn’t in the previous review.

The book clocks in at 669 pages (three two many, if you ask me), and definitely feels like it. This is not only a Player’s Handbook, but a GM’s Guide and Monster Manual as well, and also, ALSO, an adventure! This makes the book very weighty, and also, unfortunately, a little unwieldy if you don’t use it properly. The cover is a soft material, which feels great in your hands, and the board used for it is very sturdy. The binding seems very strong, which is necessary for a tome of this size.

One of the great things about the book, is that unless the players are actively using it to advance their characters, they won’t need it while you’re running the game. Right now, the physical book is only about 40 bucks in most places online, so there’s no reason not to have a couple of copies at the table. Players utilizing the PDF on their phones will also make passing around  the book less common, which is important here, because the size of it makes it difficult to casually pass it around as people need it. I know he’s planning on coming out with a PHB-style book, which will leave out the game master content, so I’m really looking forward to that. I think at the ideal table, the GM would hold this book with ALL the info, with the players using the player’s book for their own uses.

However, with the built-in bookmark, you can mark the most important parts you need to regularly reference. I like the bookmark so much, I’m tempted to start installing them in all my RPG books.

The book is really nicely laid-out, and it’s easy to know where in the book you need to go to find what you need. It’s distinctly separated into Character Creation, Rules, Spellbook, DM advice, Monster Stats, and Adventure. The Character creation rules take up a lot of room, so once the characters are made, you won’t need to head back there too often. For its massive size, it’s a really easy read. I found myself engrossed in reading the worldbuilding section, as it talked about the gods of the world. The spellbook section is nicely laid out as well.

I love the layout of the Bestiary, where the various creatures aren’t in there completely alphabetically, but are instead in distinct categories. If I want to play a humanocentric campaign, I can go into that section and just use the NPCs within. Other sections include Demons and Beasts, so you can easily find what you’re looking for.

I myself prefer physical copies of books over PDFs, and if you’re going to play Zweihander, I definitely recommend you pick this up. As I said before, prices are VERY reasonable online right now for a book this size, so there’s no reason NOT to get it.

Dice Monkey was sent a copy of Zweihander for review.