First Impressions - Xanathar's Guide to Everything (D&D 5e)

Xanathar's Guide to Everything. Including his pet fish.

TL;DR: Xanathar's Guide to Everything has some useful rules options and expansions published in it which will add to any campaign, particularly if you are rolling your own. There are interesting new spells and plenty of guidance. The character options add new flavour without feeling like a splat book. In my opinion, this expansion to D&D falls into the 'useful rather than essential' category.

 

Xanathar's Guide to Everything is a rules expansion for fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons. It fits into a similar space and style to the first edition AD&D Unearthed Arcana book, with character options and much more. Indeed, I think that some of the material in this book came from the current "Unearthed Arcana" playtest rules which Wizards of the Coast share through their websites.

I'm not the natural target for such a book, as additional crunch has long since lost its attraction to me. However, as a teenager I used to repeatedly pour over the information in rule books, reading and re-reading them to get them into my head. These days, I have far to many new rulesbooks and settings and far less time available, a reversal of my youth. Anyway, I picked this up as the new Eberron: Rising from the Last War sourcebook requires it in addition to the three usual core books. I'd tried to get it earlier in the year, but found out that the text was being updated with some errata, so wanted a 2020 copy. In the end, after four months of waiting for my FLGS to restock (and they knew I was after it), I ended up buying it from Amazon for about £12 less as my patience ran out. I'd assumed that this would be the 2017 printing, but it was the 2020 version so I was quite pleased about that.

The conceit about the book is that it is the notes of the crimelord Beholder, Xanathar, who lurks in a hideout somewhere under Waterdeep. There are lots of acerbic notes from him scattered throughout the book. They don't really add anything to the text, but they are amusing.

The book is the usual D&D format, 192 pages long in this case with a picture of Xanathar's pet fish front and centre with the Beholder lurking behind it. The contents are broken into three main sections - Character Options, Dungeon Master Tools and Spells. There are two appendices, one focused on shared campaigns such as the Adventurer's League, and the other being a selection of random name tables for non-humans and humans. The human ones draw on Earth cultures.

The Character Option chapter provides some elements to expand out a with more flavour (for example a table of tattoos for the Barbarian) and alternative paths to pursue. For example, the Sorceror gains access to three different types of sorcerous original, and the Warlock gains different patrons such as Celestials and Hexblades. On a quick read, none of this is likely to break a game and they provide some welcome variety. There is also a life path option to build a backstory, which may be fun to use if your players aren't exactly sure what they want to achieve.

The Dungeon Master' Tools chapter provides some rules expansions (falling rate, sleep, adamantine weapons) and also provides guidance on using the various tool kits and task difficulties related to it. More detail is also provided about spellcasting; some of this included using a grid (which in theory should be useful for my Strahd game on Roll20). There is guidance on encounter building and then about twenty pages of example encounter tables for different locations (which kind of bored me). Guidance is provided on trap design (including examples) and then downtime options are expanded. The section rounds out by discussing when to award magic items and more tables...

The chapter on spells provides plenty more, including those for summoning demons and devils. There are some fun spells here which I can imagine player characters wanting to get their hands on.

All in all, it's a useful supplement, but not one that I would have rushed out to get if I hadn't bought the Eberron book and discovered that it was important to it.

3rd October 2020