Recommended WotC books?

[Libertad]

I made a thread asking for recommended 3rd party material.  Now I want to know if there's any recommended D&D books made by Wizards of the Coast.

Frostburn, Sandstorm, and Stormwrack:: Are these books any good?  Even if a didn't plan on campaigns set in these locales, do they still contain useful material?

Dungeonscape, Cityscape: I heard good things about Dungeonscape, especially the Factotum class.  Rich Burlew also worked on it, if I recall.

Monster Manual 4: The only Manual I don't own.  Heard a lot of mixed reviews about it.

In return, here are some recommendations of my own!

Tome of Battle: WotC's best attempt at closing the power disparity between casters and noncasters.  A lot of guys loved it for this, but many hated its "magic-like Wuxia" and pseudo-spell system.  I fall into the former category.

Spell Compendium: A treasure trove of awesome spells, some new and some taken from a variety of earlier sourcebooks.  A must-have for any spellcaster.

Magic Item Compendium: This revolutionized my games.  I really like its emphasis on cost-efficient, reusable magic items.

Red Hand of Doom: An all-around cool adventure.  It keeps to the classic "defend civilization from the horde" scenario with dungeon crawls and wilderness exploration, but puts an interesting spin on things with a time limit and opportunities to help in settlement defense.

Player's Handbook 2: This is a rare treat, a book notable for its large amount of player-friendly classes and feats of good quality (Beguiler and Robilar's Gambit, anyone?).

Libris Mortis, Lords of Madness, Fiendish Codex I & II: Books themed after certain monster types.  A great mix of fluff and crunch, provides a nigh-endless amount of adventure ideas in each one!

[Jackinthegreen]

I find the environmental books quite handy myself, those being Dungeonscape, Frostburn, Sandstorm, and Stormwrack.  There's a lot of good stuff in there for DMs and players alike.

[Sinfire Titan]

Cityscape is not worth it. There isn't anything truly interesting in it other than Invisible Spell, but it can provide some generic cities for your party to play around in (still not worth more than $10).

I cannot physically post in a thread about what books to buy for D&D without suggesting Magic of Incarnum, provided you don't all ready own a copy yourself.

[Ryu Hayabusa]

I made a thread asking for recommended 3rd party material.  Now I want to know if there's any recommended D&D books made by Wizards of the Coast.

Dungeonscape, Cityscape: I heard good things about Dungeonscape, especially the Factotum class.  Rich Burlew also worked on it, if I recall.

Dungeonscape is worth it. Factotums are a lot of fun and it has lots of interesting material. Cityscape's a lot less interesting and really not worth the money.

Monster Manual 4: The only Manual I don't own.  Heard a lot of mixed reviews about it.

Not worth it. I think 3 and 5 are both better.

[Shadowhunter]

All three environmental books are quite solid. I can't really decide which one is better though, since I love Frost Mages, Pirates of the Caribbean and my favourite LoZ:OoT area is Gerudo Valley (god that soundtrack is so good, and I really like the Dessert Collosus).

Cityscape is not worth it.

Tome of Magic, while you didn't mention it, is the hardest one for me to decide upon.
A third of the book has one of my all-time favourite classes (Binder fanboy) but then there's one third that's pretty underwhelming (Shadowcasting) and the last third is just plain broken (Truespeak) and not the good kind either.

I briefly entertain the idea at times to just compile all the good stuff scattered throughout otherwise quite "meh" PDF's and compile it into something full of awesome. But then I realize I don't have either the tools or the time for it and shrugs it of.

[Libertad]

Exemplars of Evil.  Heard mixed reviews about this book.  How is it?

While we're on the topic, what do people think of Elder Evils, the last 3rd Edition book ever published?

Rules Compendium.  I already know a good portion of the rules and where to find them, but does this product organize things in a clean and easy reference?

Complete Champion, the only Complete book I don't own (aside from Complete Pisonic).  Worthwhile stuff for Clerics and divine casters inside?

Let's move on to adventures!

The Shattered Gates of Slaughtergarde.  Easy and fun to run for the DM and players?

How about this trilogy?  Barrow of the Forgotten King, The Sinister Spire, and Fortress of the Yuan-ti.

The Expedition Series: Castle Ravenloft, The Ruins of Greyhawk, The Demonweb Pits, and Undermountain?

[Jackinthegreen]

The rules Compendium is organized, but some of the "clarifications" are actually nerfs or otherwise annoying changes.  For instance, within the RC it states that a creature doing a dive attack can only use claws, etc.  In the Dragonborn description it lists a Dive as doing double damage with a piercing weapon.  The difference is rather annoying overall.

Complete Champion has a lot of great stuff.  Fist of the Forest for example.

Castle Ravenloft seems like a fun adventure, but most people know it for the Codex Advocare which grants a warlock another least (or lesser?  I need to reinstall Adobe Reader) invocation.  There's also a Turn Undead variant that I don't remember well enough to comment on.

[sirpercival]

+1 Magic of Incarnum.

Also +1 Tome of Magic.  Binding is just so good that Shadowcasting & Truespeak doesn't even matter.  They should've made Binding its own book.

Exemplars of Evil is good for a couple of spells -- Friendly Fire, most notably.

Elder Evils is meh.

Dungeonscape is awesome: Factotum, DC Fighter, Trapsmith.

[Ziltoid]

The rules Compendium is organized, but some of the "clarifications" are actually nerfs or otherwise annoying changes.  For instance, within the RC it states that a creature doing a dive attack can only use claws, etc. 

That's been in the MM from the start, actually

I  think the Dragonborn (and IIRC Raptoran as well) Dive attack is a specific special attack (like Pounce and what have you), whereas the dive option mentioned in the MM is a general rule for all flying critters (ofcourse it's still silly, since plenty of flying creatures don't have claw attacks, so it's useless for them...)


As for Frostburn and Sandstorm, my Druids love Dire Polar Bears and Dire Tortoises

[RobbyPants]

I've always been a fan of Heroes of Horror, but it's more for the fluff than the crunch. It does have some nice crunchy bits like the Archivist and Dread Necromancer, and I really like a few of the monsters in there (the bog imp is one of my favorites).

Still, you have to be careful with some of the rules, like their taint rules and such.

[johnboy069]

I would reccomend PHB2, MIC, Heroes of Horror (the Dread Necromancer class is fun), Tome of Battle (RKV and JPM are great), Magic of Incarnum is fun (Incarnates and Totemists are awesome), Tome of Magic is cool as well, especially the Binder. The Eberron Campaign Setting is cool for the Artificer, and Dungeonscape is awesome for the Factotum. I also like the Complete Series (even Complete Psionic for the Erudite and Ardent). Unearthed Arcana is loads of fun to.

[Jackinthegreen]

Randomly remembered why Complete Champion usually gets mentioned for martial builds: Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian.

[Halinn]

Randomly remembered why Complete Champion usually gets mentioned for martial builds: Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian.

Complete Champion also has <X> devotion, most notably Animal, Travel and Knowledge. Then there's the Battle Blessing feat to make paladins more viable, the Trappings of the Beast set for druids and the Spontaneous Divination ACF for wizards. It's a pretty solid book.

[PlzBreakMyCampaign]

All but the campaigns and RC

[InnaBinder]

I've always been a fan of Heroes of Horror, but it's more for the fluff than the crunch. It does have some nice crunchy bits like the Archivist and Dread Necromancer, and I really like a few of the monsters in there (the bog imp is one of my favorites).

Still, you have to be careful with some of the rules, like their taint rules and such.

I love the DN, but I find it a lot more interesting when used in tandem with Libris Mortis.  If you're getting one, I strongly encourage you to get the other.

[johnboy069]

I've always been a fan of Heroes of Horror, but it's more for the fluff than the crunch. It does have some nice crunchy bits like the Archivist and Dread Necromancer, and I really like a few of the monsters in there (the bog imp is one of my favorites).

Still, you have to be careful with some of the rules, like their taint rules and such.

I love the DN, but I find it a lot more interesting when used in tandem with Libris Mortis.  If you're getting one, I strongly encourage you to get the other.

I like the DN with Tomb Tainted Soul and Crusader going into Jade Phoenix Mage.

[RobbyPants]

I've always been a fan of Heroes of Horror, but it's more for the fluff than the crunch. It does have some nice crunchy bits like the Archivist and Dread Necromancer, and I really like a few of the monsters in there (the bog imp is one of my favorites).

Still, you have to be careful with some of the rules, like their taint rules and such.

I love the DN, but I find it a lot more interesting when used in tandem with Libris Mortis.  If you're getting one, I strongly encourage you to get the other.

I agree with this.

LM isn't the best book, and their playing undead section is a joke, but it's a fairly descent book for flavor on the DM's side.

[InnaBinder]

I've always been a fan of Heroes of Horror, but it's more for the fluff than the crunch. It does have some nice crunchy bits like the Archivist and Dread Necromancer, and I really like a few of the monsters in there (the bog imp is one of my favorites).

Still, you have to be careful with some of the rules, like their taint rules and such.

I love the DN, but I find it a lot more interesting when used in tandem with Libris Mortis.  If you're getting one, I strongly encourage you to get the other.

I like the DN with Tomb Tainted Soul and Crusader going into Jade Phoenix Mage.

DN 8/Crusader 2/JPM 10 is one of my favorite builds.

[Libertad]

More of Libertad's recommendations:

Complete Warrior, Adventurer, Arcane, and Divine: Indispensable sourcebooks for expanding class options.  Who can forget the Ur-Priest, or Leap Attack?

Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting: This set the standard for campaign setting sourcebooks.  This product has more than enough material in it for a Forgotten Realms DM to set up a game virtually anywhere within Faerun.

Manual of the Planes: I loved this book back when I got it in 2001.  I dare you to read this book and not try to set up/plead for a planar-hopping campaign!

How would you guys rank the Races of... books, in order of usefulness?

[Mooncrow]

For the Race books, generally speaking, probably: Stone, Dragon, Destiny, Wild.  A lot of it depends on the group make up though, since the books are fairly narrow in application. 

The generally useful stuff from each book:

Stone has Goliaths, SCM, Whisper Gnomes, Earth Spell
Dragon has Dragonborn, Wings of Cover, Wings of Flurry and Greater Mighty Wallop
Destiny has Illumian and Chameleon
Wild has Raptorans and Arcane Hierophant