A Song Of Ice and Fire Campaign Guide: A RPG Sourcebook [Hardcover]

I would put this book on par with "Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time" world book- that is, this book is a good source of information for fans of the books and has plenty to offer those who want to game in this world setting. If you enjoy or love George R.R. Martin's "Fire and Ice" series then this book presents more information about his fictional world and perhaps collates the scattered info from the books together in a better format. For a "Fire and Ice" resource book, this is it.

If you're not into the Fire & Ice role playing game that's ok, this book delivers to those for the game and the fans of the novels not into gaming equally. For the gamers, this IS A MUST resource! For non-gamers, or I should say Fire & Ice fans, this book is also a MUST HAVE.

Book details:
The maps are larger, more extensive and in color compared to the paperback and hardback novels. Places mentioned in the stories are also located on the maps. Chronological details on the history of the world setting (or rather Westeros)is in the book- if you want to read the history of the world like a history book as opposed to figuring out all the pieces of info from the novels then this is the way to go. There are more lenghty descriptions of places, Houses, geography and lesser-known histories in the book. The artwork (especially the cover) is good. The paper quality and amount of color and illustrations are also very nice.

This book brings what the core role playing game did not- a good feel and overview of Westeros and the works of George R.R. Martin. As such, it is a core book for gamers and is filled with enough information to warrant purchasing from non-gamers into the said works.

I recommend this book to any fan of the "Fire and Ice", the massive amount of information available to the reader is worth the price and purchase.

One of the things I admired about George R.R. Martin's book "A Game of Thrones," was how he introduced minor characters without bogging the narrative down with back-story. However, that left me with the question: "How is this guy (or gal)?"

"A Song of Ice and Fire Campaign Guide" answers that and many other questions a reader may have about Martin's world of Westeros. While I did buy this book with the intention of utilizing it for the role-playing game (RPG), a non-gamer would benefit by having this as a reference.

The book contains a wealth of information on Westeros's geography, history, noble houses and of course, the colorful cast of characters--from the king, on down to some the notable hedge knights, sell-swords and servants.

I don't have a photographic memory, so I can't recall who did what to whom during Westeros's tumultuous history. However, having read the campaign guide has made me better acquinted with Martin's world than I would be if I just read the novels.

The Campaign Guide is set just prior to the events of "A Game of Thrones." So plot spoilers are at a minimum.

This book has 14 chapters:
1: history of Westeros
2: Westeros culture
3-12: This is the bulk of the book, each chapter represents a large area of westeros (The stormlands, the North, etc.), describing each area in great detail. It details the major house of the area, other major houses, minor houses, the geography, and the history. It also includes bios on all important characters including their stats
13: Beyond Westoros
14: Exploring Westoros

As mentioned, this book details westeros very well, but once you get to the stats of individual characters the quality becomes very poor. For example, even though the rulebook very clearly defines the status of a number of characters, the campaign guide seems to arbitrarily assign status (Sam Tarly and Tyrion have equal status). Just about anything in this book related to the mechanics of the RPG is inconsistent with the rule book, which will make playing the game on the fly frustrating.

As I said, the detail of Westoros is wonderful, but you could get the same detail for free from the online wiki. My suggestion is to not purchase this item for the specific purpose of supplementing your SIFRPG games.