Tactics & Tales (Part II)

13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide is not the companion volume to the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook. Published by Pelgrane Press, it is instead a direct continuation, literally picking up with chapter eight following on from the character seven at the end of the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook. Together, they make up the core rules for 13th Age Second Edition, the ‘Fantasy 20’ or ‘F20’ roleplaying game derived from different editions of Dungeons & Dragons which combines the crunch of epic battles with narrative or story-telling aspects for grand adventures where the Heroes are special because of their individual ‘One Unique Thing’ which sets them apart from the inhabitants of the Dragon Empire. They are true heroes, each linked to two or three of the Icons, the great powers of the Dragon Empire in 13th Age, whose influence over the story can be positive or negative, depending upon the nature of the relationship. The 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook contains everything necessary for the players, including rules for character creation, the place of the characters in the world and their relationships with the Icons, the great powers of the age, the core mechanics, and combat, plus a fantastic example of play and character creation. The 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide contains everything else, including a description of the Dragon Empire, the setting for 13th Age, advice on running the game, a bestiary, a treasury, and an introductory scenario.

The 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide starts with a description of its setting, the Dragon Empire. This is located at the centre of a large disc-shaped land surrounded by ocean and consists of the Land, the Underworld, and the Overworld. Seven cities line the shore of the stable Midland Sea, enabling easy travel between them, and each associated with one or more of the Icons. For example, Axis, the City of Swords, is home to the Emperor, but also has links to the Archmage, Crusader, and Great Gold Wyrm, whilst Glitterhaegen, the City of Coins is linked to Prince of Shadows, the Emperor, and the Dwarf King. It dips in and out subject matter, highlighting interesting elements of the setting, such the fact that the magic that causes the calmness of the Midland Sea forces monsters onto the nearby shores; that nobody likes to live too near the Imperial roads because they are haunted; and dungeons claw their way out of the earth and roam the land until stopped! Particular attention is paid to these dungeons as they are important and potential adventuring sites in a campaign, but for the most part, the write-up of the Dragon Empire is described by the authors as being ‘half-designed’. This is intentional as it leaves room for the Game Master to add her own details. There is a gazetteer which adds more specific details, whilst still leaving room aplenty for the Game Master’s own input.

This even applies to the history of the Dragon Empire with just a whole two pages devoted to it; or rather to the 13th Age and the past twelve Ages. Each Age began, rose and prospered before collapsing due to some catastrophe, and was replaced by a new Age. Each Age is associated with particular Icons and some Icons my appear in some Ages and not others, and so on. The overall description is brief at just two pages and so the Game Master may want to refer to one of the best supplements for the first edition of the roleplaying game, The Book of Ages.

Campaign advice discusses various topics—campaign identity, the ten-arc structure for the shorter campaign, customising the Icons to fit the campaign, and some examples. Campaign identity offers up a few other suggestions beyond the classic ‘Heroes on a Mission’, but clearly states that the ‘Forbidden Theme’ of a bait and switch theme to an Icon should never be done. The ten-arc structure is tailored to the maximum of ten Levels that a Hero in 13th Age can achieved, essentially one arc per Level, this replacing the Ten-Session Campaign concept from 13th Age First Edition. Customising the Icons to fit the campaign is intended to be a collaborative process between the Game Master and her players, starting with the Game Master selecting the Icon to her campaign’s main focus, whether as patron or villain, the players adding the Icons they want to see, and the Game Master deciding on the involvement of the unnamed Icons. This is supported by examples from each of the book’s authors. For example, ‘Servants of the Court’ sets up the Elf Queen as the primary heroic Icon with more powers and purviews than the Heroes suspect as she was also the Prince of Shadows with a combination of Archmage and Diabolist as the Icon villain. Of the other Icons, the Dwarf King had died whilst killing the Orc Lord; the Priestess championed civilisation whilst propping up a weak Emperor and was also the Dawn Captain, prophesised to die and become the Crusader; and both the High Druid and Lich King were involved elsewhere. These four examples actually better explain the concepts the customising process than the advice itself, showing the flexibility of the Icon roles in a campaign, whether that is in the 13th Age or a previous Age.

13th Age is played out in arcs, each consisting of three or four combat scenes or battles leavened with narrative scenes in between. The 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide discusses in detail how to design battles per arc, primarily adjusting them for the Level and number of Heroes. There is an optimal balance for the Monster Level versus the Hero Level, but the advice suggests ways in which this can be adjusted up or down, usually to fit a narrative. This might the Game Master wants the Heroes to wade through one or two hordes of monsters before they confront a bigger threat at the end of the arc, but there is plenty of scope to vary this or just simply balance all three or four of the battles that make up an arc. The advice also covers balancing the roles of monsters on the battlefield, such as archers, blockers, casters, troops, and so on; fighting a single monster type versus a single monster; ways making an encounter unfair and thus more challenging; and even making the battlefield itself dangerous as well as adding traps.

The process of designing a battle is not complex if the Game Master decides to use the suggested optimal Monster Levels, simply choosing the appropriate foes and their roles from the bestiary. However, the process does involve a little bit more arithmetic if the Game Master wants to create a battle where the Monsters Levels are not optimised to make a battle less challenging or more challenging. Fortunately, the designers have worked out the adjusted values beforehand and provide them for the Game Master in a handy table. That said, the Game Master should probably stick to the optimised Monster Levels for the first few battles and tinker with the battle design on subsequent ones. The process is pleasingly supported with a lengthy example of a Game Master designing multiple battles across the whole progress of the Heroes for First Level to Tenth Level.

Having discussed how to fit the monsters into arcs and monster roles, the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide devotes half of its pages to talking about its monsters. The monster stat block is kept streamlined and as well as an explanation of the various monster abilities, there are lists of the monsters themselves by Level, strength (standard, mook, double strength, and elite), and Role. In comparison to other fantasy roleplaying games, one obvious addition to a monster stat block for 13th Age is that of an Icon symbol, indicating a specific link or relationship between a monster and an Icon. These can be positive, negative, or mixed, and not all of the Icons in 13th Age have relationships with the monsters in the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide, but where they do, it enables the Game Master to tailor encounters and battles to the Icons featuring in her scenario or campaign. It is followed by more guidelines on tinkering with monsters, this on adjusting the stats of an existing monster or designing one from scratch.

The actual bestiary itself runs from Dire Rat, Giant Beetle, and Wolf to Wraith, Wyvern, and Zombie, including Demons, Dragons (notably the chromatic ones rather than the metallic ones, since the Heroes are more likely going to be fighting the former, Ghouls, Goblins, Kobolds, Oozes, Sahuagin, and Stirges, it is for the most part, very much a classic ‘F20’ style bestiary. The only new addition is the Hungry Star, but there are plenty of variations within many of the monster entries, and many have sections titled ‘Icons’, ‘In Play’, ‘In Your Campaign’ and ‘At Your Table’. For example, the Kobold entry has stats for the Kobold Recruit, Kobold Hero, Kobold Warrior, and Kobold Archer. The ‘In Your Campaign’ entry asks lots of the questions of Game Master as to the character of Kobolds in her campaign and notes that several variations appear in the 13th Age Bestiary and 13th Age Bestiary 2. The ‘Icons’ entry for the Ettin suggests that if one head has been swayed by the Diabolist, the other has been influenced by the Three. ‘In Play’ for the Otyugh states that it lives in filth and slime near the entrance to enemies’ caverns, so that it is close enough to alert the enemies if it attacks the Heroes or it joins the enemies if they are fighting the Heroes, before stating that, “Oytyughs were more common in an ancient age, when adventurers were so poor they used 10-foot poles to turn over dung heaps in search of loot.”

Some monsters get extended entries, for example, the Dragons. This makes entire sense, since as their entry notes, they are the Heroes of the monster world! Besides standard abilities, they are tough and have their own personalities, and they have dragon-ticks and campaign abilities. A dragon-trick can be used once per turn, such as its godlike reflexes that let a dragon reroll initiative or its magnificent scales to force a player to reroll an attack against its Armour Class. In comparison, campaign abilities like humanoid form or spells are intended to be used when appropriate rather than in every single battle that a dragon appears. Demons and NPCs are treated in a similar fashion adding further flexibility.

The treasure chapter divides its items into two types. These are one-use items and true magic items which are essentially alive, have their own personalities, and need to be attuned to. One-use items are typically potions—healing and resistance—and runes that apply bonuses to armour or a weapon or spellcasting, and there is a guide to their discovery per Hero Level. Similarly, the availability of magic items is tracked according to the Hero Level and by the tier of the campaign—Adventurer, Champion, or Epic. The personalities of magical items are reflected in quirks, quips, and quiddities. Quirks push the wielder of a magic item to act a certain way, such as dressing nicely at every social occasion or spouting puns; quips are phrases or comments that a magic item wants to hear its wielder say or a phase it wants the wielder to do; and a quiddity is its personality, effectively turning a magic item into a mini-NPC. A true magic will typically have one or more of these and they add individuality to each and every item. In many cases, magic items have more interesting mechanical effects than they do in other ‘F20’ roleplaying games and many are also linked to particular Icons. For example, the Boots of Elvenkind are linked to the Elf Queen and Prince of Shadows and require a skill check for the wearer to move quietly, but the player rolls twice an uses the higher roll, and in game needs a Quip such as ambiguous smile or mouthing the word ‘silent’ in Elvish. The list of magic items and also of wondrous items, is not extensive, but it is more than sufficient multiple arcs and campaigns, especially when it comes to weapons, since these are not listed by sword or spear or mace, but by the magical effect, so that weapons can be tailored to the campaign and the weapons wielded by the Heroes.

The 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide is rounded out with an introductory adventure, ‘A Bad Moon & The Wrong Stars’. It takes the classic ‘F20’ set-up of a ‘village-in-peril’ and gives it the 13th Age twist along with plenty of room for the Game Master’s input in form of Icon links and the details of the village. That village is Longmeadow, built on some ancient ruins. The Heroes are escorting a scholar of past Ages to Longmeadow when they are attacked by strangely dressed Elves. Investigation, again tailored to the Icons, will reveal the presence of a Living Dungeon nearby. This is the site of the adventure’s climax and what is interesting here is that the dungeon design is tiny at just four locations. In another ‘F20’ roleplaying game this would probably not be enough, but in 13th Age each room is battle, so a big encounter that all together with the fight on the road makes up a whole arc. In story terms, the play of this Living Dungeon, as much as it is in 13th Age, is not about lengthy exploration, but about getting to the action and the exciting bits. Each of the locations and the battles is detailed, some quite extensively so. Overall, ‘A Bad Moon & The Wrong Stars’ is a good introduction to the play of 13th Age and its key setting feature of Living Dungeons whilst having a lot of flexibility for the Game Master to adjust it to her players and their Heroes.

The 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide comes to a close with an array of appendices. These include a guide to using content from 13th Age First Edition, more options for the Game Master, a price list (if the Game Master and her players want to track Gold Pieces in their campaign, though 13th Age usually avoids this), tables for Game Master, a list of 13th Age First Edition resources, an excellent combined glossary and index, and more. All very useful.

Physically, the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide is well written and an enjoyable read, though there is less input and commentary in this book than their was in the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook. The artwork is suitably heroic for the Heroes and monstrous for the monsters and all together, very good.

Despite its origins in two earlier editions of Dungeons & Dragons, it takes some adjustment to both play and run 13th Age since its combination of crunch and story is quite structured. The 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook eased that process for the player and the Game Master, whilst the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide does the same specifically for the Game Master in helping her in the process of setting up and running battles, arcs, and campaign.

Tactics & Tales (Part I)

Let us be clear. 13th Age is Dungeons & Dragons. It offers a Dungeons & Dragons style of play. It is a Class and Level roleplaying game. It has the six traditional attributes, the traditional different Races of Dungeons & Dragons, and the various Classes of Dungeons & Dragons. It is even designed by the designers of Dungeons & Dragons. Not one edition of Dungeons & Dragons, but two editions of Dungeons & Dragons. It might even be called ‘Dungeons & Dragons 4.5’. What it calls itself is an ‘F20’ or ‘Fantasy 20’ roleplaying game, a roleplaying game derived from the family of Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying games. Yet it is also very much its own thing and has been from the start. When 13th Age was published in 2013, the hobby was in an uncertain place as it always is when it is between editions of Dungeons & Dragons. In 2013, Dungeons & Dragons, Fourth Edition was done, never having been as well received as its predecessors, and Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition had yet to appear, yet to make the splash that it did on Dungeons & Dragons’ fortieth anniversary in 2014, and yet to make its glorious ascent into the mainstream and acceptance as legitimate pastime. What was available then, was D&D Next, the playtest version of the next edition. It was into this liminal space that 13th Age slipped in 2013. Published by Pelgrane Press, 13th Age did what Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition also did. Which was to take the best features of the previous editions of Dungeons & Dragons and rework them. In the case of Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, that would be to create the next edition of the venerable roleplaying game. In the case of 13th Age, that would be to combine its style of play with a style of play that had come from another wing of the hobby, one that was radical and all but anathema to Dungeons & Dragons—storytelling games. Certainly, not a direction that Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition was ever going to go in. The aim with 13th Age was to provide story and crunch, and so it is with 13th Age, Second Edition.

13th Age, Second Edition comes in two books, one a direct continuation of the other. The first is the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook, which provides everything necessary for the players, including rules for character creation, the place of the characters in the world and their relationships with the Icons, the great powers of the age, the core mechanics, and combat, whilst the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide contains a description of the Dragon Empire, the setting for 13th Age, advice on running the game, a bestiary, a treasury, and an introductory scenario. The emphasis in 13th Age is on the Player Characters and their exploits as heroes and legendary heroes to be, not just in the epic battles they will fight—and fight from First Level to Tenth Level, but on the epic stories that will be told in the process. The battles are the focus of the roleplaying game’s self-confessed ‘crunch’, providing detail and flavour whilst also making the battles fast-paced and exciting. The epic narrative or story-telling aspect of 13th Age is handled by making every single Player Character special with his own ‘One Unique Thing’ which sets him apart from everyone else in the Dragon Empire; by replacing skills with Backgrounds that broaden player choice, add depth to the setting, and enable flexibility in how they are used; and in linking each Player Character to two or three of the Icons, the great powers of the Dragon Empire in 13th Age, whose influence over the story can be positive or negative, depending upon the nature of the relationship.
One of the great things about 13th Age, Second Edition is that it compatible with 13th Age, First Edition, which means that the Game Master and her players have access to some great supplements, such as the Book of Ages which opens up the history of the Dragon Empire and the killer dungeon, Eyes of the Stone Thief. However, 13th Age, Second Edition is a new edition and that does mean changes. Pelgrane Press actually includes a list of the major changes here for the benefit of Game Master of 13th Age, First Edition. Much of it has been to clarify the rules as much as streamline them. For example, instead of using days as a time unit to indicate the period in which certain powers work, the term is now ‘arc’. This allows the period to be used narratively rather than being constrained by time. The number of Icons has been reduced from thirteen to twelve (actually making it easier to roll for them randomly), the Orc Lord having been killed in a recent war—exactly how is up to the Game Master and her players to decide. This is the major change to the Dragon Empire and is connected to another change, which is the removal of the Half-Orc as a player choice in terms of Race—or rather Kin as 13th Age calls it. This is intentionally done to avoid the controversy surrounding the nature of the Half-Orc, and is instead replaced by the Troll-kin. It serves a similar, combat-orientated, brutish role, but is connected to the High Druid or the Emperor Icons rather than the Orc Lord. Other changes to Kin include more choices in terms of Kin powers, the removal of ability bonuses based on Kin, and the making of Player Character Kin special. The removal of ability bonuses based on Kin means that a player can place them wherever he wants—though he will probably want to place them to benefit his choice of Class, and by making Player Character Kin special, that is, they possess the special Kin Powers rather than having every member of their Kin do so, avoids stereotyping and widens player choice.
Then all of the Classes in 13th Age have been adjusted, from minor tweaks to major overhauls. For example, the simplest and easiest of Classes to play, the Barbarian and the Paladin, receive minor tweaks, the Barbarian Rage feature changed to be a wider critical hit range rather than roll two twenty-sided dice to attack and the Paladin’s ‘Lay on Hands’ becomes a feature of the Class rather than a talent, ‘Smite’ inflicts more damage, and so on. Major overhauls include the Bard Class, whose features and talents are based on the type of performance—Brass: Horn & Trumpets, Dance: Poise & Motion, Drums: Rhythm & Percussion, Flutes & Pipes & Ocarinas, and Strings: Lutes & Harps & Guitars—which also presents a greater choice for the player. The Sorcerer retains its Breath Weapon, the type of damage depending on the Dragon-type, and gaining bonuses to both to hit and Critical Range from the Escalation die, and can empower his spells in one round to cast for double the effect, including damage, the next. There are a lot of changes here of varying magnitude throughout 13th Age, Second Edition, affecting everything from Icons and Icon connections and combat rules and more, all based on a decade’s worth of play of, and feedback about, 13th Age, First Edition. The aim is to streamline and ease play, especially for the player new to 13th Age.
To that end, one big change that the roleplaying game does make to 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook in order to help the neophyte player and Game Master is to give an extensive example of play right after the introduction. Most examples of play run throughout a rulebook, but here 13th Age frontloads it in one go, taking the reader through the process, step-by-step, of creating a character—selecting Icon connections and determining their relationships, choosing a Class and Kin, designing a One Unique Thing, setting ability scores, selecting gear, picking Talents and a Feat, creating Backgrounds, and so on. At each stage, particularly in relation to the Icon connections, One Unique Thing, and Backgrounds, the example of play shows how they can tie into the setting and into the campaign that the Game Master is running. Once done and the example Player Character is presented on a character sheet, the Player Character is taken through her first arc, her first series of battles, in the process showcasing combat and suffering damage, resting, bringing Icon connections into play, and more. It is annotated with pointers as where to learn more about each aspect of the creation process and the play, further, like any good example of play or any good example of the rules, what 13th Age is doing here is showing the reader how the roleplaying game is first intended to be set up and then played. It saves the telling of how this is done for afterwards, the reader having been prepared for it by that point.
A Player Character in 13th Age has the traditional six abilities—Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma—plus a Kin, Class, One Unique Thing, and Backgrounds. There are fourteen Kin, which are Human, Dwarf, High Elf, Silver Elf, Wood Elf, Forgeborn, Gnome, Half-Elf, Halfling, Holy Ones, Troll-Kin, Dragonic, Holy One, and Tielfling. Of these, the Silver Elf is also known as the Drow, and the Dragonic, Forgeborn, Tielfling, and Holy One are by default less common. The nine Classes are Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, and Wizard. Some obvious Classes, the Druid and the Monk, are not included, their details being in 13 True Ways, though not yet for 13th Age, Second Edition. The process is a matter of making choices rather than rolling dice, including selecting ability values.
Lottie Custard
Class: Rogue Level: 1
Kin: Halfling One Unique Thing: There isn’t a lie I haven’t heard and a truth that I haven’t hidden
Connections: Prince of Shadows (Conflicted/2), Emperor (Negative/1)
Backgrounds: I’m a Halfling, of course I can bake pies +2, My tongue is not so much silver, as golden +4, If I don’t know, I know man who can +1, Old Town Valley Girl +1 Strength 12 (+1) Constitution 15 (+2) Dexterity 17 (+3)
Wisdom 14 (+2) Intelligence 14 (+2) Charisma 17 (+3) Armour Class 15 (Light)
Physical Defence 15
Mental Defence 15
Hit Points 24
Weapons: Mother’s Third Best Flat Iron (d8), It’s just a fruit knife (1d6)
Kin Power: Evasive
Class Features: Bravado, Sneak Attack, Skulduggery
Class Talents: Shadow Walk, Shift, Wriggle, and Roll, Tumble
Class Powers: Evasive Strike (At-Will), Deadly Thrust (At-Will/1 Bravado), Flying Blade (At-Will)
Feat: Smooth Talk 13th Age is played out in arcs, each consisting of three or four combat scenes leavened with narrative scenes in between. The most basic of mechanics involves the Backgrounds, which work as skills in other roleplaying games, but narratively more flexible. A character’s Icon connections can also affect the narrative by providing knowledge, adding detail, securing help, triggering flashbacks, and other options, his player deciding what the actual effect is by working with the Game Master. This does not automatically happen every arc, a player needing to roll to see if it does for each Icon connection, and if it does, it can only happen once per arc. When an Icon comes into play, there is a chance that it will come with a ‘Twist’ and as the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook states, that is when, “The GM also gets to have some fun, adding a twist that improves the story by making the heroes’ lives a bit more interesting… but not so complicated that the connection turns bad for the heroes.” A twist will also occur if a player does not roll successfully to involve his character’s Icon connections, in which case the Game Master rolls for a random Icon to be involved. This is all backed up by detailed descriptions of the Icons—even the Orc Lord, helpful advice and plenty of examples and suggestions which will make the game play interesting and engaging.
Combat is comparatively much more complex and where the crunch occurs in 13th Age. It is also the focus of most of a Player Character’s Class talents, features, and feats, as well as spells for the spellcasting Classes. A Class’ talents are divided into three types that indicate their usage—at-will, once per battle, and once per arc. For example, at First Level, the Cleric Class can cast spells such as Combat Boon, Javelin of Faith, and Sacred Violence at will, Mark of Enmity and Spirits of the Righteous once per battle, and Mighty Healing and Hammer of Faith once per arc. The effects of talents increase as a Player Character rises in Level, as does total Hit Points, number of Recoveries (used for healing Hit Points) and feats, and so on up to Tenth Level. 
Where combat in 13th Age gets exciting, even exhilarating, is in the use of the Escalation Die. This sits in the middle of the table and comes into effect on the second round of the combat and then on subsequent rounds. On the second round, it gives a ‘+1’ bonus to all of the Player Characters, on the third round it gives a ‘+2’ bonus, on the fourth round, it gives a ‘+3’ bonus, and so on all the way up to the seventh round and after. It applies to the Player Characters only, not the monsters or NPCs, it can de-escalate or temporarily freeze, and it can trigger the powers of some Classes depending upon the number it is at or whether it is odd or even. The aim is to push combat forward and give it momentum once past the initially difficult rounds, rather than have it bog down in detail and unnecessary crunch.
All of the content in the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook (and also in the 13th Age Second Edition Gamemaster’s Guide) is supported by helpful examples, suggestions, and advice, some of which takes the form of commentary and interjections from the authors. This is where they talk directly to the players and to the Game Master, telling them how they ran their games, what worked, what did not work, what they think of some of the feedback on the changes to the new edition, and more. It adds a personal touch to what is very much not a drily academic-in-tone rulebook and escalating, a little, its engaging style.
Physically, 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook is a great looking book. The artwork is solidly heroic fantasy, apart from the Icons, which are drawn as a cross between the decoration on Greek vases and icons for the Greek Orthodox Church. The book is well written and despite the complexity of its crunch, never less than readable. It is supported by a very decent combined index and glossary.
It is difficult to truly criticise the 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook. The main issues are perhaps that some of the Classes are still too complex to play with ease, especially in comparison to other ‘Fantasy 20’ roleplaying games and that some fans of 13th Age, First Edition are not necessarily going to be happy with all of the changes. Yet even the designers acknowledge this and even applaud some groups that want to keep playing 13th Age their way.
The 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook is the players’ book and the core book for 13th Age, Second Edition. It does what a new edition of a roleplaying game should do and improve and tweak the rules and the game to make it play better, in this case based on lengthy playtesting and feedback, and then make it accessible. In particular, it does this with its lengthy example of campaign set-up, character creation, and play that showcases how 13th Age is intended to be played and readies player and Game Master for the rules that follows. Yet it goes even further by having the designers explain their decisions and give alternative suggestions. 13th Age Second Edition Heroes’ Handbook is everything that the 13th Age player is going to need to help set him and his character up for some heroic fantasy.