Pathfinder Howl of the Wild review — Let your inner beast run free

Pathfinder Howl of the Wild is a 224-page rulebook: this book has new information about the ancestries, character options, animal companions, and foes found within the deep wilderness. For players, you'll find 6 new ancestries and archetypes. 

Who am I? I am a game master with over 6 years of experience. I play a plethora of different tabletop roleplaying games. I bounced on and off Pathfinder a few times before finally falling in love. Therefore, I am confident that this sourcebook is exceptionally strong. 

Let's talk about the New Ancestries

The Athamaru is the first one you will run across; it's an uncommon ancestry. These are fish-like humanoids who form tight-knit communities under the sea! Next is the Awakened Animal: almost any animal can become awakened, and this opens up a ridiculous amount of opportunities for your players. These are described as being rare. 

The Centaur is up next, and this is the only ancestry I have banned. The reason I have them banned is for aesthetic purposes, in general, I tend to dislike Centaurs. Anyhow, this is a half-human, half-horse nomadic ancestry. They’re an uncommon ancestry that is described as having a long history of teaching and instruction. Merfolk instantly caught my attention because I typically don’t allow water-based ancestries in my games; however, due to their description, I got inspired and built a little spot in my setting for them. Merfolk are uncommon; they’re half-human half-fish that typically use water-based magic. 

Minotaur is up next, and they’re an uncommon ancestry that was born from an ancient divine curse. I simply adore these guys, especially with how they’re depicted in this book. Surki is the last included ancestry, and they’re rare. They’re described as having an insect-like ancestry. The Surki are extremely interesting because they are capable of developing unique adaptations that allow them to use magic in unique ways. 

The new ancestries are simply wonderful, and I am deeply obsessed with them. Each one is built with enough flavor for easy insertion. This section of the book is extremely dense; I won’t cover everything here. 

The Athamaru caught my attention right away because of the potential they offer to world-building (I talk about this more before my final thoughts.) I like that their Heritages add something to their overall design. Take the Quilled Athamaru for example, it adds quills to your character. Players use these things to add a bit of gameplay to the Athamaru. 

I found the Awakened Animals to be pretty boring because everything is determined by your animal. Where I was having a bit of fun is with using the homebrew animals of my world to let players experience them from a different perspective. I also took this opportunity to flesh my world out with animals that I hadn’t thought of before. Aside from that there isn’t much gameplay here. 

Merfolk are awesome. Frankly, I don’t care about their mechanics. This Ancestry stands out among the rest and it’s not just because of the beautiful artwork. I found that adding space in my world for Merfolk was a challenge until I realized I hadn’t populated the water with anything. 

Mechanics and Rules 

Howl of the Wild includes new rules that will aid you in inserting the new ancestries. There is a huge section dedicated to Large PCs (PC stands for player character), the rules are clear and add a lot of flavor to your game. I like the challenge for players. Large PCs can also provide standard cover for small PCs. It should be noted that these PCs might need to use the rules for squeezing, those rules can be found in the Pathfinder Player Core book. This book says that large PCs should be able to acquire gear that is appropriately sized without a cost increase. I found that having space in my world where these ancestries are not common is a fun thing for my players to engage in. 

Tiny PCs also have a set of rules that are about what you’d expect. Where the fun comes in is the rules for Riding PCs. The rule goes as follows: a PC can ride another PC as long as the second PC is at least two sizes larger than the PC who is trying to hop on for a ride. Keep in mind that this requires coordination on the part of the players and the game master. When it works, it’s extremely fun to experience. 

The Aquatic PC section offers advice for adding aquatic ancestries into your game. I tend to lean towards an assistive device but some feats can help them too. Make adjustments as you see fit. The Flying PC section offers the same amount of advice but for flying PCs. Both sections are invaluable for using the new ancestries.

While I am talking about mechanics, I have to call attention to how much I appreciate this book for being such an even split in terms of content offered for players and game masters. A lot of the book includes rules and explanations which allow me to import this book into our game a lot easier. On the flip side of that, there are a ton of new options for players to choose from. 

Book Layout 

Howl of the Wild has an excellent layout, as most Pathfinder 2e books do. There are some things I want to call out here because I think it’s beautifully done. The formatting of images and text makes this book easy to skim, and there are plenty of images. 

The information contained in Howl of the Wild has a nice flow to it. Meaning that each chapter is well-placed and has great pacing. Navigating the PDF is a touch annoying because this is yet another Pathfinder PDF that does not have any links in the table of contents, but that’s a little nitpick. The text wrapping is beautifully done; you can see it in a few of the shots I posted in the sections before this one. 

What I really appreciate about Howl of the Wild is how non-intrusive everything is; there is no lore awkwardly wedged between the rules. There is also the perfect amount of spacing between each chapter. 

Final Thoughts 

Howl of the Wild succeeds in many areas, such as the new archetypes and the additional rules. I also adore the equipment added and a lot of the fluff in the book is cool too. 

I do wish that Awakened Animal had more guidelines and background choices because as it is, players seem to be getting choice-paralysis. The discussion on flavoring just isn’t enough, but it’s still appreciated. 

There are spells, equipment choices, and more class-based choices as well and they’re all fine. Nothing screamed must have to my group and me. Another area that stood out to me is how beautifully illustrated this book is, it’s oozing with the charm that so few books manage to nail. 

Is Howl of the Wild a book that you absolutely have to have? No. But the offerings inside are fun, the rule additions are well-balanced and create interesting situations during the game, and the other additions are a nice touch.