Overall First Impression: 3.5 out of 5 .
The Toolkit comes in a standard-sized box with approximately 1.5 inches of depth, rather than the half-sized box of the Adventurer's Toolkit. Also of note: this is not a sturdy reusable box like previous offerings, but more like a cereal box – after you open it and integrate its contents with your main game, you will likely throw it away.
Inside is a cardboard fold-up that keeps everything secure and undamaged, but again is pretty much a throwaway after you open it up for the first time. The contents are the main book, which is the same size as the rulebooks, a pack of item & locations cards, a pack of career-sized Nemesis Organization cards, and the GM screen itself.
Item Cards: The item cards are what they should have done with all equipment from the start. They have an illustration on the front and encumbrance & play notes on the back, all where you need them for easy reference – bravo! They are clearly geared towards "loot" or things the GM might use as a reward. The Locked Chest and Mysterious Flask cards will be of particular use.
Location Cards: The location cards round out the initial set nicely with some excellent additions, and looking through them, they've clearly picked a good mix for maximum utility: Rural Settlement, City Gates, and Merchant's Wagon among others. Of particular note is the Burning Building card, which really look like fun.
Nemesis Organization Cards: These cards look very interesting at first glance, with a description on one side and two trackers on the other. One tracker is for positive game effects for when the organization is doing well, and the other has penalties for when they are doing poorly.
The Book: The book has 8 chapters and an Appendix, and like all the previous rulebooks, it is lavishly illustrated with full color throughout. It seems to be better organized than the main rulebook, but that could just be because there's less material broken into a large number of chapters.
Chapter 1 – Nemesis NPCs and Organizations: Nemesis NPCs are essentially NPC characters that get their own character sheet, action cards, etc. It's nice to see this explicitly spelled out, but this shouldn’t be a surprise to veteran GMs. Nemesis organizations use the accompanying pack cards in the kit, and all members of the organization receive the benefit or penalty listed on the card depending on the condition of the tracker. It's a nice game effect the could also be used for other purposes, such as a measure of the morale of townsfolk or a group of NPCs. Expect to see this concept expanded upon by fans.
Chapter 2 – Episode Templates: This chapter contains a number of canned encounters for use by beginning GMs or those looking for a one-off or sidetrack encounter. They all seemed in keeping with the Warhammer background, but experienced GM's may not find much of use in this chapter.
Chapter 3 – Making Progress: The title of this chapter is something of a misnomer, as it is devoted to the use of progress trackers of various types for different situations. There are some interesting and novel ways to set them up: the split T, the tug-of-war, and a decent guide to employing them in your games, but again, experienced GMs may not find much here.
Chapter 4 – Enjoying the Journey: This chapter covers general game tips and ideas about how to more effectively GM the game from a mechanical standpoint. It looks like this will be of use to more novice GMs.
Chapter 5 – Advancement Insights: This section covers creative ways to reward your players. In addition to the standard things (XP and Fate Points), it covers allowing non-career advances, additional stance track purchases, and generally awards "outside the box" (or rules).
Chapter 6 – Setting the Scene: There can never really be too much written on this topic, as it tends to be key to the enjoyment of any group's game. It covers tips on GMing in an immersive, narrative way – how to "show" rather than "tell," and a number of other writer's tricks that translate well into gaming. This is an excellent section for both new GMs and those that want to improve their skills.
Chapter 7 – Rewards & Incentives: This covers giving out rewards during the game. While Fortune Points and experience are the obvious ones, it also goes into more innovative ways to reward your players, such as removing Recharge Tokens from their action cards.
Chapter 8 – Optional Rules: One of the best chapters of the book, this section covers a number of Action Card options, such as using them before fully before recharged with a penalty, casting options with difficulty based on spell/blessing rank, and also options for greater lethality. I expect that almost every game group would adopt one or two of these.
Appendix 1 – The book finishes with a Master Index for all the books published to date. This is late, but welcome.
The Screen: This is both the best and worst part of the kit. Best in that it is of fantastic durability and graphic quality; I'd be happy to have it on the table from the player side. Unfortunately, their choice of material for the GM side is geared far more to new GMs than those that have been playing for a while. 3/4 of a panel to cover symbols on the dice? There are similar choices that favor a GM just starting with the game. There are some nice touches of use to any GM, such as a tracker at the bottom on one panel, and several spots at the bottom of another panel for A/C/E pools, but in terms of content, it really seemed thrown together rather than well thought out.
