This is really vague. Like, it would really depend on the library, why we're in the library, the state of the library, who owns it, the tone of the campaign, and so forth and so forth. This is something that can only be really answered on an encounter-by-encounter basis.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The question doesn’t make a lot of sense, but if you are looking for books to be found on shelves in your campaign, then here are a few. Larry Totter and the Magician’s Rock
A number of my players already had enough experience in the game to metagame any common monster.
So I created a bestiary of a number of them and included many of those I planned to use.
If they were interested I handed them each a sheet of the list of monsters.
Then when they encountered the monster in the game I would allow meta gaming. HOWEVER, I would not allow player A to tell Player B that this or that works, while in combat. It they observed them from a distance then they could.
However, most of them didn't bother looking up stat blocks. The next week they had
in a dark corner, with a chill in the air around them, the thickly bound, heavy volumes of Grimtooth's Traps.
The Canticle of Chicory
The history of Wyrlde, volumes one through five
The Future History: Legends, Myths, and Wonders of the World That is Yet To Be.
Conquering 101 for the Less Foolish (written by Alexander and Xerxes)
Conquering 201: Showing Them Up (from Atila and Gengis)
Tale #1002.
Handbook of the Realms
Oddities and Ostrophs: Orinkinalium Corruptibilium
THe Collected Works of Feldspar Tailings
In my game, there is a merchant adventurer who, in his retirement, wrote down everything he knew about the things he encountered in his travels. This is the Shim Sheroo's Critteralia Wyrldica. It is available for purchase, and a light version of it is considered a basic part of training for some. This is a handout the players can get.
It is the equivalent of the Monster manual, complete with stat blocks, but...
Shim is an unreliable narrator who wrote much from memory.
The only real statblocks are all in the DM's Codex for the game. All the rest are from the perspective of a person in the world, and so only give some value (even the stat blocks are different because they don't describe the creatures in D&D terms but in world perspective terms).
Not suggesting it for you -- it is a lot of work, lol -- but it is something to consider.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
As others have said the question is incredibly vague and open. What world? What library?, What is the party mission and the player’s interests?
In the FR world the most valuable “books” are probably the Nether scrolls and finding even one (even the badly designed and lore ignoring 5e one - the Nether Scroll of Azumar) would be momentous find changing the finder’s life forever.
A "Popup Book of Demons" - only the popup means that they popup AND OUT of the book.
"Things not to do when Adventuring" - which lists every single mistake that your party have made, and nothing else, only that party's mistakes.
hmmm pop up book of demons.
Open the book and a card board cut out of a demon pops up. If they don't shut the book right away the portal on the page summons the demon from its plane.
Hm. An idea I had for an adventure was "ABCs for titans". It's just a normal ABC book, only it uses a monster for every letter, and it was designed for near-divine entities so it's a magic item that can pull you into the book (I was originally thinking about flashcards, but could also be a book).
I would more than likely just be looking for information. Not any specific book. And libraries do not only hold books but any printed materials. Scrolls, single pages, tomes and books, maps and in some cases the collected libraries of famous or rich donors.
If it was just some random encounter I could spend a week alone just looking through to get an idea of what was in the library. They didn't have any standard cataloging systems 200 years ago. The contents could be listed by book size for all anyone knows.
But if I was a caster I would be looking for that type of information. If I was a fighter I might look for the location of some great weapon or if I was a rogue the location of great riches. Everyone would look for their own personal wishes.
As for specific book names like others have posted. Well I can't list better than they have.
- Journal of the Fallen Arch paladin: The logbook of a very famous paladin of Abba, copies of this journal are kept under extreme security and only shown to the most trusted acolytes of the faith. The titular Arch-Paladin was one of the most accomplished monster hunters in the land, and their recorded notes are one of the finest primary sources on how to identify and terminate things that go bump in the night. But the writer suffered an extreme crisis of faith less than halfway through their career; they never lost the drive to protect the innocent, but they did lose their faith in their god and the order. Maintaining the pretext of serving the church so they could continue their work, the evidence of their crisis and eventual abandonment of their faith is written all over the pages. Any paladin or cleric of the same faith who reads this book in unredacted form is in danger of either losing their faith or turning oathbreaker/blackguard.
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"You are a beginner once, but a student for life." - Firearm Instruction Adage.
My party met a gnome somewhat recently in game who had a book that was an account of some field studies done on mimics, "Middem Closomdart's Treatise on Malignant Mimicry" or otherwise known as "Middem's Malignant Mimicry". Along with details of their studied behaviors, habitats, etc. Middem made the argument at a point in her book that mimics might more accurately be considered a more advanced form of ooze.
Same gnome also had a smaller book just titled "Names to Run Away From" that was a small collection of dangerous creatures with just very brief and basic descriptive text provided for each and an occasional sketched representation.
I know my OP was very vague, that was intentionally. I wanted to see what people would come up with that way. But now let me focus in and give some details.
The library itself is located in a monastery and will only house books, manuscripts, tomes, parchments, etcetera that relate to the world(worlds) the campaign takes place in, all nonfiction stuff…..so sadly there will be no copies of ‘Tusk Love’
The monastery its self is somewhat hidden and exist outside of the influence of ruling counsel of the kingdom’s control so there may be some documentation in the library that contradicts the official accounts of history, there will more than likely be some documentation on some band magical practices as well.
I have a D100 table of books that are in the library, and if a player says that want to just grab a random book I will have them roll and they will find the corresponding book.
So generally what I am looking for is if you were in this campaign, and came to this library what would you search for specifically, or would you just grab random books off the shelf?
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If you, or your party, encountered a library during a session what book or books would you want to find in it?
This is really vague. Like, it would really depend on the library, why we're in the library, the state of the library, who owns it, the tone of the campaign, and so forth and so forth. This is something that can only be really answered on an encounter-by-encounter basis.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The question doesn’t make a lot of sense, but if you are looking for books to be found on shelves in your campaign, then here are a few.
Larry Totter and the Magician’s Rock
The Legend of Catlantis
Pride and Extreme Prejudice
Conversational Abyssal
Conversations with the Four Horsemen
A History of Croutons
Necromancy for Dummies
Gnomish Poetry
A Collection of Halfling Folktales
Poems of Bob Frost
Orc Memoirs
The Zankallala defeats the Dodo
Nine ways to cook a slug
Herbalism 101
Understanding the Ordning
The Idiot’s Guide to Dragonslaying
Anything with a spell scroll
The Far Side gallery. it is a tome with a huge collection of plot, puzzle, and trap ideas
However, one time in a library I had a bestiary.
A number of my players already had enough experience in the game to metagame any common monster.
So I created a bestiary of a number of them and included many of those I planned to use.
If they were interested I handed them each a sheet of the list of monsters.
Then when they encountered the monster in the game I would allow meta gaming. HOWEVER, I would not allow player A to tell Player B that this or that works, while in combat. It they observed them from a distance then they could.
However, most of them didn't bother looking up stat blocks. The next week they had
in a dark corner, with a chill in the air around them, the thickly bound, heavy volumes of Grimtooth's Traps.
The Canticle of Chicory
The history of Wyrlde, volumes one through five
The Future History: Legends, Myths, and Wonders of the World That is Yet To Be.
Conquering 101 for the Less Foolish (written by Alexander and Xerxes)
Conquering 201: Showing Them Up (from Atila and Gengis)
Tale #1002.
Handbook of the Realms
Oddities and Ostrophs: Orinkinalium Corruptibilium
THe Collected Works of Feldspar Tailings
In my game, there is a merchant adventurer who, in his retirement, wrote down everything he knew about the things he encountered in his travels. This is the Shim Sheroo's Critteralia Wyrldica. It is available for purchase, and a light version of it is considered a basic part of training for some. This is a handout the players can get.
It is the equivalent of the Monster manual, complete with stat blocks, but...
Shim is an unreliable narrator who wrote much from memory.
The only real statblocks are all in the DM's Codex for the game. All the rest are from the perspective of a person in the world, and so only give some value (even the stat blocks are different because they don't describe the creatures in D&D terms but in world perspective terms).
Not suggesting it for you -- it is a lot of work, lol -- but it is something to consider.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
As others have said the question is incredibly vague and open. What world? What library?, What is the party mission and the player’s interests?
In the FR world the most valuable “books” are probably the Nether scrolls and finding even one (even the badly designed and lore ignoring 5e one - the Nether Scroll of Azumar) would be momentous find changing the finder’s life forever.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
A "Popup Book of Demons" - only the popup means that they popup AND OUT of the book.
"Things not to do when Adventuring" - which lists every single mistake that your party have made, and nothing else, only that party's mistakes.
Book of mimics
hmmm pop up book of demons.
Open the book and a card board cut out of a demon pops up. If they don't shut the book right away the portal on the page summons the demon from its plane.
Hm. An idea I had for an adventure was "ABCs for titans". It's just a normal ABC book, only it uses a monster for every letter, and it was designed for near-divine entities so it's a magic item that can pull you into the book (I was originally thinking about flashcards, but could also be a book).
I would more than likely just be looking for information. Not any specific book.
And libraries do not only hold books but any printed materials. Scrolls, single pages, tomes and books, maps and in some cases the collected libraries of famous or rich donors.
If it was just some random encounter I could spend a week alone just looking through to get an idea of what was in the library.
They didn't have any standard cataloging systems 200 years ago. The contents could be listed by book size for all anyone knows.
But if I was a caster I would be looking for that type of information. If I was a fighter I might look for the location of some great weapon or if I was a rogue the location of great riches. Everyone would look for their own personal wishes.
As for specific book names like others have posted. Well I can't list better than they have.
Books that are mimics. Hundreds of them…
lol, love this idea!
- Journal of the Fallen Arch paladin: The logbook of a very famous paladin of Abba, copies of this journal are kept under extreme security and only shown to the most trusted acolytes of the faith. The titular Arch-Paladin was one of the most accomplished monster hunters in the land, and their recorded notes are one of the finest primary sources on how to identify and terminate things that go bump in the night. But the writer suffered an extreme crisis of faith less than halfway through their career; they never lost the drive to protect the innocent, but they did lose their faith in their god and the order. Maintaining the pretext of serving the church so they could continue their work, the evidence of their crisis and eventual abandonment of their faith is written all over the pages. Any paladin or cleric of the same faith who reads this book in unredacted form is in danger of either losing their faith or turning oathbreaker/blackguard.
"You are a beginner once, but a student for life." - Firearm Instruction Adage.
This is a pretty great one; I'll have to try and remember it.
My party met a gnome somewhat recently in game who had a book that was an account of some field studies done on mimics, "Middem Closomdart's Treatise on Malignant Mimicry" or otherwise known as "Middem's Malignant Mimicry". Along with details of their studied behaviors, habitats, etc. Middem made the argument at a point in her book that mimics might more accurately be considered a more advanced form of ooze.
Same gnome also had a smaller book just titled "Names to Run Away From" that was a small collection of dangerous creatures with just very brief and basic descriptive text provided for each and an occasional sketched representation.
The Book of Lost Fingers.
A mimic that will take your fingers off when you open it :D
Anything written by A. Plumbus.
I know my OP was very vague, that was intentionally. I wanted to see what people would come up with that way. But now let me focus in and give some details.
The library itself is located in a monastery and will only house books, manuscripts, tomes, parchments, etcetera that relate to the world(worlds) the campaign takes place in, all nonfiction stuff…..so sadly there will be no copies of ‘Tusk Love’
The monastery its self is somewhat hidden and exist outside of the influence of ruling counsel of the kingdom’s control so there may be some documentation in the library that contradicts the official accounts of history, there will more than likely be some documentation on some band magical practices as well.
I have a D100 table of books that are in the library, and if a player says that want to just grab a random book I will have them roll and they will find the corresponding book.
So generally what I am looking for is if you were in this campaign, and came to this library what would you search for specifically, or would you just grab random books off the shelf?