Customer Reviews

Forgotten Realms Adventures (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Hardcover Accessory Rulebook)

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Adventures is one of the BEST Forgotten Realms accessories ever made, along with Old Empires, Dreams of Red Wizards, and Moonsea! It sheds light on the Heartlands, but also on other areas such as Baldur's Gate, and the independent cities along the coast of the Sea of Fallen Stars to name a few. Each nation's/city state's distinct culture, history, and civilization will win you over for sure!
Ranging from background history, to city and social descriptions, to important people and characters, to the respective gods and pantheons, to adventure hooks and encounter tables, to magical items and maps, to new spells and treasures, this accessory has it all and more.
For other FR references/adventures, I STRONGLY recommend: the Old Empires accessory on Chessenta, Mulhorand, and Unther, Dreams of Red Wizards on Thay, Dwarves Deep, Draconomicon, the Jungles of Chult and Moonsea accessories, the Ruins of Myth Drannor Box Set, and the Ruins of Zhentil Keep Box Set (they are Second Edition AD&D, out of print and it will take a bit of searching, but it's well worth it). For updated editions of events in the Realms, see the Third Edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, which even though is quite expensive, is still very useful to all FR fans. Moreover, for a fuller picture both the first and second editions of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting are a "must."

The Forgotten Realms Adventures hardback is a must have accessory for any Forgotten Realms game, from first to third editions Dungeons&Dragons. This book focuses mainly on material presented for second edition, but the non-game specific information, such as the section on the cities and peoples of the Heartlands, is invaluable. Containing previously unprinted maps, economical standards, and specialty priests of the faiths of Faerun, this book has must have material not covered in the later revised Forgotten Realms boxed sets.

Of the AD&D campaign settings I used to play, I enjoyed Forgotten Realms the most. This book is the best accessory on the subject and I highly recommend it.

The book covers religions, cities and towns, magic, and secret societies and provides enough background to provide endless campaign material The only complaint I have is that it doesn't provide much information on the North (Waterdeep and surrounding areas).

As a side note, I actually have adapted this for GURPS campaigns as this is my preferred RPG these days-- I actually found it valuable enough to cross over.

D&D, D20 or hybrid games can still use "Adventures" as THE concise and precise guide and intro to "Forgotten Realms" [FR] questing -- centered on the Heartland region of FR. There are other resources and manuals concerning FR game-questing more-or-less specialized by world region or gaming aspect than "Adventures" -- an exemplar being the "City of Splendor" box-set for Waterdeep-and-the-North questing. But "Adventures" is a compact centralized one-source resource for FR gaming. It is well organized via primary chapters on major topics such as post-avatar history, dieties and clergy, magic and mages, cities, secret groups and treasure -- in that order. Those six chapters then are later backed by four appendices with even more detailed lists and tables concerning treasure -- and wizard spells via school, via level and via frequency [common, uncommon and rare] -- this being well-ordered for usage like the whole book. The very Table of Contents is so complete as to be almost a page-by-page on-view index.

I especially value the materials on Heartland-centric cities of FR -- as I feel cities are an oddly neglected topic for RPG settings. I also love the vivid full color artwork on pages 19, 25, 28 and 34 portraying main dieties and some clergy of FR. It is quite helpful to SEE the personas of each of these dieties to help imagine them for game purposes. However the grey-tone picture [on page 0] of Elminster looming over some others -- is great also. All the illustration is fine -- other portraits and portrayals -- even the turquoise divine, arcane and civic symbols thru-out this book. I like in general the turquoise bold accent being in a mutual balance with the standard clear print font -- helping to make this book easy on someones eyes and mind. I come from more of a Dragonlance and Greyhawk AD&D background -- and even a D&D rebel period. However it is fine older materials on oldtime D&D and especially FR stuff such as "Adventures" that inspires me to ADD more oldtime AD&D to ground and expand my present hybrid game +++