D&D General Which era and style/flavor of the Forgotten Realms do you play in?

[Mercurius]

Just curious. Anyone who at least semi-regularly DMs and/or plays in the Realms, please vote. Pick the option that best fits, or choose Other and explain.

Note that I didn't include date ranges, but starting points that reflect different eras of the campaign setting. So if you, for instance, started with the Gray Box and ignored canon (e.g. Time of Troubles, Spellplague, etc) and just continued on in Gray Box style, choose that option, even if the year is much later. Similarly with other options. The point is to choose your starting point and flavor of the era, more than the specific year of your campaign.

If you don't play in the Realms, but buy products and have a strong opinion of preference, feel free to vote.

 

[S'mon]

I have a 1359 DR Greenwoodian Grey Box FR PBP campaign set in Damara using the 2e-ish Bloodstone Lands, but I'm not using any Time of Troubles stuff - I like the anarchic post-Zhengyi environment and am running it fairly grim & gritty, more Game of Thrones than Disney Princess. Forgotten Realms Faerun Adventures (NSFW!)

I have a 1491 DR Princes of the Apocalypse Campaign which is a follow-on from my 4e level 1-29 Loudwater campaign, so the base canon is pretty much 4e with the changes that took place in that epic campaign. 1491 DR: Princes of the Apocalypse (5e D&D) (SFW!)
I always toned down the 4e-isms a bit even in my 1479-1485 DR 4e campaign, so PoTA didn't need any changes to fit in fine.

 

[Tallifer]

Kitchen sink

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Not currently running the FR, but did for many, many years in 2E, 3E and 4E. I voted no period and Time of Troubles, because it's basically a combination. I don't specify the time period, and I go largely on 1E and 2E FR information, because I don't feel like much in 3E, 4E, or for that matter 5E, made the FR any more interesting or engaging, indeed, it seems like basically 3E and 4E both messed with the Realms (arguably like 2E, but I started after that so...) in really silly ways just to get their rules to be valid (4E was a worse offender, but people understate how dumb some of the stuff in 3E was), and needlessly pushed the time period and included eye-roll-inducing events and so on.

That said, if I ran the FR again, I would pinch a bunch of 5E stuff, like the changes to Waterdeep and it's rulership, because that is one of the places where the 5E scenario is vastly more interesting that the staid and smug 1E/2E take on Waterdeep.

 

[R_J_K75]

All my FR campaigns except for one were/are set within the years 1367 DR through 1375 DR. The only campaign I ran not within that timeframe was set in 1490 DR.

 

[Weiley31]

It's whatever year it is in FR with 3.0/3.5 adventures and the Silencing of Lolth.

But there is no Spell Plague or Sundering. So the exact Canon/timeline ISN'T specific despite all of my 5E games using 3.0/3.5 FR lore and terms.

Now if I do a Temple of Elemental Evil playthrough with 5E conversion, then of course it's taking place a number of years BEFORE a 5E playthrough of City of The Spider Queen or Tyranny of Dragons.

 

[Fenris-77]

The only campaign I'm currently running in the FR is one I run for my kids. It's timeline agnostic. For one because I don't need the timeline events, and two because at some point I stopped paying attention to the FR timeline events. Sundering? Spellplague? Fake news. I'm kind of by default running it as 'current' since I'm using the 5e books as a base, but I'll change whatever I need to.

 

[Bitbrain]

My dad is DMing me (one-on-one, our group had to suspend the game because one of my players has medical issues) through a campaign combining Lost Mines of Phandelvor, Storm King’s Thunder, and Rise of Tiamat.

So post-second sundering. ~1490 Dale Reckoning.

 

[aco175]

I'm playing a post Sundering campaign- 1490s. I still have a bunch of 2e/3e stuff from FR that gets used as far as names and places that should be long dead. For example, the PCs ended up going to Waterdeep and I got to use the 2e Volo's Guide to Waterdeep. Normally the mercenary Blazidon would be 100 years dead, but my players don't know and don't care. Some stuff gets blamed on the Spellplague and Sundering like old tombs having magical wards no longer working and a return to less fantastic magic in everything, but generally everything can be rather timeline neutral.

 

[ccs]

Superficially, if you were to sit in on a current session, other than the map being reversed (oceans on the right now) & it fades out/changes a bit before you get to the desert, it might be mistaken for fairly cannon 5e Sword Coast set in whatever year SKT was.
And I'm running the Fire Giant chapter of SKT atm.

But it is not the FR of TSR/ WoTC. In fact it's not the FR at all, just a map, some names & on occasion an FR adventure.
Because I'll steal anything I like, from any source, & merge it with my own stuff.
All those FR NPCs/gods/events & thier details? Not likely in existence. All that lore you've memorized from 30k novels? Doesn't apply.