DMs Guild [Design Notes] Forgotten Realms Trail Guide: Faerûn, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara

[Epic Meepo]

A few years ago, I started prep work on a long-term project in my spare time: I wanted to gather information from across my library of Forgotten Realms products and compile my notes into a single DMs Guild product. (Update: This was before Wizards of the Coast announced it would be releasing an official player’s guide to the Forgotten Realms in 2025. I’ll be editing my posts in this thread to reflect the fact that I’m writing my sourcebook as a supplement to that official player’s guide.)

Fast forward a few years. Though I have no audience and limited resources, I’ve managed to make a fair amount of progress. I’ve curated information from dozens of primary sources and compiled it into a 350-page rough draft. I’ve sifted through tens of thousands of stock art images to find the best human-generated images available on my shoestring budget. I’ve created dozens of all-new regional maps of the Realms, from Faerûn and Kara-Tur to the burning land of Zakhara.

I don’t have a blog or a social media presence, so I’m starting this thread as a clearing house for random design notes. I’m in the process of editing and refining my sourcebook for publication on the DMs Guild (in late 2024 or early 2025, with any luck). I’ll try to post occasional notes here regarding my process and my progress. Questions and comments from other posters are also welcome.

What, exactly, am I working on?

The project I’m working on is a sourcebook which I’m writing as a supplement to the official Forgotten Realms player’s guide scheduled for release in late 2025. It will also serve as a supplement to all existing Forgotten Realms campaign setting products and adventures without rendering any one of them obsolete. As noted above, I aim to release this player’s guide through the DMs Guild once it’s finished. I may release it as early as late 2024. (In any case, if I release it before the official player’s guide in late 2025, I will also release a free update after the official guide is released, if necessary).

My primary sources of inspiration are the Character Regions section in the 3e Player’s Guide to Faeûrn and the Backgrounds chapter in the 4e Forgotten Realms Player’s Guide. I’m not attempting to recreate those sources, but to create a new, similar work which compiles information about the lands and cultures of Faerûn, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara together in a single volume.

Plenty of existing products explore specific parts of the Forgotten Realms in great depth. I’m not attempting to compete with those products in that regard. Instead, my goal is to highlight a wide range of Backgrounds and other character options from across all of Faerûn, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara, providing readers many different ways to engage with the setting when creating a character.

To distinguish itself from online wikis which present encyclopedic information about the Forgotten Realms setting, my sourcebook provides a curated, player-facing experience. The book focuses on character options, cultural details, and widely-known geographical information. It avoids delving too deeply into historical, political, or plot details which are more the purview of the DM.

The longest chapter in this guide describes over one-hundred cultures native to Faerûn, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara. That same chapter provides a brief overview of over two-hundred regions where those cultures are found. Some of those regions are described in more detail in recent Forgotten Realms products, and are included in my sourcebook for the sake of completeness. Others are regions unlikely to see updates in official Forgotten Realms products for the current edition of the game.

The book also includes an appendix of new rules, mostly options for new and existing Species. Outside that appendix—and some discussions of Backgrounds features—content is largely rules-neutral, so it can be used with Forgotten Realms products of all editions.

Why am I working on this project?

From a business standpoint, this project is a terrible idea. I’m just one worker on a shoestring budget with no upcoming crowdfunding campaigns to support my efforts. I’d be better off writing a dozen highly-focused, thirty-page products detailing specific parts of the Forgotten Realms. I could release them every few months in an effort to build both an audience and a catalog of past releases.

Instead, I’m putting my efforts into a three-hundred-plus-page sourcebook with no established audience. Why am I doing this? Because the sourcebook I’m writing is the document I’d want to provide to my players—alongside any official player’s guide—if I were running a Forgotten Realms campaign. No one else is designing anything quite like it for me to use, so I’m designing it myself.

Hopefully, when I release this sourcebook, other folks will find it useful. Speaking for myself, I will definitely benefit from having a Monster-Manual-style chapter of over one-hundred Forgotten Realms cultures, which I can pick and choose from when designing Realms-inspired characters or campaigns. As an added bonus, I also know (for example) what a typical building in Cormyr looks like.

What’s next?

I’m currently working on the second draft of my sourcebook. Everything will require a copy-editing pass, and I’ve identified a few sections that will need complete rewrites for various reasons. There are also a few sections where my design decisions are just placeholders. In those sections, I will need to make final decisions about the direction I want to take with certain content.

I also need to finalize my regional maps. I’ve mapped out the boundaries of all relevant terrain to my satisfaction, but the maps will need labels and probably a few added textures. My goal is to make the maps clean and functional. I don’t expect to produce high-end artwork worthy of a poster map, but I do hope to at least match the quality of some less-detailed, inline maps from older Realms products.

That’s all for now. I will return with more design notes and updates as time permits.

 

[Epic Meepo]

On Fish, Shellfish, and Inline Citations

Until recently, I hadn’t set a deadline for the project mentioned in this thread. (Don’t try this at home if you’re trying to actually finish what you’re doing.) The lack of time pressure has given me plenty of chances to go down all sorts of strange rabbit holes. Occasionally, there’s useful information at the bottom of the rabbit hole. More often than not, the only pay-off is the enjoyment I get when I finally dig up some obscure piece of trivia that has eluded me for hours. (What can I say? I’m weird like that.)

My latest rabbit hole involved fish and shellfish in the Forgotten Realms. The details are relatively unimportant, so I’m putting them in a spoiler block:

Spoiler: A tale of fish and shellfish

Among other things, my sourcebook lists some of the foods commonly consumed in each of the hundred-plus cultures described within. As it so happens, Forgotten Realms products mention fish and fishing in connection with certain cultures fairly frequently, so that food staple was relatively easy to associate with specific groups.

But I was left with a nit-picky question: when Forgotten Realms products mention fish being eaten, are they using the archaic definition of the word “fish” (in which shellfish count as fish)? Or are they using the scientific definition (in which shellfish are distinct from fish)? And would listing shellfish as a separate category from fish be worth the effort?

After scouring my sources for references to various types of shellfish, I determined shellfish are consumed in most parts of the Realms where “fish” are consumed. Given the the overlap between fish and shellfish, I decided to use the archaic definition of the word “fish” in my sourcebook. There would be no meaningful benefit if I listed fish and shellfish as separate categories of food.

One lesson I’ve learned from my trips down rabbit holes: I don’t want to include too many trivial facts in my sourcebook. I want to focus on big picture details that inform meaningful player choices.

I’ve also realized—after counting the number of sources I would have to cite just to confirm which cultures eat fish—that I don’t want to include inline citations in my book. I’ll include a self-contained list of my sources so folks can do further reading if they so desire, but my primary goal is presenting useful information, not documenting the underlying research behind every paragraph.

In any case, it occurs to me that none of my musings in this post are previews of cool stuff I’m putting in my book. I’ll be sure to focus more on that cool stuff in future posts.

 

[Epic Meepo]

What’s in a Name, Part I

There are a few design decisions I need to finalize before I can say the text in my sourcebook is nearly finished. Several of those decisions involve names.

As mentioned upthread, this book includes descriptions of over one-hundred cultures native to the Realms. For the most part, naming these cultures is easy. Chondathan humans are raised in Chondathan culture; shield dwarves are raised in shield dwarf culture; Serôsian sea elves are raised in Serôsian sea elf culture; etc. Each of the many peoples of the Realms has a corresponding culture.

But there are six particular Realms cultures which aren’t so easily named. Three of them have never been explicitly identified as unique cultures and thus have no names; one of them has been detailed extensively but never been given a name; and two of them have established names which, for various reasons, are confusing or potentially problematic.

For anyone who’s interested in the specifics, I discuss the six cultures in question in the following spoiler block. For convenience, I've given each culture a place-holder name.

Spoiler: Six Forgotten Realms Cultures with Naming Issues

Abyssal Tiefling Culture. Tieflings in the Realms don’t have a single, shared culture, but some of them learn the Abyssal language and interact with Abyssal-speaking Fiends. I decided the shared attitudes of this group qualify as a distinct tiefling culture, but I don’t have a good name for it. “Abyssal” is the name of a tiefling legacy in the 2024 Player’s Handbook, and this Abyssal-speaking tiefling culture isn’t specific to that one legacy. So this culture needs some name other than “Abyssal.”

Infernal Tiefling Culture. This culture has the same problem as the Abyssal tiefling culture mentioned above. I can’t call this Infernal-speaking tiefling culture an “Infernal tiefling” culture, because “Infernal” is the name of a tiefling legacy in the 2024 Player’s Handbook. Thankfully, this problem has a potential solution: the arch-devil Asmodeus meddles extensively in the affairs of most Infernal-speaking Fiends and tieflings, so I could arguably call their culture Asmodean.

Kata-Turan Hobgoblin Culture. The hobgoblins of Kara-Tur aren’t called Kara-Turan hobgoblins anywhere. In fact, they’re never called anything but hobgoblins, as are the hobgoblins of Faerun. Despite this, these two groups seem to have distinct cultures. Faerunian hobgoblins are raised in goblinoid culture alongside bugbears and goblins. But there’s no evidence of this goblinoid culture existing in Kara-Tur. The hobgoblins of Kara-Tur are a distinct cultural group with no proper name.

Koryoan Human Culture. This name is problematic. Why? Because Koryo is literally an alternate spelling of the word Korea. Giving a land in the Realms a name taken from a modern, real-world country is, at the very least, confusing. Korea/Koryo and the Korean/Koryoan people of the Realms need to be distinguished from their unrelated Earth namesakes in some way. That will require changing “Koryo” to some other, similar name, but there’s no obvious alternative to use.

Kozakuran and Wa Human Culture. The people of Kozakura and Wa are well documented in existing Forgotten Realms lore. Sources explicitly state that these two peoples share a common culture, and said culture is described in detail. So what’s the name of this culture shared by the people of Kozakuran and Wa? We don’t actually know. As it turns out, no source provides a collective name for the people of Kozakura and Wa as a single, unified group.

Orog Culture. Choosing a name for this culture should be easy. Orogs are a specific tribe of orcs in the Realms, and they have a distinctive orog culture. Unfortunately, “orog” also refers to certain elite orcs which aren’t members of the orog tribe, so using “orog” could potentially cause confusion. Thankfully, members of the orog tribe are also called deep orcs, so there’s a convenient alternative to orog. But orogs would likely call themselves orogs, not deep orcs, so deep orc is less authentic.

This leaves me with a lot to think about. I’m still deciding what to use as the final names of these six cultures. I’ll have to revisit them in a future post once everything is decided.

 

[Epic Meepo]

What’s in a Name, Part II

In the previous post, I mentioned a few name-related challenges I have yet to resolve as of this posting. Thankfully, I've already resolved several other name-related challenges.

For each of the hundred-plus cultures described in my sourcebook, I include a list of sample names appropriate for characters raised in that culture. The description of each culture lists a dozen or so gender-agnostic given names for anyone to use. For those cultures which use them, I also include separate lists of feminine given names, masculine given names, surnames, epithets, etc.

I did my best to make sure every list of sample names was as authentic to the Realms as possible. Most of my lists include a curated selection of names drawn from existing Forgotten Realms products. In cases where there weren’t enough existing names available, I generated new names by modifying existing names drawn from Forgotten Realms products, not creating new ones from scratch.

One helpful source for generating authentic Realms names was an older sourcebook called Dwarves Deep. In addition to listing sample names of dwarves, this book explained how dwarves generate new names in-universe, giving me an authentic process for generating new dwarf names. Even better, the book says these names can also be used for gnomes and halflings.

Other culture’s names weren’t so easy to pin down. On a few occasions, I had to combine names from multiple cultures which shared a homeland or a language into a single list. I then used that larger list as source of names for all contributing cultures. This resulted in a few cultures sharing names, but only when those cultures were geographically or linguistically linked. I felt that was a reasonable outcome.

In the case of Kara-Tur, where most languages use a script invented by Shou humans, I used Shou names—sometimes with cosmetic changes to spelling and with spaces between words removed—to fill in any gaps. It helped that every Shou has as many as three given names. Generating every possible permutation of individual Shou names gave me thousands of combined names to choose from.

To make sure I wasn’t assigning Shou names to non-Shou cultures at random, I consulted a Dragon magazine article which noted the real-world analogues of Kara-Tur’s fictional languages. I only assigned a Shou name to a non-Shou culture if that Shou name appeared similar to a name used in the real-world analogue of the given culture’s language (allowing for minor variations in spelling).

Was it worth devoting this much time and energy to making a few lists of names which meet my arbitrary standards of authenticity? Hard to say—but in the end, I’m satisfied with the results.

Spoiler: An Example with Design Notes: Kuong Given Names

One of the lists of names I'm including in my sourcebook appears below. This list presents sample given names for characters raised in the Kuong culture of Kara-Tur.

Kuong Given Names – Alanka, Aree, Chatuphon, Khan, Myin, Nyan, Nywan, San, Sukha, Tan, Thuta, Thvan; also:

Feminine Given Names – Ama, Anjali, Bharani, Kalyani, Ke, Kesa, Manju, Nanda, Nila, Onma, Padama, Ratana, Singgi, Sundara, Suni, Thanda, Thuza, Yuzana

Masculine Given Names – Anan, Chintana, Devuri, Jirayu, Kavayah, Komon, Malvaya, Okka, Pathom, Raja, Sura, Thiha, Thura, Ukka, Vira, Vanna, Vishnan, Zani

Some design notes: A few of the listed names are those of Kuong NPCs. The rest are names taken from Shou NPCs with the spaces between syllables removed and, in one or two places, a minor change in spelling. A Dragon magazine article suggests using certain words from Burmese and Thai languages as words in the fictional Kuong language, so I compared Shou names to names purportedly* used in Myanmar or Thailand when deciding which Shou names to include on the list.

(*Because I wasn’t attempting to create a list of authentic real-world names, I spent little time verifying the authenticity of any real-world names I encountered when conducting research. I was merely using that linguistic data as inspiration when selecting and modifying NPC names which already appear in existing Forgotten Realms products.)

 

[Epic Meepo]

Chthonic Tieflings in the Realms

Until recently, I wasn’t sure how to best describe the cultures associated with the three tiefling legacies from the revised Player’s Handbook. It was fairly easy to identify cultural traits associated with Abyssal and Infernal legacies. At various times, demons and devils have ruled territory in the Realms, giving Abyssal and Infernal tieflings distinct cultures they can look to when exploring their fiendish heritage.

I was having more difficulty finding a place for Chthonic tieflings in the Realms. Neutral evil succubi and yugoloths show up here and there in the Realms, but they’ve never founded societies with unique cultures. Without a distinctive Chthonic culture, I would need to sort tieflings with three legacies into two tiefling cultures, neither of which would be exclusive to a single tiefling legacy.

Thankfully, I eventually identified one distinctly Chthonic culture in the Realms. While Chthonic tieflings can have succubus or yugoloth ancestors, they can also have night hag ancestors. In fact, in Races of Faerun, the three groups of Fiends most often mentioned as tiefling ancestors are demons, devils, and night hags. Succubi and yugoloths aren’t prominently featured.

Identifying night hags as the most prominent ancestors of Chthonic tieflings gives those tieflings an obvious connection to the Realms. Volo’s Guide to Monsters details the culture of Faerun’s hags, and the Unapproachable East sourcebook notes there are certain parts of the Realms where mortals descended from hags are well known members of the local population.

That results in one distinctive culture associated with each of the three new tiefling legacies, Abyssal, Chthonic, and Infernal. (I also include rules for fey’ri tieflings, non-standard tielfings with a culture all their own.) Now I just need to finalize my write-up of the night-hag inspired Chthonic culture and add some artwork depicting a Chthonic tiefling. Both of those tasks should be easy enough to accomplish.

 

[Epic Meepo]

I don’t have any in-depth design notes to share today. This post is more of a quick progress report.

I’m currently doing some editing work on my book. At the moment, I’m reviewing a few hundred short descriptions of major settlements. I’ve included a few examples in the following spoiler block.

Spoiler: The Cities of the Heart

A work-in-progress excerpt from a section describing the Cities of the Heart region in the land of Zakhara:

Important Sites. Four settlements comprise the so-called Cities of the Heart:

Halwa, City of Solitude, a metropolis west of Suq Bay. One of Zakhara’s few inland cities, Halwa serves as a trading post. Local merchants trade with nomads from the Haunted Lands to the east. A seasonal river fed by melt water from nearby mountaintops fills the city’s reservoirs. (Suggested backgrounds: artisan, guard, guide, merchant, wayfarer.)

Hiyal, City of Intrigue, a metropolis at the north end of Suq Bay’s western shore. This gray, industrial port occupies a coastal valley cloaked in smog produced by the city’s many foundries and kilns. The city is known for its famed weaponsmiths. It’s also known for its smugglers, spies, and thieves. (Suggested backgrounds: artisan, charlatan, criminal, guard, merchant, noble, sailor, wayfarer.)

Huzuz, City of Delights, a metropolis at the south end of Suq Bay’s eastern shore. This port houses the Enlightened Throne, seat of Zakhara’s temporal and spiritual leader. Other destinations in Huzuz include gardens, schools, and the Grand Bazaar, one of Zakhara’s busiest marketplaces. (Suggested backgrounds: acolyte, artisan, entertainer, guard, merchant, noble, sage, sailor, soldier, wayfarer.)

Wasat, the Middle City, a metropolis near the middle of Suq Bay’s eastern shore. The port city of Wasat serves as a way station for merchants and sailors on Suq Bay. Agents from neighboring cities visit Wasat to conduct shady business far from prying eyes. Locals usually avoid engaging in intrigue of this sort. (Suggested backgrounds: artisan, criminal, guard, merchant, noble, sailor, wayfarer.)

 

[Epic Meepo]

New and Updated Species

A few days ago, Wizards of the Coast released an article summarizing the playable Species that appear in the upcoming revised edition of the Player’s Handbook. Since my sourcebook is designed to accommodate any edition of the game, the Species options in the revised Player’s Handbook are fully compatible with my book, and vice versa.

That being said, my book does include an appendix of new and updated Species rules for the latest edition of the game in particular. Some of the Species options in that appendix are updated versions of options from earlier editions of the game. A few options are completely new. The following spoiler block is a “teaser trailer” for the appendix in question:

Spoiler: Table of Contents: Appendix A

Aasimar
Mulan Aasimar Traits (inspired by the deva from the 4e Player’s Guide to Faerun)

Dragonborn
Alternative Dragonborn Ancestry (options for non-chromatic, non-metallic dragonborn)
Alternative Dragonborn Origins (including a shout-out to the Dragonborn of Bahamut from 3e)

Dwarf
Arctic Dwarf Traits (an update to the arctic dwarf from 3e)
Korobokuru Traits (an update to the korobokuru from 3e)
Wild Dwarf Traits (an update to the wild dwarf from 3e)

Elf
Star Elf Traits (an update to the star elf from 3e)

Genasi
Abbalayar Genasi Traits (an update to the Abbalayar from 2e)
Tempest Genasi Traits (a genasi variant based on the Elemental Tempest paragon path from 4e)

Gnome
Giantsoul Traits (a variant, playable version of the giantsoul spriggan from 4e)

Goblin
Goblin-Kin Traits (variant rules for goblinoids who aren’t bugbears, goblins, or hobgoblins)
Infamous Goblin-Kin (blue goblins, Dekanter goblins, norkers, varags, and more)

Goliath
Jotunbrud Goliath Traits (a variant of the 5e goliath, named for the Jotunbrud feat from 3e)
Ogre-Kin Goliath Traits (a new, playable variant of the 5e half-ogre)

Halfling
Ghostwise Hin Traits (an update to the ghostwise halfling from 3e)

Human
Deep Imaskari Traits (an update to the Deep Imaskari from 3e)

Orc
Deep Orc Traits (an update to the deep orc from 3e)
Gray Orc Traits (an update to the gray orc from 3e)
Ondonti Traits (a new, playable version of ondonti orc from 2e)

Sea Elf
Sea Elf Landwalker Traits (a variant sea elf inspired by the Landwalker feat from 3e)

Spirit Folk
Spirit Folk Traits (an update to the various spirit folk from 2e and 3e)
Table: Spirit Lineage (rules for forest, mountain, river, and sea spirit ancestors)

Tiefling
Fey’ri Traits (an update to the fey’ri, cousins of standard tieflings from 3e)
Tanarukk Traits (an update to the tanarukk from 3e; also a variant of the tanarukk from 5e)

The above appendix is still a work in progress, but the listed section headings aren’t likely to change much between now and the completion of the final draft.

(And yes, all that content really is just one appendix of this hefty tome. If I were being smart, this project would be an entire product line. Instead, I'm cramming it all in one book.)

 

[Epic Meepo]

This post is more of a progress report than an in-depth design note. I’ve spent my free time this week doing copy edits of my manuscript. My latest editing pass involved checking to make sure names of Backgrounds and Classes are capitalized (and words like “farmer” aren’t capitalized when not referring to a Background). It's boring but necessary work.

I’ve also been adapting to newly released information about the upcoming revised Player’s Handbook. I now know the revised book will include a Background called Scribe, for example, so I’m doing research to determine where Scribes can be found in the Faerun, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara. (Spoiler alert: Scribes and related professionals are all over the place in the Realms.)

Also, I now have a list of all Origin feats which will appear in the revised Player’s Handbook. I’ve used that list to pair regional feats from 3rd-edition Forgotten Realms products with Origin feats from the revised 5th-edition rules. This gives me a natural way to determine which Origin feats are associated with any given Realms culture. I’m still deciding how best to use that information.

That’s all I’ve got for the moment. Now I’m off to make another editing pass.

 

[Epic Meepo]

Some Background Information

The first 3,000 copies of the revised Player’s Handbook went on sale a few days before I wrote this post. Like many people, I don’t yet have a copy of my own. Nevertheless, I’ve learned enough from online discussions of the book to realize one thing: the new player-facing rules for Backgrounds are too narrowly defined for my purposes.

It wasn’t my intention to include that many new rules in my book, but I don't feel the Background options in new Player’s Handbook are flexible enough to stand on their own. I know more Background-related options appear in the revised Dungeon Master’s Guide, but I'm trying to avoid referring readers to DM-facing rules.

As a result, I’m adding a new Background section to each of the cultures described in the player’s guide. The Background section for each culture presents new Background options for characters raised in that culture. These new options exist side-by-side with the standard Background rules and with any new Backgrounds appearing in future Forgotten Realms products.

 

[Epic Meepo]

"TL;DR" as a Design Principal

In previous posts, I’ve mentioned the large amount of content I’m including in the sourcebook I'm writing. At the same time, I want the book to include something of value to players who don’t have the time or the inclination to do a deep dive into setting lore. Towards this end, I’ve divided the book into a few modular sections:

(Edit: The sections I describe below were written before Wizards of the Coast announced it was releasing an official player's guide to the Forgotten Realms in late 2025. Knowing that guide will be available, I will probably be modifying the introductory sections described below. Much of the information they currently contain will be redundant once an official guide to the Realms is in print.)

My book opens with a concise overview of the Realms. I’m aiming for less than one page of text, but final edits and page layout concerns might turn this section into a two-page spread. This section focuses on Faerun in particular and on a few prominent cultures native to Faerun. If you’re looking for a short introduction to the setting, this section is all you need.

The initial overview directs readers to the next two sections, which look at the world immediately beyond Faerun. The first is a brief overview of Kara-Tur. The second is a brief overview of Zakhara. These sections mention trade routes which link Faerun to Kara-Tur and Zakhara, allowing travelers from different corners of the Realms to meet and adventure together.

Currently, the opening sections are followed by a more in-depth overview of life in the Realms. I may end up moving this section to an appendix in the final draft, if doing so makes the book easier to navigate. If I don't move it, the text introducing this section will let readers know they can skip to next section, which is all about character creation, if they are so inclined.

For players who don’t want any added complexity, the character creation guidelines provide some “quick build” options which eliminate most choices not already covered in the Player’s Handbook. For players who want more customization, the guidelines also list dozens of Realms cultures and provide optional rules for creating culture-specific custom Backgrounds.

The remaining sections of the book are a deep dive into the many cultures and regions of Faerun, Kara-Tur, and Zakhara. Players and DMs can use as much or as little of this information as they see fit. This part of the book is much like an almanac or a Monster Manual. It contains information one can reference, but there’s no need to read it from front to back.

TL;DR: My sourcebook includes a few short sections introducing readers to some of the cultures described in later chapters. Casual players can glean useful information from these short introductory sections. Later sections describe the Realms in much greater detail for players and DMs who want more information.