D&D General Forgotten Realms Book preview from NYCC

Nerd Initiative on YouTube previewed the new Forgotten Realms books with Mackenzie De Armas in this short video, including a quick flip-through of the Adventures in Faerun book.



During the quick flip-through, he shows off blurry but mostly readable pages from the Dalelands section of the book, including a few of the DMG-style adventures, including a level 13 adventure called Heart of Fire, where the party is asked to recover a magic item in an Adult Red Dragon's hoard.

Notably, none of the adventures you can see in the video seem to have any new monsters from the book included. Also, not all of the adventures are confined to a single page. Some seem to be at least a page and a half, while others are even smaller to just a half page.

 

[TheSword]

Dalelands 2E for me.

My next online campaign when Enemy Within Finishes is an homage to 2nd Edition Dalelands.

 

[TheSword]

Adventures? If so, of what level?

Doom of Daggerdale is for Levels 1-3
Sword of the Dales is for Levels 1-4
Secret of Spider Haunt is for Levels 1-4
Return of Randal Morn is for Levels 1-4
Shadowdale: Scouring of the land is for Levels 9-13

I'm also planning on using Forge of Fury which is designed for Levels 3-5 to represent ancient Dwarven Kingdom of Tethyamar

 

[mankyle]

For Tethyamar, I was going to use the Dwarven Stronghold map that appears in the 3e Stronghold Builder's handbook but that serves too.

I have wanted to do a Kingmaker-esque campaign in FR and although I was going to base it in Phandalin, now I'm thinking about bading it somewhere in the dales.

 

[Zardnaar]

For Tethyamar, I was going to use the Dwarven Stronghold map that appears in the 3e Stronghold Builder's handbook but that serves too.

I have wanted to do a Kingmaker-esque campaign in FR and although I was going to base it in Phandalin, now I'm thinking about bading it somewhere in the dales.

Im thinking north of Cormyr stone lands or Lorlkh

 

[mankyle]

Im thinking north of Cormyr stone lands or Lorlkh

Greyvale would be a good place for such a campaign, yes....
I hadn't thought about the Stonelands either

 

[Henadic Theologian]

For Tethyamar, I was going to use the Dwarven Stronghold map that appears in the 3e Stronghold Builder's handbook but that serves too.

I have wanted to do a Kingmaker-esque campaign in FR and although I was going to base it in Phandalin, now I'm thinking about bading it somewhere in the dales.

The Border Kingdoms in FR are basically Ed's original Kingmaker region, but in FR (he made both TTRPG regions)

 

[GarrettKP]

Reading through these books this morning, loving most of what I’ve seen.

 

[Parmandur]

View attachment 420728

Reading through these books this morning, loving most of what I’ve seen.

Neat! Any highlights?

 

[GarrettKP]

Neat! Any highlights?

Too many to name for me, but here are some:

Some powerful new origin feats, specifically the Spellfire and Zhentarim ones.

The General feats are a combo of feats that build on the Faction backgrounds (like a Zhent General feat that requires the Zhent origin as a prereq) and one feat for the 5 settings. Fey Trickster, the general feat for the Moonshae Isles, is especially nice.

Most of the subclasses have been improved since the UA. Genie Paladin's armor buff now requires them to be unarmored, but it is 10+Dex+Con now and can use a shield. They can easily out-AC a Bladesinger, especially if they use the new Genie Touched background to pick up the Shield spell through Magic Initiate Wizard.

Spellfire Sorcerer's capstone ability now keys off their Innate Sorcery instead of being a separate action to activate!!! This was a big one for me.

Speaking of Spellfire, the feats and new Spellfire spells are STRONG! The Origin Feat allows you to just reduce incoming magic damage by 1d4 every turn, no reaction required. They also get a level 1 spell that is basically an enhanced Eldritch Blast, dealing 2d10 Radiant per blast and one blast per spellslot level spent on the spell. These attacks ignore cover except total cover.

The new artifacts in the Adventure book are cool, and most of them appear as rewards in the one-page adventures. Speaking of the adventures, they are separated into categories:

Region (the 10 areas of Faerun)
Deity
Faction
Location (the 5 settings)
High Magic

The Location ones are in the 5 setting areas, with each getting 3-4 adventures. Each of the 10 regions gets 1 adventure, as does each faction, and a handful of gods get an adventure.

Then there are the High Magic adventures, which are basically "X NPC has learned how to cast a High Magic ritual (think Karsus's Folly but lower scale) and asks the PCs to help by gathering material components and participating in the circle casting.

The Bestiary is fantastic, with some cool generic threats like the Drow (all of which are 2024 versions of their old 2014 Monster Manual counterparts) and the Cultist of the Dead Three, alongside at least one named NPC villain for each of the 5 settings, save for the Dalelands which has a villain that uses a stat block from the Monster Manual.

What they have done with Sammaster in particular is really cool.

Still reading through stuff, but I love most everything here. My real complaint is just that we didn't get a cooler Fighter Subclass. The Purple Dragon Knight in the UA is way more exciting than the Banneret, which, if you did not like the PDK in 2014, you won't like the Banneret in 2024.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Too many to name for me, but here are some:

Some powerful new origin feats, specifically the Spellfire and Zhentarim ones.

The General feats are a combo of feats that build on the Faction backgrounds (like a Zhent General feat that requires the Zhent origin as a prereq) and one feat for the 5 settings. Fey Trickster, the general feat for the Moonshae Isles, is especially nice.

Most of the subclasses have been improved since the UA. Genie Paladin's armor buff now requires them to be unarmored, but it is 10+Dex+Con now and can use a shield. They can easily out-AC a Bladesinger, especially if they use the new Genie Touched background to pick up the Shield spell through Magic Initiate Wizard.

Spellfire Sorcerer's capstone ability now keys off their Innate Sorcery instead of being a separate action to activate!!! This was a big one for me.

Speaking of Spellfire, the feats and new Spellfire spells are STRONG! The Origin Feat allows you to just reduce incoming magic damage by 1d4 every turn, no reaction required. They also get a level 1 spell that is basically an enhanced Eldritch Blast, dealing 2d10 Radiant per blast and one blast per spellslot level spent on the spell. These attacks ignore cover except total cover.

The new artifacts in the Adventure book are cool, and most of them appear as rewards in the one-page adventures. Speaking of the adventures, they are separated into categories:

Region (the 10 areas of Faerun)
Deity
Faction
Location (the 5 settings)
High Magic

The Location ones are in the 5 setting areas, with each getting 3-4 adventures. Each of the 10 regions gets 1 adventure, as does each faction, and a handful of gods get an adventure.

Then there are the High Magic adventures, which are basically "X NPC has learned how to cast a High Magic ritual (think Karsus's Folly but lower scale) and asks the PCs to help by gathering material components and participating in the circle casting.

The Bestiary is fantastic, with some cool generic threats like the Drow (all of which are 2024 versions of their old 2014 Monster Manual counterparts) and the Cultist of the Dead Three, alongside at least one named NPC villain for each of the 5 settings, save for the Dalelands which has a villain that uses a stat block from the Monster Manual.

What they have done with Sammaster in particular is really cool.

Still reading through stuff, but I love most everything here. My real complaint is just that we didn't get a cooler Fighter Subclass. The Purple Dragon Knight in the UA is way more exciting than the Banneret, which, if you did not like the PDK in 2014, you won't like the Banneret in 2024.

What is the origin feat for the Old Empires Region please? And how are the epic feats please?