This is the third Adventures hardcover, following Dragonlance (1987) and Greyhawk (1988), and first non-rulebook hardcover for AD&D second edition. Rather than a stand-alone re-introduction to the Realms, it is an expansion of the 1987 Campaign Set, filling in the Heartlands, one of the regions the ‘87 box left blank for homebrew DMs. There was also the paradigm shift of the Time of Troubles to contend with (the transition from 1E to 2E played out in dramatic narrative fashion across the three Avatar novels and the modules Shadowdale, Tantras and Waterdeep). Adventures has details on wild magic, the new gods, gunpowder and the other stupidity the event introduced.

This was the first FR book I owned and I think I enjoy it so much because it offered a small slice of a larger world in a moment of transition. Such moments are always full of excitement. There are tantalizing ideas – I always loved that beholder cult leader, for instance, and implications he personified. The confusion of having a dead god of death was also intriguing – and also a shame, as his priest’s outfit is obviously the coolest in the book.

A lot of this mystique is down to – drum roll please – the illustrations by Stephen Fabian. Yep, that Stephen Fabian, who pretty much single-handedly holds the Ravenloft campaign setting together. I love his work (which is distinctly un-Ravenloft here, I might add). It looks unique and exciting and strange and imbues the world with atmosphere. Forgotten Realms has never looked better, before or since.