I gotta say, having spoken last year on the 50 years of Chaosium panel at GenCon, seeing that little seal on there celebrating 20 years of GenCon for a book I don’t consider all that old has turned me to metaphorical dust.

The Unknown East (1995) is an expansion for Elric!, part sourcebook, part player resource. There are new options for adventurers, a new free-form magic system (somewhat similar to Ars Magica but not nearly as complicated, but still sort of a wild thing to just tuck into a sourcebook like this). It’s all fine. I like the team up of illustrators Michael Kirkbride, Dreyfus and Earl Geier. A lot of the tone of the book is down to their strange design work (no clear credits, though, and I am not sure they are the only artists, honestly). The David Day cover Elric is pretty sharp too, with the prince somehow looking both weak and strong.

The subtitle — “Forgotten Foes of the Bright Empire” — is apt, though; I don’t recall…any of this from the Moorcock stories. Some of it I should, I guess, judging from the references box. I’ve definitely read “The Flamebringers” and “The Singing Citadel.” On the other hand, I bounced right off the later Elric material (written after Stormbringer) likeThe Fortress of the Pearl and The Revenge of the Rose, so I have to assume the bulk of this book draws from them. Please correct me if I’m wrong!