Abeir-Toril is the fictional planet that makes up the Forgotten Realms Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting, as well as the Al-Qadim and Maztica campaign settings, and the 1st edition version of the Oriental Adventures campaign setting.
The name means "cradle of life" in an archaic fictional language of the setting. It consists of various continents and islands, including Faerûn, Kara-Tur, Zakhara, Maztica, [1] Osse, Anchorome and Katashaka, a sub-Saharan-like continent south of Maztica, [2] where humanity appeared. [3] Toril was originally the name of Jeff Grubb's personal campaign world before part of it was merged with Ed Greenwood's Forgotten Realms setting.
Toril was the name of Jeff Grubb's campaign world, [4] and was adopted as the name of the planet upon which the continent of Faerûn existed when he and Ed Greenwood were designing the original Forgotten Realms Boxed Set in 1987. [5] [6] : 200 Greenwood had written tales for his world "as far back as 1967" and "it had been the setting for his homespun D&D campaigns since 1978". [6] : 200 Abeir- was added as a prefix to the planet's name so that it would be the first entry in the alphabetical encyclopedia of terms included in the set. [7] The setting's entire planet underwent a major change during the 1989 Avatar trilogy, which detailed a series of events called the Time of Troubles, during which gods walked the earth and magic became unpredictable. [8] [9] These events caused permanent changes in gameplay that were outlined in the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition campaign setting books. [10] In this edition, Abeir-Toril was considered one of D&D's three main worlds, along with Krynn and Oerth. [11]
In a significant retcon of the setting's history, Forgotten Realms material for the fourth edition of Dungeons & Dragons "reveals" that the world was split in two in prehistory, divided between the primordials (Abeir) and the gods (Toril). Toril is the world that has been showcased so far. A cataclysm called the Spellplague has caused several parts of the two worlds to switch places, [12] [9] displacing portions of Faerûn and the entire continent of Maztica, [13] with regions of Abeir: Tymanther, Akanûl, and Returned Abeir. A subsequent event called "The Sundering" reverted many of these changes and restored much of the pre-Spellplague Toril. [13]
Abeir-Toril is the default world for the 5th edition of Dungeons & Dragons. [11] [14]
This Dungeons & Dragons-related section describes a work or element of fiction in a primarily in-universe style.(February 2010) |
Anchorome is almost unexplored and is at the North of Maztica. Its best-known inhabitants are the Azuposi, as well as the defunct Esh Alakarans and the xenophobic Poscadar elves. There is also a sahuagin realm called Itzcali located in the sea nearby.
The character Balduran, a sea captain and founder of Baldur's Gate, sails to Anchorome and returns with a great wealth which is used to build the wall around the fledgling Baldur's Gate. In the Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast expansion, it is revealed that Balduran returns to Anchorome and retrieves a second hoard of treasure from the Native kingdoms. When he attempts to take on a number of locals to replenish his crew, he discovers they are infected with lycanthropy. The resulting battle shipwrecks Balduran on an island, which is later discovered by a Merchant Guild from Baldur's Gate and subsequently by the player who is sent to confirm the finding, where both the original crews' and the natives from Anchorome's descendants are locked in a bloody lycanthrope feud. The fate of Balduran himself is never clearly revealed.
After the discovery of Maztica by the mercenary captain Cordell, mercenaries from the Flaming Fist are sent to Anchorome. They build a keep, Fort Flame, in the shores of Balduran's bay (which is actually far below Balduran's resting place) but other than this it has been a complete disaster.
It is speculated that it is the land where the Creator Race known as the Aearee retreated a long time ago. It is rumored that several tribes of thri-kreen make their home in Anchorome's western regions.
The continent of Faerûn is the primary setting of the Forgotten Realms and the part of Toril most detailed in stories and supplements. [9] [15] [16]
Kara-Tur's cultures and peoples are fantasy analogues of medieval regions of East Asia, including China, Korea, Japan, the Ryukyu Islands, Tibet, and others. [17] [18] [19] According to Jim Bambra, "while primarily drawing on Japan for inspiration, [Kara-Tur] also contains elements of medieval China and Korea". [20] Kara-Tur was first described in the original 1985 Oriental Adventures book. [21] A reviewer for White Dwarf called the long background section of Kara-Tur in the book, a "bonus". [21] Originally intended as a western part of the continent of Oerik in the Greyhawk setting, the description of Kara-Tur in the Oriental Adventures rulebook made no attempt to link it with another D&D game-world. The first map of Kara-Tur appeared in the adventure module OA1: Swords of the Daimyo (1986), where the setting was still world-neutral. [22] : 108 The 1987 Forgotten Realms Campaign Set left the eastern half of its continent reserved for the future publication of Kara-Tur. [18] [19] [23] In 1988, TSR released a boxed set, Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms , describing the region in greater detail, with two 96-page books and maps. [22] In the process of adapting the setting to the Forgotten Realms, the size of the continent was scaled down significantly. [24]
The ten distinct nations and regions described in the boxed set and their real-world analogues include: [17] [22] [25] [26] [27]
In 1989 a printing of Trail Maps for Kara-Tur appeared as part of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition. In 1990 the maps were again included in The Forgotten Realms Atlas . [30] Later that year TSR converted the monsters of Kara-Tur to second edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules as part of the Monstrous Compendium series. [31] After 1990, TSR ceased publishing new material related to Kara-Tur. The setting was, however, occasionally referred to by other TSR products such as Spelljammer and Ravenloft .
The setting of Kara-Tur still exists on Abeir-Toril in Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition and is often mentioned in Forgotten Realms supplements. Characters and artifacts from Kara-Tur sometimes show up in Faerûn, but beyond that there is little interaction between the continents. The 2015 release of Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide , a supplement for Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition, introduced Kara-Tur to the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons . [19] There is a brief description of the land along with references throughout the book to its culture and how certain classes or backgrounds might fit in there. [32]
Reviewer Michael Mullen, looking at the setting of Kara-Tur before the publication of the boxed set, stated that players would probably like the world, but that it would depend largely on how familiar the DM was with Oriental culture or Japanese movies and television. He remarked that the "usual opposition, if not human, will be from the spirit world", rather than more conventional battles versus monsters. [26] Game studies scholar Aaron Trammell commented: "Although Gary Gygax envisioned a campaign setting that brought a multicultural dimension to Dungeons & Dragons, the reality is that by lumping together Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Mongolian, Philippine, and 'Southeast Asian' lore he and co-authors David 'Zeb' Cook and Francois Marcela-Froideval actually developed a campaign setting that reinforced western culture's already racist understanding of the 'Orient'." [33]
The Kara-Tur campaign setting inspired the following eight adventure modules (in chronological order):
Three choose your own adventure style books (one was actually released before the original Oriental Adventures book) were published:
One of novels in The Empires Trilogy is set in Shou Lung of Kara-Tur.
Maztica, called by its inhabitants The True World, is a fictional continent that is a land of jungles and (to the Faerûnians) mystery. The area was heavily inspired by Aztec and Mayan culture. [13]
Early in its fictional history it was a land fought over by the gods Qotal the Plumed Serpent and his brother Zaltec. For a crime against his sister, Qotal retreated from Maztica for an age but returned in recent times.
It was 'discovered' by Amnian explorers led by one Captain-general Cordell and his Golden Legion in 1361 DR. Amn was quick to carve out its claim to the land for trade benefits, establishing the port city of Helmsport, and the church of Helm led the encroachment into the new land. The native peoples were devastated by foreign diseases and the ruthlessness of the invaders, and this, coupled with the difficulties encountered on Maztica backfiring against them, caused the church of Helm to come under heavy criticism. Lantan also claimed some lands.
Maztica is divided into the nations of Nexal, Kultaka, Huacli, Kolan, Pezelac, and Payit. The region known as Far Payit neighbours Payit, both in the east around Helmsport. The native people of Maztica from Payit and Far Payit are known as Payits, whereas natives from the other nations are known as Mazticans. There are also the human races known as the Dog People and the Green Folk. Many monstrous races also live in Maztica, including wild halflings and Chacs—jaguar spirits. In very old times, couatl came from Maztica to fight the Yuan-Ti of Chult.
Some scorpionfolk from Maztica found an Underdark passage to the Underdark of Faerûn. [34]
North of Maztica is the continent of Anchorome. South of it (and separated by a strait) lies an unknown continent.
Maztica was detailed for 2nd Edition Dungeons & Dragons in the Maztica Campaign Set by Douglas Niles, and in the Forgotten Realms novels of the Maztica Trilogy—Ironhelm, Viperhand and Feathered Dragon—also by Douglas Niles. It was based on historical Central America. [35]
In a retrospective review in Black Gate , Scott Taylor found Maztica unimpressive because the continent too closely mirrored the Mesoamerican world, down to the history of the Conquistadores, rather than creating a uniquely fantasy version inspired by the "colorful and diverse" reality that is Mesoamerica. [36] CBR author Matthew England considered it "a rarity in the fantasy genre" to base a continent on these cultures. [13]
Maztica was also the name of the elder goddess who embodied the land of Maztica. Killed by her own son Zaltec, she was the wife of dead Kukul, but unlike her husband, continues to live on in the continued existence of the continent.
In 4th edition, the Spellplague caused by Mystra's death caused Abeir and Toril to briefly merge and then instantly rip apart again. As a result, Maztica is no longer a part of Toril, having been replaced with a continent called "Returned Abeir". On some maps, it has been renamed Anchorome.
Zakhara is a fictional realm styled after the themes and setting depicted in the Arabian Nights . [37] [6] : 244 The land is the setting of the Al-Qadim campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons tabletop role-playing game. [6] : 244 Zakhara is a giant peninsula of the same supercontinent that hosts Faerûn and Kara-Tur on the planet Abeir-Toril. [6] : 244 Zakhara is located east of Faerûn, and the closest Faerûnian lands to Zakhara are Dambrath (by sea) and Ulgarth or arguably Konigheim (by land). Zakhara is mostly isolated from the rest of the world, as the peninsula is separated from the main mass by the World Pillar Mountains (also known as Wu Pi Te Shao in Kara-Tur).
The Zakharan pantheon consists of several cultures, like the culture of Enlightenment and more savage deities, such as Ragarra.
Waters around Zakhara are bountiful with pirates and corsairs who charge traders tolls to cross "their" seas, such traders willingly pay these exorbitant fees as Zakhara's exotic trading goods tend to be well worth the price back in Faerûn. Occasionally the pirates decide to completely cut off Zakhara from Faerûn.
The land is full of secretive cities, unwelcoming to travellers, huge deserts, lush oases and powerful genies [6] : 244 who meddle in the affairs of humans frequently. The continent is ruled by a theocracy headed by the Grand Caliph, and tales tell of demon-infested cities and godless sorcerers (like the genie-binding Sha'irs) wielding strange magic. Powerful magic and great warriors of every like are to be found in Zakhara.
Zakharans are firmly convinced they are more civilized than the rest of the world and treat "barbarians" accordingly.
The capital city of Zakhara is Huzuz, the "City of Delights". [38]
The setting itself proclaimed to have "much more in common with early Hollywood depcitons rather than hard historical fact." [6] : 244 [37]
In the view of Myles Balfe, the Fantasy "Orient" of Zakhara has been designed as a new and exotic counter-realm for players to experience, contrasting with more common settings depicted as "a moralized neo-medieval Europe". It is presented "as a chaotic, alien space". In some depictions Balfe sees the Arabic-style cities of the continent connected to erotic ideas of the harem and the "Arabian courtesan", tropes from Orientalist fiction. In his view the ruling Grand Caliph – "the symbolic figurehead of the entire Land of Fate" – is depicted as impotent to protect his own harem, so that he and his land are dependent on western-style heroic characters to save them. [38]
The Tears of Selûne are a pack of asteroids trailing Abeir-Toril's moon, Selûne.
Known as the World Pillar Mountains in Faerûn or Wu Pi Te Shao in Kara-Tur, the "Roof of the World" is the largest mountain range in the fictional fantasy world of Toril. It is inhabited by evil Yak-men and separates Zakhara from the rest of the supercontinent.
Yal-Tengri (also known as The Great Ice Sea) is Toril's equivalent of the Arctic Ocean. It is barely known at all. In the ancient time, the major city on its shore was Winterkeep; it is now the trade city of Naupau, in Sossal. Far in the north of the sea is a small island dominated by a cathedral-like spire, inhabited by gnomes of Gond.
The Yal-Tengri is free of ice for the six summer months of the year
The Endless Ice Sea is the name of the western Faerûn part of it. Somewhere there is Jhothûn, the long-forgotten capital of a mighty empire of Giants.
Philip J. Clements referred to "the world of the highly popular Forgotten Realms series" as "an unusually well-developed D&D setting", which has great variety among its fantasy races. A number of human cultures in different regions take their inspirations from real-world cultures. [39] [40] [13]
Daniel T. Kline summed up Abeir-Toril as a "vast, high-fantasy, neo-medievalist world". [41]
CBR writer Jared King considered the history of the world of Toril "full of deep lore crafted over decades of editions" and found the Dawn War, a conflict involving the gods in the ancient past of the setting, especially fascinating. [42]
In comparison to other D&D worlds, Aidan-Paul Canavan found Toril "more illustrative" and that it "became further codified and developed over time" than the world of Greyhawk , and "militarily more stable and thus may lead to more 'adventure' based missions" compared to the focus on wars within Krynn/Ansalon. In Canavan's view, Toril more closely resembled Robert E. Howard's Hyborian Age, as both are "constructed as a patchwork or mosaic of kingdoms, realms and lands, many borrowing directly from historical settings". Even though "pseudo-medieval European analogues" were predominant, a great variety in environments and cultures could be encountered in the setting. The regions of Toril were given many details and relationships among each other in various game products. As a world designed for role-playing games it has a static character: where main characters in fantasy settings designed for novels could drastically change the world, the descriptions of Toril have to be "re-usable" for various groups of players. [40] There were, however, significant changes made to the world to accommodate rule changes between different editions of the game, [9] [8] [13] explained through magical events within the fictional universe. [43]
Areas of the planet inspired by non-Western real-world cultures, namely Chult, Kara-Tur, Maztica and Al-Qadim's Zakhara, have been criticized for perpetuating simplistic and harmful stereotypes. [44] [14] In July 2020, Wizards of the Coast added a sensitivity disclaimer to digitally sold products describing such regions, to acknowledge and distance themselves from problematic content. [44]
Medievalist Amy S. Kaufman listed Kara-Tur and the Anauroch desert of Faerûn in 2010 as two of the few fantastic realms based on non-European medieval cultures to date. She remarked that the setting descriptions "reinforce their distance from the "real" Middle Ages", "which suggests that the [non-Western] realms may be outside the imaginative limits of designers, at least for now". [17]
Screen Rant author Derek Garcia questioned the use of Abeir-Toril "as the default setting of modern-day Dungeons & Dragons", as he saw many problematic stereotypes published in the game's history as associated with this world. [14]
Forgotten Realms is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Commonly referred to by players and game designers as "The Realms", it was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a setting for his childhood stories. Several years later, it was published for the D&D game as a series of magazine articles, and the first Realms game products were released in 1987. Role-playing game products have been produced for the setting ever since, in addition to novels, role-playing video game adaptations, comic books, and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
Faerûn is a fictional continent and the primary setting of the Dungeons & Dragons world of Forgotten Realms. It is described in detail in several editions of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting with the most recent being the 5th edition from Wizards of the Coast, and various locales and aspects are described in more depth in separate campaign setting books. Around a hundred novels, several computer and video games and a film use Faerûn as the setting.
Jeff Grubb is an author of novels, short stories, and comics, as well as a computer and role-playing game designer in the fantasy genre. Grubb worked on the Dragonlance campaign setting under Tracy Hickman, and the Forgotten Realms setting with Ed Greenwood. His written works include The Finder's Stone Trilogy, the Spelljammer and Jakandor campaign settings, and contributions to Dragonlance and the computer game Guild Wars Nightfall (2006).
Mystra is a fictional goddess in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.
Richard Baker is an American author and game designer who has worked on many Dungeons & Dragons campaign settings.
Oriental Adventures is the title shared by two hardback rulebooks published for different versions of the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy roleplaying game. Each version of Oriental Adventures provides rules for adapting its respective version of D&D for use in campaign settings based on the Far East, rather than the medieval European setting assumed by most D&D books. Both versions of Oriental Adventures include example campaign settings.
The Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting is a role-playing game sourcebook first published by TSR in 1987 for the first edition of the fantasy role-playing game Advanced Dungeons & Dragons that describes the campaign setting of the Forgotten Realms. It contains information on characters, locations and history. Various revised and updated editions have been produced over the years.
Al-Qadim is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game which was developed by Jeff Grubb with Andria Hayday for TSR, Inc., and was first released in 1992. Al-Qadim uses One Thousand and One Nights as a theme and is set in the land of Zakhara, called the Land of Fate. Thematically, the land of Zakhara is a blend of the historical Muslim Caliphates, the stories of legend, and a wealth of Hollywood cinematic history. Zakhara is a peninsula on the continent of Faerûn in the world of Toril, the locale of the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, although Al-Qadim is designed to stand on its own or be added to any existing campaign setting. The basic campaign setting was divided between two game products: Al-Qadim: Arabian Adventures, a sourcebook describing character creation rules, equipment, and spells unique to the setting, and Al-Qadim: Land of Fate, a boxed set describing the land of Zakhara, with separate sourcebooks for the players and the Dungeon Master.
A dwarf, in the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy roleplaying game, is a humanoid race, one of the primary races available for player characters. The idea for the D&D dwarf comes from the dwarves of European mythologies and J. R. R. Tolkien's novel The Lord of the Rings (1954–1955), and has been used in D&D and its predecessor Chainmail since the early 1970s. Variations from the standard dwarf archetype of a short and stout demihuman are commonly called subraces, of which there are more than a dozen across many different rule sets and campaign settings.
The flexibility of the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) game rules means that Dungeon Masters (DM) are free to create their own fantasy campaign settings. For those who wanted a pre-packaged setting in which to play, TSR, Wizards of the Coast (WotC), and other publishers have created many settings in which D&D games can be based; of these, the Forgotten Realms, an epic fantasy world, has been one of the most successful and critically acclaimed settings. Many campaign settings include standard sword and sorcery environments, while others borrow Asian, Central American, swashbuckling, horror and even space-travel themes.
The elf is a humanoid race in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game, one of the primary races available for player characters, and play a central role in the narratives of many setting worlds of the game. Elves are described as renowned for their grace and mastery of magic and weapons such as the bow and sword. Becoming physically mature by the age of 25 and emotionally mature at around 125, they are also famously long-lived, capable of living more than half a millennium and remaining physically youthful. Possessed of innate beauty and easy gracefulness, they are viewed as both wondrous and haughty by other races in-universe; however, their natural detachment is seen by some as introversion or xenophobia. They were usually portrayed as antagonistic towards dwarves.
TorilMUD is a MUD, a text-based online role-playing game, and is one of the oldest and largest of its kind.
Forgotten Realms Adventures is an accessory for the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the second edition of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. The book, with product code TSR 2106, was published in 1990, and was written by Jeff Grubb and Ed Greenwood, with cover art by Clyde Caldwell and interior art by Steven Fabian, Ned Dameron, Larry Elmore, Caldwell, and Jeff Easley.
Dungeons & Dragons novels are works of fantasy fiction that are based upon campaign settings released for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.
Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms is an accessory and campaign setting for the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.
Maztica Campaign Set is an accessory for the 2nd edition of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. The campaign set was co-authored by Douglas Niles and Tim Beach and published by TSR, Inc. in 1991.
Corsairs of the Great Sea is an accessory for the 2nd edition of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game, published in 1994.
The Red Wizards of Thay are a fictional organization and social class of evil aligned wizards in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting of the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing games.
Dungeons & Dragons: Adventures in the Forgotten Realms is an expansion set for Magic: The Gathering (Magic) released in July 2021. The world of the Forgotten Realms was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a paracosm for his childhood stories and premiered as a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting (1987). This expansion set is the third collaboration between Magic and D&D; both teams are part of Wizards of the Coast.
I know several folks (myself included) who transplanted Atlas Games' excellent Nyambe (with some tweaks), which also built off many of the old 2E articles in Dragon on African gaming, to the large undefined continent southwest of Nimbral and southeast of Maztica
Today, many sages surmise that humanity first appeared in the northern savannas of Katashaka around -34,000 DR