The Forgotten Realms MMOG Dream
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The Forgotten Realms may have been inked out and gathered into a campaign boxed set in 1987, but Ed Greenwood originally created the Realms for his personal D&D campaign over a decade prior in 1975. Twelve years of gaming and play testing is a long time to create a mind blowing amount of lore and history for a world, never mind the fact that Ed continues to run his campaign to this day.Why Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach was set in Eberron is beyond me. The game would no doubt be much more successful today if it had been set in The Forgotten Realms.
For years, he also wrote a number of articles for Dragon magazine in which he was visited by Elminster, a mage of unimaginable power from the land of Abeir-Toril, to learn the secrets of undiscovered spells and ancient artifacts. The truly geeky among us remember those articles with something approaching reverence. With more style than I'll ever possess, Ed brought Elminster into the land of the living and a new Golden Age of fantasy was born. To this day, Spellfire is one of my favorite books. And Ed's writing wasn't the only reason the Forgotten Realms exploded onto the world like a 250 megaton nuke.
In the spring of 1988, a little known author by the name of R.A. Salvatore released a book (the first of many set within the Realms) entitled The Crystal Shard. The world of fantasy has never been the same with the birth of Drizzt Do'Urden and we've been tortured with every possible iteration of that name in every MMOG since. Along with a string of books detailing the origin and exploits of Drizzt and his friends, R.A. also penned the Menzoberranzan boxed set, visualizing the famous Dark Elf city. In it, he fleshed out the Dark Elf culture in more detail than ever before, complete with its intricate political structure, every geek-loving statistic needed for Dark Elf characters, and the driving force behind their fanatical religion driven city, the Spider Queen, Lothe.
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We've been reading, dreaming, and arguing about everything within the Forgotten Realms for over twenty years; now give us the chance to play there. I want to explore the dungeons of Undermountain, engage in political intrigue in the city of Waterdeep, and brave the horrors of the Underdark. There are more places to see and trouble to get into than most people can imagine, and they've all been discussed in great detail for years. All this just covers the background of the Realms as it stands today, let alone the staggering possibilities for adventures that have yet to be realized.
