Faerun Books

[Geiger Counter]

I am wondering if any of the Faerun books are worth buying.
I loved the eberron campaign setting simply for all the ideas the fluff provides.

[arguskos]

The rule of thumb seems to be that if you really loved Eberron, you probably won't like the Forgotten Realms and vice versa. This is obviously not a hard and fast rule, but it seems to hold in general practice.

I personally like both well enough, though I do greatly prefer Faerun. In my opinion, every D&D book is worth something to pick up, just to have.

[Temotei]

The rule of thumb seems to be that if you really loved Eberron, you probably won't like the Forgotten Realms and vice versa. This is obviously not a hard and fast rule, but it seems to hold in general practice.

I personally like both well enough, though I do greatly prefer Faerun. In my opinion, every D&D book is worth something to pick up, just to have.

Gotta buy 'em all! D&D!

[AslanCross]

Well, the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting has a LOT of lore in it due to the numerous nations in the setting. Lords of Darkness has a lot of lore on the bad guy groups. Like Eberron, they've got a book about a large metropolis (City of Splendors:Waterdeep). It's actually not the only giant city in the setting, but they gave it its own book.

I don't personally own any of the FR books, but I have read them and they do have some interesting fluff in them.

[Geiger Counter]

Can you be more specific? Which books are better than others?
What are the few the few gems in each book?

[arguskos]

Can you be more specific? Which books are better than others?
What are the few the few gems in each book?

...you're asking me to actually list off what is good in each book for the setting I grew up on as a kid, and know better than I know real life history? You're joking, right? Seriously, each book has something worthwhile in it. Even the really questionable ones, like Champions of Valor, have things in there that I read and enjoyed thoroughly.

If I had to pick my favorite Faerunian sourcebooks, I'd likely go with Lost Empires of Faerun, because I love my old history in FR; Serpent Kingdoms, because I really like the Yuan-Ti and the other Scaled Ones of Faerun; and Faiths and Pantheons, because the divine aspect of the setting is complex and highly interesting to me.

[Dusk Eclipse]

I just love Unaproachable East because it has one of my favorite Prestige Class (Tell flamar shadow lord)

and Champions of ruins is great for archers, other than that I don't know too much about the setting since my first contatc with the FR was in 4e (not a good experience) so my knowledge: Forgotten Realms is quite low

[arguskos]

I just love Unaproachable East because it has one of my favorite Prestige Class (Tell flamar shadow lord)

Teflammar Shadowlord is excellent and good times.

and Champions of ruins is great for archers, other than that I don't know too much about the setting since my first contatc with the FR was in 4e (not a good experience) so my knowledge: Forgotten Realms is quite low

Champions of Ruin is an amazing archery book, thanks to the spells it introduced. Also, you have my sympathies for the 4e Realms. There's a support group, you'll get something in the mail.

[AslanCross]

If you're only after fluff, get Grand History of the Realms. I didn't exactly like it, but it is pure fluff.

[Turk Mannion]

Faiths and Pantheons is by far the most interesting read for me in FR.

No overwhelming interest in Eberron.

[Dusk Eclipse]

<snip>
Also, you have my sympathies for the 4e Realms. There's a support group, you'll get something in the mail.

Yay mail!! thank you arguskos.

[arguskos]

Yay mail!! thank you arguskos.

We are watching. We are waiting. We are... the Forgotten Realms 4th Edition Support Group! *flashy logo plays, funky music blares*

[The Tygre]

Personally, I don't buy into the thought that you can't like Forgotten Realms and Eberron. I adore both. What's the problem here?

My personal faves:

Serpent Kingdoms
Quick, think of the Yuan-Ti and the lizardfolk. Not much comes to mind, right? This book takes the scaly races of the world and turns them into Faerun's puppeteers. We humans? We're just so much cattle for slimy overlords.

Faiths and Pantheons
Not necessarily essential, but useful if you plan to go into divine spellcasting or deal with gods and religion a lot.

Player's Guide to Faerun
Fills in a lot of the gaps that the Campaign Setting book didn't, including the planes, regional and racial feats, races, and prestige classes. Then again, Exalted and Vile prestige classes are always a fast way to my heart.

Monsters of Faerun
A classic for any DM. Right what it says on the cover.

Lost Empires of Faerun
Updates a lot of the monsters from MoF, and details what kind of magic and epic characters you might find sniffing around eldritch kill-zones like Myth Dranor.

Champions of Ruin
Great for players and DMs, it's basically the BoVD for Faerun. Except good.

Underdark
Once again, what it says on the cover. Underdark cities, monsters, races, and magic all come up. While it's a Forgotten Realms book, you could probably get it to work for Khyber without too many problems.

[arguskos]

Personally, I don't buy into the thought that you can't like Forgotten Realms and Eberron. I adore both. What's the problem here?

Hey, I agree with ya, but the prevailing thought seems to be that liking one means you don't like the other. I don't get it, but I've seen it so much that I've accepted it's what most folks seem to think.

[Warpwolf16]

Unapproachable East is my favorite source book for FR, mostly due to the Gnoll and the Rashemi fluff...and of course the list of wonderful monsters to throw at people.

[Masaioh]

Out of the few I've read, I found Races of Faerun useful no matter what campaign setting you run. I let my players use it even though I don't run FR because the prestige classes are cool.

[Pechvarry]

Faerun books have 2 critical weaknesses for me:
1) I can't tell where 3.0 ends and 3.5 begins. I forget the specifics, but I seem to remember coming across tons of discrepancies (e.g. A book that mentions in the front that Ambidexterity no longer exists and Weapon Finesse applies to all weapons also makes reference to monks' unique iterative attack progression) in a few different books.
2) Prestige Classes are heavily loaded with once/day abilities. Most melee classes seem jumbled and too focused on flavor with very little ability, while mage classes often give tangible, potent benefits (hi, Incantrix!).

I used to think Faerun just hated melee more than other settings. Now I just realize I hate their PrCs.

Oh, one more thing: many regional feats don't deserve to be regional feats. People of X region learned a neat trick for knife-fighting? You're telling me I can't pick that feat up if I'm not born there? Riiiiiiight. Isn't that, like, racism?

[peacenlove]

We are watching. We are waiting. We are... the Forgotten Realms 4th Edition Support Group! *flashy logo plays, funky music blares*

Having only read (and not planning to play) the FRCS 4e, can i enter the group too?

To the OP: Don't forget the Forgotten realms campaign setting! I am amazed no one suggested it. If you get past the hideous images and the fact that is 3.0 then you have a book that you will read for a looong time. Yes its so detailed. Even if you don't play FR get it for the ideas therein.

EDIT: @Pechvarry
Point 1: you are somewhat correct but that's not a problem of the campaign setting, its derived from the edition change

Point 2: Peerless archer and tieflammar shadowlord respectfully disagree. Also the shadowcraft mage is much stronger choice than the incantatrix, and let us not speak of the planar shepferd in the ebberon splats...

Point 3: Those feats have the additional prerequisite for others to get them: Knowledge local 2 ranks. I don't see it as racist, i cannot learn greek if i don't study them (knowledge kicks in) or if i am not born in greece.

[SilverStar]

Liking Eberron and liking FR are not mutually exclusive; I love the Realms in all its magic-laden glory.

The best starter book IMHO is probably the Player's Guide. It's essentially a shorter, 3.5 updated version of the Campaign Setting, plus it has my favorite prestige class ever in it...

Other goodies:

Lost Empires of Faerun- interesting history, a few decent spells, new epic spell seeds, mythal creation, and a couple of nice artifacts. Some of the feats could be really useful to specialists.....

Magic of Faerun- It's not updated, but it has a host of interesting stuff in it.

Underdark- This could be world-neutral with a bit of adaptation.

Faiths and Pantheons- Faerun has a ton of gods. This lists all of them, with a bunch of PrCs in the back tied to them.

Champions of Valor- Sort of the BoED for Faerun, it has one of my other favorite prestige classes (this one's way weaker than the other one....)

[Morty]

I think Races of Faerun is one of the top priorities. It provides a boatload of information not only about races but also various human etchnicities.

[Innis Cabal]

Oh, one more thing: many regional feats don't deserve to be regional feats. People of X region learned a neat trick for knife-fighting? You're telling me I can't pick that feat up if I'm not born there? Riiiiiiight. Isn't that, like, racism?

Is it racism you don't automatically know a language? Or a special cooking technique from a region not your own?

[Tinydwarfman]

Unapproachable East! So much cool stuff.

[onthetown]

Lost Empires is great. The Shining South is alright for fluff, but it's specifically for the Shining South. The others I've read are all on par with each other. Lost Empires just happens to be my favourite.

I'll just do the obvious thing and recommend the main campaign setting book. The 3/.5 setting book is hard to find (at least here) but totally worth it.

[Kaiyanwang]

The rule of thumb seems to be that if you really loved Eberron, you probably won't like the Forgotten Realms and vice versa. This is obviously not a hard and fast rule, but it seems to hold in general practice.

I personally like both well enough, though I do greatly prefer Faerun. In my opinion, every D&D book is worth something to pick up, just to have.

I too love them both, with a slightly preference for Forgotten Realms.

I found Magic of Faerun great for special materials and weird places of magic (important in my setting).

Underdark is great for any setting. Exploration, weird creatures, materials, and so on. Nodes!

Champions of Ruin updates nodes and is awesome for any archery and has few nasty melee tricks. Great bosses too (I personally love Dendar as a villain).

Lost Empires of Fareun has cool updated monsters, nice spells, and few additional epic seeds. The flavour is very beautiful IMO and there are Netherscrolls. NEEEEEED!

Waterdeep is nice, as well Shining South. I love Loxos and flying ships. Allied defense FTW.

Unapproachable East need some flexibility but there are cool things. Feats.. and cool trolls (the ones in MMIII are better tough).

Serpent Kingdoms is situational but I combined it with some Oriental Advenures (and Mahasarpa) rules to create very exotic places. Few weird spells and poisons.

Just.. don't take Sarruks too seriuosly, if you know what I mean but they are damn awesome.

[herrhauptmann]

Oh, one more thing: many regional feats don't deserve to be regional feats. People of X region learned a neat trick for knife-fighting? You're telling me I can't pick that feat up if I'm not born there? Riiiiiiight. Isn't that, like, racism?

There IS actually a way around that. But it only gets you past the regional requirements. You still need to meet the racial/level requirements. It's in the FRCS at the front of the feat section.
However, I think it might have been errata'd away during the 3.5 shift.

I don't see a problem saying that a Halruan human with a feat gets a few 0 and 1st level spells because magic is so prevalent in the country, but that a halfdrow born in Calimshan is unable to take the same feat.

The huge territory of Faerun makes such differences as region actually usable. Most DM's don't bother with it, but the setting is big enough that it works. Otherwise it boils down to dwarf vs elf, elf vs drow, etc.
There are other settings that have tried something similar, but the worlds were too small, and the different regions too close together. Like saying that the states of Delaware and Maryland were sovereign countries, hated one another, and one was feudal japanese, while the other was pulled straight from Braveheart. Such regional differences feel too forced in small settings.

To the OP:
Lost empires of faerun
Races of faerun
Players Guide to Faerun
Unapproachable east
Drow of the Underdark (not the book Underdark). It's not a Faerun book per se, but I think it's focused to FR in the same way that Lords of Madness is focused to Eberron.
Lords of Darkness,
Champions of Valor.

As far as identifying which books are 3.0. Really the best way is to just look at the copyright in the front cover. 2004 or later is going to be 3.5.

[sofawall]

There IS actually a way around that. But it only gets you past the regional requirements. You still need to meet the racial/level requirements. It's in the FRCS at the front of the feat section.
However, I think it might have been errata'd away during the 3.5 shift.

You paying a few skills ranks? That's gone as of 3.5.

[Emmerask]

I am wondering if any of the Faerun books are worth buying.
I loved the eberron campaign setting simply for all the ideas the fluff provides.

Every single one is pure gold and worth buying
But maybe I just love Faerun so much and thats why I like them ^^

[hamishspence]

yes- Underdark was published in October 2003 and is 3.5, but it's the only one.

Unapproachable East was published late enough in 3.0 that it starts to use 3.5 prototype rules though- like renaming skills, the Extraplanar subtype, etc.

[aivanther]

On the other side never buy Dragons of Faerun. It is like someone took a dump and instead of flushing the TP they published it.

[trmptfnfr]

Is it racism you don't automatically know a language? Or a special cooking technique from a region not your own?

I can still learn the language or the cooking technique.
His problem seems to be that apparently only people from Xtopia can learn how to use a knife in Y way.