I’m fascinated by what it must’ve been like to have a personal long-running campaign setting become a public shared world. Did you continue to keep your personal Realms separate from the published Realms? 2) Or where there any aspects that other creators introduced to the published Realms that you then decided to incorporate into your home game? For instance, the goddess Waukeen, Blackstaff’s relationship with Laeral, Mithral Hall, the Arcane Brotherhood, Ten Towns?
— AdamDravian (@AdamDravian) April 1, 2019
My "home" Realms campaign continues to unfold at its own pace, so play is in the 1360s DR. I've incorporated some things from the published Realms into it (my players vote on what we adopt and don't). {Arcane Brotherhood and Blackstaff/Laeral are my creations, BTW.}#Realmslore
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 1, 2019
And the Realms predates D&D (and, so, of course, ALL fantasy roleplaying games) by about a decade. It was my childhood setting for my fantasy stories (fiction). So it "felt real" before any game mechanics 'went to work' on it. ;} But yes, it remains fascinating (and humbling!).
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 1, 2019
Right. Over the past couple years, I’ve been reading all I could about your home Realms, as part of a personal project to compile a pure “Ed Realms”. Hence a lot of my quesitons. Thank you so much for being so open and responsive. And for sharing your setting with us all. My pleasure! Ask anything. I have no secrets. ;}
NDAs, yes, but no secrets…— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 1, 2019
Oh boy. I have a list of questions I’d love to ask you, but I’ll excesise retraint so I don’t overwhelm you. I'm happy to answer, but I am CRAZY busy, and a lot of the business has to do with real-world stuff (nursing my wife, the day job and its commute, taxes and cooking and grocery shopping) or paying freelance projects that must come first, so my answers may be slow. Some Twitter…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019
Heh. Steven brought them to life in print as a couple to rescue Laeral from the Crown of Horns, yes, but Laeral and Khelben had been an on-again, off-again couple in my root Realms tales before D&D existed. @GrubbsTweet and @StevenESchendAhh. I knew you created Blackstaff and Laeral, but I was referring specifically to their relationship. I’ve read that it was @StevenESchend who made them a couple (thus rescuing Laeral from the dark fate that had been imposed upon her by Jaquays in FR5). and I all talked Realms weekly over the..
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 1, 2019
…years as we worked on it together (Steven succeeded Jeff as "Realms traffic cop" at TSR), we became very good friends, and because we treated the Realms like a real place, and discussed matters a lot, we "knew" the characters well, and saw and depicted them the same way. :}
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 1, 2019
Wow, that’s facinatiing. So in the home Realms, did Laeral become “Lady Arunsun” of Waterdeep”? Or is she still overseeing things at the Stronghold of the Nine? And how hard is it for you to keep the lore of the home Realms and published Realms seperate in your head? She became Lady Arunsun, but in my original Realms, she and Khelben travel a lot; Khelben gets back to Blackstaff Tower often, but Laeral does not (so they have fond trysts/reunions when she does). The Nine were breaking up in the "home" Realms, which is what Paul…#Realmslore
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019
…(now Jennell) picked up on, and incorporated TSR's desire to cut back on the evil gods (Bhaal and Myrkul "going away"). The Nine had reached that time in the life of an adventuring group that some want to retire, some want to do other things (like rule lands), but other…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019
…members want to keep going.
It's increasingly hard to keep everything straight in my head because of the sheer amount of lore, but there's no problem with the recent-time stuff, because the time jump has taken the published Realms about a century ahead of "my" Realms.— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019
Oh boy. I have a list of questions I’d love to ask you, but I’ll excesise retraint so I don’t overwhelm you. I'm happy to answer, but I am CRAZY busy, and a lot of the business has to do with real-world stuff (nursing my wife, the day job and its commute, taxes and cooking and grocery shopping) or paying freelance projects that must come first, so my answers may be slow. Some Twitter…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019
…or Facebook folks seem to think I live online, and am awake around the clock, and exist to be their personal answer line for every life question or idle notion. I'd be happy to do that, if I had an army of clones…but I don't. ;} So ask away, but be aware I may be slow.
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 2, 2019