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When you’re writing a novel based on a campaign setting—such as the Forgotten Realms—you need to strike a sometimes difficult balance between the mechanics of the game and the demands of the story.

For instance, there is no mechanism in 4e D&D for a paladin to transgress and lose his powers, the way there was in 1e-3e. Early in the game, paladins had to obey a strict code of conduct and a "lawful good" alignment, or they might find themselves divested of their divine abilities and turned into (worse-than) regular fighters. In 4e, the role of the paladin was expanded to encompass "holy warriors" of various alignments and faiths: you can still play the classic lawful good paladin, but you're just as likely to run into neutral sort of warriors who advance an amoral sort of cause (such

How well do you know your FR Authors? Every Monday you can expect an update to the author roundtable, featuring many of our best Forgotten Realms authors’ answers to the world’s most important questions, right here on this blog. Submissions for new questions welcome through private message. 

READER: What is your best gaming experience? (Question by Lord Toast)

Elaine Cunningham (co-author of The City of Splendors): Winning my first game of Settlers of Catan, to the astonishment of my family. (Friend Elaine)

Ed Greenwood (author of The Sword Never Sleeps): See issue 218 of DRAGON, page 8. Rest happily, Great Lady.

Paul S. Kemp (author of Shadowrealm): Oh, they’re all fun. I don’t have a particular single experience that stands out, but I think the multi-year campaign

A story is only as good as its ending, its middle, and its beginning, because that's basically what a story is. And if those three don't match, then your story's gonna collapse like a house of cards soaked in white wine vinegar.

Whether you're outlining a novel, plotting out ideas for where your characters are going to end up 3-4 books from now, or sculpting a conclusion to your latest D&D campaign, you have to practice a little bit of foreplanning.

Don't fool yourself into thinking you'll come up with an ending on the way: if you don't have a sense of where your story's going, then it's going to meander and lose itself.

3+ Steps of Story

When I conceive of a story, my process usually follows a set form.

First, I see a few scenes: what defining moments do my heroes experience, what terrible

The story

Once upon a time, there was a land called the Forgotten Realms, which was rich with heroes and villains and neutral-aligned characters of ambiguous morality who *did things.*

These things were recorded in sourcebooks, novels, and even video games, and were determined “canonical”—i.e. they truly happened in the Forgotten Realms. These characters (created by authors such as the prodigiously bearded Ed of the Greenwood, the deadly Bob “Twin Scimitars” Salvatore, the mysterious Paul “Shadows” Kemp, and so on and so forth) respectively righted wrongs, wronged rights, or maintained their list of gray hero/villain uncertainty traits through many a tale. In this way, they filled out a rich fantasy setting, which—like all settings in every sort of genre

I'm currently reading Elminster Must Die, and I'm pretty stoked about the neat alterations the Spellplague has allowed Ed to make to yon Old Mage.

Also currently reading Bill Slavicsek's The Mark of Nerath, which is a classic D&D sword-and-sorcery romp.

Also currently reading Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Justice, because this series just rocks and it's been entirely too long since I started it (going on six years ago!).

What are YOU reading?

Cheers

Inspired by Erin Evans’s great post about the Resurrection Agent, I thought I’d add my $.02 with Five True Things about . . . “The Greater Treasure,” a novella I published in the Realms of the Elves anthology (February 2006)!

1. I <3 Elves

What is it about elves? Is it the grace? The beauty? The toys? The perfect hair? Elves as presented by Tolkien (the birth of elves in modern fantasy fiction) are simply the ultimate, best, most beautiful we could be. They’re tall and lithe, their features are always described as beautiful, they’re noble, they’re better swordsmen and marksmen than any human, they're flirtatious without ever getting shot down, they live in perfect communion with nature[1], they live forever . . . heck, they probably excrete rose water and lilies. Simply

Go check out an interview with me (written in conjunction with the witty and talented Susan Morris) up on the WotC bookclub:

community.wizards.com/bookclub/blog/2010...

Topics include gaming, writing, Forgotten Realms, and all that jazz.

Cheers

High and (semi) Mighty: Erik Scott de Bie

This last week, we caught up with the elusive and extremely tall (6'6.6") Erik Scott de Bie as he flitted between D&D sessions. He's been a busy DM, running the beginning of "Halaster's Lost Apprentice," the premier of the D&D Encounters program (which he wrote), as well as "Beneath the Lonely Tower," the PHB3 Game Day Adventure (which he also wrote). Oh, and he ran one of the "Learn to Play" sessions at Emerald City ComiCon, too!

Between all the PC smooshing and natural 20s, he sat down with Wizards for some questions!

Wizards: Wow, you've really been running a lot of D&D adventures lately. Are you sure this is entirely healthy?

Erik: For my PCs, maybe not. In the first Encounters session, I rolled three natural 20s in as many rounds, while

So I DMed the first session of the new D&D Encounters program, which went swimmingly--particularly for the ranger, who ended up in a river of sewer water. (But hey, at least it put out the ongoing fire damage!)

I won't post too many spoilers, but a few highlights:

1) The Yawning Portal: LOTS of fun to run a session in this Realms mainstay--also very fun to design it, since there's so much history about the place.

2) Fayne: The NPC quest giver, and also a co-star of my novel Downshadow. How does it feel, to be working with proper villains again?

3) Tough tactical encounters that are fun to run: Whew! I'm relieved these turned out well.

4) Ranger in the sewer water: The acrobatics and athletics checks to leap across the canal might not be terribly high, but they're still there and could indeed