To the god of all wine that sets my gullet afire
I cast now my body as offering on thy pyre
Take it and end the pounding agony in my head
For my stomach you shred
Its returned contents I’ll soon dread
All in all, I’ll likely be better off dead— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 4, 2018
DnD
If a druid casts barkskin on themselves, and then wild shapes, is the barkskin spell still active?
If a druid casts barkskin on themselves, and then wild shapes into a bear, is the barkskin spell still active? Yes
— Mike Mearls, but Spooky (@mikemearls) September 29, 2018
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Do watches or clocks of any sort exist in the Forgotten Realms?
Do watches or clocks of any sort exist in the Forgotten Realms? Certainly. In the 1360s, Waterdeep (and some other cities) rang bells throughout the daylit hours (equivalent of hours), following magical, sundial, or temple (again, magical) clocks. Ere the Spellplague hit, use of water-clocks began to spread, and "hours" entered public usage.
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
What’s the rough value of a water-clock? Are there any nonmagical pocket watches or wristwatches? Water-clocks are still large, cumbersome, and expensive: 1000 gp and up for a commercial one, depending on how ornamental it looks. An artificer could make their own for as little as 200 gp (400 if they have to buy everything from scratch). Clockwork pocket watches are fist- …
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
…-sized and heavy, and some can be bought strapped to bracers, but if you're not a half-orc or half-ogre, they're going to feel MIGHTY heavy on your wrist. However, wristwatch "stopwatch equivalents" DO exist, in the form of precise-time fuses (developed by dwarf and gnome…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
… miners centuries ago: you "wear" a wrist-fuse on a metal plate (so your clothing, hair, and skin won't suffer), light it, and have a 1- or 2- or 5-minute "timedown"). This is used underground, and/or in smoke/fog/mist, to time how long it is before it's safe to go back to…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
… where something dangerous and timed (like blasting, using a similar fuse you lit just before your wrist-fused, and running to cover) is happening/about to happen. Smaller pocket watches are being developed all the time, but thus far the fashion is to wear them around the…
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
…neck on a chain (rich merchants, nobles, and even busy warehouse managers are popular practitioners of this), not at the wrist, because in the Realms, many who work with their hands wear bracers or garments with cuffs that store lockpicks, drill bits, finework hooks, …
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
…needles, and the like "handy" at the wrists, so the real estate is already spoken for. ;}
Water-clocks may be large, part-fountain, play tunes or move ornaments (figures that turn, strike bells or gongs, etc.), and take the form of large central-grand-room-feature sculptures.— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
Thank you once again great loremaster for your encyclopaedic knowledge! I love the idea of ‘neck-watches’ on livery chains for the richest of the rich. A real display of wealth! My pleasure! I mentally contrast a haughty aging noblewoman with an ornate gold-case-and-crystal timepiece on a beautiful ribbon depending from a choker with a hard-at-work crafter who wears hers as part of a leather tool-scabbard or sash bristling with sheaths for divers tools.
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 18, 2018
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How to make fantasy evoking names
So, do any other writers/game designers ever feel like all the really great, image and emotion evoking names are used? (I’m looking at you @TheEdVerse with your Gateway to The Savage Frontier and Forgotten Realms and all that). No! Come up with new ones (I'm still doing it)! Just make sure you say them aloud, record them, and play them back to yourself so there are no inadvertent "OMG, that's unintentionally hilarious!" instances.
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 13, 2018
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Where in the Forgotten Realms are the best places to get falafels?
would it be any bother to inquire of Master Volo where in the realms are the best places to get falafels? It’s, as you can imagine, sir, a very important matter. That's one of those culinary answers that many makers and fans of a particular foodstuff furiously dispute. ;} Volo has personally eaten great falafels on Tharsult, in the Tashalar, and in Sammaresh, but had surprisingly good ones in Waterdeep, Westgate, and Selgaunt.
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) October 15, 2018
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Has Waterdeep had serial killers over the centuries?
love the entry about Asmagh’s Alley in Castle Ward, and the hopping on one foot. Has Waterdeep had other serial killers over the centuries? Perhaps a topic Volo should cover in the future. Yes, there have been past Waterdhavian serial killers. @StevenESchend touched on this obliquely (TSR Code of Conduct) in his Waterdeep By Night webseries, and I put at least six in the root Realmslore (Code of Conduct, then "leave that for Ravenloft," muted most in published FR).
— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 9, 2018
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“See the weird lights in that high turret window?”
1)
“See the weird lights in that high turret window? We’ve been hired to find out what the chancellor’s doing up there, every night. The king suspects foul magic.”
“The chancellor is the king’s subject,” the thief pointed out. #epic fantasy— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 5, 2018
3)
2)
“Why doesn’t the king just ASK him? At swordpoint, with half a dozen loyal-to-the-crown wizards standing there with spells at the ready, and some archers with drawn bows, too.”
“Ah, you mean the subtle approach?”
“Exactly.”#epic fantasy “I don’t think it’s the royal style. Open threat of violence, blunt question, public embarrassment, making an enemy not just of the chancellor but of all his noble kin…no. Not when you have money enough to buy someone else…#epic fantasy— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 5, 2018
4)
…to stick their neck out; someone expendable.”
“Us.”
“Precisely.”
“You make this job sound SO enticing.”
My diplomatic skills are legendary.”
“Good. It’s settled, then. We’ll go drinking, and YOU go and ask the chancellor.”#epic fantasy— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 5, 2018
