How “Elven” does Silverymoon look? @TheEdVerse are there tree houses etc? Yes. As Blake posted, there are. A lot of the city looks like real-world Portmeirion, Wales (setting for the Prisoner classic TV series): garden-like, with Roger Dean-like dwelling-spaces "dug in" under lanes and other dwellings. There are (living) trees everywhere.#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 31, 2019

I also did a "My Slice of Silverymoon" quartet of articles for the Wizards website. Here's a link to the first one:https://t.co/6fxKdvnLlx

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 31, 2019

@TheEdVerse Hello Ed. I have a few questions about flora in the realms. Since many plants from earth grow on Toril, I wonder, does Cannabis grow there? Is it smoked recreational or is it a religious sacrament? What places/churches cultivate it and where does it grow naturally?

— Stinkweed Simp, BLM 🤍💙🖤❤💚 (@FnordKyuss) December 19, 2020

1)
Heh. This was actually officially decided back in the early TSR days. They wanted it not to be in Toril, but I pointed out we already had printed lore of “hempen” ropes, woven bags, etc. Sooooo…various plants exist, their uses and prep are jealously-guarded…
#Realmslore 2)
…herbalist/temple "secrets," cannabis has almost no effect on dwarves and gnomes, none at all on halflings, is nothing more than a painkiller for orcs, and makes elves violently ill (cramps, vomiting, feels like their blood is on fire). So most folk in the…#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 19, 2020

3)
…Realms employ other (fantastical/invented; see the Amarune’s Almanacs on DM’s Guild for a LOT of invented flora of the Realms) plants for recreational or even soothing purposes. Cannabis and several invented plants slow blood-flow, clear the head, and quell… 4)
…nausea. Most of my invented plants require the presence in a concoction (drink or poultice) or mix (line a pipe bowl with one, then smoke the other in the pipe) to derive hallucinations, or euphoria, or pain-free bliss.
[Of course, none of this was published.]#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 19, 2020

5)
Whoops! Almost forgot your last question: almost all of these plants grow wild everywhere in the temperate zone of Faerûn (= the Heartlands), but there are a few (e.g. Quilaeya/”the Desert Flower”) that grow in Raurin and other southern and eastern arid regions. 6)
Oh, just one more thing (channeling my inner Columbo): the various creatures known as "hags" know all about the many uses of various plants, and make extensive use of this. My hag lairs are full of trap-bladders that release gases on intruders.#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 19, 2020

i can’t believe it has no effect on halflings! how will they enjoy their pipe-weed now… That's why they have their own roster of BETTER stuff. The whole point of "pipeWEED" is that halflings enjoy smoking plants that other races dismiss as weeds. A halfling in the wilderness can fill his/her pipe in mere moments, where others see…nothing to glean.#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 19, 2020

Did you invent Luiren spring cheese? No. I think Jeff Grubb did. Or Tom Prusa?
Volo may have had a drink or sixteen too many, when quizzing halflings about their lives and habits. ;}#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 22, 2020

irl Ranger @HalfElfatHeart@TheEdVerse
What would the general opinion of half-dwarves in larger cities along the Sword Coast look like? I wasn't sure if they were so rare that it would provoke extreme attention.

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 9, 2020

1)
Half-dwarves that someone glancing their way will THINK are half-dwarves are rare indeed; most half-dwarves so favor either the human or the dwarven parent (usually the latter) as to pass for human or dwarf. A “pass for human” 2)
…half-dwarf will usually be short, stocky, and burly of muscle. A pass-for-dwarf half-dwarf will look like an unusually tall dwarf. A visibly half-dwarf will be even taller, and will attract attention, but will only stand out…#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 9, 2020

3)
…when walking alone or with one or two companions of different heights; otherwise, there’s enough variation in human heights, especially when youths are in the mix, that the half-dwarf will tend to “blend in with the crowd.”#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 9, 2020

Gary Gygax baked cross-species fertility into the game very early on. I recall an entire Up On A Soapbox column discussing it. Odd it may seem, but it's part of D&D. Hence half-orcs and half-elves as playable races almost from the outset.

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 9, 2020

has there been like a noir detective type game campaign done for The Forgotten Realms I've run several, but I don't think any really noir game campaigns have been published set in the Realms.
Not-so-noirish fiction, yes, from Murder in Cormyr to my novel Death Masks (the cutline for that one was "Who Is Killing The Great Lords Of Waterdeep?").#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) December 13, 2020

@TheEdVerse , O sagacious one, apologies in advance if this has been answered elsewhere but I wanted to inquire about the Spellplague. What happened to those affected by it, such as the Spellscarred, after the Second Sundering? Thanks!

— Richard Lorenzo (@richlore88) April 17, 2020

1)
It varies. In a few individuals, the changes wrought in them by the Spellplague faded in intensity after the Second Sundering was over; in a VERY few cases, they faded away altogether. Most people were permanently 2)
…plaguechanged; whatever the Spellplague did to them continued to hold sway for the rest of their lives, so if they acquired spellscars, they were spellscarred lifelong. In a few, these changes progressed over time, so they…#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 17, 2020

3)
…gained more magical powers (and/or disfigurements). Quite a few people had their lifespans extended by a decade or two over their bloodline norms (that is, if their parents and grandparents died in the sixth decades of 4)
…natural causes, not accidents or violence, they lasted into their seventh or eight decade). And early evidence seems to indicate that in some—not all—cases, this longevity has been inherited by offspring born after the…#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 17, 2020

5)
…Second Sundering (i.e. their children are also living a decade longer if not killed prematurely). Why? No one knows, though sages and clergy have advanced many claims or theories.#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) April 17, 2020

Are the mountains to the north shaped roughly the same as in the published Realms (a kind of reverse L)? As you might recall, I have an ongoing project in which I'm creating a variation of the Fonstad map that attempts to better reflect your home Realms.

— AdamDravian (@AdamDravian) September 21, 2020

2)
That glacier is the southwesternmost tongue of The Great Ice Desert, a huge glacial ice sheet that buried the rest of the mountain range (which, under it, as one proceeded north, curved slightly to the northwest and then…#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 22, 2020

3)
…curved far farther back around to the northeast, and trailed away into ridges [under the ice] and then almost level ground. (I should get you photoblasts of my original maps.)#Realmslore

— Ed Greenwood (@TheEdVerse) September 22, 2020