Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms is an accessory for the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms
The cover to the Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms boxed set
GenreRole-playing game
PublisherTSR, Inc.
Publication date
1988
Media typeBoxed set

Contents

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms details a Forgotten Realms campaign setting for use with Oriental Adventures, which describes the eastern land of Kara-Tur and its geography, population, society, government, history, languages, and opportunities for adventure.[1] Like the original Forgotten Realms Campaign Set, this set only lightly details the vast land of Kara-Tur, leaving room for the DM's creativity.[1]

"Volume I" covers the lands of Shou Lung, T'u Lung, Tabot, the Plain of Horses, and the Northern Wastes (analogs of China, Tibet, Mongolia, and Siberia), while "Volume II" covers the Jungle Lands, the Island Kingdoms, Koryo, Kozakura, and Wa (analogs of Southeast Asia, Malaysia, Korea, and Japan).[1]

Publication history

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms was written by Mike Pondsmith, Jay Batista, Rick Swan, John Nephew and Deborah Christian, with a cover by Jeff Easley and interior illustrations by Jim Holloway, and was published by TSR in 1988 as a boxed set with two 96-page books, four large color maps, and two plastic overlays.[1]

Shannon Appelcline noted that John Nephew had been contributing to Dragon and Dungeon, and that "As he continued to write for the magazines, he was also invited to contribute to larger projects such as Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms (1988) and WG7: Castle Greyhawk (1988)."[2]:52 Appelcline also highlighted that "Kara-Tur was the first big [sic] expansion" of the Forgotten Realms that "used real-world cultures as a touchstone".[3]

Reception

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms is a Gamers' Choice award-winner.[1]

Appelcline highlighted Ed Greenwood's, creator of the Forgotten Realms, note that the major additions to the setting with real-world correlations "also include 'recastings of my largely-offstage kingdoms like Unther and Mulhorand to more closely resemble real-world historical (or 'Hollywood historical') settings.' Greenwood disagrees with the results, saying that 'the too-close-to-our-real-world additions like Maztica, the Hordelands, and Kara-Tur were a mistake in style'. He thought that they '[pulled] gamers out of roleplaying into disputes about historical details, for one thing'."[3]

Reviews

Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms was reviewed in issue 16 of the German RPG-magazine ZauberZeit.[4][5]

References
  1. Schick, Lawrence (1991). Heroic Worlds: A History and Guide to Role-Playing Games. Prometheus Books. p. 103. ISBN 0-87975-653-5.
  2. Shannon Appelcline (2014). Designers & Dragons: The '90s. Evil Hat Productions. ISBN 978-1-61317-084-7.
  3. Appelcline, Shannon. "Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms (1e) | Product History". Dungeon Masters Guild. Retrieved 2020-12-08.
  4. Müller, Karl-Georg; Scheer, Rainer (April 1989). "SpielZeit". ZauberZeit (16): 41.
  5. "Kara-Tur: The Eastern Realms". BoardGameGeek. Retrieved 2020-12-08.


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