Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes (read for fun)

The supplement that is a treasure trove of lore!  This book has been a fascinating read for me, as a reader of fantasy fiction and also as a Dungeon Master. I have written previously about its value as a lorebook, the inspiration it provides to a Dungeon Master. You can read that in my other post -  The Value of Lorebooks. This post is more of an overview of the book itself. 

As stated, this is a lorebook. It is mostly about lore. Its frame narrative is that the grand mage Mordenkainen has been studying multi-versal conflicts in his pursuit of maintaining what he considers to be an ideal balance of the cosmos. This tome is a collection of his research. So it contains information about the Blood War, the origin of the feud between dwarves and duergar, why the Githyanki and Gizerazi hunt each other, and how the elves split into so many subspecies, with the drow among them. Then there is a chapter about the gnomes and halflings, who are explicitly noted not to have evil counterparts or even any major conflicts in their histories. 

 A bestiary is included after these lore chapters. It contains more monster stat blocks, along with variants on the standard drow/duergar/etc. Reading them was fun because I can think about how they would function in a campaign, not optimizing but rather about roleplay; how would this particular creature act in a story given their stats and abilities? The sections for the demon lords and archdevils was particularly fun, because they are boss-level creatures and have certain scenario considerations that can make them tougher to fight or otherwise deal with. 

Between all this lore and the bestiary, this is mainly a book for Dungeon Masters. There are only a few thing for players, such as rules for playing as some of the races featured, like drow or duergar. It is still a fun book, so I imagine that players would still find it fun to read. 

The artwork continues to impress. The illustrations of the monsters range from magnificent to horrific, and the lore chapters include depictions of certain events, like the original Clan Duergar falling into the mindflayer's trap. Those are scary. The illustration of a happy dwarven family, by contrast, is heartwarming. A few sections even have full, two-page spreads. Those are impressive. 

Trickster Eric Novels gives "Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes" an A+

Click here for my next book review: Spiral - Bonds of Reasoning

Click here for my previous book review: So I'm a Spider , so what? volume 2

Brian Wilkerson is a independent novelist, freelance book reviewer, and writing advice blogger. He studied at the University of Minnesota and came away with bachelor degrees in English Literature and History (Classical Mediterranean Period concentration).

His fantasy series, Journey to Chaos, is currently available on Amazon as an ebook or paperback.