This review has been sponsored by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

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Designed by: Stormcrow Dreamscapes (Can Uzmen), Ed Greenwood

Halflings & Hops: Gazetteer of Luiren is a Forgotten Realms sourcebook for Luiren — wait, what? Where in the Nine Hells is “Luiren?”

If you’re like me and most of your D&D knowledge stems from Fifth Edition, you probably don’t know much about the Forgotten Realms outside of the Sword Coast.

Luiren is a region far, far to the southeast. It’s the ancestral homeland of the halflings of Faerun, and features riverlands, swamplands, forests, and mountains rife with adventure.

The halflings of Luiren (who refer to themselves as hin) are a joyous, pastoral people. They worship the goddess Yondalla through their traditions of feasts, community, and family.

It’s humorously appropriate that the Gazetteer provides more information on traditional cuisine, brews, and pipeweed than on halfling history and culture.

It’s nearly impossible to talk about halflings without Tolkein, and the influences are very clear in Luiren — not to mention the surrounding lands, which include ogre tribes, spider-filled woods, powerful wizards, and even a court of eagles!

The region map and the major halfling town of Willownook are our only color maps. Willownook is lovely, but lacks the drama, intrigue, and quest ideas many other fantasy towns provide.

I’ll be honest — I’ve never found halflings to be particularly interesting, and their homeland paints them as the easy-going, friendly, and somewhat boring folk that I expected.

Fortunately, the halflings make up only a small part of Luiren, which features over 50 adventure locations.

willownook

Luiren was a region devastated by the Spellplague, when the waters rose and nearly drowned the entire land.

The sea has been receding ever since, even further than usual, revealing new lost islands, sunken cities, and hidden treasures within the Gulf of Luiren.

In the Amberbole Bog, a hag coven has recently suffered an attack from its neighbors. One hag was killed by the Greenscale lizardfolk tribe (who have their own issues they’re dealing with), while the other was captured by a bebilith and her legion of spiders and blights from a corrupted treant.

The surviving hag, Auntie Tichwillow, would be eager to make a deal with any adventurers.

Stop by the Luirwood to meet a mysterious ranger mounted on a dinosaur, chat with a friendly group of lycanthropes, or discover a recently unsealed cave into the Underdark.

The Toadsquat Mountains are filled with danger: a recently healed ancient red dragon, a clan of beholders, and a dozen different goblin tribes.

The nearly 30 pages of adventure locations are easy to read, keeping the information tightly focused on what makes each area a compelling site to explore. Frequent sidebars highlight important NPC leaders, magic items, and potential quest lines, such as a magic sword that transformed into a tower, or the evil Zhentarim leader of the haunted Black Dragon’s Den.

For character creation, the Gazetteer ties official 5e player backgrounds into Luiren, such as Folk Hero, Sailor, Noble, and Outlander.

Most of the background ties are overly simplistic. I would’ve preferred to see this section combined with the next one, which details over a dozen interesting factions, such as the Wardens of the Dead, the Ulinean Philsophers, the Hin Fist, and the Luckbringers. Give me new backgrounds using these specific factions, which include their dogmas and typical quests (though the quest ideas are also annoyingly vague!).

When reviewing a regional sourcebook, I look for two main qualities: does it give me the right amount of information as a DM, and does it provide interesting quest hooks and adventures for my players? For Halflings & Hops, the answer is a resounding yes. Even if you’re not venturing out of the Sword Coast any time soon, it’s easy to drop any of these areas and ideas into places a little closer to home, and halfling player characters will appreciate the attention to detail.

Pros:

  • Over 30 pages detailing the Luiren region, with over 50 adventure locations, and the town of Willownook.
  • Dozens of historical sidebars featuring important and interesting NPCs
  • Over a dozen detailed factions, each with quest ideas.

Cons:

  • Would prefer new backgrounds based on the new factions instead of adapting existing 5e backgrounds to the region.

The Verdict: Comprehensive and easy-to-read, Halfings & Hops‘ definitive guidebook for the Luiren region provides a wealth of fun adventure ideas for a lesser known region of Faerun.

A review copy of “Halflings & Hops: Gazetteer of Luiren” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work by using my affiliate links and pledging via Patreon.