Once the record is done, the road leaves the camp and leads to the gates of Cripta — the city proper and, beyond it, the open world of the Forgotten Realms. From there on, what one wins is by their own hand and steel.
A Land That Hunts Back
The open world is where the banished monsters returned to do what they did in the world above — hunt, migrate, dominate — only now there are peoples to fear and face them. The portal did not choose what it swallowed: alongside the exiled came creatures of every land and every age, and the timeless valleys of Vashrath gave them room to spread.
Each region keeps its own perils. The lowland forests are dense and rich in materials — and richer still in things that want you dead. The frozen mountains of the North hide creatures that thrive where nothing should. The dry lands of the interior belong to whatever survived long enough to claim them. Nowhere beyond the walls is truly safe, and that is precisely why the walls exist.
The Hunt
In the game, Expeditions are your ventures out beyond the walls, after the monsters that roam the valleys of Vashrath. They are the beating heart of a hero's life in the realms: you leave the safety of a city, track down the creatures of its surrounding lands, and fight for whatever they guard.
What the visitor should know:
- Every city has its own hunting grounds. From the mist-covered hills of Cripta to the farthest reaches of the continent, each of the five cities opens onto lands with their own creatures, their own dangers and their own rewards. Traveling the realms means discovering new hunts nowhere else offers.
- The deeper you go, the harder it gets. Expeditions range from prey a fresh awakened can face to horrors that humble veterans. The stronger the monster, the greater the spoils — experience, gold, materials for the crafts and equipment worth carrying home.
- It is a loop of hunt and conquest. Each expedition makes you stronger, and each new strength opens hunts that were beyond you before. This is the promise made since The Awakening Rite: no throne is granted here — everything is taken from the wilds, one fight at a time.
Where Expeditions End and Something Else Begins
Not everything beyond the walls is open field. Some places in Vashrath are worlds unto themselves — sealed dominions the portal swallowed whole, with their own lords and their own laws. Venturing into those is another matter entirely, told in Incursions: The Sealed Dominions.
Expeditions are the open sky and the open road: the daily bread of every hunter in the realms, and the forge where most legends of Vashrath were first hammered out.
Tied to the Hunt
- Cripta — the starting point, whose gates open onto the first hunting grounds every hero learns.
- Vashrath — the continent where the banished monsters returned to hunt, and where heroes now hunt them back.