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Fiend Folio
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fiend Folio is the title shared by three products published for different editions of the fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. All three products are collections of monsters, making each Fiend Folio a sequel to its game's version of the Monster Manual.
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The Fiend Folio Tome (ISBN 0-935696-21-0) was originally scheduled to be published in 1979 by Games Workshop, then the holder of the license to publish Dungeons & Dragons game products in the United Kingdom. Although the manuscript was completed on time by editor Don Turnbull, a business dispute between Games Workshop and TSR Hobbies delayed publication of the book for nearly two years. The Fiend Folio was finally published in August 1981 by TSR itself, who used the product to launch its UK division. [1]
The 128-page hardcover Fiend Folio owes much of its content to "Fiend Factory", at the time a regular column appearing in Games Workshop's magazine White Dwarf. Also edited by Turnbull, "Fiend Factory" also featured new AD&D monsters, many of them created by gamers who read the magazine. Turnbull included several previously-published "Fiend Factory" monsters in the Fiend Folio, but included even more creatures that had been submitted to (but not published in) White Dwarf. The Folio also included a few monsters (such as the Drow) that had previously been published in TSR products.
(The publication of "Fiend Factory" monsters had one unintended side-effect for Citadel Miniatures, who had the contract to produce gaming miniatures based on White Dwarf features. As a condition of including "Factory" monsters in the Folio, Games Workshop transferred the copyright on those monsters to TSR, who already had an exclusive contract with Grenadier Models. This forced Citadel to discontinue miniatures depicting "Factory" monsters that appeared in the Folio. [2])
Public reaction to the Fiend Folio was mixed, at best, with many gamers criticizing the new monsters as strange or useless. (The flumph is often mentioned as both.) After two mostly-negative reviews were submitted to TSR's Dragon magazine (Greenwood 1981, Zumait 1981), the magazine's editors took the unusual step of allowing Turnbull to write a rebuttal (Turnbull 1981). AD&D creator Gary Gygax even criticized the book's random encounter tables (Gygax 1982). Decades after the book's publication, D&D players continue to debate the book's merits (i.e. [3], [4], [5]). Some of the more enduring monsters featured in the original Fiend Folio, and still around in the game today include the Slaad, Githyanki, Githzerai, Achaierai, Quaggoth, Gibberling, Grimlock, Aarakocra, Bullywug, Svirfneblin, Kenku, Hook horror, Kuo-toa, and Ettercap. This book also introduced the Elemental Princes of Evil, and the slaad lords Ygorl and Ssendam.
In 1983, TSR used the Monster Manual II to introduce a new "orange spine" cover design for hardcover AD&D manuals. The Fiend Folio was the only AD&D hardcover that did not have its cover redesigned to match the new style; instead, TSR let the Folio go out of print. Despite the early withdrawal from the market, more than "more than 190,000 copies" of the Fiend Folio were sold (TSR Inc. 1991). Gygax eventually announced his intention to incorporate material from the Fiend Folio into a revised Monster Manual (Gygax 1985), but left TSR before he could do so (Gygax 1987).
The Fiend Folio Monstrous Compendium (ISBN 1-56076-428-7) was published by TSR, Inc. in April 1992, for use with the 2nd Edition AD&D rules. It is the fourteenth volume of the Monstrous Compendium series, consisting of a cardboard cover, 64 loose-leaf pages, and four divider pages. Also known as the Fiend Folio Appendix, it contains over sixty monsters created or updated by members of the RPGA, including revised versions of many monsters introduced in the original Folio (TSR Inc. 1991).
The third Fiend Folio (ISBN 0-7869-2780-1) was published in April 2003 for use with the 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons rules. The 224-page hardcover manual included only a few monsters from the original, but added many new creatures, with an emphasis on monsters with extraplanar origins. [6]
This edition introduced many new elements to the game, including the following:
- Grafts
- Symbionts
- Swarms
It also includes three prestige classes:
- Fiend of Blasphemy
- Fiend of Corruption
- Fiend of Possession
- Greenwood, Ed 1981. "Flat taste didn't go away", Dragon 55:6-7,9 (Nov 1981).
- Gygax, Gary 1982. "New spells for illusionists", Dragon 66:22-28 (Oct 1982).
- Gygax, Gary 1985. "The future of the game", Dragon 103:8,10 (Nov 1985).
- Gygax, Gary 1987. "From the Sorcerer's Scroll", Dragon 122:40 (Jun 1987).
- Ryan, Michael 2003. Personality Spotlight: Fiend Folio designers, retrieved June 2, 2006.
- TSR, Inc. 1991. 1992 (TSR, Inc.)
- Turnbull, Don 1981. "Apologies -- and arguments", Dragon 55:10 (Nov 1981).
- Zumwait, Alan 1981. "Observations of a semi-satisfied customer", Dragon 55:8,10 (Nov 1981).
- The Acaeum: Later AD&D Manuals, retrieved June 2, 2006.
- Dragonsfoot Forums: Fiend Folio - Underrated?, retrieved June 7, 2006
- EN World Forum: How stellar was the old Fiend Folio!, retrieved June 7, 2006
- Google Groups: rec.games.frp Fiend Folio, retrieved June 7, 2006
- Stuff of Legends: Fiend Factory, retrieved June 7, 2006