The High Moor is a 28-page supplement for the D&D game that offers information on a section of the Forgotten Realms, drawing on information presented in previous books and updating it for use with the current edition and the current date in the Realms. It is nicely written, and gives a good overview of this wilderness area.

The High Moor is not known for human civilisation, although a few scattered ruins are a reminder that brave and foolish souls have attempted to live here in the past. Now, most humans on the moor live in a barbarous state, fighting goblins, orcs and other monsters. The supplement gives summaries of eight locations of interest that might lure adventurers to the moor, as well as giving a good overview of the hazards they might encounter: monsters, plants and terrain features.

The supplement doesn’t just confine itself to DM-specific information. Two new class archetypes, for the Barbarian and the Ranger, are presented here. They have abilities linked to the moor, although they are not dependent on playing a campaign on the High Moor and can be used elsewhere. The abilities they grant are unusual and seem well-judged, although I haven’t looked closely at their balance.

The book concludes with a selection of tables to aid in running adventures in the High Moor, allowing you to randomly determine such aspects as weather, terrain and monsters. Three new monsters, the Crimson Death, the Fyrefly Swarm and the Golden-Ringed Dragonfly. It’s nice to see the Crimson Death again, one of my favourite “old” monsters.

The encounter table is quite interesting, as it gives situations, such goblins who have fallen into a sinkhole and are now fighting off troglodytes, rather than just a flat monster table. I like this approach, although I would have appreciated a standard random monster table in addition, just because the situations will eventually exhaust themselves and – for a general sourcebook like this one – having a more generally applicable table would be good.

The High Moor doesn’t overdetail anything. It provides you with inspiration for setting adventures in the area, and it provides enough historical information to give context to encounters and adventures. This book won’t do the work for you, but if you find yourself wanting to know more about the area, I can recommend you start here. It’s a worthy product.