Overview
The Forgotten Realms is the campaign setting in which Tomb of Annihilation takes place. It serves as the default world for this adventure, providing the geographic and political context for the death curse storyline.
Geographic Context
The adventure begins on the Sword Coast region of the Forgotten Realms, specifically in the city of Baldur’s Gate, which serves as the default starting location for the campaign. From there, the action moves to the peninsula of Chult, a tropical wilderness region composed mostly of jungles, plateaus, impassable mountains, and belching volcanoes.
Campaign Flexibility
While the Forgotten Realms is the default setting, the adventure explicitly allows DMs to substitute alternative settings from other D&D worlds:
- Oerth (Greyhawk): The Amedio Jungle and Free City of Greyhawk
- Mystara: The Savage Coast and city of Specularum
- Eberron: The jungles of Xen’drik and city of Sharn
- Any comparable jungle setting on a homebrew campaign world
DMs can adapt location names as needed while preserving the core adventure structure.
Role in the Adventure
The Forgotten Realms provides the backdrop for the death curse—a worldwide supernatural phenomenon affecting everyone who has ever been raised from the dead. This curse impacts the entire region (and possibly the entire world), creating urgency and stakes that extend beyond just Chult. Temples and divine magic scholars across the Realms are unable to explain or counter the curse, driving adventurers to seek its source in Chult’s hidden tomb.