Tomb of Annihilation

Summary

The adventure centers on the Deathcurse, a wasting disease that slowly kills anyone who has ever been raised from the dead and prevents raising the dead, caused by the Soulmonger artifact. The party is hired by Syndra Silvane, a wealthy former adventurer afflicted with the Deathcurse, whose sources have tracked the Soulmonger to the ancient jungles of Chult. The module follows a classic quest structure with an objective, a deadline as Silvane slowly dies, and a dangerous wilderness to cross. It is designed for player characters from 1st to 11th level. The table of contents includes chapters on Port Nyanzaru, the Land of Chult, Dwellers of the Forbidden City, Fane of the Night Serpent, and Tomb of the Nine Gods, along with appendices for character backgrounds, random encounters, discoveries, monsters and NPCs, player handouts, and trickster gods of Omu.

Publication history

Announced during a June 2017 Twitch livestream called Stream of Annihilation, the module hit shelves on September 8, 2017, as a 256-page hardcover. Digital versions followed on D&D Beyond, Fantasy Grounds, and Roll20. Its inspiration came from Tomb of Horrors, a famously deadly dungeon created by D&D co-founder Gary Gygax. According to Polygon, Wizards of the Coast brought in more playtesters for this adventure than for any prior release, fearing no one would finish it alive.

The story takes place in Chult, a region of the Forgotten Realms not visited since the game’s second edition. In October 2017, Kotaku reported that Chris Perkins acknowledged no black writers or consultants contributed to the book. Perkins explained the design aimed to show Chultans reclaiming their city and land, shifting from warring tribes to a business-focused society. On June 17, 2020, following the George Floyd protests, Wizards of the Coast announced that recent reprints of Tomb of Annihilation had corrected racially insensitive text. The company stated it would continue reviewing each book for such errors during future reprints.

Related products

The 7th season of D&D Adventurers League was themed around the Tomb of Annihilation storyline, including an adventure module acting as a hook and Tier 1 and 2 adventures expanding on the story, with Tier 3 and 4 play picking up after the hardcover adventure. The 14th expansion of the Neverwinter video game aligned the free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game with the storyline, adding a new campaign, dungeon, and two zones. WizKids released 44 pre-painted miniatures corresponding with the adventure, including the lich Acererak, and in October 2017 released a Tomb of Annihilation themed board game that can be played standalone or combined with other D&D Adventure System Cooperative Play Board Games.

Reception

In Publishers Weekly's best-selling books week ending October 2, 2017, Tomb of Annihilation was #14 in Hardcover Nonfiction with 7,152 units sold. Alex Springer for SLUG Magazine reported that the campaign can bring out the best or worst in a dungeon master, highlighting new character backgrounds, exploration checks, the jungle-themed creature appendix, and the lingering threat of permadeath from the Soulmonger. Springer found it streamlined and adventure-focused compared to Storm King's Thunder.

Cameron Kunzelman for Paste noted the adventure's unique feel and that the jungles of Chult are designed to try to kill players, but also observed that the jungles and dangers have a slight feel of 'darkest Africa' and that the narrative pulls from sources like Edgar Rice Burroughs or Jules Verne with a long racialized history, suggesting Wizards could have interrogated those texts more. Cecilia D'Anastasio for Kotaku highlighted the use of dated stereotypes of African cultures and themes of colonialism, stating that the setting is an amalgamation of African cultures flattening the dimensionality of human experiences on the continent.

Andrew Zimmerman Jones in Black Gate said the module provides a good framework for unleashing undead horrors upon adventurers.