Hadrune: "The primary consideration for this illustration was to define the look of a shade," said Sam. "Hadrune is not the only shade character in the new Forgotten Realms book, so we needed consistency. The costuming for this character is based on some early concept work done by John Gallagher, and was used as the basis for the costuming on another character from the same cultural and historical background."

Jezz the Lame: "Jezz is a little Drow with a club foot," explains Matt. "I gave him a leg brace to drive home the idea that his foot is crippled and that it's not just disproportionately large or poorly drawn."

Szass Tam: Sam says, "I'm always bothered by lich illustrations that either: a) make the lich look too much like a normal, living person; or b) make the lich look like a shambling, mindless zombie. I felt there had to be a be a way to capture the power and cunning of these creatures without losing sight of the fact that they're undead. I was also inspired by the costuming Todd Lockwood created for Manshoon --hence the creepy, biomechanical look of Szass' clothing . . .

Arrk: "Originally, Arrk's description called for him to have shadowy batlike wings floating behind him," Matt recalls. "But this proved to make things a little strange looking, so they were scrapped. His description also noted that his sword perpetually dripped with blood through some sort of magical means -- hence the drippies."