Book of Vile Darkness is an optional supplemental sourcebook for the 3rd edition of the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. The book was written by Monte Cook and published by Wizards of the Coast on October 1, 2002. Described as a "detailed look at the nature of evil," it was the first Dungeons & Dragons book labelled for mature audiences. Another Book of Vile Darkness was published for the 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons on December 27, 2011, written by Robert J. Schwalb. Before release Ed Stark, Design Manager for the D&D game at Wizards of the Coast at the time, explained to Pyramid that "the idea for BoVD grew out of both the initial success of the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons game and the excitement about "nostalgia" products such as Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. The new D&D game promised people the same "back to the dungeon" feel 1st Edition provided, but with all the improvements twenty-plus years can put on a game system." As with most new products, Wizards of the Coast announced and previewed Book of Vile Darkness on its website during the months before its release. Unlike other products, previewer Mat Smith revealed virtually no hard details about the book's contents because the book "is being released as a 'Mature Audiences Only' title." Instead, he stressed that this book was something its developers felt had been requested by the community, something that "many, many gamers have been asking for." Also, as part of the promotion of the book, Paizo Publishing included sealed "mature" sections in both official Dungeons & Dragons magazines. Dragon issue 300 included flesh and skin themed magic, while an adventure printed in Dungeon issue 95, "The Porphyry House of Horror", called on players to infiltrate a harem in order to disrupt a sacrificial orgy intended to turn the city's residents into fiends. Author and co-creator of the Dragonlance campaign setting Tracy Hickman distributed an angry response to Dragon 300 in a mailing-list newsletter entitled "D20 Terrorism". Hickman described both the Dragon content and the then-unreleased Book of Vile Darkness as "excrement" and as "cheap, trashy and demeaning." Following repeated references to the Comic Book Code, he stated, "Every dark fear that mothers and clergy across America have about D&D is now, suddenly, true. In one stroke, I watched everything Laura [Curtis] and I had worked toward for the