However, until then (and after then), you can find them hosted on Canonfire:A Short Introduction to the World of Greyhawk
Part I - Greyhawk in 576 CY; the 1983 boxed set; basic themes and conflicts
Part II - Greyhawk in 591 CY; development from 1983 to 2000; updated themes and conflicts
Neither of these articles are definitive, nor do they purport to do anything but give a brief introduction to the World of Greyhawk, based on my personal impressions, but you may find them useful.
I would delight in seeing a Greyhawk Campaign Setting book for 4e. Mostly, I've been happy with how Wizards have handled Greyhawk in 3e... leaving it alone, and letting Paizo offer some support through adventures.
What I would really like to see in 4e:
* A Greyhawk Campaign Setting hardcover (one book, with maps)
* Generic Adventure modules offer suggestions of where to place the adventure in Greyhawk (much like they do for FR and Eberron)
* The occasional Greyhawk-themed adventure
* Greyhawk support in D&Di.
I don't really want to see:
* Regional sourcebooks.
* World-shattering events in adventures
Potentially world-affecting events? Certainly; but let the group decide through play if they want them to affect the world or not. Don't decide "the world erupts into war", thus splitting the fans.
For me, Greyhawk is the location of a lot of very, very good adventures (Slavers, Giants, Tharizdun), and a setting where the specific details of the nations is left up to the DM and his or her players to create. It's a world for the players, not for the designers to decree from on high.
Which is why I've been pretty happy with Greyhawk during 3e!
Living Greyhawk has been separate, of course. I've DMed it for a couple of years, before my group decided it wasn't for us any more. For the past 7 years, I've been constantly running one or more Greyhawk campaigns in any case.
Cheers!
A core book would cover worldwide organizations like the Scarlet Brotherhood (I realize world-wide is misleading, but you get my meaning I hope), and racial histories, but it shouldn't have to cover what that means in a certain part of the Flanaess. One book is great, but if WOTC is actually going to make a go at publishing Greyhawk (which I don't think they are btw) then it would be under the concept of (IMO) one book for each major region, and a variety of other books detailing other major factors (other regions of the world, Greyhawk City, Iuz, etc).
Like I said, I seriously doubt we'll see much of anything, but I would love to be wrong. Personally a Sheldomar Valley Sourcebook would be a wonderful thing, but I am being pretty selfish there.
Like I said, I seriously doubt we'll see much of anything, but I would love to be wrong. Personally a Sheldomar Valley Sourcebook would be a wonderful thing, but I am being pretty selfish there.
The trouble with regional books - and it's a pretty big problem - is this: Greyhawk was originally designed as a "you fill in the details" setting. It deviated from this in 2e, but returned to it in 3e.
Thus, I have a long-running campaign set in the County of Ulek. Any major development of the Sheldomar Valley is going to invalidate the work that I've spent detailing that part of the setting.
Sure, I can ignore that book, but I'm sure I wouldn't be alone - and sales suffer as a result.
The heading for a setting needs to be determined when it's first launched: will it be a detailed setting, or a DM-created setting? Forgotten Realms has always been in the "detailed" box. Greyhawk, unfortunately, has been switched between the "DM-created" and "detailed" boxes several times, and each time the new products manage to annoy a significant portion of its fans.
Cheers!
The trouble with regional books - and it's a pretty big problem - is this: Greyhawk was originally designed as a "you fill in the details" setting. It deviated from this in 2e, but returned to it in 3e.
Thus, I have a long-running campaign set in the County of Ulek. Any major development of the Sheldomar Valley is going to invalidate the work that I've spent detailing that part of the setting.
Sure, I can ignore that book, but I'm sure I wouldn't be alone - and sales suffer as a result.
The heading for a setting needs to be determined when it's first launched: will it be a detailed setting, or a DM-created setting? Forgotten Realms has always been in the "detailed" box. Greyhawk, unfortunately, has been switched between the "DM-created" and "detailed" boxes several times, and each time the new products manage to annoy a significant portion of its fans.
Cheers!
Well, look at Eberron. both worlds are not that different actually, on the design philosophy at least.
The regional books offer the 'bones', and you can add things, without sayingf too much. They even offer plot hooks and '?' for DM to run with, and suggestions if one use optional material also at times.
Greyhawk should take example from Eberron's design, and it would work WELL.
* A Greyhawk Campaign Setting hardcover (one book, with maps)
* Generic Adventure modules offer suggestions of where to place the adventure in Greyhawk (much like they do for FR and Eberron)
* The occasional Greyhawk-themed adventure
* Greyhawk support in D&Di.
I don't really want to see:
* Regional sourcebooks.
* World-shattering events in adventures"
As to what you want to see, those are all good suggestions.
As to what you don’t want to see...the world shattering adventure themes have and always will be garbage, and I completely and utterly agree with you that this kind of thing should be left out. People have their own campaigns, so anyone doing any new material should be wise enough to make sure that any new material will fit into anybody's existing campaign, new and old players alike. That's just called common sense, not to mention targeting your market base properly(by going for ALL of them). The Surefire way of doing just that is not to magically nuke a country here and there, assassinate national leaders, sink a continent, etc.
As to your position on there being no regional sourcebooks, it seems like you want Greyhawk to merely have a poor excuse for a product line, and therefore not a viable one. One basic campaign book, and that is it? So, the nation entries that have a name population, capitol city, etc., with little to no detail of any kind really does it for you? You have no interest in knowing even the least bit of information beyond that? I think this is not a common opinion held by most.
Some of the most interesting products for Greyhawk have been the sourcebooks “Iuz the Evil”, “The Marklands”, and the unreleased “Ivid the Undying”. The only problem I see with them is that, while they did have some interesting information in them, they were not organized very well. By this I mean the areas they cover should have been very delineated and detailed equitably. The Marklands fails the most in this regard. The above mentioned sourcebooks still only gave a broad overview of the area they covered, just in a bit more detail. Major towns and cities were cited, but not every minor town, village, hamlet, etc., nor was every personage in the nations detailed either. What these sourcebooks did accomplish is that they fleshed out the area they covered to the point that a dm didn't have to literally create everything necessary to run a campaign in one of those areas.
Not all dm's have the time to literally create everything from the ground up, but many of them do like to customize things to suit their style. As it stands, unless these dm’s plan on playing in an area covered by any of these sourcebooks, they are on their own. A single initial Greyhawk campaign sourcebook is a good idea, so long as it is just the general overview. This is the type of information that anybody playing in the campaign should be able to look over, not just the dm. Additional sourcebooks should be more fully fleshed out, deal with very specific regions divided along national borders for instance, and have an eye toward giving a more detailed overview of each nation/area covered in the book. Sourcebooks are the most solid means of not only fleshing out the campaign world to a decent degree; they are also the anchor of any campaign setting product line.
To put it bluntly, doing a single campaign setting book is sort of a half-assed way of supporting a campaign world. Why would one expect WotC to devote the time and money to producing just a single book for a setting, and then maybe some peripheral products(which don’t sell all that well in comparison to sourcebooks) mostly loosely associated with the one book they made? Sounds like a colossal waste of production time to me. Either you do something full bore, or you don’t do it at all. If you want Greyhawk to not only re-launch, but to stick around and be given support, there needs to be a product range to support. They should do an initial campaign setting book aimed at both players and dm’s, and should follow that up with regional sourcebooks, modules keyed *to* the regional sourcebooks(cross product support is always a good marketing tool), and also a book on Greyhawk religions and details of their cults/followers. It is the followers the pc’s face, not the gods themselves, so make the info playable and worth a damn. Some decent novelization of Greyhawk wouldn’t hurt at all either.
If you have a product range, you have campaign world support. One book and few adventures that may or may not be set in or tied to Greyhawk are not worth the effort, and it would just be a repeat of what was done this last time with the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer. We’ve all seen just how well that went.
The heading for a setting needs to be determined when it's first launched: will it be a detailed setting, or a DM-created setting? Forgotten Realms has always been in the "detailed" box. Greyhawk, unfortunately, has been switched between the "DM-created" and "detailed" boxes several times, and each time the new products manage to annoy a significant portion of its fans.
Cheers!
In which case you are saying Greyhawk should not be a setting. It has its setting book, nothing more should ever be made because they will, inevitably, contain material that conflicts with individual development. That holds true even for adventures.
Since you have said you wouldn't buy any such books, this means that new products will not actually annoy any customers, as you and people like you are already declaring you are removed from the customer base. You might be fans, but you are not customers, and there is no way you will ever really be customers, at least not for this setting.
I would rather see future products and their development for Greyhawk driven by the active customers rather than the retired ones. There are a lot of people who will use new products. In fact, take a look at:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=921087#post13764735
that thread.
One person only uses the pre-1985 material, ten people use most everything. I would challenge the statement that every new release annoys a "significant" portion of its fans, or at least that such annoyance is of "significant" relevance in sales.
I would like some of the other parts of Greyhawk fleshed out. I don't need every tree and bush written out, but it mght be nice to have a write up like the LGG journal.
I loved Erik Mona's version of Castle Greyhawk, even though it's not the one done by the master, Gary Gygax. Since we will not see Gary coming back anytime soon. (WOTC make me a liar.) I would like to see more work by Erik.
His vision through the book was very well done and explained alot about Rolibar. I really liked the material he wrote for the adventure path. I'd like to see more like that in the online magazines.
I'd like more information even if it is only fluff that explains how Iuz got to be a Demi-god.
I'd like some of the classic adventures brought back in 4e. If nothing else but to bring my son through them.
Everyone intrested in Greyhawk show their support by placing numerous posts here in order to get WOTC attention. In regards to campaign support....
1. The first hardcover boo'k should be an edition neutral gazetteer, similiar to what we have now except updated and much longer. The book should have much smaller print and more pages. I'm thinking 400 pages of small print and yes I would pay more for the book. The cover should have art presented by Larry Elmore. Interior art should be minimal other than pictures of notable NPCs and they should be glossy color, highly detailed, not sketchy like the art is now.
Each nation entry should be twice the current length. The history of the world should begin before the Invoked Devastation and Rain of Colorless Fire.
The book should contain a large map (or two maps), with hexagon features to track accurate movement. The maps and book should cover the entire Flanaess and add finish off Hepmonaland and the Amedio Jungle. The maps should contain all major towns and cities with roads present.
The book should contain well detailed organizations which have always been key to Greyhawk such as the knighthoods and Circle of Eight. These organizations should have prestige classes and other 4th edition entries.
Random encounter tables should be included for all nations and wilderness and every creature should appear in the Monster Manual(s).
The book should contain detailed descriptions of the religions of the greater and intermediate gods. Leave the lesser gods out for now and include them in a real Deities and Demigods book for Greyhawk later. This tome should focus on the relationship of the different religions, where they are worshipped and how they are unique comapared to one another. I would leave out stat block for the deities themselves.
The book should contain key NPCs with full 4th edition stats and background such as Mordenkainen, Rary, Robilar, Acererak, etc. These individuals should have specific locales on the map showing where they live.
2. Additional books should be added according to regions rather than nations and match the type size and page count of the 1st book. Break it down into regions such as the Baklunish West, Bitter North, Western Nyr Dyv, etc. Additional full page color maps showing added detail should be present. Another poster map possibly.
These books should cover prestige classes, feats, and other 4th edition material unique to that region.
All of these books should have colors which match providing a uniformation of the books when placed together on a desk or shelf.
3. A Deities and Demigods book for the Flanaess should be written. This book includes added detail to the previous religions as well as the lesser gods. I would still leave stat blocks out in order to concentrate on the actual relgion itself and how it works in the Flanaess. I would include stat blocks for aspects however.
4. Reprinting and updating old classic Greyhawk modules. An active line of new modules as well, for Greyhawk. World generic modules should have a page for each gameworld explaining how to incorporate it into the basic D&D worlds including Greyhawk. The modules should span only a very small portion of the area, no lengthy treks. Each module should provide an outdoor map for each of the basic game worlds in order to help incorporate it there as well.
5. Finally, I would call upon the Greyhawk fanbase to write much of the material. This would provide writers who are passionate about the world and be particular in accuracy, minimizing changes. In addtion, as of now WOTC and many Greyhawk fans are not exactly on the best of terms. By involving these individuals in the writing, it would improve relations amongst the Greyhawk and WOTC community.
This is where I would start!
One thing I did fail to mention is not to screw much, if at all, with the timeline. It should not be done, is not necessary, and merely serves to possibly alienate a good portion of the customer base. Why would you advance the timeline? So you can simply rewrite all of what has been written before on all the lands we already know? That is one thing that would need to be done, but none of it develops the campaign world- it just extends its history. Developing the campaign world means creating material for those things that there is little or no material for. That means area sourcebooks. Give the world's deficient areas some well deserved attention, though not too much detail, and simply leave the building of current history and timelines to the folks who have been doing it since D&D began- all of the individual dm's who have been running their own campaigns in their own way. Provide the basic information and let the dm’s run with it.
All good suggestions there.
One thing I did fail to mention is not to screw much, if at all, with the timeline. It should not be done, is not necessary, and merely serves to possibly alienate a good portion of the customer base. Why would you advance the timeline? So you can simply rewrite all of what has been written before on all the lands we already know? That is one thing that would need to be done, but none of it develops the campaign world- it just extends its history. Developing the campaign world means creating material for those things that there is little or no material for. That means area sourcebooks. Give the world's deficient areas some well deserved attention, though not too much detail, and simply leave the building of current history and timelines to the folks who have been doing it since D&D began- all of the individual dm's who have been running their own campaigns in their own way. Provide the basic information and let the dm’s run with it.
Yeah but, if WotC were to produce area sourcebooks, they could potentially be stepping on the toes of DMs who have created their own materials and set their own campaigns in those little-detailed areas. If a DM runs his/her home campaign in the Bone March and develops a whole bunch of materials to flesh out that region, and then an sourcebook is released covering that area, then that also "invalidates" everything the DM came up with.
My point is, any time an official product is released (and therefore accepted as canon) - be it a product that advances the timeline, a product that fleshes out a specific area, a product that details NPCs, etc - it will override the personal materials of some DM, somewhere. Unless all you play are officially published adventures, your campaign world (be it Greyhawk or Eberron or whatever) will deviate from that of canon in some fashion; by definition, a home campaign is one that is not the same campaign world as that of official canon.
I would be happy to see more Greyhawk product from WotC, period. I don't mind if they advance the timeline or change things up in the setting a bit. DMs are always free to choose whether or not to incorporate any official materials that differ from their own campaign.
Has anyone noticed they took Greyhawk off of the settings list on the dnd home page?
a) they can be run purely as adventures, and
b) they don't define too much.
When you get a regional sourcebook, the designer feels the need to detail every town, every noble, every religion... and it's way too intrusive.
The classic adventures - GDQ, A1-4, T1, U1-3, etc. - are mostly localised, and are easily adapted even when you've already detailed one of the towns involved. And they do a lot to build the setting.
I think Expedition to Castle Greyhawk is also mostly in this vein - perhaps a bit more intrusive, but not terribly so (let's just forget about the ending).
Ultimately, I feel that Greyhawk is also defined far more by its adventures than any setting book. Perhaps the one exception would be a book detailing the City of Greyhawk itself...
Cheers!
I love adventures building the world because
a) they can be run purely as adventures, and
b) they don't define too much.
I prefer this as part of an organic approach to world development, as exemplified with Paizo's Pathfinder and GameMastery Modules.
What I would really like to see in 4e:
* A Greyhawk Campaign Setting hardcover (one book, with maps)
* Generic Adventure modules offer suggestions of where to place the adventure in Greyhawk (much like they do for FR and Eberron)
* The occasional Greyhawk-themed adventure
* Greyhawk support in D&Di.
I don't really want to see:
* Regional sourcebooks.
* World-shattering events in adventures
That is funny, I have almost the exact opposite wants. While a Campaign Setting hardcover is necessary if the line is to be restarted, I fail to see how it will be more useful than the three campaign settings I already have for Greyhawk (though having one in hardcover would be nice). I rarely use published adventures, so I am neither here nor there on having more of them. With no plans to subscribe to D&Di, I am pretty ambivalent on that point as well.
However, what I would absolutely love are more regional books. Gazetteers for the Sheldomar Valley, Baklunish lands, Iron League, and Thillronian would be highly appreciated. A second full-blown campaign setting for western Oerik would be even better.
The trouble with regional books - and it's a pretty big problem - is this: Greyhawk was originally designed as a "you fill in the details" setting. It deviated from this in 2e, but returned to it in 3e.
Not sure I see it in the same manner as yourself. At least in the regional books we have, there are massive holes for the DM to fill. My last campaign centered entirely on my wholely created Duskedge Barony right in the heart of Gold County. My next campaign looks to be set in North Kingdom, again fully self created. Having regional sources for Furyondy and North Kingdom helped me flesh them out, not hindered.
I also would like to see to other regions given their own book -
Thorillian Peninsula
Sheldomar
Baklunish Lands
Far West
Even the flanaess has lands mentioned is previous sourcebooks and deserve there own.
Stonehold
Pale
Bone March
Pomarj
Well the regional books help define the nations, I found the previous books were not so detail driven as too destroy adventuring possibilites.
The purchase of a sourcebook is a decision each and every indviduals must make based on their pocketbook, current world develoment, and interest in various areas of Greyhawk.
The sourcebook which may be invaluable to you could prove to be worthless to me. Likewise, the book I covet the most may be the one you chose to leave behind.
Perhaps Merric you could purchase just the sourcebooks which cover material in areas of your campaign that may suffer from a lack of attention thus far. If your entire campaign is complete, congratuations, I wish I could say mine is.
Nah, I just make things up when we go to new areas.
More seriously, I'd buy any new Greyhawk book that came out. However, it's quite likely I'd be disappointed with it. I've been feeling this since Greyhawk Adventures came out at the end of 1e!
There's a disconnect between what I saw in the original World of Greyhawk boxed set, the early AD&D Greyhawk adventures, and the first few Gord the Rogue books, and the Greyhawk that came later.
(Heck, I probably would have found later Gygaxian Greyhawk disconcerting as well, but we didn't actually see it)...
This is a different thing to what I feel about Eberron sourcebooks, btw. As we always knew there'd be sourcebooks, I don't feel threatened by them in the least (and some of them are really brilliantly handled; Secrets of Xen'drik for one).
Incidentally, I have a picture in my mind of the following places in Greyhawk, due to my game having travelled there at some point:
* Great Kingdom
* See of Medegia
* Wild Coast
* Kingdom of Furyondy
* Arch-Clericy of Veluna
* City of Greyhawk
* Bright Desert
* Geoff
* Keoland
* County of Ulek
* Vesve Forest
* Land of the Frost Barbarians
The sourcebook that I found the most disappointing? "Vale of the Mage". Gods, I hate Jean Rabe's work!
Funnily enough, the sourcebook I found the most useful was "Rary the Traitor"...
Cheers!
I haven't made extensive use of those older sourcebooks yet, but I do reference them when the need does come up. So far, I would say that Ivid the Undying has received the most attention from me but that is pretty much in an attempt to glean ancient history of the Great Kingdom for my dragon article series I'm working on for Oerth Journal.
Ivid is about as far from my conception of the Great Kingdom as you can get.
See also the Maze of Zayene series by RJK, which are closer to my conception.
Cheers!
Fate of Istus transitioned AD&D to 2nd Edition (Can't give a quote, as I don't own it, but it's really widely known)
Die, Vecna, Die! transitioned from 2nd to 3rd. Just look at the ending:
Even with Vecna's removal, his time in the crux effected change in superspace. Though the Lady of Pain attempts to heal the damage, the turmoil spawned by Vecna's time in Sigil cannot be entirely erased. Some Outer Planes drift off and are forever lost, others collide and merge, while at least one Inner Plane runs "aground" on a distant world of the Prime. Moreover, the very nature of the Prime Material Plane itself is altered. Half-worlds like those attached to Tovag Baragu multiply a millionfold, taking on parallel realism in what was before a unified Prime Material Plane. The concept of alternate dimensions rears its metaphorical head, but doesn't yet solidify, and perhaps it never will. New realms, both near and far, are revealed and realms never previously imagined make themselves known. Entities long thought lost emerge once more, while other creatures, both great and small, are inexplicably eradicated. Some common spells begin to work differently. The changes do not occur immediately, but instead are revealed during the subsequent months. However, one thing remains clear: Nothing will ever be the same again.
Yes their is MORE than enough history, and it would also level out some of those bumps in the road from multiple writers throughout the 30+ years the game world has been around.