It also came at a very opportune time in my campaign. My campaign started last year in The Free City of Greyhawk with Mad God's Key. It then moved to Hommlet for Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. We've been playing that since then, but have found it rather tedious for me as a DM and for them as players. I decided to end the adventure at the Fire Temple, and bring the party back to Greyhawk for some more urban adventures. (I also plan on eventually running the Istivin campaign arc from Dungeon Magazine).
I don't know how others feel about this book, but I can't help but feel it's the perfect supplement to the material I have so far.
I have several players who have characters that come from the City of Greyhawk or the Wild Coast. TAB will definitely come in handy.
As an aside, I'm curious about opinions of Player's Guide to Greyhawk.
would I find any use for Player's Guide to Greyhawk as a DM?
As a DM? Doubtful. Everything in it is already printed elsewhere. For players though, it's a must have (well, perhaps not, depending on which year your campaign begins..)
- nice color map of the world
- very nice color map of the Wild Coast area (though with too many spoilers IMHO)
- everything you need to know about the races, calendar, knightly orders, deities, etc...
When the Right Honorable Sir Fenward Lefthanded ended patrolling the thin sliver of territory Verbobonc claimed in the Kron Hills (pp. 36-37; see Atlas of the Flanaess, pp. 47, 58, in the From the Ashes boxed set), my players annexed it.
They visited Dark Gate, journeyed to the Sea of Dust and explored Zinbyle (p. 38), and ended up travelling back in time to the Suel Imperium in 5094 SD, a mere 28 days before the Rain of Colorless Fire.
After the war ended, they held a joint expedition with Furyondy and explored some of Hyboria (p. 10), travelled a little ways into the interior for a short time (yes, Oerth is hollow IMC; I incorporated the basic ideas from the Hollow World boxed set), and later clashed with the empire far to the west of the Flanaess in northwestern Oerik (p. 38).
Some time later, a time-travelling druid used the powers of the Stone Ring (pp. 74-75) to alter history; he was not happy with how the civilizations he had influenced over the centuries had turned out (he had been around a very long time), and so decided to undo things. The players were protected from the changes as they were in the Stone Ring just before the druid and his cronies vanished into the past, and they finally travelled far back into the prehistory of the Suel Imperium where they encountered a chronomancer who helped them figure out how, where and when to undo the alterations and set history back on course.
With some of the treasure they accumulated over the years, they've helped fund the University of the Flanaess (p. 99), and have befriended Ral, the half-orc bartender at the Roc and Oliphant Tavern (p. 98-99); not much has come of these last two things thus far, however. They do not yet know that Ral is in reality Quij, the orcish former henchman of Robilar. Once they figure that out, things will get really interesting...