Greyhawk in the Modern Era

[Dragonhelm]

As more of a casual fan of Greyhawk, I look at the setting with respect for its past, but concern for its future. Certainly, it paved the way for what came after and it gave us many wonderful dungeons and adventures.

Yet I have concerns for the future of the setting. When I look at it, I think of an old-school setting. While that's great for older fans, I'm not sure how that can draw in a new fan base. Likewise, with the many changes in 4th edition, I wonder how they all fit in the World of Greyhawk.

So what would be the draw of Greyhawk that would set it apart from other settings? Would we find homes for 4e-isms, such as dragonborn, deva, and tieflings?

Thoughts?

[Cthulhudrew]

So what would be the draw of Greyhawk that would set it apart from other settings? Would we find homes for 4e-isms, such as dragonborn, deva, and tieflings?

I'm not all that familiar with 4E-isms, though I could see tieflings existing in Iuz and/or the Great Kingdom (post-Greyhawk Wars). I don't know that there is anything in 4E that couldn't fit into Greyhawk. To me, Greyhawk is pretty much your standard fantasy genre, perhaps a little more sword-and-sorcery as opposed to high fantasy. A little grittier, a little less magical (compared to, say, the Forgotten Realms).

[Philosopher]

So what would be the draw of Greyhawk that would set it apart from other settings?

One of the issues is that many of the things that would have been draws of Greyhawk have been transplanted to other settings, especially the classic adventure sites which are now being placed in the Points of Light setting (or PoLand, as people are referring to it).

I've often heard it argued that if the Forgotten Realms is well-supported, there's no need to support Greyhawk, because they're both "classic fantasy". I've never bought this argument. The Realms seem to have become more and more fantastic - which is fine, given that it's a fantasy setting. For example, one of the things I noticed in the latest iteration of the Realms is huge floating chunks of earth that support life. They call them earthmotes. Greyhawk, on the other hand, strikes me as much more "realistic", insofar as we can apply that term to a fantasy setting. That should be played up as a selling point.

In a sense, Greyhawk sets the standard, while other settings emphasize certain aspects to differentiate themselves. Greyhawk has struggles between Good and Evil, but Dragonlance made that more central. Greyhawk is gritty, but Dark Sun is even grittier. But if everyone is "different", then "standard" becomes special again.

[ripvanwormer]

If Greyhawk can have lizardfolk, dragonkin, kobolds, dragonborn of Bahamut and a million other random monstrous humanoids, I don't see a problem with sticking 4e dragonborn in there as well. Some have suggested making them natives of the distant west, the Pinnacles of Azor'Alq, or the islands ruled by mist dragons to the far south, but I'd rather make them natives of the Flanaess than have to come up with an elaborate explanation for why dragonborn PCs are thousands of miles from home.

That said, I think the idea that every campaign world has to include every single monster and race in the core rules is ridiculous. A good setting is defined as much by what it doesn't have as by what it does. Creativity can thrive more when framed by limits. Greyhawk has always been a jumbled kitchen sink, so defending its "purity" would be just as silly, but it's not unreasonable to avoid making any dramatic changes just to shoehorn goliaths and wildren or whatever into a setting that does fine without them. There's worse things to be than old-school, and a Greyhawk defined by a lack of dragonboobs might earn new fans from that alone. It'd be a shame if every campaign world looked like a carbon copy of PoLand. If I were designing Greyhawk 4e, I'd make it as old-school as I could, embracing that as one of Greyhawk's strengths.

Gryhawk is a very generic D&D setting because Gygax designed the game with Greyhawk in mind. It's pretty distinctive in many ways, but much of what makes it distinctive became part of D&D in general. So in reissuing it, I'd emphasize things that make previous editions different from 4e, making those signature Greyhawk elements. I don't believe that 4e's innovations are all so compelling that they're obviously better than what came before, and I don't believe there are a lot of people who would refuse to look at Greyhawk because they'd rather have a humdrum clone of the default setting.

Greyhawk does have room for most or all of 4e in it, if you'd rather go that route, and there are a lot of compelling elements regardless.

[ripvanwormer]

In many ways, the core World of 4th edition is Greyhawk or, at least, has Greyhawk deep in its DNA, and Greyhawk will remain alive as long as that's true. Core 4e has a Sea of Dust, a Rain of Colorless Fire, Iggwilv, Mordenkainen, a Tomb of Horrors, a Temple of Elemental Evil, Graz'zt, Lolth, Pazuzu, Vecna, Acererak, Ctenmiir, Kyuss, and more. There are differences, of course: the core World has only a single moon, a somewhat different pantheon, and distinct elements all its own, but a lot of what I find compelling about Greyhawk is in core 4e now.

[Dragonhelm]

In many ways, the core World of 4th edition is Greyhawk or, at least, has Greyhawk deep in its DNA, and Greyhawk will remain alive as long as that's true. Core 4e has a Sea of Dust, a Rain of Colorless Fire, Iggwilv, Mordenkainen, a Tomb of Horrors, a Temple of Elemental Evil, Graz'zt, Lolth, Pazuzu, Vecna, Acererak, Ctenmiir, Kyuss, and more. There are differences, of course: the core World has only a single moon, a somewhat different pantheon, and distinct elements all its own, but a lot of what I find compelling about Greyhawk is in core 4e now.

Core D&D is stealing from a lot of the settings, including Dragonlance, Ravenloft, and Spelljammer (amongst others). So I think what you're seeing is D&D taking from Greyhawk, rather than using it as the default setting.

After some thought, I think I've come to see how Greyhawk would be fine in 4e. It is a generic setting, but its focus is more on dungeons. To me, it'd be a great introductory setting for D&D and roleplaying.

[Ashtagon]

One thing that has always puzzled me is the idea that...

"Greyhawk is swords and sorcery, Dragonlance is heroic romance, Forgotten realms is high fantasy"

What exactly is meant by each of these terms? They always struck me as a little too trite to be meaningful.

[night_druid]

Thoughts?

Unless Greyhawk was being published again, I'm not sure I'd worry much about it. D&D players will do what they have always done: come up with their own solutions and takes. Some will be very well thought out, while others will be cheesy and crazy (like what I would do ). And unless WotC decides to crack down on fan-sites like canonfire, there will always be a place for fan material about Greyhawk on the web.

[night_druid]

One thing that has always puzzled me is the idea that...

"Greyhawk is swords and sorcery, Dragonlance is heroic romance, Forgotten realms is high fantasy"

What exactly is meant by each of these terms? They always struck me as a little too trite to be meaningful.

My take:
Sword & Sorcery = inspired by Thieves' World, Conan, and other 70's "classics". Grittier world, closer to what the Middle Ages were like on Earth.

Heroic Romance = More idealized world, with plotlines driven by somewhat unrealistic romance stories

High Fantasy = magic more commonplace, You expect to see flying castles & ships, a wizard in every village, etc.

In practice, I don't think there's a huge difference. There doesn't seem to be a huge difference in the number of magic items, for example, that a party finds, and things like flying castles/ships are found in all three worlds. The only notable difference I've found is that FR has a higher number of named characters of 20+ level (FR probably has more named NPCs than all other worlds combined, though), and some of the magic items (particularly the 2nd edition era) are more powerful than a dozen artifacts (Arm of Power, for example).

[Azaghal]

One thing that has always puzzled me is the idea that...

"Greyhawk is swords and sorcery, Dragonlance is heroic romance, Forgotten realms is high fantasy"

What exactly is meant by each of these terms? They always struck me as a little too trite to be meaningful.

My take:
Sword & Sorcery = inspired by Thieves' World, Conan, and other 70's "classics". Grittier world, closer to what the Middle Ages were like on Earth.

Heroic Romance = More idealized world, with plotlines driven by somewhat unrealistic romance stories

High Fantasy = magic more commonplace, You expect to see flying castles & ships, a wizard in every village, etc.

In practice, I don't think there's a huge difference. There doesn't seem to be a huge difference in the number of magic items, for example, that a party finds, and things like flying castles/ships are found in all three worlds. The only notable difference I've found is that FR has a higher number of named characters of 20+ level (FR probably has more named NPCs than all other worlds combined, though), and some of the magic items (particularly the 2nd edition era) are more powerful than a dozen artifacts (Arm of Power, for example).

There are of course reasons that FR has the most high powered stuff, mainly it wasTHE AD&D setting of TSR`s choice. If GH and DL had gotten the same treatment FR did it could have as many high level NPC`s and artifacts as well. Basically it comes down to what the management made the focus.

[Dread Delgath]

Thoughts?

Unless Greyhawk was being published again, I'm not sure I'd worry much about it. D&D players will do what they have always done: come up with their own solutions and takes. Some will be very well thought out, while others will be cheesy and crazy (like what I would do ). And unless WotC decides to crack down on fan-sites like canonfire, there will always be a place for fan material about Greyhawk on the web.

This is exactly what I have done, nearly 15 - 20 years ago when the 'official' GH went down a path I didn't care for. Fortunately, I've never put anything up on the Intarwebz or published any of it. Most of my notes have sat around for years, without editing or sprucing up. The maps I have are beautiful, although dated with today's digital programs available. They put my maps to shame.

[night_druid]

There are of course reasons that FR has the most high powered stuff, mainly it wasTHE AD&D setting of TSR`s choice. If GH and DL had gotten the same treatment FR did it could have as many high level NPC`s and artifacts as well. Basically it comes down to what the management made the focus.

No doubt. Also might be noted that FR's main continent is bigger than GH's & DL's main continents combined, which helped too

[night_druid]

This is exactly what I have done, nearly 15 - 20 years ago when the 'official' GH went down a path I didn't care for. Fortunately, I've never put anything up on the Intarwebz or published any of it. Most of my notes have sat around for years, without editing or sprucing up. The maps I have are beautiful, although dated with today's digital programs available. They put my maps to shame.

I imagine that's not uncommon. Gamers decide how they want to use the materials and create their own version of the setting. And I imagine no two games set in the same setting are the same.

[Philosopher]

One thing that has always puzzled me is the idea that...

"Greyhawk is swords and sorcery, Dragonlance is heroic romance, Forgotten realms is high fantasy"

What exactly is meant by each of these terms? They always struck me as a little too trite to be meaningful.

What night_druid said. I could probably quibble with some details, but that's unnecessary.

I think that these descriptions are somewhat helpful in getting a basic idea of the differences, but I am in part sympathetic with your questioning their meaningfulness. The problem with the descriptions, as I see it, is not that they're not meaningful in themselves; rather, it's that they're not fully accurate descriptions of the settings. They each combine many elements from a variety of fantasy subgenres. At best, the descriptions highlight aspects of each that are only significant in distinguishing them from the other settings. If there were no Dragonlance or Forgotten Realms, and TSR instead produced a setting much more similar to Howard's Hyborean Age, we'd probably describe Greyhawk as the high fantasy setting.

[Dread Delgath]

GH was IMO very much a generic setting, because much of it seemed to be based on Real World geography, climate & human migratory patterns. Seeing a unicorn in GH was nearly as wondrous to GH players as it is incredulous to Chainmail wargamers, yet almost common-place to FR players.

Starting with the GH Folio, I've always had the impression that GH was Gary's fantasy version of Medieval Europe (although he based his original map of GH on N. America), so while there were things Fantastic in the setting; it was quite more fantastic for wargamers-turned-role-players BitD. He used GH to set up mass fantasy combats using Chainmail rules. This is evidenced in The Dragon articles where he listed troops for various countries & wrote down accounts of the battles that happened in his own campaign.

Its not so much that GH was 'low magic' (compared to FR), but as the first official TSR setting, it had a lot of ground to cover between staging Chainmail battles to a more 'pure' form of fantasy role playing. I think that's why I've always like GH so much more than FR or DL; it wasn't just about adventuring from 1st level to 12th (or higher), but players could opt to have a few sessions of mass Chainmail combat too. Perhaps even working in the results into a calendar of events that the players' PCs would muddle through, or perhaps take part in.

I've never seen this done* with FR or DL, but truthfully, I don't own one DL thing at all (except the Castles boxed set - which has a castle & a Battlesystem scenario for each GH, FR & DL.), because I wanted to be a player in that setting, leaving all the materials for a friend (who never did pick any of it up when we were playing, but that's another story...)

(*However, Battlesystem rules have always had minimal presence in the TSR products catalogue, so I'm sure there were gaming groups out there who created battle scenarios for FR/DL/other settings besides GH.)

[Philosopher]

I've never seen this done* with FR or DL

FWIW, large-scale battle was part of Dragonlance from the beginning. One of the original modules, DL11 Dragons of Glory was basically a wargame based on the assault on the High Clerist's Tower. Admittedly, though, I don't think DL did anything more with this as part of the core line.

[Dread Delgath]

I've never seen this done* with FR or DL

FWIW, large-scale battle was part of Dragonlance from the beginning. One of the original modules, DL11 Dragons of Glory was basically a wargame based on the assault on the High Clerist's Tower. Admittedly, though, I don't think DL did anything more with this as part of the core line.

Ah, I stand corrected.
I guess there was one or two modules for 1e or 2e FR that was an entire Battlesystem campaign, and I don't think GH had anything like this published until the Castles boxed set. I think what I was getting at was that Gary showed us what we could do with GH (or any setting, really) in the pages of The Dragon.

[Havard]

I have been thinking about giving Greyhawk a shot. What I would do is to stress the grittiness factor a bit and make it a truly medieval almost realistic setting with lots of demon-binding, dark knights etc. I would probably focus on themes like war and perhaps a kind of Newhon-like feel of rascals trying to strike gold among warring nations. The PCs wouldnt get into the political bit so much but rather have war be a fact of life, something that causes tragedy and problems, but also makes opportunities arise.

I would _not_ make too much of an effort to squeeze in different races. In fact I find the humans the most interesting race in Greyhawk.

But then, I remain a sort of newbie to this setting...

Havard

[Dread Delgath]

I have been thinking about giving Greyhawk a shot. What I would do is to stress the grittiness factor a bit and make it a truly medieval almost realistic setting with lots of demon-binding, dark knights etc. I would probably focus on themes like war and perhaps a kind of Newhon-like feel of rascals trying to strike gold among warring nations. The PCs wouldnt get into the political bit so much but rather have war be a fact of life, something that causes tragedy and problems, but also makes opportunities arise.

I would _not_ make too much of an effort to squeeze in different races. In fact I find the humans the most interesting race in Greyhawk.

But then, I remain a sort of newbie to this setting...

Havard

That is how I started with the GH Folio in the early 80's! My main player wanted a Conan type of character, a merc for hire, so I assigned him a small squad of fellow mercs & told him he was their captain (even at 1st level), as I thought this would be a good way to have him jump from country to country & fight for whichever side he wanted. I didn't do a lot of war gaming battles, but he & his men would find a dungeon here & there along with getting paid gold for fighting in small skirmishes too.

I didn't have much of a problem dealing with the elves & dwarves of GH, but the PCs would rarely wander into their territories (except for a small campaign in High Folk). Individual NPCs weren't a problem either, but BitD, my players had a tendency to rob & slay nearly every NPC they met.

[Cthulhudrew]

I have been thinking about giving Greyhawk a shot. What I would do is to stress the grittiness factor a bit and make it a truly medieval almost realistic setting with lots of demon-binding, dark knights etc. I would probably focus on themes like war and perhaps a kind of Newhon-like feel of rascals trying to strike gold among warring nations. The PCs wouldnt get into the political bit so much but rather have war be a fact of life, something that causes tragedy and problems, but also makes opportunities arise.

Sounds like the period of the Greyhawk Wars might be the era you'd be most interested in. They are much maligned (I think, largely, because of the changes they implemented to the setting in such a short time), but I think there is a lot of good material that can be mined there, and that the whole of it can be pretty interesting to set campaigns in.

[ripvanwormer]

The wars or perhaps shortly before and after. Maybe before, first, so you can play through the era of lots of small skirmishes and intrigue leading up to the war. Ivid the Undying remains the best source for integrating demon-binding and dark knights into the Flanaess.

Some of the post 1998 material got a little heavy-handed with addressing the "imbalance" toward darkness that had developed, blowing up Rauxes, banishing most of the fiends with a mega-artifact, and otherwise ending some of the various conflicts more definitively than I'd like. Prior to that period would be better.

[Havard]

Great suggestions guys! I like the idea of war, but my feeling is that the world changing stuff in the Greyhawk Wars might be too much. I like Rip's suggestion of placing it slightly before the Wars. Smaller skirmishes and intrigue could be more interesting than the world changing stuff.

Havard

[night_druid]

Great suggestions guys! I like the idea of war, but my feeling is that the world changing stuff in the Greyhawk Wars might be too much. I like Rip's suggestion of placing it slightly before the Wars. Smaller skirmishes and intrigue could be more interesting than the world changing stuff.

Do remember that D&D sprang from wargamming, and at least AD&D rentained some of those wargamming elements in the form of followers (fighters & clerics in particular gained small armies). I believe Gary envisioned the game as being "1st to 9th, explore dungeons to gather tons of loot, 9+ you build your stronghold and the game rolls more into politics & wargamming".