Would you run games in Greyhawk? Thanks so much to WorldAnvil for sponsoring this video! Visit www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike and use the promo code SUPERGEEK to get 51% off any annual membership! www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike
Unlikely, but that's just because of the genres of games I typically run, which tend to be a bit removed from the sort of fantasy that Greyhawk plays into than anything about Greyhawk itself.
Unlikely. It's not that I hate Greyhawk, I just find it somewhat generic and boring. If I run medieval high fantasy games, I ususally run Forgotten Realms or sometimes Dragonlance. I like Eberron and Ravenloft as well and think they are best for their respective genres.
@@TheRealVanquisher1 A fair point, however I think it has been discussed quite a bit. At the moment it seems to be a lightning rod for rabid ignorance. Who has time for that at the moment. Arguing with them is like wrestling a pig, where you both get dirty, but one of you likes it. For Mike's sake, I'd dodge this one and maybe catch the next.
Greyhawk (and D&D as a whole) was influenced heavily by The Dying Earth by Jack Vance, and I think the irreverence in the tone comes at least partially from there. Anyone who loves D&D and loves reading, I highly recommend checking out the Dying Earth. The whole fire-and-forget magic system comes from there, and I would argue that everything about Wizards in OD&D is also drawn from there, despite people being more familiar with the "wizards" from Lord of the Rings. They borrowed Prismatic Spray and IOUN stones from there, with Vance's permission, and Vecna is an anagram of Vance, and was put in there as an homage to him and his books.
I've read a lot of the appendix N stuff in my book club. Another big one that's not touched upon is Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. Where thieves' guilds originate and most of the basis of most big city adventures in D&D
This is factual. I grew up in the 70s playing in Greyhawk, but still have not read the Dying Earth series, but the Foundation series by Isaac Azimov influenced my games a lot. Excellent breakdown sir.
It also has HEAVY influence from Moorcock and Leiber. Perhaps Leiber most of all. If you read several of the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser stories you'll see much of the spirit of early D&D whole cloth in there.
My takeaway is to remember that there is a big difference between making a setting that is a good story or setting for a book or novel and one that is fun to play in.
If anyone is tangentially interested in just how dumb the “Gigax is getting erased” twitter guy is, Shaun just put out an over 2-hour long takedown of the “discourse” around the videogame Stellar Blade. It is, of course, excellent.
IMO if anything, Gygax is glorified by WotC rather than erased. D&D was developed over a decades by many people, yet WotC still presents Gygax as the single inventor of D&D. They make Greyhawk the default setting again, despite it being rather boring compared to Forgotten Realms and Eberron.
I saw that video a few days ago, and it was the first time I heard of Dumb Lying Twitter Guy (forgot his name, can't be arsed to check). This video is the second time. Seems like he's the sort of person who definitely deserves getting roasted.
I don't remember where I heard this, but I believe there's also evidence that Oerth was meant to be pronounced as though the speaker has an extremely thick New York Yiddish accent. "Oyth."
I play on the World of Greyhawk for 40 years on and off; and I am currently DMing a campaign on Greyhawk for three years. It is a really great setting.
personally i hope to never hear the name "grummz" again. i had already forgotten about this grummz controversy in the wake of the newer grummz controversy, and when i saw the twitter screenshot appear i had to go "oh god right that also happened"
Mark Kern, the guy whose biggest claim to fame was being fired from Blizzard twenty years ago and blaming it on wokeness just like every other right wing flameout raging against the industry they desperately want to be part of.
Greyhawk is my personal favorite published D&D setting. The vibes, the lore and the Names of locations/people/events fill my fantasy nerd heart on fire.
I love watching all these young creators discover all these things that have been reintroduced all Shiney and new. Makes me happy to see that everyone gets to see them again to enjoy like we did.
Greyhawk is where I played my first games, about 30 years ago, and I'm so happy they're bringing it back again! I loved Grayhawk back then. I play a Pathfinder game now, and I'm thinking of creating a blended Greyhawk/Golarion world for my group when it's time for me to take on the DM reins. I was vacillating about getting the DMG, but now that I know they have this, too, this will be extremely helpful! Thank you, Mike!
Thank you for covering the Greyhawk setting! Just a couple of quick notes about the introduction. The adventures in Tales from the Yawning Portal were *not* relocated to the Forgotten Realms even though the Yawning Portal itself canonically is located there. Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, White Plume Mountain, Tomb of Horrors, and Against the Giants (which is actually 3 adventures, G1-G3) are still in Greyhawk. Weirdly, it is only the last one that isn't listed as Greyhawk by default in the 5E description. Plus, there was also the very popular Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign which is a compilation of U1-U3 with some other stuff added in and it is most definitely placed in the World of Greyhawk by default.
Yeah, best to just ignore Mark Kern. He has wasted the last several years of his life on Twitter jumping onto every single bandwagon in existence to stink up the hell out of it. The games industry has no shortage of pieces of shit who plunge things into the ground like him, so it makes me thankful he's at least one of the only ones who's terminally online
10:50 this is such a good point of comparison, when I ran waterdeep dragon heist I outright cut the living statues out of the setting entirely because I just had no clue what to do with them, they didn't really lean into the urban intrigue themes of the campaign, and so they'd just feel weirdly tacked on or become "flee to the statues" as auto win buttons for any fights breaking out in the streets. They don't vibe with what I wanted out of the city, but those library guardians feel way more focused and contained in ways that much better suit my tastes and needs.
Greyhawk will always hold a special place in my heart, as it was an adventure set in that world-Village of Hommlet-that got me into D&D roughly 40 years ago.
It sounds to me like Greyhawk's inclusion in the new DMG was a matter of giving a framework for a campaign setting. Sure, a lot of elements that have become iconic in D&D originated there, but those elements seem more iconic than the setting itself. For those who want a jumping off point, Greyhawk provides the basic essentials and they can fill in the gap as needed. For those looking to make their own from scratch, they can look at the provided Greyhawk material as something of a baseline of things to include in their own world. It feels more template than rigid history in the way it's presented.
Regarding if you should react to the twxtter drama: personally I hope you won't, obviously if you want to or feel like it would be beneficial for the channel you might be able to get some good content out of it. But internet drama exhausts me and I don't think it's worth giving oxygen to discussions like that. Maybe that's just me.
3:23 Not at all. Disregard it. This is already more engagement than that [redacted] [redacted] deserves. It's only there to start shit, and you don't need that kind of stress in your life. 6:24 Vecna killed them at the start of "Die, Vecna, Die" an adventure from 2nd Edition, in which the opening allows the players to play as the Circle, as Vecna kills them. 11:23 St. Cuthbert is based on St. Cuthbert of Lindesfarne (for the history fans, yes, that Lindesfarne.) 12:38 It is the Icon from which all other Icons were forged. 14:28 Grayhawk Wiki FTW! 24:34 Gygax published his setting after a lot f arm twisting. His game philosophy was that you should build your own worlds. A setting book was antithetical to his core ideal.
The Baklunish, Flan, Oeridian, and Suel are the 4 major human "races" in Greyhawk The Greyhawk Justicar novel series are a fantastic read and remember that "Nobody touches the Fairy!" A lot of the lore is in previous editions! I turned AD&D modules UK2 and UK3 into the primary country of my campaign! Greyhawk is my favorite of the generic campaign worlds!
The Justicar series is so good, at least the two initial books and the prequel in Dragon magazine. The last book kinda felt like the author had lost all interest at that point, which is understandable.
PLEASE ignore all the ridiculous drama started by Grummz. It's just a ploy for "twitter's" owner to make headlines and farm engagement. I'm really interested in Greyhawk so more videos surrounding it would be great
23:01 that was exactly what I did when i started homebrewing our game world (jeesh) 20+ years ago. And we still play in that homebrew world. I'd say it's 50% Greyhawk, 40% actual homebrew, and the rest equal-ish parts sprinklings from various other settings, IPs, etc.
18:55 While true it hasn't been the setting for a major adventure, a lot of the adventures in Quests from the Infinite Staircase were tied to Greyhawk by default of them being republished from 2e adventures. It has the same "problem" as Saltmarsh in that they made it setting neutral in a lot of ways, and don't go into detail on the setting so it doesn't add a lot of context for players, but I just wanted to offer that up as a helpful factoid.
When my friends asked me to make them a real campaign instead of the starter set, I chose Greyhawk. This was well before this was announced for the 2024 DMG. I did so because, unlike Faerun, I knew little about it. There were no novel series, no campaign setting books, just old adventure modules that I could change as much as I want because no one would know the difference. I chose the Isle of Dread. The tropical island with Dinosaurs and any other monsters I wanted to use. The original adventure had several races that don't exist in 5e, but the ones I couldn't adapt (tabaxi for a different race of cat-people, for example), I just changed the map. The King Kong size wall in the main southern village was perfect for preventing the party from getting in over their heads. A bunch of "trials" and fetch quests gave them more experience with these characters before entering the more dangerous part of the island. I had sharks, giant alligators, mephits, twig blights, (which they learned to fear in Phandelver), carnivorous apes, a giant boar, and so on. Once they opened the main map, I kept it localized to prevent metagaming. The only objective they needed was to ascend the mesa in the middle of the map. A temple that sometimes sparkles is said to be there. They had to eventually go there because I surrounded the island with impassable storms that wrecked the ship they were on originally. All over the island, I made different environments and different styles of adventures. I had an underground labyrinth where a mummy commanded his undead servants. I had a group of dwarven miners whose miners were beset by a strange monster (umber hulk). I threw as many classic DnD monsters as I could to show them how FUN this game is. Manticore, owlbear, ogre, troll, Lizardfolk (I recreated the cover of the player's handbook with the demon statue with the ruby eyes). It was a blast! After they conquered that adventure, I was going to lead them through the White Plume Mountain module, but scheduling got in the way. Next time. I also looked at combining the Keep on the Borderland and the In Search of the Unknown for an 8 level campaign. The point I am making is Greyhawk feels virginal and unspoiled by all the lore that I loved about Forgotten Realms. It takes more work to adapt, but it gives you more freedom. Also because it is old school, all my monsters are actually monsters, not misunderstood NPCs.
17:34 Plot nails, maybe? Plot knot? Depending on if plot hook as a metaphor is meant to be a fishing hook that catches PCs or a coat hook that plots get hung on, I guess?
Ptolus when? Another favorite setting of mine is Kingdoms of Kalamar. It's basically a spin on Greyhawk with the fine details turned up to 11 and I think its criminally underrated.
Greyhawk was the first D&D I experienced as a kid. My 4th grade teacher had some of the novels she let us read during free time. I have always loved the setting. Glad to see it being brought back as the "default setting," or whatever you like to call it.
I love that Morley is back, and now cannonically a dragon in human wizard guise. For those that don't know, Morley was TSR's mascot, a kindly wizard probably created to ease brand apperance during the satanic panic.
Greyhawk was known as the baseline for each DM. If I wanted to add places and stuff from Judges Guild then game on. If I wanted to take stuff away, then game on.
I actually do like the idea of "plot pegs". It ties into the idea of lego-ing in players' backstories. Instead of trying to figure out how to get you players to the plot hooks, you can focus on where next to the players the plot hooks would hang. You have a Rogue in your group who used to be an apprentice wizard? Maybe she knows Morley. Even though she isn't studying magic under her master any more, she picked up enough to know how to find and recognized magical valuables, and Morley's always been willing to offer her a fair price. Plus she gets leads on where to go looking for a good score now and then. It's a mutually beneficial business relationship for the two of them. So when you want the party to go off in search of some particular artifact, it's Morley who's heard a rumor about where a treasure might be found, and could you please bring back this one item in particular if it happens to be there? Or if you want the party to try to find the cure to a magical illness, that plot hook can go in the temple that the Cleric belongs to. A monster hunt can start with a bounty posted outside a tavern where some of the characters are regulars, the tavern that they'll default to when one of them says, "I go to the tavern." It makes for a much more organic system for introducing quests. The players know who their characters are, you tell them the people and locations they'd know, and those characters and locations just "happen" to have reasons for them to go on adventures tied to them.
0:25 Good. More people need to hear about the setting with Dinosaur-Riding Halflings, Elves who take LARPing to new extremes, and the. Most. EVIL. Gnomes. Ever. Do not cross the Gnomes.
I've returned to Greyhawk this year - without considering the anniversary until several sessions in. It's the one I started with back in '84 and I had some ideas revolving around some classic artefacts. We wrapped up a major arc last night, centred on the Machine of Lum.
4e absolutely had the best pantheon. I'm looking forward to that Eberron video. I do like how they set up the Greyhawk chapter. It provides a good template for a setting that can be used in all the ways you mentioned like urban intrigue, mega-dungeon delving, and West Marches. It also makes sense to bring back Greyhawk just because so many of the anthology adventure sets take place in Greyhawk and those that don't can be easy to plug in. The names are weird, though. I think St Cuthbert was a real guy? Anyway, thanks for the great video.
Greyhawk was my first and still. My number 1 favorite. Eberron is #2 which surprised me... I broke into it through DDO and then got into some tabletop campaigns. I LOVE the lore of Forgotten Realms, but like playing in it a little less. My third fav setting? Vamp the masquerade, not DnD at all, lol
i have not seen greyhawk in many years. we started in 1e in greyhawk and played many modules and when forgotten realms came out in 1987 we adopted that and merged our favorite greyhawk things and never looked back. in 1989 when 2e came out we were fully into forgotten realms.
Greyhawk was one of the big inspirations behind the setting I've been developing since we started at the beginning of 5e, it was cool to hear your thoughts on it.
As someone who, perhaps unhealthily, finds a lot of enjoyment in videos discussing the stupid uninformed drama conservative gamer bros drum up over nothing, I'd personally greatly enjoy a video going over the Gr*mmz tweet. Especially after only just learning about him from Shaun's new video on the Stellar Blade drama (highly recommend). Obviously, protect your own peace first though! I know how draining this stuff can be
If you're still looking for another setting to look into and talk about, I'd love to see your opinions on Warhammer Fantasy. Its probably my favorite fantasy setting with lots of fun and zanny stuff (Ogres, Orks and Skaven) as well as some great dark stuff (Chaos, Dark Elves and Skaven) its got a very flavorfull and well developed world with hundreds of fun plot hooks and a setting location for basically any type of story you want.
Definitely interested in the Ravnica video eventually. I don't even really care about DND (I mostly watch this channel because you just have a good personality). But I am DEEP DEEP into Magic the Gathering so I'm fascinated to see how one of our biggest planes is reflected when turned into something that people have to interact with in a TTRPG setting instead of card games and novels.
The Greyhawk setting is new to me, even though Ihave ran/played Basic/Expert D&D, AD&D settings. This version of Greyhawk i supplement with DMs Guild content from ppl who are devoted to the Greyhawk mythos.
So funng story...I started playing in 3.5e, but I was a kid. My main introduction to D&D is based off games like Neverwinter Nights. All that to say, I was Today years old when I learned Greyhawk was the default setting for 3rd edition 😂
I'd be very interested to hear Mike's opinions on the latest D&D drama, since I don't really keep up these days and I generally trust Mike's opinions. That said, I feel it'd be unhealthy for him to be focusing on twitter drama after just leaving twitter, so maybe best not.
Troll lord games is publishing castle Greyhawk under a different name. Gary was working on it before he died. Look there the stuff oven seen is pretty good and it’s easy to covert to 5e
I don't really like Greyhawk because its too fleshed out to be a blank slate setting (unlike Nentir Vale), but not logically fleshed out to the point where the world feels like it exists beyond a game. Also, it doesn't have a gimmick to set it apart from any other fantasy world other than "It's the first D&D setting."
And here I thought that the immediate attachment to Greyhawk I got while reading the book was because it was based on Chicago. XD Well, that and the fact the only game I ran so far was from the Saltmarsh module. Still, glad to see there is more to it as I do agree with the idea that there is more to it that it just feels like a setting that can be made my own while still feeling like the original D&D setting. Do wonder if they're just going to have future modules take place in some of those other countries/locations to help fill those out. (Was there a Temple of Elemental Evil 5e conversion yet? Feels like that's the one big Greyhawk adventure that hasn't been updated yet)
The person who complained about Gygax getting 'erased' and 'slandered' is being disingenuous. They are just a troll intentionally being incendiary for attention and drama. It's just the same old tired culture war BS. Don't give trolls attention
A guy named Ludic Savant did a bunch of (very non-canon) very fun write ups of the Greyhawk gods over on Giant in the Playground. Check it out for a different view on gods and their followers.
Greyhawk is the the only D&D setting I've played in for the last 30(odd) years. It should be noted that this is a persistent campaign set there. Funnily enough, none of the stable of characters have been to the city of Grehawk as far as I can remember. Everything was always based of Gradzul 😁
Not really a fan of Greyhawk. It's fairly generic and to be honest quite boring. I know they made it the default setting because it was so generic in addition to being the oldest setting. They had to chose a medieval high fantasy setting as the default setting, so steampunk Eberron, horror Ravenloft and post-apocalyptic Dark Sun were not valid choices. Still both Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance had more elaborate cultures, interesting characters and engaging stories than Greyhawk.
PersonallyI hope we can keep FR as the main setting. I dont Hate greyhawk but its not really inspiring for me while Faerun feels like home, I can come up with characters from all over the map.
I move for a universal ban on Twitter (yes, it’s *always* going to be Twitter, Elon) drama on this channel. Words cannot accurately describe how tired I am of social media drama. Please, never darken our D&D with that crap (the hobby has enough problems).
As someone who has never played D&D but is a huge fan of fantasy and all sorts of stuff like that, when I hear D&D think of Forgotten Realms and Sword Coast because that's where the video games are set. Since things like BG3 are what most people, especially average "normies", know then the default setting should be that. No need to confuse things. Ive never understood why there isnt just one setting for each genre of fantasy and just leave it at that.
I don't know why they didn't reprint the boxed set in a book format, it has so much more info and places and details of some of the major gods. Unfortunately I no longer have physical copy of the boxed set, but i do have the pdf's. I started with Greyhawk in 1984 and never really got into Forgotten realms as even now if asked about a region of the Flanaess I could give a player an answer but I couldn't tell you anything about Forgotten realms.
I’d love to hear your opinion on Planescape since that recently game out and has similar vibes to Exandria in the sense that alignment is not determined by species. I’d much rather hear you talk about that than the Gary Gygax drama
12:05 I apologise for such an incredibly pedantic nitpick, but flan is european first, I assume it must have been adopted into mexican culture by some migration or settler/colonial mvoements (for better or worse) but it originates from rome. I had always thought ti was french since I mainly have it in france with family there but this made me look up where it actually comes from out of curiosity, which is interesting to find out!
Personally I really, really, really hope that Greyhawk doesn't become the new default campaign setting as I really love the forgotten realms and am incredibly invested, both emotionally and physically, in that setting. I love it when new adventures come out and I can just drop a bit of news into my own game from that adventure. "Oh no, looks like Elturel fell into Avernus!", "Oh hey it's back again". That's a very important part of the D&D experience for me and I hope that doesn't change any time soon.
Flan is popular in Mexico and I'm sure they have regional variations specific to Mexico, but it's originally a French dessert. I looked it up because while I'm familiar with flan, this is the first time I've heard it described as a "Mexican dessert". Anyway, regarding the actual topic of this video, I always thought of Greyhawk as a generic fantasy setting with nothing particularly unique about it. After watching this video, the impression that I'm getting is that it's a less heroic Forgotten Realms? I can see the appeal in that. In any case, I still think Eberron is the best setting since it was specifically designed to facilitate running a TTRPG campaign. I just appreciate the diversity of environments present in Eberron and all the choices you have for the BBEG of a campaign...
The biggest problem with Greyhawk is the fact that it’s not detailed anywhere that’s terribly accessible. Ironically, that also leaves it wide open for individual tables to wedge in their own ideas.
In some ways, it reminds me of the campaign setting of Creation, for White Wolf/Onyx Path’s game “Exalted”, where the campaign map has a broad range of canon locations webworked all across the world (which has a massive central continent and eight distinct regions around the edge of the map), but also huge stretches of territory that are deliberately left unexplored so that you can stick homebrew material in them. By which I mean regions the size of the former Soviet Union. HUGE territories that can fit empires, even clashing empires.
I've been running D&D on my own setting but I was never fully satisfied with it. I might give greyhawk a look to steal some ideas because this sounds fun. I never liked the exaggerated levels of mega epic high fantasy of forgotten realms. I want magic to feel special (it makes PCs more special). The only issue, we speak Spanish here, "Halcón Gris" on its own won't sound like a city name so I might need to rename some stuff if I use the setting as is. Oarth can stay tho, it's not close at all to "Tierra" (Spanish for "earth")
Could anyone tell me the difference between Sword and Sorcery, Heroic Fantasy and High Fantasy? I hear these terms often thrown around in D&D circles but they all sound like the same thing to me. I admit I'm more familiar with East Asian interpretations of medieval fantasy, my western knowledge extends to just Lord of the Rings vs more political, darker tones like Game of Thrones.
High Fantasy really just means "Fantasy that takes place in a world that is not Earth." So like Game of Thrones and LOTR are both High Fantasy, despite their tone differences. But King Arthur or God of War would not be high fantasy as they take place on Earth. Sword and Sorcery (SAS) and Heroic Fantasy (HF) deal more with tone. SAS is usually darker than HF and features more morally grey situations and events. SAS is also usually much more personally focused. In Heroic Fantasy you need to stop a dragon because it threatens the city and has killed dozens of people. In Sword and Sorcery, you need to stop a dragon because it killed your mother and at night you still hear her screaming as she burned.
I'm looking forward to reading this new version. I started gaming in 1981 with AD&D, so Greyhawk was my first campaign world. I always loved the setting, even though there were way more gaps in the published material than I would have preferred (obviously you were supposed to fill in details yourself, but sometimes this was a very heavy lift- for example, the See of Medegia was supposed to be an evil analog to the Vatican, where the leaders of the church had secretly converted to devil worship; sounds like a great hook, but in a world where the gods are *real* and grant spells, how can this work in actual play?!). Greyhawk was also the "default" setting to early 3rd Edition, and that version was very disappointing- little if any of Gygax' "flavor" came through. WotC just took his map and depicted it as a very "generic fantasy" campaign setting with none of the European analogs that "sold" the setting.
If you throw the players into a campaign. You're going to get an answer. What you do next is what is what is necessary to keeping everyone coming back.
Would you run games in Greyhawk?
Thanks so much to WorldAnvil for sponsoring this video! Visit www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike and use the promo code SUPERGEEK to get 51% off any annual membership!
www.worldanvil.com/supergeekmike
Unlikely, but that's just because of the genres of games I typically run, which tend to be a bit removed from the sort of fantasy that Greyhawk plays into than anything about Greyhawk itself.
Unlikely. It's not that I hate Greyhawk, I just find it somewhat generic and boring. If I run medieval high fantasy games, I ususally run Forgotten Realms or sometimes Dragonlance. I like Eberron and Ravenloft as well and think they are best for their respective genres.
@@SupergeekMike I think I have an original map/poster
Greyhawk is the only place I play, for over 30 years. Nothing against the other settings but I have no interest in them.
I’ve run and played in Greyhawk back in the 80s in my 1E high school days. Forgotten Realms was much better.
I don't remember who said it, but my favorite quote is
"Grey hawk's leading export is Ancient Evil Archmages and Liches"
Acererak still pops in every now and then like a college alumni
3:41. Ignore it. Definitely ignore it.
Yup ignore the heck.out of it
I actually think it needs to be discussed just so that people realize that not everyone Wotc hate Gary Gygax
@@TheRealVanquisher1why should it matter either way?
Absolutely ignore it
@@TheRealVanquisher1 A fair point, however I think it has been discussed quite a bit. At the moment it seems to be a lightning rod for rabid ignorance. Who has time for that at the moment. Arguing with them is like wrestling a pig, where you both get dirty, but one of you likes it. For Mike's sake, I'd dodge this one and maybe catch the next.
Greyhawk (and D&D as a whole) was influenced heavily by The Dying Earth by Jack Vance, and I think the irreverence in the tone comes at least partially from there.
Anyone who loves D&D and loves reading, I highly recommend checking out the Dying Earth. The whole fire-and-forget magic system comes from there, and I would argue that everything about Wizards in OD&D is also drawn from there, despite people being more familiar with the "wizards" from Lord of the Rings. They borrowed Prismatic Spray and IOUN stones from there, with Vance's permission, and Vecna is an anagram of Vance, and was put in there as an homage to him and his books.
I've read a lot of the appendix N stuff in my book club. Another big one that's not touched upon is Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. Where thieves' guilds originate and most of the basis of most big city adventures in D&D
This is factual. I grew up in the 70s playing in Greyhawk, but still have not read the Dying Earth series, but the Foundation series by Isaac Azimov influenced my games a lot.
Excellent breakdown sir.
It also has HEAVY influence from Moorcock and Leiber. Perhaps Leiber most of all. If you read several of the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser stories you'll see much of the spirit of early D&D whole cloth in there.
My takeaway is to remember that there is a big difference between making a setting that is a good story or setting for a book or novel and one that is fun to play in.
If anyone is tangentially interested in just how dumb the “Gigax is getting erased” twitter guy is, Shaun just put out an over 2-hour long takedown of the “discourse” around the videogame Stellar Blade. It is, of course, excellent.
IMO if anything, Gygax is glorified by WotC rather than erased. D&D was developed over a decades by many people, yet WotC still presents Gygax as the single inventor of D&D. They make Greyhawk the default setting again, despite it being rather boring compared to Forgotten Realms and Eberron.
I saw that video a few days ago, and it was the first time I heard of Dumb Lying Twitter Guy (forgot his name, can't be arsed to check). This video is the second time. Seems like he's the sort of person who definitely deserves getting roasted.
@@matunusdonnerhammer3423 they credit Arneson as well.
Gygax
I don't remember where I heard this, but I believe there's also evidence that Oerth was meant to be pronounced as though the speaker has an extremely thick New York Yiddish accent. "Oyth."
That’s another pronunciation provided in the book, as well :)
I play on the World of Greyhawk for 40 years on and off; and I am currently DMing a campaign on Greyhawk for three years. It is a really great setting.
Quite frankly if I never hear of Grummz again it'll be too soon.
personally i hope to never hear the name "grummz" again. i had already forgotten about this grummz controversy in the wake of the newer grummz controversy, and when i saw the twitter screenshot appear i had to go "oh god right that also happened"
Mark Kern, the guy whose biggest claim to fame was being fired from Blizzard twenty years ago and blaming it on wokeness just like every other right wing flameout raging against the industry they desperately want to be part of.
Greyhawk is my personal favorite published D&D setting. The vibes, the lore and the Names of locations/people/events fill my fantasy nerd heart on fire.
I love watching all these young creators discover all these things that have been reintroduced all Shiney and new. Makes me happy to see that everyone gets to see them again to enjoy like we did.
Greyhawk is where I played my first games, about 30 years ago, and I'm so happy they're bringing it back again! I loved Grayhawk back then. I play a Pathfinder game now, and I'm thinking of creating a blended Greyhawk/Golarion world for my group when it's time for me to take on the DM reins. I was vacillating about getting the DMG, but now that I know they have this, too, this will be extremely helpful! Thank you, Mike!
Thank you for covering the Greyhawk setting! Just a couple of quick notes about the introduction. The adventures in Tales from the Yawning Portal were *not* relocated to the Forgotten Realms even though the Yawning Portal itself canonically is located there. Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, White Plume Mountain, Tomb of Horrors, and Against the Giants (which is actually 3 adventures, G1-G3) are still in Greyhawk. Weirdly, it is only the last one that isn't listed as Greyhawk by default in the 5E description.
Plus, there was also the very popular Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign which is a compilation of U1-U3 with some other stuff added in and it is most definitely placed in the World of Greyhawk by default.
Yeah, best to just ignore Mark Kern. He has wasted the last several years of his life on Twitter jumping onto every single bandwagon in existence to stink up the hell out of it. The games industry has no shortage of pieces of shit who plunge things into the ground like him, so it makes me thankful he's at least one of the only ones who's terminally online
10:50 this is such a good point of comparison, when I ran waterdeep dragon heist I outright cut the living statues out of the setting entirely because I just had no clue what to do with them, they didn't really lean into the urban intrigue themes of the campaign, and so they'd just feel weirdly tacked on or become "flee to the statues" as auto win buttons for any fights breaking out in the streets. They don't vibe with what I wanted out of the city, but those library guardians feel way more focused and contained in ways that much better suit my tastes and needs.
Greyhawk will always hold a special place in my heart, as it was an adventure set in that world-Village of Hommlet-that got me into D&D roughly 40 years ago.
It sounds to me like Greyhawk's inclusion in the new DMG was a matter of giving a framework for a campaign setting. Sure, a lot of elements that have become iconic in D&D originated there, but those elements seem more iconic than the setting itself. For those who want a jumping off point, Greyhawk provides the basic essentials and they can fill in the gap as needed. For those looking to make their own from scratch, they can look at the provided Greyhawk material as something of a baseline of things to include in their own world. It feels more template than rigid history in the way it's presented.
Regarding if you should react to the twxtter drama: personally I hope you won't, obviously if you want to or feel like it would be beneficial for the channel you might be able to get some good content out of it. But internet drama exhausts me and I don't think it's worth giving oxygen to discussions like that. Maybe that's just me.
3:23 Not at all. Disregard it. This is already more engagement than that [redacted] [redacted] deserves. It's only there to start shit, and you don't need that kind of stress in your life.
6:24 Vecna killed them at the start of "Die, Vecna, Die" an adventure from 2nd Edition, in which the opening allows the players to play as the Circle, as Vecna kills them.
11:23 St. Cuthbert is based on St. Cuthbert of Lindesfarne (for the history fans, yes, that Lindesfarne.)
12:38 It is the Icon from which all other Icons were forged.
14:28 Grayhawk Wiki FTW!
24:34 Gygax published his setting after a lot f arm twisting. His game philosophy was that you should build your own worlds. A setting book was antithetical to his core ideal.
The Baklunish, Flan, Oeridian, and Suel are the 4 major human "races" in Greyhawk
The Greyhawk Justicar novel series are a fantastic read and remember that "Nobody touches the Fairy!"
A lot of the lore is in previous editions!
I turned AD&D modules UK2 and UK3 into the primary country of my campaign!
Greyhawk is my favorite of the generic campaign worlds!
The Justicar series is so good, at least the two initial books and the prequel in Dragon magazine. The last book kinda felt like the author had lost all interest at that point, which is understandable.
PLEASE ignore all the ridiculous drama started by Grummz. It's just a ploy for "twitter's" owner to make headlines and farm engagement. I'm really interested in Greyhawk so more videos surrounding it would be great
If you want more about the stupid Gygax ""erasure"", there's a video on BobWorldBuilder's channel that covers it in a calm, measured way.
Which made poor Bob the focal point of all the weird Elon fanbois. Another reason to just ignore this drama.
That backstory trick of having it tied into the setting is great. I bought a supplement like that for Waterdeep and it was so useful!
Plot drywall anchors. Then you screw your plot hook into the anchor. Then you hang your plot on it.
23:01 that was exactly what I did when i started homebrewing our game world (jeesh) 20+ years ago. And we still play in that homebrew world. I'd say it's 50% Greyhawk, 40% actual homebrew, and the rest equal-ish parts sprinklings from various other settings, IPs, etc.
All I know is, my all-time favorite D&D deity, Wee Jas, is from Greyhawk. 🥰
Ooh, new video on my birthday! Thanks for the birthday gift, Mike!
Happy Birthday, birthday buddy!
18:55 While true it hasn't been the setting for a major adventure, a lot of the adventures in Quests from the Infinite Staircase were tied to Greyhawk by default of them being republished from 2e adventures. It has the same "problem" as Saltmarsh in that they made it setting neutral in a lot of ways, and don't go into detail on the setting so it doesn't add a lot of context for players, but I just wanted to offer that up as a helpful factoid.
When my friends asked me to make them a real campaign instead of the starter set, I chose Greyhawk. This was well before this was announced for the 2024 DMG. I did so because, unlike Faerun, I knew little about it. There were no novel series, no campaign setting books, just old adventure modules that I could change as much as I want because no one would know the difference. I chose the Isle of Dread. The tropical island with Dinosaurs and any other monsters I wanted to use. The original adventure had several races that don't exist in 5e, but the ones I couldn't adapt (tabaxi for a different race of cat-people, for example), I just changed the map. The King Kong size wall in the main southern village was perfect for preventing the party from getting in over their heads. A bunch of "trials" and fetch quests gave them more experience with these characters before entering the more dangerous part of the island. I had sharks, giant alligators, mephits, twig blights, (which they learned to fear in Phandelver), carnivorous apes, a giant boar, and so on. Once they opened the main map, I kept it localized to prevent metagaming. The only objective they needed was to ascend the mesa in the middle of the map. A temple that sometimes sparkles is said to be there. They had to eventually go there because I surrounded the island with impassable storms that wrecked the ship they were on originally. All over the island, I made different environments and different styles of adventures. I had an underground labyrinth where a mummy commanded his undead servants. I had a group of dwarven miners whose miners were beset by a strange monster (umber hulk). I threw as many classic DnD monsters as I could to show them how FUN this game is. Manticore, owlbear, ogre, troll, Lizardfolk (I recreated the cover of the player's handbook with the demon statue with the ruby eyes). It was a blast!
After they conquered that adventure, I was going to lead them through the White Plume Mountain module, but scheduling got in the way. Next time. I also looked at combining the Keep on the Borderland and the In Search of the Unknown for an 8 level campaign. The point I am making is Greyhawk feels virginal and unspoiled by all the lore that I loved about Forgotten Realms. It takes more work to adapt, but it gives you more freedom. Also because it is old school, all my monsters are actually monsters, not misunderstood NPCs.
17:34 Plot nails, maybe? Plot knot? Depending on if plot hook as a metaphor is meant to be a fishing hook that catches PCs or a coat hook that plots get hung on, I guess?
Plot studs. Evenly-spaced hard points you can screw a nice load-bearing plot hook into.
Ptolus when? Another favorite setting of mine is Kingdoms of Kalamar. It's basically a spin on Greyhawk with the fine details turned up to 11 and I think its criminally underrated.
Greyhawk was the first D&D I experienced as a kid. My 4th grade teacher had some of the novels she let us read during free time. I have always loved the setting. Glad to see it being brought back as the "default setting," or whatever you like to call it.
I love that Morley is back, and now cannonically a dragon in human wizard guise.
For those that don't know, Morley was TSR's mascot, a kindly wizard probably created to ease brand apperance during the satanic panic.
Oh cool!
Greyhawk was known as the baseline for each DM. If I wanted to add places and stuff from Judges Guild then game on. If I wanted to take stuff away, then game on.
Just found this channel. This video is great . Can't wait to watch everything
I actually do like the idea of "plot pegs". It ties into the idea of lego-ing in players' backstories. Instead of trying to figure out how to get you players to the plot hooks, you can focus on where next to the players the plot hooks would hang. You have a Rogue in your group who used to be an apprentice wizard? Maybe she knows Morley. Even though she isn't studying magic under her master any more, she picked up enough to know how to find and recognized magical valuables, and Morley's always been willing to offer her a fair price. Plus she gets leads on where to go looking for a good score now and then. It's a mutually beneficial business relationship for the two of them. So when you want the party to go off in search of some particular artifact, it's Morley who's heard a rumor about where a treasure might be found, and could you please bring back this one item in particular if it happens to be there? Or if you want the party to try to find the cure to a magical illness, that plot hook can go in the temple that the Cleric belongs to. A monster hunt can start with a bounty posted outside a tavern where some of the characters are regulars, the tavern that they'll default to when one of them says, "I go to the tavern." It makes for a much more organic system for introducing quests. The players know who their characters are, you tell them the people and locations they'd know, and those characters and locations just "happen" to have reasons for them to go on adventures tied to them.
0:25 Good. More people need to hear about the setting with Dinosaur-Riding Halflings, Elves who take LARPing to new extremes, and the. Most. EVIL. Gnomes. Ever. Do not cross the Gnomes.
I've returned to Greyhawk this year - without considering the anniversary until several sessions in. It's the one I started with back in '84 and I had some ideas revolving around some classic artefacts. We wrapped up a major arc last night, centred on the Machine of Lum.
Hey, I did watch your PHB art video! (This is less yelling and more engaging with the video in order to appease the algorithm)
4e absolutely had the best pantheon. I'm looking forward to that Eberron video.
I do like how they set up the Greyhawk chapter. It provides a good template for a setting that can be used in all the ways you mentioned like urban intrigue, mega-dungeon delving, and West Marches. It also makes sense to bring back Greyhawk just because so many of the anthology adventure sets take place in Greyhawk and those that don't can be easy to plug in.
The names are weird, though. I think St Cuthbert was a real guy? Anyway, thanks for the great video.
I strongly recommend the adventure “Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk” for anyone getting into the setting.
Greyhawk was my first and still. My number 1 favorite. Eberron is #2 which surprised me... I broke into it through DDO and then got into some tabletop campaigns. I LOVE the lore of Forgotten Realms, but like playing in it a little less. My third fav setting? Vamp the masquerade, not DnD at all, lol
i have not seen greyhawk in many years. we started in 1e in greyhawk and played many modules and when forgotten realms came out in 1987 we adopted that and merged our favorite greyhawk things and never looked back. in 1989 when 2e came out we were fully into forgotten realms.
3:41 Do YOU wanna talk about it? 😂Otherwise why give him more attention?
Greyhawk was one of the big inspirations behind the setting I've been developing since we started at the beginning of 5e, it was cool to hear your thoughts on it.
As someone who, perhaps unhealthily, finds a lot of enjoyment in videos discussing the stupid uninformed drama conservative gamer bros drum up over nothing, I'd personally greatly enjoy a video going over the Gr*mmz tweet. Especially after only just learning about him from Shaun's new video on the Stellar Blade drama (highly recommend). Obviously, protect your own peace first though! I know how draining this stuff can be
I guess it makes sense that one of the first d&d sessions fit d&d one of the best
If you're still looking for another setting to look into and talk about, I'd love to see your opinions on Warhammer Fantasy. Its probably my favorite fantasy setting with lots of fun and zanny stuff (Ogres, Orks and Skaven) as well as some great dark stuff (Chaos, Dark Elves and Skaven) its got a very flavorfull and well developed world with hundreds of fun plot hooks and a setting location for basically any type of story you want.
Definitely interested in the Ravnica video eventually. I don't even really care about DND (I mostly watch this channel because you just have a good personality). But I am DEEP DEEP into Magic the Gathering so I'm fascinated to see how one of our biggest planes is reflected when turned into something that people have to interact with in a TTRPG setting instead of card games and novels.
15:05 I feel like gods should almost be put with Cleric subclasses like how Paladin tenants are
Great overview. Cheers mate
Love your work. Another great video.
I like the bagpipes.
Thanks!
3:37 I do not want to see any twitter drama. I hear BlueSky is good though.
I second this motion.
Cuthbert is an actual saint, known for converting heathens by force.
The Greyhawk setting is new to me, even though Ihave ran/played Basic/Expert D&D, AD&D settings. This version of Greyhawk i supplement with DMs Guild content from ppl who are devoted to the Greyhawk mythos.
Please just ignore this "controversy" I hate channels that focus on drama and like that you don't seem to want to focus on those things
The reason I loved Greyhawk was because it was so open to interpretation.
So funng story...I started playing in 3.5e, but I was a kid. My main introduction to D&D is based off games like Neverwinter Nights.
All that to say, I was Today years old when I learned Greyhawk was the default setting for 3rd edition 😂
I'd be very interested to hear Mike's opinions on the latest D&D drama, since I don't really keep up these days and I generally trust Mike's opinions. That said, I feel it'd be unhealthy for him to be focusing on twitter drama after just leaving twitter, so maybe best not.
I highly recommend the channel @Greyhawk Grognard.
That dude is like an Encyclopedia of Greyhawk
I've been using the gray hawk pantheon since 3.5
Troll lord games is publishing castle Greyhawk under a different name. Gary was working on it before he died. Look there the stuff oven seen is pretty good and it’s easy to covert to 5e
Looking forward to the Ravnica review.
I don't really like Greyhawk because its too fleshed out to be a blank slate setting (unlike Nentir Vale), but not logically fleshed out to the point where the world feels like it exists beyond a game.
Also, it doesn't have a gimmick to set it apart from any other fantasy world other than "It's the first D&D setting."
Looking forward to the exandria setting.
This reset to old school grey hawk is why I run Grey Box Gritty forgotten realms...
Thanks for the shout out!!
Any time!
And here I thought that the immediate attachment to Greyhawk I got while reading the book was because it was based on Chicago. XD
Well, that and the fact the only game I ran so far was from the Saltmarsh module. Still, glad to see there is more to it as I do agree with the idea that there is more to it that it just feels like a setting that can be made my own while still feeling like the original D&D setting. Do wonder if they're just going to have future modules take place in some of those other countries/locations to help fill those out. (Was there a Temple of Elemental Evil 5e conversion yet? Feels like that's the one big Greyhawk adventure that hasn't been updated yet)
The person who complained about Gygax getting 'erased' and 'slandered' is being disingenuous. They are just a troll intentionally being incendiary for attention and drama. It's just the same old tired culture war BS.
Don't give trolls attention
No need to cover the current controversy. I always prefer channels to focus on content and ideas. Just like this awesome one!
3:41 Wow, Grummz? I remember when he ruined Firefall by being a freakin moron. Maybe Grummz should be quiet.
A guy named Ludic Savant did a bunch of (very non-canon) very fun write ups of the Greyhawk gods over on Giant in the Playground. Check it out for a different view on gods and their followers.
You already said too much about the discourse imo. I'm here for ttrpg content, not stupid internet drama
Greyhawk is the the only D&D setting I've played in for the last 30(odd) years. It should be noted that this is a persistent campaign set there. Funnily enough, none of the stable of characters have been to the city of Grehawk as far as I can remember. Everything was always based of Gradzul 😁
Not really a fan of Greyhawk. It's fairly generic and to be honest quite boring. I know they made it the default setting because it was so generic in addition to being the oldest setting. They had to chose a medieval high fantasy setting as the default setting, so steampunk Eberron, horror Ravenloft and post-apocalyptic Dark Sun were not valid choices. Still both Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance had more elaborate cultures, interesting characters and engaging stories than Greyhawk.
I want to see the twitter guy get owned. We're too afraid to call stupid ideas stupid
PersonallyI hope we can keep FR as the main setting. I dont Hate greyhawk but its not really inspiring for me while Faerun feels like home, I can come up with characters from all over the map.
Last time I playedin Greyhawk, avoiding Stoink became something of a meme in my group.
Loved it, more videos on Greyhawk ! :)
I move for a universal ban on Twitter (yes, it’s *always* going to be Twitter, Elon) drama on this channel. Words cannot accurately describe how tired I am of social media drama. Please, never darken our D&D with that crap (the hobby has enough problems).
As someone who has never played D&D but is a huge fan of fantasy and all sorts of stuff like that, when I hear D&D think of Forgotten Realms and Sword Coast because that's where the video games are set. Since things like BG3 are what most people, especially average "normies", know then the default setting should be that. No need to confuse things. Ive never understood why there isnt just one setting for each genre of fantasy and just leave it at that.
Ravnica mentioned: day improved
Oh, I think I can guess where the "fungal plagues" are coming from...
I don't know why they didn't reprint the boxed set in a book format, it has so much more info and places and details of some of the major gods. Unfortunately I no longer have physical copy of the boxed set, but i do have the pdf's. I started with Greyhawk in 1984 and never really got into Forgotten realms as even now if asked about a region of the Flanaess I could give a player an answer but I couldn't tell you anything about Forgotten realms.
I’d love to hear your opinion on Planescape since that recently game out and has similar vibes to Exandria in the sense that alignment is not determined by species. I’d much rather hear you talk about that than the Gary Gygax drama
12:05 I apologise for such an incredibly pedantic nitpick, but flan is european first, I assume it must have been adopted into mexican culture by some migration or settler/colonial mvoements (for better or worse) but it originates from rome. I had always thought ti was french since I mainly have it in france with family there but this made me look up where it actually comes from out of curiosity, which is interesting to find out!
Yeah it's a variant of a creme caramel. I learned this in world food and culture class. A great connection
Personally I really, really, really hope that Greyhawk doesn't become the new default campaign setting as I really love the forgotten realms and am incredibly invested, both emotionally and physically, in that setting. I love it when new adventures come out and I can just drop a bit of news into my own game from that adventure. "Oh no, looks like Elturel fell into Avernus!", "Oh hey it's back again". That's a very important part of the D&D experience for me and I hope that doesn't change any time soon.
love your stuff mike. still i mentally recoil from campaign setting as anything more than a vein of resources to mine and work into my own creations
Flan is popular in Mexico and I'm sure they have regional variations specific to Mexico, but it's originally a French dessert. I looked it up because while I'm familiar with flan, this is the first time I've heard it described as a "Mexican dessert".
Anyway, regarding the actual topic of this video, I always thought of Greyhawk as a generic fantasy setting with nothing particularly unique about it. After watching this video, the impression that I'm getting is that it's a less heroic Forgotten Realms? I can see the appeal in that. In any case, I still think Eberron is the best setting since it was specifically designed to facilitate running a TTRPG campaign. I just appreciate the diversity of environments present in Eberron and all the choices you have for the BBEG of a campaign...
Seeing the Video pop up I admit I thought "Still haven't gotten to Eberron, huh Mike?"
But it's all good :D
All Hail the Algorithm.
Please ignore the D&D drama. I'm broke af but I'd happily pay you to not cover it 😂
The biggest problem with Greyhawk is the fact that it’s not detailed anywhere that’s terribly accessible.
Ironically, that also leaves it wide open for individual tables to wedge in their own ideas.
In some ways, it reminds me of the campaign setting of Creation, for White Wolf/Onyx Path’s game “Exalted”, where the campaign map has a broad range of canon locations webworked all across the world (which has a massive central continent and eight distinct regions around the edge of the map), but also huge stretches of territory that are deliberately left unexplored so that you can stick homebrew material in them.
By which I mean regions the size of the former Soviet Union. HUGE territories that can fit empires, even clashing empires.
I've been running D&D on my own setting but I was never fully satisfied with it. I might give greyhawk a look to steal some ideas because this sounds fun.
I never liked the exaggerated levels of mega epic high fantasy of forgotten realms. I want magic to feel special (it makes PCs more special).
The only issue, we speak Spanish here, "Halcón Gris" on its own won't sound like a city name so I might need to rename some stuff if I use the setting as is. Oarth can stay tho, it's not close at all to "Tierra" (Spanish for "earth")
Could anyone tell me the difference between Sword and Sorcery, Heroic Fantasy and High Fantasy? I hear these terms often thrown around in D&D circles but they all sound like the same thing to me. I admit I'm more familiar with East Asian interpretations of medieval fantasy, my western knowledge extends to just Lord of the Rings vs more political, darker tones like Game of Thrones.
High Fantasy really just means "Fantasy that takes place in a world that is not Earth."
So like Game of Thrones and LOTR are both High Fantasy, despite their tone differences. But King Arthur or God of War would not be high fantasy as they take place on Earth.
Sword and Sorcery (SAS) and Heroic Fantasy (HF) deal more with tone. SAS is usually darker than HF and features more morally grey situations and events. SAS is also usually much more personally focused.
In Heroic Fantasy you need to stop a dragon because it threatens the city and has killed dozens of people.
In Sword and Sorcery, you need to stop a dragon because it killed your mother and at night you still hear her screaming as she burned.
I'm looking forward to reading this new version. I started gaming in 1981 with AD&D, so Greyhawk was my first campaign world. I always loved the setting, even though there were way more gaps in the published material than I would have preferred (obviously you were supposed to fill in details yourself, but sometimes this was a very heavy lift- for example, the See of Medegia was supposed to be an evil analog to the Vatican, where the leaders of the church had secretly converted to devil worship; sounds like a great hook, but in a world where the gods are *real* and grant spells, how can this work in actual play?!).
Greyhawk was also the "default" setting to early 3rd Edition, and that version was very disappointing- little if any of Gygax' "flavor" came through. WotC just took his map and depicted it as a very "generic fantasy" campaign setting with none of the European analogs that "sold" the setting.
If you throw the players into a campaign. You're going to get an answer. What you do next is what is what is necessary to keeping everyone coming back.
17:30 hooks go into holes so.... plot holes?
Doesn't seem in anyone's interest but his to give that guy more attention