Thank you for working tirelessly to keep Greyhawk alive. I've never played in a megadungeon, but if I ever gave it a try I'd start with Castle Greyhawk.
Most excellent, Your Groglyness. This was one of my favorite videos yet. I'm a real sucker for your history type videos. Makes me want to try out a megadungeon. Watching your channel so much, I've come to realize just how much I missed out on with my DMs back in the day.
Thank you! I have to admit that back in the day I hadn't really glommed on to the idea of the megadungeon. It was only years later that I realized what the game was originally organized around. All that player advice in the PH suddenly made sense.
Thanks Grognard! The Adventures Dark & Deep books arrived. Love the brilliant white non slick pages and the fonts you picked; I don’t need my reading glasses! Going to play B1 & B2 with them. Happy New Year!
Your version of the castle of the mad archmage is still my favorite so far. I will undoubtedly pick up a copy of the new one coming out, just so I can have the complete set. I love your work on the cast of The mad archmage and its spinoffs
Excited about the return to Castle Zagyg...I hope Steve C makes a good run of it. I was so excited when I discovered the Upper Works and then crushed to find out that it wasn't going to be finished.
I have the feeling you could have waxed on for hours, but this is a succinct summary. You know the old stories and their crossovers to published stuff. I think the Castle deserves more time, but this is a good primer.
I actually ran WG7. It wasn't set in Greyhawk when I ran it. It was run for fun and I ran it as a direct slight against TSR after they did that to Gygax. There are some fun things in it and if you approach it as something NOT Castle Greyhawk, you can have fun with it, but NEVER set it in Greyhawk EVER.
I find that WG7 Castle Greyhawk is a good snapshot of what the TSR creative staff was thinking about the hobby in 1986-7. I'd bet good money that the origins of that module were an attempt to curry favor with Lorraine Williams. But the section where "Mordenkainen" tries to make his own movie is very clearly a jab at Gary Gygax's escapades in Hollywood, where he was trying to get a D&D movie made with the help of Flint Dille.
Synchronicity, I was just looking at the Greyhawk Ruins module last night, and looking forward to Castle of the Mad Archmage getting here thru the mail soon. Thanks Joe!
So many gaming sessions held involving Castle Greyhawk ruins! It was my favorite module to run, and I ended up modifying it beyond all recognition. In the end, I tried tying it to Dave Arneson's Blackmoor, with mixed results... That said, all the players I ran through the Castle ruins had a great time. ANd I sure loved running it. If you could see how tattered my copy of the booklet ended up...! Honestly didn't think much of the hardcover from WotC, although we did use bits and bobs from it. Thanks for featuring this wonderful classic. I hope kids today have an equivalent in modern D&D. The old castle produced years of gaming experiences.
This channel I appreciate for enlightening me on Greyhawk, having back in the 80s focused on BECMI and into AD&D2e. Forgotten Realms as it was and is, just doesn't cut it. It's bland, so my experience with Greyhawk was limited to Dragon magazine throughout 80s/90s. Now with 2014/24e am playing catch up. An aside Adventures Dark and Deep I just recieved and Swords of Wuxia have arrived and intend to use with OA/GH. Just waiting for the bestiary and OA5 in print. Am thinking of PoD versions of the old GDQ 1-7 modules, to go with the 3.5e Drow of the Underdark which I adapt from the pdf. Ik I got the 5e portion in Tales of the Yawning portal with the giants.
Jon over at YeOldeGeek has been running adventure modules he dislikes for one reason or another for a few months. He did "Expedition to the Barrier Peaks" because he does not care for sci-fi, "The Forest Oracle" which he considers the worst published module ever, and now will be choosing between the WG7 Greyhawk or Red Sonja for the next one. Hopefully I will be able to get in on them for at least a little bit of the fun. I bought WG7 long ago, not realizing it was what it was. I got it used from an online gaming store, not for a huge price but definitely more than than it was worth. I was furious when I read through it. I kept it, just for completion sake in my collection, but what a piece of junk.
Help Me, Greyhawk Grognard, Help Me-- In the language of High Oeridian: Solnor = "Birthplace of the Sun" and Aerdy built three 'Cities of Enlightenment' Rel Astra = City of Heaven (Stars) Rel Deven = City of ????????? Rel Mord = City of ???????? IF there is no canon on the High Oeridian words "Deven" and "Mord" -- what would you design?! Rel Astra = City of Heaven (sunrise) Rel Deven = City of Man Rel Mord = City of The West (sunset)
I know WG7 is looked down upon - _and for _*_good_*_ reason_ - but I honestly like the portion involving the "Power of Shadow," "Zol Darklock," and his entrapment within Xodast's malachite cube, the "Darkness That Holds All Shadows," as well as Xodast's connection to the "Bringer of Doom." (In my campaign "head canon," I treat Zol as being connected to the City of Shade from the _Forgotten Realms_ - that after Netheril's fall "Lord Shadow" set agents out across the multiverse to seek out powerful magic, leading Zol to Oerth… only for him to get captured by Xodast.)
Loved the Castle Greyhawk overview! WG7 was an abomination and absolutely aimed as an egregious insult towards Gary. It came out the year I turned twenty, and though the cover art set me back and was not at all what I expected I snapped it up when I first saw it. The first "adventure" in it was . . . odd, but while a simpleton's concept it wasn't . . . awful. Everything got worse from there. The most irritating thing to me was the crossover where, as the party watches, a handsome human, an austere elf, and a skeleton enter a room with a corpse in it, the skeleton kneels by the corpse then looks up at the human and says "He's dead, Jim." That was pretty much where I refused to read more as the stupidity had ticked me off. And ticked me off so much that thirty six plus years later I still basically remember the 'Star Trek' scene and dialogue. Just ugh. Over the dozen years between my starting in the hobby and that module coming out I had done all I could to learn what I could about Castle Greyhawk (and Blackmoor as well) and its environs and episodes. We got piecemeal references in some modules, more info through related articles in Dragon Magazine, and some from other sources including a conference call with the man himself when I was in middle school. The first big homebrew adventure I got to try to explore was a megadungeon at a summer camp the year I turned 11, and I became fascinated with the idea. Thankfully, my mechanical engineer father was happy to get me notepads of graph paper from his job and occasionally buy me some of the larger sheets as well, probably the 17x22 inch sheets as I remember that they came folded to standard notebook paper size but unfolded to four times that. I still have some of my early maps and some of my room keys for them (done in a much more limited style, like the descriptions in the larger scale products from Judges Guild [who I adored] like City State of the Invincible Overlord and, my favorite JG product, Tegel Manor). I still occasionally work on some of my newer megadungeons, but I tend to try to plan and prepare smaller scale adventures over multi-session ones. I do have Greyhawk Ruins and liked it well enough, though it felt a pale reflection of the original at best. Still astronomically better than WG7. I've never seen Return to Greyhawk Ruins, but based on your thoughts I may try to pick up a copy. Thanks for that! I do have a copy of your Mad Archmage work that I hope to sit down and give a dedicated readthrough to once I've gotten caught up on all the work I've got to finish first. Sigh. If only it'd quit piling up faster than I can finish it. 😕
Thank you for working tirelessly to keep Greyhawk alive. I've never played in a megadungeon, but if I ever gave it a try I'd start with Castle Greyhawk.
Most excellent, Your Groglyness. This was one of my favorite videos yet. I'm a real sucker for your history type videos. Makes me want to try out a megadungeon. Watching your channel so much, I've come to realize just how much I missed out on with my DMs back in the day.
Thank you! I have to admit that back in the day I hadn't really glommed on to the idea of the megadungeon. It was only years later that I realized what the game was originally organized around. All that player advice in the PH suddenly made sense.
Thanks Grognard! The Adventures Dark & Deep books arrived. Love the brilliant white non slick pages and the fonts you picked; I don’t need my reading glasses! Going to play B1 & B2 with them. Happy New Year!
Ha! One of the reasons they're so big is because I couldn't read my own books. Hence a slightly larger font.
Your version of the castle of the mad archmage is still my favorite so far. I will undoubtedly pick up a copy of the new one coming out, just so I can have the complete set. I love your work on the cast of The mad archmage and its spinoffs
Your channel and publications made it possible for me to experience much of this as I didn't have much of this growing up. Thanks for that!
Man i am looking forward for the Troll Lord Games Kickstarter
Excited about the return to Castle Zagyg...I hope Steve C makes a good run of it. I was so excited when I discovered the Upper Works and then crushed to find out that it wasn't going to be finished.
30+ dungeon, that's a weekend for a bunch of single guys that are dedicated to a fun weekend of gaming.
Absolutely love these videos! Please do a deep dive into both of those Greyhawk Ruins products.
I have the feeling you could have waxed on for hours, but this is a succinct summary.
You know the old stories and their crossovers to published stuff.
I think the Castle deserves more time, but this is a good primer.
Love all the details you share, and appreciate your time and effort keeping Greyhawk alive!
One of my favorite subjects! Had to watch as soon as I saw it pop up.
I actually ran WG7. It wasn't set in Greyhawk when I ran it. It was run for fun and I ran it as a direct slight against TSR after they did that to Gygax. There are some fun things in it and if you approach it as something NOT Castle Greyhawk, you can have fun with it, but NEVER set it in Greyhawk EVER.
I find that WG7 Castle Greyhawk is a good snapshot of what the TSR creative staff was thinking about the hobby in 1986-7. I'd bet good money that the origins of that module were an attempt to curry favor with Lorraine Williams. But the section where "Mordenkainen" tries to make his own movie is very clearly a jab at Gary Gygax's escapades in Hollywood, where he was trying to get a D&D movie made with the help of Flint Dille.
Synchronicity, I was just looking at the Greyhawk Ruins module last night, and looking forward to Castle of the Mad Archmage getting here thru the mail soon. Thanks Joe!
So many gaming sessions held involving Castle Greyhawk ruins! It was my favorite module to run, and I ended up modifying it beyond all recognition. In the end, I tried tying it to Dave Arneson's Blackmoor, with mixed results...
That said, all the players I ran through the Castle ruins had a great time. ANd I sure loved running it. If you could see how tattered my copy of the booklet ended up...!
Honestly didn't think much of the hardcover from WotC, although we did use bits and bobs from it.
Thanks for featuring this wonderful classic. I hope kids today have an equivalent in modern D&D. The old castle produced years of gaming experiences.
Good job, GG. Keep up the great love for Greyhawk. It is appreciated!
Good to see the channel content returning to form. 😎
This channel I appreciate for enlightening me on Greyhawk, having back in the 80s focused on BECMI and into AD&D2e.
Forgotten Realms as it was and is, just doesn't cut it. It's bland, so my experience with Greyhawk was limited to Dragon magazine throughout 80s/90s. Now with 2014/24e am playing catch up.
An aside Adventures Dark and Deep I just recieved and Swords of Wuxia have arrived and intend to use with OA/GH. Just waiting for the bestiary and OA5 in print.
Am thinking of PoD versions of the old GDQ 1-7 modules, to go with the 3.5e Drow of the Underdark which I adapt from the pdf. Ik I got the 5e portion in Tales of the Yawning portal with the giants.
It’s funny to see how petty small minded people can be (reference to all the attacks on Gary way back to that funhouse module).
What shirt are you wearing? Looks like Tiamat?
A comment for the numbers brother
Jon over at YeOldeGeek has been running adventure modules he dislikes for one reason or another for a few months. He did "Expedition to the Barrier Peaks" because he does not care for sci-fi, "The Forest Oracle" which he considers the worst published module ever, and now will be choosing between the WG7 Greyhawk or Red Sonja for the next one. Hopefully I will be able to get in on them for at least a little bit of the fun. I bought WG7 long ago, not realizing it was what it was. I got it used from an online gaming store, not for a huge price but definitely more than than it was worth. I was furious when I read through it. I kept it, just for completion sake in my collection, but what a piece of junk.
Interesting.
Help Me, Greyhawk Grognard, Help Me--
In the language of High Oeridian:
Solnor = "Birthplace of the Sun"
and Aerdy built three 'Cities of Enlightenment'
Rel Astra = City of Heaven (Stars)
Rel Deven = City of ?????????
Rel Mord = City of ????????
IF there is no canon on the High Oeridian words "Deven" and "Mord" -- what would you design?!
Rel Astra = City of Heaven (sunrise)
Rel Deven = City of Man
Rel Mord = City of The West (sunset)
I know WG7 is looked down upon - _and for _*_good_*_ reason_ - but I honestly like the portion involving the "Power of Shadow," "Zol Darklock," and his entrapment within Xodast's malachite cube, the "Darkness That Holds All Shadows," as well as Xodast's connection to the "Bringer of Doom."
(In my campaign "head canon," I treat Zol as being connected to the City of Shade from the _Forgotten Realms_ - that after Netheril's fall "Lord Shadow" set agents out across the multiverse to seek out powerful magic, leading Zol to Oerth… only for him to get captured by Xodast.)
Loved the Castle Greyhawk overview!
WG7 was an abomination and absolutely aimed as an egregious insult towards Gary. It came out the year I turned twenty, and though the cover art set me back and was not at all what I expected I snapped it up when I first saw it. The first "adventure" in it was . . . odd, but while a simpleton's concept it wasn't . . . awful. Everything got worse from there. The most irritating thing to me was the crossover where, as the party watches, a handsome human, an austere elf, and a skeleton enter a room with a corpse in it, the skeleton kneels by the corpse then looks up at the human and says "He's dead, Jim." That was pretty much where I refused to read more as the stupidity had ticked me off. And ticked me off so much that thirty six plus years later I still basically remember the 'Star Trek' scene and dialogue. Just ugh.
Over the dozen years between my starting in the hobby and that module coming out I had done all I could to learn what I could about Castle Greyhawk (and Blackmoor as well) and its environs and episodes. We got piecemeal references in some modules, more info through related articles in Dragon Magazine, and some from other sources including a conference call with the man himself when I was in middle school. The first big homebrew adventure I got to try to explore was a megadungeon at a summer camp the year I turned 11, and I became fascinated with the idea. Thankfully, my mechanical engineer father was happy to get me notepads of graph paper from his job and occasionally buy me some of the larger sheets as well, probably the 17x22 inch sheets as I remember that they came folded to standard notebook paper size but unfolded to four times that. I still have some of my early maps and some of my room keys for them (done in a much more limited style, like the descriptions in the larger scale products from Judges Guild [who I adored] like City State of the Invincible Overlord and, my favorite JG product, Tegel Manor). I still occasionally work on some of my newer megadungeons, but I tend to try to plan and prepare smaller scale adventures over multi-session ones.
I do have Greyhawk Ruins and liked it well enough, though it felt a pale reflection of the original at best. Still astronomically better than WG7. I've never seen Return to Greyhawk Ruins, but based on your thoughts I may try to pick up a copy. Thanks for that! I do have a copy of your Mad Archmage work that I hope to sit down and give a dedicated readthrough to once I've gotten caught up on all the work I've got to finish first. Sigh. If only it'd quit piling up faster than I can finish it. 😕
What kind of "mists of time" at 0:41? LOL
"Hoary". It means very old. 🙂
@@GreyhawkGrognard Specifically, white in color due to age. See also, "Hoar-frost".
I never purchased the joke Greyhawk dungeon module, it wasted people's money. Very poor taste by TSR.
Gary messed up by not Copyrighting large portions of his own personal stuff.
I like WG7, it is a fun set of adventures to run!