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D&D (2024) How Does Greyhawk Fit In To The New Edition?

Dungeon Master’s Guide contains a sample setting—and that setting is, indeed, Greyhawk.

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According to Game Informer — “the surprising importance and inclusions of what is arguably the oldest D&D campaign setting of them all – Greyhawk.”

So how does Greyhawk fit in? According to GI, the new 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide contains a sample setting—and that setting is, indeed, Greyhawk. Not only that, but the book will come with a double-sided poster map with the City of Greyhawk on one side and the Flannaes on the other—the eastern part of one of Oerth’s four continents.
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Even as the multiverse of D&D worlds sees increased attention, the Dungeon Master's Guide also offers a more discrete setting to get gaming groups started. After very few official releases in the last couple of decades, the world of Greyhawk takes center stage. The book fleshes out Greyhawk to illustrate how to create campaign settings of your own. Greyhawk was the original D&D game world crafted by D&D co-creator Gary Gygax, and a worthy setting to revisit on the occassion of D&D's golden anniversary. It's a world bristling with classic sword and sorcery concepts, from an intrigue-laden central city to wide tracts of uncharted wilderness. Compared to many D&D campaign settings, it's smaller and less fleshed out, and that's sort of the point; it begs for DMs to make it their own. The book offers ample info to bring Greyhawk to life but leaves much undetailed. For those eager to take the plunge, an included poster map of the Greyhawk setting sets the tone, and its reverse reveals a map of the city of the same name. "A big draw to Greyhawk is it's the origin place for such heroes as Mordenkainen, Tasha, and others," Perkins says. "There's this idea that the players in your campaign can be the next great world-hopping, spell-crafting heroes of D&D. It is the campaign where heroes are born."
- Game Informer​

 

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Ringtail

World Traveller (She/Her)
But I would chuckle sometimes at the names of some of the nations and locations on the map...

Furyondy... LOL
Honestly the issue I had. I wanted to get into Greyhawk just because I love digging around in fantasy worlds, but some of the names for things just felt so goofy. Iuz?

Maybe I'd get used to it with time, I got used to Forgotten Realms after all.
 

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As an aside, a decentering of the Forgotten Realms in the Core does make it much, much more likely that a fat Forgotten Realms Setting product might be coming down the pike.

It actually occurred to me that the lore book from the Lore & Arcana guys might be that project, but focused on the huge amount of FR lore and updating the lore.

I could be wrong, I mean its not unreasonable to think WotC would want do a FRCG themselves, but if its a pure lore and art FRCG for 5.75e then getting these folks to do it can't be precluded.
 


I will never for the life of me understand Greyhawk fans.

You want the setting to come back, but you don't want ANY changes to the setting, NOTHING new. What do you want? Them to copy and paste the exact text from 2E books, same art of course since yall usually get mad over new art, and then put it into a new book with "5E" on the logo????????

I've never understood the inability to embrace change to an IP. Evolve the idea, play with it, and if you don't like it you have all the old stuff still remaining.

They want a mechanical update and for it to be dmsguild legal.
 

Well I mean, I kind of get it.

One of my favorite things a bout Eberron is there's been no meta-plot advancement (though sure, they added dragonborn and stuff.)

I prefer when books don't have these meta-plots, because I just end up ignoring them. Which then makes it more difficulty when I'm referencing 3 editions of lore books for my homebrew (Grrrrr, Forgotten Realms). Sure just homebrew and ignore but it doesn't mean its not a pain. So if you've been playing in Greyhawk for so many years, you've probably got your own continuity going and having to wrestle around any new changes is a pain. Plus, changes too drastic can change the feel, the vibe.

All that bit about same art feels a little bit hyperbolic though. But once again, art can convey theme and tone, and if the style changes dramatically it can have an effect.
I just don't know what they want in a product. What would it look like? Would there be anything new at all?
 

Well I mean, I kind of get it.

One of my favorite things a bout Eberron is there's been no meta-plot advancement (though sure, they added dragonborn and stuff.)

I prefer when books don't have these meta-plots, because I just end up ignoring them. Which then makes it more difficulty when I'm referencing 3 editions of lore books for my homebrew (Grrrrr, Forgotten Realms). Sure just homebrew and ignore but it doesn't mean its not a pain. So if you've been playing in Greyhawk for so many years, you've probably got your own continuity going and having to wrestle around any new changes is a pain. Plus, changes too drastic can change the feel, the vibe.

All that bit about same art feels a little bit hyperbolic though. But once again, art can convey theme and tone, and if the style changes dramatically it can have an effect.

WAS no metaplot advanced, Eberron is no longer cut off from other D&D settings, it got sucked into the FR/Multiverse metaplot.
 

Ringtail

World Traveller (She/Her)
WAS no metaplot advanced, Eberron is no longer cut off from other D&D settings, it got sucked into the FR/Multiverse metaplot.
Being part of a multi-verse is easy enough to ignore (there's no such thing to me) And unless a recent adventure gets canonized in the next Eberron sourcebook I'd say my point still stands.

Because that's just it. We've had 3 "Core" Eberron setting books and they all start in the same year, with the same configuration of nations and potential villains, etc. Not many settings can say the same, Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms even Greyhawk have been hit with the lore stick at some point.
 

Distracted DM

Distracted DM
Supporter
For sure Dragonborn and Tiefling are part of the Greyhawk setting. How could they not be?

Greyhawk has "Cambion" − the Tiefling is canon!

Really, "dragon people" are a bridge too far?
I think some fans want to avoid having their favorite setting become another "kitchen sink" where everything that WotC sells is put into it canonically. Some settings exclude certain player options to help them feel more "special," or even just to fit the theme.

My favorite way of doing this was 3e Eberron, where as new 3e books were released with new player options they'd have a little sidebar suggesting how these options could fit into Eberron etc. It was not assumed by default that every player options had a place in the setting.
 


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