D&D 4E How would you re-envision Greyhawk with 4e?

[billd91]

I wouldn't move the timeline forward any more than, say, 10 years. Enough to put a few changes into the timeline.

As far as things like dragonborn, they can come out of the west, from past Baklunish lands. Another wave of migration, so to speak, into the area of the Flanaess. We know there's a lot more land mass out there that wasn't solidly defined in any publication. Any shift to 4E gives us a chance to define elements of that.

For that matter, the whole land mass west and the undefined nature of much of Oerth is a great source to explain anything new to GH since 1e. New alchemical items are available? A great exploratory expedition returned from over the sea bringing new technology! Explanation from that point is easy.

I haven't read much about things like feywild or any of that but new stuff can just be explained as something that's never been a factor before, or something previously secret. I did that with dwarven wizards/sorcerers. They had always been there, but they are very secretive about their existence. I tied that in with a secret motivation for the dwarves to participate in the Hateful Wars to bring the Lortmils out from under humanoid control too.

 

[billd91]

It is also not a setting where Kord and some of the other Suel pantheon are among the default gods (except possibly around the Lendore Isles). The default deities include Istus, Tritheron and several other deities introduced by EGG in his Greyhawk articles, but not to be found in 3.x until Complete Divine.

I find this a fairly weird argument. The default pantheon was just that, an incomplete pantheon that was set up to at least cover major bases and the main alignments so that a basic campaign wouldn't be woefully short. The other Greyhawk gods were available pretty early in the 3E, long before Complete Divine, in the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer and other online LG sources.
But given the spread of Suel stock over the Flanaess, there's a lot of potential for Kordites to be around... culturally speaking. So I would pretty much consider Kord and any other Suel gods to be the default pantheon of any ethnically Suloise character, of which there are many in places like Keoland, which is pretty far from the Lendore Isles.

 

[A'koss]

I like a lot of these ideas, and arguably I'm a Greyhawk grognard (and was a Living Greyhawk triad). I don't think it'd be necessary to advance the timeline *that* far (like 100 years) - there was plenty of change from 1e to Wars to From the Ashes to the LG Gazetteer. It would also be nice if they used some of the huge amounts of fan-created material from Living Greyhawk region development; I think it would go a long way to making the fan base feel more enfranchised again.

I think putting some significant distance between the current era and 4e in the long run will prove to be a good idea. It allows enough breathing room time for as big an upheaval the setting is going to need to spice up the setting and draw in new players again. It allows new cities and castles to be built, the changes in magic to take place, nations to fall and new ones to rise and time to incorporate the new races (like the Dragonborn and the Tieflings) in such a way that it isn't all happening in an absurdly short amount of time. Also, there is so much "strong opinion" about how things should be "now", that at least with a buffer of 100 years it'll be a lot easier to smooth over changes.

As far as the LG work goes - it becomes a part of history and can help shape the future. I've heard though that there are copyright concerns or some other legal issues with most (but not all) of the fan-created material so it may be a moot point anyway.

There's nothing in 4e that is different enough from 3.5e Greyhawk to justify 100 years - many of the jumpstarting ideas can happen quickly and it'd be a shame to miss out on some of the cool changes the recent Dungeon Adventure Paths (Age of Worms, Savage Tide) have added to the Greyhawk landscape (in fact, in terms of revitalizing Greyhawk those did a pretty boss job). And Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk.

AoW & ST are great, but they could probably use the 100 years to recover!

Iggwilv, Kyuss, Lord Robilar, Iuz, Graz'zt, Mordenkainen, Rary the Traitor... Loads of possible fun. I like the idea of Iuz being supplanted by Iggwilv; he is described as very trained after being caught in the Godtrap in Ruins.

Yeah, Iuz has been taking in on the chin long enough that he needs to take on a more subordinate role in GH. He's still valuable though, especially if used as a foil to his mother and sister.

As for the Dragonborn - sure! From the Sea of Dust maybe. Or maybe Rary imports them from some other plane as shock troops in the Bright Desert.

I do like the idea of the Dragonborn migrating out from the west somewhere and then having enough time to settle across the Flanaess. I kinda like the idea of the warrior culture background they have - they would make excellent soldiers in the Shield Lands (playing up the ongoing war with Iggwilv). A Dragonborn Lord of Admunfort would be highly cool IMO.

However I have little love for Rary, he always seemed to come across as a bitter old codger who went to sulk off in his sandbox. I know he likes to traffic in demons and I'd love nothing better than for Rary to find his ego outstrip his ability and is now the groveling pet of some amorphous Demon Lord.

 

[A'koss]

Roger Moore once commented that Greyhawk was an important planar nexus in the multiverse and that was a possible reason why Demon Lords were so interested in it. And it got me thinking about possible overarching themes that Tharizdun didn't necessarily have to have a heavy hand in.

The Earthstone is one of Greyhawk's most intruiging uber-artifacts. Now what if there were actually several of them and they were the source of power for the random, uncontrolled planar activity and time disturbances on Oerth.

Now imagine Iggwilv learning of what happened in the Expedition to the Ruins of Castle Greyhawk adventure (no spoilers here but it's easy to see how she might), learns of the Earthstone and through many years of research finally gleans their true nature. Control all the Earthstones and you control Oerth's (that's the entire planet) place in space, plane and most importantly... time. Tovag Baragu would naturally be the "control" point on the world. That could be the true impetuous behind Iggwilv's return to Oerth and supplanting her son.

And since Iggwilv has never been big on "sharing", she has to act in with the utmost care, patience and secrecy. Graz'zt learning about this would be bad enough, but if the secret got out every god, primordial, demon lord, devil prince and elemental lord would descend upon the planet like a cloud of god-powered locusts (and devour the planet in much the same manner to find them).

An adventure possibility might be Iggwilv succeeding but our heroes destroy one of the Earthstones at the last moment and it sends Oerth on a whirlwind tour of the planes for the duration of an epic level adventure. The planet could have a front-row seat to some of the key places and times in the multiverse's history - The Primordial/God War, the birth of the Abyss at the hands of Tharizdun, etc. And our heroes having to find unique magical materials along the way to create a new Earthstone so they can use it's power to return Oerth to it's rightful place and time. Further, they could have a hand in some of the most important events that shaped the future. At the end, with their epic destinies fullfilled, they ascend to godhood and each PC becomes a guardian of one of the Earthstones.

Anyway, just some late night musings...