D&D (2024) WotC Invites You To Explore the World of Greyhawk

This week a new D&D Dungeon Master's Guide preview video was released. This one features the sample setting chapter in the book, which showcases the World of Greyhawk.

One of the earliest campaign settings, and created by D&D co-founder Gary Gygax, Greyhawk dates back to the early 1970s in Gygax's home games, receiving a short official setting book in 1980. Gyeyhawk was selected as the example setting because it is able to hit all the key notes of D&D while being concise and short. The setting has been largely absent from D&D--aside from a few shorter adventures--since 2008. Some key points from the video--

• Greyhawk deliberately leaves a lot for the DM to fill in, with a 30-page chapter.
• Greyhawk created many of the tropes of D&D, and feels very 'straight down the fairway' D&D.
• This is the world where many iconic D&D magic items, NPCs, etc. came from--Mordenkainen, Bigby, Tasha, Otiluke and so on.
• The DMG starts with the City of Greyhawk and its surroundings in some detail, and gets more vague as you get farther away.
• The city is an example of a 'campaign hub'.
• The sample adventures in Chapter 4 of the DMG are set there or nearby.
• The map is an updated version, mainly faithful to the original with some tweaks.
• The map has some added locations key to D&D's history--such as White Plume Mountain, the Tomb of Horrors, Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth, Ghost Tower of Inverness.
• There's a map of the city, descriptions of places characters might visit--magic item shop, library, 3 taverns, temples, etc.
• The setting takes 'a few liberties while remaining faithful to the spirit of the setting'--it has been contemporized to make it resonate in all D&D campaigns with a balance of NPCs who showcase the diversity of D&D worlds.
• The backgrounds in the Player's Handbook map to locations in the city.
• Most areas in the setting have a name and brief description.
• They focus on three 'iconic' D&D/Greyhawk conflicts such as the Elemental Evil, a classic faceless adversary; Iuz the evil cambion demigod; and dragons.
• There's a list of gods, rulers, and 'big bads'.

 

[pemerton]

Ioun, Melora, and Torog were explicitly the only Dawn War Gods made from Scratch.

Where's Avandra from?

 

[Parmandur]

Where's Avandra from?

They took Tymora from the Forgotten Realms and renamed her.

 

[Zeromaru X]

They took Tymora from the Forgotten Realms and renamed her.

Actually, Avandra is a renamed Tyche. While Erathis is a renamed Athena. The only Forgotten Realms deity in the setting is Bane, and as any FR fan love to point out, this version of Bane is different enough from the Realms one to be is own thing (he seems to be more of a renamed Ares).

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

But seriously, I have never understood those (in my experience few) people who have trouble seeing tieflings in Greyhawk. Iuz; he's right there. The Horned Society! The already mentioned Great Kingdom. And that doesn't even consider ancient civilisations, famously the Suel, who one can easily see having truck with the Lower Planes.

That said, I want to address a slightly bigger issue that I've hit before.

I think that the three following statements are all true:
1. Greyhawk (as in the Flanaess) is "humanocentric" in the sense that humanity is the dominant force, in terms of population and politics.
2. Greyhawk (as in the Flanaess) shouldn't have "retconned" countries of other races/species.
3. Greyhawk is easily able to have all the races you could want for a PC, and it's always been that way.

To expand- the Flanaess is human dominated in terms of the politics and countries, and also in terms of overall population. The non-human countries are either few and clearly demarcated (see, e.g., Celene, Pomarj) or alluded to and not on the map (dwarven areas in mountains, dark elves per D1-D3)

It wouldn't make sense to just say, "Well, the Yeomanry is actually a Dragonborn kingdom." Moreover, you don't need to.

Greyhawk is scaffolding. It always had the ability to accommodate new races. As I wrote before, Gygax was constantly putting in new things (Half Ogre, Duergar, too many dang elves, etc.). You don't need to explain a small presence, because there's a lot of space! In addition, we know that PCs could be non-standard races back then from reincarnation (Rogue's Gallery, Centaur).

It's simple to have a PC from a non-standard race. Why? Because:
1. The map has areas that are unexplored. You could have dragonborn in the mountains near the Sea of Dust, for example.
2. The Flanaess isn't all of Oerik. The PC can be from "off the map." Maybe your Flanaess doesn't have dragonborn, but just west of the Flanaess ....
3. The borders between worlds are porous. Whether you're Gith, or a Warforged that fell through a portal, you can always deus ex machina it in Greyhawk.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Actually, Avandra is a renamed Tyche. While Erathis is a renamed Athena. The only Forgotten Realms deity in the setting is Bane, and as any FR fan love to point out, this version of Bane is different enough from the Realms one to be is own thing (he seems to be more of a renamed Ares).

Weren't Zehir and Asmodeus FR gods?

 

[Zeromaru X]

Weren't Zehir and Asmodeus FR gods?

Asmodeus is your classic Asmodeus from 1e. He is as Greyhawk as Bahamut. He got promoted to be a major god in the Realms in novels, but he didn't originated there.

Zehir is a renamed Set (but more of a Conan's Set than Egyptian Set, given all the snakey imagery). Again, he was added to the Realms in Neverwinter Nights 2, but didn't originated there.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

The only Forgotten Realms deity in the setting is Bane, and as any FR fan love to point out, this version of Bane is different enough from the Realms one to be is own thing (he seems to be more of a renamed Ares).

I LOVE THAT VERSION OF BANE!

 

[Parmandur]

Actually, Avandra is a renamed Tyche. While Erathis is a renamed Athena.

I mean, actually, Tymora is renamed Tyche, so probably...both. I am sure I heard someone at WotC make the Avandra-Tymora connection.

The only Forgotten Realms deity in the setting is Bane, and as any FR fan love to point out, this version of Bane is different enough from the Realms one to be is own thing (he seems to be more of a renamed Ares).

I seem ton recall something that they combined Bane with Hextor, the Oerdian god of War and Tyrannt from Greyhawk (linked pretty hard to the Great Kingdom).

 

[Voadam]

Actually, Avandra is a renamed Tyche. While Erathis is a renamed Athena. The only Forgotten Realms deity in the setting is Bane, and as any FR fan love to point out, this version of Bane is different enough from the Realms one to be is own thing (he seems to be more of a renamed Ares).

And in the Forgotten Realms Tyche was part of the original mix and match pantheon as detailed in Dragon 54 - Greenwood's Down to Earth Divinity article, and then in the 1e FR campaign boxed set Lady Luck was renamed Tymora. 2e Faiths and Avatars later retconned Tyche to have split into Tymora and Beshaba during the Dawn Cataclysm.

Per Greenwood's Dragon article a bunch of the FR gods are renamed 1e Deities and Demigods, particularly a large number of Greek ones. Chauntea is a rewritten Demeter, Gond is a renamed Hephaestus, Mask is a rewritten Hermes, Sune is a renamed Aphrodite. It does not explicitly say Lathander is Apollo, but the parallels are there. There are also borrowings and transmutations from Lankhmar, Finnish, Greek, Moorcock, and Egypt, and even non-DDG Narnia.

 

[Zeromaru X]

I mean, actually, Tymora is renamed Tyche, so probably...both. I am sure I heard someone at WotC make the Avandra-Tymora connection.

I seem ton recall something that they combined Bane with Hextor, the Oerdian god of War and Tyrannt from Greyhawk (linked pretty hard to the Great Kingdom).

According to what James Wyatt said in one of the Dragon articles with the "behind the scenes" info, they originally wanted to use Hextor as the god of war (they had reservations over using FR gods due to many reasons). However, given that Hextor makes little sense without Heironeus, and they replaced Heironeus with Bahamut as the god of paladins, they discarded Hextor as well.

I mean, actually, Tymora is renamed Tyche, so probably...both. I am sure I heard someone at WotC make the Avandra-Tymora connection.

Yeah. They were the equivalent for taking feats and such. But Tymora has specific lore that doesn't fit Avandra.