Dungeons & Dragons May Not Come Back to Greyhawk After 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide

greyhawk city.jpg


Wizards of the Coast does not appear to have future plans for the Greyhawk setting past the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide. Speaking at a press event earlier this month, Dungeons & Dragons game architect Chris Perkins explained that the inclusion of Greyhawk campaign setting material in the upcoming rulebook was meant to stand on its own. "Basically, we're saying 'Hey DMs, we're giving you Greyhawk as a foundation on which you can build your own setting stuff,'" Perkins said when asked about future Greyhawk setting material. "Whether we get back to Greyhawk or not in some capacity I cannot say, but that's our intention for now. This is the sandbox, it's Greyhawk. Go off and run Greyhawk or Greyhawk-like campaigns with this if you wish. We may not come to this version of Greyhawk for a while because we DMs to own it and play with it. This is not a campaign setting where I think we need to go in and start defining large sections of the world and adding more weight of content that DMs have to sit through in order to feel like they're running a proper Greyhawk campaign."

The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide includes a campaign setting gazetteer focused on the Greyhawk setting, one of D&D's earliest campaign settings. The use of Greyhawk is intended to be an example for DMs on how to build a full-fledged campaign setting, with an overview of major conflicts and places to explore within the world. New maps of both Oerth and the city of Greyhawk are also included in the rulebook.

However, while it seems like Wizards isn't committing to future Greyhawk campaign setting material, Perkins admitted that the fans still have a say in the matter. "We're not so immutable with our plans that if the fans rose up and said 'Give us something Greyhawk,' that we would say 'No, never,'" Perkins said. "That won't happen."

Perkins also teased the appearance of more campaign settings in the future. "We absolutely will be exploring new D&D worlds and that door is always open," Perkins said.
 

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Christian Hoffer

Christian Hoffer


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I’ve determined I’ll be going a different direction for my Greyhawk.

Advancing the timeline to the 700s CY. Just like how GDQ brought awareness of drow to the campaign and the unreliable narrative of the setting, there will be events that do the same for Dragonborn, goliaths, others, though they were all just there all along in small numbers.
Why do you need to advance the timeline?

Seems already there but "in small numbers" works fine for CY 576 too.
 

I wholeheartedly wish that Wizards abandons Greyhawk. Not because I have anything at all against Greyhawk (in fact I generally prefer it to the forgotten realms). But because the 2024 DMG makes clear that the writers haven't the faintest miserable clue as to what makes the setting awesome.
What is the point of speaking vaguely about "awesome"?

What, exactly, do you, personally, find awesome in the 1980 Greyhawk?
 





Granted, this article in and of itself is seemingly written to obfuscate the fun of the magic chaos desert full of man scorpions.
I've never used scorpion-folk in the Bright Desert, but it's a cool idea!

The last time I GMed any Bright Desert action, the PCs fought with Orcs who were excavating an ancient magical tomb, took refuge in a friendly Sphinx's oasis, met nomads who were led by an old enemy of one of the PCs, and then had to cross the desert on foot to get to the Abor-Alz.

I don't think it's hard to come up with interesting stuff to happen in the Bright Desert.
 


Kinda necroing, but the damage is obvious. They added dragonborn to the setting, the audacity!
There's a wee bit more than that. The rulership of the Flanaess of the 2024 DMG is a completely different to any other product. The odd tiefling nomad at the periphery of the setting, or sneaking in a Dragonborn librarian/knight are the least of the problems.

A learned colleague here wrote a rather long article on why the DMG 2024 is mildly vexing to us fan-author types that tried to have fidelity in our writings - Entirely Unsolicited Grognard Opinions on the World of Greyhawk in the 2024 D&D Dungeon Master’s Guide

(And yes, don't mention the words "Independent Fief" to him. It's red-rag to a bull :D ).

independent (adjective)
1. free from outside control; not subject to another's authority.
2. not depending on another for livelihood or subsistence.
fief (noun)
1. an estate of land, a vassal’s source of income, held from his lord in exchange for services
 

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