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

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.

 

[pemerton]

as I said, varies by person

That feels like a rather low bar, FR, DL (pre and post Cataclysm even ) Midgard, and plenty of other settings have maps too, not sure I would have a strong preference for any of them… maybe pre-Cataclysm DL as it gets the least use / is the least familiar

I've explained upthread why I think the GH maps are first-rate for FRPGing.

 

[mamba]

I've explained upthread why I think the GH maps are first-rate for FRPGing.

I assume it is this

Maps with proper names are very handy for coordinating the fiction. And they fit well with trope-y places on the map, so that we (ie the group playing the game) can put stuff down in places that make sense and we'll remember - eg mountains for Dwarves to come from, forests for Elves to live in, hills or hidden vales for wizards to have their towers, etc.

And then some fairly loose backstory is good too, both to give some proper names (eg the Suel Empire) and to allow the tropes we want to be sourced (eg ancient liches, which are a standard REH-ish sort of thing, can be ancient Sueloise wizards).

but that to me is something most settings with maps offer. You can argue that many offer much more than that, i.e. a lot of additional detail you do not care for, but I do not really see them offering any less.

I mean, mountains, forests, location names, seems very basic to me.

Again, not trying to knock your preference for GH for this, I just do not see GH standing out in this regard. It sounds like any sufficiently generic setting (so not Dark Sun, Eberron, etc.) should be able to satisfy this requirement. If anything they exceed it with stuff you do not care for

 

[Parmandur]

I assume it is this


but that to me is something most settings with maps offer. You can argue that many offer much more than that, i.e. a lot of additional detail you do not care for, but I do not really see them offering any less.

I mean, mountains, forests, location names, seems very basic to me.

Again, not trying to knock your preference for GH for this, I just do not see GH standing out in this regard. It sounds like any sufficiently generic setting (so not Dark Sun, Eberron, etc.) should be able to satisfy this requirement. If anything they exceed it with stuff you do not care for

The cartography on the original Darlene map for Greyhawk Stull dtands out, just as an art object.

 

[Stuart Kerrigan]

I've never done that sort of RPGing.

It's not as if the two options in FRPGing are Diablo or book-of-lore story-time.

Absolutely, though I feel the original Gygax campaign was more dungeon romp Diablo style.

 

[mamba]

The cartography on the original Darlene map for Greyhawk Stull dtands out, just as an art object.

there is nothing wrong with picking GH, the map is sufficiently interesting and varied to allow for all kinds of campaigns (strictly speaking about the map here…).

 

[DrunkonDuty]

But you can see how this pitch just tells me that it's like all the other settings and nothing about what makes GH cool or unique, right?

Same old tropes plus the same old Conan tropes that are forced in somewhere in most other settings, plus vague politics, a sinisterly names group of villains and then two proper nouns I have never seen mentioned before that are then unexplained that I'm assuming are also villains by comma usage alone.

None of that wants me to know more.

Where's Greyhawk's Dragonmarked Houses and Fantasy Cold War? Where's it's return of the gods and dragon armies? Where's it's Dracula cosplayer and ironic hell? Where's it's space hippos and realmspace? Where's it's annoying wizard sleeping with the concept of magic?

Where's the Evil Windmill? Or an equivalent from a module people like? Where's the cool stuff that's Greyhawk?

I am very grateful for the lack of that particular annoying wizard. Just sayin'.

 

[Voadam]

Next, the Boxed Set, which included Pholtus, made it abundantly clear that it was Pholtus. Unless, you know, it was some other Greyhawk Deity that LG, but was also the god of Inflexibility, and who happened to have his two symbols on the Pale's Coat of Arms.

Well, it's kind of like this.

The Pale is LG(N).
The Pale has a coat of arms with two symbols- a sun and a crescent moon.
The Pale is a theocracy that is religiously intolerant.
The Pale is located where Oerdians are located (they are Oerdian/Flan).

Pholtus is the god of Light, Resolution, Law, Order, Inflexibility, Sun, and Moon.
Pholtus is going to show all the "One True Way" which allows no deviation.
Pholtus's robes are embroidered with the sun and moon, his symbols.
His clerics are inflexible and brook no argument.
Pholtus is LG(N).
Pholtus is Oerdian.

(the other gods that could fit are Fortub and Allitur, and Fortubo is obviously not it... )


I mean, it was obvious to me, and to everyone I knew at the time. It's not like it came from nowhere. Pholtus was one of the very first Gygax deities, and one of the few that predates the creation of the "Official" Greyhawk campaign.

Ooh, do the religious Baklunish Ekbirian Caliphate next!

I had never really noticed the Pale's coat of arms yellow sun and moon sort of matches the suns and moons embroidered in silver and gold that Pholtus wears on his cassock (looking it up his holy symbol is a silvery sun), or its racial breakdown, or the fact that the Pale is LN on the country alignment map with borders but no country names, those facts being scattered across four different parts of the material separate from the entry for the Pale. Looking over those facts now that is pretty cool and all fits together.

My campaign was never really around the Pale so it did not really come up but not knowing what religion dominates the archclericy of Veluna was an odd omission when looking. Cuthbert maybe I would guess but only because of the Temple of Elemental Evil module references of him being around and nothing really specific.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

But as to cool things about Greyhawk.

One of my faves is the whole post Greyhawk Wars unholy mess that is Rauxes, former capital of the Great Kingdom.

And I mean Unholy.

A little background: The Great Kindgom, once a shining beacon of Good Guy tropes, has fallen to all the Bad Guy tropes. It's latest ruling house, the Naelex, are demon worshipping baddies. The current Overking Ivid V, the Undying, has embraced undeath* and summoned armies of demons to help him fight the Greyhawk Wars. At the end of the Greyhawk Wars a holy relic of immense power, The Crook of Rao, banished all demons** from the world. This had the adiditional affect that it in some way disrupted some sort of demonic gate*** in Rauxes that led to the entire area becoming an Abyssal hell-hole.

The setting is (I assume deliberately) vague as to exactly what has happened. But the practical upshot is that no-one has heard a peep out of Rauxes since. The area for leagues around Rauxes has become home to all manner of terrible monsters. No-one even knows if Rauxes was dragged into the Abyss or not. Is Ivid still living (heh) up to his epithet? And what of all the riches of Rauxes palaces?

It may be that there is now a rift to the Abyss, a la Golarion's World Wound. Or it may simply be that there has been magical fallout that has corrupted the world. Or something else. For my campaign, I've gone with a small rift. But one that is slowly growing larger with time.

This is all from later sources, Ivid the Undying and From the Ashes.

* IIRC it's not said anywhere if he's a lich, death knight, vampire, mummy, or something else entirely.
** Doesn't effect Iuz, he's a local boy. His many summoned demons on the other hand are banished.
*** Again, I don't think offical sources say exactly what interacts with the power of the Crook, just that it's presumed to have been demonic and very powerful, hence the earth shattering kaboom.

 

[Voadam]

Thank you for the explanation.

I'm someone who prefers to homebrew and takes settings apart for useful inspiration, so I'm the opposite: I don't have a lot of need for maps and names, I'm looking for hooks and lore ideas and grand setpieces.

That's why I find the vagueness people speak of the setting with frustrating; I'm seeing allusions to what I'm looking for, but the content is often very hard to coax out.

I suggest starting a +thread on "Unique Cool Things From Greyhawk That Could be Plundered for a Homebrew?"

Mention you heard about the late 2e Stone Doom Windmill and the things you think are neat about the Bright Desert and that you are looking for others.

That way you will likely get more individual neat useable things and less "baseline D&D" or "places for standard tropes".

 

[Parmandur]

I had never really noticed the Pale's coat of arms yellow sun and moon sort of matches the suns and moons embroidered in silver and gold that Pholtus wears on his cassock (looking it up his holy symbol is a silvery sun), or its racial breakdown, or the fact that the Pale is LN on the country alignment map with borders but no country names, those facts being scattered across four different parts of the material separate from the entry for the Pale. Looking over those facts now that is pretty cool and all fits together.

Gygaxian organization.