D&D (2024) Greyhawk- New Map, Discussion of Changes

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Okay, here’s another impressive little detail.

The city of Roland along the coast of the Gull Cliffs, as described in Ivid is in the Bay of Gates, a small well-protected freak harbor that nestles into the hills.

The included map from the Dragon Magazine article on the Sea Barons placed a large label for Bay of Gates in the sea between the Sea Barons and the mainland. This was misinterpreted in the LGG maps to label the entire sea between the Sea Baron islands and the mainland as the Bay of Gates.

But Mike corrected the Bay of Gates to the source material description!

 

[Yaarel]

Well, the character sheet is an example of a worksheet, a form based way of working through am idea. And we have seen some worksheet pages from the DMG, like so:

View attachment 369028

I really like encouraging the DM to begin creating a new adventure, while keeping "player hopes" and "potentially sensitive elements" in mind. This is great.

 

[Clint_L]

Okay, here’s another impressive little detail.

The city of Roland along the coast of the Gull Cliffs, as described in Ivid is in the Bay of Gates, a small well-protected freak harbor that nestles into the hills.

The included map from the Dragon Magazine article on the Sea Barons placed a large label for Bay of Gates in the sea between the Sea Barons and the mainland. This was misinterpreted in the LGG maps to label the entire sea between the Sea Baron islands and the mainland as the Bay of Gates.

But Mike corrected the Bay of Gates to the source material description!

I consider myself a pretty big Greyhawk fan, but I don't have anything like your knowledge and expertise on the subject. Thanks for catching these and pointing them out; I love it!

 

[Demetrios1453]

Has anyone found a previous source for Aerdiaak yet? Is it completely new, buried in some obscure source, or perhaps a previously unseen translation for the North Province?

 

[Yaarel]

Yeah the Suel are all over the place and very common. It's part of the reason that the Brotherhood is able to sneak into tons of places and get into positions of power. No one is going to assume that a random Suel person is actually an agent of a secret society of Suel supremacists.

The problem with German academia of the past centuries, was they were hypnotized by the deeply racist concept of being a "master race". They hypothesized there was an ancient "Germanic people", which the "superior" groups of Northern Europe all descended from − with some groups having "purer blood" than others.

Their hypothesis turns out to be complete fiction. In fact, the German ethnicity today emerges from a melting pot of many ethnicities − especially because of the Migration Period but even before then − the opposite of an "ur" master race.

Meanwhile the flagrant cultural appropriation of other cultures in an attempt to reconstruct this supposed ancient Germanic people, did horrific harm to those other cultures.

The Gygaxian version of "Suel" is his continuation of this "master race" racist hategroup assumption. The text of the World of Greyhawk is, in a few places, uncomfortably obsessed with racial purity and skin color. All of this racist premise needs to go away for any version of Greyhawk today. It is more a case of everyone was doing that then, not just Gygax. But it needs to stop.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

So for those of you discussing.

I used an on-line map to make the first list. I was at work.

Then I went home, and based on my older tattered map I confirmed that Prelacy of Almor is on the map.

Which is what my mind remembered as well. No, I don't have an explanation.

Well, maybe two explanations-

1. Maybe some people are having fun with us on the internet? HA. NO PRELACY SUCKERS!

2. Maybe some people are distributing on-line versions that include some mistake, so they know when idiots are using it for reference? And by idiots, I mean me. Always go to the source!

 

[LaTia J]

@LaTia J you could get serious mileage out of teasing this stuff.

-strokes fake beard conspiratorily-

 

[Voadam]

Almor funny enough was no more after the Greyhawk Wars.

From the Ashes page 27:

Almor, Prelacy of: Almor has passed from the map of the Flanaess. Weakened and embarassed by Osson’s exploits, it was invaded by Ivid in 584 CY and its old capital, Chathold, utterly decimated by the Overking’s mages and priests.

 

[Yaarel]

Has anyone found a previous source for Aerdiaak yet? Is it completely new, buried in some obscure source, or perhaps a previously unseen translation for the North Province?

Could it derive from a Flan language?

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Almor funny enough was no more after the Greyhawk Wars.

From the Ashes page 27:

Almor, Prelacy of: Almor has passed from the map of the Flanaess. Weakened and embarassed by Osson’s exploits, it was invaded by Ivid in 584 CY and its old capital, Chathold, utterly decimated by the Overking’s mages and priests.

So I was just thinking.

First, I always loved the name Prelacy of Almor. Evocative.

That said .... now that I'm thinking about it more, I guess I'm a little surprised that this is one of those names that they didn't update.

Prelacy does have a specific connotation. Maybe it's too archaic for people to get concerned about?