D&D General Greyhawk setting material

[Parmandur]

Just make a HUGE post-setting source book for it and let people pick and choose. Make the setting material official and all the rest optional. Those who want to use the sandbox old GH can then at least use the SB material as well. Everyone gets to have their cake and eat it too.

Basically what they have done with the DMsGuild and the Forgotten Realms.

 

[Remathilis]

You all are giving wonderful examples of exactly why WotC won't actually DO a new Greyhawk setting book. Because they don't want to have to deal with all this crap about what should or shouldn't be in it.

That's why they stick with the Realms and Eberron, because both of them explicitly DO accept anything and everything and can find a place for it, without folks saying "X shouldn't be here!". So it doesn't matter what the new D&D edition has introduced that is different from the previous ones... new players and old players alike can use what they have and find a place for it.

But if older Greyhawk players can't accept the idea of the current 5E races all having a place in the setting and will fight tooth and nail over it... then why should WotC even bother? Those that want to play in Greyhawk can buy the older setting material off of DMs Guild and then bring in whatever 5E rules and mechanics they want, leaving out the rest.

This has been my thought on this for a while, and I know it drives the Setting Purists nuts, but why would WotC waste resources on a setting that doesn't support their vision of D&D?

Right now, WotC has supported (in some form or another) 4.5 settings: Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Ravnica, Eberron, Saltmarsh/Greyhawk. Each has been supported differently; ranging from a campaign guide to just enough material to run a small sandbox. That being said; I think we can attempt to draw conclusions on what WotC thinks of their settings.

First, they prefer a light touch. They aren't in the business of uberdetailed setting bibles anymore. We have had only a small portion of each world detailed (Sword Coast, Saltmarsh, Barovia, District Ten, Sharn) detailed, and the rest left open or detailed lightly. Of course, Faerun has had some additional areas given greater detail in every module released (Underdark, Chult, Waterdeep, Baldur's Gate, etc) but even then, the detail each area has gotten pales to the massive tomes written during 2e or 3e. Ignoring that, WotC seems to prefer a "here is a starting local and a map; fill in what you like based on the sketch" model so far.

Second, they only change what is needed and do so sparingly. The most radical change was Ravnica (which removes most of the D&D races to replace them with MtG races), but beyond that, they haven't been in the market of saying "no." Barovians don't react to dragonborn or tieflings and worse than they do elves and dwarves (which is to say, they dislike but tolerate) Similarly, Curse of Strahd takes much of the magic restrictions and changes and chucks them out the window; keeping only the ban on planar travel/escape and a few minor tweaks to some spells. Certainly, not to the level previous Ravenloft settings changed magic. Saltmarsh has a tiefling NPC; Eberron has homes for post 3e races, etc.

Third, they aren't re-inventing the wheel. If Ravnica wasn't an excuse to port over hundreds of MtG spells, mana-based spellcasting, and planeswalkers, then I guarantee they aren't rewriting classes for Dark Sun, Dragonlance, or any other setting. They may add a few extra rules (such as updated item creation in Eberron, or defiling in Dark Sun) but I really think class changes will be done via subclass or not-at-all.

Fourth, WotC isn't afraid to add stuff. Dusk elves didn't exist in Barovia prior to 4e. Genasi live in Athas; the Elemental Evil Player's Guide explicitly says so. Half-elves were never explicitly stated to exist in Ravnica, but they are a playable race there. Again, we have a tiefling in Keoland.

Fifth, and this is important; WotC is not above retconning things. Strahd's origin was given some noticeable changes to fit with the updated Barovia. The tabaxi tribe of Chult are now the same as the tabaxi cat race. A fair amount of the gnomish deities in Tome of Foes got sex changes. "The way it was before" is not set in stone, merely a suggestion.

All of these trends lead me to think that WotC will continue to be fairly open when it comes to allowing new options in old settings. Its not going to be the floodgate that people want to hang as a strawman; there will be no ocean of aboleths in Dark Sun or warforged in Krynn, but I don't expect many hard-bans. I used to say none, but Ravnica showed they are open to some tinkering (at least at the racial level) to fit the setting. That said, I still think the main takeaways of WotC's setting strategy is akin to seasoning packs for D&D rather than strict diets; a way to flavor D&D in certain ways rather than rewriting it.

 

[David Howery]

We have had only a small portion of each world detailed (Sword Coast, Saltmarsh, Barovia, District Ten, Sharn) detailed, and the rest left open or detailed lightly.

GoS also shows that they are willing to take classic material and revamp it to 5E. Since many of the classic modules are set in WoG, it's a matter of speculation as to what else might be done in the future. We've mentioned the possible Temple of Elemental Evil and Caverns of Tjoscanth/Temple of Tharizdun as another(s). The A/Slaver series is a possibility. Others may not lend themselves to large-scale books, as they are pretty much 'one shots'. And of course, there is the all time favorite GDQ series...

 

[Demetrios1453]

And that simply is not the case. In 2e the game designers knew that. DS 2e altered some of the fluff e.g. halflings = cannibal. I wonder if these modern RP kids of today would like that if I bring a cannibal DS Halfling or thrikreen into their vanilla FR setting.

Thri-kreen have always been inhabitants of the Shaar in the Forgotten Realms, and have been playable there pretty much since 2e onwards.

Cannibal halflings would, admittedly, be... somewhat more difficult.

 

[Rob Kuntz]

You all are giving wonderful examples of exactly why WotC won't actually DO a new Greyhawk setting book. Because they don't want to have to deal with all this crap about what should or shouldn't be in it.

That's why they stick with the Realms and Eberron, because both of them explicitly DO accept anything and everything and can find a place for it, without folks saying "X shouldn't be here!". So it doesn't matter what the new D&D edition has introduced that is different from the previous ones... new players and old players alike can use what they have and find a place for it.

But if older Greyhawk players can't accept the idea of the current 5E races all having a place in the setting and will fight tooth and nail over it... then why should WotC even bother? Those that want to play in Greyhawk can buy the older setting material off of DMs Guild and then bring in whatever 5E rules and mechanics they want, leaving out the rest.

Specificity for unique settings should be a plus not a minus, otherwise we would OK with Robots in Middle Earth. what?

 

[Rob Kuntz]

I don't see the hub-bub surrounding races <> core rules to settings. The setting Src Books would trump
the core rules, changing these out, no?? But if not and WotC wishes to keep the core rules races generic for all realms for cross market value, then I see a repeat of what TSR suffered through with competing RPG products and realms.

 

[Hussar]

One other thought I had.

There's been many calls to reset Greyhawk back to the boxed set. Ok. You also want to chuck out the Scarlet Brotherhood too? After all that wasn't added to the setting until the late 90's. The species purist monk thing didn't exist in Greyhawk as anything other than a name on the Darlene map.

So, are folks groovy with chucking probably the most iconic element of Greyhawk outside of the AD&D modules?

Funny thing about canon purists. By and large, canon purity is just a dogwhistle for stuff I like and anything I don't like isn't canon. Well, folks, Scarlet Brotherhood are certainly not canon if we reset to the 1983 boxed set.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

See, the problem with this is, "what is canon" is a very, very slippery issue. You don't really get to pick and choose. Like it or hate it, From the Ashes IS canon. The Greyhawk Wars ARE canon. Canon simply can't be a dog whistle for "stuff I like". We shouldn't fall into the trap of picking and choosing canon based on our personal preferences because, well, there's no actual way to go forward from that. "Only the original boxed set is canon". Really? What about all the 1e modules, classes, races and whatnot added to the game after 1983? Considering the boxed set was written in 1982, would things like Forgotten Temple ofTharizdun be considered canon or not? Isle of the Ape comes out in 1985 and includes many iconic GH characters. Is it canon or not? Barbarian class? After all, that came out in Unearthed Arcana in 1985.

I was mostly speaking about an ideal situation, which as you rightly point out cannot happen at this point due to the decades of material published.

But it isn't completely theoretical, because Eberron did a pretty good job of following good canon-management principles. As I understand it, Eberron's setting material was all set at the same date. So when expansions came out, they expanded the setting, but didn't advance the timeline. Is this correct, or did they later change that?

I think perhaps the problems that make it hardest to use official material with your own game come from advancing the timeline--because then you create an additional story dependency. This material doesn't just depend on the World of X, it depends on the World of X, plus updated setting book set 3 years later, plus updated region book set 2 years after that, plus novel/adventure timeline progression. You buy a product and the material in it will no longer work with World of X, unless you also include all of those other dependencies. If we were to only make new material based on a set of core dependencies that were frozen as of a certain date on the calendar, then anyone could pick and choose which new material to use and not have to put in a bunch of work adjusting everything to fit, or committing to a particular edition-phase's canon.

Don't forget there is still a open door to allow an official no-canon GH. With a right remake of the Chronomancer sourcerbook, the time spheres could show us different timelines of the D&D worlds, for example a uchrony of Dragonlance where lord Soth and (god) Raitslin are fighting each other with armies of walking dead.

It would be an interesting idea to use some sort of chronomantic "multiverse-shaking event" to split the worlds off into different continuities, with descriptions of each suitable for expansion by players and DMs in their home game, and to reset the default publishing timelines to their original dates, and then publish new material using only those as the core dependencies.

 

[Rob Kuntz]

Poor Greyhawk. Once it became a commodity it lost its track to being an ongoing idea. Well, back to Greyfalkun for moi. It may not have the name, may not have the WOTC stamp, but at least it will require less arguing and hand wringing in getting something to print.

 

[David Howery]

There's been many calls to reset Greyhawk back to the boxed set. Ok. You also want to chuck out the Scarlet Brotherhood too? After all that wasn't added to the setting until the late 90's. The species purist monk thing didn't exist in Greyhawk as anything other than a name on the Darlene map.

huh? The SB was in the 83 boxed set. They were specifically mentioned as having monks. They weren't really mentioned as 'purists', but it is said that they believe that the Suel are the rightful rulers of the Flanaess. They were detailed a lot more in that 2E supplement, but they weren't absent from the 1E box....