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Message: <blockquote data-quote="timbannock" data-source="post: 9346233" data-attributes="member: 17913">Obviously "it's bad" is subjective, but I think you miss why people think "it's good":Greyhawk is a setting where most of the nations are locked in a cold war, and several are locked in a hot one. Armies are constantly clashing, domains are constantly up for grabs. Evil with a capital "E" is rampant, and evil without the capital "E" is pretty much everywhere. Mercenaries aren't just common, they are necessary, otherwise civilization will fall, or become a decadent mess as it has in about 3 or 4 of the current "greatest" nations. Basically, everything is in decline.The reason this is popular among the folks that like it is because it's the first real points of light setting with all that entails, but also because it jives 100% perfectly with the original thrust of D&D: that fortunes are won by mercenaries, and fortunes are exactly how you level up. That was the whole of the D&D reward cycle, and Greyhawk perfectly fit it.Now...whether or not the reward cycle has anything to do with how D&D works today, I think we can all say "nope" pretty readily. But I'll posit that the bleakness, the mercenary focus, and the warring kingdoms still make for a good backdrop, even if the PCs are now no longer mercenaries but heroes and do-gooders.Rant: People constantly say "Greyhawk is more swords & sorcery" (than presumably FR, I'm guessing the comparison goes?), but if you look at basically everything that's been published for it, I'd argue that's only passingly true, a relative statement that's not entirely indicative of the truth. Greyhawk's still, at its core, MUCH more high fantasy than Conan and a lot of the source material. Monsters and magic abound in far, far greater amounts than people give it credit for. Just roll some random stuff on the OD&D or B/X era tables to see what I mean. But importantly, everything in 2E and later is way, way higher fantasy. /rant</blockquote>

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