Remember the old Greyhawk Gazetteers?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

More than likely they were pdf'd and could be purchased from rpgnow or that other place that sells such things.

ALL of the Mystara stuff is now on RPGNow, it looks like.

For someone jumping in the first time, I'd recommend Karameikos for a great "baseline" D&D nation, and Glantri as a magic-user-dominated nation. Both were updated a little for 2E in box sets. You'll find people passionately attacking the latter, but I had them both and liked them quite a bit. If you find yourself flush with cash, and want to see the settings evolve (I think the gazetteers and boxed sets are set 20 years apart), I'd pick them both up.

Note that you will have to convert them to 3E on your own. The various Mystara conversion projects tend to get bogged down in ultra-minutia shortly after restarting. I just ran them as straight 3E settings, except for making 3E halflings back into hobbits.

 

[Shadowslayer]

I rather liked the Kingdom of Karameikos box set. It was sold as a starter set with a CD for the adventure (that was kind of lame), but the set itself had a nice map and some interesting adventure hooks. I used it quite well for a good campaign once. (based around the Song of Halav...for those who know the setting) What I thought was interesting and unique about it was that the whole thing was written as a primer on how to use a campaign setting...never seen that before or since.

I remember laughing out loud at one of the pointers. The book gave a rundown on the Royal lineage and was explaining how to use the Royals as story hooks.

Explaining how NOT to do it: You don't just say 'Opening the door, you find a 10 by 10 room with a chest, table, and the King of Karameikos in it.........roll for surprise."

 

[Navior]

I rather liked the Kingdom of Karameikos box set. It was sold as a starter set with a CD for the adventure (that was kind of lame), but the set itself had a nice map and some interesting adventure hooks. I used it quite well for a good campaign once. (based around the Song of Halav...for those who know the setting) What I thought was interesting and unique about it was that the whole thing was written as a primer on how to use a campaign setting...never seen that before or since.

I remember laughing out loud at one of the pointers. The book gave a rundown on the Royal lineage and was explaining how to use the Royals as story hooks.

Explaining how NOT to do it: You don't just say 'Opening the door, you find a 10 by 10 room with a chest, table, and the King of Karameikos in it.........roll for surprise."

There were definitely some good things in the Karameikos boxed set, and I think some Mystara fans are too quick to dismiss the entire thing. However, there were some poor areas, too. The updating of the timeline was not done well. Some areas were moved forward, but other things (notably NPC descriptions) were just copied directly from the Karameikos Gazetteer, and so there were a bunch of characters who hadn't aged at all in ten years (really noticeable if they were children). The Glantri boxed set did a much better job with advancing the timeline.

All told, I think the original Gazetteers were a lot better than the 2E versions, but the 2E versions weren't all bad. And Mark of Amber (sequel to the old adventure Castle Amber) was an absolutely marvellous adventure!

 

[trancejeremy]

Well, actually, I believe the Glantri boxed set didn't take into account the whole Wrath of the Immortals thing. Which had some really big effects on Glantri

Part of the neat thing about Mystara, was it had a moving timeline. But when they moved from D&D to AD&D, this got screwed up. Badly. Very badly.

But yeah, the Mark of Amber is quite good.

 

[Staffan]

Well, actually, I believe the Glantri boxed set didn't take into account the whole Wrath of the Immortals thing. Which had some really big effects on Glantri

It did. There was a new principality created by a kobold wizard who decided he'd rather be part of Glantri than the Broken Lands, Etienne d'Ambreville had vanished, clerics had become legal (as long as they didn't proselytize), and stuff like that. It's possible that they could have done more with the post-WOTI aftermath, but there was definitely some stuff there.

 

[Grimstaff]

I picked up Glantri at a KB Toys for about $4 a couple of years ago. FOr the price, I certainly wasn't disappointed!