The importance of the seasons in your adventures/campaigns?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Anyone wanting to incorporate holidays in their settings, but not sure how to do so: Check out this PDF, which I've found to be the single best collection for fantasy games. Some of the holidays resemble real world ones, but many more are holidays that seem like they must be real in some culture, but which will still seem fresh and new to players while still seeming plausible.

I've used several of them in my Midwood campaign so far, and it's really helped ground the players in the world, even if it's just them making passing references to last year's Apple Night, which didn't even occur in the context of the campaign, it's just something they know about and understand in the context of the setting. (In fact, they talk about it so much, I pretty much have to use it when it comes around this year.)

And it's a buck twenty-five!

 

[seskis281]

The important two things are flavor (a sense of the world actually moving about them) and opportunities - which is what festivals offer in the possibilities for adventure hooks through meeting various people gathered in a central location.

The biggest drawback is when you are trying to convert and use setting "names" that players don't transcribe instantly in their heads, so you end up saying - "oh it's mid-January" or describing a festival as "you know, a summer solstice thing."

John Maddog Wright

 

[seskis281]

Oh, and the fact that a torential downpour might affect someone trying to set off a burning hands spell, even if it is magical.

John Maddog Wright

 

[grodog]

Pardon me Grodog, but I have to interupt the thread a little bit to say
HOORAH FOR YOU!!!
I also have been doing the same thing, and do in my most recent adventure I finished last night.
Nice to know you're not alone, eh?

But of course

In addition to the core GH festivals, I've also found the various festivals from the AD&D Oriental Adventures book useful for rouding out ideas, as well as the Greyhawk calendar put together by Clay Luther @ http://www.canonfire.com/cfhtml/modules.php?name=Downloads&d_op=viewdownload&cid=16

There are a few articles on the GH calendar festivals in the Oerth Journal @ http://www.canonfire.com/cfhtml/modules.php?name=Downloads&d_op=viewdownload&cid=13

Is that a little more helpful, Myacnid?

 

[Mycanid]

Yes sir Grodog - good stuff. Thanks for the link.

Also Whizbang, thanks for the link to the .pdf ... a stunning piece of work there! I didn't expect a DWARF to be so aware of above-ground seasonal festivals though. Hmm. Are the Dustyboots related to the Bouldershoulders perchance?