Dungeons & Dragons Settings: Greyhawk 

Thank you so much for watching and commenting (both here AND on MeWe!). I really appreciate it.

People who had never even heard the word "gazetteer" before made it the standard format for documenting campaign worlds.

I always love hearing about people's campaigns and what/how they played. Thank you for sharing, and also thank you for watching and commenting. I'm glad you enjoyed the video.

Ever visit Spinecastle?

I really like this! What a fun way to incorporate and acknowledge the history of the game into your campaign. Very clever! "...the old coins are used interchangeably with new." I see what you did!

That is really awesome. Feels exactly like something a cheeky, clever dev would put into a video game as an homage/Easter egg. Love seeing it being incorporated into tabletop!!

@@DivineBanana Considering I'm a videogame developer hobbyist a couple steps up my totem pole above being a tabletop nerd hobbyist, the comparison completely checks out.

It probably seems like my collection is large, and I guess it is by most peoples' standards, but I definitely grew up drooling over and pining for books and boxed sets that I never got. For my AD&D Hardbacks, three of them I acquired during the Pandemic, and one was a recent gift from someone on Reddit who noticed I didn't have it! So I'm continuing to add all the time!

You're welcome! It's so huge that it's difficult to fit into the camera but I tried to show a few different parts. Thank you for watching and commenting!

Thank you so much for letting me know! I'm so glad you found the channel and I really appreciate you watching and commenting. I remember those days of playing until the wee hours! For us it was usually on a weekend, unless it was summer.

Still my goto setting even now.

Thank you for watching and commenting, and for your support of the channel! I like quite a few of TSR's settings, but the standard for me was always Greyhawk as it was the first one for which I'd seen a developed "campaign setting" (I started with the boxed set) so that's how I've always thought settings should be presented. That said, I really liked the 3E "Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide" book, even though I don't play in the Realms.

Thank you for watching and commenting! I, too, have never used a campaign setting" as is" but only used them to supplement my homebrew worlds. Sounds like you're mainly a player? Have you ever tried your hand at running a game? If so, did you use a homebrew world?

@@daddyrolleda1 I only got to DM a few times. I used the Judges Guild Campaign settings. I had access to a lot of their stuff at low, low prices from my friend who owned a comic book shop. We mostly played in the "City State of the Invincible Overlord" campaign.

Those City-State and Wilderlands products always looked really cool from the ads I saw in Dragon, but I never saw them for sale at my local game shop.

I'm so glad to hear that! Thank you for watching and commenting, and I'm happy you enjoyed the video.

That is a really huge compliment and I appreciate that very much. I'm very glad you found my channel and are enjoying my videos. Thank you.

Greyhawk and the "Known World' (from the 1981 Expert Set) are the two settings I grew up with, so I have a special fondness for them as well. It seems that, sadly, both setting are no longer being supported by the game. But they do live on in fan websites!

I can add that to my list. You will hear a bit more about that in my follow-up video to this one, on the origin of Early TTRPG Settings: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Rrbei_hxDnQ.htmlsi=URkHYf1FdE4pc4cm Thanks for watching and commenting!

That's one of the things I've not liked about published settings over the years - the constant changing and updating, advancing the timeline, etc. I totally understand why it happens, from a product development and marketing standpoint, but it can be frustrating because the idea, once I buy the setting, is that I'm going to use it the way I want to in my campaign, so what ends up happening in my version of that world is never going to match up with the published stuff that comes after my initial purchase. Anyway - that's a long way of saying I can empathize with you!

@@daddyrolleda1 Well put, my friend. I suppose I could have just ignored everything that came after the initial world setting was published, but it's interesting to see where the authors are taking things, too. I just would have wished they treated this little section of the world with more care, or at least explained how something so improbable could have happened.

I'm so glad to hear that! Thank you for letting me know. I really appreciate you watching and commenting.

I'm glad you enjoyed it! I will add that to the list of potential future video topics. Thanks so much for watching and commenting!

That sounds like a fun game! Thank you for sharing!

Thanks for watching and commenting! Yeah, first Dragonlance, then Forgotten Realms, both kind of pushed Greyhawk to the side, and things of course got worse after Gygax left the company. The Forgotten Realms, also, really seemed to resonate with folks. I think there are a lot of reasons why, but for whatever reason, anybody new to the game now is being introduced to it via the Realms, and I suspect most have never even heard of Greyhawk!

That's so cool! I have two sets of maps and have been considering getting one of them framed, but I haven't figured out where I would hang them! Thanks for watching and commenting!

Thank you so much, as always, for watching and commenting! I'm kind of surprised - I know you use a lot (all?) of the Greyhawk deities in your campaigns now, so I assumed that was a holdover from your younger days. Did that happen instead because they were part of the 3E PHB?

Thank you so much for watching and commenting! I'm really glad you enjoyed it. Cheers!

Thank you for watching and commenting. I appreciate it! I'll go check out your video now. Thanks again.

There's a tiny bit more about Dave Wesely in my next video on the history of Early TTRPG Settings. When I was first getting into the hobby, the corporate line, and what you saw on the news, is that Gary Gygax created D&D "out of nowhere" on his own. Arneson wasn't really mentioned. The truth is much more complicated. D&D certainly wouldn't exist the way we know it without Gygax, but neither would it exist without Arneson. They came together to produce something that was new, but was based on an evolution of the games both were already playing. It's the evolution that I think is really interesting, but it's also complicated because it's much more difficult to explain than simply saying, "Gary Gygax created D&D in 1974" which is easier to understand. Without Arneson, there's no D&D. But without Dave Wesely having read Strategos (from 1880) and working with the other gamers in the Twin Cities to take those rule and re-write them to make them easier to use and understand, Arneson probably wouldn't have created Blackmoor, which he then took to Gygax for them to together create D&D. That said, I have seen several times where ideas for later things in D&D appeared in Dragon Magazine, such as the Bard, Illusionist, and Ranger classes, all of which were originally written by other people, but which found their way into Gygax's Advanced D&D Player's Handbook with very few changes. Gary seems to have had a talent for recognizing things that would be appealing and then packaging them in a format that people would like. For example, Blackmoor predates Greyhawk, there's no question. But if you read Arneson's 1977 "First Fantasy Campaign" (which is Blackmoor with the name removed for legal reasons) and compare that to Gygax's 1980 "World of Greyhawk" (Folio Edition) - there's no question which one is easier to read and use to run a game in the campaign world (it's Greyhawk). The First Fantasy Campaign reads almost like a stream of conscious word dump that makes it difficult to figure out how one would use it without a lot of work.

@@daddyrolleda1 TY for the reply. I think I may posted this somewhere here I bought a t shirt from your shop. Putting this channel in amongst my favorite go to for knowledge folder along with things like AJ Pickett etc. LOVE the background info.

That is a really nice compliment, Wayne, and I really appreciate you buying one of my shirts! Thank you so much for your support. Cheers!

Thanks for the tip - I appreciate it!

Thank you! I can add that to the queue for a future video. Thanks for watching and commenting!

Thank you so much! I really appreciate you watching and then taking the time to comment. I'm so glad you enjoyed the video and it give you some positive nostalgia. Cheers, and Happy New Year!

The map is indeed a work of art. I bought the folio when it first came out. No idea where the book went but I sure as Hell still have the map !

That's awesome! I keep thinking about getting the map framed to hang in my office but I think that the size would be way too big for the wall space I have available!

I'm glad to hear that. Thank you!

Yeah, but the time of the 2E Era, the Realms quickly became the default primary setting for the game, as it still is today. While there were tons of settings in 2E, FR was dominant and Greyhawk was moved to the back-burner (mostly after the departure of Gary Gygax from the company). I'm really glad you enjoyed the video! Thank you!

@@daddyrolleda1 Yeah. I think that was part of the decision. I think I wanted to also go with the more or higher fantasy of those. I ended up a huge fan of FR for years so not a bad choice 😀

@@paavohirn3728 That's a great point - Forgotten Realms is definitely more "high fantasy" whereas Greyhawk adheres a little more closely to a Conan-like Sword & Sorcery aesthetic. At least, that's how I always perceived it.

@@daddyrolleda1 Yeah. I might have to look more into Greyhawk eventually.

Thanks for watching and commenting! Based on your description of the box color and the painting of the adventurer on the horse, it sounds like you're referring to the 1987 Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting Boxed Set: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgotten_Realms_Campaign_Setting

@@daddyrolleda1 you'd probably know better than I; thought I had Greyhawk as well as forgotten realms. It was a long while ago. I probably misremembered.

Ah, you know, the only Greyhawk boxed set I can think of that's a gray box with an adventurer on a horse is Greyhawk Wars which I talked about here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Ek1znTOMpl4.htmlsi=RjAte564F4SE0p7N&t=1079

I am so happy to hear that! Thank you so much. I really appreciate your support. Cheers!

You're welcome - I appreciate your comments, and thanks for watching!

Totally agree! As you saw in the video, I have two sets of maps and I'm strongly considering getting one framed. I just don't know where I'd hang them as my office is pretty much full on every wall with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves!

@@daddyrolleda1 such problems!

I really appreciate that! Thank you so much for taking time to let me know, and for watching and commenting! Cheers!

I'm glad you enjoyed it! Thank you for watching and commenting!

Thank you very much! I'm glad you enjoyed it! That was a fun one to put together, as it's one of my favorite settings.

Thank you for watching and commenting! I really appreciate it, and I'm very glad you enjoyed the video. Cheers!

Thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed the video and I appreciate you commenting! I used a combo of Greyhawk and the Known World, plus the world of Conan,, to build my own campaign setting back in the mid-80's. I'm still running a version of it today!

@@daddyrolleda1 That's awesome!

Man Greyhawk is the best of the D&D settings. Would never change to Forgotten Realms.

I did the same! And my first "exposure" to Greyhawk was via the G-series of modules!

​@@daddyrolleda1same for me. The very first game I ran is a DM if I remember the title correctly Against the Steering of the Hill Giant Chief.

@@WayneBraack G1: Steading of the Hill Giant Chief was the very first module published by TSR (there were other adventures that pre-dated it, but they were published by other companies, namely Wee Warriors). I actually show G1 quickly in my video at this point: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Ek1znTOMpl4.html.

That is such an interesting theory! Chronologically speaking, the timeline works out, but I've never thought of that before!

@@daddyrolleda1 We'd have to ask people who knew him at the time whether he liked Deep Purple.

@@jonothanthrace1530 I suspect Griff from Secrets of Blackmoor could get in touch with the folks he interviewed for his documentary, if he thought it was worth their time!

Thank you very much! I really appreciate that. It partly comes from just being older and having lived through a lot of this, plus a hobby of mine has been reading books and watching documentaries about the early history of the hobby. Thanks for watching and commenting!

​@@daddyrolleda1 I keep trying to reply to your reply, but it keeps deleting my comment. No clue why 😢

@@Lightmane Oh no! I don't know why that would be happening. You can always reach me at samothdm AT gmail dot com if you need!

@@daddyrolleda1 I'll try again : ) I'm 60, and the first time I played was 1980, so I know a little bit about the game, but clearly not as much as you do. I was going to share this video, but I saw you already did, so cool : ) I think you'd enjoy my story that I wrote and then narrated on my channel. Hope you check it out and let me know what you think. Now that I'm on my computer, and not my phone, here's hoping this comment stays up : )

@@Lightmane I'm a little younger than you, and started a year later (tail-end of 1981). I do have a weird personality quirk that once I get into something, I *really* get into it, whether it's Star Wars, comic books, vinyl/jazz, cocktails, or D&D. As a kid, I got into learning as much about the game as I could, and I've read a lot of books and watched a lot of documentaries about the history and early days of the game, which is where that knowledge comes from! Luckily I retained at least some of it, too! My memory isn't as good as it used to be. I will definitely watch your video! Thanks for the invite!

That's cool! And thanks for watching!

Yes, they did. That's why I was so specific in my language at 00:20 in the video. I was specifically referring to the first setting published by TSR that was created *for* Dungeons and Dragons, (meaning, D&D already was published and the setting was made for the game by TSR, not a setting that pre-dated and/or led to the creation of the game). I know it might sound overly specific but I have quite a few videos on early games and settings including Empire of the Petal Throne (which is a game *and* a setting) and a whole video covering the history of TTRPG settings from the 1940s to 1977) including stuff by Judges Guild, etc.

Thank you so much for the kind words. I have not delved into that subject too much other than to just briefly mention it, partially because I felt that Jon Peterson covers it pretty well in his book(s) and I didn't want to be too repetitive, but I can certainly add it to the list of potential future topics. Thanks!

I do have an ongoing list of potential future topics, and I have added Forgotten Realms to the list. I felt like doing Greyhawk first mainly because Forgotten Realms is so ubiquitous now and every new player to the game knows of it, while many of them have never heard of Greyhawk or Blackmoor! For a taste of Forgotten Realms and how it fits into D&D's history, you can check out my video on the History of Early TTRPG Settings: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Rrbei_hxDnQ.htmlsi=BPnfmyBK5S2XCyKW Thank you so much for watching and commenting!

Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked this. This one was tough to put together because, as you saw, there's quite a bit of content from the later years I don't personally own. Part of the reason I like doing these videos is that I can show and flip-through my books for folks who may not have seem them before. I could cover Forgotten Realms but interestingly enough, the only true Realms book I have is the 3rd Edition Campaign Setting! I've followed the setting over the years but nowhere near to the level that I'm sure other folks have. Judges Guild stuff is fun and that's potentially a topic for a future video! I'm considering covering Blackmoor next.

@@daddyrolleda1 I'm in for any of it! :-D Whatever you want to cover is fun.

On the Forgotten Realms, some of it appeared in Dragon Magazine. I recently bought a new copy of Dragon #54 (first issue I ever owned), and one of the articles was the deities of the Forgotten Realms. A good part of the deities were either pulled directly (Loviater and Mielikki, for example) or renamed gods from Deities and Demigods.

@@jimamos7984 Dragon Magazine was my first exposure to the Realms as well! There were a lot of fun articles that predated it being an official D&D setting. The story of how that came to be purchased and used by TSR is quite fun and interesting!

@@daddyrolleda1 I remember reading the story a few months back. As far as Dragon Magazine goes, it's definitrly a good source of information for anyone playing 1 and 2E. Would also recommend the 1E DM's Guide to any DM, no matter the edition.

Ha - that's a funny story and a fun way to look at things. It's almost like an episode of "Connections" if you remember that old TV show. Thanks for watching and commenting - I hope you enjoyed the video.

@@daddyrolleda1 I don't. Mostly 'cause I was born in 84--in Chicago. I know what you mean though. :D Every person I grew up with, raised me, teachers, friends parents made me who I am. I wonder if I even would have gotten into Lord of the Rings and roleplaying if my dad (who doesn't do either of those things) didn't teach me how to hunt with bow and gun, fish, make a fire, survive in the wild. I could go on and on about all the people that basically inadvertently pushed me in the direction of RPGs, LARP, HEMA, SCA. I'm sure a lot of us RP nerds have similar stories.

I definitely remember those articles about Minaria in early issues of Dragon magazine. While "Divine Right" was published in 1979 by TSR, the year before the release of the Greyhawk folio in 1980, it was technically a board war game, not a tabletop roleplaying game. While it perhaps pre-dated Greyhawk, it wasn't created for the purpose of being a setting in which to play tabletop role-playing games. I think I've had a bit of trouble articulating my point in my two videos about early tabletop roleplaying games, but what I'm trying to convey is that while there were settings that pre-dated Dungeons & Dragons (Tékumel, Forgotten Realms, Blackmoor, etc. - perhaps even Minaria) , Greyhawk was the first setting that was made SPECIFICALLY for a tabletop roleplaying game. Tékumel was adapted to be an RPG, but Greyhawk was created by Gygax as a way to playtest the ideas that would become the game we call Dungeons & Dragons.

Thanks for watching and commenting! That's a deep reference! Bath's Hyboria is definitely an early fantasy setting developed for gaming, but "How to Setup a Wargames Campaign" is, at least to me, a set of rules for a wargame, not a roleplaying game. While things were changings rapidly at this time, and there is a bit of a hazy period between the change from wargames to the development of RPGs, having read the book, I didn't consider it to be an RPG. Braunstein, similarly, isn't an RPG, but it could be considered a form of LARP, and it definitely had a directly influence on the creation of Blackmoor, which was responsible, at least in part, for the creation of Dungeons & Dragons. Bath seems to have had correspondence with Professor Barker (Tékumel, which was later made into the Empire of the Petal Throne RPG in 1975), so there's clearly some shared DNA. I just had to draw the line somewhere and I chose to focus on those settings that were specifically developed for, or turned into, settings for roleplaying games.

Yes, they did. But it wasn't called Blackmoor due to legal rights (Blackmoor was part of the World of Greyhawk at that point; at least, the *name* Blackmoor was, if not the actual setting), so they called it "First Fantasy Campaign." I have that book, too. But it wasn't published by TSR. I tried to be VERY specific in my introduction to the video because I know this is a contentious topic, which is why I said, "The first commercially available setting created specific for the game Dungeons and Dragons by TSR."

Yes, that's why I was specific in the language I used to introduce this video as "the first commercially available published setting for D&D by TSR" - while the City-State and the Wilderness of High Fantasy by Judges Guild pre-date the publication of the Greyhawk Folio (they were published in 1976/77), as you note, they were published by Judges Guild and I was keeping my earlier videos focused on TSR publications. However, in my follow-up video on Early TTRPG Settings, I do mention the Judges Guild stuff: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Rrbei_hxDnQ.html

Ha! So funny - I never really thought of it that way before!

Pete and Judy? That could be fun, but it would be a very short video! I heard Pete had appeared at a few conventions but there isn't a lot of information out there. I don't live too far from where they started Wee Warriors.

@@daddyrolleda1 I tried to do some research on them a couple of years ago. Not a lot of info. Save the idea for a RU-vid Short. They will start bugging you to put up some shorts.

@@MrRourk That's a perfect topic for a short! I know my videos are long and I've been posting some "reels" on Instagram and Twitter, but those have all been around the 2-minute mark. I think RU-vid shorts are limited to 1 minute. I'll have to figure out how to do that! Thanks for the idea!

I didn't show a picture of it or mention it by name, but I briefly said there were more modules published in the WG series: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Ek1znTOMpl4.htmlsi=xMD_xo40VeOcGqfJ&t=1050 There were just too many novels and modules to go over each one individually without the video being a lot longer.

@@daddyrolleda1 I got it for birthday from a aunt I was strictly forgotten realms or home brew till then it made a good impression and I then pick up city of greyhawk and liked that so stop avoiding greyhawk just in time for them to wreck it by the greyhawk wars so I skipped there time line and still use the old setting

@@alanrickett2537 Now I feel bad that I didn't put a screenshot of it and call it out! Thanks for sharing your story. I always enjoy hearing another other people's history with TTRPGs.

I was aware it was an actual book and of its purpose, but I honestly had no idea how to pronounce it! Thank you so much for letting me know for the future. Cheers!

Yeah, I used to call it "o-erth" as well (and sometimes still slip). It wasn't until years later that I learned it was pronounced Oith.

Blackmoor *pre-dates* D&D. I was talking very specifically about the first campaign setting that was developed *for* the game, as I mentioned in the video. A lot of folks made that mistake based purely on reading the video title and not actually watching the video. I talk a lot more about Blackmoor and other early settings (both Empire of the Petal Throne and Forgotten Realms pre-date D&D as well) here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Rrbei_hxDnQ.htmlsi=T0n3eYCzaG8d2LfA

I'm glad you liked the rest of the video! Thanks for watching and commenting, and for catching that error. I appreciate it!

Thanks for commenting. When you get a chance to watch the video, you'll note in the very first part of the video, I say that I'm talking about the first setting that was created specifically for Dungeons & Dragons. Blackmoor of course pre-dates Dungeons & Dragons and was its own game and its own setting that then inspired the creation of D&D. I do mention Braunstein and Blackmoor in this video. You may also find my latest video on Early TTRPG Campaign Settings interesting. I discuss Blackmoor in more detail.