Greyhawk

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Always wanted to run a campaign from 576 to 616.

Was there any info of what happened in Greyhawk after the Living Realm stuff ended?

Yes. I'm still relatively new to DMing, so I went with an established setting for my first campaign, and I really fell in love with the World of Greyhawk. I can't peg why, exactly, but there's just something innately appealing about it to me that Forgotten Realms doesn't have. There are a lot of things I prefer - the pantheon is more interesting to me, and the nations seem natural and believable, but there's something more fundamental that I just can't figure out.

It's not covered in Ed Greenwood's oily fingerprints, and full of his self inserts and weird fetish bait?
I know that's why I don't like FR.

>the pantheon is more interesting to me
They aren't all fucking drama queens for starters.

Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl is a favorite of mine.

Anyone interested in giving a rundown of why they like Greyhawk especially, and perhaps a small general bio of the setting for someone who knows nothing about it?

This.

I liked how a lot of the spells were named after famous wizards who were floating around in the setting - Mordenkainen, Tenser, etc. Meant that the characters could recognise them when they met them, do a bit of fan worship if they were impressed or go "oh fuck better not mug this one".

Not too dark, not too noble, felt plausible. Helped to suspend my disbelief for all the implausible magic being thrown around. The better NPCs had backstories that were simple and easy to understand, but also fed the adventure, rather than just being unrealized wish fulfillment from a ham author yearning for everyone to take him seriously. These guys weren't trying to create an epic to sell sad dimestore novels. They were all about the game, on a Saturday afternoon gaming level. The adventures could've been more accessible, but they really tried.

Those wizards were originally PCs in the first playtest groups

Greyhawk DM here. Fell in love with the setting like 15 years ago. Not too high fantasy (or hiper magical like FR), with more "belivable" pantheons and nations. Right now DMing Lost Mine of Phandelver adapted to the setting, set in the Yeomanry.

>why they like Greyhawk

I like it because in Greyhawk the forces of evil are organized, competent, pervasive and often win, unlike in FR where they're a bunch of incompetent boobs meant as villain-fodder for bad fantasy novels.

In Greyhawk, evil will push your shit in and laugh at you when you cry.

That said, it's not some caricature dystopia either. The forces of weal do prevail sometimes, and the PCs are part of those forces. The forces of Law and Neutrality are just as widespread and influential. The motives of commerce, realpolitik, kingsmanship and racial destiny are part of the politics of the land.

And there isn't too much magic or annoying high-level self-insert NPCs running around.

It's overall a much more believable world than anything D&D ever produced.

Also, Greyhawk doesn't have any of the weirdness that infected later TSR/WOTC products, such as robot-men, dragon-men, demon-girls, etc. as player characters.

The weird fantasy shit is rare and otherwordly, not something to put in your backstory about your dead parents.

And Greyhawk drow are more realistic and interesting than any other version.

TFW you realize the Nyr Dyv is Lake Superior and most of the Central Flanaess is a map of the American Midwest rotated 90 degrees.

The wizard Melf - of Melf's Minute Meteors fame - was named by a player who couldn't think of a name and simply combined Male + Elf.

There's tons of instances like this. Some of the major players are just people's names spelled backwards (Drawmij = Jim Ward, etc).

It's interesting to see how they evolved since their simple inception.

Anyway - I always run Greyhawk as my "go to" setting, mainly because it isn't as detailed as Forgotten Realms. Forgotten Realms has every little inch, every nook and cranny mapped out for you in explicit detail. Sure, you can add a small hamlet here, or a little town there, but for the most part there's little room for changes. ESPECIALLY if you get an "expert" on Faerun, who'll visibly groan or grumble if you change too much ("An eleventh, new town in Ten Towns?! HOW DARE YOU")

That's not to say that Greyhawk is barren. You can find a lot of information, it's just a lot of it is vague and up to interpretation. It's fascinating to see some of the stuff they come up with on canonfire, based entirely off of vague information. I'm convinced that the user rasgon is a wizened old sage surrounded by Greyhawk modules, pouring over them religiously when he's not posting on the slow moving forum.

LOL @ the Ice and Snow Barbarians living in Florida.

The world Greyhawk is set in, called Oerth, is pronounced "Oi-th" with a strong Brooklyn accent, according to Gary Gygax.

I always pronounced it "O-Earth", so this is hilarious news to me.

Yeah, the guys in cannonfire tend to surprise me with the detailed knowledge they have about the setting. Especially concerning really old products.

Greyhawk is more easily molded by the GM than any other major setting.

This was my favorite Greyhawk book.

Where do I get started with Greyhawk? I've been GMing forever and I've never used an established setting because of how daunting it seems to read every bit of lore about that world and universe and apply it in my games, especially since my group of players get sidetracked to the point of having to improvise something major almost every session.

My biased reply is start with the City of Greyhawk boxed set. It provides an adventuring locale, NPCs, some wilderness and enough of a glimpse of the rest of the world to pique your curiosity.

I'm pretty sure a bunch of those guys sit around in OSRgen, or else it's guys just like them.

my favorite part of Greyhawk is one that was introduced relatively recently compared to most of the setting; The Sundered Empire/God War, first introduced in WOTC's short lived Chainmail revival from 2002, the setting details are relatively sparse(only about 20 pages), but it gives a very evocative overview of the setting that gives you plenty of room to tweak it for your own needs(indeed it's ties to Greyhawk proper are loose enough that you could easily make it into it's own setting)

Is there a complete guide for someone who wants to learn everything in one place, or do I need to find a bunch of different books to get the full thing?

>not pronouncing it 'Oath'

Begone, foul peasant.

>Also, Greyhawk doesn't have any of the weirdness that infected later TSR/WOTC products
erm....
>en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expedition_to_the_Barrier_Peaks

>Expedition to the Barrier Peaks takes place on a spaceship in the Barrier Peaks mountain range of the World of Greyhawk campaign setting.[3] In the adventure's introduction, it is explained that the Grand Duchy of Geoff is under constant attack by a succession of monsters that have been emerging from a cave in the mountains. The Grand Duke of Geoff has hired the characters to discover the origin of the creatures, and stop their incursions.

Noyce.

>erm....
Guess you didn't finish reading the sentence before you eagerly posted to disprove something?

>"...as player characters"

Yeah, I know Expedition had lasers and spaceships, but that's my point exactly: it was a wondrous dungeon to explore and figure out, not starting equipment.

The Gazetteer for 3E is probably the most concise single source.

Its very complete, and good enough to introduce new players to the setting. But i have found that the most interesting parts of the setting lore are in older products.