I'm interested in basing my next campaign in the Known World, also known as Mystara...

I'm interested in basing my next campaign in the Known World, also known as Mystara, but I'm not sure where I should start reading about the lore and lands. Any help?

Other urls found in this thread:

forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?724379-Let-s-Read-The-Known-World-Mystara-ALL-of-it-from-the-beginning
mystara.thorf.co.uk/
mystara.thorf.co.uk/projects.php
twitter.com/NSFWRedditImage

The gazetteers are the best source. Add in Hollow World boxed set (if you're doing that) and the Creature Crucible series, and you're pretty good.

This however original Greyhawk (present 3.pf) is 1k times better

Greyhawk a shit, a SHIT

I dunno, O.G. Greyhawk did spawn the best fan-made D&D vidjeo game.
I'll grant that the sanitized No-Gygax-Remaining 3e version is total shit, though.

There's a huge online archive of almost all published Mystara material (including maps) that has been curated since the 90s - sorry I can't remember more, but it would be a great place to start.

There is an rpg.net thread where they read and summarize every product. forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?724379-Let-s-Read-The-Known-World-Mystara-ALL-of-it-from-the-beginning

Also, you should know that it was never a fully coherent setting. They just kept adding shit. There were a bunch of authors that didn't bother to read what the other authors wrote. The most common recommendation is to read the GAZ series.

>Replica Maps
mystara.thorf.co.uk/
>Repository of a shitload of stuff
www.pandius.com
>Active forum dedicated to Mystara
www.thepiazza.org.uk

>summary from page 150 of thread.
Pre-Setting Era
Dates: 1979-1980
Products: B1, B2
Description: These first adventures weren't written with any particular setting in mind. They're pretty much simple dungeon crawls. What little setting information we get in them is generic Gygaxian and could easily be part of any D&D setting.

Weird Tales Era
Dates: 1981-1984
Products: Moldvay Basic, Cook/Marsh Expert, B3-B6, B8, X1-X7, Also CM4 & M3 (both of which are later throwbacks to this era released long after it finished)
Description: This is the era dominated by the trifecta of Moldvay, Cook and Schick and their interests in pulp and weird fiction. It's notable for its use of alternate dimensions (rather than planes), its emphasis on lost civilisations in the distant past, and its influences from Clark Ashton Smith and even H. P. Lovecraft.

Back to Basics Era
Dates: 1983-1985
Products: Mentzer Basic, Mentzer Expert, Mentzer Companion, B7, B9-B10, X8-X11, CM1-CM3
Description: The start of this era is marked by Frank Mentzer's taking over of the line when he started editing the first of the BECMI sets. The era drops much of the Weird Tales influences, and initially pulls the setting back to a more generic feel, introducing elemental planes/monsters and monsters from other editions of D&D. There's much less of a "lost world" feel in the new map areas introduced in this era, and less of a Cthulhu Mythos feel; and the world is expanded to a consistent planet rather than a map with unknown areas beyond its edges (although not all of the map is given to the customers at once). There is a deliberate move towards the game and its setting being a simplified introduction to generic D&D rather than having its own feel.

Cosmic Era
Dates: 1985-1987
Products: Mentzer Master, Mentzer Immortals, CM5-CM7, M1-M2, M4, IM1-3
Description: As the power level of the setting expands upwards with the M and I sets and their associated adventures the setting moves away from being generic and becomes its own thing once more. We get a unique cosmology starting to develop with space travel and multiple planes and Immortal meddling and alien Alphatians/Atlanteans. This new cosmology is less Weird Tales and more Jack Kirby. However, Mentzer's changes to the setting and feel are all additive in that the older stuff isn't invalidated by them, it's incorporated into them; so we end up with a very complex setting containing both planes and dimensions; and a planet that is simultaneously both prehistoric Earth and a living elemental.

Gazetteer Era
Dates: 1986-1989
Products: DA1-DA4, GAZ1-GAZ12, CM8-CM9, B1-9, M5, PC1-PC3, B11-B12, Dawn of the Emperors
Description: This era starts when Frank Mentzer leaves TSR and Bruce Heard takes over the line. The main distinguishing features of this era are a desire to unify everything into a single historical timeline; an emphasis on increasing detail on the core parts of the setting rather than expanding the setting; a pull away from the big cosmic stuff that the end of the Cosmic era had (although there is some overlap here as the last few Cosmic era items were released after this era started); a steady and deliberate move away from Immortals-as-cosmic-superheroes towards Immortals-as-Gods; and a willingness to ret-con or ignore previously published setting information rather than feeling the need to incorporate it.