D&D (2024) Greyhawk Confirmed. Tell Me Why.

[Micah Sweet]

Well, updating legacy content isn't the same thing as removing/reducing conflict.

As for leaving the problematic elements alone, I think I'd prefer the opposite: make the changes they want to make, to modernize the setting and bring it up to date...and then point the folks who don't like the changes back to the originals. Put a little sidebar in there that reads, "This is the updated Greyhawk campaign setting. For a look at the original, visit www.drivethrurpg.com/whatever/url/" or something like that.

Yeah, I very much don't want WotC pretending they aren't making modern updates. Call out what you're doing.

 

[Kurotowa]

Here is a picture from the 1e Monster Manual 2.

The Solar is a psionic being. All angels are.

Every endgame type creature was psionic in 1e because psionics and magic weren't interoperable. You needed psionic defenses to counter psionic attacks. That meant a creature without the full psionic defensive suite could potentially be cheesed, and there was no way Gygax would let that fly. So every angel and fiend had psionics.

If you check the 1e MM then you see that Asmodeus and Orcus and the other big names are all pretty much psionically maxed out, and even lesser fiends like the Succubus and Hezrou are moderately powered.

 

[Yaarel]

Every endgame type creature was psionic in 1e because psionics and magic weren't interoperable. You needed psionic defenses to counter psionic attacks. That meant a creature without the full psionic defensive suite could potentially be cheesed, and there was no way Gygax would let that fly. So every angel and fiend had psionics.

If you check the 1e MM then you see that Asmodeus and Orcus and the other big names are all pretty much psionically maxed out, and even lesser fiends like the Succubus and Hezrou are moderately powered.

Psionics is a fundamental aspect of AD&D.

The AD&D Monster Manuals list Psionics as a vital stat in the monster statblock − it doesnt even list what the Abilities are! (Besides Intelligence which the DM used as a roleplay cue.)

Authentic D&D is psionic.

 

[AstroCat]

That's because the Sequels were low quality movies. That really has nothing to do with the greater conversation at work, which is the real reason Astro's example was bad. IT doesn't display the larger context at all.

Regardless, and this is to the rest of the thread, Greyhawk is an interesting setting IMO but as someone who doesn't have history in it, I'd be uninterested in seeing it reprinted without something new in it. 5E has its own cosmology, its own races, and I'd want all of those races reflected in Greyhawk; aasimar, tieflings, and yes, dragonborns. If your setting can't be updated to match the base standards of the vanilla game in 2024, then your setting best exists in its older state and has no business being remade into a 2024 book. But if you're willing to accept that your setting has to change a bit, then I think we could all embrace a pleasantly surprising Greyhawk update.

That was one small personal experience I decide to share, not cool to lock onto it and ignore the rest of what we've been saying.

About GH, not every setting, needs every thing. And especially not carbon copies... that sounds super boring. I'd much prefer settings were things are actually different. I don't want all the races in Greyhawk because they don't fit the world, just like I don't want FR in my DS, or whatever. That's what makes the different setting interesting, they are different.

 

[MGibster]

And, frankly, the real problem with "historial" settings is that by and large, they aren't. They are based on outmoded, ignorant, just plain wrong pulp fantasy interpretations of history. And even when they aren't, they are based on history written by people with biases and agendas stretching back centuries.

I sometimes think we all have a different idea of what we're talking about here. Greyhawk isn't a historical setting in any sense that I understand it.

 

[Kurotowa]

Psionics is a fundamental aspect of AD&D.

The 1e Monster Manuals even list Psionics as a vital stat in the monster statblock − it doesnt even list what the Abilities are!

Authentic D&D is psionic.

Oh, come on. I enjoy a little psionic flavor now and then, but age is no guarantor of authenticity. Otherwise it wouldn't be "authentic" D&D without racial level limits, gender based Strength penalties, and twelve types of historically dubious polearms.

 

[Belen]

Well, updating legacy content isn't the same thing as removing/reducing conflict.

As for leaving the problematic elements alone, I think I'd prefer the opposite: make the changes they want to make, modernize the setting and bring it up to date...and then point the folks who don't like the changes back to the originals. Put a little sidebar in there that reads, "This is the updated Greyhawk campaign setting. For a look at the original, visit www.drivethrurpg.com/whatever/url or something like that.

It does not matter to me although I'd prefer to see in world reasons for the change etc. I find it more interesting to see things evolve naturally.

I am agnostic to most of the settings since I tend to build my own, usually to suit my campaign. I love Planescape but that is the only setting I usually use as part of my own campaign worlds.

 

[Gradine]

You know, it's strange. I was in a Star Wars discussion group and they were talking about how the sequels and new continuity was a ploy by Disney to fire their longtime fans and appeal to some new modern casual fans with certain agendas. Then I went on Twitter and they were talking about how the new season of Doctor Who was trying to fire their longtime fans and appeal to some new modern casual fans with certain agendas. Then I went on a comic book forum and they were talking about how Marvel's comic lineup was designed to fire their longtime fans and appeal to some new modern casual fans with certain agendas. Weird how every fandom older than a decade decided to fire their longtime fans and appeal to some new modern casual fans with certain agendas at the same time...

Surely that has to be a coincidence.

You missed Star Trek, whose real fans miss when it wasn't all political

 

[Yaarel]

Oh, come on. I enjoy a little psionic flavor now and then, but age is no guarantor of authenticity. Otherwise it wouldn't be "authentic" D&D without racial level limits, gender based Strength penalties, and twelve types of historically dubious polearms.

Original D&D is psionic. AD&D is psionic. 3e is Psionic. 4e is Psionic. 5e is Psionic.

Psionics a core of D&D.

Psionics is authentic D&D.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I sometimes think we all have a different idea of what we're talking about here. Greyhawk isn't a historical setting in any sense that I understand it.

Maybe not technically, but it incorporated a lot of misapprehensions based on a 1960s Hollywood view of the medieval period.