Greyhawk Twitter Topics

Welcome Greyhawk fans and readers of all things related to D&D. When it comes to social media, I spend a lot of time on Twitter (@GamersTableMike) and recently I asked some of my friends and followers for topic ideas. I got a few good responses, so let's just do them all!

Alec Stutson (@padawanovelist) wants to hear about, "Taking real world and historical influence, from politics and ancient world powers, and incorporating those into a campaign."

Okay let's get the hard one out of the way first, haha. The World of Greyhawk setting, created by Gary Gygax is a clinic in historical influence. Old Gygax was first a historical wargamer thus the genesis of his fantasy realm was real world influence. This pseudo-realism is what keeps Greyhawk grounded even when you throw in liches, dragons and death-trap dungeons.

For those wanting to run a campaign with ancient real world flavor all you need to do is read the boxed set Guide to see references to each nations' borders, army strengths and their ongoing or past conflicts. Gygax goes into great detail on knighthoods, royal naming conventions and of course heraldry, like no other. The nature of the setting is also to borrow analogs of Earthly culture. This way you have Euro, Asian and Arabic references to draw upon. All a DM needs to do in crafting a story based on say the Roman Empire or the Crusades is find the region best suited both culturally or geographically and highlight the most important aspects for players.

Example: I run a campaign based on the golden age of piracy. The most geographically advantageous spot for that is the Azure Sea and southward. In canon, a seafaring area like the Hold of the Sea Princes or the Lordship of the Isles is best to base these campaigns around. From there you can spin other tales on the high seas such as the Great Kingdom creating a fleet inspired by the Spanish Armada or you can have exploration of Oerth's jungles inspired by the Age of Exploration. Never mind that these historical eras mash up directly against more ancient tropes like armored knights, raiding vikings or sword and sandal Roman gladiators. It's a fantasy world!

Barantor (@Barantor) suggests, "Explain Iuz as a force present in "the flesh" on Oerth. This is a topic that needs a little backstory on the demigod of evil, pain and deceit. To sum up, Iuz is the progeny of the Demon Prince Graz'zt and the witch Queen of Perrenland, Iggwilv. His birth was likely planned as a long term powerplay for both parents to rule the world, though Iggwilv would later lose Perrenland and Graz'zt would have his hands full as well. Iuz likely started as a bandit king whose supernatural powers gave him an advantage over his neighbors. As he grew more powerful and realized his birthright he took on more followers of humanoid persuasion and by means not entirely understood attained immortality enough to soon have his own priesthood.

All this happened on the watch of Furyondy and the Shield Lands too. You would think if a powerful individual like Iuz was ascendant, the forces of good would be swift to stamp it out. Iuz perhaps hid behind the more vile acts of the Horned Society and the Temple of Elemental Evil for a while. The former even took  Iuz's short disappearance into captivity by Zagyg for granted and much like the kingdoms of good, wasn't prepared for his return, an almost Napoleonic rise back to power where he carved out a bloody empire from the north.

Iuz's purpose in the setting is the big bad evil guy, the meta-plot villain mastermind behind all the world's ills, ala Sauron. Iuz is also a foil for other would-be BBEGs such as Vecna or Kyuss. Evil turns on evil and the spoiled little demigod Iuz does not want other demigods running around. Iuz is a rather kitchen-sink type villain too. He has it all, orc armies, undead armies, demons, you name it. So there you have it, I don't know if I answered the question, but the short of it is the world needs a major villain or two to keep heroes busy.

Temujin (@Temmogen) wants to know more about, "The lost civilizations under the Crystalmist mountains." Here's one that I'm no expert on, but I'm assuming he wants to hear about the Lerara tribe of the Suloise. Long ago when the Suel fled the destruction of their empire in the Rain of Colorless Fire, many tribes fled through Slerotins's Tunnel, a sort of moses parting the Red Sea moment in Greyhawk history (see above question). For whatever reason the Lerara got lost or fell behind and they were trapped in the underdark with all those creepy critters. they managed to eek out an existence thanks to the "Mother" a mysterious entity who is basically like a god to the Lerara.

In my opinion, Mother is probably some unique, ancient amorphous being left over from an age before mankind, maybe an aberration akin to the Aboleth or an old obyrith demon like Dagon. whatever the case, the Lerara worship her like a goddess. Little has been written on this culture outside the World of Greyhawk Guide or sources about the mage, Elayne Mystica who left the underdark to live in Irongate. elayne aside, I wager given a millennia of underdark life, they albino, they have dark vision and are probably inbred to the point of being inhuman in appearance.

The Lerara are lost to human kind, but are surely well known to the drow, duergar and other races of the Under-Oerth. Besides this tribe as a lost culture in the mountains you could also speculate on clans of giant-kin lost among the vast mountains as their larger cousins spread out into the plains or maybe time-forgotten cavemen hidden in and around the inaccessible Valley of Mage or the site of the adjoining Barrier Peak ship crash.

and finally...

Brandi (@xb0shi3x) inquires, "Sabriel, where is she now? Probably getting nasty with George Clooney." Hah, well she is from my last Sea Princes game group (see above). where she played Sabriel Loreweaver, bard, pirate and wielder of the sword Dreamsinger from the adventure Five Shall Be One. When we finished that quest she had been a "friend with benefits" to a pirate lord named Captain Kendrick of Blue. He was best described as looking like George Clooney, thus the appeal.

To answer Brandi, what is Sabriel doing now? Well she is not in Blue port, she was last seen in the Hold of Sea Princes mulling over a lucrative marriage proposal from the rotund Count Robiga of Poniard. What she really has in mind for the count is left to be seen, but I'm sure the he won't keep Kendrick away for long. Yep, we have a lot of unfinished political intrigue to finish should we ever return to Sabriel and the crew of the Envy.