Greyhawk Rebooted - 576CY

Preface

I
n 1972, after seeing a demonstration to our own planet but was populated
of Dave Arneson’s Castle Blackmoor by strange creatures and wielders of
game, Gary Gygax agreed with magic. In this way, D&D differed from the
Arneson to co-develop a set of rules settings of Lord of the Rings and Robert E.
for a game that would eventually become Howard’s Conan stories, which actually
known as Dungeons & Dragons. Gygax took place on Earth.
liked the idea of a castle and dungeon that
players could explore, and created his own TSR intended to publish The World of
imaginary place called Castle Greyhawk, Greyhawk early in 1979; the foreword by
which he used to test and develop the editor Allen Hammack was dated February
game. 1979. Gygax himself assured Dragon
readers in issue No. 37 that, barring
With almost continuous play during catastrophe, the World of Greyhawk was
the years 1972–1975, Gygax, and later ready for official release. However, Gygax’s
his co-Dungeon Master (co-DM), Rob The World of Greyhawk (TSR 9025) did
Kuntz, expanded the setting to include not hit store shelves until August 1980. (I
an entire world. After the creation of was 11 years old at the time!)
TSR, publication of D&D and the release
of several adventures set in his world of The World of Greyhawk consisted of a
Greyhawk, Gygax was surprised to learn thirty-two page folio (this edition is often
that there was strong player demand for called the “World of Greyhawk folio” to
access to his fantasy setting. He agreed to distinguish it from later editions) and a 34”
publish a campaign setting based on his x 44” (86 cm x 112 cm) two-piece colour
home campaign. map of the Flanaess, by Darlene Pekul. The
book came with a folder containing maps
Gygax serialized a fantasy novella called and a gazetteer describing every state and
The Gnome Cache in the first seven issues region on the maps. In addition to details
of TSR’s house magazine, The Dragon. of geography, history, and political states
This was where fans first learned that mentioned above, Gygax also included
Greyhawk was located on a planet called a complete fictional calendar including
Oerth, which was similar in many ways days of the weeks, months and festivals,

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