Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 wrecan Feb 13, 2009 8:51:59	In another thread in General Discussion, discussing alignment, it occurred to me that a revived Greyhawk Campaign Setting might be the perfect place to reintroduce the alignment mechanics stripped from Fourth Edition. Greyhawk, having been Gygax's original campaign world, and Gygax having developed alignment, has alignment as an integral part of its world, particularly through the Great Wheel cosmology. The Temple of Elemental Evil, Iuz, and numerous other elements, work best when there are tangible forces of chaos, evil, good and law that exist even above the gods. The Council of Eight's various machinations on behalf of good, or Mordenkainen's careful neutrality, all work within a framework of alignment. The other campaign setting that would have been a good home for alignment is Planescape, but it appears that Sigil has been incorporated into Fourth Edition's cosmology. To me, this leaves Greyhawk. I think this solves what I consider Greyhawk's "marketing" dilemma. Greyhawk (whether rightly or wrongly) is often criticized for being a bit too generic as a fantasy setting. By making Greyhawk the setting dominated by the cosmic battle of the impersonal forces of good, evil, law and chaos, it gives Greyhawk a unique identity. It also draws Greyhawk farther from its Tolkein-esque roots and closer to its Moorcock roots. It wouldn't even require a major cosmological shift, as happened in Forgotten Realms and almost happened to Eberron with the edition shift. I think Greyhawk could proceed into Fourth Edition relatively unscathed in this fashion, requiring only a justification for the inclusion of the new races and classes. So what do you think? Would wedding Greyhawk more closely to the Great Wheel and alignment mechanics be a wise move or a foolhardy one?
#2 ripvanwormer Feb 14, 2009 21:49:39	I don't think Greyhawk needs an explanation for where the new races come from. Dragon-looking humanoids and tieflings are nothing new to Greyhawk, after all. The worst thing they could do would be to make them too big of a deal, though; dragonborn might well be a minor race found in the Crystalmists and Hellfurnaces as servants of the dragons, but they're not rulers of a kingdom that got recently plane-shifted in or of a lost empire that warred with the tieflings, they're not the primary inhabitants of Zahind south of the Sea of Dust or Dragon Isle south of the Celestial Imperium, and they're not found in every major city. As for classes, this mostly isn't an issue as NPCs don't generally have classes anyway. Warlocks are mostly solitary, but can be included wherever diabolic cults, regions of fey influence, or stargazers gather. Many characters that were sorcerers, witchdoctors, cultists, or witches in previous editions become warlocks in 4e (and there are probably some 3e warlocks that ended up in Greyhawk at some point). Warlords are just another kind of fighter, so they train wherever knights, fighters, and militia train. The biggest problem with Greyhawk in 4e is the lack of bards (especially fochlucan/1st edition bards), druids, assassins, and monks - hopefully this will be rectified soon, but in the meantime Scarlet Brotherhood members could be given monk or assassin powers individually, and I suppose if you're desperate fey warlocks could replace druids. As for using the classic multiverse, I approve. They could mostly convert the Great Wheel outer planes directly to astral dominions - the only sticking points are Limbo and the Abyss, which are in the Elemental Chaos in 4e. Limbo could be replaced by a permanent Great Storm on the edge of Concordant Opposition/Outlands, a hurricane of thoughtwinds that wears at the gate-town of Xaos, occasionally sweeping it away and depositing it in the Elemental Chaos or elsewhere. The Abyss could simply have a portal in the Outlands in the town of Plague-Mort leading to Pazunia, I suppose.
#3 maldin Apr 14, 2009 19:54:51	I'm not really up on the 4E changes (in fact my campaign is still 2E), however from a campaign setting/fluffy perspective, I don't see alot of problem either. I pretty much agree with most of what rip said. In my own campaign, I've always considered "assassin" more of a mindset, not a class (even before 2E got rid of them - then sorta brought them back). Any class, with perhaps a few specialized skills learned along the way, could have a career path as an "assassin". Druids are specialty priests - IMC all priests must essentially be a specialty priest of a chosen god. I've never really used monks (and in 29 years of gaming, I think we've had a total of 2 monk PCs), so that problem has never really come up. Other races can easily have travelled (in small numbers) from other locations on or off the world. I'm a hard-core adherent to the Great Wheel (Planescape and Spelljammer are fully integrated into my Greyhawk campaign), and that provides lots of places for the new races to come from. If I were to ever play 4E, the first thing I'd do is dump the new cosmology. It was a huge mistake on WotC's part, in my opinion. If PC's believe (in game) in alternate cosmologies, its just misinformation from their gods, knowledge of only a few of the (incorrectly named/described) planes that really exist (from the Great Wheel), or just plain ignorance of the masses. I've spent far too much time and effort in developing the details of my cosmology to just toss it out with every change in the wind that blows from Renton. Denis, aka "Maldin" Maldin's Greyhawk http://melkot.com Loads of edition-independent Greyhawk goodness... maps, magic, mysteries, mechanics, and more!
#4 rob_douglas Apr 15, 2009 9:45:01	Hey Maldin I actually like the changes in the cosmology in 4E - and I was a real cynic going in. I couldn't believe they would change it like that, but now that I see it, I like some aspects of it a lot. The handling of Elemental Chaos makes more sense than the Elemental Planes, para-elemental, Limbo, etc. The phrase "down with needless symmetry" works for me. I still believe that past characters, etc view the multiverse as a Great Wheel, and it can always be viewed that way since it is an extra-dimensional arrangement that can be viewed as connected in any geometry - based on how the portals interact. E.g. Sigil has portals to virtually all the planes - mustn't it be a hub of a wheel? Or is it totally separate, yet totally contained in a demi-plane? What physical features could differentiate the two? Nothing observable, as I see it. But I really liked your Life, Multiverse, and Everything when I first read it - so I will try to read it again in light of the 4E cosmology and see if there are any true discrepancies. I suspect that it merges very well. I will let you know. Cheers, ROB
#5 OleOneEye Apr 19, 2009 23:20:52	Greyhawk, having been Gygax's original campaign world, and Gygax having developed alignment, has alignment as an integral part of its world, particularly through the Great Wheel cosmology. Funny, I have never thought of alignment as being very important to Greyhawk at all. I have always viewed the machinations of the various feudal states and power groups in a real-politik nature. For instance, the Scarlet Brotherhood is racist not because they are evil, but because they want to resurrect the power and glory of their Suel birthright. Also, I don't recall the Great Wheel being important to Greyhawk at all. Sure, demonic machinations are rife, but much more to do with the nature of demons than having the Abyss placed between Pandemonium and ..... Gehenna(?).
#6 rob_douglas Apr 21, 2009 17:56:05	I think though that the Gygaxian model very much turned on the conflict between Law and Chaos. The Gord the Rogue novels make this very clear in the later ones when Gord becomes the champion of Neutrality. The various players line up entirely according to alignment structures. Mordenkainen works hard for balance, releasing Zuggtmoy even to ensure it. The Lawful evil and neutral evil outsiders all work to support Tharizdun, while the Chaotic Evil demons work against being subjugated to that rulership. Alignment almost dictates action in many characters within the basic structure of Greyhawk. I think it was later, especially with Sargent's work when political wranglings superseded alignment concerns. ROB
#7 Cennedi Apr 21, 2009 18:50:04	Wouldnt a character that released a demon into the world or freed a demon to go on and spread even in the name of "balance" actually just be a pawn of evil? Did big mord kill the wife of anyone who won the lottery or burn that persons home down in the name of balance? Old alignments are silly.
#8 ripvanwormer Apr 28, 2009 17:02:45	Wouldnt a character that released a demon into the world or freed a demon to go on and spread even in the name of "balance" actually just be a pawn of evil? No, he's the chess player - Good, Evil, Law, Chaos, and Neutrality are all his pawns. On the other side of the board is a rotating array of other players with their own pawns. Sometimes the other player has good pawns, sometimes the other player has evil pawns, and sometimes he plays against other neutral players with pawns of a variety of alignments. Each game is different, but there's no doubt, in Mordenkainen's case, who is being manipulated by whom. That's not to say he's undefeatable - he's lost games before: Vecna beat him, Iuz beat him, and Rary beat him. But Mordenkainen's mistakes are his own, not the result of him being manipulated by anyone else. Your question is a bit like asking if someone who starts a war that kills innocent civilians is a pawn of evil. Casualties happen, and killing innocents is undoubtedly an evil thing, yet good characters in D&D are permitted to wage war for a just cause despite the inevitable bad things that happen because of it. A good chess player knows when to sacrifice a piece to win the game. Mordenkainen has specific goals, and they aren't the same as Good's goals or Evil's goals. He'll use either Good or Evil to try and achieve those goals, but committing an evil act in the pursuit of a non-evil goal isn't intrinsically evil. Did big mord kill the wife of anyone who won the lottery or burn that persons home down in the name of balance? No, that would be silly. The Balance, as Mordenkainen practices it, is about the big picture. He believes that either Good or Evil, if they grow too powerful, could threaten existence - too much Good, and everyone grows weak and complacent like H.G. Welles' eloi, and then the morlocks show up and kill everyone. Too much Evil, and everyone just dies. But these are the vast cosmic forces at work that dwarf the planes of existence, and these are Mordenkainen's targets. If someone gets murdered, or a small war erupts, or someone wins the lottery it's very unlikely to alter the Balance one way or another, and Mordenkainen is likely to ignore it. He has bigger fish to fry - he deals on the level of demons, godlings, angels, heroes, kings, and archmagi, beings with the potential to reshape the cosmos. For lesser things, he is more of the self-interested/uninvolved type of neutral. Not that winning the lottery is intrinsically good or evil. Old alignments are silly. Sure, if you don't understand them. Of course, by this you seem to be implying that the idea of unaligned beings who attempt to balance good and evil doesn't exist in 4th edition, which is odd because it explicitly does. From the 4th edition Player's Handbook, page 20: "A few unaligned people, and most unaligned deities, aren’t undecided about alignment. Rather, they’ve chosen not to choose, either because they see the benefits of both good and evil or because they see themselves as above the concerns of morality." Such silliness!
#9 ripvanwormer Apr 28, 2009 17:29:03	Funny, I have never thought of alignment as being very important to Greyhawk at all. I have always viewed the machinations of the various feudal states and power groups in a real-politik nature. For instance, the Scarlet Brotherhood is racist not because they are evil, but because they want to resurrect the power and glory of their Suel birthright. Also, I don't recall the Great Wheel being important to Greyhawk at all. Sure, demonic machinations are rife, but much more to do with the nature of demons than having the Abyss placed between Pandemonium and ..... Gehenna(?). Tartarus. Gygax's Greyhawk had plenty of shades of grey, but the underlying dynamic beneath it (made explicit in the Gord books, but found in adventures involving dramatically clashing alignments like the Temple of Elemental Evil and the Vault of the Drow, as well as many examples of pure Law combating unaligned Chaos as in the Pale) is of brightly contrasting cosmic forces forever jostling for supremacy. It's not so important what the specific planes of existence that represent these forces are called or how they fit together, but the essential notion of Good, Evil, Law, Chaos, and Balance involved in what was pictured in the Gord series as a literal chess game is integral to the setting as its creator conceived of it (and certainly as I picture it). It could be pictured as a wheel, as a square, with seventeen outer planes or nine, but it's the implicit and explicit background to all the "big picture" events in the World of Greyhawk setting. The baatezu intervene in Ivid's court, for example, because they're attempting to counter the influence of the tanar'ri, the two races of fiends making the Oerth a battlefield in their eternal Blood War. Gord is a champion of the Balance disdained by Good and Evil alike, seeking the middle way while others prefer extreme solutions to their common problems. Perhaps you prefer focusing on the gritty, day-to-day mortal politics of the setting, which are plentiful, but that's only half of the setting as it exists in print. There's another half - the horrors and raptures, the unfathomable laws and uncontrollable howling chaos of the planes beyond, which simultaneously expand upon and form the foundation of the conflicts of the mortal world. And 4th edition has a very different dynamic. Oh, there are good guys and bad guys and chaotic guys, but there is no Cosmic Good or Cosmic Law. The only objective alignments in the World Axis cosmology are Chaotic Evil (represented by the Abyss), and Chaos itself as represented by the Elemental Chaos (not that chaos is an alignment in 4e; it's still a cosmic force). But there is no balance in the structure of the planes, no equal forces of good or law. There are good deities, even lawful good ones, but there is no reflection in the cosmos of what in Greyhawk are the primary cosmic themes. There are only the muddled patchwork of the Astral Dominions, whose shape and form is merely a matter of opinion. I think it's important to have a cosmos that reflects the setting's cosmic themes, rather than some random other set of themes invented for the 4th edition game. Besides which, I like the Great Wheel better than I like Oerth, and if I had to choose between the two, Oerth is the setting I'd drop. Fortunately, the two have been intimately meshed together since the beginning, one feeding and improving upon the other to the point that it's impossible to separate them without doing considerable violence to both.
#10 Cennedi May 01, 2009 19:26:33	I think you are over complicating things Rip. Unaligned just means you are a human(oid) and given to moments of weakness as well as moments of heroism but most of the time you are most interested in taking care of yourself. I would think most humans on oerth would be unaligned. Saying that a person could or would commit evil knowingly and not somehow be tainted by his actions is a stretch. When the mordmeister unleashed the fungus queen how did he not feel guild over being directly responsible for all the pain suffering and death his actions were going to cause? And describing the persons of oerth as pawns in a bigger game kinda takes away from the heroism of the characters and NPCs of the world.
#11 OleOneEye May 03, 2009 16:16:07	Perhaps you prefer focusing on the gritty, day-to-day mortal politics of the setting, which are plentiful, but that's only half of the setting as it exists in print. . . . . Besides which, I like the Great Wheel better than I like Oerth, and if I had to choose between the two, Oerth is the setting I'd drop. Fortunately, the two have been intimately meshed together since the beginning, one feeding and improving upon the other to the point that it's impossible to separate them without doing considerable violence to both. Eureka! After sprawling commentary on this site and Canonfire, I think that I finally understand your position and it appears that you may understand mine. As an example, I am mostly interested in Iuz as he relates to Oerth as a megalomaniac attempting to conquer the Flanneass, and conversely, would suspect that you are mostly interested in Iuz as he relates in the various machinations of the Abyss and among the great powers of the planes. At the end of the day, if there is a 4E release for Greyhawk, I feel for any author whom would attempt to satisfy all the fractured fans of the setting. Best such author present his own vision of Greyhawk whether the end result be something either of us would recognize or not.
#12 ripvanwormer May 08, 2009 19:44:38	I think you are over complicating things Rip. Unaligned just means you are a human(oid) and given to moments of weakness as well as moments of heroism but most of the time you are most interested in taking care of yourself. I would think most humans on oerth would be unaligned. It can mean that, but according to the 4th edition core book I quoted from, it doesn't always mean that. There's the "uninterested" form of being unaligned, but there's also the form that sees benefits in both good and evil and seeks to balance or manipulate them both. Perhaps that's silly for you, but it's been part of the D&D game since its inception, and it's part of the 4th edition game as well. As I quoted. You're oversimplifying things, trying to create banal conformity in what is actually a much more flexible and interesting concept. And contradicting the actual rules. Saying that a person could or would commit evil knowingly and not somehow be tainted by his actions is a stretch. When the mordmeister unleashed the fungus queen how did he not feel guild over being directly responsible for all the pain suffering and death his actions were going to cause? No one said he didn't feel guilt, but as I said, seeking to balance the forces of good and evil doesn't necessarily make you evil. As I said above, it's certainly allowed for even good characters to commit some amount of evil in the interest of the greater good, or it would be impossible for good characters to wage war. No good-aligned nations on Oerth are pacifist - even Rao, god of peace, accepts the need for just war to bring about the kind of peace he desires. All war results in some civilian casualties, the death of innocents, crimes in the heat of battle and its aftermath, good soldiers coming back home mutilated mentally or physically. Good warriors seek to minimize these things, but some evil is unavoidable. Are good characters nonetheless tainted by the necessary evil they inflict on the world? Perhaps, but not enough to change their alignment. If it was, the game would fall apart. Neutral characters - even unaligned 4th edition ones - are surely allowed more leeway in this than good characters are. They can't commit casual murder. They don't sow misery to balance out happiness (emotional states aren't the same thing as good and evil anyway). They don't torture helpless prisoners. There are some crimes that are unavoidably evil, which neutral characters can't commit without their alignment changing. Mordenkainen doesn't commit those crimes. We don't know for a fact that Mordenkainen has ever killed anyone (although as a former dungeon delver, it's likely the blood of monsters and bandits is on his hands, there's no reason to believe he is any worse in this regard than your typical paladin). He doesn't commit needless cruelty. He doesn't seem greedy or selfish. During the Greyhawk Wars he was a tireless opponent of Iuz and the forces of evil that then seemed on the ascension on the world of Oerth. His ultimate goal is to stop the rise of Tharizdun and the world's destruction. Far from only being interested in himself, he might be considered a good character. But that's not all there is to Mordenkainen. On the other hand, he was the conspirator involved in convincing and enabling Robilar to free Iuz. He did so hoping that Robilar and his comrades would kill Iuz, but Iuz's subsequent rise and conquests are ultimately his responsibility. According to the Gord books, Robilar's freeing of Zuggtmoy was also his idea. This was only mentioned in the Gord books, I think; according to Temple of Elemental Evil, Robilar freed Zuggtmoy by accident. There are other dark rumors of things Mordenkainen might have been involved in, but no proof, so I'll leave such scurrilous libel alone for now. But let's assume that Mordenkainen did indeed free Zuggtmoy on purpose. What evil was accomplished? Zuggtmoy was behind the first rise of the Temple of Elemental Evil, a force that threatened to overwhelm the Central Flanaess, becoming an expanding evil theocracy in the heart of the good-aligned nations. Definitely bad news. But then the Horde of Elemental Evil was defeated by the allied forces of Good (no thanks to Mordenkainen, who sat this battle out), and Zuggtmoy imprisoned. The question is, was imprisoning Zuggtmoy necessary? What happened when she was finally freed? Her temple was in ruins at that point, her minions defeated by Robilar and others, and she went back to the Abyss where (in 3rd edition continuity) she became a thorn in the side of Juiblex and his expanding Abyssal empire, checking Juiblex's ambitions with her own. Was that evil? Did it add to the suffering of the world? Or did it prevent suffering? According to the Gord books, she becomes part of a triumverate with Iuz and Iggwilv to capture one of the Theorparts, but again, it's not clear she's substantially adding to the world's evil by doing so; in fact, Iuz's faction is responsible for preventing their Theorpart from landing in the hands of the other factions, which might otherwise get more than one. Gord later gives one of the Theorparts - a powerful artifact capable in conjunction with the others of freeing Tharizdun - to Graz'zt on purpose in order to maintain the balance and delay the destruction of the world. This is the kind of neutrality that Mordenkainen, an ally of Gord's, represents. By freeing Zuggtmoy, he helped strengthen an evil coalition to the point where it could counter other evil coalitions and prevent any single one from gaining dangerous ascendency. Did this make him a pawn of evil? Certainly, it required both Mordenkainen and Gord to be more ruthless than a good character would typically be, getting their hands dirty by meddling in demonic affairs, but did it taint them irrevocably and change their alignments? Surely not. Later, the Temple was reestablished, but Zuggtmoy wasn't involved; in fact, the forces of Evil re-imprisoned her beneath the temple according to Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, under the control of the priesthood of Tharizdun. Does that change your assessment, knowing that Mordenkainen was responsible for doing the opposite of what other evil factions wanted? Where Tharizdun's faithful wanted Zuggtmoy out of the way, might an unaligned character not conclude it might be best to have her active so that evil might turn upon itself? It seems to me that D&D morality is more complex and interesting than you imply. And describing the persons of oerth as pawns in a bigger game kinda takes away from the heroism of the characters and NPCs of the world. Didn't you do the same earlier when you suggested that Mordenkainen might be a "pawn of evil?" The D&D multiverse is full of pawns, rooks, bishops, knights, kings, queens, and chessmasters. Mordenkainen isn't such a big deal that everyone is one of his pieces - the PCs certainly aren't. Iuz is a pawn of his that got out of control, became a king, and then became a player in his own right. There are many chessmasters in the game world, and ideally the PCs eventually become the most important ones. I don't see how it takes away from their heroism to have clever, manipulative heroes, antiheroes, villains, and in-between characters at work making plot points happen for the benefit of the game. I don't see how it takes away from the heroism of the NPCs, either; they aren't all manipulatable by Mordenkainen, and some good-aligned characters like Philidor are chessmasters in their own right, just as evil characters like Rary are. Gord didn't become less heroic or less central to the novels to have Mordenkainen, Basiliv, the Cat Lord, Keoghtom, Zagyg, and other Lords of Balance working in the background. Sherlock Holmes didn't become less heroic because Moriarty was a chessmaster.
#13 ripvanwormer May 08, 2009 20:05:42	As an example, I am mostly interested in Iuz as he relates to Oerth as a megalomaniac attempting to conquer the Flanneass, and conversely, would suspect that you are mostly interested in Iuz as he relates in the various machinations of the Abyss and among the great powers of the planes. Yes, exactly. A better way to put it than I did above (relating a false dilemma about which setting I'd drop) would be to say that I consider the planes to be the campaign setting, and Oerth to be a part of it. To me, asking whether you could separate Oerth from the Great Wheel and still have the same setting is like asking whether you could separate the Domain of Greyhawk from the rest of the Flanaess, reconfigure, repopulate, and rename the surrounding nations, and still have the same setting. You would still have Greyhawk City, the Wild Coast, Hardby, Castle Greyhawk, the Cairn Hills, Diamond Falls, and other important places that were given great detail in a variety of publications, but maybe the Great Kingdom is ruled by tieflings, Keoland is a dragonborn nation, Hepmonaland doesn't exist, and the Pomarj and the Bone March are one and the same. Even if everything about the Domain of Greyhawk was otherwise as they were, I think changing the context it exists in changes the setting, even if you don't run campaigns outside the Domain of Greyhawk. And yes, I'm sure there are a number of people like yourself who don't deal with the planar themes to any significant extent for whom changing the planar context really wouldn't make a great difference, just as there may (for the sake of argument) be people who deal with events and characters outside of the Domain of Greyhawk so seldom that it doesn't really matter how they're configured or populated. I didn't doubt you when you said you didn't deal much with alignment or the planes; I'm just arguing that those things are part of the setting, and changing those elements changes the setting as it's been conceived. I don't know if there are actually any active Greyhawk campaigns that use surrounding nations and their intrigues that seldom, but I think the parallel is sound, just on a smaller scale. While ignoring or altering the planes that magnify and support the themes of Greyhawk may be all right for some campaigns, it does alter the setting as written.