Living Greyhawk Journal #2

Okay, I am excited to have a physical copy of this one for a couple of reasons. First, it wasn't easy to get; it was sold out the first time I went looking for it, and I just happened to look at the right time. Second, it's actually got the poster map included! It's a map of the City of Greyhawk, which looks great. Very detailed, lots of marked buildings. Third...it's complete. I did have a PDF copy of this, but it was missing a page. So, I now have the proper and complete issue to work with. Hurray!

The issue starts with some news on what's going on with Living Greyhawk. The Living Greyhawk Gazetteer is, of course, available, and there are several scenarios available for different regions to get play really going. Oh, and there's an announcement that in January of next year WotC will be running an event at Winter Fantasy where they will be running a sequel to one of their classic modules: Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. That's right, it's time to head back to Hommlet and see what's been going on over the past twenty or so years. No indication that they'll be releasing it as a published module, but we all know they did.

Some notes on playtesting follow, as well as a review of the initial Living Greyhawk scenario run at Gen Con 2000, Legacy of Valor: The Fall of Geoff. This was a scenario in which players got to be part of the Greyhawk Wars and the destruction of Geoff at the hands of giants. It was a five-round tournament with pregenerated characters; your character was based on your ranking of five categories. The tournament ended with the surviving characters being put in the center of a room, and other players ran a bunch of giants to try to wipe them out. Sure, why not?

The Gem of the Flanaess is our first content article, and it's all about that big, beautiful map in the center of the magazine. All those marked buildings now have labels, although there isn't any room to describe them. Still, it's nice to know what's where. And apparently there's something else about Living Greyhawk that I didn't see or didn't understand; there were what are called 'Core' scenarios that everyone could run regardless of what region they were in, and those Core scenarios often took place in the City of Greyhawk. So, my Ket character could easily go to Greyhawk City after all and adventure there, so there's that, at least.

We are promised future articles on the City as well, so it looks like they're going to expand on those labels to give the city a more lived-in feel. Good plan. The sections of the map are the City Gates, the Artisans' Quarter, Clerkburg, Foreign Quarter, Garden Quarter, Grand Citadel, High Quarter, Outskirts, Shacktown, Slum Quarter, Thieves' Quarter, and the Wharves. And on the next page, we do indeed get a full writeup on the Artisans' Quarter. 23 buildings in all, with plenty of details and adventure hooks to be found in six pages. Good stuff. My favorite is the toymaker who made a literal deal with a devil to become a master toymaker; all he has to do is carve intricate magical seals on the chests of the wooden dolls he makes. I'm sure there's nothing sinister involved in that.

Next up, we get some information on the Rhennee, the Greyhawk river-gypsies. These are actually bargefolk on the Nyr Dyv lake. However, we get two new prestige classes for Rhennee characters only: The Darkhagard, who are elite Rhennee warriors and sailors, and the Vetha, the only spellcasters the Rhennee trust. These are females over the age of 35 who are expert healers as well as casters (they don't get cure spells, though). We also get some plots and adventure hooks involving these new prestige classes.

We get another report from the Fiend-Sage on Greyhawk monsters. Remember the Gazetteer entry on Rel Astra where the leader was an undead called an 'animus'? I speculated that this new monster would be described in a future product, and lo and behold, here it is. It's a template that can be applied to any humanoid creature; they become undead, obviously, and their hit dice become d12s. They can command undead, their touch invokes fear, they can use a greater command spell a number of times per day equal to their Charisma modifier, their gaze paralyzes, they can make a suggestion, they have damage reduction, turn resistance, cold, acid and electricity resistance, fast healing, and occasionally some unique powers. They can also be affected by diseases despite their undead status, and they have a 1 in 4 chance of having a lichlike appearance. They gain a +4 Str bonus and several feats, and their CR is +3 to the base creature. So yeah, these guys are pretty tough.

Next is the Bullywug Savant. There were no bullywugs in the Monster Manual, but we do get a brief statblock for the basic bullywug in this entry. The bullywug savant is a tougher bullywug who gains character levels; their favored class is sorcerer, and they rarely multiclass. They have a poisonous sac on their heads, and have powerful summoning abilities. They are rare among bullywugs, and they will generally be the leaders of their tribes. If a bullywug tribe led by a savant ever encounters an aboleth, the savant will instantly pledge the entire tribe to the eternal service of the aboleth. I guess there's a connection there.

The third monster is the Grigaur. This is a medium-sized beast with 4 HD and a CR of 4.  They're blind, but have compensatory senses. This makes them immune to gaze attacks and any visual illusions, but they are more susceptible to sonic and scent effects. And they're extinct. Or rather, they're supposed to be; a powerful wizard decided he needed some extra-tough security and went way back into the past to grab a few of these. So yeah, it's Land Before Time in Greyhawk. Sure, why not?

Finally, we have...the Valley Elf. Like, gag me with a spoon. Yes, dammit, ALL the jokes will be told. I doubt there was ever a more mocked creature in D&D history, and I'm including the flumph in that. These are a slight variant on gray elves who live in the Valley of the Mage. There are only a few hundred of them, and they're good at disguising themselves as humans. They can't be clerics of the elven gods, but they can worship any other god they want. I'm not sure why; maybe the Seldarine has abandoned them for swearing loyalty to a mere human wizard. Speaking of wizard, that's their favored class.

Alright, let's wrap this up. We get four pages of dispatches from the various regions describing events going on that can lead to adventures. There's blight in Furyondy, driving up food prices. Geoff's citizens are chafing under the lax efforts of the Marcher leadership in getting the giants off their backs. The election in Perrenland is coming up, and campaigning is in full swing. In the Theocracy of the Pale, ancient relics have been rediscovered, sending the Pholtans into a religious fervor. I mean, a bigger than usual fervor. Ket's dealing with a tax issue involving Bissel. Yay. That's some exciting intrigue right there. I'm so glad that's my region.

And that's it for this issue. Not a bad one, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of the City of Greyhawk developed over the following issues. Next up, though, we are going to head back to the Forgotten Realms as we take a look at the second adventure published for the setting and a return to one of the all-time classic computer RPGs of all time: Pool of Radiance. Until next time, may your swords be ever-sharp.