Outside of canon, I am interested in what other folks use as inspiration for their Greyhawk adventures, characters, stories, etc. My main inspirations are a bit of Elric, a bit of Conan, a bit of LotR, a bit of Cthulhu and the movies Legend and Excalibur. I like a gritty, action-oriented game, with subtle an yet powerful magic, and horrors too vast to comprehend. I also like sweeping epics, with powerful storylines and memorable villains.
My problem is that I tend to forget where a lot of my inspiration comes from, as far as canon and fantasy goes. >_< But there are a few points that I remember:
-Shakespearean plays like King Lear and Macbeth, which were among my prime inspirations for the tragic figure I made out of Ivid V, a man led to his doom by forces he couldn't control, a man at the world's end. I also got the inspiration for the Knights Protector of the Great Kingdom being tied to the health of their provinces from the ideas of the "King's Two Bodies" expressed in those plays, and in earlier Arthurian legend.
-A lot of the inspiration for more subtle parts of Greyhawk, as well as what the world is like beyond the Flanaess comes from, believe it or not, the real world. I tend to view the Flanaess as North America, where the indigenous aborignal peoples (the Flan) have to cope with the huge influx of new arrivals and their states, some of which have treated the Flan very badly.
The areas of Hepmonaland and southern Oerik are a lot like South America, with lots of Aztec and Maya-type civilizations. Northern "Anakeris" is a lot like medieval Africa, and is the area where the Touv dominate, obviously. Southern Anakeris, the colder areas closer to the South Pole, are the home of European-type peoples in the Dark Ages: the Huns, the Celts, the Goths, the Vandals, etc.
Western Oerik and parts of northern Orannia are a lot like Asia, with the Baklunish being similar to the Arabs, the Sufang Empire being similar to ancient China, and so forth. Orannia (the name I give for the continent beyond the Solnor, where the "Empire of Lynn" is supposed to be) is a very strange land that is modelled on a combination of North American Aboriginal, Greek, Norse, Japanese, African, Celtic, and various other real-world mythologies, and the mythologies of fantasy authors such as Baum, Anderssen, and Grimm.
I'm fascinated by two things in these respects. The first is how non-European cultures might interact with the dwarves, elves, and orcs in a D&D mythos. How would North American Aboriginal people get along with elves? How would African folk get along with halflings? Would orcs get mixed up in the battles between ancient Chinese warlords? Would Arab warriors under Saladin make common cause with the gnomes of the region when the Crusaders came calling? How would the human cultures be affected by the demihumans? How would the humanoids be affected by the humans? We've already pretty much documented how medieval European cultures would be adapted; now I want to see how the rest of the world fits in.
The other thing is how certain mythical characters can pull off stuff that would get real-life people killed. When I talk about borrowing from Baum, for example, I'm talking about borrowing the idea of an unfortunate warrior being stuck with a cursed battle-axe that amputates every one of his limbs successively, requiring the poor fellow to go to the dwarven smith to have new limbs crafted each and every time. How about having PCs face off in combat against Kelidahs or Hammer-heads?
Can PCs really journey to the underworld to rescue damned souls, or set off in search of the golden apples needed to prevent their elven friends from withering and dying away? Is it possible for a continent to literally be held on the back of a turtle? Do some types of magic-users automatically suffer from polymorph effects if struck by ash twigs? _________________ <div align="left">Going to war without Keoland is like going to war without a pipe organ. They both make a lot of noise and they're both a lot of dead weight, so what's the point in taking them along? </div>
Along with the above named authors, I draw quite a bit from Conspiracy Theory (always entertaining), Western Mysticism, and Buddhist thought.
For example, IMC Tharizdun is not evil, but literally misunderstood and demonized by organized religion. His followers are basically the equivalent of the Gnostic Christians in our own world, who lost out to the better organized Orthodox Christians when the religion was in its formative years.
Lately, due to the fact that the party is currently in Hepmonaland, I've been reading a lot of Aztec, Mayan and other Central American history and lore.
Believe it or not, I also get great ideas from song lyrics. From that Slipknot song "Vermillion," I got the idea that my evil necromancer villain wants to bring back the soul of the woman-he-loved-but-had-to-murder-in-order-to-gain-his-power from Nerull's realm and insert it into the body of the PC's priestess of Wee Jas, since she bears a resemblence to his former lover. Go figure....
I also have had great inspiration from other game systems' supplements, like Call of Cthulhu (especially the Dreamlands with some help from the Queensryche song "Silent Lucidity"), GURPS, and Ars Magica. Particularly, I have taken the Ars Magica idea of the Order of Hermes and made it into the Order of Boccob, with the Circle of Eight, the Tribunal that presides over the Flannaess.
I am with rumblebelly on the Conspiracy Theories, it's always good to see player's faces when they expose some fact from a clue they found. I recently have been inspired by the Da Vinci Code and other historical detective fiction. Also like CSL says I take inspiration from the real world. My own views of Ull are drawn from Mongol and Afghani culture, not just ancient but modern. Truth can be stranger than fiction.
I think the Magician series by Raymond E Feist and the follow-up series with Fenny Wurts (Daughter of the Empire etc.) are absolutely first class. The depth of setting development is excellent and the whole thing smacks of someone's home campaign. I particularly like the parts about the Gods War and the Valheru - for me it throws up some really interesting thoughts on Tharizdun.
I read some of the Magician's series, and remember liking it. In which novels give you the interesting thoughts about Tharizdun? I'd like to check them out, since it seems old T will be playing a role in upcoming events.
Tharizdun... a name that stills chills down my spine. Right up there with Great Cthulhu. Sorry, but I cannot envision Tharizdun as anything other than an Elder God. Same with the Elder Elemental God (and the original WoG one, not that worthless FR Ghaunadar reject); in fact, I have the two of them with a handful of others in a small pantheon of Elder Gods. A lot of the old, mysterious, "non-human(oid) race" ruins (like the Cairn Hills, or Skrellingshald) are ruins of elder races that worshipped these beings. But I try not to make it a center of the campaign, its just a part of it.
As far as Conspiracy Theory... if the group I game with could put two and two together and get four, we might be able to try that. A lot of behind the scene, Machiavellian plots have been tried, but my group tends to "bash first, get treasure, let others figure out clues". I'm tired of gaming with them. In fact, currently I've handed over my campaign notes to another DM, and am working with him on certain aspects of the game, and am now just a player. Some day I might find a group that likes the game I'd like to run...
I find a great deal of inspiration for my Greyhawk campaign to come from the works of Jack Vance and his Dying Earth masterworks. I also mix in some of the Gygax novels from way-back-when-that-I-wish-I-held-onto, Robt. E Howard, even the Doc Savage novels (?!).
I also take a view of the Flanaess as a kind of twisted parallel of medieval Earth. And as for conspiracies? When you have the likes of the mad followers of (EVIL!!)Tharizdun, Rary, The Scarlet Brotherhood, Vecna, etc. - what more villainous assembly could be hoped for?
I like to storytell, and make my players more than just incidental characters in the grand, sweeping epic that is Greyhawk. Now if only I could get them to show up regularly. The ideas just build up and backlog when the DM doesn't have the opportunity to inflict them on players! Wait did I say inflict? I meant incorporate... _________________ "I have stated my abhorrance for plunderers and thieves, and now I must visit upon you justice in its most unmitigated rigor!"
A couple of folks have noted real-world influence in their games, and I use much of that myself (althouhg I've disagreed with many over certain interpretations - Oeridains as Greek/Roman types to me as opposed to Celtic/German to others, and so on). I put a lot of thought into developing names, places, customs and cultures of WoG based on real-world counterparts. This gives me and my players a "point of rference", helping them to identify a certain place. I suppose what I am looking for in this thread, however, is what non-canon, non-real world sources of inspiration. Lots of good responses here, many of which I use as well. I guess that's one of the things that makes Greyhawk what it is - despite individual DM differences, it is similar enough for us all to draw from the same sources for inspiration.
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