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Greyhawk Errata

1980 Greyhawk Folio

In Dragon 46 (February 1981), page 50, Lawrence Schick noted the following corrections:

  • on the Darlene E-4 sized maps, any settlement located within one hex of a body of water should be considered a port; for a listing of such locations, read Stephane Tanguay's 6 July 2000 Greytalk post 
  • settlement symbols were not printed consistently throughout the initial print run of the Gazetteer booklet; if your page 4 lacks the symbols from the folio's interior cover, then you have a true first edition

Nomenclature Issues

I have found the following missing names in the Folio, as well as the 1983 box set:

  • Telfic Gulf (Folio page 5, Guide page 8):  from the description, this sounds like it should be either Relmor Bay or perhaps Woolly Bay (or Dunhead Bay, between Onnwal and Ahlissa on the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer map)
  • Sea of Yar (ibid) = this is probably the Sea of Gearnat?; note that "Bay" spelled backward almost appears as "Yar" (capital b almost = capital r)

The Living Greyhawk Gazetteer notes that "

Inconsistency of names:
  • Dora Kaa vs. Dorakaa
  • Maure Castle vs. Mauve Castle
  • Lake of Whyestil vs. Whyestil Lake

1983 Greyhawk box set

Settlement Population 

In Dragon 101 (September 1985), page 8, Gary Gygax made corrections to the Settlements Population table (Glassography, page 3; corrections appear in green).  He stated that the incorrect figures were carried over from the original Folio booklet. 

Settlement Population Dice
thorp, dorf 20 to 80 2d4 x 10
hamlet 100 to 400 1d4 x 100
village, wych 600 to 900 (1d4+5) x 100
town 1500 to 9500 (3d6+1) x 1000
city 12,000 to  96,000 12d8 x 1000

The following additional settlement information was also provided:

Urban Area:  A town or settlement will have suburbs with are a part of the greater community.  To determine the number of people in these lesser settlements, simply roll a six-sided die.  The result is the total number of additional, suburbal residents expressed as a percentage, i.e., 10% to 60% of the population of the urban center.

For example, a town of 6,500 residents is found to have a suburban population equal to 40% of the town proper, and 40% of 6,500 is 2,600.  Obviously, this is not another town unto itself, so there are at least two other communitites on the outskirts of the town.  Since the town is average in size, it would be safe to assume that there is a nearby village of 900 residents, another of 700, and a pair of hamlets of about 300 population each.  This totals 2,200.  The remainder of the residents (400) are assumed to be spread in individual dwellings and smaller-than-thorp clusters throughout the radius of the area.  

Skip Williams answered some Greyhawk-specific "Sage Advice" questions in Dragon 141 (January 1989, page 14) and Dragon 160 (August 1990, page 33), including the following tidbits.

Random Encounter Tables

The Glassography notes on page 4 that "Elven clerics can and do wield all forms of edged and piercing weapons."  Williams comments about this discrepancy that

Mr. Gygax's Greyhawk campaign was started long before the AD&D game came on the scene.  The first rules used were the three booklets and (later) three supplements of the original D&D game.  In time, Mr. Gygax used what he learned from running Greyhawk to write the AD&D game rules.  The campiagn, which was older than the AD&D game rules, could not be switched over to them because the D&D game and AD&D game rules are not compatible.  When TSR published the WORLD OF GREYHAWK fantasy setting, the editors decided to remain faithful to the original campaign.  This is how this rule-breaker got in.  [Dragon 141, page 14]

Heraldry

It is noteworthy that both the 1980 Folio and the 1983 box set display 78 Greyhawk coats of arms (the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer lists only 63 devices).  However, none of the items displayed on the cover of the 1983 box and Guide appear among the listed devices.  

The knight's pennon on the cover of the 1983 box and the Guide is a modified verision of the heraldry for the city of Fax in the Wild Coast, with a bar, azure, in fess, added for distinction.  It "probably designates one of the more important noble families in Fax" (Dragon 141, page 14).  His shield, however, is not identified, nor are those of the other two riders.  

The right-hand rider bears a red shield with a diagonal line from top right to lower left which appears to cover a unicorn or a horse.  Two black, equilateral triangles appear on the shield, one on either side of the line.  The upper left triangle points upward, while the lower right triangle points downward.  The lower right one may have a lightning bolt to its right side, as well.  

The left-hand rider bears a white shield with a red stripe in a carat shape like this:  ^ , with a bulging on the lower left end of it.  Some skulls or other marks appear to be atop the carat, but I can't make them out on my covers.  

Demi-Human Deities

Skip Williams notes in Dragon 160 (August 1990, page 33) that "Ehlonna is the primary deity among the elves in Ulek and Celene, and she has a strong following among elves everywhere else on Oerth."  This contradicts EGG's assertion in "From the Sorceror's Scroll" that Roger Moore's demi-human deities can be used in Greyhawk (Dragon 71, page 5):

Those AD&D players who are employing the WORLD OF GREYHAWK setting for their campaign can likewise incorporate this material into their activities if they so desire, although some alterations should be made to make sure the non-human deities reflect the WORLD OF GREYHAWK mode, as presented in several previous issues of this Splendid Journal. 

I'll eventually wrestle more with the demi-human deities on my Greyhawk Gods page.  

From the Ashes box set (1992)

from Dragon 191 (March 1993), page 67:

  • Fort Lehman lies four hexes northwest of Sourlode (upper right corner on FtA maps)
  • the Screaming Valley lies four hexes due south of Stankaster Tower
  • From the Ashes mysteries (ibid):
    • Bigby is not dead
    • Tenser spoke with the Hermit of Wavenair (Druid 13) about elemental water magic (gee, what a surprise, given his name)
    • the same dwarves who built the Beauteous Cones built the Doomgrinder
    • no one knows what happened to Stankaster (who fled the Great Kingdom, supposedly with info on Ivid's genealogy) or to Karposhnen
    • Storm Keep was formerly occupied by the wizard Melandril, who fled to the Scarlet Brotherhood
    • the fifth Star Cairn has never been discovered

Living Greyhawk Journal

  • Living Greyhawk Journal #10 (Dragon Magazine 294):  Alas, I have an entry for my article with Erik Mona, "Artifacts of Oerth."  In the "Creating Artifacts" section, I reversed the Oerth Stone and Obelisk:  Zagig chipped from the Obelisk, not the Oerth Stone.  Mea culpa!

Miscellaneous Errata


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