Soooo many creative ideas written in the 1st addition. So many areas to flesh out. LONG LIVE ORIGINAL AD&D.

I like the idea that extreme cataclysms damage magic, causing the slide. The Twin Cataclysms could have been one of these events, but not necessarily the most recent: Iuz and Vecna disrupted Tovag Baragu in "Vecna Lives," possibly destroying its mythic powers, and potentially damaging magic further.

Cycles of magic potential were at the core of the lore in FASA's old Shadowrun universe, and thier Earthdawn setting (which was essentially the same world in a much earlier age)

My co-DM and I discussed such things back in the 80s and came up with our two favorite somewhat connected "true answers PCs shall never know" explanations for these catastrophes. Here they are: With the thin walls between the various spheres of existence (as shown by having a ship from Metamorphosis Alpha crash into the mountains to create the "dungeon" of Barrier Peaks as well as the DMG having rules for transporting characters to and from AD&D, Gamma World and Boot Hill) some great powers of the past used their artifacts and/or highest level magical abilities to try to bring some sort of overpowering thing from one world to another. But the magics used to try to, for instance, bring an armored division of Panzers (an example brought up in our discussion from some of the early issues of Dragon about variant wargame battles) into Oerth brought about such an instability due to the massive quantity transferred to cause a catastrophe of unexpected devastation. And, of course, no one responsible survived to tell the tale since they were at the epicenter of the attempt and resulting devastation. The other answer was basically formulated on the same basic premise, but instead of the instability caused by such a massive shifting of materiel across the barrier between worlds causing the destruction it was the gods themselves who viewed such uses/abuses of magic as being a threat to their divinity, as powers that could bring such powerful devices into the balanced ecosystem of a medieval fantasy world would be a threat to the gods themselves and thus should be destroyed. Thus all pantheons working in concert brought absolute ruin on the civilizations with such hubris as to believe them near gods in power. It would follow that either result would lead to a trough in the power of magic as the devastations caused, whether by arcane or divine magic, would drain the regions immediately affected completely and lead to a ripple effect as elemental magic flowed back into these places rendered bereft. That would create a low tide of magical ability, limiting some capabilities, etc., until the original balance was reestablished over time, if it ever was. At the point mentioned magic could still be ebbing as it gradually flowed back into the devastated places, not to reach an equilibrium for decades and not to return to previous levels for generations to come. Or it might never recover to what it once was, who can say? Either way it is fun to consider. 🙂

In addition to Vance, Fred Saberhagen's "Empire of the East" books are another inspiration. I didn't know about Larry Niven's "The Magic Goes Away" stories, so I'll look those up! Thanks!

History Channel can do an Ancient Greyhawk Aliens spinoff lol.

M A R Barker did just that with Empire of the Petal Throne.

I’m running a campaign now with The Codex of the Infinite Planes (basically the Book of Eibon or Necronomicon) as the center piece that brought about a great renaissance in magic in the ancient past but then ultimately caused a cataclysm as the sentient evil tome was sent by Outer Gods that manipulated those who used it and feed on their pride and hubris. Now the world has had nearly 2 millennia to recover. Magic is far less common but no less powerful. Adventurers find items of extraordinary power hidden in ruined jungle cities (Dwellers of the Forbidden City), in forgotten temples, under the sea in sunken ruins, and ancient vaults / crypts. Only now is the power and evil of the Codex (now separated into smaller less potent pieces) rising again after a discover by a now twisted Mage who seeks to rule by its magic.

That makes the easy transition to Gamma World, Star Frontiers, Thundar the Barbarian type mix tech/magic worlds. It mixes in all the good stuff.

I passed this video along to my DM, since he hinted that our next mission in our Planescape campaign will involve going to Greyhawk and finding some sort of technological artifact... My gnome artificer is currently doing a lot of research in the libraries of Sigil to see what he can learn..... thanks for the fun content!!!!

There was an 80s cartoon, Visionaries, that had the premise of magic returning to a world and causing the collapse of a technological age.

Agreed, there was always an undercurrent of a greater magical civilization in the past. The one that has long tickled my mind is the Kwalish Contraption(?) A barrel that is in effect a two person submarine, that looks and acts like a giant crawfish. Edit: Just went to look up the name, it's not an artifact?! Apparatus of Kwalish.

Fantastic I think you nailed this one Joe! Super research you should make a document of all these ideas. I really think that's the best explanation for the the story of how two mighty civilizations destroyed themselves utterly in events know as the Rain of Colorless Fire and the Invoked Devastation! for sure. Thank you looking forward to the next video 😎🎲🤺🦖👑

I link the rise and fall of magic to the belief in DETERMINISM. The more the world / civilizations believe in absolute things will always happen. eg. X + Y = A the idea and power of magic will of course go down. People aren't allowed to explore as much because most situations are "known". Safetyism creeps in as well. Conversely, the more generalization is favored over determination, eg. X + Y = A most of the time (generally speaking) but there's still plenty of cases where it doesn't. We just can ever admit to fully knowing it will happen, and therefore have to be more humble in our prognostications. Places like this, magic starts to flourish again.

Thought provoking. I can use this, for sure. Quite interesting concepts!

Look up precession, it's happening to us as we speak. It takes our Earth 25,920 years to go full circle. The Egyptians called theirs Zep Tepi, meaning golden age, or something like that. Your analysis of Greyhawk's cycles is brilliant and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Makes sense to me anyway.

Great ideas right here for later campaign material: the gradual change of Oerth from a world of magic to one of technology! For now I may just plant the tiniest seeds of this, an eccentric sage that shares his theory that magic is slowly dwindling away with anyone who will listen. To further discredit him, he offers highly perilous missions to the party to further his research with meagre rewards beyond scientific knowledge: climb to the mountain tops to count the number of eggs being lain by nesting dragons, and the like. And of course, by campaign end they find out the crazy sage was right!

I think I read somewhere that magic is continuously declining because of Tharizdun? But I forgot where I read it and I forgot the details.

Thanks for another great video. 🙂 This may be a really wacky question...but didn't the original gold box even allude to there being an interdimensional accident (or was it an accident...?) where a U.S. Air Force ballistic missile silo gets somehow magically plane-shifted into the Cairn Hills? Not even kidding; I *know* I read that somewhere. Would the USAF personnel, with their knowledge on how to launch the thing, have gone with it? Since the gold box was published in the 80s when all those "end of the world" Cold War movies came out, this would presumably be a Minuteman II ICBM. Imagine a party of adventurers somehow figuring out how to arm and launch it, and aiming it straight at Dorakaa...

I had it that Tharizdun was actually Magic incarnate and when he was imprisoned magic started to reduce and with the twin cataclysm the level of magic used there meant that the level of magic now is far less. This was written in to a campaign called 'For the Love of Magic'. The gist of the Campaign Arc was, Sehanine Moonbow wants to ascend to Greater God, but needs to increase the level of magic in the world so that she can lead the Elves back to the Feywild via the moon-arches. The story of Tharizdun was a Lie created by Asmodeus to turn the gods against Tharizdun so that Asmodeus could keep the power that he had gained from Tharizdun, (Separate background document supporting this, dealing with a battle between Aeshma and Mok'slyk ). This means that any plans that she puts forth has to be subtle or covert so that she does not tip her hand to the Greater gods, or Asmodeus for fear of reprisal by both as well as having to work with and against the Cults of Tharizdun.

Thanks!

Good stuff! Thanks for the content! Cheers!

Vance to Vecna one dying other thriving in death

My all time favorite 11th level spell has to be the "Deplorable word" of CS Lewis. Jadis actually had it....Vladimir Putin seems like to play that he has it. lol

Very interesting !

The Magic Goes Away was Larry Niven, not Farmer. How do you know Vance by heart but not Niven?

We all know Gary’s love of Vance. I think you are spot on in your assessment.