There's nothing wrong with liking them, but here's why I think those three consistently end up at the bottom:

Darokin is a merchant utopia where everyone gets along. Zero conflict means no adventures; they forgot to include anything interesting. And while it's supposed to be based on Renaissance Italy, it's like they forgot that while writing the text, and just churned out a bland generic somewhere. (Glantri does a better job capturing faux-Renaissance Italy. And faux-Germany, and faux-Transylvania. And....) Also some significant editing problems.

Atruaghin. They used a lot of tricks like big borders and a huge box around the header to stretch the word count. The actual content is padded as well: For instance, the first thing you're supposed to do is roll for your character's totem. Except your totem is just an animal grouping (like mammal or crustacean) and a diet (like carnivorous or omnivorous). They didn't even bother figuring what animals are common in the area, or whether the combinations make sense. (It's an isolated culture on the top of an immense land-locked plateau... I don't think molluscs are going to be as common as insects. And if you roll "herbivorous arachnid", I guess you're expected to roleplay a Bagheera kiplingi to earn that special XP bonus, because that's the only spider that primarily eats plants.)

Despite its terrible rep (which I can understand), I have to admit I kind of like Ierendi. It's certainly silly and doesn't fit in well with the rest of the Known World, but the islands are kind of cool and could be dropped anywhere. But they probably should have gone with a pirate theme instead of Club Med for adventurers. It's very meta fourth wall.

(GAZ1) Karameikos - Very good if you're new to the setting/game and want a detailed description of an area to start adventures in. Less good if you've been playing the earlier adventures because it contradicts/ret-cons quite a bit of material from them.

(GAZ2) Ylaruam - Concentrates far too much on a long-dead civilisation that the Immortals refuse to let anyone find out about, rather than on the civilisation that's there now. The civilisation that's there now is a rather heavy-handed pastiche of Islamic culture, which may be offensive if you have any Muslims in your group. Like GAZ1, it contradicts/ret-cons the material from earlier adventures that were set in the area.

(GAZ3) Glantri - A very good description of a villainous dystopia of a region that your players will be reluctant to visit and will want to get out of as quickly as possible. Having places like that is good for a setting, and it's nice to see such a place getting a thorough description.

(GAZ4) Ierendi - A strange gazetteer. The place it describes is basically the Caribbean. There's a lot of rather forced humour in the gazetteer that puts people off, and there's a strange emphasis on in-setting tourism which doesn't fit if you're imagining the world as a grimy pseudo-medieval setting but can be fine if you accept that the world is a highly magical place and isn't medieval at all. While this isn't the best of the gazetteers, it's by no means as bad as some people say it is.

(GAZ5) Alfheim - One of the better gazetteers. It describes an isolationist elven forest well, and it makes a change that the elves are so xenophobic because they're afraid of these short-lived humans that are surrounding them rather than going for the "aloof and arrogant" elvish stereotype. It also introduces Shadow Elves (Mystara's equivalent of Drow).

(GAZ6) Rockhome - Very middling. It adequately describes the dwarven kingdom, but it's not terribly exciting.

(GAZ7) Northern Reaches - I'm torn about this one. On the one hand it's a very good description of a viking themed area, but on the other hand it is very incompatible with the previous adventures that were set in this region. Also, it includes some metaphysical stuff about the afterlife in the setting that doesn't mesh well with the rest of the setting either.

(GAZ8) The Five Shires - Like GAZ7, I'm torn about this one too. It's got a good description of a typical hobbit filled shire, but the shire that is described seems too Tolkien and doesn't really fit in Mystara very well. And, of course, it contradicts what earlier adventures and even earlier Gazetteers say about the area!

(GAZ9) Minrothad Guilds - As with GAZ3, this describes a place that's quite hostile to outsiders, so players probably won't want to visit or stay for long. It does have a good description of the mercantile islands though, and is great background if you're planning on having adventures that involve sea travel in any major way.

(GAZ10) Orcs of Thar - Lots of fun and a great resource for playing humanoid races such as orcs and goblins. Some may find the humour a bit out of place (like that in GAZ4) and it's a bit racist in places, but it's a good gazetteer nonetheless. It also contains more information about the Shadow Elves.

Dawn of the Emperors - Although this wasn't officially in the gazetteer line of products, it was a gazetteer in all but name. It describes the two major empires - Thyatis and Alphatia - that are locked in a perpetual cold war with occasional skirmishes over colonial territories. The former of which is expansionist and warlike, and the latter is far more powerful but rather decadent and hard to provoke. It's mostly a good product, but suffers a bit from the problem that the empires are so large it's hard to do them justice.

(GAZ11) Darokin - I'm not keen on this gazetteer. It portrays the mercantile state as some kind of Randian wet dream, with the invisible hand of the market keeping everything balanced and everyone happy. For some reason I find that elves and dragons stretch my suspension of disbelief far less than the politics and economics that this gazetteer shows working fine and problem free.

(GAZ12) Ethengar - This gazetteer tries, but it is in an awkward situation. It describes the Ethengarians, who are clearly based on the Mongol hordes. The big problem with it is that these guys should be regularly invading everywhere and getting beaten back again. Unfortunately, the gazetteers for their neighbours have already been written and mention no such invasions. So the Ethengarians come across as rather impotent - always talking about taking over the world but never acting on it.

(GAZ13) The Shadow Elves - After being mentioned in two previous gazetteers (Alfheim and Thar), the Shadow Elves get their own gazetteer at last. Unfortunately, this was published as Mystara was moving into the Hollow World era, and it shows. Not only does this mean that the key elements of the Shadow Elves' history gets ret-conned here, it also means that the style has changed. Whereas the previous gazetteers were about the actions of populations, the emphasis here is now on the actions of the author's favourite Immortal NPCs. I wouldn't recommend this, to be honest.

(GAZ14) Atruaghin Clans - Again, this late gazetteer (in fact the last gazetteer if you don't count the three Hollow World ones) is all about the author's favourite Immortal NPCs and their adventures in the Hollow World and beyond. It portrays the clans as very stereotyped Native Americans too, which might be offensive to some. Again, I wouldn't recommend this one.

The only good thing about Ierendi was the Magnum PI joke

Another good rundown of the full Gazetteer line here -- very interesting to contrast and compare with Blacky's.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;817200(GAZ1) Karameikos - Very good if you're new to the setting/game and want a detailed description of an area to start adventures in. Less good if you've been playing the earlier adventures because it contradicts/ret-cons quite a bit of material from them.

Hey Blacky,

You mention a few times in your (most excellent!) descriptions about "the earlier adventures" in reference to retconning. Are they simply any B/X or BECMI modules with a publication date prior to the gazetteer, or is it more complicated than that?

Thanks!

Quote from: Atsuku Nare;817262Hey Blacky,

You mention a few times in your (most excellent!) descriptions about "the earlier adventures" in reference to retconning. Are they simply any B/X or BECMI modules with a publication date prior to the gazetteer, or is it more complicated than that?

Thanks!

You're basically right.

With only a couple of exceptions, the various adventures (the B series, the X series, the CM series, the M series, and the IM series) were all written when either Lawrence Schick or Frank Mentzer were in charge of the setting. There is a change in feel and tone between the earlier stuff under Schick and the later stuff under Mentzer, but it all fits together more or less.

Then in 1986, Mentzer left and Bruce Heard took over the reigns of the setting instead. Heard introduced Blackmoor and The Radiance to the setting, produced the Gazetteers - which ret-conned out a lot of the setting info from the Mentzer and Schick periods, added the Hollow World, and radically changed the tone yet again; making the setting "his".

There are later adventures (the DA and DDA series, the HWA and HWQ series) written during Heard's tenure; and they fit the Gazetteer era. But the earlier adventures are trickier to fit in because the descriptions they have of the regions and their histories simply don't match the Gazetteers and later adventures and supplements.

If you want the long story, a bunch of us go through it here (yes, that's an RPG.net thread) from start to finish, reading through every publication and noting how each one adds to or changes the setting.

Appreciate the link, Blacky. Now I just need to make some popcorn and sit down for a good read!

I loved all of them, to varying degrees.  Even Ierendi.