TheRPGSite

This was originally going to be the subject of a post in my livejournal but I see the issue coming up again and again here.

People keep saying stuff like "OD&D was just a game of dungeon crawling with random monsters and treasure that made no sense." Or claiming that 4e does nothing more than codify the exact way that D&D was always played.

Elsewhere I've read someone who ought to know better writing that in D&D "the fiction was secondary" to the rules until Vampire came out.

This line of thinking, while certainly based in the experiences of the people who've put it forward, is frankly rubbish when applied to the game as a whole, or more precisely, the experiences of others. How can that be?

I think what largely influences your impression of a game, and of older editions of D&D in particular, in fact, of "traditional" roleplaying in general, is the age at which you were introduced to it. If someone started playing D&D when they were 10 years old, there's a good chance they treated it as a random dungeon crawl. Then if they started to become interested in a different style of play, many people sought out other games even though D&D wasn't particularly ill-suited to other styles. Essentially people tend to attribute the style of play to the game, as opposed to their reception of it through the eyes of 10-year-olds.

This isn't to say that the adults who played D&D in the 70's and 80's were necessarily engaging in "mature themes" or anything--but many of them, who knows what percentage, received D&D as quite a bit "else" from a rules-bound tactical game, what was already known at an early date as "hack and slash". You can see this for example in the various interview threads at Dragonsfoot (e.g., the one with Tim Kask) or the reminiscences of Dave Arneson's old crew, such as Greg Svenson (http://web.tampabay.rr.com/gsvenson/svenny.html). These are people who got into D&D when they were already in their 20's; they quickly recognized the potential of the RPG form as extending quite far beyond a series of corridors and encounters (the latter consisting of a dry cycle of "to hit"/damage rolls) without rhyme or reason.

This also isn't to say that the interaction of rules and fiction was the same as what's found in so-called "story games". The games of the 70's had rules; they weren't bounded by the rules. What was done outside the rules was often motivated by agendas which simply don't match up with current popular divisions of purpose. But the shift in divisions is easily mistaken as a product of rules when it's more a matter of culture and aesthetic preference.

It's also ironic that D&D and other games of the first decade-plus of gaming tend to be seen as a thicket of rules. They're not really very complex by today's standards--at least if you exclude some of FGU's more baroque offerings. If you don't believe me, have a look at RQ II (even III), The Fantasy Trip, SPI's Dragonquest (the writing of this one gives a greater impression of complexity than the actual execution).

As one of the people who got into gaming at the age of 21, I agree entirely, Elliot. We never went through the "hack 'n' slash" or "dungeon delving" thing which seems rather universal amongst younger folk. Or, rather, your point matches exactly with my experience.

-clash

And here I was thinking you were going to talk about D&D's fetish for artifacts and how it shaped gaming experiences away from pure dungeon crawls.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen...many people sought out other games even though D&D wasn't particularly ill-suited to other styles. Essentially people tend to attribute the style of play to the game, as opposed to their reception of it through the eyes of 10-year-olds.

The implied style of the OD&D rules and modules was hack n' slash. The people you mention were pioneers who moved beyond the game supported in the published books. They were probably gaining XP for things other than combat & treasure collection, developing interesting backgrounds for their characters aside from just Elf or Dwarf and creating abilities that affected the game, beyond simply "detect sloping passage" and "find secret door". They were likely using customized wandering monster tables that took into account the setting background they'd developed on their own, and writing all their own adventures.

The blank areas in OD&D can certainly be filled out to suit one's tastes. However, there are enough rules dealing with the minutiae of dungeon-crawling, hack n' slash-type play, that rules supporting other styles are conspicuously absent by comparison.

Out of curiosity, how old were you when you first played D&D, Arnulfe? What edition? Also, I think this is somewhat important, what sorts of games had you played before your first exposure to D&D?

From here: (http://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=443511#443511)

Quote

QuoteQ: Do you think that the age at which a gamer started D&D affected how they played the game? More specifically, how concerned they were about playing "by the book", as it were. That is, players that started at a younger age are more interested in BtB play than the older beginners.

Quote from: Tim Kask, employee #1 at TSRI believe that the age at which you are first exposed to or begin participating in gaming has a great deal to do with how you approach the sanctity and inviolability of rules.
Every group of any size has at least one "rules lawyer". I know that every group I ever played miniatures with had at least one. You know the type; they have the rules memorized verbatim and insist on word for word adherence. Even when confronted with a blatant inconsistency, they are incapable of deviation or accepting a more logical interpretation.
That said, there do seem to be more among young players than old grognards such as myself. I think I know why this might be. I will use my old college group as an example.
I was a Nam vet, so I was about 4 years older than most of the members that were in the same year of college, let alone the freshman and sophomores. But, we were all in college, learning to think for ourselves, learning to interpret life. When I infected, er, introduced them to D&D, I had the only rules and we played how I said. They were all OK with that, having fun and enjoying themselves. Then some of the rest started getting the game and I was challenged a couple of times by their interpretations. My response always include something like "...that's the way I do it...", and they were pretty OK with that. The ones that weren't were usually the 18 or 19 year olds.
We are raised to follow the rules: "Don't play in the streets", "Obey the speed limit", "Always tell the truth", "don't run with scissors" etc. All of these, and soooo many more are meant to protect us when we are young. It is only after a time that we begin to challenge these dicta.
So it is with games and gamers. Younger players get a game and seem to be more prone to following the rules verbatim, even if they have a blatant inconsistency that is later corrected with errata or the like. Older gamers seem to be more able to think through that inconsistency and work out what seems more logical, I think it comes down to having more tools with which to analyze the situation and more experience to draw on in reaching an answer.

As I mentioned in an earlier thread here (http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8629), one of my all time favorite role-playing magazine articles is Bill Armintrout's article "Metamorphosis Alpha Notebook" (http://www.metamorphosisalpha.net/MA_Notebook.pdf) (linked from here (http://www.metamorphosisalpha.net/html/ma1e.html)) originally published in The Space Gamer #42.  That was the August 1981 issue.  The article talks about the lessons that Bill Armintrout learned running his Metamorphosis Alpha campaign in college a half-decade earlier and I think it stands up well as advice, even today.  His advice includes nods to campaign goals, characterization, story, verisimilitude, puzzles, and even co-GMing.

In the 1979 to 1981 period for my area and age group it was about worldbuilding and doing your "thing". The dungeon crawl as present because that what we had modules for and we were just learning what to do. But the point was, a least for my group, was to make your mark on the world. To be the king.

Partly this was because for a year prior to our discovery of D&D we played various wargames (hex and chits variety). D&D was great because it was personal (you played a character), you built up your character and YOU GOT TO DO THE HELL YOU WANTED rather than just follow some scenario in the rule book. The best were cool world changing epics and the worst were monty-haul characters loaded with magic items. Note notion of "powers" was very ill-formed in those days, it was all about the STUFF you had.

19+ attributes were the closest that we came to handing out powers thanks to the Deities and Demi-Gods. There was some notions of having character with god powers but no DM in their right mind would let those in their campaign.

Quote from: NicephorusAnd here I was thinking you were going to talk about D&D's fetish for artifacts and how it shaped gaming experiences away from pure dungeon crawls.

That's an interesting idea, sorry for the misleading title.

The reason for the thread title is that a fetish, in one of the senses of the word, is an object which is imbued by the observer with magical powers. Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fetish) describes this (undoubtedly quoting some early anthropological theory that may no longer hold much currency) that "fetishism" is a primary stage in the development of a culture. In other words, the culture externalizes and concretizes its values in physical objects--but the objects themselves "really" have no power aside from what people project onto them.

Quote from: Elliot WilenFrom here: (http://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=443511#443511)

I think Tim Kask is misidentifying the problem.  If you can find a copy, everyone should probably read William Dear's book The Dungeon Master: The Disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III (Dear was the PI who went looking for and found him).  In the book, Dear talks about interviewing the D&D players at the college he disappeared at, which he was attending while only 14 years-old.  At one point, some students tell Dear that Egbert would react to things in ways that would remind him that he was only 14 and not 18 or older like most of the other students.  Basically, it was an emotional maturity issue.  People who can't play the social side of the hobby well are going to rely on the rules, instead.  That said, I think there are plenty of kids who are emotionally mature enough to deal with the social aspects of the game (I never experienced many of the common problems people describe suffering through as teenagers and never had a hack-and-slash phase) and plenty of adults who aren't and lean on formal rules instead of social rules well into adulthood.

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeThe implied style of the OD&D rules and modules was hack n' slash. The people you mention were pioneers who moved beyond the game supported in the published books. They were probably gaining XP for things other than combat & treasure collection, developing interesting backgrounds for their characters aside from just Elf or Dwarf and creating abilities that affected the game, beyond simply "detect sloping passage" and "find secret door". They were likely using customized wandering monster tables that took into account the setting background they'd developed on their own, and writing all their own adventures.

The blank areas in OD&D can certainly be filled out to suit one's tastes. However, there are enough rules dealing with the minutiae of dungeon-crawling, hack n' slash-type play, that rules supporting other styles are conspicuously absent by comparison.

Emphasis mine.

Why must rules supporting other styles be present? We felt no lack. There was a lot of freedom there, to do what you wanted. Combat was complex and needed rules. They weren't written to "support a playstyle." That's Forge talk.

The rest of your post could have been written specifically to describe my group, except that we weren't in any sense pioneers. That's the way everyone I knew ran things in 1977. Of course, all I knew were adults...

-clash

Quote from: Elliot Wilen... If someone started playing D&D when they were 10 years old, there's a good chance they treated it as a random dungeon crawl. Then if they started to become interested in a different style of play, many people sought out other games even though D&D wasn't particularly ill-suited to other styles. Essentially people tend to attribute the style of play to the game, as opposed to their reception of it through the eyes of 10-year-olds...

:haw:
That was certainly my experience.  I largely abandoned D&D and AD&D around 1984 or so (age 13-14) for other systems (mainly MERP and Rolemaster, but also Runequest, Dragonquest, Hawkmoon, Stormbringer, GURPS, etc.) precisely because I wanted to explore 'deeper settings' than those provided by 'hack-n-slash' D&D.  I didn't completely abandon D&D, but I did come to view it as an inferior system, appropriate for only 'dungeon crawls'.

Ironically, these days I find Classic D&D quite useful for role-playing focused games.  I like the lighter rules now that I'm old.

Quote from: flyingmiceWhy must rules supporting other styles be present? We felt no lack. There was a lot of freedom there, to do what you wanted. Combat was complex and needed rules. They weren't written to "support a playstyle." That's Forge talk.

And what a lot of people miss is that some styles of play are best supported by an absence of rules governing certain elements of play.

In the 70's, I was too young to know about RPGs.  In the 80's, I was in Mexico, and I knew not a bit about them.  So I never played D&D the "Old School" way.

But I like the ideas, I like the notion of how it was played.  So to me it's not nostalgia or a fetish.  It's how I want to play.  

EDIT: Or rather, it influences the way I play very strongly.

Quote from: Elliot WilenOut of curiosity, how old were you when you first played D&D, Arnulfe? What edition? Also, I think this is somewhat important, what sorts of games had you played before your first exposure to D&D?

I was 12 (1985) when I started with D&D Red & Blue box edition. I'd already played the Swedish RPG Drakar och Demoner for a year at that point. Now, the Swedish game was also a swords & sorcery RPG, but a wider variety of playstyles was supported in the printed books. Although I had some fun with OD&D's nonsensical dungeoncrawls, I soon moved on to AD&D1, which offered a bit more variety, so I kept playing that for a few years, but ultimately it was still a nonsensical dungeon-hacking game. Then I discovered WFRP and never looked back.

I was never much of a house-ruler until the past few years, so if a game didn't support what I wanted, I'd seek out one that did.

That said, if I hadn't learned to play Drakar och Demoner already when I was 12, OD&D would've been a perfect introductory game. I actually broke down in tears the first time I tried running the Swedish game because it made me feel like a stupid child. :( :)

Quote from: flyingmiceWhy must rules supporting other styles be present? We felt no lack. There was a lot of freedom there, to do what you wanted. Combat was complex and needed rules. They weren't written to "support a playstyle." That's Forge talk.

Heh, when you have rules for detecting sloping passages, finding secret doors and Saves vs Dragon Breath, but only Halflings can attempt to hide, it implies a certain playstyle. It basically says "this is a dungeoncrawling game, and unless you're a Halfling, you have to fight." Now if the rules had been more universally rules-light, and not so meticulous about defining the dungeon-exploration / combat aspects, I might buy into your theory.

Elliott is right, but is points only will make sense to the unitiated if they do some research on the genesis, history and reception of D&D in the 70ies.

Wargames is the key word, club is the second one. D&D was written for adults, adults of a specific background.

What others, who lacked the specific socialization made of it, is history.

Only on rare occasion did anything worthwhile come from someone lacking a  (old school) wargaming/ club gamer background. I could possibly name five (in print) people who really understand RPGs in this day and age.

Quote from: Elliot WilenThe reason for the thread title is that a fetish, in one of the senses of the word, is an object which is imbued by the observer with magical powers. Wikipedia describes this (undoubtedly quoting some early anthropological theory that may no longer hold much currency) that "fetishism" is a primary stage in the development of a culture.

A case could be made from an entirely materialistic standpoint that culture is ONLY fetishism. From that you could argue that the only real differences between cultures are differences in form and presentation of artifacts.

Anyways, I think you're right about D&D. D&D is primal fetishism. It makes relics out of old character sheets and totems out of a stack of hardback rulebooks. The dungeon crawl itself is a ritual with no obligation to make sense beyond the circle of participants. In that sense, it's a lot like a cave painting of some ancient hunt. It's a convergence of random events in a controlled setting that forms the basis of a heroic tale in the minds of the participants. Powerful and primitive social magic that can't be reliably explained but only experienced. And IMO, a much more 'real' experience than the forced plot you see in most 'storyteller' games.

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeHeh, when you have rules for detecting sloping passages, finding secret doors and Saves vs Dragon Breath, but only Halflings can attempt to hide, it implies a certain playstyle. It basically says "this is a dungeoncrawling game, and unless you're a Halfling, you have to fight." Now if the rules had been more universally rules-light, and not so meticulous about defining the dungeon-exploration / combat aspects, I might buy into your theory.

It's not a theory. I don't do theory. It's a fact. That's the way we played, and we didn't need any rules "supporting" it. No-one in the circle of GMs I knew played any different. I ran D&D, then AD&D, once a week for 20 years and in that time I ran maybe 5 dungeons. The vast majority of our play was in cities or in the wilderness. We almost never ran modules - the Village of Hommlet and something else I can't remember were it for me, both heavily modded to fit my setting. We never used minis either. That's the way everyone I knew played.

-clash

Quote from: KellriAnyways, I think you're right about D&D. D&D is primal fetishism. It makes relics out of old character sheets and totems out of a stack of hardback rulebooks. The dungeon crawl itself is a ritual with no obligation to make sense beyond the circle of participants. In that sense, it's a lot like a cave painting of some ancient hunt. It's a convergence of random events in a controlled setting that forms the basis of a heroic tale in the minds of the participants. Powerful and primitive social magic that can't be reliably explained but only experienced. And IMO, a much more 'real' experience than the forced plot you see in most 'storyteller' games.

Wow...very well put, Kellri!

QuoteIf someone started playing D&D when they were 10 years old, there's a good chance they treated it as a random dungeon crawl. Then if they started to become interested in a different style of play, many people sought out other games even though D&D wasn't particularly ill-suited to other styles. Essentially people tend to attribute the style of play to the game, as opposed to their reception of it through the eyes of 10-year-olds...

I did start to play it when I was 10, and we did play it as a dungeon-crawl. But that was the best part! I can't begin to convey the sense of wonder we had creating and exploring magical labyrinths full of monsters. We absolutely loved maps, and we loved exploring - the most serious transgression in our group was peeking at the DMs map. It wasn't crude playing at all - there was more wonder, drama, and imagination in one of our homebrew dungeoncrawls than in any AAR I've read of a sophisticated storytelling game.

Our play style did involve into more free-roaming wilderness campaigns, with evolving storylines and ongoing narratives. Our games became gritty, and took on a sometimes darkly ironic and fatalistic tone. But we never felt the urge to either ramp up the mechanical complexity, or to explore more 'sophisticated' setting-based games. We never got into deep PC backgrounds or tried to emulate serious fiction. We played D&D and it was good enough for what we wanted to do.

Despite starting as 10-year-olds, we never had any of those socialization issues that others bring up in their hatred of early D&D. The DM's weren't domineering assholes. The players weren't rules-lawyering munchkins. Nobody played favourites. We did meet players like that, but we ran them out of our group immediately. Maybe that's because we're all close friends outside of gaming, and fairly well-adjusted socially.

But perhaps my experiences are unusual, being the only hardcore gamer in a largely casual group who have played together for almost 30 years.

* If we had been exposed to it at the right time, I'm pretty sure we would have switched to WFRP.

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeHeh, when you have rules for detecting sloping passages, finding secret doors and Saves vs Dragon Breath, but only Halflings can attempt to hide, it implies a certain playstyle. It basically says "this is a dungeoncrawling game, and unless you're a Halfling, you have to fight." Now if the rules had been more universally rules-light, and not so meticulous about defining the dungeon-exploration / combat aspects, I might buy into your theory.

I never saw the rules that way.  In fact, I wonder if this assumption (and a few related ones) are key to the way people experience the hobby.  Some people seem to see the rules as a straightjacket while other people tend to see the rules as guidelines.  I never saw the absence of rules for social interaction in an RPG to mean that social interaction wasn't important.  I saw the absence of rules as an indication that you didn't need rules to work that stuff out.  I never had a problem with tinkering with rules or creating my own rules and random tables yet some people seem to need "permission" from the game author to do this.  I also never had a problem with ignoring rules to make the game run faster, while other people describe groups where players demand to use every rule in the book.  Perhaps the key here is the realization that the rules serve you rather than you serving the rules?

Quote from: John MorrowI never saw the absence of rules for social interaction in an RPG to mean that social interaction wasn't important.  I saw the absence of rules as an indication that you didn't need rules to work that stuff out.

Bingo, John.

-clash

Quote from: John MorrowI think Tim Kask is misidentifying the problem.

I think via a little charitable reading you can reconcile his opinion with yours. We're talking tendencies here. I'm assuming most people pass through similar stages of development; the exact timing varies, but in the general population there are apparent trends.

In other words, sure, it's a social maturity issue, but "maturity" is tied to age (more loosely in some than others, but nevertheless); even the folk-term "munchkin" for a certain style of play reflects an observation (or if you must, opinion) that it's found most commonly among younger players.

I find it hard to argue with Elliot's main point: that your perception of "traditional" gaming is heavily influenced by your start in the hobby.

However, I also remember a lot of articles, letters to the editor, and published adventures and supplements that seem to indicate that the hobby as a whole started out in large part by dungeon-crawling. I can remember numerous "What Happens When The Adventure Ends" and "Get Your Party Out Of The Dungeon" and "101 Town Encounters" style articles in Dragon magazine and elsewhere.

I am sure there were lots of groups doing lots of different types of gaming, even back in '78 when I started, but I do think there has been a gradual transformation of what is considered the norm, and that it generally coincides with our nostalgic rememberings of "traditional" D&D.

My whole progress in the 80's could be summed up as "The Quest for Better Rules" by better rules I mean rules that elegantly supported aspects of fantasy role-playing. More options for combat, more options for spell casting, more monsters ,etc ,etc.  Better rules could also mean cool rules for cool genres epitomized by Traveller, Paranoia, and Call of Cthulu.

Understand that making up your own shit takes only so far when you don't know much in the first place because of age or experience. THE GAME was still D&D in both it's B/X/C version and AD&D version.  

It wasn't until White Wolf and Vampire hit that I saw a serious alternative style of play arose in RPGs. After Vampire the Masquerade was released I started to see large numbers of different type of role-players in addition to the earlier crowd.

The lack of rules didn't inhibit styles so much. More was a saw of uneven play, arguments, lack of playtesting, lack of maturity in some groups, etc. With a good rules system a lot of those problems went away along with the benefit of additional possibilities put in by the game's designers.

Again I stress there was a large large group that was happy with Mentzer's D&D or AD&D and never moved on to anything else. When 2nd edition came out most of that crowd withered and turned to 2nd edition AD&D, but by then there was the vampire crowd as well.

I will also point out that the mid 80's was when Japanese Anime hit hard and there were a hell of a lot of BattleTech, RoboTech, etc fans. Paladium Games benefited the most from supporting that crowd with TMNT, RoboTech, and finally Rifts.

Quote from: cmagounHowever, I also remember a lot of articles, letters to the editor, and published adventures and supplements that seem to indicate that the hobby as a whole started out in large part by dungeon-crawling. I can remember numerous "What Happens When The Adventure Ends" and "Get Your Party Out Of The Dungeon" and "101 Town Encounters" style articles in Dragon magazine and elsewhere.

Definitely. The model for the earliest games was a single dungeon that players return to again and again. By the time I started playing in '79 the horizons had widened a bit. But you only have to look at the dungeon (B1) bundled with the Holmes Basic set (the first version of D&D to achieve mass-market reach) to see that dungeons were still central to the game. We learned what the game was about by buying those old pastel dungeons, and until Hommlet those were all, well, dungeons. We never did stop calling published adventures 'dungeons.'

Quote from: John MorrowI never saw the rules that way.  In fact, I wonder if this assumption (and a few related ones) are key to the way people experience the hobby.  Some people seem to see the rules as a straightjacket while other people tend to see the rules as guidelines.  I never saw the absence of rules for social interaction in an RPG to mean that social interaction wasn't important.  I saw the absence of rules as an indication that you didn't need rules to work that stuff out.  I never had a problem with tinkering with rules or creating my own rules and random tables yet some people seem to need "permission" from the game author to do this.  I also never had a problem with ignoring rules to make the game run faster, while other people describe groups where players demand to use every rule in the book.  Perhaps the key here is the realization that the rules serve you rather than you serving the rules?

Sure, I too made judgement calls on how to resolve climbing attempts by non-Thief characters, or how non-Halflings could hide. But I can't see how anyone could read the OD&D rulebook and modules as being more than a dungeoncrawl game -- it's simply not there, neither in the rules nor in the flavour text. The Expert set included a page on how to build a castle once you'd collected enough treasure, but that was about it. And I don't recall any modules supporting epic play until Battlesystem came out for AD&D. Being able to kill monsters and take their stuff outdoors was about as far as it deviated from the formula in the first 3-4 boxed sets.

OD&D talks lovingly about fighting through 20' x 20' rooms and breaking down doors, but where's the love for shadowing enemies through crowded markets or piloting rowboats down treacherous rapids? OD&D didn't conjure that kind of imagery, neither with rules nor in the flavour text. We did have a lot of fun playing D&D dungeoncrawls for awhile, and I still get the warm and fuzzies looking back at some of the graph paper mazes I designed. But other RPGs were clearly written by people who's tastes were closer to my own, and inspired me to create games like the fantasy fiction I was reading in ways that D&D didn't.

It was less about being a 'slave' to the rules, and more about wanting rules that seemed to care about more than just dungeoncrawling.

Dungeon adventures only?  Bullshit.

Dude, one of the OD&D rulebooks was titled "The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures."

That book had rules for overland movement.  There were rules for castles, a bit about kingdom income.  There were rules to determine what happened when you approached a castle or town.  The monsters section had encounter tables for the wilderness.  Rules for naval combat.  Rules for aerial combat.  (What more did you need?)

Later editions of D&D (B/X, BECMI, AD&D, etc.) expanded on this info.  It was a bit more than "a page" on castle building.  Yes, your basic sets concentrated on the dungeon because they were basic sets.  But they said plenty about what was upcoming in the expert set (wilderness!).

One of the earliest campaign-style supplements for OD&D was called The Wilderlands of High Fantasy.  Its most popular and enduring supplement was a city setting.

The rules were always about more than dungeoncrawling.

EDIT: As per Clash's request, my first RPG experiences were at age 6 in 1982; my older brothers (12 and 13 at the time), stuck with babysitting me, begrudgingly let me play in their weekly game because it was easier than keeping track of my running around like a nut.  I really started playing on my own 4 years later using my brothers' old Moldvay/Cook boxes, then inherited all their AD&D stuff a year or so after that!

Could people please state how old they were when they started RPG gaming and when that was in their posts? For the record, I was 21 in 1977.

Haffrung started 2 years later than I, in 1979, yet his experience was very definitely tied to dungeon delving, and his group bought lots of dungeon oriented modules from which they "learned what the game was about."

My experience couldn't be more different. We almost never ran modules, we played in our own world, most of our adventures were urban/town or wilderness, and we learned what the game was about by just playing it. This was the pattern all the other GMs and groups I knew of - all also adults - followed.

This is so radically different I am staggered, and wonder what the ages as well as years involved were for him.

BTW - Rock ON Ken! You the man! :D

-clash

Hang on a sec, the third booklet of OD&D is "The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures". 1st edition expert set by Cook, published 1981, also explicitly describes making an outdoors, setting up kingdoms, etc. It included the outdoor adventure "Isle of Dread" in the box set.

Even the Holmes Basic set was including "The Keep on the Borderlands" in 1979. Someone correct me if I'm wrong but "Keep" is somewhat more than just a dungeon or even complex of dungeons.

As for AD&D, the DMG (1979) has extensive material on outdoor adventures and kingdom and campaign building.

EDIT: cross posted with Ken & Clash.

I will start a thread just for this subject Clash.

Edit

Started (http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10409) This will, I hope, also be useful for reference.

My first encounter with the game was around '76 or '77 when I was about 10 or 11 years old. It was only a brief session but I got a glimpse of both dungeon and town adventures, with a promise (never fulfilled) of adventuring into swamp. The group was several 16-year olds and the DM was a wargamer.

Next time I played OD&D (white box) was about a year or two later, and by that time I'd started playing Avalon Hill style wargames. Bought the AD&D books as soon as each one came out.

I edited my post above to include Clash's requested info!

Started (http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10409) a thread which we can use a reference materials!

Quote from: KenHRLater editions of D&D (B/X, BECMI, AD&D, etc.) expanded on this info.  It was a bit more than "a page" on castle building.  Yes, your basic sets concentrated on the dungeon because they were basic sets.  But they said plenty about what was upcoming in the expert set (wilderness!).

Maybe 2 pages on castle-building then? I don't have the books in front of me. I did mention that OD&D touted running outdoor dungeoncrawls as well.

Maybe I was just spoiled at a young age by Drakar och Demoner, which conjured imagery that I thought was much cooler and had rules that didn't constantly need to be tweaked or invented on-the-fly if you wanted to play outside of the dungeon/monster/treasure formula. All in a single softback book not much thicker than BD&D, too. I would've kept playing that game if my folks hadn't moved me back to Canada.

Another question, HA--how did you learn D&D? Did you form your own group or join an existing one?

Quote from: Elliot WilenHang on a sec, the third booklet of OD&D is "The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures". 1st edition expert set by Cook, published 1981, also explicitly describes making an outdoors, setting up kingdoms, etc. It included the outdoor adventure "Isle of Dread" in the box set.

Even the Holmes Basic set was including "The Keep on the Borderlands" in 1979. Someone correct me if I'm wrong but "Keep" is somewhat more than just a dungeon or even complex of dungeons.

As for AD&D, the DMG (1979) has extensive material on outdoor adventures and kingdom and campaign building.

EDIT: cross posted with Ken & Clash.

Yes, I own or at one point owned all of the material you mentioned and I do not contend your point one bit. Still, am I misremembering the various articles about introducing your group to bits other than dungeoneering and hack-and-slash? As much as there can be a norm of how various groups run their games, I think there was a lot of ink given to transforming that norm from an episodic, kill & loot style to a more campaign-centric one.

Again, these memories could be in the brain cells I lost to Guiness...

Quote from: Elliot WilenAnother question, HA--how did you learn D&D? Did you form your own group or join an existing one?

I formed my own BD&D group. The kids up the street had already graduated to MERP, which was a bit too advanced for me at the time.

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeMaybe 2 pages on castle-building then? I don't have the books in front of me. I did mention that OD&D touted running outdoor dungeoncrawls as well.

Expert also had naval rules, mounted combat, a brief bit about aerial combat, special attack forms usable outdoors (swoop, bombard, etc.).  There was lots more in there than you're remembering.  Actually, the only reason I probably remember a lot of this is because I'm prepping a B/X game in my spare time. :)

I've heard some stuff (always good) about Drakar och Demoner...maybe you could say a bit more about it?  What made it cooler, how did the systems work, etc?  Maybe a new thread is needed for that, but I'd love to hear about it.

Quote from: KenHRExpert also had naval rules, mounted combat, a brief bit about aerial combat, special attack forms usable outdoors (swoop, bombard, etc.).  There was lots more in there than you're remembering.  Actually, the only reason I probably remember a lot of this is because I'm prepping a B/X game in my spare time. :)

I'd have to go back and look. Although really I was interested in more details on non-combat action stuff (stealth, jumping, climbing, swinging over chasms etc.).

Quote from: KenHRI've heard some stuff (always good) about Drakar och Demoner...maybe you could say a bit more about it?  What made it cooler, how did the systems work, etc?  Maybe a new thread is needed for that, but I'd love to hear about it.

The first edition which I played was basically a slight adaptation of Runequest with a Nordic fantasy flavour.

Elliott: I have to disagree with your assertion.  Those of us who started in our early teens were playing stories with plot and focusing on roleplaying of the personality of our character even concurrently with the dungeon crawling.  

The LIE that the Forgers and other Swine have always pushed was the idea that the Dungeon Crawl was like a kind of video-game where no roleplaying went on, only "roll-playing". But it was NEVER like this.

4e is more likely to be closer to this than any other version of D&D ever was.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeI'd have to go back and look. Although really I was interested in more details on non-combat action stuff (stealth, jumping, climbing, swinging over chasms etc.).

Ah, understood.  Some of that was covered, albeit briefly.  The rest was covered under a catch-all paragraph in the DM's chapter headed "But That's Not In The Rules!"  Which was the best paragraph in the entire set, imo; it basically told the DM to improv, and gave a couple of quick examples and ideas to help you do that (ability checks debuted here, I think?).

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeThe first edition which I played was basically a slight adaptation of Runequest with a Nordic fantasy flavour.

Neat!  One of my unfulfilled wishes is to run an RQ3 game with the Vikings set.  I did run a RoleMaster game in a Nordic-type setting, but I'd like to take RQ for a spin one day; I've never been able to interest any of my gaming buddies in it, though.

I recall that before my 14th birthday I was already creating my own homebrew settings with 50 pages of setting materials (not dungeons or stats, but descriptions of places and histories), and our gaming at that time was of an urban campaign with dueling thieves' guilds, dangerous archwizards, etc etc.  Occasionally trolling through the sewers was the closest to dungeon crawling that we ever did in that campaign.

RPGPundit

Quote from: KenHRAh, understood.  Some of that was covered, albeit briefly.  The rest was covered under a catch-all paragraph in the DM's chapter headed "But That's Not In The Rules!"  Which was the best paragraph in the entire set, imo; it basically told the DM to improv, and gave a couple of quick examples and ideas to help you do that (ability checks debuted here, I think?).

I thought ability checks were an AD&D thing, but I did use them in BD&D after an older friend suggested it. Still, after playing Drakar och Demoner, modded D&D felt pretty patchy (e.g. should Thieves use their Climbing skill or roll against Dex like everyone else?)

Quote from: KenHRNeat!  One of my unfulfilled wishes is to run an RQ3 game with the Vikings set.  I did run a RoleMaster game in a Nordic-type setting, but I'd like to take RQ for a spin one day; I've never been able to interest any of my gaming buddies in it, though.

It wasn't based on Nordic mythology or anything, but the monster descriptions, character names etc. were very Scandinavian (I believe Arnulfe was one of the suggested character names :p ). Some of the adventures were specifically Nordic though. I still have one of the early modules, in which the PCs sail to France on a viking ship and have to infiltrate a bandit village.

Quote from: RPGPunditElliott: I have to disagree with your assertion.  Those of us who started in our early teens were playing stories with plot and focusing on roleplaying of the personality of our character even concurrently with the dungeon crawling.

Oh yeah, there was plenty of roleplaying going on, even though we were mostly doing dungeoncrawls and giving our characters names like Bob the Barbarian.

Quote from: RPGPunditI recall that before my 14th birthday I was already creating my own homebrew settings with 50 pages of setting materials (not dungeons or stats, but descriptions of places and histories), and our gaming at that time was of an urban campaign with dueling thieves' guilds, dangerous archwizards, etc etc. Occasionally trolling through the sewers was the closest to dungeon crawling that we ever did in that campaign.

Totally, I loved drawing world maps, even if their only purpose was for players to travel from one dungeon to the next, getting into some fights along the way, or shopping for new gear in the nearest town. I think it took WFRP to teach me about making good town adventures that weren't essentially dungeoncrawls amid a bunch of buildings.

Quote from: RPGPunditElliott: I have to disagree with your assertion.  Those of us who started in our early teens were playing stories with plot and focusing on roleplaying of the personality of our character even concurrently with the dungeon crawling.

See my reply to John Morrow earlier in the thread. The fact that you were a bit precocious (and if I may say so myself, so was I, at least in aspirations) doesn't disprove a trend.

QuoteThe LIE that the Forgers and other Swine have always pushed was the idea that the Dungeon Crawl was like a kind of video-game where no roleplaying went on, only "roll-playing". But it was NEVER like this.

I think this thread and others show that it was like this...for some groups. But I don't think it was like this for groups that were in contact directly or indirectly with Gygax & Arneson, or for many other groups. My hypothesis is that the groups which picked up D&D and only used it for h&s dungeon crawling were disproportionately younger, while the ones that quickly implemented more full-blown campaigns were older on average.

Quote4e is more likely to be closer to this than any other version of D&D ever was.

I think you're probably right here, in that 4e sounds like it's going to be focused more on that style of play. But I wouldn't rule out the possibility that some selective editing will allow groups to run a wider range of games. That's not to say there won't be problems when people go from group to group, or when a DM decides to take the bit in his teeth only to find that the group has been conditioned to expect rote by the book play.

Quote from: cmagounStill, am I misremembering the various articles about introducing your group to bits other than dungeoneering and hack-and-slash? As much as there can be a norm of how various groups run their games, I think there was a lot of ink given to transforming that norm from an episodic, kill & loot style to a more campaign-centric one.

Again, these memories could be in the brain cells I lost to Guiness...

I didn't read the Dragon much. I've found a couple indexes on the web, though:

http://www.aeolia.net/dragondex/
http://home.earthlink.net/~dmindex/index.html
Also the Acaeum http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/periodicals/dragon.html

Generally, I wouldn't deny that the dungeon was the "basic" scenario. The first dungeon (http://web.tampabay.rr.com/gsvenson/FirstDungeonAdv.html) that Arneson ran is remembered as a landmark, and Gygax equally playtested his draft of the rules using a dungeon--most likely Castle Greyhawk.

Quote from: Wired"There is a ruined castle that you have heard is filled with strange monsters and treasures, and you want to get them," he explained. "Your object is to slay the monsters and take their treasures and become more powerful. Go!" The players would make choices — go east, open a door — and Gygax would riff on what happened. When things got slow, he would roll a die and say, "Why are you standing in this dead-end corridor trying to look for a secret door? The Orcs have you cornered! Now you must fight them!"

(Source (http://www.wired.com/gaming/virtualworlds/news/2008/03/ff_gygax?currentPage=all)).

But it was understood from an early date, really before and concurrently with the publication of the game, that outdoor adventures were also an important element. Check this out. (http://mmrpg.zeitgeistgames.com/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&p=6168&sid=43898f3e0bb79aef41a5872636b93d1c#6168) See how Robert the Bald goes on a series of wild overland and sea adventures. Also

QuotePlayers were constantly wandering off to other places in the map, and David usually had something waitng for us wherever we went. Identifying Blackmoor as the game with the dungeon does not do it justice. A great deal of adventuring happened outside of blackmoor town, let alone the dungeon.

As noted above, the game did have the rules needed for outdoor adventures, but based on my own experience, the dungeon was such an easy, compact scenario that people inevitably started with that. It was then a question not so much of whether you could see outside the dungeon, but when--and how much additional prodding or support you needed. The latter were provided in those Dragon magazines, word of mouth, Judge's Guild publications, etc.

Quote from: Herr ArnulfeI thought ability checks were an AD&D thing

Nope, they're not in AD&D 1e, at least not the core 3 books. I believe the idea first saw print in a D&D rulebook in Moldvay Basic (the second version of basic), though they may have been in Holmes.

I'm not a fan of them unless applied very carefully--as I believe you've noticed, they can overshadow class abilities making the latter meaningless.

Quote from: RPGPunditThe LIE that the Forgers and other Swine have always pushed was the idea that the Dungeon Crawl was like a kind of video-game where no roleplaying went on, only "roll-playing". But it was NEVER like this.

I've been running "dungeon crawls" for twenty years, and between the wizard who hires them, the townsfolk who supply them, the monsters they encounter, and their interactions with each other, there's plenty of role-playing.

I began roleplaying on April 1st, 1983 - I was 11.

We played AD&D, but I didn't really read or understand most of the rules, and went and bought myself Basic D&D with my saved-up pocket money. I was a bit confused about what was Basic and what Advanced.

Our first adventures were just the AD&D modules. We'd play them through, then when it was completed the GM would hand us the module to look over and see what we'd missed!

By about 14 I had all my own rulebooks and my own fantasy game world of "Eron", centered around an inland sea, but I didn't GM it until 16. I was with my girlfriend and I was sitting there rolling dice taking my character through a random dungeon - no, I don't know why I was reading a book and rolling dice with my girlfriend sitting by me - and she said, "can I play?" and she was the first player through Eron.

I couldn't afford to buy a lot of modules so I made up my own adventures. These involved a lot of wilderness travel and survival stuff.

Along the way we played bits and pieces of other games, but AD&D was the major one through those years.

Then I got to university and played in the club there, someone GMed Rolemaster, I liked that they had skill lists, and so my regular campaign converted from AD&D to Rolemaster.

After that I really branched out into lots of different games.

Did my early experiences shape my perspective of roleplaying games? I dunno - I was a crap roleplayer and decent GM then, and am a crap roleplayer and decent GM now :cool:

I started in 1979 when I was nine. Bought the Holmes D&D set (the one with B1) myself, and was somewhat baffled. My best friends bought it a few months later, and we were still puzzled. (Frankly, the Holmes book is a terrible introductory ruleset to D&D. The artwork is pure awesome, though). Finally, we played a few sessions with another friend's older brother (11 years old) and his group. We realized they were being assholes, so we started our own group. That group is still together.

The first dungeon I read was B1: In Search of the Unknown. It's basically a huge labyrinth filled with abandoned halls and weird effects and locations. A very different adventure altogether than B2: Keep in the Borderlands. With the dense maps and wondrous features to inspire us, we started creating our own dungeons right away. My buddy's dad was a draftsman, so we had plent of graph paper, rulers, compasses, etc. We were both also quite good artists, so we illustrated our own dungeons.

At the same time, we were buying up the classic pastel D&D modules - White Plume Mountain, the Giant Series, the Drow series, Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan. These gave us further inspiration for dungeon design.

We did use city and wilderness material as well. I got City State of the World Emperor for my 11th birthday. My buddy bought Invincible Overlord shortly after. But the outdoor and city material wasn't much more than a change of pace or backdrop for the meat of dungeon delving.

Eventually I got into world design in a big way - this was when I was maybe 15 or 16. But by then the halcyon days of D&D were already giving way to partying, smoking dope, and girls.

Huh, odd. My roleplaying experiences are very similar to Kyle's, other than a slight age difference and sans girlfriend. Possibly an Aussie thing :p

I began roleplaying around 1984 at age 9, with the D&D basic stuff. It was a birthday present from my folks. I am told it was to encourage me to read more (it worked). In all honesty, my interest in the hobby was brief and died out shortly later.

Late high school started roleplaying again (after being told I shouldn't play contact sports for at least a year after a rather bad concussion from playing schoolboy Rugby League and prolonged hospital stay due to eye surgery). Loved the hobby, dungeon-crawled with the guys at high school and wasn't aware there was anything else (it wasn't like we had computers or had a gaming store anywhere nearby). Got the school to officially name it as Sports alternative. Bought my first AD&D books via the newspaper trading-post.

Went to University and started playing Rolemaster with the local Uni gaming club.

I know what transformed my game/gaming style from dungeon-crawling to something different however, having given it some thought in the past. Firstly, it was a change in my taste of fiction. Up until late high school I was reading and watching pulpy high fiction. Then I started getting more interested into Hard SF and world building style fantasy. I started writing short stories in those same styles and that directly influenced my gaming, since I was shit at dialogue and used to use my story worlds in my games as a dodgy way to get more natural dialogue (I have embarrassing mag-tape recordings of our early game sessions .. we were drunk a lot in them :haw: ).

Secondly, I started to get more socially and politically involved at University, mainly because the people who were gamers and my friends were involved. For us, our games modified to become more heavy on political plots at the same time.

Basically, for me at least, my gaming and gaming requirements matured as I did. Did my experiences early on shape what I do now? A little; I have a dice addiction and I still roleplay, but I think my gaming has changed as I have.

Quote from: flyingmiceCould people please state how old they were when they started RPG gaming and when that was in their posts?

I was 13.  Bought my first RPG with no idea what the fuck it even was on 31 Dec 1987 -- WEG's 1st-edition Star Wars game, because it said "Star Wars" on it.  Oh, and I started gaming as a GM, not a player.  

Set the tone for the rest of my gaming life, as it turns out...

Quote from: Elliot WilenI think what largely influences your impression of a game, and of older editions of D&D in particular, in fact, of "traditional" roleplaying in general, is the age at which you were introduced to it.

My personal experience leads me to disagree with this assertion.

I started playing around 10-11 years old and for several years typically played with hack-n-slash dungeon crawls, using D&D and later Rolemaster.

Later on, around age 18, I played in my first Rolemaster campaign where there was more to the story than just killing monsters and taking their stuff. A few years later I played in a D&D campaign of a similar nature.

My impressions of games now aren't necessarily related to these past experiences as much. I have stronger impressions of game masters than I do of games.

Lately though, my impressions of some games has been tainted by the people posting on forums. The rash of D&D character optimization talk, where people go into great detail discussing various "builds" for characters and providing a mathematical analysis of how much damage they can deal per turn has really stuck in my head as being indicative of D&D in general. I realize that I can play any way I wish, and that these people have no influence over my game, but for some reason this irrational notion sticks with me.

I was finishing up a blog posting when I ran across this thread... interesting coincidence. My thoughts here (http://lotfp.blogspot.com/2008/05/is-this-how-d-is-supposed-to-be-played.html).

Quote from: Elliot WilenNope, they're not in AD&D 1e, at least not the core 3 books. I believe the idea first saw print in a D&D rulebook in Moldvay Basic (the second version of basic), though they may have been in Holmes.

I'm not a fan of them unless applied very carefully--as I believe you've noticed, they can overshadow class abilities making the latter meaningless.

You're right, I checked and Saves vs Attributes are mentioned in the back of the Moldvay Expert book (in the Handling Player Characters section). I seem to recall some DMs adapting regular saving throws to other applications (e.g. Save vs. Spells could be used to resist extreme weather conditions, Save vs. Dragon Breath could be used to dodge falling boulders, etc.). However, I found it rather messy trying to draw meaningful connections (e.g. what the heck does a save vs. Wand represent?) so I fell back on attribute saves more often than not.

Quote from: JimLotFP I was finishing up a blog posting when I ran across this thread... interesting coincidence. My thoughts here.

Excellent blog post!

JimLotFP - I just read your blog post. I've done a bit of work on the upcoming version of OSRIC. I don't necessarily agree with everything you've said, but it's a very valid point of view. You might want to drop by the Knights & Knaves Alehouse - this is exactly the kind of discussion we love.

Quote from: JimLotFPI was finishing up a blog posting when I ran across this thread... interesting coincidence. My thoughts here (http://lotfp.blogspot.com/2008/05/is-this-how-d-is-supposed-to-be-played.html).

I think it helped that I switched to Traveller before ever really playing D&D or AD&D.  Look at the Traveller Supplements (that include things like Library Data books about the setting and 76 Patrons) or the adventures and the were very much more open than the D&D module.

Quote from: JimLotFPMy thoughts here (http://lotfp.blogspot.com/2008/05/is-this-how-d-is-supposed-to-be-played.html).

Jim I just have to say that your blog post was a damn interesting read.

I started with RQ but I remember having trouble with the system. I can't really remember with what exactly I was having trouble with, but it most probably had something to do with how "culture" was so entwined with the rules. It was kind of limiting esp when I had so many other ideas that I wanted to incoporate which did not necesarrily have to be mechanic based. I was also having trouble structuring the campaign and character progression.

Discussing this with the other GM who was a couple of years older, he suggested the D&D boxed sets (BECMI). I remember reading them or at least the first two and thinking how great they were (still are IMO) I really dug the way how these sets were structured. Beginning at low level and progressing further up the food chain.

And I was free to handle all the "cultural" elements any way I thought best served my setting. I didn't use any of the modules for it really was not the groups thing. The campaign did start of in a dungeon - the PCs were prisoners - but moved on into city and wilderness adventures almost immediately. Of course combined with the others sets the campaign took off into many different exciting ways.

I always found it a bit funny that most gamers begin with D&D and "graduate" to something like RQ. It was the other way for me. I've always run pretty thespy games and D&D esp the boxed sets were never a barrier to the kind of adventures I wanted to run.

Regards,
David R

D&D is my late adolescence: 16-18. Make of that what you will. I started house-ruling it, but realised that RQ was already there from first principles.

Quote from: droog.... but realised that RQ was already there from first principles.

Very true.

I guess what I wanted at the time was the freedom to houserule..... if this makes any sense.

Regards,
David R

16, 1980. Experience matches those of Clash and Pundy. Single most important supplement for me was TSR's Lankhmar book (the one with the urban geomorphs). We did play the hell out of the UK modules, which are usually a combo of wilderness plus "motivated" dungeons. But the appeal of the "true," North American dungeons a la Caverns of Thracia or the G and D series I understood only when Cali et al. explained it to me.

I started playing when I was 7 in 1983.  My brother and I were playing AD&D with our cousin and his friends that were 10 years older than me.  Usually this was just them handing me a character and telling me when to roll the dice.  

Red Box D&D and Star Frontiers were the first games my brother and I started to learn how to play.  We DMed for each other back and forth.  The adventures we were trying to emulate were the ones our cousin and his friends were running with a good mix of influences.  I don't think it ever occurred to us that the system was promoting dungeon crawls or hack & slash.

Well our first D&D game was a dungeon crawl. I got the blue basic book and taugh myself but didn't grasp the fact that you didn't need a board so I drew the whole dungeon out on A0 graph paper (my dad was a graphic designer so the house was full of stuff like that) and used figures for the characters.
After that they stopped us sitting in the clas room all lunchtime and made us go outside so the map and the figures disappeard and we just talked through it.
I only ever bought 1 D&D module I think it was bone hill but never even played it. I did play a couple of scenarios taken from the early White Dwarf and I think this influenced me the most becasue they were all much more narative than a standard dungeon crawl. You know they were outside there were little riddles to solve subplots etc ..
I don't think we ever played another dungeon crawl after than first one to be honest, although there were plenty of small dungeon type elements to our other games.
We moved on to AD&D Xmas 1980 (about 3 months after starting basic). As for other systems we picked up Traveller pretty quickly and used it to run games that felt like Blakes Seven or whatever was in 2000 ad that month. We always houseruled, added skill systems or whatever and I designed my first system in 1982 when I was 12 becuase we had tried Gamma World but thought it was crap and I wanted to play a sci fi game with lots of aliens and mutations (hey I was 12)

Quote from: David RI guess what I wanted at the time was the freedom to houserule..... if this makes any sense.

Maybe...I found RQ had a more elegant modular framework to hang shit off.

Quote from: John Morrowone of my all time favorite role-playing magazine articles is Bill Armintrout's article "Metamorphosis Alpha Notebook" (http://www.metamorphosisalpha.net/MA_Notebook.pdf) (linked from here (http://www.metamorphosisalpha.net/html/ma1e.html)) originally published in The Space Gamer #42.  That was the August 1981 issue.  .

Bill's published?



I play both crawls and role-play sessions. IME, crawls make for a good starting point to learn a character - say I decide to play a half-elf sorcerer, I know the basic gist of the character - not accepted by either group, possibly a freak in my hometown as both Ms. pointy-ear and then Ms. burned-down-the-barn-by-accident or whatever. But how does that shape my interaction with the rest of the PCs? The dungeon crawl lets me figure that out before the group has to save the world :D

And we're not rules lawyers too much - if it's a mechanic we rarely use (grapple) we'll look it up and follow it closely. If it's something we know, we can adapt to interesting situations.

Then again, we're grownups :D

Quote from: JimLotFPI was finishing up a blog posting when I ran across this thread... interesting coincidence.

All the Dragon articles and RPGA ads weren't going to help them get through to us when the meat of most of their published adventures was "here's the dungeon, here's a reason to go in if you're lucky, have fun!"

And that influence was so pervasive that Dungeons and Dragons, as presented by Wizards of the Coast, is nothing more than a reflection of the surface of the game as presented by 1970s and 1980s gaming products.

Shit.

I missed all of that. There were no modules when I started GMing, except for a few published by Judges Guild and they were wilderness adventures, dungeons, and campaigns set in a world with pre-existing cultures. Then there was Harn and Middle Earth too. Both very good medeival settings.

For anything else we made up our own campaign worlds right from the get-go. Always have, although there are a couple of campaign worlds I have adopted, and try to play in regularly, Airde, and Eberron. Made up our own adventures too.

I dissented in 1979-1980 as the published adventures and advanced books  came out. A few of them were very very good (1e dmg), and were able to build the skills of the GM as they used them. Most were railroads to nowhere. The beginnings of a decline, so to speak.