This is a review from 1974 of dnd.
Some real gems in here.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~beattie/timeline/1972-1979/dd.gif
"illustrations are excellent"
bwaahaahahahaaha. Look, I get the "era of the times" thing, but this is also the same time when there were some really wicked looking album and van art going around. Heavy Metal debuted in 75, and there were lots of S&S established great artists in the 70s. OD&D was revolutionary, but art was not one of its strong points lol.
I love the way that the reviewer - clearly a wargamer - doesn't "get" the fundamental way that DMing works.
Because they're so used to playing wargames on huge tables laid out with terrain, they make the assumption that the DM's map will be one of those rather than just a bit of paper, and then complain that playing in person is impossible due to the necessity to keep most of that terrain hidden from the players!
They obviously assume that the DM will actually be playing out the PCs' actions on a full wargame table.
I don't know what a "esoteric maticoras" is, but I want one in my game.
Cool link. I had fun puzzling out what the reviewer found puzzling in the game rules.
Quote from: Gold Roger;781239I don't know what a "esoteric maticoras" is, but I want one in my game.
Think he meant Manticoras.
Hes essentially saying that these are creatures that only a few would know the names of. Referring to the Manticore, Chimera, and Wyvern.
You should google the reviewer's name. He did get up to speed and has worked on a number of well-known games.
I found at least one interview; would be interesting to see his comments specifically on that one review in retrospect.
Bill, that was an interesting read. Thanks for posting the link.
Quote from: Al Livingstone;781283Bill, that was an interesting read. Thanks for posting the link.
No problem! I stumbled on it and was pretty sure people would enjoy it.
Nice find.
It kinda debunks the notion that OD&D wasn't badly written because the audience was all coming from the same background and didn't need things spelled out. Even by the standards of the times, and for an experienced wargamer, the rules are puzzling and difficult to parse.
I checked out "Arnold Hendrick" because his named sparked a foggy memory-
- He cowrote Swordbearer with Dennis Sustarre (so it looks like he figured out the RPG thing)
- The very review the OP attached was responded to by Gygax in The Strategic Review in 1975 (or thereabouts - I don't have my Dragon Mag CD handy).
Quote from: Haffrung;781291Nice find.
It kinda debunks the notion that OD&D wasn't badly written because the audience was all coming from the same background and didn't need things spelled out. Even by the standards of the times, and for an experienced wargamer, the rules are puzzling and difficult to parse.
They werent puzzling. They were though disorganized and if you approached them with a certain mindset then it was likely worse. That is true even today.
There was a world of difference between RPG rules written by a professional gaming company like SPI and fly by night outfit like TSR in 1970's. SPI's stuff like Commando, DragonQuest and Dallas were rules -wise well organized but also very dry (they followed case system SPI always used). I think that SPI's style would not be acceptable nowadays as they were very dense (and at least Universe rules seems to me to be unintentionally too complicatedly written as if they missed one or two rewriting sessions) and dry.
Quote from: Nikita;781347There was a world of difference between RPG rules written by a professional gaming company like SPI
I like the SPI style of rules writing. Always did. That didn't stop me from understanding the OD&D rules, though it was clear even to my teenage self that the SPI rules were better written. Personally I don't mind dry rules. I prefer to have the color in the rules examples. And I prefer to have some good examples. The good and colorful examples was one of the virtues of first and second edition Runequest over contemporaneous versions like AD&D.
The world would be a better place if SPI's style of rules presentation had won out. I like my rules short and sweet, so we can save all the creativity and verbal blibber blubber for the settings and roleplaying.
Quote from: Larsdangly;781353The world would be a better place if SPI's style of rules presentation had won out. I like my rules short and sweet, so we can save all the creativity and verbal blibber blubber for the settings and roleplaying.
Having tried to write some house rules in the SPI style, I'm not convinced that most RPG rules would end up shorter if they were written in that style. But I agree that it would be nice to have the greater precision, clarity, and the ease of reference that the SPI outline style provides.
Looking at some recent threads on various message boards on 5e, I'm inclined to say people won't understand the rules whenever they don't want to understand the rules.
That said, I found it funny how his description of the play by phone reads as though he's seriously hooked. That might be me, in turn, reading what I want to read, though.
Quote from: Omega;781269Think he meant Manticoras.
Hes essentially saying that these are creatures that only a few would know the names of. Referring to the Manticore, Chimera, and Wyvern.
So I should have put in a note saying that I know he meant manticores after all:D
Too freaking funny.
Okay, I'll give a guy a pass on Not Getting It -- in 1974, how many did?
But "playing" and "game" in quotes? (No, buffoon, you don't "play" a "game" -- you just bloody play a game, mmkay?) Excellent illustrations and decent graphics? The need to play by phone or post? (Buffoon, even in 1974, wargamers had worked out hidden movement rules.) Eeeesh.
It is a really fascinating insight to realize people actually didn't understand what was supposed to happen when you played, and imagined the game was actually inconsistent with sitting around a table. One thing that is very true is that the D&D style structure of play puts a huge burden on the referee. We've come to think of this as normal, but for a refreshing alternative go read En Guard! I would love to subtly re-shape D&D to be more compatible with that sort of collaborative play.
Hendrick was no buffoon. The review is an interesting window into how a wargamer saw D&D when simply dropped into his lap as a text in 1974.
Reading that review was an absolute delight. It's easy to make fun of the reviewer now, but a short period of that kind of awkwardness is what you get when someone actually creates something genuinely new.
When I finally snap and publish my own fantasy heartbreaker the monster section is gonna be entitled "Esoteric Manticoras".
Quote from: Larsdangly;781353The world would be a better place if SPI's style of rules presentation had won out. I like my rules short and sweet, so we can save all the creativity and verbal blibber blubber for the settings and roleplaying.
Universe.
While its a good RPG in and of itself. Its SPI through and through and shows that probably board games and wargames were their better route. Though I've never seen Dragonquest.
Though their hybrid experiments into dungeon crawlers and hybrid paragraph games tended to be darn good. I think they could have carved themselves out quite a niche if theyd survived long enough.
Quote from: Phil Moskowitz;781307*snippage*
Welcome to the adult swim, Tiger . . . er, Phil.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;781441Welcome to the adult swim, Tiger . . . er, Phil.
Thanks. Nice to see someone know where my av came from. ;)
Quote from: Omega;781422Universe.
While its a good RPG in and of itself. Its SPI through and through and shows that probably board games and wargames were their better route. Though I've never seen Dragonquest.
Though their hybrid experiments into dungeon crawlers and hybrid paragraph games tended to be darn good. I think they could have carved themselves out quite a niche if theyd survived long enough.
Dragonquest is actually a pretty incredible game. It has a couple of mechanical elements that needed quantitative revisions — the exp progression tables for combat skills; exp rules for learning spells; perhaps one or two other things. But the basic structure of the game is fantastic and includes a bunch of elements that could/should have been jacked by other game systems. A D&D/Dragonquest or Runequest/Dragonquest hybrid would be a terrific game. Some of the best things include: Skills come in 'packages' that are like min-classes you can mix and match at will - modular like a class based system but flexible like a skill based system. Damage has a 'wound point/temporary damage' sort of split. Magic is really flavorful and fun. Combat is tactical but quick.
Quote from: Larsdangly;781605A D&D/Dragonquest or Runequest/Dragonquest hybrid would be a terrific game.
I used to play in a D&D game that used Palladium FRP classes and Rolemaster for the combat charts. A little Runequest for flavor. I thought that's how everyone did it...
Quote from: Brad;781611I used to play in a D&D game that used Palladium FRP classes and Rolemaster for the combat charts. A little Runequest for flavor. I thought that's how everyone did it...
At one time they did! The rolemaster tables were initially intended to be a bolt-on damage and crit system for AD&D. And Palladium is transparently a D&D re-boot that can be raided with impunity. And the Runequest resistance table is a good way to resolve all sorts of D&D events. And so on. In some ways the understanding of and creative use of rules was better in ~1978 than it is now, despite the huge number of games and sophistication of design philosophies.
Dragon Quest...if that's the game I think it is, very fond memories.
Is it still in print?
According to the Wikipedia article, WotC abandoned the trademark, so it's not only hasn't been in print for something like 25 years, it never again will be.
Quote from: Bill;781838Dragon Quest...if that's the game I think it is, very fond memories.
Is it still in print?
No, but easily found in online used game stores. If you can handle an action point system, get the 1E boxed set. If action point systems make you break out in hives, get 2E. If someone offers you TSR's 3E, kick them under the knee cap and run away. Basically, TSR bought the game, cut its balls off, sold it for a few years, and then let it die of starvation. True story.
Quote from: Larsdangly;781863No, but easily found in online used game stores. If you can handle an action point system, get the 1E boxed set. If action point systems make you break out in hives, get 2E. If someone offers you TSR's 3E, kick them under the knee cap and run away. Basically, TSR bought the game, cut its balls off, sold it for a few years, and then let it die of starvation. True story.
I want the original version :)
It's a good choice. The real meat of the game is present in the original boxed set. The only significant additions in 2E are skills for perception and horsemanship. The action point system I refer to is the sort of thing few popular games have attempted, and it might remind you of the horribly over-engineered games that rode roughshod over the hobby in the mid 80's. But it is actually an elegant, playable thing. I recommend it. It just isn't for everyone.
I am tempted to revive a Dragonquest retroclone project I started last year. The original game is good and widely available so my stab at this isn't really very much like Labyrinth Lord or one of the other D&D clones that cleaves closely to the original. Rather, it is a game that is more 'inspired by' Dragonquest, but swaps out the damage, armor and injury rules with those from strucuturally similar but better-made games, simplifies some elements, draws in some D&D isms, simplifies dice mechanics, re-balances and greatly simplifies EXP charts, etc. Basically, the game I wish had emerged from D&D swallowing Dragonquest or Dragonquest swallowing D&D.
Quote from: Brad;781611I used to play in a D&D game that used Palladium FRP classes and Rolemaster for the combat charts. A little Runequest for flavor. I thought that's how everyone did it...
I used to occasionally see people getting in a huff about Gary Gygax's somewhat dictatorial pronouncements (in Dragon Magazine and the forwards to the 3 1e core books) about what the D&D game is. I think they either forgot or were never aware of the context for these statements.
Everyone was kitbashing their own version of the game and for a while "Dungeons and Dragons" was becoming a generic term for role playing, sort of like "Xerox" became synonymous with photocopying. There was a danger (form TSR's point of view at least) that the game would lose its identity completely.
Quote from: Larsdangly;781863No, but easily found in online used game stores. If you can handle an action point system, get the 1E boxed set. If action point systems make you break out in hives, get 2E. If someone offers you TSR's 3E, kick them under the knee cap and run away. Basically, TSR bought the game, cut its balls off, sold it for a few years, and then let it die of starvation. True story.
Never owned the game, but in the early 90s I picked up "The Shattered Statue" (TSRs only support for the line aside from the game itself, if I recall correctly), a dual-system AD&D/DQ adventure by Paul Jaquays (of all people). The DQ stats merely mystified me, and the adventure itself didn't strike my fancy the way a lot of the 78-83 TSR modules did. I still have it somewhere in a box in the attic.
Back before the Internet, everything in life - music, your available fast food chains, what movies were playing at your local theater, what word you used to describe carbonated candy water- was way more regional. Things would be hits in one isolated pocket of America that flopped everywhere else (Or vice-versa).
In my small Midwestern college town, SPI's DragonQuest was the game the "Cool" crowd played instead of D&D even up into the 1990's. At one point in the Clinton years (Long after TSR had abandoned the game, but before retro-clones or Internet PDFs) privately printed and bound bootleg copies were common.
Another interesting gem in the DragonQuest and Universe was that since they were intended to adult boardgamers they were very clear that you followed rules until you tried something not explained in rule:
[4.1] If a character attempts a feasible task not specifically explained in a rule, the gamesmaster derives a percentage chance of the character succeeding.
It seems now pretty much ordinary but back then it must have been a total revolution to boardgamers.
Quote from: Just Another Snake Cult;782391Back before the Internet, everything in life - music, your available fast food chains, what movies were playing at your local theater, what word you used to describe carbonated candy water- was way more regional. Things would be hits in one isolated pocket of America that flopped everywhere else (Or vice-versa).
In my small Midwestern college town, SPI's DragonQuest was the game the "Cool" crowd played instead of D&D even up into the 1990's. At one point in the Clinton years (Long after TSR had abandoned the game, but before retro-clones or Internet PDFs) privately printed and bound bootleg copies were common.
There was (and still is, most probably) a long-running and legendary DQ campaign in Auckland, New Zealand. It morphed into an entire club, publishing newsletters, manuals and so forth, over more than 30 years. Cool for such an obscure game to take root in an equally obscure corner of the gaming world.