Dungeons & Dragons

Honza

Honza

Member
Has anyone ever played any (Advanced) Dungeons & Dragons? That is a fantasy world all of its own. I got very immersed in it as a child/teenager. It is a great fun game, hobby, interest.

Gary Gygax who invented the world was very clever and very imaginative. He is no longer with us unfortunately. But his legacy lives on.
 
Yes, I played Dungeons and Dragons quite a lot from 1983 until the mid-1990s. I still do play occasionally. I would play more often, but getting the old group together these days is difficult, and I don't know others who might be interested in the game. Although i did have various characters, more often than not I was the Dungeon Master.
 
That is the trouble with the game; you need a regular group of players to keep it going. Real Life usually wins out and stops the fun. I wondered if AD&D could be played solo? Sort of like a story telling game to yourself.
 
Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone produced a series of books, 'Fighting Fantasy' which were stand alone adventures in the world of Ansalon. I don't know whether you hhave encoutered them? They include such titles as 'The Warlock of Firetop Mountain', 'Deathtrap Dungeon','City of Thieves' and many others. In the books, you play the hero, with a set of stats for skill, stamina and luck. Instead of reading from page 1 to the end, you start on page 1 then, at the end of that section, you are given two or more choices each with their own page number. You then carry on until you complete the quest or are killed by any one of an assortment of foul creatures or deadly traps. Another series which I enjoyed very much was the 'Lone Wolf' series by Joe Dever, set in the land of Magnamond.
 
Honza said:
That is the trouble with the game; you need a regular group of players to keep it going. Real Life usually wins out and stops the fun. I wondered if AD&D could be played solo? Sort of like a story telling game to yourself.
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That always was a lot of the problem with all tabletop role-playing games.
AD&D did manage to transfer itself very well into various reasonable PC based computer games though back in the 1990`s or early 2000`s though which did allow some very good solitair play.
Resulting in what are now considered classic games like the `Baldur`s Gate` series or `Neverwinter Night`s`.
Both of which used AD&D`s rules structure and `Forgotten Realms` setting to good effect with the computer taking over the DM`s role.

Things did seem to take a huge step backwards later with the switch over to console and cellphone games which seem to emphesise combat and nothing else!
 
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I would like to point out that the early D&D games most definitely emphasized combat as well, they were a breakaway of Gygax and Perren's Chainmail wargame. The first few books (I still have my redbox back here..) were just table after table of combat and treasure and monsters to battle. The non-combat element was very haphazard and broken, and the later splatbooks attempted to enhance THAT, but ended up breaking stuff all over the place.

While Gygax and Arneson's D&D work was legendary and groundbreaking.. let's not act like they were flawless in the first attempt.. or that this was anything but a dungeon crawling game. The social / non-combat RP was added on later.

That said, the tabletop game I'm absolutely loving right now is Mouse Guard. EXCELLENT game running off Luke Crane's phenomenal "Burning Wheel" system.
 
I'm aware of the Chainmail origin. I used to live not far from where Tactical Studies Rules was headquartered. And I did play some solo adventures.

I had a fighter character who was a sort of Messianic Jewish Berserker. His name was Gene Wildest, and he had an unrequited love for a female magic-user named Madeline Kann. To forget his heartbreak, Gene set out on a quest. It was said that one of the seven Dwarf Rings from Middle-Earth had survived, and had been brought to Gene's world; so Gene went on a search to find it, so it could be prevented from causing harm. This scenario allowed me to play solo as Gene; I had various ways of creating random events and encounters for him.

Gene, by the way, hated Rust Monsters with a vengeance, because one had consumed his first sword. (Gene had retaliated by kicking that Rust Monster in the private location.) As we played it, Rust Monsters could NOT destroy ALL metals, only ferrous metal. So Gene carried a spare sword made of BRONZE, in order to slay any Rust Monsters he might meet. He called it Brazendeath.
 
Has anyone here read "TOM SAWYER"? Aunt Polly remarks in one scene that "Folks does the same in a dream as they would if they was awake." Any sort of unscripted roleplaying reveals something about the roleplayer's own personality.
 
For those who miss that type of RP, might I suggest OSRIC ,which is a serial numbers filed off AD&D :D

Check it out sometime :D Just use the googles. :D

My characters were all lawful neutral to lawful good. Pretty much in line with my sense of honor. We had to play it somewhat secretively as kids, the whole satanic panic and all that caused the local church leaders to basically call on parents to beat their children who played it.. and to burn their books.

My mom did not fall into that trap, but she did caution me that it'd result in harm for many of my friends if they got caught.
 
Pardine said:
For those who miss that type of RP, might I suggest OSRIC ,which is a serial numbers filed off AD&D :D

Check it out sometime :D Just use the googles. :D

My characters were all lawful neutral to lawful good. Pretty much in line with my sense of honor. We had to play it somewhat secretively as kids, the whole satanic panic and all that caused the local church leaders to basically call on parents to beat their children who played it.. and to burn their books.

My mom did not fall into that trap, but she did caution me that it'd result in harm for many of my friends if they got caught.
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Fantasy roleplaying CAN damage the spiritual and moral character of people involved in it; but so can the reading of NON-FANTASY fiction. Lots of things can be corrupting, if we LET them be.

 
Copperfox said:
Fantasy roleplaying CAN damage the spiritual and moral character of people involved in it; but so can the reading of NON-FANTASY fiction. Lots of things can be corrupting, if we LET them be.

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Exactly. That's what my mom's message was to me as well. She said, "I'd rather teach you how to handle things in your life that might be detrimental than to hide you from them."
 
Love the analogy! Rather like the current obsession with elf'n'safety, whereby children (and adults) are being smothered in cotton wool, thereby depriving them of many fantastic activities and experiences my generation enjoyed.
 
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