Ah, lots of good stuff can be found over the years in Dragon. I still have a word document with a list of my favorite articles of all time. Interestingly, while 3e is my favorite edition of the game, my favorite Dragon articles are generally from 1e and 2e (my favorite 3e articles are almost exclusively the Demonomicon and Core Beliefs).
Let's read the entire run
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(un)reason
Legend
Mainly the big cosmological stuff. That oerth and earth (and urth and yirth, as they will mention later) are all alternate timelines with relatively recent divergences on a cosmic scale. It's another instance of how much closer the various worlds were at that point. They thought very little of crossing over between boot hill, gamma world and D&D, and we get plenty of examples of that. A far cry from later products (3rd ed ravenloft suffered particularly badly from this) where due to licencing issues, they couldn't even mention stuff from other D&D settings, and had to dance around the issue where those crossovers had been important in the setting's history.
Yeah. It's not like Gary to normally be shy about taking credit for the things he did.lol I wonder who wrote under that name.
(un)reason
Legend
The Dragon issue 2: August 1976
Another step upwards in production values takes place here, a full color cover, and the first internal color art as well. Along with that, the confidence of the editorial staff seems to be growing. They've found a basic formula, and now they're refining it. Quite a few of the regular features are still missing, but they're putting more articles that span multiple issues in now, with the expectation that people are buying multiple successive issues to get the full story. Which means those bugbears Continuity and Metaplot begin their slow growth into the monsters that would entwine their tentacles around and inside the 90's, violating so many peoples play experiences, here.
In this issue.
A formal arena fighting system for monks. Essentially an entirely different system of combat based around selecting a sequence of fighting moves (6 in a row, which reminds me of burning wheels scripted combat.) and then consulting a table which makes certain moves effective or useless against other ones, rock paper scissors stylee, and seeing how each sequence turns out. This is basically its own self contained minigame, and looks like it could be quite fun, as it involves far less luck than regular D&D combat, but more ability to second guess your opponent, and is a lot more tactical. I'd definitely like to try it sometime.
The second installment of The Gnome Cache and the conclusion of the Search for the Forbidden Chamber. The contrast between these two stories is quite striking, when looked at in succession and shows that people were already playing the game with very different tones.
Hints for dungeon construction, with a particular emphasis on traps and tricks. Adventurers should never trust magic items in old-school games. You never know when one of them is going to explode or curse you with something embaressing.
Fiction: Shadow of a demon by Gardner F Fox. Some very old skool (and rather mysogynistic) swords and sorcery, with some wonderfully florid prose. A real guilty pleasure to read. Their habit of continuing articles several pages becomes really irritating when reading in .pdf, however
Some stuff on Queztalcoatal and aztec culture. Completely systemless, and rather dry.
Remorhaz! With classic Erol Otus artwork! Another iconic weird D&D monster gets its start here.
Finally, a new class that never caught on. The alchemist. That perennial problem of being too dependent on downtime and components makes them ill suited to adventuring (although someone really could do something that does for alchemists what indiana jones did for archeology, as seeking out rare formulae and components is a very adventurable process) and so that is quite understandable.
More Dirt.
A weapons specialisation and two weapon fighting system. Oh yes, another optional rule granting additional powers with no drawbacks. Not that it really balances fighters in comparison to all the amazing things spellcasters can do at high levels. But we've got to give the fighter players some choice to keep them from getting bored. Otherwise we'd lose our meat shields, and that would be no good now, would it .
An advert for Gods, Demigods and Heroes, billed as "The Last D&D Supplement!?!" (Ahahahahaha!!!!! ahem) Already feel like your're scraping the bottom of the barrel folks? Fear not. You will scrape many a barrel more before your time is up.
Lots of good fiction in this one, but the rules stuff isn't as well integrated as in previous issues. Still not a lot of actual setting, just whatever is nececary for the adventure.
Another step upwards in production values takes place here, a full color cover, and the first internal color art as well. Along with that, the confidence of the editorial staff seems to be growing. They've found a basic formula, and now they're refining it. Quite a few of the regular features are still missing, but they're putting more articles that span multiple issues in now, with the expectation that people are buying multiple successive issues to get the full story. Which means those bugbears Continuity and Metaplot begin their slow growth into the monsters that would entwine their tentacles around and inside the 90's, violating so many peoples play experiences, here.
In this issue.
A formal arena fighting system for monks. Essentially an entirely different system of combat based around selecting a sequence of fighting moves (6 in a row, which reminds me of burning wheels scripted combat.) and then consulting a table which makes certain moves effective or useless against other ones, rock paper scissors stylee, and seeing how each sequence turns out. This is basically its own self contained minigame, and looks like it could be quite fun, as it involves far less luck than regular D&D combat, but more ability to second guess your opponent, and is a lot more tactical. I'd definitely like to try it sometime.
The second installment of The Gnome Cache and the conclusion of the Search for the Forbidden Chamber. The contrast between these two stories is quite striking, when looked at in succession and shows that people were already playing the game with very different tones.
Hints for dungeon construction, with a particular emphasis on traps and tricks. Adventurers should never trust magic items in old-school games. You never know when one of them is going to explode or curse you with something embaressing.
Fiction: Shadow of a demon by Gardner F Fox. Some very old skool (and rather mysogynistic) swords and sorcery, with some wonderfully florid prose. A real guilty pleasure to read. Their habit of continuing articles several pages becomes really irritating when reading in .pdf, however
Some stuff on Queztalcoatal and aztec culture. Completely systemless, and rather dry.
Remorhaz! With classic Erol Otus artwork! Another iconic weird D&D monster gets its start here.
Finally, a new class that never caught on. The alchemist. That perennial problem of being too dependent on downtime and components makes them ill suited to adventuring (although someone really could do something that does for alchemists what indiana jones did for archeology, as seeking out rare formulae and components is a very adventurable process) and so that is quite understandable.
More Dirt.
A weapons specialisation and two weapon fighting system. Oh yes, another optional rule granting additional powers with no drawbacks. Not that it really balances fighters in comparison to all the amazing things spellcasters can do at high levels. But we've got to give the fighter players some choice to keep them from getting bored. Otherwise we'd lose our meat shields, and that would be no good now, would it
.An advert for Gods, Demigods and Heroes, billed as "The Last D&D Supplement!?!" (Ahahahahaha!!!!! ahem) Already feel like your're scraping the bottom of the barrel folks? Fear not. You will scrape many a barrel more before your time is up.
Lots of good fiction in this one, but the rules stuff isn't as well integrated as in previous issues. Still not a lot of actual setting, just whatever is nececary for the adventure.
WayneLigon
Adventurer
I decided to start reading it as well. Nice trip down memory lane. And next issue, whew. History is made several times.
Orius
Legend
And shortly after WotC, there were a lot of angry letters about non-D&D articles, people would be mad about the 1 Alternity article that would show up each issue. WotC finally switched it to all-D&D with issue #274 because I think there was a lot of popular demand for it to be all D&D at that point.
(un)reason
Legend
The Dragon Issue 3: October 1976
At last! We have a table of contents! Hooray hooray caloo calay! Truly, advancement is made of things that seem utterly obvious and indispensable once you have them. We also have the first letters page actually containing letters from the public, not just more stuff from Gary. However, as a result of these letters they decided that the amount of fiction was too high in the last couple of issues, so they're going to cut down. Have we already seen the high watermark in terms of systemless fiction ratio in Dragon?That was surprisingly quick, since its only been 4 issues since the first story. Or will it creep up again? We shall see.
In this issue:
An article of the death of War of the Empires, a play by post (that's snail mail, not internet message board, just to be absolutely clear) that died abruptly when the creator lost interest and simply stopped answering messages. (an all too familiar tale.) and his attempts to revive it. A reminder that many things we take for granted required huge amounts of effort to make work back then.
Our first Women in D&D article. This one is disastrously laughable. Typical of the time, there are no roleplaying notes at all, merely a load of tables detailing how female characters differ statistically from male ones. Attractive female characters get "seduction magic" regardless of class among other things, (including the potential for ugly witches to scare their target to death when they try and use it) which I think says it all. Yeah, they'd never have got away with this one even 10 years later, let alone now. Include in your game at your peril.
The search for the gnome cache continues.
Birth tables for D&D. No, not that kind, don't giggle, although given the previous article I wouldn't have been surprised at that. This is just for random generation of social class, siblings, parents occupation and other mundane stuff for people who can't be bothered to make a background themselves, or want to leave it up to chance. Nothing wrong with it, but not particularly brilliant and detailed either.
Comic: The adventures of Finieous Fingers and Fred and Charly by JD. Considerably larger and more detailed than Dirt, but still a pretty simple self-contained premise. We've still got a way to go before we get demented metaplot and in-joke filled stuff like Yamara.
Wargaming world, a collection of miniatures reviews. As I remember seeing those when I was reading first time round, I presume this also becomes a regular feature.
We're starting to get international DM listings in Mapping the Dungeons. Which I guess is significant.
The letters are interesting. We have our first case of fan copying being stamped down upon, (and the resultant outrage) and a tremendously long and pedantic letter about the unbalancedness of an article in a previous issue. Already business as usual then .
6 new classes, including 2 joke ones: Healers, Scribes, Samurai, Berserkers, Idiots and Jesters. In addition, they expand on dwarves abilities and abilities to enter classes. A good reminder of just how low demihuman limits were at this point, even compared to 2nd ed AD&D. The classes are typically wonky, with the healer unable to do any healing until they get to 3rd level, but able to raise dead from 3rd level up as well, Scribes having a monopoly on spellbook copying, which forces every wizard to pay them exorbitant amounts if they want new spells, and Berserkers having a requirement of an intelligence less than 9. These could definitely have done with some more playtesting and consideration of their ramifications on the world.
Dirt continues.
As you may have gathered, there is a lot of crap in this issue. Fortunately, it's still entertaining crap, that wouldn't make it into future books (as dragon continues to expand, I expect that this will become the norm, and its the stuff that does influence future canon that will become noteworthy.) and so only cause problems for the kind of groups that throw every optional rule in there for the hell of it. And the format continues to grow ever more familiar.
At last! We have a table of contents! Hooray hooray caloo calay! Truly, advancement is made of things that seem utterly obvious and indispensable once you have them. We also have the first letters page actually containing letters from the public, not just more stuff from Gary. However, as a result of these letters they decided that the amount of fiction was too high in the last couple of issues, so they're going to cut down. Have we already seen the high watermark in terms of systemless fiction ratio in Dragon?That was surprisingly quick, since its only been 4 issues since the first story. Or will it creep up again? We shall see.
In this issue:
An article of the death of War of the Empires, a play by post (that's snail mail, not internet message board, just to be absolutely clear) that died abruptly when the creator lost interest and simply stopped answering messages. (an all too familiar tale.) and his attempts to revive it. A reminder that many things we take for granted required huge amounts of effort to make work back then.
Our first Women in D&D article. This one is disastrously laughable. Typical of the time, there are no roleplaying notes at all, merely a load of tables detailing how female characters differ statistically from male ones. Attractive female characters get "seduction magic" regardless of class among other things, (including the potential for ugly witches to scare their target to death when they try and use it) which I think says it all. Yeah, they'd never have got away with this one even 10 years later, let alone now. Include in your game at your peril.
The search for the gnome cache continues.
Birth tables for D&D. No, not that kind, don't giggle, although given the previous article I wouldn't have been surprised at that. This is just for random generation of social class, siblings, parents occupation and other mundane stuff for people who can't be bothered to make a background themselves, or want to leave it up to chance. Nothing wrong with it, but not particularly brilliant and detailed either.
Comic: The adventures of Finieous Fingers and Fred and Charly by JD. Considerably larger and more detailed than Dirt, but still a pretty simple self-contained premise. We've still got a way to go before we get demented metaplot and in-joke filled stuff like Yamara.
Wargaming world, a collection of miniatures reviews. As I remember seeing those when I was reading first time round, I presume this also becomes a regular feature.
We're starting to get international DM listings in Mapping the Dungeons. Which I guess is significant.
The letters are interesting. We have our first case of fan copying being stamped down upon, (and the resultant outrage) and a tremendously long and pedantic letter about the unbalancedness of an article in a previous issue. Already business as usual then
.6 new classes, including 2 joke ones: Healers, Scribes, Samurai, Berserkers, Idiots and Jesters. In addition, they expand on dwarves abilities and abilities to enter classes. A good reminder of just how low demihuman limits were at this point, even compared to 2nd ed AD&D. The classes are typically wonky, with the healer unable to do any healing until they get to 3rd level, but able to raise dead from 3rd level up as well, Scribes having a monopoly on spellbook copying, which forces every wizard to pay them exorbitant amounts if they want new spells, and Berserkers having a requirement of an intelligence less than 9. These could definitely have done with some more playtesting and consideration of their ramifications on the world.
Dirt continues.
As you may have gathered, there is a lot of crap in this issue. Fortunately, it's still entertaining crap, that wouldn't make it into future books (as dragon continues to expand, I expect that this will become the norm, and its the stuff that does influence future canon that will become noteworthy.) and so only cause problems for the kind of groups that throw every optional rule in there for the hell of it. And the format continues to grow ever more familiar.
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WayneLigon
Adventurer
Your three historical events: Fineous Fingers' first strip, the first 'women and gaming' article, and the first but not last bare-boobie picture.
The letter from Scott Rosenberg in Out on a Limb is just beyond funny. He wants to cut and paste tables from the books into a more convenient format, then sell the resulting product, and can't understand why this ticks off TSR. He cites the 'Xerox Revolution'. Funny how he's twenty years ahead of 'information wants to be free' meme.
One thing I like reading are the ads. Back then if you didn't go to conventions the only way you'd ever learn about a products existance was through the pages of The Dragon or (later) other magazines. Right now, we see the first Judge's Guild stuff, which I think makes them the first real third-party publisher. It's not even 'City State of the Invincible Overlord' right now, it's just a map billed as 'above-ground dungeon'
The letter from Scott Rosenberg in Out on a Limb is just beyond funny. He wants to cut and paste tables from the books into a more convenient format, then sell the resulting product, and can't understand why this ticks off TSR. He cites the 'Xerox Revolution'. Funny how he's twenty years ahead of 'information wants to be free' meme.
One thing I like reading are the ads. Back then if you didn't go to conventions the only way you'd ever learn about a products existance was through the pages of The Dragon or (later) other magazines. Right now, we see the first Judge's Guild stuff, which I think makes them the first real third-party publisher. It's not even 'City State of the Invincible Overlord' right now, it's just a map billed as 'above-ground dungeon'
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Orius
Legend
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Would quoting the Book of Ecclesiastes here be considered a breach of the no-religion rule?
(un)reason
Legend
You know, I never even noticed that one. But then, it was years before I noticed the blatant nipplage in the illo of Morgan the basic set fighter. My mind is insufficiently dirty.
Just give us a chapter/verse reference so we can look it up ourselves.The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Would quoting the Book of Ecclesiastes here be considered a breach of the no-religion rule?
(un)reason
Legend
The Dragon issue 4: December 1976.
Empire of the petal throne special issue.
Our first themed issue, this expands to 36 pages. As you may have noticed tekumel's setting detail has shown to be easily the best available in a game (well, it was still a small field) at this time. The people back then noticed it as well, and the editor goes as far as to call it "superior to middle-earth in matters that concern gamers". Which may be hyperbole, but hey.
This issue contains:
Reports submitted to the petal throne. We see our first case of attempting to integrate peoples campaigns into a larger universe, and the inherent problems that generates with continuity, particularly when some GM's are "overly generous" with advancement. (M.A.R's opinion on this is pretty similar to Gary's, the players should have to work hard for every level they get, and the journey is more interesting than the destination, as high level characters acquire responsibilities with their power that make further adventuring difficult ) He concludes that the simplest solution is to consider all campaigns equally valid parallel universes.
From this point we get lots of adventure hooks and setting detail, presented as reports to the petal throne, and the emperor's reaction to these reports. Which is an interesting way of doing it, and makes it easy for GM's to turn them into adventures. Pretty good stuff overall.
Metamorphosis Alpha! TSR's first science fiction RPG starts here. Vat grown Androids have inflitrated the human tribes. They could be anyone, including the leaders. Only pink fuzzy balls can detect the interlopers and ensure the freedom of humanity! There's a bit more depth than that, but yes, this is a silly setting. Lets not go there. (cue camelot)
A random encounter table for tekumel.
The battle of the temple of Chanis. More dense, information heavy stuff combining setting overview with in character narration to give you an excellent snapshot of an event and the culture that surrounds it.
Monsters for Tekumel. The inscrutable, hermaphroditic, shapechanging Mihalli, and the Viragga, which are essentially organic squid/tank hybrids with lots of tentacles. As with other stuff, a lot more attention is placed upon their behaviors and place in the world than contempory D&D monsters.
An update on the joke monsters described in SR3. Beware the ring of wedding and Bi-labial fricative. Really. Don't say you weren't warned.
Fiction: Roads from Jakalla by Jerry Westergaard. Nice to see some tekumel stuff that isn't by M.A.R, as his distinctive tone does get a bit dull in large quantities.
They said Dirt was cancelled for space reasons in the editorial, and yet here it is. Guess there was a bit more room at the last minute than they expected.
Wargaming world: Lots of staple low level D&D monsters this time around.
A recommended reading by Gary Gygax. Poul Anderson, Tolkien, Lovecraft, Vance, Weinbaum; you ought to know the score by now. Go read them. It'll explain a lot.
Finieous fingers & fred & charly continues to entertain.
Magical Eyes for Tekumel.
The temple of Vimuhla for tekumel. A detailed set of photographs of its construction as a miniatures battleground. This suffers from the poor resolution of the .pdf scans, preventing me from looking as closely as I'd like. I suspect this problem will become more frequent in later issues as the amount of higher quality color artwork increases. Which is a shame.
After this issue, I definitely have a decent idea of what the setting of tekumel was like. Which is a lot more than can be said for greyhawk. Whatever happened to it? When and why did it descend into its current state of publishing limbo. Hopefully I'll find out as I read onwards.
Empire of the petal throne special issue.
Our first themed issue, this expands to 36 pages. As you may have noticed tekumel's setting detail has shown to be easily the best available in a game (well, it was still a small field) at this time. The people back then noticed it as well, and the editor goes as far as to call it "superior to middle-earth in matters that concern gamers". Which may be hyperbole, but hey.
This issue contains:
Reports submitted to the petal throne. We see our first case of attempting to integrate peoples campaigns into a larger universe, and the inherent problems that generates with continuity, particularly when some GM's are "overly generous" with advancement. (M.A.R's opinion on this is pretty similar to Gary's, the players should have to work hard for every level they get, and the journey is more interesting than the destination, as high level characters acquire responsibilities with their power that make further adventuring difficult ) He concludes that the simplest solution is to consider all campaigns equally valid parallel universes.
From this point we get lots of adventure hooks and setting detail, presented as reports to the petal throne, and the emperor's reaction to these reports. Which is an interesting way of doing it, and makes it easy for GM's to turn them into adventures. Pretty good stuff overall.
Metamorphosis Alpha! TSR's first science fiction RPG starts here. Vat grown Androids have inflitrated the human tribes. They could be anyone, including the leaders. Only pink fuzzy balls can detect the interlopers and ensure the freedom of humanity! There's a bit more depth than that, but yes, this is a silly setting. Lets not go there. (cue camelot)
A random encounter table for tekumel.
The battle of the temple of Chanis. More dense, information heavy stuff combining setting overview with in character narration to give you an excellent snapshot of an event and the culture that surrounds it.
Monsters for Tekumel. The inscrutable, hermaphroditic, shapechanging Mihalli, and the Viragga, which are essentially organic squid/tank hybrids with lots of tentacles. As with other stuff, a lot more attention is placed upon their behaviors and place in the world than contempory D&D monsters.
An update on the joke monsters described in SR3. Beware the ring of wedding and Bi-labial fricative. Really. Don't say you weren't warned.
Fiction: Roads from Jakalla by Jerry Westergaard. Nice to see some tekumel stuff that isn't by M.A.R, as his distinctive tone does get a bit dull in large quantities.
They said Dirt was cancelled for space reasons in the editorial, and yet here it is. Guess there was a bit more room at the last minute than they expected.
Wargaming world: Lots of staple low level D&D monsters this time around.
A recommended reading by Gary Gygax. Poul Anderson, Tolkien, Lovecraft, Vance, Weinbaum; you ought to know the score by now. Go read them. It'll explain a lot.
Finieous fingers & fred & charly continues to entertain.
Magical Eyes for Tekumel.
The temple of Vimuhla for tekumel. A detailed set of photographs of its construction as a miniatures battleground. This suffers from the poor resolution of the .pdf scans, preventing me from looking as closely as I'd like. I suspect this problem will become more frequent in later issues as the amount of higher quality color artwork increases. Which is a shame.
After this issue, I definitely have a decent idea of what the setting of tekumel was like. Which is a lot more than can be said for greyhawk. Whatever happened to it? When and why did it descend into its current state of publishing limbo. Hopefully I'll find out as I read onwards.
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