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I know, what's next - a cookbook?

This. "Rule Zero" wasn't a patch slapped on to a rigid boardgamesque ruleset, it was a holdover from an era of miniature wargame design when people self-consciously published a loose framework or set of guidelines with the intention that players (and referees) around the table would flesh them...

Instead of one sentence, here's two: Because we got off on the wrong foot long before this thread, I will not be induced to post sources that support or refute your thesis here, despite your generosity in posting receipts, nor am I really inclined to bump this thread with my responses. If for...

Um, I was not trying to produce any tangible evidence that the publication of Chainmail preceded the "Northern Marches" description letter. Why would I? We all knew that Blackmoor emerged out of Arneson's area of the C&CS game, which this letter describes, and we knew the C&CS game preceded the...

I did not enter this thread to opine on your thesis, but just to explain why PatW said what it did (though I have apparently broadened that to include whether the "Northern Marches" piece changed my thinking). Regarding Sir Jenkins and when he gained his honorifics, PatW here followed FFC pg25...

I am familiar with that general line of reasoning, sure, but I see it as poking at the timeline over when work towards the "Great Kingdom" blossomed into the thing that we call the "Blackmoor Campaign." There's no doubt there was work towards the "Great Kingdom" before Chainmail came out, and...

Rather then establishing when Chainmail went on sale, I'd say that the April IW establishes when you could have ordered Chainmail if your only way of learning about it was through the IW - there was no IW sent in March. But as I said above, Dave Arneson was not "just anybody," and he had other...

I wish. My DB#9 does not have a postmark; some were mailed in separate envelopes. It seems pretty random which were and which weren't.

So, having been pointed to this thread a number of times now, let me start out by saying that the OP and I have a bit of history from another forum, and I am weighing in here with due dread of causing cross-forum drama. Sorry for that. Dates for these early games are nearly always problematic...

Art & Arcana probably serves as this quite nicely.

This article's presentation of those attributions takes Playing at the World out of context. Section 5.6 of PatW on psionics draws attention to the particular issue of Astounding where Campbell popularized psionics, and does not connect psionics in any way with the Doctor Strange comic - the...

When you put it in these terms, that's perfectly reasonable - but the claims in the article (which only mirror Gary's own claims) come across stronger than that. The title is "The Crazy Origin of the Dungeon." The intro paragraph talks about how "It turns out there was a formative experience in...

This is a nice series, Mike, and I've enjoyed reading various installments. This edition lends Gary's later reminiscences too much credence, I fear. Back in 1975, Gary gave a very different account of the origin of dungeon adventures: in the intro to the TSR Blackmoor pamphlet, he calls Dave...

An update, now featuring a conversation with Len Patt about his rules: http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com/2016/02/a-conversation-with-len-patt.html

Well, in fairness, I was citing a write-up that Mark Swanson produced for Alarums & Excursions #4 within a week of playing in the tournament personally, which I corroborate with a direct comparison to the actual 1975 Tomb draft used by Gygax to run the game, as well as the Origins program and a...

Frank (and the Wikipedia page for the Tomb of Horrors that shows up for me anyway) are correct that the Tomb was run at Origins in 1975, not 1976. You are correct that the PHB did not come out until 1978. It is true that they are not the same adventure. The Origins Tomb was run for exactly 120...

PatW does indeed show that other people were experimenting with many of the same ideas that ultimately constituted D&D. Tony Bath was coming quite close, perhaps. But it's important not to underestimate the extent of Gygax's personal achievement. When it comes to inventing a technology, often...

Very enterprising. The earliest accounts of where Gary bought games suggest that he favored Brentano's in Chicago to get his Avalon Hill titles in the very early 1960s. My point though was more that Monopoly was a game that could be secured in any number of venues, while, say, to get Metagaming...

Yeah, actually one of the people I asked to give this an advance read for me flagged this sentence, but I decided to keep it. I think the term "hobby gaming" had a slightly different sense than "gaming overall," though if you want to get real technical about what it meant in the 80s, I'd...

A ripping yarn! I guess things must have been simpler in the early days - the Alex Raymond estate probably wasn't banging down your door looking for a cut. I hadn't known of that story before, but I'm sure now collectors will be scrambling to find a copy... and there's probably more where that...