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Look What ED GREENWOOOD Is Doing! Forgotten Realms: The Unofficial, Non-Canon, Unlicensed, Utterly U
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<blockquote data-quote="Cyberqat" data-source="post: 7662879" data-attributes="member: 6791901"><p>Okay, the old guy weighs in. I stared in this hobby with the three little OED books and Greyhawk back in 76. I also spent my young adult life in Maidson, WI down the road from Lake Geneva. My mom, who was a freelance writer, wrote the first popular press article on Dungeons and Dragons.</p><p></p><p>This is the actual, sordid tale of the early history of TSR and D&D. </p><p></p><p>OED was a collaboration between Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson and the Blume brothers. They had a tiny little company that had previously published wargaming miniatures rules (Chaimail, Tractics). It also published a little single-color newsletter that was one step up from being run off on a mimeograph machine called "The Strategic Review". At the time, the big players in war games were a company called SPI and, to a lesser extent, Avalon Hill.</p><p></p><p>The original D&D rules were actually a "cap system' for adding "heroes" to their existing Chainmail fantasy miniatures rules. There was one sentence, a;most an afterthought, that said "oh and you can play this just with pen and paper if you don't want to bother with miniatures." And thus, roleplay gaming was born.</p><p></p><p>The OED rules were *very* simple and heavily inspired by the characters and monsters of Lord of the Rings. Most of what you think of as D&D, which would become canonized in AD&D, were in fact player created extensions. Players would send these into the Strategic review (which became Dragon Magazine a bit later) and they would print them for use by other fans.</p><p></p><p>D&D was created mostly <strong>by the players</strong> and this is something you should never, ever forget.</p><p></p><p>As D&D took off and TSR started making real money, a number of bad things happened. The first thing was that Gygax and the Blumes pushed Dave Arneson out of the business. He sued TSR and eventually won a settlement, you can find more abotu that if you google it. (In fact TSR was in court a total of 4 times and never, ever won a court case.)</p><p></p><p>In a plot worthy of Shakespeare, the Blumes then pushed Gygax out and took over the entire company themselves. They ran it into the ground with bad management and eventually sold it to the heirs of the Buck Rogers creator.</p><p></p><p>When D&D started, there were no worlds or even modules. Just rules. We made the adventures and settings up ourselves. While TSR eventually started selling pre-canned adventures under the name "modules", a great many of us never used them, preferring our own imaginations.</p><p></p><p>Ed Greenwood was one such GM with a particularly detailed and interesting world. One of his friends went to work for TSR and encouraged him to bring it to them and them to look at it. You can read all about that in the intro to "Elminsters Guide to the Forgotten Realms." It started as modules and grew into a complete campaign setting offering hitting its height, IMO, in the City of Splendours boxed set. To this day one of the most detailed and lovingly created setting products of all time.</p><p></p><p>TSR, however, was having more and more difficult times financially. In the end they committed the cardinal sin of all business-- they started suing their own customers. Depserate for every dime, they tried to shut down the free flow of fan made game materials between fans, in particular suing computer bulletin board systems that had come into being for the purpose of fans trading advice and information. (A BBS system is the precursor to this sort of forum before there was the internet.)</p><p></p><p>When they were just about dead, WOTC bought them, which leads to a whole different chapter I wont get into except to say that WOTC polished and centralized the campagin settings business.</p><p></p><p>Some people like where WOTC has taken the FR recently. Otehr people (mysel included) feel that it has been watered down and confused for purely marketing reasons. As an example, if you read Elminsters Guide to the Forgotten Realms you will notice that Dragonborn and Tieflings are not mentioned. These come from other less financially successful D&D settings (Eberron and Planescape) and TSR pulled them over into FR with 5E, mostly cause a segment of their audience really liked them.</p><p></p><p>I for one am greatly enjoying Ed's first book on *his* realms. It is the one I grew to love and the one that loosely inspired my own game world. I am thus looking forward to everything else he publishes about them.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Cyberqat, post: 7662879, member: 6791901"] Okay, the old guy weighs in. I stared in this hobby with the three little OED books and Greyhawk back in 76. I also spent my young adult life in Maidson, WI down the road from Lake Geneva. My mom, who was a freelance writer, wrote the first popular press article on Dungeons and Dragons. This is the actual, sordid tale of the early history of TSR and D&D. OED was a collaboration between Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson and the Blume brothers. They had a tiny little company that had previously published wargaming miniatures rules (Chaimail, Tractics). It also published a little single-color newsletter that was one step up from being run off on a mimeograph machine called "The Strategic Review". At the time, the big players in war games were a company called SPI and, to a lesser extent, Avalon Hill. The original D&D rules were actually a "cap system' for adding "heroes" to their existing Chainmail fantasy miniatures rules. There was one sentence, a;most an afterthought, that said "oh and you can play this just with pen and paper if you don't want to bother with miniatures." And thus, roleplay gaming was born. The OED rules were *very* simple and heavily inspired by the characters and monsters of Lord of the Rings. Most of what you think of as D&D, which would become canonized in AD&D, were in fact player created extensions. Players would send these into the Strategic review (which became Dragon Magazine a bit later) and they would print them for use by other fans. D&D was created mostly [B]by the players[/B] and this is something you should never, ever forget. As D&D took off and TSR started making real money, a number of bad things happened. The first thing was that Gygax and the Blumes pushed Dave Arneson out of the business. He sued TSR and eventually won a settlement, you can find more abotu that if you google it. (In fact TSR was in court a total of 4 times and never, ever won a court case.) In a plot worthy of Shakespeare, the Blumes then pushed Gygax out and took over the entire company themselves. They ran it into the ground with bad management and eventually sold it to the heirs of the Buck Rogers creator. When D&D started, there were no worlds or even modules. Just rules. We made the adventures and settings up ourselves. While TSR eventually started selling pre-canned adventures under the name "modules", a great many of us never used them, preferring our own imaginations. Ed Greenwood was one such GM with a particularly detailed and interesting world. One of his friends went to work for TSR and encouraged him to bring it to them and them to look at it. You can read all about that in the intro to "Elminsters Guide to the Forgotten Realms." It started as modules and grew into a complete campaign setting offering hitting its height, IMO, in the City of Splendours boxed set. To this day one of the most detailed and lovingly created setting products of all time. TSR, however, was having more and more difficult times financially. In the end they committed the cardinal sin of all business-- they started suing their own customers. Depserate for every dime, they tried to shut down the free flow of fan made game materials between fans, in particular suing computer bulletin board systems that had come into being for the purpose of fans trading advice and information. (A BBS system is the precursor to this sort of forum before there was the internet.) When they were just about dead, WOTC bought them, which leads to a whole different chapter I wont get into except to say that WOTC polished and centralized the campagin settings business. Some people like where WOTC has taken the FR recently. Otehr people (mysel included) feel that it has been watered down and confused for purely marketing reasons. As an example, if you read Elminsters Guide to the Forgotten Realms you will notice that Dragonborn and Tieflings are not mentioned. These come from other less financially successful D&D settings (Eberron and Planescape) and TSR pulled them over into FR with 5E, mostly cause a segment of their audience really liked them. I for one am greatly enjoying Ed's first book on *his* realms. It is the one I grew to love and the one that loosely inspired my own game world. I am thus looking forward to everything else he publishes about them. [/QUOTE]
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