Forked Thread: all about the minis!

[Stoat]

What did Gary Gygax say about using minis/counters in D&D? I'm only familiar with the language from pp. 10-11 of the 1E DMG, in which he suggests that DM's urge their players to use official AD&D Miniatures.

 

[M.L. Martin]

Actually, during the high point of 2E, miniatures use appears not only to have not been assumed, but considered problematic.

From the essay "Why Do I Play the AD&D Game?" by Steve Winter in the 1993 TSR Catalog

[T]he simplicity and abstractness of the AD&D game's combat and magic rules work to reinforce rather than weaken the player's imaginations. In an ultra-tactical game with pieces and playing maps and movement points and combat turns measured in seconds, the player's attention is focused on the map. Instead of imagining his character facing the towering ogre, instead of smelling its matted hide and hearing its lumbering step, the player sees his inch-tall miniature figure standing next to an inch-and-a-half tall ogre figure. How much more frightening is a dark, web-filled, musty, dripping corridor when it is conjured in the player's mind than when it is reduced to a few paper hexes?
The AD&D game is tailored to be purely imaginary. There are no complex movement rules, no detailed battle options. The heroic feats of the player characters and the images they create in the players' minds are the most important elements.

One can dispute these assertions, of course, but I think they provide a valuable bit of insight into how the designers saw the AD&D game at that point in time.

 

[Lord Xtheth]

Night Below
Inside this box are:

Three 64-page books compromising a single grand-scale adventure, which can be placed in any AD&D world.
16 Player Handout sheets featuring art, maps, charts, and letters.
8 two-sided DUNGEON MASTER Reference Cards providing cutouts, monster rosters, and two new evil deities.
An eight-page booklet of new MONSTROUS COMPENDIUM entries, detailing three new races and two new monsters.
6 full-color poster maps detailing all the important locations in the entire campaign setting.
​

Nothing specific about mini maps, although the DM reference cards seem likely to contain counters of some sort, making mini maps believable.


RC

I'll go open up my box and tell you what mini stuff came with it!
These are only the 1" square maps I'm referring to...

1 Room map 5x8 squares big
1 Hallway map (5x20)
1 "Church" map (I think this was the "End Boss" map. (18x27)
1 circular map, 14 squares through the middle (8 square radius)
Note: They are part of the "full color poster maps" you mentioned.
2 sheets of monster portraits that you can cut out and use on said maps

 

[Shemeska]

Actually, during the high point of 2E, miniatures use appears not only to have not been assumed, but considered problematic.

From the essay "Why Do I Play the AD&D Game?" by Steve Winter in the 1993 TSR Catalog

That's beautiful. Pretty much mirrors my perspective on the issue.

 

[avin]

That's beautiful. Pretty much mirrors my perspective on the issue.

Been using minis for a while and combats are more fun this side of the table.

The freedom of things in battle resides on GURPS, not D&D. GURPS allows you to do all sort of tricks. D&D is very limited, no matter what edition. You can insert some tricks but you can't pretend it's free enough that a mini would hinder the fun.

That said, yeah, minis remove some of the game imagination.

Come on shemmie, don't be so bitter, I've already ordered your book and I'll use it with minis hehehe

 

[Mark]

The AD&D Dragon Mountain Box Set included maps with grids and, and I thought, cardstock monsters with plastic stands.

 

[Fifth Element]

1 Room map 5x8 squares big
1 Hallway map (5x20)
1 "Church" map (I think this was the "End Boss" map. (18x27)
1 circular map, 14 squares through the middle (8 square radius)
Note: They are part of the "full color poster maps" you mentioned.
2 sheets of monster portraits that you can cut out and use on said maps

We just finished Night Below and I seem to remember more than that...but maybe my DM was just really clever in reusing them.

The "Church" map wasn't the "End Boss" map. It was for the illithids.

 

[Chris Knapp]

The fact that AD&D used inches for distance and movement indicates to me that minis were at least planned for if expected. Sure, you can argue that it's roots in chainmail just carried over, but do you think it wouldn't have been a lot easier to just say 10 feet as opposed to 1 inch?

Also, there were at least a few of the original Dragonlance modules with 1" maps in them.

 

[Fifth Element]

The fact that AD&D used inches for distance and movement indicates to me that minis were at least planned for if expected. Sure, you can argue that it's roots in chainmail just carried over, but do you think it wouldn't have been a lot easier to just say 10 feet as opposed to 1 inch?

Yeah, that confused the 11-year-old me to no end. Why was everything in inches?

 

[Stoat]

It's a very late 2E product, but Gates of Firestorm Peak comes with several poster-sized tactical maps (like the ones in 4E adventures) and a sheet of cardboard tokens to cut apart and use.