What was the first Dungeons and Dragons rule system you used?

[Herzog]

I think it was AD&D 1st edition, although it could have been second edition.

 

[Dioltach]

Mentzer, though I'd already played the Dutch version of the original edition of Das Schwarze Aug.

 

[Roland55]

Guess who.

Well! Should have known!!

 

[tuxgeo]

First actual D&D owned: 3.5 Basic set (black dragon version; wizards.com had a video on their site about using it to learn the game)
First actual D&D played: 3.0 Adventure game (used) (to get the full experience)

First RPG played: Tunnels & Trolls in the 1980's.
First exposure to D&D: being told not to play it (by women I knew in the 1980's).
First D&D fiction read: the books of the True Game by Sheri S. Tepper (King's Blood Four, Necromancer Nine, Wizard's Eleven; and the 'Mavin Manyshaped' books.)

 

[Li Shenron]

I voted Mentzer, but really it was a mid-90s reprint of the first 5 levels material of BECMI, in a boxed game format.

 

[jonesy]

I voted Mentzer, but really it was a mid-90s reprint of the first 5 levels material of BECMI, in a boxed game format.

If it's mid-nineties then it's one of the two ones marked Classic D&D Game. If it's earlier than it's the one with "New, Easy to Master Dungeons & Dragons Game" written on the cover which had slightly different contents but was still basically the same (which I forgot about until I re-checked).

 

[haakon1]

Wow, only:
-- 6.50% for 3e/3.5e/D&D Basic Game (3.5 starter box) combined
-- 2.44% for 4e/D&D Roleplaying Game Starter Set (4e)
-- 0% for Pathfinder

Sounds like a serious lack of growth, at least of the "hard corps" audience here.

 

[Plaguescarred]

I started with D&D Basic (Mentzer, red box) in the 80's.

 

[Li Shenron]

If it's mid-nineties then it's one of the two ones marked Classic D&D Game. If it's earlier than it's the one with "New, Easy to Master Dungeons & Dragons Game" written on the cover which had slightly different contents but was still basically the same (which I forgot about until I re-checked).

I think it was this of 96', but there's another very similar box of a few years before with the same picture on it:

http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/setpages/setscans/basic96box.html

I can't say which one because the DM owned it, so it could have been either one. I didn't notice them in the list because of the "multicolor box" and "black box" tags while in my memory I remember the red rather than the black (it's literally more black than red, but the red sticks out better).

Anyway IIRC the rules are the same as Mentzer's BECMI, except that only levels 1-5 are covered.

 

[jonesy]

http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/setpages/setscans/basic96box.html

Hmm. That's odd. For some reason I can't see anything on that site. Like, it's literally a blank page everywhere. I can hover my mouse over the links which are there, and I can read the source just fine, but I can't see any of the content.