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Looking back, it really seems that TSR didn’t realize what it had. These days, IP is king. Lorraine (I’m assuming it was her) put Zeb Cook in charge of the 2E game—which is still my personal favorite iteration with 5E a close second. They had extremely good fiction—Ben Riggs stated it being 50%...

5E if it really needs to be compared to another edition is actually rather difficult. Only because I think you have to use two to nail it. 5E is what B/X & BECMI were to AD&D to 3/3.5. It is basically a stripped-down version of 3E, specifically to keep the BECMI to 2E reference, with the skill...

I feel personally attacked by the Socializer.

@AuldDragon, hey dude, love what you're doing. I've found The Faceless God to be the most enigmatic of the TSR deities. Except when you get into the meat and potatoes of the lore and he's a bit...less enigmatic and more practical if not mortal in his motives. It would be if you took the...

Yes, it is a major part of creating the verisimilitude of having the characters interacting with a continuous world where the players are having a week or so between sessions. It's difficult to do this without giving the game away. Beyond the campaign details having an encyclopedic knowledge...

Honestly, the tropes are not necessarily a bad thing. It makes it easy to run things as a DM if you introduce something and the players immediately understand what you're going for. On the other hand, when you want to avoid them, I've found it best to just not subvert a trope, but to avoid...

I think he was overthrown by a pantheon that was also overthrown. There seems to have been a cascade of pantheon overthrowing.

I wonder if there is some regionally based way on how it’s pronounced. I’ve played since 1991 and never heard it pronounced rhyming with grow ever. This involved a lot of different people at different tables as well. I didn’t even know it was controversial until fairly recently. I do...

I think there is more to it than you're suggesting. I first became aware of this whole thing, specifically Tolkien reimagining Norse elves as the tall & fair concept that was simply not the same as that of most of the public, was when I first read The Hobbit in the early 1990s as my school...

Based on the sources listed in the Wikipedia article, it seems like both were implied or at least could be inferred. Getting back to another comment, the same Wiki article also says that there are scholarly interpretations of the dökkálfar (which are typically assumed to be dwarves) to be the...

The Giants part is lifted very much from another work, The Roaring Trumpet which was mentioned by Mannahnin a few posts back. Again, I take Gary rarely at his word. The more he insists the less so. I'm not saying that Gary didn't create drow, he most certainly did. I'm just saying that his...

The G part is not. The D-Q definitely are. I think the contemporary aspects between the The Silimarillion & the two later series is part of why I think this. Also the deviation of the equivalent creatures in the story that forms the basis for the G series adds to this in my mind.

I think you're following Mr. Gygax's preferred rendering of the history, which now includes other, older things that make that rather inconsistent. Again, we now know that Gygax was writing Tolkien fan-fic for the game Diplomacy zine Thangorodrim which becomes the basis for D&D's chromatic...

Eh, given the relative rarity of really high-level games it probably isn't actually worth the effort. The games that do make it to these levels of play are usually one of two types: Ran by really experienced DMs that are likewise capable of dealing with the game mechanics. Munchkins who don't...

I think you've already been asked several times, but it really is important for suggestions. How exactly are you looking for different? Less stuff, more stuff, overall mechanics? 2E is probably the most extensible version of D&D and can be as simple as (or even simpler honestly) as BECMI with...

which honestly sounds pretty distinct from “k”. I did decide to dig into my Tolkien source theory a bit last night and I’m actually leaning more toward that than I was originally expecting. The biggest thing was that I found out how much influence Tolkien had on Gygax, which is somewhat odd...

I prefer to ignore the term archfey to begin with. Seems like a needless appellation. Also, it’s a weirdly misinterpreted title as the English is from the Greek prefix αρχ- which translates roughly as ‘chief’ when the Hebrew equivalents of the named archangels of the Old Testament were...

The Kinslaying at Alqualondë of the Falmari by the Faenor-led Noldorian elves while in rebellion against the edict of the Valar is very similar to several drow origins. Also, the remaining Noldor who, while refusing to slaughter their kin, still remained in defiance of the Valar and left to...

That Dökkálfar and Ljósálfar of the Prose Edda aren’t distinct and different subspecies or that Tolkien’s elves are distinct and different species? In the former, they are quite different. In Tolkien they are the same biologically, however Tolkien applies much significance to lineages and...

I never got into Dragonlance, and with the exception of Dalamar in various The Wizards Three columns in Dragon Magazine had little exposure to them. Granted, Dalamar was a dark elf and I could tell there was something different to him compared with the typical way a drow elf was portrayed at the...