AD&D 1E Best 1E AD&D rulebook?

[Sacrosanct]

This will seem like an irony, especially with all the hatred it's gotten (and those who defend a singular Asian-Canadian who has a strong vendetta against it), but...

I play (now days, far more occasionally, as we have spread apart quite a bit), or played in the past with (now days, it's more like once or twice a year) a bunch of players from Asia (mostly Japan, but also one from China and Korea).

Universally they choose to play Oriental Adventures. If they play D&D, they want to use the OA. So...we use Oriental Adventures when we play. (We actually tried the 3e version once, they didn't like it, they preferred the 1e version).

So, with that memory fresh in mind, I chose the OA. I was highly tempted to choose D&DG (it has use to me outside of the actual game) or the DMG (as that is what I may normally choose, and I see many others chose), but the mood just struck me this time, especially with that period of time coming up this year where we will get the old group together again to play OA for our annual/bi-annual game session from parts all over the world (I being the lone non-asian gamer among them).

I think OA gets a bad rap--kinda. By today's standards, there certainly a lot of things problematic with it. Even by 1980s standards, some things were pushing the line (like the title). But, and I said this guardedly, at least they made an effort to make it a book that respected some of the cultures within. They actually made an effort to reach out to several Asian players (all credited in the front page) and review it in an effort to avoid being offensive. In the 80s, that was a big deal that no one else was doing at the time. As everyone growing up in the 80s remembers, western culture had an infatuation with east Asian historical culture and myths (especially ninjas). That's when the urban legend about a samurai sword's power started lol. "It can cut through an M60's barrel!" Not to mention all of the ninja movies and TV shows.

I'm certainly not saying that players of East Asian heritage shouldn't be offended, or should give OA a pass. I'm not the smartest person, but I'm smart enough to know not to speak for an impacted group of people I don't belong to and tell them how they should feel. As someone who lived in Korea for 4 years, I know a huge problem is the assumption that all East Asian cultures are similar or the same. You can't (or shouldn't) just mix and match Chinese culture with Japanese culture with Korean culture with Vietnamese culture, which OA did on a certain level. "Hey! We had a bunch of Japanese people review the book, so we're good!" What about the Chinese players? Taiwanese? Philippines?...

I'm only saying that at the time, TSR made the additional effort that wasn't being done by anyone else to try to avoid these issues and try to be respectful. And more importantly, to give representation to a group of people who had been ignored in the game prior.