Hello,
Posted by Crothian:
I'm in the middle of one heck of a no fun move and have been going through some rather old RPG stuff from the early 80's.
Gaming stuff from the '80's, eh? Many are the mighty gaming names from that era that are no more: Metagaming, SPI, GDW, FASA, Avalon Hill, Iron Crown (they had the TOLKIEN license, for Heaven's sake!); even TSR itself is folded without a trace into Wizards of the Coast. Steve Jackson Games, Hero Games, and Chaosium are probably the most prominent survivors of that era, and White Wolf was just beginning to emerge at the end of that period.
Posted by Crothian:
I'm curious to hear what you all think are some of the best RPG books, box sets, etc that have been produced since RPGs came out.
Well, this far into the thread, lots of the best stuff has inevitably already been mentioned;
GAZ3 The Principalities of Glantri,
Hero System 5th Edition, the
Birthright boxed set, the
D&D Rules Cyclopedia,
GURPS Cabal, and the 3e
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting are my own favorites among these.
Other favorites of mine that haven't yet gotten any attention include:
- the UNTIL Super Powers Database, an excellent aid for Hero System newbies, and also useful as inspiration and massive time-saver for even experienced Herophiles,
- GURPS Mecha,
- GURPS Swashbucklers, 3rd Edition and
- GURPS Celtic Myth, all three of which evoke the spirit of their respective genres very well, and tweak the GURPS system just a bit for closer fits with them,
- Sorceror, the best of the supplements for the only White Wolf game I can stand, Mage; it presents rules for lower-powered spellcasters who don't warp reality on whims and go insane doing so,
- Flying Buffalo's fiendish Grimtooth's Traps series, diabolically clever and cruel, and presented with great humor,
- PC1 Tall Tales of the Wee Folk, a wonderfully done supplement for fey in BD&D, and first of the excellent "Creature Crucible" series for that rule set,
- the Dawn of the Emperors boxed set, which details the two major powers of BD&D's "Known World", Thyatis and Alphatia, and presents them to the players with beautifully written story-segments,
- the Wrath of the Immortals boxed set, which brought cataclysmic changes to the long-established BD&D campaign world of Mystara - changes that had been hinted at for years in modules and other BD&D products, but which no one (certainly not me, anyway) thought they'd have the guts to actually carry out in a published product. Just my first look at the map in the boxed set was a "Holy [-expletive deleted-] !" moment for me.
Posted by Crothian:
What stunk then, but has somehow stood the test of time?
As I've mentioned before, my first impression of GURPS on opening the 2nd Edition boxed set was, "man, how did this lame
Champions rip-off make it into
Games Magazine's 'Games 100'?" I grew to like it after seeing the magic system (not included in the Basic Set in those days), which was the closest match to fantasy-literature magic that I'd seen at the time. The system has grown immensely since then, of course; most of the additions have been good and useful, and even the ones that have been horrible (*cough*GURPSSupers*cough*) can mostly be ignored given the system's modular nature.
So, there are a few of the opinions you asked for. Have fun with them!
I'm sorry Talislanta, I've named you now. 
