The problem with this is it really only worked if you were playing the game for really long or really frequent periods. I've mentioned before that I managed to get a couple characters in the low teens over time, but there were a lot of people who never exceeded 6-8th level, and you needed to do that to get into the whole domain game.
So at best, the game had a serious split personality here; it actively discouraged getting to the levels where the more wargame elements would kick in (and was, honestly, pretty sketchy about handling those by itself).
To your point, Gary Gygax himself wrote in
The Strategic Review, that even in the longest running games in either Blackmoor or Greyhawk were only in the low double digits after many years of playing:
It requires no careful study to determine that D & D is aimed at progression which is geared to the approach noted above. There are no monsters to challenge the capabilities of 30th level lords, 40th level patriarchs, and so on. Now I know of the games played at CalTech where the rules have been expanded and changed to reflect incredibly high levels, comic book characters and spells, and so on. Okay. Different strokes for different folks, but that is not D & D. While D & D is pretty flexible, that sort of thing stretches it too far, and the boys out there are playing something entirely different — perhaps their own name “Dungeons & Beavers,” tells it best. It is reasonable to calculate that if a fair player takes part in 50 to 75 games in the course of a year he should acquire sufficient experience points to make him about 9th to 11th level, assuming that he manages to survive all that play. The acquisition of successively higher levels will be proportionate to enhanced power and the number of experience points necessary to attain them, so another year of play will by no means mean a doubling of levels but rather the addition of perhaps two or three levels. Using this gauge, it should take four or five years to see 20th level. As BLACKMOOR is the only campaign with a life of five years, and GREYHAWK with a life of four is the second longest running campaign, the most able adventurers should not yet have attained 20th level except in the two named campaigns. To my certain knowledge no player in either BLACKMOOR or GREYHAWK has risen above 14th level.
E. Gary Gygax, The Strategic Review Vol. II No. 2, April 1979 (citation from Dragon Magazine Archive CD-ROM)
I believe this is a fairly well known rant by Gary Gygax, particularly as it discusses his personal feelings towards the West Coast faction. That being what it is, it likewise makes it fairly clear that high level and faction play as is suggested by Brozer wouldn't be realistic, especially not in the way that Brozer implies in the following sections I have not yet covered.
I have found at least
one letter from Gary Gygax in Alarums & Excursions which addresses competitive play among players. From my reading, it looks more like that on occasion various parties would end up in conflict, not necessarily individual players.
While the letter is wide-ranging, the following is what Gary Gygax has to say specifically about a suggestion that competitive play was the norm among his groups:
Rumors concerning the way we play D&D seem to be flying about all sorts of places, and unfortunately most of these bits of information are only partially correct at best. Dan Plerson says that we are rumored to play competitive D&D with group against group. It so happens that when we get the campaign into high gear, there is considerable competition between three or four factions, and they find it enjoyable to attack each other when the opportunity arise -- and they do play to make such opportunities. As a DM I find this quite suitable. It does not occur frequently. It almost never happens during dungeon expeditions. Here is how we have things set up:
The game world is a parallel earth, but the continents are somewhat different. Most of our campaign activity takes place on what corresponds to North America, on the eastern half of the continent. The "Blackmoor" lands lie far up on the northeast coast. "Greyhawk" is in the central portion. There are a few other independently run campaigns located on this map. There are also some other dungeons related to the "Greyhawk" campaign located at some distance from the free city of Greyhawk. Players in our campaign may freely play in "Blackmoor", but to get there they must adventure cross country. With one or two other campaigns, we do not allow any cross-campaign play other than this, for these is too great a disparity of DMing. The territory within 500 or so miles of our main dungeon is mapped out at 5 miles to the hex. Territory within 50 miles of Greyhawk city is mapped more closely, and monster locations are indicated. The entire world is mapped out in rough form, with notes regarding typical encounters in given areas as well as particular special places, for hardy souls who wish to go forth to seek their fortunes.
My reading of this doesn't give me the feeling that Gary (or Dave for that matter) was running Braunsteins, at least not in the manner described in Brozer or even in the reported way Wesely did. If I was going to ascribe a label to what it sounds like to me, I'd honestly say West Marches more than anything.
