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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Orius" data-source="post: 5282295" data-attributes="member: 8863">This is where I started.  The actual box (which is dated 1991) has the same art from the 1996 box.  The box refers to it as the "New easy to master" D&D.  It included dice, stand-up counters, a one-sided poster map, and a DM Screen with a pocket that contained cards that had the introductory adventure and instructions for a novice DM.  This DM screen is kind of flimsy, and the cards tend to tip it over.  It was designed by Troy Denning and included black and white art by Terry Dykstra.The cards had a sort of choose-your-own adventure layout on the front that walked a novice DM through a solo version of the "Zanzer's Dungeon" adventure, on the back, the cards explained the rules being introduced on the front.   The full adventure was on 4 double folded up cards, the DM was supposed to read a section of the cards, and then run one of the 4 parts of the adventure after learning some of the rules.  However, the 4 parts by themselves are pretty short, some are only 3 or 4 rooms in a dungeon with about 32 rooms.  Also, there are a few undetailed rooms in the dungeon in the tradition of B1 and B3, they're left for the DM to stock, the last set of cards has some instructions on that.  The last card also has a map for a dungeon called Stonefast which is meant to be the second adventure.  The "boss" for the dungeon is a weak white dragon, but this dungeon is set up for the DM to stock on his own.  One of the final cards gives some advice on it. There's also a 64-page rulebook that covers levels 1-5 for the fighter, cleric, thief, magic-user, dwarf, elf, and halfling.  There's a decent selection of monsters, with most of the classic D&D stuff.  Not a lot of really powerful monsters, given the level range, but it does include giants and dragons.  Spells cover the highest levels the cleric and m-u can cast.  There's the treasure chart, and magic items go up to about +2, and some various basic miscellaneous stuff.  This is meant to be the actual rulebook, with the cards being a teaching device.From the final dungeon card:[sblock][/sblock]This was likely meant as a replacement to the original Basic set, and players were probably intended to go to other introductory and beginner sets like Dragon's Den, and then eventually move up to the RC.  Unfortunately, TSR soon discontinued the basic D&D line.  I'm unfamiliar with Mentzer and 1e, so I don't know how far apart the rules were.  But 2e had some differences with the RC rules.  I note that TSR later released an into product almost every year after discontinuing D&D.  This looks like really bad brand management to me; let the easy and advanced rule drift apart, discontinue the easy rules, then try to have various intro products that last only a year.  Let's hope 4e's Essentials will be handled more deftly than this.It might have been a repackaging of the 1996 box, but I remember an ad in Dragon from 1997 or maybe 1998 for another intro set that reused the Moldvay/Cook set's cover art.This was WotC at this point. They didn't drop the TSR logo until 2000, but WotC published everything D&D from 1997 onward.  IIRC, this was connected to the Fast Play rules by Jeff Grubb(?).   First Quest was set in 2e-based Mystara.  This was when Mystara was being briefly used as a beginner setting.  The 2e Mystara used a lot of the audio CD stuff that TSR seemed to be big on at the time.  I don't know if this was connected with the 1995 set or not.</blockquote>

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