Dragon Reflections #103

TSR Inc. published Dragon #103 in November 1985. It is 100 pages long and has a cover price of $3.00. This issue features errata, gnomes, and the future of AD&D!

The cover, titled “Birth of the Blues,” is by Robert Pritchard. Interior artists include Larry Elmore, Bob Maurus, Roger Raupp, Tom Centola, the Marvel Bullpen, David Trampier, Ted Goff, and Joseph Pillsbury.

This month’s special attraction is “Unearthed Arcana additions and corrections.” Editor Kim Mohan notes that, though TSR spent months producing Unearthed Arcana, it took readers “only a fraction of that time” to uncover a multitude of errors. What follows are 6 pages of errata, including revisions to many key tables. The book clearly lacked adequate editing and playtesting.

In “The future of the game,” Gary Gygax describes what the planned Second Edition of AD&D will be like. The intention is to combine the Monster Manuals I and II, as well as the Fiend Folio, into a single volume with new illustrations, organisation, and layout. In a similar manner, the Player’s Handbook, Unearthed Arcana, and Oriental Adventures will also be combined, with a couple of new subclasses added (the mystic, savant, and jester). The Dungeon Masters Guide will be heavily reorganized, and Deities & Demigods (retitled Legends & Lore) will be revised to focus less on statistics and more on the worship of each god. But even as this article was published, Gygax was being sidelined within TSR and would be gone completely within a year. The Second Edition would finally be published, four years later, under the leadership of Zeb Cook.

“All about Krynn’s gnomes” finishes up Roger E. Moore’s series on the demi-humans of Dragonlance. The gnomes were originally humans serving Reorx, the divine creator. They misused their crafting skills, and so the god cursed them, reducing their stature and making them obsessed with tinkering, but unable to pursue a higher purpose. Their society is highly industrialised but also absurdly bureaucratic, with the gnomes hyper-curious yet focused on trivia. I guess the “tinker gnome” archetype, which came to dominate how the game presents the race, started in Krynn.

“A dozen domestic dogs” by Stephen Inniss presents more gaming detail on these most ancient and ubiquitous of pets. He divides them into 12 categories, based on size (Very small, Small, Medium, Large) and type (Fighter, Normal, and Runner). For example, a terrier is a very small fighter, while a greyhound is a medium runner. Otherwise, the dogs differ only slightly in movement, hit points and damage. Such articles reflect the simulationist tendency then in vogue, but it is a lot of detail for a negligible impact on the game.

“The Centaur Papers” by Stephen Inniss and Kelly Adams has an unusual history. Inniss and Adams separately submitted articles on the topic, so Mohan asked for permission to combine them into one. The result is 12 pages long and covers everything from social organisation through to personal grooming. I found it less compelling than the Moore/Greenwood articles on similar topics, but I did appreciate the information on using them as player characters.

“The Wages of Stress” is a short story by Christopher Gilbert. In a near-future society, the government punishes those who cause stress and compensates those who suffer from it. Hale Rothemon figures out how to exploit the system, but things quickly spiral out of his control. It’s an intriguing premise with strong pacing and good characterisation. Gilbert is a psychologist who published a few short stories in the 80s.

“The Role of Books” by John C. Bunnell reviews the latest in speculative fiction:

• The Silver Crown by Joel Rosenberg is "entertaining reading."
• The Song of Mavin Manyshaped / The Flight of Mavin Manyshaped by Sheri S. Tepper are "soundly plotted though rather brief."
• The Secret Country by Pamela C. Dean is "great fun and just plausible enough to be thought-provoking."
• Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart is "an unforgettable reading experience."
• Dragons of Spring Dawning by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman should "at last satisfy the old demands for something to read after the Ring books."
• Magic in Ithkar, edited by Andre Norton and Robert Adams, fails as a shared-world anthology because the stories "do not truly mesh into a single setting."
• The Gadget Factor by Sandy Landsman is "a fascinating tale about computer games and scientific accidents."

Finally, the ARES Section returns, presenting about a dozen pages of science-fiction and superhero gaming material. It includes four articles:

• "Of Nobbles and Men" by Paul Vernon brings galactic ranchers to Traveller.
• "The Saurians" by Jeffrey Bouley is a new race for Star Frontiers.
• "Tanks Again!" by Alex Curylo presents more vehicles for Star Frontiers.
• "The Marvel-Phile" by Jeff Grubb shares Marvel Super Heroes stats for Armadillo, Count Nefaria, and Hyperion.

And that’s a wrap! It was a rather unsatisfying issue, though I did enjoy reading about Gygax’s plans for the game. Next month, we have the Ochre Jelly, thieves, and a Marvel Super Heroes module!

 

[RealAlHazred]

In my 1e campaign, clerics used to take lucerne hammers since clerics couldn't have edged weapons and they did more damage than regular war hammers. But then UA came out and we found out these were really pointy polearms instead of hammers.

Dragon had a comic that responded to this.

 

[Flying Toaster]

I remember much of this issue. An EGG 2E would probably feature even more overpowered classes balanced by crippling roleplay restrictions. One thing I find remarkable about Gygaxian game design is how much of it is punitive, meant to push you towards playing the “right way” i.e. the Gygax way. Sure he would let you play a non-human or a wizard, but he would use lots of fiddly details and restrictions to make you regret it, until you relent and play the Conan or Fafhrd type of macho warriors that got EGG excited.

The centaur article was interesting, but I think you could only use them as PCs in a wilderness campaign that did not venture much into caverns or dungeons. Otherwise the centaur PC would periodically get stuck staying outside guarding the horses.

Back then I was a bit of a “young fogie” about D&D settings and disliked many of the changes made in Dragonlance, but I particularly disdained the kender, tinker gnomes, and gully dwarves, who seemed unfit even for comic relief. I vastly prefer gnomes as forest-dwelling fey folk wearing pointy hats. Fun fact: gnomes do not originate in legends or folklore at all, they were invented from whole cloth by 16th century German Renaissance man Paracelsus, who needed an earth spirit for his book on elemental alchemy.

I read at least one Sheri S. Tepper novel but do not remember anything about it. I read the first few Joel Rosenberg Guardians of the Flame novels because my friends did, but they were too gritty for my taste even then. Portal fantasy about RPG players getting sucked into the game was very popular in that era, and of course it was the frame story for the D&D cartoon. IRL Rosenberg became a gun rights advocate after receiving threatening letters from a neo-Nazi.

 

[Flying Toaster]

Our group perused the UA errata, but I do not know if we ever actually used any of them in the game, and I think we assumed that they had been incorporated into the later printings that we had bought. Years later I was a bit shocked to read the UA Wikipedia entry only to find out that it never happened.

I never actually played Original Recipe™ late 70s / early 80s AD&D 1E. My group learned D&D from the red Basic and blue Expert sets but regarded them as the kiddie table of D&D, and the tamer content suggests that TSR wanted us to think that way. We eagerly took off the “training wheels” and graduated to the grown-up game with heavens and hells and naked lady demons.

We started playing Advanced circa 1986, so UA was already out and we never knew the game without it. We knew it was the latest book of D&D goodies, but at the same time we never actually used very much of it. The only things we used consistently were the new spells and magic items. UA was particularly good for rounding out the druid and illusionist spell lists, giving those neglected classes a bit of a boost.

We never really sat down and talked about exactly what UA content would be legal at our table, we just sort of intuitively realized that most of it was edge cases and minutia. We never used polearms much at all. Just for fun I once rolled up a fighter who used only obscure UA weapons and armor, but wisely never tried to actually play him. Why did grey elves who inexplicably served a human mage ruling an isolated valley need to be a separate “valley elf” subrace anyway? Baffling. One of our group liked to play overpowered “monster” races so he would play dark elf rangers or half-ogre fighters (somewhat surprising that Gygax did not include his half-ogre in UA), but other than that we did not use the new races.

As soon as we saw that the barbarian could not use magic items or associate with spellcasters, we scoffed and dismissed it altogether, because we knew that magic items (especially magic long swords) were the main way to power up warrior PCs. I played a cavalier through a few low levels, but gave up because suicidal charges against invincible foes seemed like a dumb way to play D&D. Both classes could probably be salvaged with a bit of work. EN World user Celebrim has a thread about a revised AD&D thief class that adds the acrobat skills to the standard thief, and I like that idea a lot.