D&D General Fifty Years

[GMMichael]

My first character was a Halfling Rogue named Willow (because I had a celebrity crush on Alyson Hannigan). . .

Huh. Was expecting Joanne Whalley here. But anyway... my first D&D memory was getting a pre-gen character at Barnes'n'Noble and jumping into an Eberron noir-mystery that had these things called "houses" and what, "dragonmarks?"

But there was this earlier game that already had my attention, called AD&D...

By the way, careful when kids are found on the lawn. Some catchphrases will quickly date you.

 

[Richards]

Happy birthday, FitzTheRuke and Eis!

My first AD&D memory was running my pre-generated human druid, Jon (chosen from a pool of a dozen or so PCs because his stats were the least sucky), in a game my cousins ran for my two brothers and me. I was told my character could do whatever he wanted, so when we met up with a group of dire rats, I did what I thought my PC would logically do: I fled!

Johnathan

 

[Zeromaru X]

Happy birthday!

My very first D&D memory was watching Record of Loddoss War, that's a D&D-inspired anime. I would not actually play the game until some years later, tho (ultra religious family, so only when I became legally an adult could I search for friends to play).

 

[Sacrosanct]

I’m in the same boat. I turn 50 in a couple months while at GaryCon. There’s just something…fitting about that I guess.

 

[ichabod]

My first D&D memory was making up an AD&D character in middle school (after school club in either the French or Spanish room). Another kid was helping me, and showed me how to roll for psionics. I actually rolled up psionics. The other kid excitedly told the DM (Charles, IIRC). He said "there's no naughty word psionics in my game." I was so deflated.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

My first D&D memory was making up an AD&D character in middle school (after school club in either the French or Spanish room). Another kid was helping me, and showed me how to roll for psionics. I actually rolled up psionics. The other kid excitedly told the DM (Charles, IIRC). He said "there's no naughty word psionics in my game." I was so deflated.

Was that the old Dark Sun Wild Talents?

 

[not-so-newguy]

My character Dweeny the Dwarf getting killed* by the carrion crawler outside the ruined walls of Castle Mistamere.

*The DM, my brother, retconned the encounter and I went on to face a Giant Bee, Kobolds, et al.

 

[Edgar Ironpelt]

My first RPG memory was seeing the ads for the microgames Melee and Wizard (from Metagaming), and being frustrated because mail-order was not an option for me back then.

My first D&D memory was playing a wizard for one session in the fall of 1978 as a college freshman; with the first AD&D memory being my purchase of the Monster Manual and Players Handbook at around the same time (but not the Dungeon Master's Guide because it hadn't been published yet).

(The D&D campaign was "Foggy Mountain," at Michigan State University. I remember hearing claims that it was the second oldest D&D campaign, after Greyhawk.)

 

[Stormonu]

Happy Birthday!

I got the D&D Holmes set for Christmas in '79, and I have a flurry of memories about it - the set came with numbered chits, so we went back to the mall toy store to get dice, but all they had for a d20 was one that was numbered 0-9 in two different colors and I was able to convince my dad to get two sets of Grenadier minis - one of monsters and one of heroes. Also, my dad was taking a home drafting course (La Salle) at the time, and as "practice" he took a portion of the Caves of Chaos and enlarged them to 1" squares on a couple sheets of vellum paper for me. My brother and I played with the (lead) minis on those sheets for many hours until we abducted my mom's pattern board to turn it into an even larger battle board! I also remember painting those minis with Testor's enamels using those awful brushes that came with the paint set (and cleaning them with the included turpentine(?) cleaner).

As for actual D&D game memories, I remember my dad doing the first DMing and running away from a skeleton after a group of them had reduced my halfling character to one hit point in the first encounter. I guess that's why you don't adventure alone!

 

[GuyBoy]

Happy Birthday!

I was 13 in 1976 and Dave, a lad from the year above had got the white boxed set for his birthday. Dave ran myself and a friend, Phil, through a dungeon he had designed. I played a fighter called Aelric, Phil played a magic-user called Amroth.
We were hooked straight away, regardless of being slain by orcs in our third session.
I got the boxed set for Xmas 1976 and have played ever since, with the odd hiatus for marriage, kids, career etc.
I actually started the D&D Society at school in 1978, and my grandson now attends the same school and tells me that the society still runs.