Way back during the summer of '81 I saw the Lord of the Rings (Bashki's cartoon version) at a drive-in. This inspired me to read Tolkiens works (my dad had The Hobbit and first book of the trilogy on a the bookshelf). One of my friends from school had already read tolkiens works and iImentioned how cool it would be to play a game based on something like the Hobbit. As it turned out this particular friend had the old Basic Box Set (Red) and a Boxed Set from TSR for playing Miniatures.
I ended playing the Mini Set with him several times during the summer. Then in 6th grade I joined the Boy Scouts and went on my first camping trip during January of '82. Since it was winter, we stayed in a cabin. One of the guy's had brought his Basic Box Set (Red) and we played the Keep on the Borderlands module. I was hooked from that point on (my character had somehow slain the Minotaur single handedly and the DM could scarcely believe it and went on to make a big fuss about my slaying the Minotaur, I no longer recall what kind of character I was playing but he was only 1st level).
I ended up buying the Basic Book (from the Red Box set) from a kid in my class, later that year. However I ran into difficulties finding anyone intersted in playing the game so I made up maps on graph paper and tried playing the game myself without benefit of owning any Dragon Dice for about a year and a half.
I got the 1st edition AD&D Players Handbook, DM's Guide and Monster Manual for Christmass in '83 (and had by now obtained a set of Dragon Dice).
I finally started playing full time in '84 as a High School freshman. My High School had a D&D club and I was able to find people to play with (1st edition AD&D). By the time I graduated in '88, I had acquired the Fiend Folio, Deities and Demi-Gods and Monster manual II books. And had also picked I.C.E.'s MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing) handbook (couldn't quite figure out how it worked, so it was never played, but I liked the Critical tables) and been introduced to I.C.E.'s Role Master system (a very short, two session, introduction).
Then I joined the Army and acquired the Unearthed Arcana and Forgotten realms Boxed set (grey, if there were any of another color I've never seen one). And as 2nd edition started to come out I acquired the Players and GM's books and anything Forgotten Realms (mainly the source books), a boxed set for Dragon Lance and the hardbacked DL guide. I also picked up the Hero System/Champions and Fantasy Hero rulebooks (fourth edition, I believe), but never played them.
After leaving the Army, I picked up the 1st edition Manual of the Planes and continued buying the FR sourcebooks as they became available. Then in the mid '90's I found some people who played the Hero System/Champions game and played a few sessions.
In '97 or '98 I got tired of and became dissatisfied with the D&D system and devised my own set of mechanics to run my campaigns (percentiles to resolve everything, influnced from I.C.E. and character progression based on buying and increasing skills/abilities influenced from the Hero/Champions system). Most of my gaming experience up to and beyond this point had been as a DM, not a player.
In 2002 I picked up the 4th edition of I.C.E.'s Role Master, just to add it to my gaming library. And when 3.0 D&D came out I got the core books and the Forgotten Realms core book. I own nothing 3.5 D&D but have downloaded the SRD for 3.5 D&D.
At some point in time a friend had given me all the boxed Basic sets at once (2nd edition red Basic set BTW).
Currently I play (3.0/3.5 D&D) as much as I DM (my personal system).
Sorry for the long post.
Gone are the good times!!!
