If you could have created D&D before Gygax..

[RFisher]

If I'd been old enough, my game would probably have strived to be truer to myths & legends, have been less of a melting pot of ideas from so many sources, & have been more simulationist.

& it probably wouldn't have used polyhedral dice.

Although, I think the differences between the game I would have created & the game that Gary did create are some of the primary things that made it successful. I'm very glad that Gary was the author of the game instead of me.

As I study the original incarnation of the game, I've begun putting together my own draft of a variant. A conglomeration of "what if this choice had been made instead of that one" sort of thing. Although it's really just an academic exercise, I figure in another year or two I might have something worth trying to force my group to actually try to play.

 

[jaerdaph]

If I had "invented" RPGs back then, my influence would have been classic Star Trek, not The Lord of the Rings, so we'd be looking at a totally different game.

 

[der_kluge]

I think my game would have focused more on mythological monsters, and fey creatures, and made them more central to the plot. Given the origins of D&D as a wargame, it seems likely that I would have opted for things where the players could fight large mobs of trolls, or giants and there would have been rules to easily do that on a semi-large scale.

Also, it would have probably been more swords, and less sorcery, but spellcasters would have been equal to fighters in a scalar sense. That is, a 1st level wizard would have been able to fight a 1st level fighter, all things being equal. Versus, a 1st level wizard being a total wuss, and a 1st level fighter being awesome. Magic would have also been completely replenishable, and more focused on basic offensive/defensive stuff, and less utility.

That said, I think what Gygax created was nothing short of miraculous since he created something that no one had ever done before. It was truly visionary. I'm surprised role-playing elements made it in there at all, actually, given the game's nature.

 

[Aethelstan]

Here's my short list:

-No alignment: adds nothing to the game in terms of mechanics or roleplaying. Alignments are simplistic, confining and have led to endless, pointless debates (ex. If a LG PC kills a helpless orc is he now CE?)

-Magic as a commodity: the price lists for magic items and services in the 1st ed, DMG promoted the notion that magic had standard prices and was readily available on the open
market. This led in short order to the standard D&D campaign world having a "Ye Olde Magic Shop" on every corner. Instead of winning a magic sword in an epic quest, a player could just save up and buy one. How heroic. Did Roland buy Durandal? Did Gandalf trade in some gems for Glamdring? By pricelisting magic, D&D changed magic from a mysticsl phenomena to a capitalist enterprise.

-"Fire and Forget" magic: bland and predictable. In mythology, legend and fantasty, magic is wonderous, unpredictable and tinged with danger. Fantasy magic should be like shooting a shotgun: its a blast but you wince a little just before you sqeeze the trigger.

 

[rogueattorney]

Rogue, let me pose my question another way. If knowing what you know about D&D c. 2005
you could go back to a time before D&D emerged in its "classic" form (i.e. 1st edition) what
would you change? Is there anything in the core themes and concepts of "classic" D&D c. 70's
that you would alter to make the game "better" as its evolved into the next millenium (i.e.3.5)?

Knowing what I know now, what would I go back in time and change to make the D&D of 2005 better?

That's pretty simple... I would go back in time to about 1973 and teach Gary and his business partners a few of the basics regarding the fromation of corporations, the different classifications of stock, especially non-voting stock, the raising of capitol funds, etc. I'd also strongly encourage he and his partners to all get life insurance policies on each other (good advice for anyone forming a business relationship with someone). Then I'd sit back and watch the history of gaming in the 80's happen very differently.

I don't have any proof that would fix the problems I have with D&D 2005, but I strongly suspect it would.

R.A.

 

[WayneLigon]

It probably would have used only 6-sided dice, since they would be cheap and easy to come by. Perhaps it would have used playing cards in some manner.

Since it would be likely that I would be coming into the idea through wargames, even as Gary did, there probably would have been some kind of SPI-like resolution chart for combat, spell-casting, and everything else. One chart, probably.

Magic probably would have been based off of comics (with sidetracks into Tibetian, Egyptian, Norse, Greek and Roman mythology), vaguely wiccan witchcraft, The Golden Bough, and Darkover/Earthsea, rather than Vance. Casters would probably use wands or staves as a nessesary prop for their magic, and incantations, as well as herbs and animal parts. There would be great artifacts. There probably would not be nearly so many spells or, if there were, I would have done a later supplement to correct that. There probably would have been some form of ritual magic. Magic items would probably be pretty rare save for some normal magics almost everyone would be able to get. A real magic weapon would be something you'd never get rid of, nor would you have to.

Fighters and some form of rogue would exist from the onset. Druids, priests, all that would all be rolled into the generic idea of 'caster'. They might call themselves something different and have some different spells, but they'd all use the same rules.

There would not have been nearly so many monsters. Goblins, giants, dragons, ogres, trolls, faeries, things like that. Certainly there would be planar creatures, inspired by things like The Mindless Ones from Dr. Strange.

The concept of the 'dungeon' probably never would have existed, save for caverns and such. It's unlikely I'd ever have thought of healing magic. Character would survive through use of some type of 'action points' or something vaguely like that, that would enable them to avoid certain death until their luck ran out.

I doubt I'd have though of anything even like 'alignment', though there probably would have been some sort of essay on being heroic and good and why that was best.

 

[mmadsen]

For the sake of discussion, pretend you could go back in time and become the “Godfather” of RPGs by publishing your own personal version of D&D a year before Gary Gygax (my assumption is that slick and flexible d20 D&D would trump Gygax’s OD&D and become the dominant RPG).

An amusing historical footnote: the Bronte sisters more-or-less created their own fantasy RPG almost two hundred years ago:

In 1826 their father brought Branwell a box of wooden soldiers, and each child chose a soldier and gave him a name and character: these were to be the foundation of the creation of a complicated fantasy world, which the Brontës actively worked on for 16 years. They made tiny books containing stories, plays, histories, and poetry written by their imagined heros and heroines. Unfortunately, only ones written by Charlotte and Branwell survive: of Emily's work we only have her poetry, and indeed her most passionate and lovely poetry is written from the perspectives of inhabitants of "Gondal." For Emily, it seems that the fantastic adventures in imaginary Gondal coexisted on almost an equal level of importance and reality with the lonely and mundane world of household chores and walks on the moor.​

 

[Aethelstan]

Ahh...Rogue you ARE actually an attorney! You are right. So much time and effort was wasted on business and legal squabbles during the formative years of D&D. Pity.

 

[Aethelstan]

m, thanks for the interesting footnote.

 

[mmadsen]

I agree with Aethelstan's short list:

• No alignment
• No magic as a commodity
• No Vancian magic (even though I enjoy Vance's Dying Earth)

I don't think I would have complicated the game with the six attributes (Str, Dex, etc.). Of course a fighting man is strong and tough, and a magic-user is intelligent, and a thief is dextrous -- no need to specify that separately.

I would have eliminated hit points but kept armor class as a measure of how hard a character is to hit-and-hurt. One "hit" would take out any no-name character (though tough monsters would have very high AC values); heroes would have hero points. An Nth-level fighting-man would have a +N bonus to attack and to defend.

Magic-using evil high priests would be magic-users. No clerics.

Multi-classing would be much easier. After all, Conan is a fighting-man/thief, Elric is a fighting-man/magic-user, the Grey Mouser is a thief with a level of magic-user (as is Cugel, perhaps), etc.