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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 6262219" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 359: September 2007 part 4/8And now for the hall of shame. They did manage to throw up a fair few stinkers along the way, after all, and I would be remiss if I didn't warn people away from them. 10: 3. The issue that really showcases the fact that yes, there was a lot of crap back in the old days too, and at least the modern stuff is better edited. The largest, most flimsily designed set of classes we'd ever see, and more than a few other half-baked ideas. Still, at least it's memorable. 9: 157. Buck Rogers gets forced down our throats, to massive public indifference, and considerable annoyance in the offices. The themed section is one of the most half-assed they ever did, showing that Lorraine might have been able to crack the whip, but she couldn't force them to write good, useful material. The rest is merely so-so, but that beginning drags the whole thing down. 8: 154. In which TSR bow to the satanic panic, only to have to deal with the backlash. This issue is packed full of corporate <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />, and most of the general articles are pretty boring too. It really is annoying when the upper management are the problem, rather than the solution. 7: 64. Gary really started to lose his grip in 1982, both of the company, and in terms of adding things to the system that weren't very well thought out mechanically. This is an excellent example, with the introduction of the celestials, one of the most mechanically annoying monsters to keep track of in all D&Ddom. Meanwhile Brian Blume makes a bizarre diversion into sumo wrestling, and Giants in the Earth continues to taunt us with illegal characters. It all just leaves me irritated. 6: 151. The issue that indicated maybe they were starting to do the oriental fetishism the late 80's saw to death, with two of the worst ecologies they've done, and a whole lot of other dull stuff. Any idea, even a good one, wears out it's welcome eventually, or simply isn't applicable to the present problem, and it's stupid to stick with it in that situation. 5: 231. By the mid 90's, D&D had created so many supplements and settings that it was a real nightmare to keep track of them. This issue really brought that home to me, back in the day. At some point, you really have to take a break or let go, and that was my personal breaking point. 4: 224. The end of 1995 saw TSR realising something was very wrong, and starting to panic, realising they had to change or die. Unfortunately, this only hastened their decline. The three "little red triangle" issues were full of poor choices in both articles and formatting, and this is the worst of them. They'd removed the last bits of third party coverage, and still didn't know how to properly replace it, and weren't communicating well internally. It really shows, unfortunately. 3: 122. Aka Gary's formal resignation notice. The magazine had been going downhill for a good year before this, with Kim's resignation and Roger being forced to handle Dragon & Dungeon simultaneously really hurting their organisational capabilities. It's not until next year that he would really get the hang of things and start pulling up again. In the meantime, we get poorly organised issues like this one. Even without the shoddily redacted farewell from Gary, it wouldn't have been good, but that easily pushes it down into this not so exalted position. 2: 300. In which WotC fail pathetically at being dark and mature, to an extent which still boggles me to this day. You read it back and wonder what possessed them to collectively read and edit this stuff and think it was actually a good idea, all the way through to publication. Obviously Monte Cook has to take the lion's share of the blame, but no-one comes out of this looking good. 1: 310-14. It's cheating, I know, but it really is impossible to choose which of these 5 issues is worst to single out, because there's nothing there to choose from. The biggest dullest heap of grey, generic crap the magazine ever did in a row. Most of the other issues here were bad in more memorable ways, or less usable in actual play, but nothing beats the second half of 2003 for sheer boring. And since D&D is still supposed to be a game, that makes them the biggest failure. A game is nothing without fun. Unsolved mysteries of D&D: We continue the system-free retrospective with a runthrough of things that still bug people to this day. There's a ton of loose ends and unexplained things from various settings and modules that people still debate about on forums, decades after they last appeared in print. Of course, if they gave concrete answers, they'd ruin the fun in a lot of cases, so this turns out to be an article that asks big questions, but doesn't really resolve much. If anything, it's likely to keep them talked about more in the future, as it makes even more people aware of these little bits of history. Essentially, trololololo suckers! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> Do what you like in your game, because you're never getting to see the complete picture. Well, that wasn't particularly helpful. They could definitely be doing more here.</blockquote>

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