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Message: <blockquote data-quote="fanboy2000" data-source="post: 5963673" data-attributes="member: 19998">So I just got finished reading The Dungeon Master. It's a book about the the disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III.For those of you who don't know, Dallas' disappearance made national headlines in 1979, in the early days of D&D's popularity. It was reported that Dallas may have disappeared into the steam tunnels he played D&D in. If you've never heard of the case before, there's a good summery <a href="http://ptgptb.org/0006/egbert.html" target="_blank">here</a>.Long story short, the family hired a priviate investigator, William Dear, to find Dallas, and Dear did. Then he wrote a book about it a few years later.What interested me in the book was the look at the early years of D&D and roleplaying from an outsider's perspective. The case had zero leads, so Dear tried to get into Dallas' head. Since Dallas played D&D, Dear bought the game and payed a guy and his friend $50 to run a session for him (it's unclear at first if he bought the basic boxed set or the 1e AD&D PHB, but the chapter where he plays a game strongly suggests that's it AD&D).Because the events happened in 1979 and the book was written in 1984 none of the stereotypes have really set in. Dear paints himself as an openminded guy. At the time, D&D was just one of the many things college kids did. You know how college kids are.For example, Dear sends a couple of guys to a science fiction convention because the few friends Dallas had said that he really wanted to go to it. They worked with the convention staff and checked out everything, including D&D games. They reported seeing lots of people at the games, including professionals like lawyers. (There's also a subtle dig on furies, which is hilarious because it's just about the only group that gets made fun of. They just can't catch a break.)But here's the interesting part. I know, I should have gotten to it earlier. By all accounts students really did play a live action version of D&D (house ruled, obviously) in MSU's steam tunnels. And there were reports of this going on at other colleges. (E.g., Southern Methodist University.) No one in the book utters the phrase "live action roleplaying" let alone the acronym "LARP".I associate LARPing with WW's Mind's Eye Theater, because when I started playing RPGs, that was popular. In fact, I haven't heard a lot about medieval LARPs, though I know they exist, I've seem people make props for them.So, I wonder if maybe this incident is part of the reason TSR never developed a live-action game, D&D or otherwise. What rule system to medieval LARPers use? Or do most of them just join the SCA?</blockquote>

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