TSR Q&A with Gary Gygax

This is the multi-year Q&A sessions held by D&D co-creator Gary Gygax here at EN World, beginning in 2002 and running up until his sad pasing in 2008. Gary's username in the thread below is Col_Pladoh, and his first post in this long thread is Post #39.

 

[Joseph Elric Smith]

Hi John

The LA game "Quick Start" pdf is all done except for final layout. Chris Clark is away at the GAMA show, so the final won't be ready for a few days. I'll announce the availability of the download here, I suppose, on a new thread, and give the URLs of the webssites that have it ready to go. Likely be a week or so.

Cheers,
Gary

excellent and with that I shall hopefully bring my saturday group around to playing LA
ken

 

[Col_Pladoh]

excellent and with that I shall hopefully bring my saturday group around to playing LA
ken

BluSponge has done an excellent bit of work on the "Quick Start" for the LA game, Ken. there are four pre-generated Avatars and a good adventure for the LM to run--it is a tough one but managable if the players are knowledheable and careful. this isn't something for for newbies to role-playing to tackle, for sure, unless the Lejend Master is expert and softens things up considerably.

Now to get Chris Clark to finish the pdf and get it around for posting

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Joseph Elric Smith]

BluSponge has done an excellent bit of work on the "Quick Start" for the LA game, Ken. there are four pre-generated Avatars and a good adventure for the LM to run--it is a tough one but managable if the players are knowledheable and careful. this isn't something for for newbies to role-playing to tackle, for sure, unless the Lejend Master is expert and softens things up considerably.

Now to get Chris Clark to finish the pdf and get it around for posting

Cheers,
Gary

Oh that sounds great. Just the kind of quick start I need for my group. I have my Wednesday night group at least letting me run LA part of the time. and with the Quick start and a good adventure I am sure I should be able to bring my saturday group around at least for part time if nothing else. And since they all play on-line games I can use that as a spring board for LAO too
ken

 

[Wolv0rine]

3 stupid questions

Gary,here's three stupid questions that have been floating around in my head for the past few days after after some D&D cartoon nostalgia. I really expect the answers to be either "I have no idea" or "no", but I'll ask anyway.

1) Who came up with those weapons the kids had?
2) Why didn't they ever get some horses? I mean they walked the length of the realm and back again.
3) Is there, anywhere in existance that you know of, a map of the Realm the kids were in? So many interesting places (if presented in a goofy and cheesy fashion for younger-audience consumption).

Thanks!

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Re: 3 stupid questions

Gary,here's three stupid questions that have been floating around in my head for the past few days after after some D&D cartoon nostalgia. I really expect the answers to be either "I have no idea" or "no", but I'll ask anyway.

Pretty good questions, amigo

I'll answer them in order...

1) Who came up with those weapons the kids had?
2) Why didn't they ever get some horses? I mean they walked the length of the realm and back again.
3) Is there, anywhere in existance that you know of, a map of the Realm the kids were in? So many interesting places (if presented in a goofy and cheesy fashion for younger-audience consumption).

Thanks!

1) That was Dennis Marks and me. He was the lead, because CBS would not allow weapons that did real violence.

2) Because the age group that was initially considered as the primary audience would not feel comfortable with large horses--seen as threatening--the "Kids" walked. think of Uni, and you'll get the mental picture of what the network people thought of as appropriate. Of course in the spinoff series, more real weapons and horses would have been in the adventures.

3) No map was ever done, as that would force the various writers to conform to a "known world." With a nebulous area, most anything could be done to make a story idea fit in. Of course sans a mapped area there was also no reference points for recognitin from story to story, and no inspiration from the depicted terrain.

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Wolv0rine]

Re: Re: 3 stupid questions

Pretty good questions, amigo

Thank you.

I'll answer them in order...

1) That was Dennis Marks and me. He was the lead, because CBS would not allow weapons that did real violence.

*nods* Logical, about CBS and all. But why did the weapons (or even permutations of them that would fit into the AD&D/D&D game) never show up in the game itself? I mean, Shiela's cloak was just a cloak of invisibility (easilly gotten in-game), but I don't think anything like the others was ever found in the books. Those were great stuff. And, is there any copyright on them going around these days (the weapons themselves, that is), or could some publisher put out a book with with a close variant of them statted up for 3E (I, myself, would loveto take a crack at illustrating the kids in a more realistic fashion, aside from just for laughs, hehe)?

2) Because the age group that was initially considered as the primary audience would not feel comfortable with large horses--seen as threatening--the "Kids" walked. think of Uni, and you'll get the mental picture of what the network people thought of as appropriate. Of course in the spinoff series, more real weapons and horses would have been in the adventures.

Gods, I hated Uni.
Really? Just horses were considered too big and scary? Tiamat they thought was okay, but horses were too much? *falls over laughing at asinine TV execs* That's great stuff right there.
Gods I'd love to see that spinoff show, even now (Willie Ames, forsake Bibleman, I want my updated Ranger!).

3) No map was ever done, as that would force the various writers to conform to a "known world." With a nebulous area, most anything could be done to make a story idea fit in. Of course sans a mapped area there was also no reference points for recognitin from story to story, and no inspiration from the depicted terrain.

I suspected this one would be No, actually. It was a logical step to assume the writers had no map to deal with while they were writing to confine them, but I did harbor a wee hope that someone both qualified and who worked with the writers (you, perhaps) had created an official map of the Realm. (not just made one up, but actually mapped out the realm as it was presented - possibly even including places the show never got around to showing us)
*chuckles* That always bugged me, even as a kid, that the Realm had no name. It was just "This Realm" or "The Realm". I mean, of course we knew it was "The Realm of Dungeons & Dragons", but I never thought the locals called it that.

Thanks a ton Gary, this thread is just unendingly cool. (And I still want an energy bow, hehehe)

 

[The Fool]

Hi Gary...Gord question...

Hi

I was wondering if Gary knew what was happening with
the re release or re printing of the 'Gord the Rogue' books...

I sort of remember this was on the cards over a year back...

I heard rumours of an Omnibus of all the books in one book also?

If this is only just a rumour i apologise for getting anyones hopes up (including mine)


The Fool

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Re: Re: Re: 3 stupid questions

Thank you.
[/b]

*nods* Logical, about CBS and all. But why did the weapons (or even permutations of them that would fit into the AD&D/D&D game) never show up in the game itself? I mean, Shiela's cloak was just a cloak of invisibility (easilly gotten in-game), but I don't think anything like the others was ever found in the books. Those were great stuff. And, is there any copyright on them going around these days (the weapons themselves, that is), or could some publisher put out a book with with a close variant of them statted up for 3E (I, myself, would loveto take a crack at illustrating the kids in a more realistic fashion, aside from just for laughs, hehe)? [/B]

There was no one back at TSR that was paying attention to the cartoon show, so nothing that appeared in the episodes was picked up in article material in DRAGON.

Copyrights to the cartoon show material are jointly owned by Marvel and TSR--now WotC. Still, descriptive material for the paper game could certainly have been taken from the TV episodes and added to the game.

Gods, I hated Uni.
Really? Just horses were considered too big and scary? Tiamat they thought was okay, but horses were too much? *falls over laughing at asinine TV execs* That's great stuff right there.
Gods I'd love to see that spinoff show, even now (Willie Ames, forsake Bibleman, I want my updated Ranger!).

Well, more likely the idea was to avoid showing children riding horses in dangerous places--immitatable action. Venger also had a horse, a threatening one.

I suspected this one would be No, actually. It was a logical step to assume the writers had no map to deal with while they were writing to confine them, but I did harbor a wee hope that someone both qualified and who worked with the writers (you, perhaps) had created an official map of the Realm. (not just made one up, but actually mapped out the realm as it was presented - possibly even including places the show never got around to showing us)
*chuckles* That always bugged me, even as a kid, that the Realm had no name. It was just "This Realm" or "The Realm". I mean, of course we knew it was "The Realm of Dungeons & Dragons", but I never thought the locals called it that.

Thanks a ton Gary, this thread is just unendingly cool. (And I still want an energy bow, hehehe)

There would be no benefit from a map that would be ignored or conflict with a writer's idea for a show. Programming for a young audience generally doesn't call for such continuity. In a more "advanced" spinoff version of the D&D Cartoon Show, such a step would have been logical. Sadly we never got that far.

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Re: Hi Gary...Gord question...

Hi

I was wondering if Gary knew what was happening with
the re release or re printing of the 'Gord the Rogue' books...

I sort of remember this was on the cards over a year back...

I heard rumours of an Omnibus of all the books in one book also?

If this is only just a rumour i apologise for getting anyones hopes up (including mine)


The Fool

Heh,

I hope to shout I do, as those yarns are thr IP of Trigee

We changed plans aver a year ago when a publisher approached us with a proposal for full-color graphic novel versions of the Gord the Rogue books.

That is now underway, and there will be an announcement regarding the books later in the summer. More I can not say.

If those novels do well, there is a a strong likelihood that the regular books will be reprinted in hardback version, possibly with paperback reprints following that.

There is no plan to reprint all seven books in one giant volume, though

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Eridanis]

Gary -

I woke up this morning, planning to finally take a ride over to Lake Geneva to visit the Game Guild (where I hadn't been in years, since my first stint living in the Midwest), and when I Googled for their website, it was empty! A call to their phone # says it has been disconnected.

How long has the Game Guild been out of business? All good things must come to an end, I suppose. Guess I'll just have to spend the day outside enjoying the sunshine.

Yours, disappointedly,

- Matt