TSR The Dueling Essays of Arneson & Gygax

A recent article and documentary about Dave Arneson's involvement in Dungeons & Dragons shares a different perspective on the game's creation, with a particular emphasis on Rob Kuntz's testimony. Some of it contradicts what Gary Gygax positioned as D&D's origins. Fortunately we can read what both designers thoughts in their very own words -- published in the same book.

Alzrius pointed out that both Arneson and Gygax contributed essays to Lawrence Schick's Heroic Worlds. What's startling is how their essays contradict each other just pages apart.

Heroic Worlds, published in 1991, was an attempt to catalog every tabletop role-playing games publication. It was a massive undertaking that was possible only because of the limited scope of the hobby. Thanks to electronic publishing, the Open Game License, and the Internet, tabletop gaming products have exploded -- DriveThruRPG has over 30,000 products alone -- making it impossible to produce a book of this scope ever again. It also provides a snapshot in time of the thoughts of various game designers, including Steve Jackon, Jennell Jaquays, Tom Moldavy, Sandy Petersen, Ken St. Andre, Michael Stackpole, Greg Stafford, Erick Wujcik and more.

Arneson kicks off the D&D controversy on page 131:

My first set of miniatures rules was for fighting out battles with sailing ships. This led me to meet several people, including Gary Gygax, at an early GenCon. These people later participated in a historical campaign I refereed. When I began refereeing what later became D&D in Minnesota, I mentioned it to them. They were interested, and when some of us went down to visit we all played this strange game...the lads in Lake Geneva got turned on to it. Tactical Studies Rules, a Lake Geneva-based game company, was already publishing historical rules and was willing to do D&D.

Gygax follows up on the origins of D&D in a short one-page essay on the very next page:

In the late 1960s a club called the Lake Geneva Tactical Studies Association met weekly at my home for military/naval miniatures gaming. From this activity sprang Chainmail. The D&D game was drawn from its rules, and that is indisputable. Chainmail was the progenitor of D&D, but the child grew to excel its parent.

This point is disputed by RPG archivist, Paul Stromberg, in the Kotaku article, "Dungeons & Deceptions: The First D&D Players Push Back On The Legend Of Gary Gygax":

“People think that Blackmoor arose from Chainmail, and thus Chainmail gave rise to Dungeons & Dragons. That is not correct,” said Stormberg, the RPG historian. While Chainmail, amongst other things, was an influence on Blackmoor, Arneson’s game was “entirely new,” he said. “It’s a game entirely unlike Chainmail. It’s like saying a Rodin uses red and a Picasso uses red so they’re the same style of painting.”

This perspective is shared by Arneson himself in his first essay:

Contrary to rumor, the players and I were all quite in control of our mental processes when D&D was designed. I also hasten to point out hat the Chainmail connection was the use of the Combat Matrix and nothing more. Find a first-edition Chainmail and compare it to a first-edition Original D&D someday and you will see that for yourself: not a hit point, character class, level, or armor class, much less any role-playing aspects in Chainmail.

Arneson's perspective on the game industry comes through in the other essays scattered throughout the book. Here's his version of how Blackmoor came about:

I originally began with a simple dungeon and expanded it into several dungeons loosely organized as a campaign. The rules were not really an organized set, more notes on what I had earlier. Today people expect a lot more detail, coherency, organization, and story.

Here's Arneson's thoughts on writing a scenario:

When I design a scenario, sometimes the plot or situation will come from books I read, and sometimes it just pops into my head...Changes are made, and then the work is sent off to be butchered--er, ah, edited, I mean...The original Blackmoor supplement included what was the very first published scenario. My intention was that it would serve as a guideline for other GMs to design their own. Instead, it spawn an entire "service" industry. Oh, well...

And finally here's what Arneson thought of the game industry:

My serious advice to the would-be role-playing-game author will sound cruel and heartless, and most will be offended and not listen. To would be game designers I say: seek useful employment in another field...play your own house rules with your friends and associates; it will be less painful and far more fun. (On the other hand, frankly, I wouldn't have listened to an old fogey like me.)

Gygax's thoughts on the subject of D&D are well-known; Arneson's less so, and Heroic Worlds is a trove of his perspective on tabletop gaming and publishing, undoubtedly informed by his legal tussles with TSR. The difference between Arenson and Gygax's approach to gaming is starkly illustrated in their essays. And yet, despite their long and sometimes antagonistic history, Gygax ends his essay on a hopeful note:

Dave Arneson and I have spoken frequently since the time we devised D&D. We don't plan to collaborate on another game, but just maybe one day he'll decide to combine talents again.

Did Gygax mean "we'll" instead of "he'll"? Gygax ends the essay with our only answer: Who knows?

 

[Reynard]

It's definitely worth it; although the prose is a lot denser than you might think.

A review of it by Jason Begy, quoting the book, said it best:

“Readers in whom this justification does not spark an eagerness to explore the minutiae, however, should not hesitate to skim over the technical detail in the rest of this chapter.” Reading this I laughed to myself, thinking this warning would have been better placed some two hundred pages earlier.

I started last night. It's interesting but I make no apologies for skimming the wargaming development section.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Yaarel]

I am hoping that someone with the procedural knowledge and the dates can step in to comment here, or contact me.

Based on people I have spoken with, this is my understanding of what happened at the Arneson v Gygax lawsuit. This includes indirect information from someone who spoke with the original attorney of Arneson as well as an other attorney who was with Arneson before the judge. I would love to speak with these attorneys directly if possible.

At some point, Arneson went before a judge.

At this time, his lawyers had with them Arneson’s evidentiary documents, in preparation for a trial.

These documents included the transcripts of Arneson’s gaming group − and manuscripts of D&D gaming designs by Arneson himself. The organization of these documents was mainly an arrangement of texts from D&D 1e paralleling the texts from D&D 0e and the texts from Arneson himself and his gaming group. To show derivation.

Gygax is also here on this day with his lawyers.

The judge did ask to look at the documents that Arneson and his lawyers brought.

It seems the intention of the judge was to assign ownership of certain parts of D&D to Arneson, and certain other parts of D&D to Gygax, and in this way resolve the dispute.

However, looking at the evidence, it seemed to the judge, the collaboration between them was too intermingled − each developing the others response further − in every part of D&D. He therefore felt it was impossible to divide up the ownership.

At this point, this same judge recommended to Arneson and Gygax and their respective lawyers, to settle the dispute between themselves without the court. Which they did.

And this is how the case came to be settled ‘out of court’.

 

[jayoungr]

So a bigger question is, assuming these transcripts existed, what happened to them? That's what I'm most curious about.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Yaarel]

At this point, I suspect @lowkey13 is the one who is inventing fiction.

He is treating legal documents as if nothing else in the universe exists except for documents.

This is the tendency that religious fundamentalists have, and it gets them into trouble.

At some point, the messiness of reallife must be taken account, when reliably reconstructing an event.

Certainly, this includes evaluating statements from people who were there, including the lawyers of Arneson who were there.

Judges have much leeway when evaluating a particular case. When a judge makes a request, their motivation is not always obvious.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Yaarel]

So a bigger question is, assuming these transcripts existed, what happened to them? That's what I'm most curious about.

I agree. What matters now is these documents.

The transcripts exist. The dispute is only @lowkey13 denying a judge ever saw these documents. But this is just Lowkey13’s own imagination/reconstruction.

In any case, the legal debate is besides the point. Legally, whatever dispute existed between Arneson and Gygax was settled. It is a done deal. A footnote in history.


What matters is these early documents. These are valuable evidence that help reconstruct the invention of RPGs generally and the invention of Dungeons & Dragons specifically.

 

[jayoungr]

I don't know what Yaarel is smoking, but at a later date Arneson claimed that he sent more notes to Gygax than the fabled "16 pages" that everyone talks about.

But what's the source for saying there were game transcripts and/or that they were in the hands of Arneson's lawyers at some point? Is there a record of them being presented? Did the lawyers mention having them? Or is this one of those "somebody who knows somebody who saw them told me about it" things?