D&D 5E The Youngest Grognard?

[Zardnaar]

Recently I turned 41 and I started playing D&D in late 93 with my first campaign in 94.

At the time 2E was the edition but that was for people who have things like gamestores. We had some old red/blue B/X stuff and B2,3,4 and X1. My friends older brother gave it to him and he played in the late 80s. In 95 I switched to 2E, 96 a grognard ran 1E for us.

So I got to play for my early D&D editions that were out of print already although in 94 one player has the Rules Cyclopedia. Very battered versions of Spelljammer were found in the bottom of closets from another friend and old issues if Dungeon and Dragon were also found with new issues bought May 1996.

Now I'm not a grognard in the traditional sense. I do like OSR gaming and probably have a preference but will happily play modern editions mostly due to advantages of getting new players.

I'm sure in not the youngest but I wonder how many people were playing BECMI in 1995 as a new (for them) game. I knew AD&D existed but had really only played computer games.

TSR died 97, 2E went out if print in 2000. I'm sure since then some grognard has played with a new player post 2000 but when I started AD&D and BECMI were still in print with the last BECMI material coming out in 1994.

So my question is how young would the youngest grognard be if they played while those editions were still in print?

A 10 year old could have played in 2000 which would make them 29. It's possible someone younger could have played but I don't think you would remember much or have much attachment to a 6 month or so period before 3E landed.

Another possibility is someone picking up 1E or B/X in the late 90s pre 3E. Probably wouldn't be common but I'm sure it happened.

The youngest grog theoretically is probably around 29, but to remember much or played for a year or two and old enough to remember much 33 or so.

Others might have learned post 3E launch even as their first D&D. Personally I use the term Neo Grognard for them and probably myself as I'm not strictly OSR only or even most if the time.

But I'll bust out clones, AD&D etc every now and then for as long as I can get players to go for it although that's now and occasional thing and not much long term one or two adventures or homebrew.

The youngest 1E grog who played while it was in print would likely be in the early 40s although I suppose a 5 years old could have played 1E in 1989.

 

[jasper]

8010.10 Stardate on my PHB. So I was 17 when I bought it. But I been playing since school began that Late Aug so I was 16 when I started playing. My brother started playing that year and did buy the basic, expert etc sets. So he was 11 when he started. So he is 49.
So the question is "If you started before 1980 were you younger than 11?"

 

[DND_Reborn]

I started when I was 5, 40 years ago, back in '78. My older sister and some cousins introduced the game. My first character was a magic-user named "Dartson" because he would throw darts when he ran out of spells. It as Basic, and they always just asked me, "What do you want to do?" and told me when to roll the die.

 

[Nevvur]

Grognard has taken on a few meanings over the decades since it first came to be used in the gaming community. Might be helpful to pin down the definition you want to use.

For instance, 'older gamer' appears in many definitions, so by that a grognard necessarily cannot be young. But then we have to determine what young and old mean. Is it adherence to older systems? There's no strict age or era requirement on that.

 

[Zardnaar]

Probably youngest gamer that played pre 3E that would still play a pre 3E game in 2019. For ultra hard core youngest pre 3E player that never moved into 3E onwards.

Just wondering if anyone has any stories. It would be funny if someone knows a 30 year old who started in 1999 or something and stuck with 2E.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I’m honestly not sure that I’d classify someone that grew up playing an older edition in later times as a grognard. Is it not a different gaming environment when you play older editions after the fact, rather than playing them when they were current? I don’t necessarily have an answer here. Culturally, people were growing up with different influences in the 90s than the 70s and 80s. I guess it goes back to the question “what makes a grognard?”

I guess, if we were to arbitrarily say that a grognard is someone that grew up playing when the current edition was 1e at the latest, I suppose the cut-off year would be 1988. Assuming the youngest someone could play and get anything out of it is in the five-ish range, the youngest grognard could be, what 36. But I think that’s pushing the definition. And again, I think a grognard is more than just the edition they started with.

 

[ccs]

What if the player started in 2012 with the 1e "premium" reprints?

A few months before these came out several of us old Grognards & the owner of the local shop had set up a 1e game.
It was 1e because that's what the owner was familiar with & wouldn't have to learn a whole new system. We set it on the shops slowest night & the owner DM'd Hommlet. We had 3 players + the DM.
Every now & then there'd be pauses in the game as he had to help a customer etc. But like I said, we'd intentionally set it on the slowest night. We were just playing, killing time on slow as molasses Tue evenings, so there wasn't any rush in how much we needed to accomplish.

About 1/2 way through Hommlet we attracted the attention of a couple of disillusioned early 20's MTG players. They'd never played an RPG in their life.
They sat in on a session. We taught them how to play. A few weeks later they asked if one of their friends could join. We taught him to play. He in turn brought his two best friends. We taught them to play.
During this time the special editions of 1e were just hitting the shelf. The youngest of this new blood was 19.

So in 2012 we were selling brand new 1e books to 19-22 year olds.

This led to a 1e game that ran for the next 4.5 years & several new and still going gaming groups.
And that former 19 year old? He's a regular in the PF group I play in. He also equally prefers 1e & PF.

So our youngest Grognard is now 26.

 

[Len]

For instance, 'older gamer' appears in many definitions, so by that a grognard necessarily cannot be young. But then we have to determine what young and old mean.

I think "older gamer" is still part of the definition, but the definition of "older" has changed - when I was young, it meant anyone over 30.

 

[Celebrim]

"Grognard" comes to us from the French from "grumbler", and originally referred to those veteran campaigners who - having been with Napoléon since the beginning - were entitled to speak their mind. The effective meaning is "an old soldier" so to be young and a grognard is a contradiction in terms.

To me, to be a grognard you have to have begun play no later than 1e AD&D or "red box" basic, preferably prior to the printing of the "Unearthed Arcana" - though if you want to be purist about it, I would accept an argument that you had to have come to the game in the OD&D era before the printing of the 1e Monster Manual.

I would not accept a later definition of what it means to be a grognard until such time as the OG's die off and there is no generation old enough to view the oldest left as youngsters. Rather than seeing you as one of the youngest grognards, by starting your first campaign in 1994 I see you as one of the oldest non-grognards. No one that started play after the printing of 2e counts as a grognard for me, and basically I think we're still at least 20 years out from any need to define such late bloomers as grognards.

The youngest grognard by the strictest definition is probably about 49 right now, probably playing as an 8 or 9 year old with older relatives in 1979. I can't really conceive of anyone younger having the maturity. A slightly looser definition would put the youngest grognards at around 43. But in either case, even if you are 43 if you didn't begin gaming until you were 13 or 14, you aren't a grognard because you don't remotely have a case that you've been with the game since the beginning. You don't remember first hand the original publications of 1e AD&D, the Red Box appearing in toy stores, the Dungeon & Dragons cartoon or the related toys, the first publication of Chronicles of the Dragonlance or when Dragon felt very much like an amateur 'zine. You don't remember Boot Hill, Top Secret, and Traveller. By the time you got into the game, it was Vampire the Masquerade.

And I'm vaguely familiar with the culture of OD&D as it spread from college war gaming groups into the fringe groups that made up the experimental 1970's, but I was too young to actually be a part of it so I would accept the judgment that I'm not a grognard either, having missed the cut off by 3 or 4 years.

 

[Tony Vargas]

The effective meaning is "an old soldier" so to be young and a grognard is a contradiction in terms.

..it's an attitude, and Zard' certainly as the 'tude.

The Youngest Grognard?

We're indoctrinating a new generation of Grognards, right now.