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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Snarf Zagyg" data-source="post: 8334483" data-attributes="member: 7023840">Provocative thesis! Probably needs to be longer, a bit more meandering, with a few pop culture quotes. Jus' sayin'.As to the substance, as you might know from my avatar, this is something I am somewhat familiar with. So breaking it down-1. Is Hickman a founder, or a third founder, after Arneson and Gygax? Absolutely not. I get that this is partly provocative, but you don't just get to have tons of founders of something. D&D was founded (started) by Gygax and Arneson. If you wanted to expand the grouping, you would still need to keep it to the people that were that at ... the founding. So we'd be looking at people like Tim Kask, Rob Kuntz, and Jim Ward. If you wanted to, you could also look at the artists who helped create the "look" of early D&D- Otus, Dee, Trampier.2. Next, there is the question of "eras" of D&D. We often talk about "editions" because those are clear breaks. But IMO, the "TSR" era (OD&D-1e-2e, and without going into the B/X and BECMI line for right now) is really broken down into these three eras-Early- 1974-1984Mid- 1985-1994Late- 1995-2000A brief explanation- early D&D is pretty much a continual evolution, expansion, and (occasionally) refinement of a set of rules starting with OD&D and going through 1984, with a general vibe, feel, and aesthetic that is largely the same.Mid D&D is when that "early D&D" artwork is completely superseded by the "E" art department (Elmore, Easley and Co.- Parkinson, Caldwell, etc.) and we began to see a change in the modules and the rulebooks, along with the ouster of the Gygax. Ironically, the rules really switched starting with Gygax's last, rushed book that was a quick cash grab- unearthed arcana. This is the 1.5-2.0 era.Late era D&D is the decline, but also when the market was flooded with player options (call this 2.5). This was also a marked shift in the game, and those player option splat books became an idea that would continue on in later editions in various forms.3. I think Hickman was fine- I think that Pharaoh (which was actually originally written around 1977, along with the original Ravenloft) which he wrote with his wife, was one of the great examples of early D&D. Ravenloft ... that was a really, really good module that has resonated through time to the extent that an entire campaign setting was based off of it.But you are putting a lot of emphasis on the Dragonlance modules. Have you ... played them? I remember when they came out! I was really excited to play the first one! The whole idea ... steel as currency (it seemed cool at the time). Dragons. All of it. But you know what?The. Modules. Suck. They are so bad. Even at the time, they were terrible. The books, on the other hand, were ... well, I'll just say that they were decent if you were starving for workman-like fantasy fiction at the time- it's not like the early 80s were a great time for that. It was Dragonlance, terrible puns in Xanth, just not a great time. The books sold really well. But that's not D&D- and Dragonlance is also Weis.The Weis issue is one thing- I mean, we'd have to, at a minimum, have to acknowledge Margret Weis and Laura Hickman. Otherwise ....(continued, premature publication again!)</blockquote>

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