Was Santa Claus the reason you started playing D&D?

[diaglo]

nope. got introduced to chainmail by my uncle. he was a wargamer. but i did get my own copy of chainmail for my birthday.

OD&D came later. met a kid in my homeroom class at a new school who was talking about gaming. i mentioned i played wargames. he invited me and some other kids over for a game. his older brother refereed for us. it totally clicked with me. i got my boxed set for xmas.

edit: my parents had no idea that it was any different from chainmail when they got it for me.

 

[Tigerbunny]

I learned about D&D from an article in Boys' Life magazine in 1979, and was immediately fascinated. I began a campaign of persuasion aimed at every adult in my life I could think of, which culminated in receiving the Holmes Basic Set from my grandparents for Christmas that year. The rest is history.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

My first exposure to D&D was actually at the hands of an older neighborhood kid when I was about 8 years old. I didn't entirely get it, but I loved it! Even so, I didn't really grasp that there were purchasable materials involved... other than his dice, everything I saw him use was homemade.

When my mom came across the red box at a garage sale a couple years later (in a different town), she remembered my prior experience and connected the dots. She bought the box, then did a little research before giving it to me... this was about 1984, and D&D already had a bad rep, though she didn't buy it. I'm glad. That was certainly the most formative decision of my life. I've been running D&D games now, in one form or another, for nearly 23 years.

And mom has been one of my players for the vast majority of those years. A good one, at that.

 

[TerraDave]

No. But I did get some good stuff for Xmass way back.




I have been wondering where my copy of this is:

 

[el-remmen]

Kind of.

I got the old Dungeon board game from my uncle for Christmas when I was 9 - and in the TSR catalog that came in the box were descriptions of the Basic and Expert sets and other D&D things and I became fascinated with it.

However, it would not be until I was 11 (after seeing Mazes & Monsters on TV) that my interest developed enough to seek it out.

 

[Drkfathr1]

Santa didn't introduce me to D&D....

Jesus did!

I was introduced to D&D on a church youth trip, turns out our Youth Minister and his brothers used to play. After that trip, He started running a weekly game at Church for us!

Had a hard time getting my mom to accept it though, she thought it was Satanic and evil. Eventually she realized it was JUST A GAME. I had to buy everything for myself though, my parents wouldn't buy any of the books for me.

 

[timbannock]

I played D&D with a cousin, but then Christmas of '87 or so I got the D&D basic box set (the version before the Red Box...I don't know how my parents got their hands on that!). But my cousin was a sly bastard, so he traded me a tape of Cinderella/Scorpions mixes for it.

I soon realized my mistake, and went out and bought the Red Box Set. Then the blue one. And the bluey-greenish one. And then the 2e PHB, DMG and MM. And so on.

It's blasphemy to some, but 4e got me interested in a lot of the old stuff that I'd missed (mostly Greyhawk 1e stuff, coz I kinda skipped 1e, going from Basic to 2e). I don't know what exactly it is, but 4e somehow connected with the nostalgia part of me, even though it's radically different.

Whatever it is, I likey.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I started back in summer camp in 1978. I was staying over between 2 sessions and there were about a dozen kids stuck there for a weekend. One of them had the white box and he taught us to play. I don't remember exactly when I bought the red box (which was the first set I owned) but I know it was because I saw it and wanted it because I liked the game, and not as a gift.

 

[Zaukrie]

Let's see if I can figure out the dates....first, no, I started playing because a friend played. I have gotten a lot of D&D stuff from my kids as presents (gee, I wonder who uses those more.....).

I started in 1974 or 5, I think. It was pretty much just two of us playing. Then, I started DMing in the late 70's, and I gave some friends some stuff to get them going.

My kids and I have given minis away to others, and have gotten them hooked on either buying minis or playing the RPG. My kids are right in that ideal pre-teen/teen agegroup.

I've often thought about giving the D&D game to toys for tots, but the game is pricey to keep buying, and I'm not sure I want to put that in front of someone and then not have them be able to afford to keep buying....very conflicted on that one.

 

[darjr]

6th or 5th grade saw kids at 'recess' playing with the blue box. His older brother had given to him cause they upgraded to AD&D.

I don't remember pining about it, but I must have, I did indeed get the Modvay RedBox for christmas. Blue box for the following birthday.

Ah, fond memories...