What if you brought 4E back to 1970?

[Ed_Laprade]

Actually, no. There is a letter from Tolkien that specifically refers to the fact that orc-women exist, and play the same role in reproduction that women everywhere play.

Because orcs are really only shown as soldiers, though, we just happen to never see any.

And that's where the 'Dwarven women have beards' argument came from.

I have no idea what the overall effect of 4E in 1970 would be, but there would certainly be other RPGs created eventually. (After the supply of $1 4E material dried up.) One of the main motivating forces that caused the creation of the early non D&D RPGs was: "But I can't make the character I want to with these rules!" (Or some varient thereof, keeping in mind that the OD&D rules were pretty darn loose!) And, of course, there would be the non fantasy games too.

I do think that E. Gary would be unknown, pretty much. His major contribution to RPGs, at first, was publishing (with some work of his own added) Dave Arneson's work. But 1970 is four years before that happened. So it begs the question of how involved he'd be in the new games that came out. Would he write one of his own? Publish someone else's? Play 4E? Who knows?

 

[Intense_Interest]

So, if Tolkein mentions young goblin children, then they could just be corrupted elf children, right?

Exactly what evidence would you accept that orcs reproduce?

J.R.R. Tolklien's notes or books actually containing the passage anywhere that Orcs are not a sterile race and/or have children. The inferences you've shown are merely corrupted views of cultural osmosis.

 

[jmucchiello]

It wouldn't have been Gary as DM, and indeed, he would have been called the DM because it would have occurred before D&D existed. It would have been one of Dave Arneson's blackmoor players.

Dave had classes with levels and XP before Gary started D&D? I thought Gary had 1:1 skirmishers with "advancement" between "campaigns" (a.k.a. battles) before Dave (as player) discovered the "role" element of play. (Here, I'm thinking about the 1:1 raid-the-bunker spy game that Dave p0wned by emphasizing role.)

I need to hang out on dragonsfoot more.

 

[Raven Crowking]

J.R.R. Tolklien's notes or books actually containing the passage anywhere that Orcs are not a sterile race and/or have children.

Please rephrase this sentence.

 

[Desdichado]

And that's where the 'Dwarven women have beards' argument came from.

Actually, that didn't come from any Letters, it came from the appendix "On Dwarves" in Return of the King.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Back on original topic. I think it would have failed, miserably. It's like asking what would have happened if you put a finely tuned modern engine in a Ford Model A. Or if modern military weapons were on the battlefields of WWII. Or if Spartacus had a Piper Cub. The surroundings aren't geared for it and can't support it.

I think today's RPGs, compared to most in the 1970s, are overdesigned and overly niched to gain the kind of support that early RPGs were able to get.

I'm inclined to agree.

I think that the gamers of today will put up with/demand (*) a lot more complexity than was appropriate in those early days. The fact that D&D took 10 minutes to explain and 10 minutes to create a character back then meant that the barrier to entry amongst friends was incredibly low.

I think that had D&D sprung forth fully-formed as 4e, there might have been a small ripple of interest, but it would have struggled to become the early phenomenon it did.

My 2c, from the point of view of someone who started in ~1975, anyhow.


*delete according to preference

 

[DreadPirateMurphy]

The fact that D&D took 10 minutes to explain and 10 minutes to create a character back then meant that the barrier to entry amongst friends was incredibly low.

How does that jive with the evolution of the genre out of wargaming? I mean, have you looked at the rules for Squad Leader, which came out in 1977? I remember those days myself, and D&D was always that complicated thing that geeks played. AD&D was one of the most complicated things out there.

Here is text from page 10 of the AD&D 1E DMG: "A single die, or multiple dice read in succession (such as three dice read as hundreds, tens and decimals) give linear probabilities. Two or more dice added together generate a bell-shaped probability curve." I could see how that would draw in those seeking simplicity.

Ah, but maybe that is just the DMG. Well, page 8 of the PHB spends almost half-a-page explaining the different usages of the word, "level," while page 9 expounds on how Strength runs from 3-18, and fighters (and only fighters) with a strength of 16 or more gain a 10% experience point bonus, and get to role percentile dice for exceptional strength between 01 and 00.

Other gaming systems back then had equivalent quirks, like Traveller's character generation that could result in your character dying before you even get to play the game. While I never played RuneQuest, I don't remember anybody commenting on how simple it was.

 

[billd91]

How does that jive with the evolution of the genre out of wargaming? I mean, have you looked at the rules for Squad Leader, which came out in 1977? I remember those days myself, and D&D was always that complicated thing that geeks played. AD&D was one of the most complicated things out there.

Squad Leader came out in 1977, yes. And it incorporated a staged education to ease people into playing it. But its final expansion, with half-squads and all that additional complexity, didn't come until 1983. Before those expansions, SL is a much simpler game. And then Advanced Squad Leader came along in 1985, also in staged releases, to revise all that complexity into a titanically complex game that even has additional flowcharts you can buy to get yourself through calling in artillery support.

Panzer Blitz and Panzer Leader, from 1970 and a bit more contemporary with what the OP was suggesting, are considerably less complex. Their popularity and innovations probably helped lay the groundwork for Squad Leader. It's all a question of priming the pumps.

Ah, but maybe that is just the DMG. Well, page 8 of the PHB spends almost half-a-page explaining the different usages of the word, "level," while page 9 expounds on how Strength runs from 3-18, and fighters (and only fighters) with a strength of 16 or more gain a 10% experience point bonus, and get to role percentile dice for exceptional strength between 01 and 00.

Simple has a certain relativity to it. AD&D, with all of its description of "level", is a lot less complex to get someone started with than 4e. If early editions of D&D were as complex as 4e, it probably wouldn't have broken out to the broader fantasy market nearly as well as it did.

 

[Plane Sailing]

In addition, it was under OD&D that the first head of steam was built up, which was considerably fewer words than AD&D.

Don't forget that one of the key advantages of OD&D (and to an only slightly lesser extent AD&D) is the asymmetric nature of the game. The DM had to have a very good grasp of the rules, but the players didn't. This is what I mean by the 10 minute introduction to the rules.

This is what opened D&D up to the non-wargaming community. It was dead easy to say to people "Hey, do you want to come and play a game where you GET TO BE CONAN!" and it was simplicity itself for people to play.

Current editions are much more like wargames in that all participants need to know a lot about the rules - it is much more symmetric in its requirements.

Regards,

 

[JohnRTroy]

I do think that E. Gary would be unknown, pretty much. His major contribution to RPGs, at first, was publishing (with some work of his own added) Dave Arneson's work. But 1970 is four years before that happened. So it begs the question of how involved he'd be in the new games that came out. Would he write one of his own? Publish someone else's? Play 4E? Who knows?

Well, consider EGG first created Chainmail and also created GenCon, I think he would have been famous enough. By his own wording, Dave only wrote 1/3rd of the Men and Magic book. While this is very much in dispute over the years, both men knew each other threw Wargaming. Gary and Dave were both very known in Wargaming circles.

I think people who are fans of the "Dave invented" idea forget two key things in this plan. First, Gary was the one who sacrificed and actually formed TSR by quitting his day job and founding TSR with Don Kaye, while Dave stayed at his day job. Forming a company takes a lot of work, especially before personal computers and the established hobby market. An "idea" can only get you so far.

Secondly, while Dave might have been the first to create the RPG, I doubt he would have had the tenacity to be a publisher. From what I've seen, he had never had the same level of output (or fecund creativity) as a writer that Gary had. Most of the Blackmoor supplements after Dave left TSR were fleshed out by co-writers (such as the Basic D&D revival, and both the 3e and 4e versions). Gary's written several games and you can easily see that he had a strong writing style.