What was the "golden age" of Dragon

[Alzrius]

If I could have, I'd have selected "the Paizo years."

 

[the Jester]

Using Erik's categories, I have to go:

Mohan
Moore
Paizo

...in that order.

 

[pogre]

I really enjoyed dragons #40-#60. #50 was a great issue. Of course, I was younger and I may not feel the same looking them over again today.

 

[Greg K]

For myself it was 45-100. There were lots of great articles- The demihuman point of view and deities, The Deities of Greyhawk, Ed Greenwood's articles on Hell, articles by Stephen Iniss and Katerine Kerr. I also enjoyed having articles on games other than ADND.

My next favorite period was 171-215. I liked the articles by David Howery and John Wybo II dealing with various Native American and African cultures. I also liked the articles on Completing the Complete Handbooks.

In between, those two periods there were some really good articles such as David Howery's "Tracking Down the Barbarian" and "The Corrected Cavalier". However, the two above periods were

My third favorite period is Erik Mona's run simply for the Demonomicon articles by James and the Sean Reynold's series on the deities of Greyhawk. Unfortunately, I couldn't justify purchasing Dragon just for those articles.

 

[Keldryn]

QFT. I voted for 81-140 as that came the closest for me.

I'd have to agree as well. I started buying with issue #123, though I did pick up a handful of earlier issues as well as the "Best of" compilations (and later the CD-ROM).

 

[Quartz]

Part of the problem is that AFAIR Dragon really didn't have any stretches of duff issues, so you're asking us to choose between good and very good.

Another part of the problem is that the history of Dragon was the history of RPGs, more or less. It wasn't just a magazine but a chronicle. It's fascinating to read through the issues and watch the hobby and the game develop.

 

[Drowbane]

Paizo

which reminds me... I need to start a Pathfinder subscription!

 

[Emirikol]

For myself it was 45-100. There were lots of great articles- The demihuman point of view and deities, The Deities of Greyhawk, Ed Greenwood's articles on Hell, articles by Stephen Iniss and Katerine Kerr. I also enjoyed having articles on games other than ADND. .

I hear you. EVERYTHING that fills in the blanks for the D&D mythology, history of the worlds, and the game mythology appeared in there. There seems to me to have been a huge "BLANK" in timeless material after about #130 or so. The recent stuff handled by Paizo was excellent, but dry house-ruley-stuff. It's not their fault..it's just that everything had already been done...

jh

 

[an_idol_mind]

I loved Dragon in the late 90s. Around the time that 3rd edition came out, I let my subscription expire because I lost interest in the way the magazine was going. I'm not sure if that came as a result of the magazine changing or the fact that my gaming style changed dramatically following the release of 3e.

 

[delericho]

Yeah, not keen on the categories either. There was a spell, around 250ish, that the magazine was quite poor indeed, such that I stopped buying entirely (and only came back with the "Countdown to 3e" issues).

And yet, the best I remember it being were the issues in the last couple of years.

FWIW, I started reading just before #150.