When was the Golden Age of Dragon magazine?

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I would point out that the this is mostly DM's advice which has been shifted to Dungeon. Most of the meta-game information is now to be found there. Dragon has become more of a base resource, rather than a "How should I run a game" type resource, which, IMHO, is more the realm of DM's anyway.

The fact that they chose to reorient the purpose of the magazine in no way alters my view. If anything it reinforces it. If I always turned to Dragon as a source of DMing advice more than anything else, and they they STOPPED giving DMing advice, clearly that marks the end of the magazines "Golden Age" as far as I would be concerned. Now that you've mentioned it I can see that of course you're correct in that regard. So, while I may not be able to pinpoint when the Golden Age began I can now pinpoint when I think it ended.

I don't buy Dungeon. Never really have. I think I have maybe 5 or 6 issues, none more recent than 3 years ago. I had no use for it and thus never looked at it again.

 

[jrients]

As far as I'm concerned Dragon reached its absolute pinnacle in March '77 with the publication of the greatest Dragon article ever: Bruce Seligman's one page opus "Gandalf Was Only A Fifth Level Magic-User". As soon as I find a suitable frame that page is going up in my game room. There's been lots of great stuff published in Dragon since but Seligman's article was a real punch in the gut.

 

[JoeGKushner]

It it wrong of me to say 'now'?

Ditto.

Don't get me wrong. At the time, I was getting a lot of use from Dragon. But clearing out some stuff, I came across #148. Trust me, those 'universal' articles people keep talking about are not in each and every issue. There was like one bit about clerics that was useful to any edition and everything else heavily involved in game mechanics which are now outdated. Useful for the time, yes, but universally useful? Nope. Just like the current magazine.

Black and white, filled with ads, $3.50 cover price. Currently something like $8.00 but full color, larger, and well, even the ads look better these days.

 

[painandgreed]

Roger Moore, Ed Greenwood, the Hell Article... Those are what comes to mind.

The current Demonomicon articles are a good go at a new age. Something that will be remembered and used long afterwards.

 

[Set]

I didn't start reading until 43ish, so I have no idea what came before, but I think the first 'golden age' for me started around the time that Roger Moore started up his Demihuman Dieties articles, detailing the Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, Halfling, Orcish, etc. pantheons.

Since then, the book has had a few slumps, and a few amazing runs. Right now we seem to be in a good place, but I'm not sure if I would call it a 'golden age.' A year or two ago, I would find a half-dozen great ideas in a single issue. Now, not so much.

I don't think that there is any one run of issues I can point to and say, 'it's all good' or 'it's all bad.' And it's terribly subjective anyway. I can't stand Order of the Stick, and miss Phil & Dixie, so tastes are all over the place, obviously.

 

[DM_Jeff]

Now

While I will always remember 75-100 with great fondness from a nostalgia point of view, I have to admit the current editors and directors have turned the magazing's "Golden Age" to right now, if that's possible.

The art, and many of the articles of way back when during Roger Moore's time drove my imagination and filled me with wonder, but just as many articles were so niche or, well, nearly unreadable that they never found any use at my table. I make monthly use out of the magazine now over the past 2-3 years, and that's worth it as the Golden Age to me.

-DM Jeff

 

[Scribble]

The Dragon Magazine CD-ROM archive is just amazingly wonderful. I think it may be my best RPG resource. When I got it off Ebay It had 2 copies of disc 4 so I didn't have the issues over 234. I didn't really care.

Hrmm would offering to trade you a copy of the 5th cd for a copy of the cd I stepped on in my set be considered pirating?

 

[Allandaros]

Legally, possibly. Morally, you have to make that call, but I would think not, since you paid for the goods. Especially since Flexor got two copies of disk 4, when he was trying to get disk 5.

...even though disk 5 only has 12 issues or something.

(Man, I was SO lucky to grab it for $30...)

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Hrmm would offering to trade you a copy of the 5th cd for a copy of the cd I stepped on in my set be considered pirating?

Yar! Who cares. I paid for it, there is no cash changing hands so I can't see any problem, and if there was I wouldn't care anyway.

That would be cool for me. I don't need 2 copies of the 4th disc.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Anyone with the Dragon Archives ought to copy all the PDFs to hard disk . . . that's what I did! They are about 2.5 gb and would fit on a single DVD, also.