The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons 1970-1977
The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons 1970-1977 is a historical biography, written by Jon Peterson and published by Wizards of the Coast.
By Aaron T. Huss
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Back in the 80s and 90s, blockbuster films were often followed-up with “Behind the Scenes” documentaries. These movies didn’t have CGI to create special effects, so the movie crew had to get creative on how those effects were created and the “Behind the Scenes” documentaries gave everyone a look into that process.
The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons 1970-1977 (referred to as MODD from here) is like one of those documentaries.
I’m going to preface this review with a statement that I am not an old-school gamer. I am drawn to games with more role-playing than combat and would have been more interested in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons than Basic or Original. I state that because I am approaching this review as a complete noob to what makes “Original” Dungeons & Dragons so unique as part of the old-school renaissance.
Unfortunately, Wizards of the Coast cannot delve into the mind of Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. In a sense, this documentary comes about 30 years too late. Instead of having the developers at your fingertips to create a true “Behind the Scenes”, you are left with the material they created directly and indirectly related to “Original” Dungeons & Dragons. As such, MODD is divided into four distinct sections to educate the reader on how this game came about and how it led to an evolution of RPGs.
MODD starts with Chainmail; the game that started it all. This first chapter sets the tone for the rest of the book – a combination of narrative from the producers of the book and a reprinting of original content. This chapter starts with an introduction and then reprints articles written by Gary Gygax that eventually led to the development of Chainmail – tabletop miniature wargaming rules for medieval miniatures that was eventually supplemented with a Fantasy Supplement (influenced by J.R.R. Tolkien and mythology). During these years, tabletop miniature wargames were already popular and were primarily historical. At the same time, Dave Arneson had developed his setting – Blackmoor. This includes scanned versions of Chainmail inserted directly into MODD.
MODD then moves into the development of Dungeons & Dragons – effectively a set of rules for creating campaigns using tabletop miniature wargames. This includes Gygax’s development of Greyhawk. I can’t believe these lasted this long, but this chapter is literally scanned and inserted versions of the draft pages between Gygax and Arneson while developing OD&D (kind of like a playtest packet). You get a glimpse into the development process and their notes for editing the content. You also glimpse into some letters between Gygax and Arneson to further refine these rules.
Chapter 3 is the published product – Dungeons & Dragons “Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns…”. Reading this chapter is when I first realized that Dungeons & Dragons started as a set of campaign rules for tabletop miniature wargames and not a role-playing game. I would daresay that Advanced Dungeons & Dragons actually started the RPG revolution, but ultimately it had to evolve from something. This chapter is a scanned and inserted version of, I believe, the 2nd printing of “Original” Dungeons & Dragons (all three books and the errata) in all its glory (for that time). It’s interesting, and a bit funny how hard Gygax and Arneson worked to balance the mechanics through limitations that effectively favored playing humans. Whatever; it was 1973; we don’t think that way anymore, but it’s fun to see where things started. At least now I can go on record stating that I would never have played this game as the idea of nothing more than combat with little else really bores me. However, I did enjoy reading it in this book as it helps you understand how RPGs came to where they are nowadays (especially old school fantasy games). This was also the first time I realized that Dungeons & Dragons was actually a set of rules that required you to also have Chainmail to play – these rules are simply the campaign rules.
Chapter 4 is the largest of the four and focuses on how Dungeons & Dragons grew and expanded from that original publication, eventually leading to the development of Basic and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. It appears that in the 70s, there were many magazines that supported gaming along with the magazine published by TSR. These magazines featured in-game content to enhance your gaming experience. This was actually my favorite chapter as I love seeing how a game set grows in new directions as the designers push their game into unexplored areas. This includes the releases of Greyhawk and Blackmoor as supplements.
MODD is a collectible book. It is incredibly large and is not something you curl up with and read at night (I mean you could, but I don’t really see that happening). If you are a fan of the old-school renaissance and classic fantasy gaming, this is a great gift. Especially if you get into the history of how the game developed and how companies are approaching their retro clones. If you don’t like old-school gaming, this really isn’t the book for you unless you’re a fan of the history of Dungeons & Dragons as a whole. I found it enjoyable and quite interesting, but then I’m also a history geek and enjoy learning about how things came to be (e.g., how RPGs were born).
