Too many… follow the official line of “You can’t change anything or you’ll destroy the rules.” Aw forget it. That’s not the way things started, that’s not the way things should be. If something doesn’t work, get rid of it. If something works in another set of rules and you want to put it in your game, go for it. The [rules’] job is to make the Referee’s life easier, so he can referee, not harder.
Preach! We all have to follow enough rules in everyday normie life already, ha.
Honestly the part of this quote that really illuminated how little I know about this side of the hobby wasn’t anything he said, but rather this bit:
Somehow it never occurred to me that Arneson was still involved in writing and making D&D well into the 90’s; probably well into the 2000’s since he passed away quite young.
It’s bonkers how little I know even from the side of the hobby I’m theoretically more familiar with - I don’t really know the name or production history of White Wolf… pretty much at all. I do know the broad strokes of Pendragon but it also never had a very deep or convoluted history, being Stafford’s Favourite Son (as I call it).
Makes me wonder what other obvious stuff was out there since the beginning but just never found its way to me.
Yeah Dave was gaming and participating in the community right up until his death. He had the classic thing of saying “Actually I’m a lot better I’ll be seeing yall at cons soon” before he passed.
Former White Wolfers are kinda uncovering a bunch of things now since many of the agreements and contracts with Paradox have been over for some time now. I know MissAtomicBomb’s been posting and discussing things from her era on RPG.net.
Are there any books you’d recommend on Arneson and the development of D&D?
All of Jon Peterson’s work is great, Playing at the World is getting a rewrite so the first volume is the only one out at the moment. Caveat is Jon seems to skew things slightly toward Gygax when the conflict between them comes up.
The documentary Secrets of Blackmoor is fun, but more a hangout with friends kind of documentary.
For actual gaming material, First Fantasy Campaign is crucial, but out of print and pretty hard to find.
Rob Kuntz is working on an Arneson book, and he released a small version of it a few years ago, but I was highly unimpressed (although I’ve been told rereads are necessary to get it, which I have not done).
Havard’s Blog is also a fantastic resource.
