Dave Arneson Talks About Helping Create D&D

Warrior-GS writes "GameSpy has an interview with Dave Arneson, the lesser known co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons with Gary Gygax. He is at Gen Con in Milwaukee. Also on hand to talk was Sandy Petersen, the creator of Call of Cthulhu. He is working at Ensemble Studios on Age of Mythology. Both interviews are very informative."

Comments

Beating the Slashdot Effect

[roadkill999]

Here is my great idea for beating the Slashdot Effect. It is guaranteed to be effective - just follow these easy steps:

1. Don't assume that just because a site appears on slashdot that it is going to be:
[a] even remotely interesting
[b] within the realms of your tiny brains to understand
[c] in any way related to anything that will ever improve your life, health, career, sex-appeal etc

2. Don't complain about the "poor little site" that got slashdotted. In order to know the site has gone down, you must have clicked the link numbnuts. And NO, pressing F5 doesn't improve your chances.

3. If by chance you see a site that you really need to visit consider these options:
[a] check the google cache
[b] go read about it on The Register - the Brits are much more capable reporters than the Slashdot baboons.
[c] wait until tomorrow. contrary to james bond films, the world is not full of evil geniuses hell-bent on destroying the world and robbing you of your precious internet.

4. Finally if you are one the egotistical maniacs who think that posting a story to slashdot will help you make friends consider the followng:
[a] make a mirror of the poor site before you post
[b] stop. think. is it worth it? the slashdot baboons are NOT going to invite you round their house for tea.
[c] i know that this is hard to understand but kudos does not exist. its all in your head. geeks don't like each other - they are geeks for christ sake.
[d] i

Yeehoghu hits!

[Bilestoad]

The thing about D&D that always bothered me was the Deities and Demigods manual. How do you go about assigning AC and HP to gods?

Can you imagine the arguments? Who's tougher out of Zeus and Odin? Heimdallr and Vulcan? No big problem in Nethack where you have just one pantheon but in a system where imagination sets the rules you could have them meeting.

(and there were plenty in that book who were neither Deities nor Demigods, like Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, but that probably doesn't matter)

Re:Yeehoghu hits!

[bughunter]

I'm stronger than Loki!

I will never be able to forget the time I moved to Ventura Co. CA and joined a gaming group made up predominantly of sailors from Pt. Mugu NAS. They had all served together on a carrier and played a lot of D&D for R&R. That much seemed reasonable...

Until they explained that if, after you kill your foe, you eat his/her/its brain then you gain all of his/her/its hit points, experience points, spells, special abilities, exceptional stats, and whatnot.

Ooooh.... Kay.

Then I played a game in their campaign, which had basically degenerated into a series of raids on the seats of various pantheons to eat as many god brains as possible. Of course, all the regulars in the group were 100th level F/T/C/MUs with thousands of hitpoints and every special ability and spell and psionic talent in the books. The only thing that saved my character from being brain sucked by these PC mindflaying ghouls was that they made me roll up my character at first level with zero experience points.

I tell ya, it sure was a great education in munchkinism.

Snippet

[Alien54]

Sounds like my kind of guy:

Dave Arneson: Yeah. We created the Continental Congress and because I knew things the teacher didn't share with the students we ended up not having the Continental Congress, Delaware rejoined the Empire and New York and New Hampshire were at war. Anyway, (laughs) I was accused by my professor of perverting his exercises... and well, it was true I did, and he was mad at me. The same thing happened with the French Revolution, and he accused me of introducing these random events that were of no historical interest at all.

There is a certain puckish commonality that I see here with a number of creative types.

Re:Legends Speak!

[Riskable]

It's always cool to hear that these designers are still kicking.

You crack me up! So I guess old game developers never die. At least, if they had the foresight to up up down down left right left right A B select start at the beginning of their careers.

Yes, it's nice to hear that they're still kicking, but I'd like to see that they can punch too. Maybe still be able to pull of that Hadu-Ken energy burst combo.

Tales of the Plush Cthulhu

[nucal]

There's also a version of Cthulhu for nursery schoolers.

all in the name

[Kraft]

I started out with D&D and I know two people were credited, but with a name like "Gary Gygax", how can anyone be expected to remember the other dude Arneson, ... something Arneson...?

Gary Gygax... it's all the way up there with Wolf Blitzer and Rocco Siegfredi.

Deities and Demigods was great

[tmark]

The Deities and Demigos manual was one of the coolest books they put out, for sheer enjoyment's sake. I remember being a kid and browsing that book and the Monster Manual OVER AND OVER again, even though I had read every entry probably hundreds of time. It was also great because it probably had the largest number of Jeff Dee illustrations, who was by far my favorite D & D illustrator. I sthink I might have even had a crush on some of the goddesses he drew in that book...

Re:Legends Speak!

[SN74S181]

These are game designers.

Not electronic game designers. There's no cursor buttons nor an A or a B button.

I guess you can do whatever silly things you want with your dice though.

Re:Legends Speak!

[Riskable]

Oh! You're right! Damn, I guess old pen & paper RPG developers never die... They just whip out the 1D20 and reroll every once in a while.

DM's Guide cover art

[samf]

[...]followed by the billygoat on the front of the Monster Manual, and that HORRIBLE illustration on the cover of the DM's Guide[...]

<sarcasm>

What? Are you kidding? That cover art of which you speak (especially the DM's Guide) gave the television media some of the images they needed to show the viewers how utterly satanic those games were!

I still remember the sound bites on the Oklahoma City TV stations; the voice-overs, and the camera slowly zooming on Mr. Giant Devil on the cover...

</sarcasm>