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

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!

[grendelkhan]

But they never explained that they were Avatars until the 2nd Ed of Greyhawk, and it never made it into the Dieties and Demigod's rulebook. I always loved the "I'm stronger than Loki!" comments that would be made by some of our dumber players.

Personally, I want the "Giants in the Earth" series to come back in Dragon. I loved getting ideas by looking at these cool mythic heros all done up nice and neat with the James Holloman or Roger Raupp art.

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.

Dave Arneson

[Ass-Gas-Istan]

Though Gary Gygax did a lot of the setup for the D&D game, it was Dave Arneson that wrote many of the early adventure modules, particularly the B and X series.

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.

One thing that's always bothered me.

[Sabby]

The whole "origins of RPG" seems all misty to me. You can read interviews with Rob Kuntz, Dave Arneson, Gary Gygax, and others... You get the impression that its a group of relatively good friends, with the typical tensions. You know, typical gaming group.

They come up with a cool idea. You never really know WHO was the one who came up with it. All of them claim to have varying levels of importance in the creation, and all of them have counter stories to each others stories. Some of them are under legal obligation not to reveal their side of the story anymore.

You know that Arneson was very involved. You also know he signed a legal document saying he's not going to argue with Gygax anymore, basically.

But, you do know that Gygax is the one who quit his job and started fixing shoes in order to get the game off the ground. No matter who created it, Gygax was the one who believed in it.

So, I'm pretty sure that I'll never get the story. But, it's definitely intriguing. I love these interviews, though. Makes me all misty eyed that I was too young to see the origins of RPGs. But then again, I'm young enough that I'll see a few generations more. (And I'm glad that I'm not so crusty that I'm unwilling to play the most excellent 3rd edition.) Here's over 20 years of gaming under my belt, and hopefully many many more to come.

Re:One thing that's always bothered me.

[PainKilleR-CE]

So, I'm pretty sure that I'll never get the story. But, it's definitely intriguing. I love these interviews, though. Makes me all misty eyed that I was too young to see the origins of RPGs. But then again, I'm young enough that I'll see a few generations more. (And I'm glad that I'm not so crusty that I'm unwilling to play the most excellent 3rd edition.) Here's over 20 years of gaming under my belt, and hopefully many many more to come.


Personally, I'm just happy that I'm still interested in computer gaming and now have a chance at all of the excellent D&D PC games that have been coming out in the last few years. Over the years it got harder and harder to find a good group to sit down and do the pen & paper versions, but now I can sit down in front of the computer at any time and have a couple hours of good fun. Unfortunately, I have yet to see any plans for a DragonLance game, and I really wasn't into Forgotten Realms as much when I was playing the pen & paper stuff.

Re:One thing that's always bothered me.

[tmark]

Well, reading the article about Arneson it sounds like *he* was the one who invented *everything*. To my eyes, it was just a lot of "me, me, me". I would have been much more interested to hear about the interactions between Gygax and Arneson and how the game evolved from those interactions and the probably uncountable numerous game-playing sessions, because surely D&D was NOT D&D without Gygax's work. As it is, it sounds like he created the game and then showed the rules to Gygax who "liked it".

Re:One thing that's always bothered me.

[Sabby]

Honestly, the way he presented it in that article seemed to be very close to what I've gathered to be PROBABLY true. He invented the concept of the dungeon-adventure, with medieval fighting man miniatures going into the dungeon.

Gygax made up the rules which said that you could have player class X, with Y hitpoints, etc. Arneson had the idea that the miniatures had hitpoints, etc. Gygax made the leap which said that the miniatures just represented the personalities. So, I would say Arneson is more correct to say he was the father of "adventure gaming" and not roleplaying.

Gygax and Arneson are both trumped for actual "father of roleplaying" however, by the inventor of the "Braunstein" adventures. (I think it was David Wesley.) These were wargames where players could assume the roles of "President of Local University" and "General of Allied Forces." You talked your way into and out of things. It was more of a "How to Host a Murder Mystery" style roleplaying game. Sort of a LARP with a wargame tossed in. That really smacks heavily of the "First roleplaying game."

Arneson is the first one to have a roleplaying campaign setting, but only the second or third to ever have a published campaign setting. (You get really fuzzy with what came first between "Greyhawk," "Blackmoor," and "Tekumel.") And when you come down to it, Tolkien's Middle Earth predated them all, was a richer background, and had all the information to set up a good RPG.

So, any amount of "me me me" is mostly unfounded. You can always trace back to someone who predated you. But, they're still forefathers. And if one of them wants to have enough of an ego to say, "I invented it all" then let them... As long as they said, "And all my buddies helped me a lot." Arneson usually credits Gygax pretty well. I've seen interviews where BOTH of them downplay each other's achievements, but they seem to be much more gracious nowadays.

I'm waiting to see a good interview by Steve Jackson about his involvement in the beginnings of RPGs. Steve Jackson sounds like a very interesting fellow. In fact, they all sound fascinating. But, SJ was the first of those old RPGers to realize what an impact that computers were going to have on RPGs. Some of the companies of today are just NOW realizing how important the computer is to the modern RPG. (Wizards can barely recognize it. For a company that big, their attention to their webpage is kind of a side gesture. If they put some serious moeny behind it, I would be very impressed by what those guys could do.)

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.

Shoplifting Those Little Brown Books...

[grendelkhan]

Takes me back to my childhood: shoplifting huge amounts of RPG's because I couldn't afford the $32 for a boxed set of Rolemaster. Nowadays, I try to remember that when my son is so jazzed up about a $40 PSX game, and I say "Okay, we'll save up your allowance for a few weeks, and you can pick up extra cash by edging the lawn". Trying to avoid the creation of another prolific teenage shoplifter in my family!

Anyhoo, those little brown books, followed by the billygoat on the front of the Monster Manual, and that HORRIBLE illustration on the cover of the DM's Guide (all courtesy of the same artist, whose name eludes me) occupied many lunches in Jr. High and High School for me, going over the endless variants of classes, the newest Dragon mag, the latest from Judge's Guild, the Thieves Guild series, and anything from Chaosium.

Speaking of which, it's really cool to see Sandy Peterson there, that man is simply a genius of the RPG world. CoC, the various supplements he made, plus his work on Runequest, made my bookshelf (legally, or illegally) every release. I'm about to have all my stuff out of storage for the first time in eight months, and I have space now for ALL of my RPG stuff, and I've kept it all from when I was younger: Traveller, Twilight 2000, RoleMaster, Battletech and Mechwarrior (1st ED), Gamma World, Harn, etc. And I have a feeling that after I spend a few hours setting up the network and entertainment totem again, that I will be unpacking these for days, since I'll be rereading them as I go! My wife will not be happy...

Re:Shoplifting Those Little Brown Books...

[Kraft]

I dont know which books you are referring to, but as far as the artist goes, I just remembered Larry Elmore, the guy who did the covers for the D&D boxsets and lots of other TSR stuff. How about buying THE ORIGINAL cover painting for the forth boxset? Price: $2,500

A couple of years ago I bought four of his original drawings (for something like 50 bux a piece!) and gave two to my first rpg buddies. For me it was the ultimate gift to give.

The Greatness of Petersen

[Torgo's Pizza]

It's too bad that the reporter didn't really get in depth with any of the designers. I had the wonderful pleasure of working with Sandy at Ensemble Studios for just over a year. The guy is just pure genius. I could talk with him for hours because he had always something interesting to say on just about any subject.

One thing that isn't covered is his voracious knowledge of history. I remember taking my dad up to work (he has a degree in Ancient History) and just watching he and Sandy just go back and forth on the effects that the chariot had on ancient civilations. In fact, he and Tim Deen basically were the Rise of Rome expansion pack.

But not only that, Sandy would get into all sorts of things. Every day at lunch he would drag out either a new board game or card game to play. I blame him for my Lunch Money addiction. He was always patient and took time to explain game design or a decision he had made about game balance. He was truly a designer in every sense of the word.

He's one of the people I miss most at Ensemble. (No, he *doesn't* wear sunglasses all the time. Suspenders and shorts is another story.) He's a great guy, has a wonderful family and takes time for his kids. In fact, one urban legend about Sandy is that when every one at iD was buying their fast cars after Doom came out, Sandy went out and bought a mini-van.

I hope I get to work with you again Sandy!

Arduin Grimoire

[oggodog]

Just need to mention David A. Hargrave's works, all the cool DMs at the time were using them.

google says here and here.

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...

RPG Economics

[pgrote]

A good article about today's RPG Economics inside the fantasy worlds.

It's amazing to think that a few people designed a system so well working that it's served as the basis for countless types in the genre.

Re:Shoplifting Those Books - yes I regret it.

[grendelkhan]

Yes I do feel bad about it now, and I'm determined not to give my son the excuse of being too poor to afford it, and show him that through work on his part he can earn what he wants. Would I go back and smack myself if I could? You bet. Can I fix what I did twenty some years ago? No. Can I make sure my son doesn't follow in my footsteps? Hell yeah.

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>

DragonLance Games

[argel]

FYI, Sovereign Press (Margaret Weiss' and Don Perrin's company) has aquired the rights to publish DrangonLance pencil and paper gaming material. My understanding is that SP will write the DL core rule book and WoTC will publish it. Then SP will release supplemental material. This is according to the folks at the SP booth up at GENCON.

If it does well maybe we'll see a DL computer game. Until then, you could look for the old goldbox and silverbox games from SSI.