gavmor
4 days ago
This was a good read, and the author makes convincing points. Largely, I agree, but the author makes a mistake that's extremely common in the hobby: they presume that the author of the book is the authority of the game, whereas the presumption made by Gygax et al. was that the Dungeon Master was overflowing with ideas, and needed only some reference points to pin them down.
One might as well refer to my garage toolbox as "anti-Cabinets" for containing no hinges.
And these anti-Medieval fixtures from the text aren't even necessarily central to the experience. Hiring retainers is a hand-wave, a way to get back to the meat of the game: prying gems from the eyes of enchanted statues.
I guess my point is that the most accurate possible exegesis of the Gygaxian canon misses, almost entirely, the heart of the game, which exists overwhelmingly at the table, and not in the book.
Supermancho
3 days ago
> This was a good read, and the author makes convincing points.
The meaning of MEDIEVAL is at the heart of this. D&D is Medieval, as it has markedly and prominent medieval world characteristics.
When the game world clashes with what narrative is being presented, they retreat to minutia. When the game world makes no reference, a reasoning is constructed without reference. Topics are repeated - eg no feudalism and no vassals and no kings (which is incorrect and handwaved away as it serves them).
I think it's empty prattle, reeking of being edgy, and seems more than a little strange to show up on HN.
handoflixue
3 days ago
Can you actually provide any citation for OD&D containing feudalism or monarchy? Certainly, later versions add it, but I found myself nodding along going "huh, he's right, the original version didn't have anything that really resembles a large-scale government at all."
Every version of D&D contains the idea that a random peasant can go make a name for themselves as a monster-slayer and become a baron. Land is literally free for the taking if you can just clear out the beasts. That seems much more American Dream / Colonialism, and not at all European / Medieval history.
mistrial9
3 days ago
referring from memory to little paper-bound books and dice sold in Berkeley, California.. yes there were kings and monarchy and Feudalism in the games. Granted the emphasis was on playing one or more characters that started at a "low level" and worked their way up, in many many ways, per their character type and other factors. Lots of changes from those versions but.. city characters might even pay taxes? A different thread comment says something about the Dungeon Master being the real core imagination factory and this is correct. Spelled out quest dungeons were few and carefully done -- the bulk of the printed content was rules and guidelines for the DM and players to use in a turn-based game of essentially their own stories with their own names of places and characters.
RHSeeger
3 days ago
> The meaning of MEDIEVAL is at the heart of this. D&D is Medieval, as it has markedly and prominent medieval world characteristics.
That's the important part for me, too. The general idea I always ran with was that "medieval" in the context of D&D (and most role playing games with that setting) referred to the environment (castles, villages, etc) and technology level (swords, bows, etc; sometimes early firearms).
As a general rule of thumb, it didn't go into government at all, because that's a aspect of the campaign setting. The actual campaign settings (Greyhawk, etc) defined various governments, everything from kings/emperors, to mage groups, to dragon kings.
bazoom42
3 days ago
D&D (and much fantasy) is the inverse of theatres staging Shakespeare in modern dress. Macbeth can be made to look modern by having modern suits and a set resembling an office or whatever, but the language and cultural attitudes depicted are still renaissance.
D&D has the swords and castles which makes it look somewhat medieval on the surface, but the culture of the world does not resemble medieval times at all.
pessimizer
4 days ago
I don't buy that the "heart of the game" is at the table. It's at the table where the game is being played, by the rules that the game sets up. In a way that no one had ever really played before, and a way everyone ended up playing since.
You can barely call D&D anti-medieval; it isn't from a world of obsessing about Tolkien-style fantasy. It's Gygax coming up with rules for miniatures wargaming where players are individuals within a group rather than being entire sides of a war and moving armies, or being squad-level and choosing how to move squad members. That was the important part that influenced the entire world. All of the players were part of a single squad, and working (and cooperating) as individuals for their own benefit.
These rules were then applied to Gygax's (and everybody else's) favorite fantasy novels. The thing that varied most about those novels was the idea of magic, so the only influence on his system from fiction that I recall is the stat-friendly Jack Vance magic, which would end up imposed onto other settings.
But it's still fair to call the system anti-medieval as the article does because it was made for a competitive multiplayer tabletop game which was meant to progress over sessions, and the main aspect of its progression are stats. So it has to be as fair as possible, and you have to be able to accumulate indefinitely rather than die in the same place you were born with no more than your parents had. That's American myth, not medieval reality. There can't be a medieval system, because that would crush all of the characters, starting by burning all of the witches. If every character were a fighter trying to get ahead by fighting in an army, there's no D&D, because D&D is individual, not squad or army.
crooked-v
3 days ago
> So it has to be as fair as possible, and you have to be able to accumulate indefinitely rather than die in the same place you were born with no more than your parents had. That's American myth, not medieval reality.
The medieval era actually had a pretty decent number of wandering mercenaries and adventurers, many of whom were displaced people from the neverending ongoing local wars across the centuries. (Of course, these groups were also basically interchangeable with bandits if they were broke.) Just look at the Varangian Guard, which recruited itinerant soldiers from all over Northern Europe from the 900s pretty much right up until Constantinople fell to the Ottomans.
This all kicked into even higher gear in the Renaissance and later. As central monarchical control grew, so did army sizes and the impacts of those armies, leading to entire villages being wiped out or displaced entirely as a side effect of being in the way of an army passing through. Conflicts like the Thirty Years' War led to immense numbers of deaths and famine (current estimates say 4-8 million deaths just from the Thirty Years' War, for example), and consequently to immense numbers of migrants looking for work anywhere they could.
The part that didn't exist was, of course, the dungeons. There was no nominally ethical-concern-free money sitting around underground; the source was other people, willing or not. But the whole point of D&D was to have a small-scale alternative to the "armies or mercenary companies fighting each other" gameplay that it originally sprang from, so I can give a pass on that, even if the writers never actually figured out any coherent setting explanations for it.
whythre
3 days ago
“But the whole point of D&D was to have a small-scale alternative to the "armies or mercenary companies fighting each other" gameplay that it originally sprang from, so I can give a pass on that, even if the writers never actually figured out any coherent setting explanations for it.”
‘A wizard did it’ is almost always the in-universe reason. Whether it is Halaster Blackcloak or a Red Thayan or Acererak, it is usually a magic user doing it to mess with people. Which, as I type that out, kinda just seems to be a barely disguised expy of the role of the GM…
zahlman
3 days ago
> The part that didn't exist was, of course, the dungeons. There was no nominally ethical-concern-free money sitting around underground; the source was other people, willing or not.
I would have said the dragons were a much more obviously non-existent part, but sure.
Yeul
3 days ago
I would say that things like afterlife, divine intervention and souls are non existent parts.
The clerics in Constantinople no doubt prayed very hard during the Fourth Crusade but it didn't work.
antifa
16 hours ago
You don't know what they prayed for.
xandrius
3 days ago
Komodo dragons would like to have a word with you
cthalupa
3 days ago
> All of the players were part of a single squad, and working (and cooperating) as individuals for their own benefit.
Sorry, I'm not sure if this is specifically referring to Chainmail or early D&D. If the latter, this is explicitly not how Gygax (and Arneson) ran their campaigns back in those days, though. They had groups of people playing that fluctuated in the 30-50 player range, and people often had multiple characters specifically because they frequently did not have the same people at the table each session. They were in the same shard, persistent world, but there were many different parties, and they all decided on their own goals. These often conflicted - adversarial interactions between groups were things that happened! B2 - Keep on the Borderlands - even includes a lot of details around how the DM should handle such situations, how the players can protect their treasure from other players, etc.
upwardbound
3 days ago
That sounds amazing!!! I would love to be part of a gaming community like that (in-person I mean) with party vs party interactions in a single unified & fluid unfolding plot. The closest thing I've read about to this (but never participated in) is the "Grand Quest" in Drew Hayes' excellent litrpg series Spells, Swords, & Stealth, which is still being written. The audiobook format version of the series is especially captivating. https://www.audible.com/series/Spells-Swords-Stealth-Audiobo...
cthalupa
3 days ago
It's a very different way to play than most people get to experience now, and one that I think is a lot more fun!
Ben Milton of Questing Beast has a great video on the concept - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slBsxmHs070
upwardbound
3 days ago
cool! Thanks for sharing this
graemep
3 days ago
> you have to be able to accumulate indefinitely rather than die in the same place you were born with no more than your parents had
There were ways people could advance in medieval society: https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/people-social-m...
No doubt more in some places and times than others: there is a lot of variation over a thousand years and an entire continent or more.
On top of that the player in D & D are not playing very low ranked characters (they have weapons and money, are free to adventure, etc.) and are adventurers of some sort so are exceptional to start with. Clerics even belong to a group that could rise a great deal through ability (albeit by showing administrative or leadership ability within the organisation rather than by going off on adventures).
> sarting by burning all of the witches
Witch burning was more of an ancient and early modern phenomenon than medieval.
pdonis
3 days ago
> I don't buy that the "heart of the game" is at the table. It's at the table where the game is being played, by the rules that the game sets up. In a way that no one had ever really played before, and a way everyone ended up playing since.
To an extent, yes, but while, as I responded to the GP just upthread, I think Gygax's view, at least with AD&D, was that every game should be played a certain way, I don't think that's what actually happened. Every D&D campaign I have been in has had plenty of house rules, ignored some of the standard rules, and in the end, if what the rules said didn't make sense at the table, the rules got thrown out and everyone just roleplayed what made sense at the table. So in the end, I think the heart of the game is at the table; that's where the actual stories are made. The rules are a helpful framework for cooperative storytelling, but they don't and shouldn't be the final determiner of what happens in your world.
vintermann
2 days ago
Gygax didn't insist everyone play his way all the time, he didn't even play that way himself all the time. But he did deeply want a "standardized" way to play to exist, for things like tournaments.
creer
3 days ago
The original books missed the idea of initial motivation on the "adventurer" career path. Why and how did even these first level characters end up this way. That makes the rules and settings awkward and necessitates the world to contain bait for first level characters. Like posters seeking guards for (incompetent) caravan escort duty or that kind of thing. Some people noticed that and tried to formulate 1st level adventures or entire world settings which did not start with a fully formed 1st level fighter or mage. Perhaps you start as a bored teen farm hand, or something extraordinary happens in your life but it helps if there is something that kicks you outside of "normal" medieval life and into something far more individualistic.
jfengel
3 days ago
In my experience, there are an awful lot of people waiting around in taverns for somebody to show up with some sort of quest. Fame and fortune in return for killing the bad guy and returning the crucial artifact he stole.
hoseja
3 days ago
Vancian magic is so unusual and unfit for most settings... Plus the idea in Vance's books is completely different from how it's used in the games.
upwardbound
3 days ago
Fair enough. I forgot the name of this ruleset, but there's a very simple D20-based game ruleset which is designed for beginners but IMHO is more fun even for everyone, as it focuses on creativity and storytelling! The rules are very simple:
(1) The players take turns. They describe what they want to do, and the DM narrates the outcome, incorporating a dice roll into the process if needed, because:
(2) Any significant action requires a dice roll, which cannot be re-attempted if failed.
(3) A roll of a 1 is a critical failure (a guaranteed failure even on an easy task such as cooking pancakes), and a critical failure during combat causes accidental self-injury. A roll of a 20 is a critical success, which always succeeds (e.g. a level 1 archer can destroy a level 18 Elder Dragon if they aim for the eye and roll a 20). Any roll between 2-19 is compared to the difficulty level of the attempted action. Difficult actions require a roll of around 16 to succeed; easier ones, perhaps around 12. The raw dice roll (if between 2-19) is supplemented by adding around +1 or +2 if the player has invested skill points into the relevant skill, and by also adding around +1 or +2 if the player is using high-quality specialized equipment for the task.
That's it! Of course you probably also want to incorporate standard gaming tropes such as levels, gold, HP, MP, weapons, armor, and such, but all of that is not meant to be set in stone within this system - e.g. if you want to try using a pair of sapplings and some rope as a giant improved slingshot weapon, that's meant to be allowed to work, in this system (albeit maybe with a -3 adder to dice checks, since the weapon's quality is probably total crap). It's about being nice to each other and encouraging each others' creative ideas, so the team + DM can tell a totally new and perhaps unexpected story together.
When I explain DND-like games to people, I usually tell them about this system, because it's very welcoming, and encourages people to try out new ideas and find creative solutions to big tasks. A campaign can be super open-ended; e.g. "Destroy Sauron's ring - by any means - open world". With these rules, all sorts of creative ideas (such as the classic idea of asking one of the giant eagles to fly over Mt. Doom and simply drop the ring into the open caldera of the volcano) can be attempted, and can succeed, if the players are plucky and resourceful!
chias
3 days ago
I have never liked the "20 = critical success = always succeeds", mainly because I can with a 5% chance end a "Destroy Sauron's ring" adventure in 40 seconds with "I attempt to destroy it by hitting it with a hammer, like, really hard."
Ferret7446
3 days ago
"Always succeeds" is up to the DM's interpretation.
Rather than "destroy sauron's ring", it's more like "you dislodge a mysterious gold coin that was stuck to the bottom of the table".
xandrius
3 days ago
Yeah, it was never in its literal sense but more like "you get the best possible outcome for this action".
For example, if the player is attempting something totally stupid the 20 result might even be "and nothing bad happened", as nothing better was possible (for instance it is impossible to break the one ring with a hammer, so even not totally wrecking your powerful hammer could be a great outcome of such a foolish action).
Or a 20 for asking the eagles for help might be that they bring you half-way, as the eagles wouldn't want to get too close to Mt. Doom anyway.
upwardbound
3 days ago
> Or a 20 for asking the eagles for help might be that they bring you half-way, as the eagles wouldn't want to get too close to Mt. Doom anyway.
I'd also add that ideally (if the DM is fully in the spirit of how this can be played for maximum creative storytelling potential), asking/negotiating for the assistance of the Eagles wouldn't be a single quick dice roll, but rather a complex, possibly hour-long session of courtly intrigue, diplomacy, and politicking, featuring many dice rolls, a lot of carefully chosen words, and a lot of favor-trading and maybe even intimidation. Ideally, getting straight to Mt. Doom via the Eagles should really be achievable, but not with just a single roll of a 20 - rather I imagine it would perhaps involve a concerted and creative effort by the whole party during at least an hour of playing time.
And then, there will be numerous dice checks to survive Mordor's anti-air assets (including probably cool eye beam lasers from the Eye of Sauron tower) and to accurately land the ring in the volcano despite buffeting wind. If any of those checks fail and the ring falls into inert dirt, the party would probably have to quickly send a commando team into Mordor to rapidly finish delivering the payload to target before Sauron's mages arrive in overwhelming force. Would honestly be more fun to play through one of these semi-failure disaster scenarios than an easy win!
Even if / when the party defeats Sauron, they don't have to stop there. For example, they could set their sights on investigating and stopping the reason for the waning of magic from the world, or any (ideally noble, or at least villainously entertaining) goal of their choosing. They could even e.g. research and create dimensional travel magic and hop to a totally different setting such as that of Star Wars.
cthalupa
3 days ago
Simply put, a DM should not allow you to roll in that situation. You only roll for things you might possibly succeed at. If I had a player at my table say that, I'd simply reply "Your hammer bounces off of it with great force, but as you examine the ring, it is unharmed."
If they complained that they didn't get a chance to roll the dice, I'd explain to them that they're misunderstanding the purpose of dice in the game - it's to provide randomness to situations where outcomes are uncertain.
In the inverse case, I wouldn't make someone roll the dice for mounting their horse when breaking camp if their character is someone who is familiar with riding horses, or to not spill their flagon of water when taking a rest in the dungeon.
Particularly for older versions of D&D, players went out of their way to avoid rolling dice whenever possible - dice are dangerous! Roll poorly, and you don't succeed. You might even die! And the ability to resurrect the dead is far more limited for older editions - player characters being effectively immortal outside of TPKs is a much more modern change.
dragonwriter
3 days ago
No, because (even aside from the whole DM judgement and rolls only for things that can succeed thing):
“Success” on a roll to hit with a weapon is just that: hitting, not destroying. And, well, hitting the One Ring with a weapon doesn't short-circuit the adventure (see Gimli at Rivendell.)
mrob
3 days ago
And the "critical failure during combat causes accidental self-injury" rule quickly turns any combat-heavy campaign into slapstick comedy.
pdonis
3 days ago
> they presume that the author of the book is the authority of the game, whereas the presumption made by Gygax et al. was that the Dungeon Master was overflowing with ideas, and needed only some reference points to pin them down.
Original D&D may have been more or less that way, but anyone who read the AD&D 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide will see the opposite: a profusion of detail laid out by Gygax himself, with strong implications all over the place that this was The Correct Way to run a D&D (or at least Advanced D&D) campaign.
> the heart of the game, which exists overwhelmingly at the table
I agree with this, and I think Gygax probably would have said the same if asked, but at least as far as AD&D is concerned, I think what Gygax meant by "at the table" was "at the table as long as things are run the way I think they should be run".
And of course no discussion of D&D and Gygax would be complete without the classic XKCD requiem:
cthalupa
3 days ago
Hmm. I still play a mix of ADD 1E and Basic/Expert twice a week, and regularly re-read the 1E DMG. I think Gary has a lot of ideas about how D&D is best played, and is happy to share them, but between what's written in the DMG, all of his posts on dragonsfoot over the years, etc., I can't agree that he thinks the only way to play D&D (or even AD&D specifically) is the way he envisions it.
In fact, he's always known that the overwhelming majority of players have not ever played D&D the way that he did during the OD&D/AD&D 1e days. You have to remember that Gygax and Arneson's campaigns were much more like a tabletop precursor to MMOs than what we think of today when we talk about TTRPG campaigns. Both of them were running persistent worlds where 30-50 players were dropping in and out constantly, often with multiple characters involved in different things, multiple parties, etc. Time ingame ran linearly with time in the real world (thus Gygax's repeated insistence that strict time records must be kept), things happened in-world even when no one was playing, etc. But it's always been a tiny minority of games that were run this way, and Gygax knew it and knew that most people playing would have difficulty doing it the way he did.
You also have to remember that Gygax explicitly states in the DMG that players should not know all the rules and that you should distrust any player that has a copy of the DMG, and has many places where he recommends the DM adjust things as they see fit for their situation and table. He also was in favor of DMs fudging rolls when they believed it to be the right thing to do! And there's also his quote of “The secret we should never let the gamemasters know is that they don't need any rules” - to me, all evidence points towards Gygax believing that the heart of the game really was at the table.
mistrial9
3 days ago
IIR by the time AD&D 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide was published, there were already a bunch of blooming competing systems, with different dynamics between explicit and implicit, not to mention the combat systems. Those alternates include the Arduin Grimoires for example! Not everyone read or stuck with AD&D 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide but some did.
PeterCorless
14 hours ago
There was to me (it seemed at the time, given I was in middle school) a huge time gap between the AD&D Player's Handbook being released (April 1978) and when the DMG finally shipped (August 1979).
Dragon Magazine #22 (February 1979) eventually came out with a sneak peek at some of the tables needed to resolve combat.
Otherwise, yes, during that gap time there was a lot of homebrew solutions. Cobbling together elements from OD&D, Basic Edition (July 1977), 3rd party supplements (Arduin Grimoire, Jan 1977), etc. You did what you could with content gaps and often-conflicting sources.