Knights & Knaves Alehouse

You want to hear a fucked up D&D introduction?

You heard my intro to D&D but my intro to AD&D was some guy who lived in his aunt's basement and she was a friend of my grandmother. My grandmother went on about how I was fixated on Dungeons and Dragons and she said her nephew is into that and they suggested I meet him. This guy drove a hatchback, had metal framed glasses, a Member's Only jacket and said "dwarf" in the most pronounced Brooklyn accent that you could possibly pronounce "dwarf". He said that he had the biggest miniature dragon ever made for D&D and like a fool I went in there to see it. Just to let you know what I looked like, I was 13 years old and the kind of cute boy who got too much attention from girls all the time until I grunged out in 1983 growing my hair and beard to look like a barbarian, or at least thats what I thought! He actually had the big dragon advertised in DRAGON and he even said I could borrow his PLAYERS HANDBOOK for as long as I wanted but after that it got a little awkward. So I left never even blinked about it but somebody stole the PLAYERS HANDBOOK and when I went to ask for him to tell him he had moved and something was funny about it that nobody wanted to say at that time. A few years later when I was asking around about him everybody was saying he was arrested for molesting boys.

Now thats a hell of a start. Well, at least I dodged that "bullet". Yikes. See? It pays off to have a violently abusive Dad who randomly attacks you for no reason! He probably thought I was going to kill HIM!

geneweigel wrote:That is just such a poor choice of words in that ad in more ways than one. It sounds like a punchline for a sublime parody!

For context: that ad was put out during the 3e days, when WoW on the rise, well before they announced DDI/VTT/vaporware of the week. Still, it is hilariously ironic.

thedungeondelver wrote:Apparently they missed the part where their promo film for 4e said "Go fuck yourselves old dudes, you were playing wrong for years".

Yeah, that was precious.

seriously, where are all these "ZOMG THAT'S THE SET I GREW UP WITH!" people coming out of the woodwork from? nobody I knew started with that D&D. Nobody!)

I did. The moldvay basic set was the first D&D product I owned, followed by the MM, DMG, and PHB about 18 months later. We were playing a mish-mash of Basic D&D and AD&D at the time.

Fine, ALL OF YOU GUYS started with it. I didn't.

What's this "all of you guys" nonsense? Holmes/AD&D hybrid here baby, quickly going fully AD&D after only a couple games.

- Wheggi

Wheggi wrote:What's this "all of you guys" nonsense? Holmes/AD&D hybrid here baby, quickly going fully AD&D after only a couple games.

I'm a Holmes baby too.

James Maliszewski wrote: I'm a Holmes baby too.

Me three. Actually never played any of the 'classic' line, unless you count Holmes.

My very first D&D purchase (in late 1980) consisted of:

1. Holmes boxed set (with B2 and chits inside)
2. AD&D Monster Manual
3. 20-sided, 12-sided, and 4-sided dice

Soon thereafter I acquired an 8-sider and a 10-sider, and then the AD&D Deities & Demigods Cyclopedia.

All of the above, plus my friends' B1 module and their Best of the Dragon, is what we gamed with for many months.

thedungeondelver wrote:Fine, ALL OF YOU GUYS started with it. I didn't.

I started playing with AD&D. Then ran the Dark Eye. THEN picked up Mentzer somewhere. So I'm an AD&D child. Not a Mentzer child.

Holmes set here.

<<sniff>> I miss those chits... NOT!

James Maliszewski wrote:

Wheggi wrote:What's this "all of you guys" nonsense? Holmes/AD&D hybrid here baby, quickly going fully AD&D after only a couple games.

I'm a Holmes baby too.

Same here. In 1981 I used my paper route money to buy the AD&D DMG, and I still have that very copy, now signed by all the legends I've met over the years. The best is Gary's autograph. I asked him to sketch a pole arm in my DMG. He asked me which one, and I said, "Any one you like!"

Anyway, for a long time I ran my games with Holmes + DMG. Then one day one of my players showed up with a PHB, and the Advanced migration went into full swing.

All you guys who started with Holmes = old

I didn't even know Holmes existed until about 3 years ago.

DungeonDork wrote:I didn't even know Holmes existed until about 3 years ago.

About the same here...I'd heard about it from the weirdo up the street when I first started playing, but the first time I saw it was a few years ago when I found a couple of copies at Half-Price Books for about $6 total.

T. Foster wrote:All you guys who started with Holmes = old

And feeling it more every day ...

James Maliszewski wrote:

T. Foster wrote:All you guys who started with Holmes = old

And feeling it more every day ...

The body is a mere 43... It's doing its best to convince me otherwise in a not too favorable way.