Math, history, and design of old-school D&D
The D&D cartoon first appeared on CBS 40 years ago this week! Man, 1983-1984 were really great years for our hobby.
Here's a link to the blog and an hourlong video interview by Mark Evanier, who wrote the pilot script and series bible"
News From Me (Mark Evanier)
Original Edition Delta
House rules for OD&D
Free download
OED: Book of Spells, 2E
Core spells in a concise booklet
Available at Lulu.com
OED: Book of War
Mass combat with miniatures
Available at Lulu.com
OED: Deck of Spells
Memorization made easy with old-school style spell cards
I loved this cartoon at the time, and watched it diligently every Saturday morning, waking up early to catch every episode. I own the DVDs of it now, and my daughter was just watching it last week. I still enjoy it, and despite others' protests to the contrary, I find much of it very much "D&D." Far more so than the live-action films bearing the title "Dungeons & Dragons."
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link.
My sister and me watched this back in the day on the BBC and really loved it. I've re-watched many of the episodes on YouTube and think that as JB says they're still pretty much D&D as we played it (though more death and gore obv).
ReplyDeleteTo my mind they should've made the recent D&D movie a sequel to this where the kids go back into the D&D world either as their adult selves or their teen selves to rescue Dungeon Master or similar. It would have anchored it as both a game and in its own history as well as present a similar retro feel as with the Jumanji reboot.
A missed opportunity imv.
This show never aired where I lived (Australian country town), so I never knew it existed until I'd been playing D&D for at least a couple of years. Some episodes showed up on VHS in our local video rental, my friends and I excitedly loaned them out - and we hated it. The tone was so far removed from everything I loved about D&D, and the other fantasy novels we were reading. I was at that age where it all had to be "serious business", so baby unicorns and inept wizards and the rest of what this show had to offer were the opposite of what I was hoping it would be. I really should revisit it as an adult, I'd probably appreciate it a lot more now.
ReplyDelete