TheRPGSite

This is something I'd had a lot of questions about, but Gary always answered with a "no comment" when asked about details over on Dragonsfoot.  With the many articles that have been written about Gary's life (particularly the one at wired) I was able to put this timeline together.

Quotes are from the Gamespy Interview with Gary Gygax (http://pc.gamespy.com/articles/538/538817p1.html), the recent article on Gary at Wired.com (http://www.wired.com/gaming/virtualworlds/news/2008/03/ff_gygax?currentPage=all), and Wikipedia.

QuoteIn 1973, Gygax formed a company called Tactical Studies Rules with childhood buddy Kaye. They didn't ask Arneson to join. "Dave was never considered as a partner," Gygax says."We didn't figure he was the kind of the guy who would be too good at running a business."

Arneson agrees. "Gary was willing to go and make the pitches," he says. "I was having fun."

TSR scraped together $2,400 for startup costs. In January 1974, it ran off a thousand copies of the 150-page booklet titled, Dungeons & Dragons: Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargame Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures. The rules cost $10. The extra dice you needed to play the game were $3.50 extra. The base of operations was Gygax's basement, and there wasn't a marketing budget. D&D would live and die by word of mouth.

Okay, so Gary co-creates the game with Arneson and co-founds the company that will publish it with his friend Kaye.  This is something I think a lot of us can relate to... because a lot of us are doing that.  We're individuals or very small groups publishing RPGs from home offices.

QuoteIn 1982, the company saw its annual D&D sales shoot up to $16 million. This game of math, maps, and probability had acquired an aura of the dangerous and forbidden. "We couldn't print the stuff fast enough," Gygax says.

When Gygax went to Hollywood to close the deal on an animated show and explore a possible feature film based on D&D, the day-to-day operations of TSR were overseen by his fellow board members, brothers Kevin and Brian Blume. "They knew that I was in the midst of a divorce, so they figured I would be happy to go out to the West Coast and get away from my ex-wife," Gygax says.

"While I was out there, though, I heard that the company was in severe financial difficulties and one of the guys, the one I was partnered with, was shopping it on the street in New York. I came back and discovered a number of gross mismanagements in all areas of the company. in New York. I came back and discovered a number of gross mismanagements in all areas of the company. The bank was foreclosing and we were a million and a half in debt."

 "There were 70-some odd company cars, something like $1.5 million in furniture."

"We eventually got that straightened out, but I kind of got one of my partners kicked out of office. (Kevin Blume, who was removed as TSR CEO in 1984 - ed.).

QuoteGygax looked for someone with management experience to fix the problem. "I said, we're going to need somebody to get us over this period until we can get positive cash flow again," he says. Lorraine Williams, the mother of a writer he'd met in Hollywood, had management experience, and he brought her on board. "Worst mistake of my life. I think she was losing about $3 million a year. Which is pretty good, even better than the Blumes could do."

Williams soon bought out the shares of the Blumes, and suddenly Gygax no longer had a controlling stake in TSR.

Quote"I tried to block it in court, but in the ensuing legal struggle the judge ruled against me. I lost control of the company"

QuoteGygax sold his remaining stake in TSR in late 1985. "I was so sick of the fucking company at that point, I was glad to get rid of it," Gygax says. "It was getting more and more screwed up all the time."

QuoteTSR faced stiff competition from other tabletop game companies like White Wolf, as well as the growing popularity of collectible card games like Magic: The Gathering. The company became notorious for zealously protecting its intellectual property. TSR was soon referred to by geeks as T$R: They sue regularly.

QuoteI came out with a game called Dangerous Journeys and TSR sued us! Eventually, we settled and I'm pleased to say that I think the amount of money it cost them to sue us and pay out in settlement was what really drove TSR under. A couple years later when Wizards of the Coast took over the company, TSR was over 30 million in debt, 27 million of it secured and the rest unsecured. The woman who took over from me who was gonna show everybody how to run the company lost somewhere between two and three million a year.

QuoteBy 1997, the company was deeply in debt, and it was purchased by Wizards of the Coast, the company that made its fortunes with Magic: The Gathering.

Wizards of the Coast regained some goodwill and popularity with the release of the third edition of D&D rules in 2000. Gygax was brought in for a brief and somewhat symbolic consultation on the new rule set, as was Arneson. Gygax didn't approve of the decision to open-source the game. The third edition of the rules was made available under the Open Gaming License, which allowed anyone to modify or write games based on the core system for free. "It pretty much gives the store away," he says. "It ruins the uniqueness of D&D."

It makes me think about things like authorship, personal vs corporate ownership, products vs trademarks, etc.  

I'm assuming that what happened to Gary, D&D, and the various people and companies involved was all perfectly legal -- but the question is:  was it right?

If anyone has any links to more details or insights into any of this, I'd be very interested in reading them.

I believe that Gary Gygax answered much of this at one point and then got tired of asking questions about it.
 
This is from memory, but here are a few more key points:
 
Kaye died unexpectedly. Ownership of half the company went to his wife. She had no interest and sold her half. I believe Gary tried unsuccessfully to buy it. If I remember, this is how the Blumes got involved - buying Kaye's share.
 
Blumes and Gary had uneasy partnership, but the 50/50 split kept things from getting out of hand. That was until Gary's divorce. His wife managed to get part (half? don't know) of Gary's ownership in the company. From this point on, Gary held less than half the company. I believe his wife sold to the Blumes.
 
After the Blumes realized that they had run things into the ground, Gary found Lorraine to buy them out at a fraction of the price of buyers years earlier in Gary's earlier attempts to get rid of the Blumes.
 
 
When you read some of the crazier rants by Gygax in the 80's, keep in mind that, at the time, he was going through a divorce and having his own company ripped out from under him.

Thanks!  That fills in some of the gaps.

Anyone know what month and/or day in 1973 TSR became a company? I'd love to get a jolt of unwarranted pride if it turned out to be October 23rd. :)

Quote from: StuartI'm assuming that what happened to Gary, D&D, and the various people and companies involved was all perfectly legal -- but the question is:  was it right?

Well, considering how Gary screwed over Arneson, one might call it a karmic balance.

I appreciate Gary's creation of the hobby and by all accounts he was a nice guy, but he was not "Saint Gary", he was a flawed human being like the rest of us.  And that includes the Blumes and even Williams.

And while the Blumes may have not been the creative force behind D&D, they were the economic force behind it.  They may have ultimately fumbled the ball, but they still were partly responsible for getting the game going in the first place.

Same thing with Williams.  In some ways, she's a robber-baron.  But by another POV, without her, TSR may have gone bankrupt far earlier.

My point here is that you have a bunch of actions taking place over many years by a collection of individuals who all have their good and bad points.  It can't really be simplified into a single, simplistic ethical question of "was that right?"  It's just not that cut and dry.

Okay... more details from the Wikipedia entry on TSR

QuoteTactical Studies Rules was formed in 1973 as a partnership between Gary Gygax and Don Kaye as a means to publish formally and sell the rules of Dungeons & Dragons, one of the first modern role-playing games. They first published Cavaliers and Roundheads, a miniature game, to start generating income for TSR. The partnership was subsequently joined by Brian Blume and (temporarily) by Dave Arneson. Blume was admitted to the partnership to fund publishing of D&D instead of waiting for Cavalier and Roundheads to generate enough revenue.[1] When Don Kaye died of a stroke in 1975, the Tactic Study Rules partnership was dissolved.

...

Brian Blume and Gary Gygax, the remaining owners, incorporated a new company, TSR Hobbies, Inc., of which Blume and his father, Melvin Blume, had the larger share. The former assets of the partnership were transferred to TSR Hobbies, Inc. Ownership of Melvin Blume's shares were later transferred to Kevin Blume. With the board of directors consisting of Kevin and Brian Blume plus Gygax, Gygax was primarily a figurehead president & CEO of the corporation with Brian Blume as President of creative affairs and Kevin as President, operations effect in 1981. In 1983, the company was split into four companies, TSR, Inc. (primary successor), TSR International, TSR Ventures and TSR Entertainment, Inc.

...

Gygax left for Hollywood to found TSR Entertainment, Inc. (later Dungeons & Dragons Entertainment Corp.), which attempted to license D&D products to movie and television executives. His work would eventually lead to only a single license for what later became the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon.[2] The Blumes were forced to leave after being accused of misusing corporate funds and accumulating large debts in the pursuit of acquisitions such as latchhook rug kits that were thought to be too broadly targeted.[3] Within a year of the ascension of the Blumes, the company was forced to post a net loss of 1.5 million US dollars, resulting in layoffs for approximately 75% of the staff. Some of these staff members went on to form other prominent game companies such as Pacesetter Games, Mayfair Games and to work with Coleco's video game division.

...

Gygax, who at that time owned only approximately 30% of the stock, requested that the Board of Directors remove the Blumes as a way of restoring financial health to the company. In an act many saw as retaliation, the Blumes sold their stock to Lorraine Williams.[4] Gygax tried to have the sale declared illegal; after that failed, Gygax sold his remaining stock to Williams and used the capital to form New Infinity Productions.

...

Williams was a financial planner who saw the potential for transforming the debt-plagued company into a highly profitable one. However, she disdained the gaming field, viewing herself as superior to gamers.[5][6] Williams implemented an internal policy under which playing games was forbidden at the company.[citation needed] This resulted in many products being released without being playtested (some were playtested "on the sly") and a large number of products being released that were incompatible with the existing game system.

Quote from: jgantsWell, considering how Gary screwed over Arneson, one might call it a karmic balance.

I'm curious.  How much did he really screw him?  I have no idea what kind of cut Arneson was getting as second author. Certainly some of the key early ideas were Arneson's but it appears that most of the writing work and most of the sweat of running the business was Gygax.  
 
I've read (on a forum - grain of salt) that one of the motivations behind the AD&D books was to be able to take Arneson out of the loop.

Quote from: StuartI'm assuming that what happened to Gary, D&D, and the various people and companies involved was all perfectly legal -- but the question is:  was it right?

Shrug. Before I tried to determine whether or not I thought what happened was right, I'd want an account I can trust. So much of what I've heard over the years varies from account to account that it's hard to know what actually happened...

Seanchai

Quote from: SeanchaiShrug. Before I tried to determine whether or not I thought what happened was right, I'd want an account I can trust. So much of what I've heard over the years varies from account to account that it's hard to know what actually happened...
 
Seanchai

It's also almost all recollection from decades later.

Quote from: jgantsSame thing with Williams.  In some ways, she's a robber-baron.  But by another POV, without her, TSR may have gone bankrupt far earlier.

I'm sorry, but I don't have much sympathy for Williams. If TSR had gone bankrupt in 1985, D&D would have found a buyer - because, just like when TSR did go bankrupt, it was the hottest game on the market. Heck, in 1985 there were probably more game companies around who could afford to buy it up.

As it is, Williams has said herself that she was not interested in the gaming angle, and only cared about developing intellectual properties (like the novel line). Did you know that she was so irritated by gaming she refused to allow playtesting on company time?

I'm sure there are a few people who could potentially have done a worse job than Williams of managing D&D, but by the same token I can think of companies who could have done much better.

Quote from: jgantsMy point here is that you have a bunch of actions taking place over many years by a collection of individuals who all have their good and bad points.  It can't really be simplified into a single, simplistic ethical question of "was that right?"  It's just not that cut and dry.

I agree.  Legally it might be cut and dry, but that's entirely dependent on the legal system of the country you live in.  It's not the same thing as ethically "right".

I'm also more interested in "How Gary Gygax Lost D&D" than "How Gary Gygax Lost TSR". :)

For example:

QuoteIn Civil Code countries all moral rights and some economic rights are granted exclusively to flesh and blood individuals, or so-called 'natural persons'. Such creator's rights, to quote the Tunis Model Law, are: "perpetual, inalienable and imprescriptible". Furthermore, most "may not be transferred" to another individual (except as an heir) nor to a corporation.

Under that legal system (which I think may apply to Quebec) Gary would have lost the company -- but not the game he created.

Quote from: NicephorusI'm curious.  How much did he really screw him?  I have no idea what kind of cut Arneson was getting as second author. Certainly some of the key early ideas were Arneson's but it appears that most of the writing work and most of the sweat of running the business was Gygax.  
 
I've read (on a forum - grain of salt) that one of the motivations behind the AD&D books was to be able to take Arneson out of the loop.

I suspect that that list item is what Jeff is talking about. Attempting to manuever to get out of a prior deal. Although I haven't seen all the documents of Arneson vs Gygax and Gygax vs Arneson.

IMO in the end Gary lost control of of TSR, and therefore D&D, because:
1) divorce
2) the scraps he got in
3) he wasn't so much the astute businessman
4) his poor judge of character, maybe he didn't understand Williams or maybe he thought he could control Williams to beat off the Blumes? *shrug*
5) mostly though because he walked away, to LA; if you given up the reigns like that your heart isn't in it anyway, and you probably aren't the person for the job

Maybe things would have been different if he'd found a different partner after the death of Kaye. It is my understanding that Kaye's widow did sell to him but Gary got the Blumes to invest because of cash crunch ( and this is just a guess but probably a combination caused by growth and the drain of having to buy out the widow, assuming TSR didn't have life insurance policy on Kaye).

Quote from: blakkie5) mostly though because he walked away, to LA; if you given up the reigns like that your heart isn't in it anyway, and you probably aren't the person for the job

No he didn't walked away. What happened prior to LA was the first round of the Gygax-Blumes dispute. The Williams incident was round 2.

http://www.dragonsfoot.org/files/pdf/ODD09.pdf

QuoteAs it's written in your biography, from
1976 to 1983 you were President of
TSR Hobbies despite Brian and Melvin
Blume having the 65% and then the
70% of company's shares. Were the
relations between you and the Blumes
good or at least tolerable? Did they
give you directions about the
company's evolution and business
strategy or did you set them by
yourself?

Melvin Blume was Brian's father. He
purchased shares in the corporation.
Then, at Brian's insistence, I agreed that
Kevin, a younger brother of Brian then
managing the accounting and fulfilment
operations at TSR, be allowed to own
those shares. They were duly transferred
and then Kevin became a member of the
Board of Directors.
I have spoken earlier of the structure
that the Blumes imposed on TSR in 1981.
As another example of things before then,
late 1979 or early 1980, I issued some
instructions. When Brian heard what I had
ordered he shouted loudly for all to hear:
«I don't care what Gary said. I own
controlling interest in this company and it
will be done the way I say!». I should have
parted ways with TSR then and there, but
I still had a lot of loyalty to the company
and the vision upon which it had been
created. Anyway, from that point on, I had
little control, and in general what I desired
be done was ignored or the exact
opposite was put in place.

Quote from: estarNo he didn't walked away. What happened prior to LA was the first round of the Gygax-Blumes dispute. The Williams incident was round 2.

Oh to be sure he walked away from a situation that he didn't like. A crappy situation, and the divorce on top of it. And yeah, he eventually came back and went atomic in round 2 bringing in Williams.

I don't know exactly what happened but from everything I have read and heard for years, it seems like the typical story of unprepared amateurs making it big and things spiralling out of control as they reach success.

There seems to be a mix of ego clashes, personality changes, crappy management, bad legal counseling, plain laziness and several screw jobs by numerous parties involved.

I've seen that sort of stuff often when I worked in the music industry.

Quote from: StuartUnder that legal system (which I think may apply to Quebec) Gary would have lost the company -- but not the game he created.

Careful. You may be right, but given how copyright works and the fact that copyright isn't patent or trademark, Gary might have only ended up with "AD&D" the text, but not the right to use the trademark in future games.

As things stand, the "only" thing he lost was the AD&D text and trademark(s). Had he wanted to write his own version of Palladium RPG or whatever, I don't see why he couldn't have.

Then again I seem to recall that TSR rather vigorously tried to keep him from writing any games, e.g. when he worked with GDW. I don't remember what the legal basis for that was.

Interesting that Gygax thought the OGL was a big mistake.  (And ironic, given that the OGL made Castles and Crusades -- and thus his most recent products -- possible.)

It seems that WotC has come to share that view ...

Quote from: Elliot WilenThen again I seem to recall that TSR rather vigorously tried to keep him from writing any games, e.g. when he worked with GDW. I don't remember what the legal basis for that was.

The legal basis was "flaky premise used to beat on the little guy with big bags of money till he goes away". Which is exactly how it played out. Of course I believe Gary also screwed up with a computer programming partner with a lack of communication there, which really hobbled him financially. I'm pretty sure that was in that series of posts by Old Geezer. All coming back to Mr. Gygax not being a particularly astute business leader and organizer. :shrug:

Quote from: AkrasiaInteresting that Gygax thought the OGL was a big mistake.  (And ironic, given that the OGL made Castles and Crusades -- and thus his most recent products -- possible.)

It seems that WotC has come to share that view ...

Or maybe that they don't need it so much anymore?  EDIT: Though it seems more like they are simply scaling it back a notch or two, it's hard to say since we still haven't seen the new document.

Quote from: Elliot WilenCareful. You may be right, but given how copyright works and the fact that copyright isn't patent or trademark, Gary might have only ended up with "AD&D" the text, but not the right to use the trademark in future games.

True enough, but that also brings up the interchangeable way Trademarks and Product names are sometimes used --

Quote from: WikipediaAnother common practice amongst trademark owners is to follow their trademark with the word "brand" to help define the word as a trademark. Johnson & Johnson changed the lyrics of their Band-Aid television commercial jingle from, "I am stuck on Band-Aids, 'cause Band-Aid's stuck on me" to "I am stuck on Band-Aid brand, 'cause Band-Aid's stuck on me." Google has gone to lengths to prevent this process, discouraging publications from using the term 'googling' in reference to web-searches. This led New Scientist's Feedback section to coin the neologism FWSEing, in reference to the Famous Web Search Engine.[2] In 2006, "google" has been defined in the Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary as a verb meaning "to use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet."[3][4]

One example of an active effort to prevent the genericization of a trademark was that of the Lego company, which printed in manuals in the 1970s and 1980s a request to customers that they call the company's interlocking plastic building blocks "'Lego blocks' or 'toys' and not 'Legos'." While this went largely unheeded, and many children and adults referred to the pieces as "Legos", use of the deprecated term remained largely confined to the Lego company's own products – and not, for example, to Tyco's competing and interchangeable product – so genericization of the Lego trademark did not occur.

How often do you see "Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game" compared to "Dungeons & Dragons"?  What do you call it?

Gygax came out against the OGL at first because (like many people) he didn't really understand or know what it would do.

Gamers are terrific at predicting things. And by terrific, I mean, they suck at it. But they do it constantly. In the Army we had a term for this constantly trying to predict stuff.  The term used was (you might laugh) called "Wargaming". A Commander or whatever would say something like "You can't wargame this out on that assumption".

At one point I recall huge numbers of people (industry and fans alike)  were completely convinced that the OGL  was basicaly going to be used by WOTC as a tool to gather up everyone else's work for resale.

And also a widely agreed upon prediction where everyone agreed that absolutely no other game would ever use d20 as  a rules system.

Seeing the possibilities and not falling into the "everyone says so" trap is key.

Quote from: NicephorusI'm curious.  How much did he really screw him?  I have no idea what kind of cut Arneson was getting as second author. Certainly some of the key early ideas were Arneson's but it appears that most of the writing work and most of the sweat of running the business was Gygax.  
 
I've read (on a forum - grain of salt) that one of the motivations behind the AD&D books was to be able to take Arneson out of the loop.

Who knows - I certainly don't.

It's very much like the Jack Kirby vs. Stan Lee fiasco - after the big money poured in, everybody disagrees over who invented what.  Then, years later, they realize that neither of them can really remember the objective truth of what happened and make a separate peace of sorts.

Quote from: StuartI'm also more interested in "How Gary Gygax Lost D&D" than "How Gary Gygax Lost TSR". :)

Under that legal system (which I think may apply to Quebec) Gary would have lost the company -- but not the game he created.

See - here's the problem with sole ownership of a brand (from a non-legal POV) like that...

What constitutes D&D?  And who really created it?

How much of the product should Arneson have owned?  Didn't he form a lot of the original rules as well?

And what about Holmes?  Metzner?  Moldavay?  Cook?  etc.

Gary might have been the main author of the original game rules, but a lot of other guys were instrumental in building up the game into what it became by the time he left.

You get the same problem with trying to decide movie ownership outside of laws/contracts - who really "created" a movie: The writer, the director, the editor, the producer, the lead actors, the cinematographer...?  If multiple people contribute different parts to an artistic work, how does one determine which artist should ethically hold the rights?

@jgants -- I agree.

"None of them" doesn't feel like a good answer though.

Quote from: Stuart@jgants -- I agree.

"None of them" doesn't feel like a good answer though.

Although you can't transfer the status of being the creator it is my understanding that you can effectively transfer everything else linked to that. So in the end all that the status of being the creator stands for is who's death starts the copyright clock.

So Gary didn't lose D&D. Ultimately he sold it, as much as he legally could, which is pretty much everything except noteriety and a name on an old book.

But that's just a layman's understanding. Is there an attorney in the house?

Quote from: Abyssal MawGygax came out against the OGL at first because (like many people) he didn't really understand or know what it would do.

At one point I recall huge numbers of people (industry and fans alike) were completely convinced that the OGL was basicaly going to be used by WOTC as a tool to gather up everyone else's work for resale.

I distinctly remember Gary falling into this later category back in 2000 (or 2001?), in posts he made as Col Playdoh on Eric Noah's site. He was avoiding the OGL because he was worried about getting ripped off. Not necessarily by WotC though, he wasn't that explicit.

Quote from: StuartTrue enough, but that also brings up the interchangeable way Trademarks and Product names are sometimes used --



How often do you see "Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game" compared to "Dungeons & Dragons"?  What do you call it?

I dunno. I do know that in the 80's I ran across people who'd say "D&D" to mean "roleplaying in general", but the meaning wasn't nailed down very precisely. Sometimes it was somebody talking about an extremely houseruled campaign that didn't even directly refer to the D&D books anymore.

And TSR back then was famous for putting the trademark symbol on practically every proper noun that appeared in one of their products. ("Trademark Strictly Required" was the joke.)

I'm pretty much at a loss to think of someone who retained copyright on a work but involuntarily lost the right to use the title due to trademark.

Quote from: jgantsSee - here's the problem with sole ownership of a brand (from a non-legal POV) like that...

What constitutes D&D?  And who really created it?

How much of the product should Arneson have owned?  Didn't he form a lot of the original rules as well?

And what about Holmes?  Metzner?  Moldavay?  Cook?  etc.

Gary might have been the main author of the original game rules, but a lot of other guys were instrumental in building up the game into what it became by the time he left.

The Arneson thing will probably remain murky forever, but I believe Holmes, Mentzer, et. al. were doing "work for hire" and legally that would mean that everything they came up with belonged to TSR.

QuoteYou get the same problem with trying to decide movie ownership outside of laws/contracts - who really "created" a movie: The writer, the director, the editor, the producer, the lead actors, the cinematographer...?  If multiple people contribute different parts to an artistic work, how does one determine which artist should ethically hold the rights?

From a legal perspective, it's the person who "oversaw the work as a whole" (or something like that. So, generally, unless contracts spell things out otherwise, it's the director or producer.

From an ethical perspective I'm not sure that IP really has much validity. Once you put it out there, it belongs to everyone. I believe that IP should be seen rather reductively, as an arrangement constructed at the pleasure of society to encourage creators. About the only ethical right I'd recognize is the right to be recognized as a creator, part of what in copyright law is called "moral right".

Quote from: Elliot WilenI'm pretty much at a loss to think of someone who retained copyright on a work but involuntarily lost the right to use the title due to trademark.

Pilates.  A bunch more with more details here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_and_genericized_trademarks).

Photoshop and Google are on thin ice.

Quote from: StuartPhotoshop and Google are on thin ice.

Probably less so than Kleenex, which has been hanging in there against the odds for a long time. But yeah, such are the downsides to success.

However D&D isn't anywhere close to that common of use though. It is a rough equivalent to those well outside the industry and RPG player base. But by people that buy games? Nobody uses D&D and RPG interchangably. Not even close to the type of use you get from people that refer to any brand of facial tissue as a "kleenex" when they know damn well it isn't made by Kimberly.

No, I'm not talking about losing exclusive rights through genericization. I'm talking about having someone else obtain/retain exclusive rights to the TM even though you retain the content.

The speculative example is: I write a game, call it Peonies and Pansies, and I launch the Peonies and Pansies brand through SRQ, Inc., which includes revised versions of the game. I then separate from SRQ with more or less ill-will, but a court rules that I retain copyright on the original game (only). So the question is, how much control would SRQ now have over my ability to publish Peonies and Pansies on my own? Would I have to change the title? Could I publish just that one game under the original name but not other games with similar titles? Or what?

I suppose underlying all this is the assumption that I granted SRQ the right to make derivative works of P&P but we never explicitly established ownership of the trademark.

Also needless to say, a good contract could avoid all this mess.

I don't think they're currently at risk of that, no.  But if by 5e it's a completely different game as some people have suggested you could have people using the term "D&D" to mean substantially different games.

But that's really an aside.  I'm more interested in how Gary Gygax, the (co-)author of a game lost control of it completely -- to the point they were doing things with the game he didn't agree with.

My wife's uncle had 2 business partners and was forced out of his business in a similar way.  I got out of a business partnership a few years ago because I was going to be in a position where I had < 50% share.  Starting a game company now, this is all both very interesting... and probably pretty important too. :)

Maybe I'll release my game in French first in both Quebec and France.  Their laws seem to protect authors a bit more. :haw:

Quote from: StuartBut that's really an aside.  I'm more interested in how Gary Gygax, the (co-)author of a game lost control of it completely -- to the point they were doing things with the game he didn't agree with.

That happens when you sell it. First he dropped below 50% in TSR and then he completely bailed. EDIT: TSR ending up owning the sole distribution rights and sole rights to make direct derivative works. Gary is still the creator but he'd effectively and explicitly signed away any control of the use of it.

Quote from: jgantsHow much of the product should Arneson have owned?  Didn't he form a lot of the original rules as well?

Looking at Arneson's published work it is hard to attribute many D&D rules to him.  First Fantasy Campaign is basically a collection of his campaign notes and it doesn't look very much like D&D at all.  I suspect much of his influence on the game is procedural in a way that doesn't come through in rules.  My recent obsession on my blog with OD&D is basically an attempt to reconstruct some of the procedures that the earliest DMs took for granted and hence didn't make it into the text of the game.

Quote from: jrientsI suspect much of his influence on the game is procedural in a way that doesn't come through in rules.

A comment by Gygax that I read recently (in the gamespy interview in post 1 perhaps?) supports this.  Gygax stated that his group used heroic figures in Chainmail.  But Arneson took the next step with one heroic figure per player and no other player controlled figures.  This was what inspired Gygax to transfrom Chainmail to D&D.  Arneson seems to have had the first rpg campaign that predated the first actual rpg.

Quote from: jrientsMy recent obsession on my blog with OD&D is basically an attempt to reconstruct some of the procedures that the earliest DMs took for granted and hence didn't make it into the text of the game.

Uh, sorry for the tangent, but I gotta say that is very cool.


How much is there from the other parties perspective? Ms. Wisemans (sp?) or the Blumes? I'm really interested in a kind of 'where are they now' way.

I'm not really that interested in being a sympathetic ear, mind.

Somebody just put up a link to an article with some direct quotes from both those parties. It may have been on Gamespy. (In any case Gamespy has quite a few articles on Gygax and Arneson.)

Hey, Jeff, that's a pretty cool project.

I'm not sure which of the following was either procedural or rules-ey. What is abundantly clear, though, assuming the Wired obit is accurate, is that Arneson came up with a LOT.

QuoteWhen Arneson saw Chainmail, he was very intrigued by its potential for free-form, improvisatory play. It was similar to the game scenarios that one of his game groups in the Twin Cities had been experimenting with. "We didn't have volumes of rules and people arguing about historical accuracy," Arneson recalls. "In one game, we all ended up chasing a South American dictator as he was trying to escape with his comic book collection."

Arneson modified Chainmail for his own group's purposes. He took the action underground, like the claustrophobic sets of the Hammer Film Productions horror flicks he watched. Corridors. Tunnels. Caves. "A dungeon is nice and self-contained," he says. "Players can't go romping over the countryside, and you can control the situation."

Arneson tested his Chainmail mod in play sessions with his group and, based on their feedback, continued to tinker with the rules to make it more fun. "We had to change the combat system because we added more monsters. They were getting big and gruesome."

There was another aspect of the game he wanted to tweak: the fact that it ended. Arneson's group was having too much fun playing these specific roles to want to part with them after a single game. Outside of the individual games, Arneson created an experience system for characters. Your character would earn experience points based on their success from game to game. After a certain number of poins, a character would "level up."

To help move the story along, Arneson assumed a more elaborate role than that of the referees used to resolve disputes in war games. He would be the game master – setting the scene, guiding players along their quests. After developing the game, dubbed Blackmoor, for about six months with his group in Minnesota, Arneson and a couple of his buddies trekked back to Lake Geneva in late 1971 to run a game for Gygax and his crew. "Six-level dungeon, you start on the first floor and you go to the others by taking staircases," Gygax says. "We ran into a troll with magic armor, and we fought him and killed him and took it." The Wisconsinites all loved it. Arneson had successfully distilled the involved tactical military campaigns into a virtual world of first-person action.

Further down, G & A agree that A couldn't "type" while G could. Where typing obviously means: A is one of those people with awesome ideas who just can't organize them into at least a semi-coherent text. A's later game publication history bears that out.

I used to be in denial, but I have to say that Wired obit makes it pretty clear just how much D&D owes to A, and I find G's conduct at the time grating. Again, assuming here the report is accurate.

That's interesting.  The Wired obit makes it sound like it was Dave's idea to turn the referee into a GM.

Gary talks playing Cops and Robbers with a GM with his childhood friends John and Jim Rash:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ra9h63CLtLY

In response to the question -- "Where did the idea come from?" He says Jim Rash was the first game master that he knows of.

More interestingly... LARPing predates tabletop. :haw:

It was Dave's idea to take the Braunstein concepts and (a) move them into a fantasy medieval context and (b) (apparently) move from style of game that was multisided to one where the main source of challenge/opposition to the PCs was the GM.

Also from Gamespy...

Quote from: Dave ArnesonI had a regular miniatures group that played wargames for, oh, 10 years at that point. We started it in the early '60's really. I had of course encountered role-playing in College. In history classes. And then I applied some of that to our wargames...

Lots more info!
http://archive.gamespy.com/articles/august02/gencon/arneson/

Quote from: StuartGary talks playing Cops and Robbers with a GM with his childhood friends John and Jim Rash:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ra9h63CLtLY

In response to the question -- "Where did the idea come from?" He says Jim Rash was the first game master that he knows of.

That's an interesting story Gary tells. I don't think anyone ever questioned Gary's skill at spinning a yarn. :keke:


P.S. Oddly that little story of his does underscore how a single person with the role of 'game master' IME isn't a typical part of children playing cops and robbers.

QuoteAnyway, when we tried to use the old matrix rules (for Chainmail) only one die decided combat. So either the player would die or the monster would die. Well, the players didn't like that, so that's where I came up with hit points. Actually I got that from a set of Civil War Naval Rules where you had Armor Class and Hit Points and guns would do different damage.

Oh, man.

I've known that Gamespy article for a long time, but as I said I was in denial.

Quote from: StuartAlso from Gamespy...

>> Dave Arneson: Oh sure. I play a lot of computer games. In fact, you can get an A in my course if you can beat me in Age of Empires 2.

Hehe, the old guy's a pro at a click-fest game no less. :)

Dudes...

Braunstein, RPG Roots, and the Role of the GM (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/35560.html)
Dungeon Master Zero (http://www.robmacdougall.org/index.php/2007/05/dungeon-master-zero/)
R&D (http://www.robmacdougall.org/index.php/2007/06/r-and-d/)
Update on Totten and "Dungeon Master Zero" (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/41347.html)
More D&D Roots (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/41493.html)

Whether or not you agree with my theses, it's all there. But the Gamespy articles are a very good collection, too.

Also: The history of the GM-as-God meme (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/27308.html)

Quote from: Abyssal MawGygax came out against the OGL at first because (like many people) he didn't really understand or know what it would do.

Gamers are terrific at predicting things. And by terrific, I mean, they suck at it. But they do it constantly. In the Army we had a term for this constantly trying to predict stuff.  The term used was (you might laugh) called "Wargaming". A Commander or whatever would say something like "You can't wargame this out on that assumption".

At one point I recall huge numbers of people (industry and fans alike)  were completely convinced that the OGL  was basicaly going to be used by WOTC as a tool to gather up everyone else's work for resale.

And also a widely agreed upon prediction where everyone agreed that absolutely no other game would ever use d20 as  a rules system.

Seeing the possibilities and not falling into the "everyone says so" trap is key.

I´m alongside you for 99%. Only the Gary remark, I´d at least give you something to ponder: All the Gary-created Spells, items and Monsters (which are in the SRD) are now free, forever. I think he knew that.

Folks, you are mudding the waters. EGG did create D&D from whole cloth, whereas the RPG-hobby has several fathers.

The big white rabbit pwns us all.

EDIT: Do elaborate, Settembrini. Because while Todden etc. are more or less distant forefathers, Arneson was a co-creator of D&D, in a way that is both major and specific.

No, not really.

The Monsters, Spells and Items are all from Gygax. Look into Chainmail, that´s Pre-Arneson. Swiss-Polearm fetish included.

So the building blocks are pretty much by Gygax from whole cloth. HPs and AC are from the Fletcher Pratt game, as I´ve stated oftentimes, that´s from the Arneson-angle. That´s about it regarding his contributions for D&D. The RPG-hobby, now that´s were Arneson really was a major contributor.

OK, that's true, there IS a lot in Chainmail. Including the PC races. No spells, though?

One caveat:  I have the 3rd ed. from 1979, which calls itself revised and expanded. Has anyone seen the first?

That leaves HP/AC, more three-dimensional PCs, and most importantly dungeons. Including the group-style play and the tactics associated therewith, which presumably prompted EGG to flesh out the identity of certain classes. That is still a BIG DEAL.

Quote from: SettembriniI´m alongside you for 99%. Only the Gary remark, I´d at least give you something to ponder: All the Gary-created Spells, items and Monsters (which are in the SRD) are now free, forever. I think he knew that.

Not significantly more really than they already were, as you can find in a number of "serial numbers filed off" projects. Evard's Black Tentacles for example is not free, forever.  And as has been pointed out ultimately Gary did publish work under the OGL via C&C.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityOK, that's true, there IS a lot in Chainmail. Including the PC races. No spells, though?

Several spells appear in the fantasy appendix of the first edition, all of which have counterparts in D&D.

In any event, the point wasn't to diminish Gygax's contributions - the point is that when you have multiple people creating a work of art (in the non-pretentious sense of the word) it's very difficult to talk about who "should" own something because even if one guy created the initial spark of it, a lot of other contributors were key in shaping it into what it became.

The only way to really claim exclusive creative ownership in the non-legal sense is to create something and all its derivative works yourself without any meaningful input from anyone.

Quote from: jrientsSeveral spells appear in the fantasy appendix of the first edition, all of which have counterparts in D&D.

Well... that's impressive. Having looked at Chainmail a bit more closely, it does already feel like D&D waiting to happen.

But without the dungeons, it wouldn't have.

Quote from: blakkieThat's an interesting story Gary tells. I don't think anyone ever questioned Gary's skill at spinning a yarn.

I've never gotten the impression that Gygax deliberately lied about anything, only that he was wildly inconsistent from one instance to the next. It seems to me that he had a healthy ego and that it colored his recollection of events. But, again, who knows what really happened? Shrug.

Seanchai

I agree, I don't think we need to see Gygax as deliberately lying. Maybe resisting or ignoring some evidence that didn't fit into his view of things, though. From his perspective, when he saw that Arneson was using Chainmail (albeit it seems only briefly) within Blackmoor, it must have appeared to him that Blackmoor was an evolution or application of Chainmail. But, as I've argued I think with hindsight we can see that Chainmail was a fairly arbitrary module slotted into the more important roleplaying framework developed by Weseley and Arneson.

EDIT: replaced second "evolution" with "application".

I definately don't think Gygax was ever lying about it.

It's just that memory is a faulty thing.  And in cases like this, even moreso.

Again, the exact same thing happened with Kirby and Lee.

I concur: Gary, creator of D&D. RPGs as a hobby: different story, but Gary was there right from the start.

His record is the best: 1/3 RPG Originator, and 95% D&D creator. All others just have some dibs on RPG Originatordom.

Quote from: SettembriniSwiss-Polearm fetish included.

BTW, this is an interesting angle--I wonder how, to what extent, Gygax's awareness/pride of his Swiss heritage had to do with his polearm fixation.

C'mon now, dungeons aren't just 5% of Dungeons & Dragons.

They were the fundamental tactical environment. That idea must have prompted EGG to hone his already existing Chainmail ideas accordingly and/or produce new ones to complement them. Just how active A was in that honing/production process, how much Blackmoor actual play was codified into rules (probably a lot) and by whom (probably by EGG), I have no idea. But even so.

Some of you guys are going to kill me, but my theory of dungeons has always been because they are an easy and consistent ways to place encounters. And encounters are the basic unit of D&D.

The word that used to be used interchangeably with module was the wargamer term "Scenario", which was taken to mean an actual situation already in place., with battlefield and conditions already set. So a scenario might be like "The Battle of Bunker Hill" or "Battle of the Coral Sea".  You already knew the forces that were present, the equipment, the battlefield conditions and terrain.

Well, it's hard to link up scenario after scenario after scenario if your'e going to do repeat play. The Wargame term "campaign" was usually a series of scenarios. This worked out to be a recreation of several key historical or ahistorical battles in a conflict.

Boil that down and change squads and units into individuals and you get "encounters" which are small scale and take place over a limited amount of terrain.

Mix in the very obvious influence of Lord of the Rings and Sinbad movies and soon you have the encounters taking place underground and involving monsters.

Mix in the idea of moving from one battle to the next and so on, and soon you have dungeons.

So in many ways, the "encount4rdization of D&D" is kind of a natural progression, at least as I see it.

AM,

:flameon:

I've said in the past, I really, really disagree. You're following the Mike Holmes line of reasoning, which I believe is utterly faulty when applied universally, however much it may have been true for many groups over the years, particularly IMO those composed mostly of younger players. Even if D&D was originally a game without much "roleplaying" in the sense of distinguishing the character's personality from the player--it operated as much or more in the spectacle, the exploration of the dungeon, the mapping, the puzzles and traps, than in the set-piece combats.

I think a lot of people didn't fully understand/appreciate this which is why Steve Jackson/Metagaming came out with The Fantasy Trip and ICE developed Arms Law. One made combat into form of endogenous fun (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/42314.html) through tactics and positioning, while the other did the same, I think, through vivid outputs from the stochastic model. (You didn't just inflict 10 points of abstract damage, you disemboweled the poor wretch.) Not that either of these is a bad game; I for one love TFT, and it's not like the combat system completely overshadowed other elements of the game, it just adjusted the balance somewhat.

You may wonder at the "younger players" comment above, but consider how much fun kids get out of purely random games like Candyland or Mouse Trap--for them, it's enough to have a stake in the gamble, and the hack & slash mode of original D&D offered that. As they grew older, or if they were already older when they found the game, I think they were more likely either to go the same route as Steve Jackson or to see the WHOLE game as extending outside of just combat, so that the self-contained skirmish was only a component within the larger balance.

Quote from: Abyssal MawSo in many ways, the "encount4rdization of D&D" is kind of a natural progression, at least as I see it.

Mmm, but that´s not how Wargmaning works/worked. They had clubs. The club was the thing. You weren´t a "Chainmail" or "Diplomacy" or "Tactics" player. You went to the club.

Some movie was  on, Gygax read something about the Burgundian wars, and off tehy go, looking for rules for that. Or making them themselves. Or getting hold of APAs or fanzines with rules and inspiration. Some games took off, some games didn´t, different in every club.

So before play starts, all participants were already sort of GMing, (as they still are, at least in the historical minis hobby): making up countries for their faction, painting, talking about which battle, which rules, modelling, terrain etc.
A common understanding about the simulated world, and the important parts of that simulated world was reached or strived for on a continuous basis.
Some games, like the Napoleonics, also have a rather long history of alt-history fluff, campaigns. And some had stuff like Braunstein, which is an outcrop of that, yadayadayada.

So, continuous play is in fact, as AM alluded to, important.But the continous play was done via the club, not via single person´s campaigns. That naturally shifted toward the more active members, who wrote rules or hosted special events like Braunstein, but there still was the clubs.

But the nature of the historical minis stuff, is as you say: continous play within the campaign is difficult. Ultimately, alt-hist-continous Braunstein lead to RPG-campaigns, and together with Fantasy+Burgundian Wars to D&D.

But what was the appeal? I tell you, as you say: continous play! TO GET AWAY FROM SET PIECE BATTLES WITHOUT CONSEQUENCES! TO BETTER EMBED THE COMBAT EXPERIENCES INTO A WIDER FRAMEWORK!

And now they are going back, destroying the main fun source of D&D.

To get back to your quote: It´s not a natural evolution, it´s retardation or devolution; specifically talking about the "continous play" factor here.

Stuart:

http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/setpages/chainmail.html

Quote from: WarthurI'm sorry, but I don't have much sympathy for Williams. If TSR had gone bankrupt in 1985, D&D would have found a buyer - because, just like when TSR did go bankrupt, it was the hottest game on the market. Heck, in 1985 there were probably more game companies around who could afford to buy it up.

As it is, Williams has said herself that she was not interested in the gaming angle, and only cared about developing intellectual properties (like the novel line). Did you know that she was so irritated by gaming she refused to allow playtesting on company time?

I'm sure there are a few people who could potentially have done a worse job than Williams of managing D&D, but by the same token I can think of companies who could have done much better.

You know, this might sound like "folksy wisdom"; but us pipe smokers have an old adage: "You don't get a nonsmoker to run a tobacconist".
You can always tell in a smoke shop if the guy running the place is actually a pipe or cigar smoker, or not.  If not, the quality is going to suck ass, and there's going to be all kinds of stuff missed because the owner doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about.

Its the same with RPGs: Even if you have a really competent businessperson running the company, if they're not a gamer, they're going to fuck up.  And Lorraine Williams was NOT a competent businessperson, she was a dilettante with delusions of grandeur.

Her cardinal crime was that she didn't even follow the advice of people who did know what they were doing, and her attitude can be summed up by her oft-quoted phrase "Gamers will like what I tell them to".  She showed nothing but contempt for the hobby and never thought of it as anything but a personal teat she could suckle at like a parasite, till it bled dry.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditHer cardinal crime was that she didn't even follow the advice of people who did know what they were doing, and her attitude can be summed up by her oft-quoted phrase "Gamers will like what I tell them to".  She showed nothing but contempt for the hobby and never thought of it as anything but a personal teat she could suckle at like a parasite, till it bled dry.

Witness, in fact, the debacle of the dire Buck Rogers RPGs she had TSR churn out solely so that she could claim royalties from them.

Quote from: RPGPunditYou can always tell in a smoke shop if the guy running the place is actually a pipe or cigar smoker, or not. If not, the quality is going to suck ass, and there's going to be all kinds of stuff missed because the owner doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about.

Its the same with RPGs:

Palladium suffers for the exact opposite reason.  I don't think anybody could deny that Siembeda is a gamer and has great intentions but his business sense is horrible.  Even though I'm not a big fan of 3.x, I'll give it credit as probably the most successful example of a marriage between business and the hobby.  It's sad when you come to a realization that even a company carrying D&D can die (TSR).  I can't believe no one has tried to buy the rights to that name unless it was dissolved with the purchase of D&D by WotC.

Quote from: GunslingerI can't believe no one has tried to buy the rights to that name unless it was dissolved with the purchase of D&D by WotC.

WotC would own that and it is hard to imagine them selling it for a price that sane people would pay. Or really at any price. Imagine marketing hitting the roof when told they are about to be selling into the face of "TSR Inc. is back!"

Quote from: blakkieWotC would own that and it is hard to imagine them selling it for a price that sane people would pay. Or really at any price. Imagine marketing hitting the roof when told they are about to be selling into the face of "TSR Inc. is back!"

I thought that was the case but didn't really believe it was worth the time or effort to research.  Even people that aren't fans of D&D might be able to be drawn in to a TSR product.  Those three letters meant RPGs to me for a very long time.

Quote from: GunslingerPalladium suffers for the exact opposite reason.  I don't think anybody could deny that Siembeda is a gamer and has great intentions but his business sense is horrible.  Even though I'm not a big fan of 3.x, I'll give it credit as probably the most successful example of a marriage between business and the hobby.  It's sad when you come to a realization that even a company carrying D&D can die (TSR).  I can't believe no one has tried to buy the rights to that name unless it was dissolved with the purchase of D&D by WotC.

Yes, I should have added that the other side of the coin is that if all you get is an aficionado with no business sense, you're going to get a financial failure on your hands too.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditYes, I should have added that the other side of the coin is that if all you get is an aficionado with no business sense, you're going to get a financial failure on your hands too.

To be fair, I think Williams' tenure at TSR saw both problems rear their ugly head. Williams, from her end, simply wanted to farm IP and didn't care about the gaming side of things. Because she didn't care about the gaming side of things, occasionally financially-unviable pet projects happened which ended up eating money. Planescape is the example I've seen cited most often - most of those incredibly lavish boxed sets ended up losing TSR a fat wad, especially since while many gamers were happy to buy 1 box to run a campaign setting, they weren't so keen on buying 4-5 - remember, if you wanted more details on the Outer Planes, you had to buy the Planes of Law/Chaos/Balance boxes, and there was also a box that went into detail on the Blood War.

Planescape is undeniably a labour of love, a product of people willing to go and make a product which is really "out there" through sheer love of gaming. It was also a financial disaster.

So in the end, how much money did Gygax walk away with?

The guy was one of the founders of a movement. Most people agree without D&D many of the industries in the gaming world wouldnt exist or they would exist in a different form.

So as one of the founders- what was his net worrth?

I'm not talking about admiration of the masses and noteriety as pop culture icon- I'm talking dollars and security.

Did he own his house?
Did D&D put the kids through college?
Is his survivng spouse and family taken care of?
Did he have trouble making ends meet in the later years?

I've seen pictures of his porch parties- I'm seeing a nice house in a decent neighboorhood, comfortable lived in furniture. But no butlers, BMW's or speedboats.

Well, if the story is to be believed, he was living QUITE the Hollywood lifestyle while out there in California promoting the D&D cartoon and trying to get a movie deal.

But it seems that after falling out from TSR he had some serious problems that came out of the various lawsuits etc. that Williams subjected him to.

I'd imagine that in the end he was making a comfortable living off of RPGs (and being a celebrity in general), but wasn't exactly wealthy.  Still, he was one of very few people that at one point could be said to have become a millionaire from RPGs (even if he lost those millions in the end).

RPGPundit

Quote from: GunslingerEven people that aren't fans of D&D might be able to be drawn in to a TSR product.  Those three letters meant RPGs to me for a very long time.

Same for me. I was surprised at the time that the TSR name vanished. Sure it had become  tarnished & WotC likely wanted to ensure there name got stronger but most people (esp. non-gamers) still likely id'd TSR -> D&D & Wizards' name would still be on the D&D books & Magic was still extremely strong then.

Currently Wizards' boardgames are mostly (all?) under the Avalon Hill name, the RPGs could similarly be released under the TSR name.

Offhand there could be some legal reason why, perhaps from one of the many lawsuits and/or not wanting to have to assume debts.

selected quoting:

Quote from: SettembriniMmm, but that´s not how Wargmaning works/worked. They had clubs. The club was the thing. You weren´t a "Chainmail" or "Diplomacy" or "Tactics" player. You went to the club.

So before play starts, all participants were already sort of GMing, (as they still are, at least in the historical minis hobby): making up countries for their faction, painting, talking about which battle, which rules, modelling, terrain etc.

So, continuous play is in fact, as AM alluded to, important. But the continous play was done via the club, not via single person´s campaigns. That naturally shifted toward the more active members, who wrote rules or hosted special events like Braunstein, but there still was the clubs.

But the nature of the historical minis stuff, is as you say: continous play within the campaign is difficult. Ultimately, alt-hist-continous Braunstein lead to RPG-campaigns, and together with Fantasy+Burgundian Wars to D&D.

Locally the groups I'm involved with don't stick to just RPGs or any particular type of game (board, war, card etc.). Usually stick with a game for about a month or two then switch. Most of those games don't have a GM or really even a referee, though usually the most enthusiastic person (who is often the only person with the rules or the first to have bought them) handles the bulk of pitching a game & looking up rules. That role and/or GM usually changes with each game though of course we each have our favorite genres & games but usually we play something everyone that's there that night plays or run 2+ games at once.

I guess you could call these groups clubs though none are formally organized. Most of us are also involved in one or more actual gaming clubs but those are usually themed, a particular game or company's games or type of games (Magic the Gathering, Games Workshop games, or historical miniature wargames for example). Those are also not local, up to an entire region of the US.

And yes wargame campaigns almost always end long before any sort of resolution is reached. There are few good campaign rules & campaigns either  break down fast and/or players lose interest esp. if there's a lot of upkeep involved. We game to get away from such a level of paperwork. :haw:

Quote from: Elliot WilenBTW, this is an interesting angle--I wonder how, to what extent, Gygax's awareness/pride of his Swiss heritage had to do with his polearm fixation.

Well, it´s all there in Chainmail already. The Swiss/Landsknechte get EXTRA rules, they are DESIGNED to pwn everyone because of CONSTRUCTED kewl powerz.

So my take is that he read something about the military revolution of the Burgundian wars, but was not exposed to Delbrück (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Delbr%C3%BCck)-ian thoughts ("The revolutions of the Swiss was the rentroduction of massed infantry as a tactically body of infantry with offensive qualities. The reasons why the Swiss could do this wer the following... ") As this could be reproduced by High German states (Landsknechte), it´s not a "genetic" thing, but rather an organizational and motivational development. One could assume, Gygax did not fully grasp this; at least that´s not how it was modelled in Chainmail. He retro-fitted the Chainmail model when statting up the Swiss. If the failings lie in the modelling or his understanding, I´m not sure.

There´s hints that he knew more about it. The polearms article in the DMG alludes to most important facts, but does not explicitly state them:

- main difference is between long-spears (pikes) and pole-axes (halberds)
- long-spears were wielded by the avantgarde, the best and strongest warriors
- once the avantgarde opended up a breach in the enemy ranks, the halberdiers slaughtered and hacked the enemy to pieces in wild & wolly charges; the avantgarde would open a gap so the halberdiers would flow into the enemy formation
- formations continually cut back on the halberdiers, and enlargened the long-spear-carrying element (the halberdiers were oftentimes interested in plunder & violence without taking the main risks)

Gygax does say, that understanding the "when and which" of polearms leads to understanding of military history of the late middle ages. I concur, but I wonder why he didn´t add some paragraphs to set it into context?

To sum it up:

- Gygax already knew it wasn´t only the Swiss
- Gygax knew polearms were important and different polearms were used for quite different battlefield duties
- Gygax didn´t state the "when and which" explicitly (IIRC)
- Gygax modelled the Swiss in Chainmail exception-based.

Actually the interesting part would be to sooth-say , whether the basic Chainmail rules were a Perren contribution, that was made more colourful by Gygaxian exception-based design of the Swiss and the Fantasy supplement.

I'd have to doublecheck the exact period Chainmail covers, for all I know it might end with the Swiss still ascendant. I think there were some early articles on Swiss & Renaissance wargaming in early issues of The Dragon (& Strategic Review) & TSR used to have a wargaming magazine co-currant with The Dragon for a time. Gygax wrote several of those articles.

Cavaliers and Roundheads (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/25990), while not technically the right period or location may cover war from the end of Chainmail through the ECW. I don't have it though. It is TSR's first product, something of a successor to Chainmail, but isn't as rare as their Barsoom rules.

Wikipedia entry for it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavaliers_and_Roundheads_(game)). Can't seem to find an Acaeum entry for it.

Quote from: Elliot WilenBTW, this is an interesting angle--I wonder how, to what extent, Gygax's awareness/pride of his Swiss heritage had to do with his polearm fixation.

I knew it!!

That is, I didn't specifically know that Gary Gygax was of Swiss origin, but a few years ago there was in my firm a guy from Switzerland called Karl Gygax. When he told me his surname I must have opened my eyes like plates :eek: