D&D master Gary Gygax was a nerd's nerd

SFGate ^ | 3/6/08 | Peter Hartlaub

[Teflonic]

Set both of your 20-sided die to 0-0, raise the Monster Manual to half-staff and spend your 14th level ranger's next several turns hoisting a few pints of ale - even if that does mean losing some hit points along the way.

If none of that makes any sense, then you probably didn't take much notice when Gary Gygax died earlier this week. But for those of us who spent our Friday nights huddled around a hexagonal map scattered with lead figurines of dwarves and owlbears, instead of the spiked punch bowl at the junior prom, this is a very mournful week. Our nerd king has fallen.

Gygax was the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, and the godfather of role-playing games. The legacy of D&D is most apparent today in its huge impact on video games and social networking. (Don't fool yourself. Dungeons & Dragons and Second Life are a lot more similar than you think.) For many of us who played, however, the name Gygax conjures up the past: a short but meaningful era when we lost ourselves for hours at a time in a fantasy world created with pen and paper and lots of imagination.

[qam1]

Xer Ping

Ping list for the discussion of the politics and social (and sometimes nostalgic) aspects that directly effects Generation Reagan / Generation-X (Those born from 1965-1981) including all the spending previous generations are doing that Gen-X and Y will end up paying for.

Freep mail me to be added or dropped. See my home page for details and previous articles.

[Xenalyte]

Line of the day, my FRiend.

[Dominnae]

>>Too bad I can’t get my kids into this stuff. It’s computer games for them and that’s it.

Aw that’s too bad .. my daughter has played pen ‘n paper RP since she was 12 years old, with her Dad’s gaming group. They play everything from DnD to Vampire, The Masquerade, to Robotech RP.

When I started playing Everquest in 2000 she had a little woodelf warrior on my account, and RP’ed it! She belonged to the RP Club & Ren Club in High School and now moderates RP chats online. She has a 70 alliance rogue in WoW, and is one of the most imaginative fantasy writers I’ve seen in the vein of R.A. Salvatore. (allowing for my bias of course.)

And it all started with pen ‘n paper RP for her. Maybe if you get a group of gamers together they’ll watch enough to join in and show you how it’s done! :)

[Incorrigible]

I was in engineering college in the mid 80’s and was friendly with the D&D players in my dorm but I still thought of them as somewhat nerdy. I was an EE/CS major with a Math minor so you had to be pretty nerdy if I thought you were a nerd!

None-the-less, I’m addicted to first person shooter games from Wolfenstein to Halo 3 and I have not doubt there was plenty of input from pizza and Mountain Dew guzzling D&D players in those games.

[ßuddaßudd]

LOL,, I'm still wondering how I got pinged to a D&D thread. DO I look like a nerd? (lol just kidding to nerds who are offended,,, not)

[Melas]

Ten sided dice (two of which make percentile dice) came later. Twenty sided dice were the original percentile dice with 0-9 repeated twice with one set colored in for the 11-20. I haven’t played in 20 years, but I was playing D&D since the days it was mail order only and was always addressed to “your name” sitting atop his castle at your address.

[Mr. Silverback]

If you like Star Wars, the new version of the Star Wars RPG is based on the D&D 4th edition rules.

[Mr. Silverback]

So the game had devils and demons and evil beasties...what else should a noble holy paladin whet his sword against?

Exactly.

[Mr. Silverback]

The other night I was playing the Star Wars computer game “Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords” and I was struck by how similar it was to playing D & D back in the day.

[Mr. Silverback]

Let us observe a moment of silence (10’ radius).

LOL!

[Political Junkie Too]

I remember this mock-photo from a few years ago:

-PJ

[Mr. Silverback]

None-the-less, I’m addicted to first person shooter games from Wolfenstein to Halo 3 and I have not doubt there was plenty of input from pizza and Mountain Dew guzzling D&D players in those games.

I don't play D&D anymore, but I'm betting you're right, and I LOVE Halo.

Last year my 8 year old son lured me to him and shot me in the head with a rocket launcher. I was so proud! Then I respawned and took him out with the 40mm pistol at long range. Being a dad is fun.

[Mad Dawgg]

"Very true. I don’t think the computer world would be what it is today had the D&D legacy not occured."

During one of our Magic Tournaments (A very complex card game and A direct offshoot of D&D) we discussed and charted how Magic (card game again) and many other Popular computer games and Console gaming systems came about.

The whole chain of events as we could discern went through Gary Gygax's creation.

BTW D%D was spawned by the Writings of Tolkien C.S. Lewis and Lewis Carroll.

Amazing how such writings most of which were panned by the critics of their times turned into a Billion Dollar industry.

[Grunthor]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=-RePL0iLe9I

[SuziQ]

Dungeons and Dragons is what kick started our #1 son's desire to read. He was an OK reader; he read well, he just didn't LIKE to read much. When he was in 5th grade or so, he attended a summer enrichment program at which one of the classes offered were fantasy role playing games. Since he seemed so interested, we bought him some of the D&D rules books, and he got started playing with some friends. We'd heard strange stuff about how some college kids were playing it, so we monitored who he played with. He and eventually his younger brother got really into it, but reading those rule books gave him such a desire to read for comprehension that he brought that into his schoolwork as well.

He eventually majored in English in college, graduated Law School, and practices trademark law in Boston. He stopped playing D&D in college, but picked up Warhammer, and other role playing games, developing a remarkable skill in painting miniatures. He and his friends still get together every couple of weeks to play.

So God Bless Gary Gygax, and may he rest in peace.

[SuziQ]

Last year my 8 year old son lured me to him and shot me in the head with a rocket launcher. I was so proud! Then I respawned and took him out with the 40mm pistol at long range. Being a dad is fun.

*snort*

[qam1]

Never played the game - liked the cartoon when I was younger, though I just saw a few episodes late at night recently (on Cartoon Network?) and I now realize that it was pretty cheesy (What's up with the gay unicorn?)

But one D&D knock off I do still like

[gogogodzilla]

Bahaha, that’s a good one.

:-P

[Mr. Silverback]

Glad I could amuse you. :-)

[Mr. Silverback]

Wizard needs food!