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I believe Mike Mornard (Gronan), who was a player then, would say "We Made Up Some Sh*t We Thought Would Be Fun..."

There's nothing in those rulesets in and of themselves that clearly indicate how. In view of later rulebook & clarifications, until recently I think most assumed there was a duration that was overlooked, or it just ended after the encounter was over, but now there's some evidence that it was...

Great point. I didn't mention it in my post, because it was getting too long already, but OD&D Vol 1 (Men & Magic) expressly mentions paralysis as one of the effects subject to Constitution's "withstand adversity" aspect in OD&D, which is the forerunner of "system shock". The description of Con...

Keep your eye out for sales. I missed it, but Game Nerdz apparently had an early bird pre-order for $65, which is unfortunately out of stock. The MSRP for the deluxe version of Art & Arcana (which includes the OD&D tournament version of Tomb of Horrors) was $125, but my pre-order charged price...

The "Alternative Combat System" is in Vol 1 (Men & Magic) of the LBBs. It's literally listed under that name in the Table of Contents. Greyhawk only provides some "Additions and Changes" to this (Weapon vs AC, Missile Ranges, Varying Damage by Weapon and Monster). But if you want to run LBB...

From the promo images that I've seen, each page of Chainmail will be printed on one page of the new book. See here for an example: https://zenopusarchives.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-making-of-original-d-1970-1977.html

I don't think we are getting the entirety of Chainmail either. The index lists it as "Chainmail's Fantasy Supplement" and it only covers 20 pages in the book, whereas Chainmail 2nd edition is 56 pages long. Which is unfortunate as you need the non-fantasy portion to actually run the game. But of...

New promo ad for the book posted by Wizards on Twitter/FB today. Shows two pages of tables from Chainmail plus part of the "Gygax on Armor" article from Panzerfaust. Never though I'd see Chainmail tables used in an ad!

Thanks for the article! I enjoyed reading it. The above section is confusing. It seems to be conflating The Dragon magazine with the Dungeon boardgame. The picture shows the first issue of Dragon, and the first sentence refers to the Dragon, but then the rest of it appears to be describing...

I always liked the cryptically intelligent monsters in the 1E Monster Manual. So much that I put together a list of them a few years back: d20 Unexpectedly Intelligent Monsters in the Monster Manual

Today on the Zenopus Archives, I look at a possibly surprising reason why monster paralysis in OD&D, Holmes and the AD&D (mostly) doesn't have any duration: a 1989 letter from Gygax suggests that he originally viewed it as permanent until removed...! See the letter and read about it here...

For the latest on the Zenopus Archives, I take a closer look what the "Precursor" documents listed in Table of Contents might be. Speculative, but informed by the listed titles and knowledge of existing documents. The Making of OD&D Book: What Might the "Precursors" Be?

Around 600 pages!

Just about a month until this book is released! If you missed it, the full Table of Contents were shown at a panel at Gary Con back in March, and I transcribed on my blog along with some notes and promotional images showing some of the pages: "The Making of Original D&D: 1970-1977": Table of...

I like the standard cover, but I like this one much better! It might even get me to buy a copy. The font on this alternate cover is very reminiscent of that on the original 1978 PHB, down to the yellow color. (PHB 1978 cover from Wayne's Books)

Good call and reference art! The top one is the Gold Dragon by David Sutherland, from the 1977 AD&D Monster Manual.

Fifty Years of Dungeons & Dragons, released two days ago, is beginning to arrive in mailboxes! And I now have the full Table of Contents for the book, which I've posted on the Zenopus Archives blog today: Fifty Years of D&D: Table of Contents