[ur-D&D] What are we playing here exactly?

[glandis]

So something happened with the link I posted (maybe because the thread went to two pages? Dunno - thought I tested it several times). It was supposed to go directly to this line, from Jesse, on page 1: "There's a serious grain of truth in the idea that AW finally taught me how to play the games that frustrated me as a kid." That's what I was trying to reference here, a confirmation that some people have found "modern" tools that let them solve old problems, and link that to what Ron was saying about "but you could already solve that problem." I think he's right, but - people gain insights in different ways. For some, the insight on how to play, and how to play better, happened in DungeonWorld (or whatever). Maybe it's that simple.

[Ron Edwards]

A word of caution: unlike every other RPG, D&D discussions contain lurking menaces. One of them is "rally to the defense." Please bear in mind that nothing anyone can say can possibly hurt the game, as if it were somehow both omnipresent at every discussion of it and terribly vulnerable to whatever might be said in those discussions. When this behavior appears, it is another example of the ur-D&D phenomenon at work.

Judd and Eero, this may apply to you especially, but it should be understood as a potential issue for everyone.

[Erik Weissengruber]

Sorry for the oblique reference: here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75TiGaIqnyY

To continue on this thread, rather than some of the other threads relevant to D&D or your 4E Game.

What does your playing table look like, Ron. Do you have a barebones sketch, graphpaper, wipeable vinyl sheet, a full on pile of toys? Do you lurk behind a GM screen? What kind of play pieces and tangibles do you dole out when you run your dungeons? Secret rolls? Those were all practices I was immersed in back in '79-'80.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Erik,

Your questions are confusing me a little because I am not currently DMing a D&D game. I am preparing notes for a 4E game, which as it happens seems to be attracting players quickly, and I'm playing in a game at a local store, which ends next week, or rather the official scenario does.

When I DMed the game I mentioned in the first post (the 3.0/3.5 one), we used dice, character sheets, my notes and map sheets, and scraps of paper all over the place. There was no screen, no battlemap or any other representation of positioning. I rolled openly, and in the final session which had a dungeon-like setup, I put out the whole map and said, "you're there and you can see up to here." Overall, it looked a lot more like playing Sorcerer than most referenced images of playing D&D, which are a lot like you described in the earlier post.

(editing these in:)
[D&D 3.0/3.5] The kid two houses down
[D&D 3.0/3.5] Skill combat and blood drinking
[D&D 3.0/3.5] Spells and swords: fight!
[D&D 3.0/3.5] Undead, real dead
[D&D 3.0/3.5] At long last, a dungeon - this last one is probably most relevant to your questions and includes a link to the dungeon map I used

I hope to get the 4E game up and running in a week or two, and then I'll answer about it probably in the current "psychedelic et cetera" thread.

[Erik Weissengruber]

Sorry for the confusion. I should have written:

"What kind of play materials have you used for recent explorations of the D&D phylum, and what kind do you think will play a role in your upcoming game?"