Saturday, July 30, 2022

"Why make a mistake once when you can repeat it over and over?"

So, here's what the excellent website for discussion of all things D&D-ish (esp. 3e) make of Ben Riggs' book, SLAYING THE DRAGON.

https://www.enworld.org/threads/slaying-the-dragon-the-secret-history-of-dungeons-dragons-review.689824/  

For those who have time, there are some interesting exchanges in the comments, including at one point some back-and-forth disagreement between two ex-TSR folk.

My favorite bit though is one poster's observation that 


So many products I loved 

would likely never had existed 

if TSR was a well-run company.


The irony of that really hits home.

--John R.

--current reading: P. G. Wodehouse


at

1 comment:

  1. Paul WAugust 1, 2022 at 11:45 AM

    I will likely read this when I finish my current reread of the Harry Potter series, but I'm very torn. On the one hand, any work that counters the prevailing Gygax worship is a good thing, based solely on his own writings in Dragon magazine and his latter posts on various online versions I realized early that considering Gygax an "unreliable narrator" was the most polite way of describing the man.

    On the other hand, this author hypes his "anonymous sourcing" for the sales figures, and makes it a big selling point.

    I'm a historian by profession. Historians do not use "anonymous" sources, our work must be cited so that other historians can replicate it. So, this work is not a history, and I dislike that it gets marketed as one. It is about best a work of pop culture or journalism.

    ReplyDelete