03-22-2011, 09:42 AM
Havard Wrote:This is really interesting Jeff. It also adds some new dimensions to the Arneson lawsuits.
-Havard
It did; I had a front row seat for all of it. There was always a certain dynamic tension between the Minneapolis crowd (Dave and Phil and their friends) and the Lake Geneva crowd (Gary and his friends); there were a lot of in-game rivalries which got played out at the first Gen Cons. I recently bought a copy of the book "Forty Years of Gen-Con" (or something to that effect) and laughed my fool head off reading it.
My personal take on the lawsuits is that Gary wanted very badly to be a 'respectable' author and publisher; the trade dress and format for what became AD&D was based primarily on what the largest bookseller in the US at that time, B. Dalton's, was dictating for their in-store display format. Boxed sets like the original D&D, were 'too crude' for the mass retail market, and any new products had to be either up to the standards set by Avalon Hill for boxed games or be 8 1/2" by 11" hardbound books. Period. Another driver in the marketing of AD&D was the tournament game, which was a direct follow-on from the historical miniatures world that both Gary and Dave came from. (Ancients were the worst of this trend; see also the WRG sets of rules, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards. I have an opinion about tournaments and tournament players, and got entirely out of historical miniatures as a result.) The modules that these Gen Con tournaments generated provided new products, as they could be easily produced and shrink-wrapped to fit B. Dalton's retail format.
Once the game took off, the money started rolling in, and people got a little goofy. My personal experience, as well as my conversations with both Dave and Gary, was that both of the Blume brothers got just a little too greedy and thought themselves just a little too clever; the result was their cutting Prof. Barker and EPT off, as they were able to play on the fact that EPT out-sold D&D to persuade Gary to agree to drop Tekumel. (I've seen all the letters back and forth, between TSR and Prof. Barker; it makes for both interesting reading and a classic case of how to start a war by provocative letters.) When TSR refused to pay Dave a royalty on AD&D, Dave had no option but to sue, and Prof. Barker was only too happy to help him out. The Blume brothers made asses of themselves in court during their testimony, Gary was made to look like an idiot, and that was pretty much that after a lot of time and money was spent by the Blumes to try and wriggle out of a very bad business decision.
*Sigh*. Not pretty to watch, and not at all helpful to the game hobby / industry...
yours, Chirine