Steve Perrin on Greyhawk and RuneQuest

[Vile Traveller]

Some of you might have heard of the early genesis of RuneQuest and how it originally had an AD&D basis before Steve Perrin came onboard. Obviously, although the systems are very different in play there are many technical similarities such as 3d6 ability scores and the hit point and weapon damage systems.

It looks like the link is even stronger, though according to this message from Steve Perrin on the RuneQuest Archives mailing list: rpgreview.net/pipermail/runequest_rpgreview.net/2013-April/001941.html

Strictly speaking, D&D Greyhawk was the first d100 system because it
introduced thief skills, which at that time were rolled on a d100.

That's what we used as a basis when we decided to have RuneQuest have
one system for all types of characters.

Steve Perrin

[havard]

Nice find Vile!
I have been looking for connections between the RQ/Glorantha people and the early D&D guys.

-Havard

[havard]

In this thread on the Supplement II Hit Location rules I bring up the subject of whether large parts of RuneQuest could be based on ideas from both Supplement I and Supplement II...

-Havard

[Finarvyn]

It doesn't seem like such an amazing connection, but I guess it's nice to have it verified. Just looking at RQ and OD&D you can see some clear parallels, and RQ didn't appear from a vacuum, so it had to be generally modelled after OD&D. In fact, if Perrin had made the claim that RQ was created totally without knowledge of OD&D I would have been skeptical.

[havard]

Jun 3, 2013 8:03:28 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

It doesn't seem like such an amazing connection, but I guess it's nice to have it verified. Just looking at RQ and OD&D you can see some clear parallels, and RQ didn't appear from a vacuum, so it had to be generally modelled after OD&D. In fact, if Perrin had made the claim that RQ was created totally without knowledge of OD&D I would have been skeptical.

Yep. On the other hand the fact that they ditched the combat system, but kept various bits from the Supplements is interesting

-Havard

[benoist]

The Perrin Conventions, which inspired RuneQuest's combat structure, were OD&D house rules.