Post by aldarron on Nov 28, 2009 8:01:05 GMT -6
Mortality radio interview, July 9th, 2004. (much of this 2+hr interview has the hosts babling on about trivia, and asking irrelevant and uniformed questions but Dave gave us some nuggets of info that I’ve transcribed here. In addition, to what’s here he also talked a bit about the contents of d20 Blackmoor, which would no doubt be of interests for some (cough*Havard*cough). I had thought to put there various quotes in the posts on this forum to which they were most relevant but decided that it would be more useful for folks to have them all together.
(Question: Can you tell our listeners about the variant magic system in the Wizards Cabal?
About 75 minutes into the program)
Dave Said…
“I actually like to think that what they’re referring to as the d20 system is the variant system, and that this is closer to what I originally wanted to do ha ha ha. So who’s the variant and who’s the original? We’re trying to capture a different flavor of how you do magic and how you implement magic… Too often it seem like these magic user they run around with spell books the size of semi trucks and they just crank them out like some kind of assembly line; and were trying to put a little bit individual variation into the spells and how they are used. Again, just to catch the flavor of a fantasy world where you can’t assume the orcs you’re going to find are the same old orcs and you can kill them in the same old way. I had a big argument way back when about dragons because they came out with all these different color dragons and to me they are just cookie cutter dragons. I always thought that dragons should be huge blusterous things that, each of them, are unique. Too often you sit there and the player says, “well, we’ll just assume that its 2 hit dice and armor class 8 etc.” and I like to say, “well, okay that’s the little ones, but you’re fighting a big one.”, or “You’re fighting the tribe from that side of the hill, not the other side.” Magic is probably one thing that is the most unique aspects of fantasy worlds. Magic does not work all the same when different authors are writing about different fantasy worlds. I am attempting, as best I can by staying within the structures of the d20 world, to add that flavor…."
(Question: Looking over the years, what do you think of the changes the game has undergone?)
Dave Said…
"A lot of the changes between 2nd edition and third edition are actually changes in so far as what I originally wanted to do with the D&D system. For instance with the different classes and the different fields you could learn. I wanted to do that originally, but it was considered to complicated and people couldn’t handle it. Well now that’s come back, you can do that. You could really make a unique character class with the variability; and I always wanted to do that and I do that in my original campaign even today. So I feel vindicated because a lot of the stuff I wanted to do has now been added. People don’t realize that I came up with it way back when. You have to look at an early first edition to even get an idea of that. So, I’m happy.”
(Question: Gygax listed a bibliography of inspirational books. What were some of the books that inspired you when you were creating original D&D?
82 minutes into the program)
Dave says:
“As far as books go, fantasy books, science fiction/fantasy books that inspired me, we’re talking about Poul Anderson, Robert Heinlein, and a lot of the other authors, like the author of the Horse Clans series. (Robert Adams) Gary Seems to have listed every book he’s ever read in his bibliography, and I’ll be blunt, I don’t think I’ve read a lot of those books. Although, after having read a few thousand books, I really can’t remember which ones I’ve read anymore… So a lot of it is, Yes, I was inspired by…; but where does the inspiration stop and the game design begin? I mean, you’ve got to make changes. You’ve got to do variations. You can be influenced by something you read and don’t even remember reading, because you want to include “oh here is something neat I can incorporate into my world.”
(Question: Egg of Coot of based on Gygax? 86 minutes into the program)
Dave says:
“It’s not based on Gary. It was actually a name variation for one of the original players in my Blackmoor campaign… We had an Egg of Coot even before Gary got involved in the early baby steps of our fantasy campaign. The Egg of Coot was just a variation then, a variation of the name of one of players who was more sinister. Because we didn’t have character classes then, every player had to play it the way they wanted too. So we had our evil characters and they played it that way. “
(Question: The new Arcane Warrior class is an interesting mix of magic and fighting? 92 minutes into the program.)
Dave says:
“Because the players in the original campaign could learn different skills and different abilities, virtually everybody who was a fighter also wanted to be able to throw magic. And it seemed like everybody who was a magic-user also wanted to be able to fight. “
(Question: A friend of mine, says you are to blame for the Mind Flayers. True? 105 minutes.)
“No, not that one… Some of the monsters came from Gary and some of them came from me… He was really into psionics. I didn’t like psionics.”
(Question: Can you tell our listeners about the variant magic system in the Wizards Cabal?
About 75 minutes into the program)
Dave Said…
“I actually like to think that what they’re referring to as the d20 system is the variant system, and that this is closer to what I originally wanted to do ha ha ha. So who’s the variant and who’s the original? We’re trying to capture a different flavor of how you do magic and how you implement magic… Too often it seem like these magic user they run around with spell books the size of semi trucks and they just crank them out like some kind of assembly line; and were trying to put a little bit individual variation into the spells and how they are used. Again, just to catch the flavor of a fantasy world where you can’t assume the orcs you’re going to find are the same old orcs and you can kill them in the same old way. I had a big argument way back when about dragons because they came out with all these different color dragons and to me they are just cookie cutter dragons. I always thought that dragons should be huge blusterous things that, each of them, are unique. Too often you sit there and the player says, “well, we’ll just assume that its 2 hit dice and armor class 8 etc.” and I like to say, “well, okay that’s the little ones, but you’re fighting a big one.”, or “You’re fighting the tribe from that side of the hill, not the other side.” Magic is probably one thing that is the most unique aspects of fantasy worlds. Magic does not work all the same when different authors are writing about different fantasy worlds. I am attempting, as best I can by staying within the structures of the d20 world, to add that flavor…."
(Question: Looking over the years, what do you think of the changes the game has undergone?)
Dave Said…
"A lot of the changes between 2nd edition and third edition are actually changes in so far as what I originally wanted to do with the D&D system. For instance with the different classes and the different fields you could learn. I wanted to do that originally, but it was considered to complicated and people couldn’t handle it. Well now that’s come back, you can do that. You could really make a unique character class with the variability; and I always wanted to do that and I do that in my original campaign even today. So I feel vindicated because a lot of the stuff I wanted to do has now been added. People don’t realize that I came up with it way back when. You have to look at an early first edition to even get an idea of that. So, I’m happy.”
(Question: Gygax listed a bibliography of inspirational books. What were some of the books that inspired you when you were creating original D&D?
82 minutes into the program)
Dave says:
“As far as books go, fantasy books, science fiction/fantasy books that inspired me, we’re talking about Poul Anderson, Robert Heinlein, and a lot of the other authors, like the author of the Horse Clans series. (Robert Adams) Gary Seems to have listed every book he’s ever read in his bibliography, and I’ll be blunt, I don’t think I’ve read a lot of those books. Although, after having read a few thousand books, I really can’t remember which ones I’ve read anymore… So a lot of it is, Yes, I was inspired by…; but where does the inspiration stop and the game design begin? I mean, you’ve got to make changes. You’ve got to do variations. You can be influenced by something you read and don’t even remember reading, because you want to include “oh here is something neat I can incorporate into my world.”
(Question: Egg of Coot of based on Gygax? 86 minutes into the program)
Dave says:
“It’s not based on Gary. It was actually a name variation for one of the original players in my Blackmoor campaign… We had an Egg of Coot even before Gary got involved in the early baby steps of our fantasy campaign. The Egg of Coot was just a variation then, a variation of the name of one of players who was more sinister. Because we didn’t have character classes then, every player had to play it the way they wanted too. So we had our evil characters and they played it that way. “
(Question: The new Arcane Warrior class is an interesting mix of magic and fighting? 92 minutes into the program.)
Dave says:
“Because the players in the original campaign could learn different skills and different abilities, virtually everybody who was a fighter also wanted to be able to throw magic. And it seemed like everybody who was a magic-user also wanted to be able to fight. “
(Question: A friend of mine, says you are to blame for the Mind Flayers. True? 105 minutes.)
“No, not that one… Some of the monsters came from Gary and some of them came from me… He was really into psionics. I didn’t like psionics.”
