Well, I haven’t posted anything here for a couple of years. I guess I haven’t been too inspired to write about Cajun and zydeco music and dancing. But, just after Christmas of 2014, I got back into playing Dungeons & Dragons. A friend told me then that her son and a friend of the son wanted to play Dungeons & Dragons, but they weren’t sure how to get started. And seeing as I’m an old Dungeon Master from the late 1970s/early 1980s era, I jumped at the chance to DM once again! The last time I had DMed any D&D (or Traveller, or Boot Hill) was in early 1982. I started going to college then, and didn’t have time to properly prepare dungeon adventures. And I just never went back to it.
In the intervening nearly 33 years, I had often thought of selling my old D&D stuff, but for some reason, never did. Now I’m glad I kept all of that old stuff. So now I’m running Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 1st Edition rules. Why 1st Edition? Well, because I already own a bunch of stuff (DM Guide, Player Handbook, Monster Manual, et al, plus a number of store-bought and home-grown modules). I am familiar with the 1st edition stuff, and already had a number of my own “house rules.” As an example, I throw out the “weapons proficiency” rules for fighters — I figure if someone has a profession as a fighter they will be conversant with many different types of weapons, but of course other character classes, such as magic-users, clerics, and thieves, are limited in what weapons they can use.
Anyway, it’s been a blast DMing again. I write up a story about each adventure, and figured I should post those stories online.
One more thing to say about AD&D 1st edition rules…. They must still be good as the original rulebooks for 1st edition have been made available for sale in PDF form, plus physical reprints of much of the original material.
— The Dungeon Master