arnson didn't' do crap but if you love him so much go play adventures
in
fantasy, and see how that works for you
ken
A long time ago my brother took me to meet this _guy_, while we were
at coast
con, who had designed this new system and wanted to know if I would
take a
look at it. I went to meet him on the convention floor at an unused
gaming
table. He was pale and old. Wearing an ill fitting shirt and holding
some
pages that looked like they hadn't left his hands in months. I had
encountered
all types of DM's by this time and knew that appearances could be
deceiving.
So I relaxed became attentive so I could see his ideas. When we got to
the
spell list my heart almost stopped.
I only recognized one word out of every spell name. The vocabulary was
extraordinary, ancient, and arcane. I didn't understand any of them,
but the
words seemed to crawl through my brain with a will of their own. I
immediately
decided that spells _had_ to be something people could understand and
use
right away. I shook my head. I frowned and said "I'm sure these spells
are
incredible, but they are so obscure they would require an entire
dictionary
all their own to explain them."
He looked puzzled and look back at the spell list questioning. I stood
up and
continued speaking, keeping my feet still as they tried to back away
on their
own. "The days where words like Clairaudience and Clairvoyance send
people to
the library and stimulate discussion are gone." He seemed sad. And I
left, as
quickly as I could.
It took days to forget that spell list. To shed the desire to research
every
single one and learn what forgotten knowledge they contained. Hell
what the
words even meant. You can imagine how shocked I was to find a picture
of him
on the Internet later. It was Dave Arneson. I regret it to this day.
Later he
published a D&D knock off. It contained all the same vocabulary that
people
expect these days. And at least it sold a lot more copies than
"Adventures in
Fantasy" I don't know what to feel these days.
David Michael Grouchy II
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