REPOST: The Articles of Dragon: "Charting the Classes"

One of the characteristics of what I call the Silver Age of D&D is an obsession with mathematics, using it for a wide variety of purposes, from determining the best way to model falling damage to proving if one's dice "be ill-wrought." In issue #69 (January 1983) of Dragon, Roger E. Moore offered up yet another new field for mathematical analysis: class "balance." Many old school gamers think worrying about such matters is a peculiarly modern notion, but it's not. For almost as long as I've played the game, I've known players who fretted over whether this class or that class was "overpowered" or "underpowered" compared to the others. It's a concern I've never really worried about myself, partially because I think all but the most egregious mechanical differences take a backseat to what actually happens at the table. Nitpicker and hair splitter I may be about many topics relating to D&D but this isn't one of them.

However, I'm hardly representative of anyone but myself and I expect that, when Moore wrote this article he was speaking on behalf a sizable number of gamers who had a sneaking suspicion that some AD&D character classes were better (or worse) than others -- and he was going to prove it. Moore's analysis hinges on comparing the classes according to accumulated experience points, not level. His thesis is that, by examining the relative strengths and weaknesses of each class at certain XP benchmarks, he might get a sense of which classes are more (or less) potent than others. In doing this, Moore discovers that, for the most part, AD&D's classes are reasonably balanced against one another, with two significant exceptions, along with a third point of discussion.

The first anomaly concerns druids, which Moore says are unusually tough compared to other classes. Compared to clerics, they advance very quickly and, more importantly, they continue to gain full hit dice all the way to 14th level, which also nets them more Constitution bonuses as well. Druids thus wind up being comparable to fighters at mid-levels and even surpassing them at higher levels. Consequently, he recommends increasing the druid's XP requirements to compensate. The second anomaly concerns monks, which Moore says are too weak in terms of hit points for a class that is supposed to fight hand-to-hand. He recommends that they have D6 hit points. Finally, Moore says -- along with nearly every AD&D player I knew back in the day -- that bard, as presented in the Players Handbook, needs to go. He recommends Jeff Goelz's bard as a replacement.

In the end, "Charting the Classes" is actually a very modest and limited analysis of AD&D's character classes and Moore's suggestions are all quite reasonable. I believe I even adopted his recommendation regarding druids, as I know from experience that they were more potent than they had any right to be. Still, I largely find the idea of "balance" between the classes a Quixotic obsession that's played a lot of mischief with D&D in its later incarnations. But it is, unfortunately, a long and deeply held concern of many gamers and I don't expect it to ever go away.

The Articles of Dragon: "A Split Class for Nimble Characters: the Thief-Acrobat"

Issue #69 of Dragon (January 1983) is another one about whose articles I have very strong memories. The strength of my memories is bolstered, no doubt, by the issue's remarkable cover by Clyde Caldwell. Caldwell's an artist about whom my feelings are generally mixed, but I've nevertheless got a fondness for this particular piece, which, in some ways, encapsulates the vibe of the dying days of D&D's Golden Age. Consequently, I'll be returning to this issue several times in the coming weeks. 

This week, though, I want to look at Gary Gygax's "From the Sorceror's [sic] Scroll" column, in which he provides full details on the thief-acrobat "split class" that he first mentioned in a previous column. A split class is a specialization path for an existing class, in this case the thief. Provided he has the appropriate ability scores requirements (STR 15, DEX 16), a thief can, upon attaining 6th level, choose to devote himself to acrobatics as an outgrowth of his thievery – in effect, becoming a cat burglar or second story man in criminal parlance.

At the time of this article's publication, this was a comparatively unique concept, one that Gygax claims "has not been expressed before" and for which there is "nothing similar" in AD&D. I'm not entirely sure this is true. As I mentioned previously, the thief-acrobat reminds me a bit of the original concept for the paladin class, as found in Supplement I to OD&D. Likewise, the AD&D version of the bard, in which a character must first attain levels in fighter and thief before becoming a bard, is in the same ballpark in my opinion. Even so, the precise arrangement Gygax presents for the thief-acrobat isn't one we'd seen before.

I liked the idea of the thief-acrobat more in principle than in fact and my friends held similar views. Only one of them ever chose to pursue this split class and the player soon grew bored of playing him. That was probably the biggest problem with the thief-acrobat: it was very specialized and thus of limited utility. This is the kind of class that I could see thriving in, say, an urban, all thief campaign, where each character needs to distinguish himself from his fellow thieves. In a more traditional dungeon-based campaign, I think the thief-acrobat hold much less or appeal – or at least that's how my friends and I viewed it.

When it comes to the question of designing character classes, there are a couple of common approaches, neither of which is without its problems. Dungeons & Dragons began with only a few broad, archetypal classes, like the cleric, fighting man, and magic-user, but soon added many more, each one devoted to a narrower but nevertheless real archetype. AD&D opted for a larger list of available classes, while the D&D line kept to something closer to the original, narrower list. Each approach has its advantages and disadvantages and I can easily defend them both.

Had Gygax remained at the helm of AD&D, we would certainly have seen more classes added to its roster, some of which, like the thief-acrobat, would have been quite narrow in their utility. That's not necessarily a problem, but it can add a lot of unnecessary complexity to the game, not to mention diluting the game's flavor. On the other hand, a goodly selection of classes can, if presented properly, increase the game's flavor, with each one revealing more about its explicit or implied setting and the sorts of activities characters are expected to undertake within it.

Whether the thief-acrobat succeeds in doing any of these things is an open question, hence my own ambivalence toward it. Even so, this article sticks in my mind, because, like others written by Gygax at the time, it offered a sneak peek into his evolving vision of AD&D. It was a really interesting time to be a fan of the game and I'm glad to have been around for it.

REPOST: The Articles of Dragon: "Character Classes to Consider"

Issue #65 (September 1982) of Dragon saw yet another "From the Sorceror's [sic] Scroll" column by Gary Gygax that I will long remember. At the time, I was an avid AD&D player, having largely cast aside the D&D line as "for kids" (despite my being only just shy of 13 at the time). So, anything Gygax wrote about an "expansion volume" for the system was of keen interest to me. In the article under examination today, Gary laid out his plans for some new sub-classes, a topic sure to cause me to catch my breath.

According to Gygax, there would be seven new sub-classes, in addition to an additional level for druids beyond 14th. Of these sub-classes, we only ever saw three: barbarian, cavalier, and the thief-acrobat, in addition to the 15th level Grand Druid (and the Hierophant levels), each appearing first in the pages of Dragon and then in Unearthed Arcana. The others never appeared under Gygax's name in any form. They were:

• Mystic: A cleric sub-class "concerned more with prediction and detection than are other sorts of clerics."
• Savant: A magic-user sub-class "specializ[ing] in knowledge, understanding, and arcane subjects." Because of their deep learning, they can even learn some cleric and druid spells and, at high levels, use scrolls of other classes as well.
• Mountebank: A thief sub-class "specializ[ing] in deception, sleight of hand, persuasion, and a bit of illusion." 
• Jester: Whether this was a sub-class or a new class all its own Gygax never explains, though he does reference Roger E. Moore's NPC jester class. Amusingly, he has already worked out the class's level titles in this article and presents them.

At the time, I was salivating at the thought of so many new sub-classes for AD&D, though, in retrospect, the only one I now think was a good idea was the mountebank and it's one of the classes we never saw. Regardless of my present feelings, the article caused quite a stir at the time, leading many to believe that the next volume of AD&D was about to appear imminently. As it turned out, it would be several more years before we saw Unearthed Arcana and that book was not at all what we were expecting.

The article also covered a handful of other topics. First up was about personalizing one's character, a key facet, Gygax claims, in a role-playing game rather than a "roll playing" game. I'm not sure if this is the first ever instance where this pun was used, but it's certainly an early example of it. Of course, for Gary, "personalizing" meant one of a wide variety of adjectives to describe one's character's complexion, skin, hair, and eye color. It's both an odd thing to include in this article and a strangely literal understanding of "personalizing."

Gygax also notes that he is "retir[ing] from the position of 'sole authority' regarding the D&D game system," making way for Frank Mentzer as his colleague. He also notes that he is working closely with Francois Marcela-Froideval on several AD&D-related projects, including two "volumes." One of these is presumably Oriental Adventures but the other could have been any number of things. Finally, Gygax once again inveighs against "cheap imitations" and "knock-off" products, urging his readers to "avoid all such fringe products." I'm not certain which products he specifically had in mind in 1982, but it's unlikely to have been the Arduin series, since they were several years old by that point.

The Articles of Dragon: "The Big, Bad Barbarian"

As I've mentioned on multiple occasions, I looked forward to reading Gary Gygax's "From the Sorcerer's Scroll" columns in Dragon whenever they appeared. As Gygax himself regularly reminded his readers, his columns were (usually) the only articles in the magazine whose content was 100% official and approved for use with AD&D. Rabid AD&D player and TSR fanboy that I was at the time, this imprimatur thus meant a lot to me, because it ensured that I was permitted to make use of this new material in my campaign without reservation – and use it I did!

Like many (most?) gamers at the time, I'm not certain I ever played AD&D "by the book." Instead, my friends and I played a cobbled-together mishmash of Holmes, Moldvay, AD&D, and random bits of RPG "folklore" we picked up from Crom knows where. We still called what we were playing Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, of course, because that was the game to play and we all wanted to play it, but whether we actually were playing something Gary Gygax would have recognized as AD&D is an open question. What's important to understand for our present purposes is that we believed ourselves to be playing AD&D, hence why the new material Gygax presented for use with AD&D in Dragon was so important to us. 

My first experience of Gygax's additions had come in issue #59 (March 1982) with his introduction of cantrips. While these minor spells were interesting, they were never widely adopted in our group, unlike those that began to appear a few issues later. A good example of what I am talking about is "The Big, Bad Barbarian," which appeared in issue #63 (July 1982). As its title suggests, this article gave us our first peek at the barbarian character class that would later be included in Unearthed Arcana several years later. Since this was the first new – and official – addition to the line-up of AD&D character classes, I was very excited to see it.

I also perplexed by it. My own sense of what a "barbarian" was had been informed by two sources: ancient history and fantasy literature, particularly Howard's stories of Conan the Cimmerian. The class that Gygax presented in issue #63, with its proficiencies in survival and suspicion of magic, was vaguely reminiscent of both, but still somehow its own distinct thing. I didn't hate the class, but neither did I wholeheartedly embrace it as I would other new Gygaxian classes. I suppose it's fair to say that, in principle, I was attracted to the idea of a barbarian class. I simply wasn't yet sold on the AD&D version.

Part of the reason why I felt this way is that Gygax's barbarian broke a lot of standard AD&D "rules." For example, the barbarian's ability scores were generated according to its own unique methods, unlike even those presented in the Dungeon Masters Guide. Strength is generated by rolling 9D6 and picking the three highest, while Constitution uses 8D6 (Wisdom, interestingly, is generated by rolling 4d4). Furthermore, barbarians get double the benefit for high Dexterity and Constitution scores, both of which they'll almost certainly have, given the way the scores are generated. The class also began play proficient in even more weapons than a fighter, in addition to many other special abilities. Even to my twelve year-old self, it all seemed a bit much.

Nevertheless, I dutifully attempted to make use of the new class. One of my friends asked if he could convert his longtime fighter into a barbarian, since he'd always imagined him as a barbarian. I agreed, since it gave us the perfect opportunity to give the barbarian a whirl, just as Gygax suggested we do. The results were ... mixed. In play, we found the barbarian exceedingly tough in combat and its various abilities useful. However, in its Dragon iteration, the class was utterly forbidden from using magic weapons, which hampered its ability to take on many powerful monsters. I imagine this was intended to be balance out its other strengths, but, in the end, it proved crippling and my friend asked to return his character to being a fighter, which I happily permitted.

My first experience with a new, official class for AD&D ended in disappointment. This made me wary of all future classes Gygax presented in "From the Sorcerer's Scroll, though, as we'll see in future posts in this series, my wariness did not sour me on the idea of new character classes in general. But the barbarian, in either its original version or its "improved" one in UA, never won me over. I retain a fondness for the concept of a barbarian class, as I've explained before. I simply haven't yet found (or created) one that I like well enough to use. One day!

Level Titles: Beyond D&D

Having now covered all of the published TSR era D&D and AD&D character classes with level titles, I wanted to turn to some other RPGs published by the same company that also include them. First up is Empire of the Petal Throne (1975), which only makes sense, as the game's rules were essentially a variant of OD&D. Here is the chart featuring level titles for all three character classes available in that game:

There are a couple of notable ways that this chart differs from its D&D predecessors. The first and most obvious is that these titles aren't in English. Instead, they're in the Tsolyáni constructed language used in the setting, though they are accompanied by rough English translations. Secondly and more importantly, most of these titles have a meaning within the setting. For example, the titles of the fighting man class are, from levels 1 through 6, actual titles within the Tsolyáni legions. Likewise, the titles of both the priest and magic-user classes are those of ranks within the "circles" (an administrative term) of the temple priesthoods and lay priesthoods respectively. In short, these level titles aren't arbitrary names but rather markers of attainment within Tsolyánu. 

Empire of the Petal Throne is not, however, the only TSR RPG to include level titles. Another one that does so is Top Secret (1980) and its titles seem to have a lot in common with those of Dungeons & Dragons. Take, for example, the titles of the Investigation section:

Like most of their D&D predecessors, the Top Secret level titles (or "designations") are just synonyms related to the class in question, as you can see in the case of the Confiscation section:

If anything, the Confiscation titles are even less plausible than those for Investigation. Shoplifter? Crook? Those don't strike me as at all credible internal designations for a covert operative. Consider, too, the Assassination section:

Punk? Hood? Muscleman? As I said, these strike me as simply synonyms – and of a decidedly colloquial sort – rather than anything that could be accepted as having any purpose within the world of the game itself. 

On the other hand, there's Gangbusters (1982), which includes level titles for some of its character professions, but not others. For example, these are the titles for FBI agents:

You'll notice several things about this chart. Firstly, not every level has a unique title. Secondly, each increase in level includes a commensurate increase in salary, which has a real in-game effect. The titles in Gangbusters are, in this way, go beyond even those of Empire of the Petal Throne in being something that definitely exists within the game world rather than being simply an artifact of the game rules. For the sake of completeness here are the charts for Prohibition Agents and police officers:

Clearly, Gangbusters puts level titles to the best use of all the roleplaying games so far examined, in that they not only reflect a setting-based reality (i.e. promotion within a character's profession) but also provides a setting-based benefit in the form of increased pay. These are small things, to be sure, and one could reasonably argue that there's no need to present such things in this fashion. However, given that Gangbusters uses a level-based system, albeit one very different from D&D, it makes some sense to do it this way. In any event, I think it's fair to say Gangbusters does level titles better than D&D and Top Secret.

Level Titles: Illusionists and the Rest

Having already covered the level titles of most of the character classes in Dungeons & Dragons, it's now time to turn to those that remain, some of which are unusual. Let's start with the most straightforward: illusionists. A sub-class of magic-user, illusionists first appeared in volume 1, issue 4 of The Strategic Review (Winter 1975) in an article written by Peter Aronson. As presented there, illusionists have the following level titles:

The AD&D Players Handbook (1978) has an almost identical list of level titles. The only difference is that the original level 1 title, minor trickster, is turned into the level 2 title, in order to make room for "prestidigitator," which also happens to be the level title for a level 1 magic-user. There is, of course, no explanation for this overlap of titles, which is, I think, unique in the game.

The paladin class first appeared as a kind of proto-prestige class to the fighting man in Supplement I to OD&D (1975). In that form, the class has no distinctive level titles. Those didn't appear until the stand-alone version of the class was presented in the AD&D Players Handbook several years later.

Unearthed Arcana (1985) formally introduced the cavalier class into AD&D. The book also made the paladin, previously a sub-class of the fighter, a sub-class of the new cavalier, which makes a certain amount of sense, given its knightly overtones. The cavalier's level titles, includes those of its two 0-levels.

Speaking of "proto-prestige classes," Unearthed Arcana also gives us the thief-acrobat. The thief-acrobat is a specialist version of the thief that an ordinary thief can opt into, starting at 6th level, provided he meets certain ability score requirements for Strength and Dexterity. Interestingly, thief-acrobats have their own distinct level titles.

Finally, there is the barbarian class, also appearing in UA. The barbarian probably has the most unusual level title chart of all:

Aside from being funny, what strikes me about the chart above is the implication that level titles actually mean something and are perhaps even bestowed by someone or some group within the world of D&D. Barbarians, as outsiders, aren't part of that world and thus have no such titles. At least, that's how I read it – but I may simply be finding meaning where there is none.

I'll return to the question of the meaning of level titles in a future post, since I've still got at least a couple more to present before I can offer any attempt at a summation of my thoughts. Stay tuned.

Level Titles: Druids, Rangers, and Bards

The druid class first appeared in Supplement III to OD&D, Eldritch Wizardry (1976). Though the supplement gives Gary Gygax and Brian Blume the byline, the class was actually the creation of Dennis Sustare, who's credited with a special thanks (and dubbed "The Great Druid"). Here's the original list of druid level titles:

The level titles of the druid found in the AD&D Players Handbook (1978) is nearly identical, except that Gygax has inserted a new title, "ovate," between "aspirant" and "initiate of the 1st circle." Its inclusion is interesting, because of its connection to British neo-druidism, where "ovate" is a type of prophet or seer. I suppose it's a good thing that the term and its connections are sufficiently obscure or else critics of the game might have had more "support" for their bad arguments against it.

The ranger class originates in volume 1, number 2 of The Strategic Review (Spring 1975) in an article written by Joe Fischer. Presented as a sub-class of fighting men akin to the paladin (which appeared in the Greyhawk supplement earlier the same year), this OD&D version of the ranger has the following level titles:

The ranger reappears in the AD&D Players Handbook. Its level titles are almost identical to those from The Strategic Review. However, a few of the titles have been transferred to different levels and the original 9th-level title (ranger-knight) has been pushed back to level 10, in order to make room for the title of "ranger." 

Like the ranger, the bard class first appeared in the pages of The Strategic Review, specifically volume 2, issue 1 (February 1976). Written by Doug Schwegman, the article presents bards as jacks-of-all-trades based on ideas drawn from the Celtic bard, the Nordic skald, and the southern European minstrel. As originally presented, the bard has the following level titles:

The level titles of the AD&D version of the bard differ from the OD&D version in only one small way. The OD&D title of "lore master" is changed – bizarrely, in my opinion – to "lorist," a coinage for which I can find very little evidence in any of the dictionaries to which I have access. Regardless, I find it notable that Gary Gygax, in translating Schwegman's bard to AD&D, retained nearly all the level titles while changing the overall nature of it. 

Druids explicitly and bards implicitly all belong to an organization that governs their advancement. In the case of druids, this advancement is similar to that of monks in being adjudicated through a trial by combat. I find details of this very fascinating for what they suggest about the "world" of Dungeons & Dragons and how the various character classes fit into it. Perhaps this is a topic worthy of a later post or two.

Level Titles: Assassins and Monks

To continue with our discussion of level titles in Dungeons & Dragons, I thought it might be worthwhile to take a look at two classes that first appeared in Supplement II to OD&D, Blackmoor (1975), and later in the Advanced D&D Players Handbook (1978) – assassins and monks. Here are the level titles of the former, as they were in Blackmoor:

As with most level titles, these are all mostly synonyms, with a few exceptions, the first being "dacoit," which is an archaic term that, like "thug," ultimately derives from India. Another notable exception is "guildmaster of assassins," which suggests, like the titles immediately before it, that there's some kind of organized structure granting these titles to assassins as they gain experience. The text of Supplement II more or less states this: "Any 12th level assassin (Prime Assassin) may challenge the Guildmaster of the Assassins' Guild to a duel to the death, and if the former is victorious he becomes Guildmaster." This suggests there's a single Assassins' Guild rather several, as seems to be the case with thieves.

Regardless, the assassin level titles in the Players Handbook are somewhat different:

While many of the low-level titles are identical to those in Blackmoor, their arrangement is changed. In addition, Gygax indulged in his fondness for odd archaisms, like rutterkin and waghalter, while getting rid of "dacoit." Interestingly, he added a new title above "guildmaster assassin," namely, "grandfather of assassins," for reasons both historical and practical.

Monks offer an intriguing parallel to assassins, because, like them, their level titles suggest the existence of a single organization that governs them and thus grants these titles. Likewise, above a certain point, the granting of these titles is tied to success in combat against the previous holder of the title, perhaps inspired by martial arts trials. The OD&D level titles are:

In the AD&D Players Handbook, we get this version of them:

The AD&D list differs only in inserting an additional level and reserving the title "grand master," as opposed to simply "master" for the highest level. Otherwise, the two lists are almost identical, even down to the progression order of the various master titles (Dragons, North Wind, West Wind, etc.). I find that interesting, but I'm unsure what conclusions, if any, we can draw from these facts. It's also worth noting that, according to some sources, the "master" titles were inspired by the names of mahjong tiles, which seems plausible, given how wide were the interests in games of men like Arneson and Gygax.

Level Titles: Clerics and Magic-Users

Yesterday, we looked at the level titles of fighters and thieves, so today we'll turn to the level titles of clerics and magic-users. These are a bit more interesting, in that there's more variability between the different editions of Dungeons & Dragons. In OD&D (1974), clerics have the following level titles:

In the AD&D Players Handbook (1978), we get a similar but not identical list. Levels 1 and 2 are the same, while level 3 is simply "priest" rather than "village priest." The title of "curate" becomes a level 4 title and "vicar" disappears entirely, replaced by "perfect," which may or may not be a misspelling of "prefect." "Bishop" is replaced with "canon" and there's a title above patriarch – high priest.

The 1981 Expert Rules has yet another set of level titles, one that is fairly close to that of OD&D and yet still distinct. There's a new title, elder, that's placed in between curate and bishop, making the latter a 7th-level title rather than a 6th-level one in OD&D.

The strangest thing about all the lists of clerical level titles is how, for the most part, they're all derived from the names of Christian clergy, which says a lot about the origins of the cleric class. The anomalous titles are "adept," which strikes me as being more appropriate to a magic-user of some kind and "lama," which, while religious in character, has nothing to do with Christianity. Why these were both included in the list, I have no idea.

Turning to magic-users, we get this list in OD&D:

AD&D has a similar list, starting at level 3. The first two AD&D level titles are quite different and the titles that were replaced appear nowhere else on the list. They're simply removed. 

The Expert Rules give us yet another list. "Medium" and "seer" are restored to level 1 and 2, while "theurgist" and "thaumaturgist" are both removed entirely, much as "medium" and "seer" were in AD&D. The OD&D level titles that followed, starting with "magician" simply drop down several levels, perhaps so that "wizard" can now be the 9th-level rather than 11th-level title, since the 1981 edition places a great emphasis on level 9 being "name" level for the four human classes. Also of note is that the 1981 rules spell "conjurer" and "sorcerer" as "conjuror" and "sorceror," despite neither OD&D nor AD&D spelling them that way.

Normally, the 1983 Frank Mentzer-edited edition of D&D follows its 1981 predecessor quite closely, but there are some differences worthy of note. In the case of magic-user level titles, it's worth noting that '83 restores the "–er" endings of both "conjurer" and "sorcerer," while everything else remains the same.

I find these changes quite fascinating, but I wish I knew precisely why they were made. I have theories but no proof and I suspect, even if I were to hunt down the people responsible for doing so, they would not remember after so many decades. 

Level Titles: Fighters and Thieves

Level titles first appeared in original (1974) Dungeons & Dragons, seemingly inspired by the various types of figures available in the "Fantasy Supplement" to Chainmail (1971), about which I may make a separate post later. These titles, in themselves, have no mechanical purpose whatsoever, serving solely as a verbal way to distinguish between two characters of the same class but of different levels. Consequently, they disappeared entirely from AD&D's Second Edition (1989), but were present in all editions of D&D until the Rules Cyclopedia (1991), when they disappeared (though they did reappear in the brief and often forgotten The Classic Dungeons & Dragons Game in 1994).

Since I've lately become very interested in the degree of continuity between the various editions of D&D, I thought looking at the level titles of the various classes might make for an interesting series of posts. To start, let's look at fighters (fighting men) and thieves. Here's the level title chart for the former from Volume 1 of OD&D:

 In the AD&D Players Handbook (1978), the list is identical.

However, in the 1981 David Cook/Stephen Marsh-edited Expert Rules, we get this list of level titles, which is only nearly identical. The 3rd-level title, Swordsman, becomes Swordmaster, probably for the same reason the 9th-level title, Lord, gains the parenthetical option of Lady. All later editions of D&D (1983, 1991, 1994) use these same level titles.

Thieves first appear in Supplement I to OD&D (1975) and use the following level titles:

In the AD&D Players Handbook, we get a slightly different list for thieves. Most of the titles are the same, but the levels they're associated with are swapped. We also get a couple of new titles, like Filcher at 6th level and Magsman at 8th level, because Gygax loved obscure and archaic words.

The D&D Expert Set much more closely follows the Supplement I level titles than does AD&D, replacing only Master Pilferer at 8th level with Thief instead (and lowering the level at which Master Thief becomes available).

Of the two character classes examined today, it's the thief that shows the most changes in its level titles between their first appearance in Greyhawk and later versions, though, even there, the changes are small. Meanwhile, the fighter changes barely at all. The same cannot be said of clerics and magic-users, as we'll see in the next post in this series.

The Articles of Dragon: "Singing a New Tune"

In starting this new iteration of The Articles of Dragon, I struggled a bit with deciding when to begin. The very first issue of Dragon I remember buying for myself – from Waldenbooks, no less – was issue #62, which features a phenomenal cover painting by Larry Elmore. However, I'd been reading the magazine for a few months prior to that purchase, largely thanks my friend's older brother, who acted as one of our gaming mentors. He had a collection of Dragon issues and we'd often sneak into his basement bedroom to read them when he was out of the house. 

Issue #56 (December 1981), with its memorable Phil Foglio cover, was among the issues in that collection and is thus the first Dragon magazine I ever read. It's not a great issue, at least in comparison to many of those that followed, but it has two articles in it that I remember quite vividly, the first of which I decided would be the first entry in this new series, whose purpose, after all, is to use old Dragon articles as an occasion to share memories of my early days in the hobby.

Written by Jeff Goelz, "Singing a New Tune" offers up "a different bard, not quite so hard" for use with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. AD&D's bard, as presented in the Players Handbook, is a bizarre and unprecedented multi-class/split class thing. A prospective bard begins play as a fighter. Then, after achieving a level between 5 and 7, he takes up thievery. He then abandons the thief class sometime between 5th and 9th level and becomes a bard proper. Why Gygax opted for this scheme is unclear, since Doug Schwegman's original bard class from Strategic Review, Vol. 2, issue 1 (September 1976) is a straightforward class without multiclassing. So different is this class than any other in the game that it's stuck in an appendix at the end of the PHB.

In his article, Goelz proposes to return bards to something closer to what was seen in the Strategic Review, albeit with numerous tweaks of his own. He begins with an amusing exchange between a DM and two half-orc NPCs, in which they discuss bards.

I was so taken with this dialog that, all these years later, I can still quote sections of it from memory. The idea of a Dungeon Master chatting with two non-player characters, who call him "boss," is quite funny to me for some reason. The dialog also serves the purpose of pointing out the problems with both previous versions of the bard class.

Goelz opted for a middle road between a wholesale rewriting of the class and a simple reworking of what had come before. He looked to the Welsh bard, both historical and mythical, for inspiration, using it as a guide for what aspects of previous bard classes to retain, to omit, or to alter. The result is, in my opinion, pretty good – simpler, more playable, and with a power level that's comparable to the other AD&D classes. Most importantly, Goelz's bard has a clear niche for itself as a loremaster with strong social skills and a smattering of druid and illusionist spells.

That list bit is important, because I think the real judge of whether the existence of a class is justified is its role within the game. Both previous versions of the bard were very broad classes with a wide range of skills and abilities that stepped on the toes of several other classes. This new one is much more unique, carving out a specific role that is not clearly served by any other class. That it's also mechanically less onerous is another point in its favor. That's why I was quite taken with it when I first read this article more than forty years ago.

At the same time, I've never been a huge fan of any version of the bard class. The bard has always felt weirdly specific – Goelz's version especially so – in much the same way that the monk did. In some campaign settings, a bard is perfectly reasonable and appropriate, while in others it would stick out like a sore thumb. My dislike is also probably a function of the people I've know who are boosters of the class: flamboyant, theatrical types with a penchant for extemporaneous poetry and song. I readily admit this is a me problem, not a bard problem as such, but it's there nonetheless. That's why I cannot recall the last time I've permitted a bard in any of my D&D campaigns. Were I to do so, however, I wouldn't hesitate to use the version in this article (or some variation thereof).

Secrets of sha-Arthan: Tomb Robber

A tomb robber by Zhu Bajie

 

Tomb Robber 

Prime Abilities: DEX and INT

Hit Points: 1d6 per level 

Starting Possessions: Leather breastplate, dagger, one-handed weapon, tool bag, 3d6 × 5ul

An almost universal custom among the myriad peoples and cultures of sha-Arthan is the burial of grave goods to aid the deceased in his journey to the afterlife. A tomb robber is someone who makes his living by stealing these goods, despite the strong taboos against it. The skills he acquires in these illicit endeavors make the tomb robber a valuable addition to expeditions into the Vaults. 

Alertness

Thanks to his keen awareness of imminent danger, a tomb robber reduces the chance of his party being surprised to 1-in-6.

Skills

A tomb robber begins with four +1 bonuses that may be applied to any of them following skills: Architecture, Climb, Lore, Luck, Search, Stealth, Survival, and Tinker. Each bonus must be applied to a different skill. Every level thereafter, he gains two additional +1 bonuses that can be applied to any of the aforementioned skills. 

• Dead Languages: Because of his familiarity with inscriptions in ancient ruins, the tomb robber does not suffer the usual –3 penalty for attempting to read dead languages.
• Improvisation: If specific equipment is normally required to use a skill he possesses, a tomb robber does not require it. If he does possess the equipment, he gets a +1 bonus to his roll. 

Trap Avoidance

To succeed in his chosen professional, a tomb robber develops a knack for avoiding traps. This knack grants him a +2 bonus to saving throws to avoid the effects of traps. 

Polyhedron: Issue #23

April Fool's issues were a staple of my youth, but they're very difficult to pull off. Partly, that's because humor can be very subjective and, partly, that's because most attempts at humor, especially in writing, are simply not very good. Consequently, I greeted the arrival of issue #23 of Polyhedron (April 1985) with some trepidation, despite its delightful cover by Tom Wham (take note of the bolotomus and snits in the bottom lefthand corner). However, I'm happy to say that this particular April Fool's Day issue is (mostly) pretty good. In fact, there are a couple of articles that I still find rather amusing even now – not laugh-out-loud funny, but intellectually droll, if that distinction means anything.

The issue begins with another installment of "News from HQ" that explains the nature of this issue: 

If this is your first issue of the POLYHEDRON Newszine, I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome you to the RPGA Network, and let you in on the gag. Five out of the six issues you will receive with each year of membership will bring you club news, informative articles on your favorite game systems, and a chance to make a serious contribution to the hobby by sharing your ideas with other members. This is not one of those five.

That's the kind of humor I'm talking about. The editorial goes on to explain that this issue was "conceived in madness and dedicated to the proposition that there is room for levity in gaming." I wholeheartedly agree, as anyone who's ever played in one of my campaigns will tell you. Yes, even the ones occasionally featuring unpleasant stuff. Games are supposed to be fun, after all, and it's important not to lose sight of that.

Much less funny is "An Official Policy Statement," whose entire shtick is using $64 words to say silly things about, in this case, "the sex lives of monsters." As I said above, humor writing isn't easy.

Fortunately, Gary Gygax gifts us with "Ultimists," a new character class for AD&D. Described as "fighting wizard-priests," Ultimists combine the abilities of clerics, magic-users, and monks. While their ability scores are rolled using only 3d6, the result of that roll is made by recourse to a chart, with most rolls resulting in scores of 15 or higher. This section of the class description pokes fun, as Gygax makes clear, those "enthusiasts" who objected to his system for rolling up the abilities of the then-new barbarian class. Ultimists also make use of spell points, because "memorizing spells is tedious, and the selection requires reasoning and intelligence applied to the game." Ouch. I can't really blame Gygax for using the article as an opportunity to vent about critics of AD&D. I imagine he was quite fed up with them by this point in his life.

"Why Gargoyles Don't Have Wings (But Should) (An Alternative Viewpoint) by David Collins is an attempt to explain away Gary Gygax's concerns about the illustration of the gargoyle in the Monster Manual through a variety of vaguely humorous means. It's fine for what it is, but nothing special. A bit more interesting is Skip Williams's "The Lighter Side of Encounters" in which he presents a couple of humorous encounters from Frank Mentzer's Aquaria campaign as a way of demonstrating how humor sometimes finds its way into otherwise "serious" RPG campaigns. The encounters are all based on things that actually happened in Menzter's campaign, which is fascinating in its own right. Speaking of Mentzer – or, rather, Knarf Reztnem – his "Punishments to Fit the Crime" offer a pair of humorous stories whose conclusions depend on puns. They're basically Dad jokes in written form. Make of that what you will.

Frank Mentzer reappears with "New Magic Items," which offers up some fun (and funny) magic items from his Aquaria campaign, like the canister of condiments and the sweet tooth. Then, he reappears yet again – the man was a machine back in the day – with "Excerpts from the Book of Mischievous Magic," a spoof of his The Book of Marvelous Magic. This second article many amusing magical items like the awl of the above, cool hand lute, stocking of elf summoning, and practical yoke. It's all very silly, of course, but done with some real cleverness and an understanding that a good joke magic item isn't just a joke, but should also have some potential utility in a game. Mentzer clearly understood this.

Part 2 of David Cook's "In the Black Hours" AD&D adventure (Part 1 appeared in the previous issue) is the sole piece of "serious" material in the entire issue and thus feels very much out of place. Like its predecessor, it looks fun, reminding me a bit of something in which Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser or Conan, while working as a thief, might have become involved. "Dungeonsongs" is back to form, with a trio of humorous, RPG-themed songs set to well-known tunes, like "I'll Be a Wererat in the Morning" and "Green Slime." "Dispel Confusion" answers numerous important questions for D&D, AD&D, and Top Secret, like this one:

Bruce Heard pens "Zee Chef," another new character class for use with AD&D. A chef is designed specifically for NPCs "devoted to the culinary arts and learning more about native delicacies." It's a spellcasting class, with a host of new spells, including my favorite, edible glamour. Concluding the issue is "The Male of the Species" by – you guessed it – Frank Mentzer, which describes "emezons," the male counterparts to the amazons presented by Gary Gygax in issue #22. Some emezons are members of the new chef NPC class, while others are "exceptionally skilled at child raising, interior decorating, and hair styling." Hey, it was a different time.

All in all, not bad. Even someone as humor-impaired as myself chuckled a couple of times, which is quite a feat in itself. I'd still rather have had a "normal" issue of Polyhedron, but I can't deny the staff did a good job with their assignment. Well done!

Barbarian, Scout, Tomb Robber

Initially, I modeled the character classes of Secrets of sha-Arthan on 4+3 structure of Tom Moldvay's D&D Basic Set, coming up with the following:

• Adept: An analog to the cleric only in as much as it's a second "caster" class.
• Chenot: A non-human class occupying a similar niche to the halfling.
• Ga'andrin: An analog to the dwarf – a "tough" non-human class.
• Jalaka: A non-human class that combines combat and sorcery – elf analog.
• Scion: An analog to the thief only in as much as it's a "skill" based class but focusing more on social situations.
• Sorcerer: Obviously, an analog to the magic-user.
• Warrior: Fighter.

I was quite happy with this arrangement, because it kept the number of classes down to a manageable number and (for the most part) the classes were all distinct from one another. However, as I've developed sha-Arthan, both through preliminary playtesting and my own evolving sense of the setting as a place, I've come to realize the need for some additional classes – or at least I am seriously considering adding them. 

The proposed additional classes are:

• Barbarian: Another "fight-y" class but distinguished in part by its "outcast" status, which is to say, coming from outside the major societies/cultures of sha-Arthan. The purpose of the class is to provide an easy "in" for players who don't want or don't yet feel comfortable playing a character who's part of one of the established cultures of the setting.
• Scout: Since travel and "hexcrawling" are a big part of Secrets of sha-Arthan (including how secrets are acquired), I felt the need for a class whose niche was exploring (which is why I might use the name "explorer" instead). It's a very broad analog to the ranger class, but with more focus on survival and overcoming terrain hazards, in addition to the usual stuff.
• Tomb Robber: Despite my alleged hatred of thieves, I nevertheless find myself drawn to (and creating) variants of the class. The Tomb Robber is yet another one, albeit one closer to the traditional D&D thief in terms of its abilities. Given the more "ancient world" of sha-Arthan, I felt like the Tomb Robber makes good sense and has a clear place in the setting.

I haven't yet made up my mind about the additional three classes. They'll require further thought and playtesting, but I feel like they all add to the game, as well as the setting. In fact, one of the biggest reasons I like them is that they all – even the barbarian – hook into the setting and kind of gameplay I find enjoyable. The question is whether they bring enough to the table to justify bringing the total number of "basic" classes to 10. (Alternately, I could eliminate the racial classes entirely, leaving seven classes and four races, but that's a much bigger change in my opinion).

Regardless, work on Secrets of sha-Arthan continues. With luck, I might even finish a complete draft before the next total solar eclipse!

Seeking Alternatives

An adventurer by Zhu Bajiee

There are four "basic" human character classes in Secrets of sha-Arthan: the adept, the scion, the sorcerer, and the warrior. There's also a fifth class, which occupies a middle ground between the sorcerer and the warrior – a hybrid fighter/magic-user that I've dubbed the adventurer.

The truth of the matter is that I've never been completely satisfied with the name "adventurer." It's very generic and, more than that, its usage for a specific character class prevents my using it as a broad term for all classes, including the non-human ones. Consequently, I'm forever trying to come up with a better name, one that's actually evocative of what the class is, namely, a fighter/mage.

So, I'm turning to my readership to ask if you have any ideas. What would you call a character class of this sort? A coveted Grognardia No-Prize goes to anyone who comes up with a good alternative.

White Dwarf: Issue #68

Issue #68 of White Dwarf (August 1985) features a cover by Brian Williams, who's probably best known for his work on the Lone Wolf series (though he also produced covers for both Games Workshop and TSR UK). For me, the issue marks the first one in several years when I was not a subscriber. I still picked up copies from time to time, but I was inconsistent in doing so. Consequently, many of the issues that I'll look at in the coming weeks are ones I didn't see at the time of their original publication or that, in some cases, I never read at all.

In his editorial, Ian Livingstone theorizes, based on reader feedback, that the readership of White Dwarf is in the vicinity of 100,000. That seems implausibly high to me, especially for mid-1985, but I must confess I've never had a good sense of the actual size of the hobby. Livingstone states that "our hobby is growing fast" and I can only presume he had better information on this than I ever have. Regardless, I always find it fascinating to ponder the size and growth of the hobby over the decades and this is yet another data point to consider.

"The Artificer" by David Marsh is a new character class for use with AD&D. As its name suggests, the class focuses on the construction and use of mechanisms of various sorts. Unfortunately, as presented, the class is simply a spellcaster with a unique (and very focused) spell list and some thief abilities thrown in. While I can understand why this approach was taken, it's disappointing to me. I've long wanted an artificer (and alchemist) class that was genuinely different in its presentation and not simply a magic-user or cleric with some unusual spells. Oh well.

"Open Box" very favorably reviews Blood Bath at Orcs Drift (9 out of 10), a scenario for use with Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Also reviewed are Dragon Roar (5 out of 10), the computer game Chaos (7 out of 10), Legacy of Eagles (7 out of 10), an adventure for Golden Heroes; and The Worlds of Boris Vallejo boardgame (3 out of 10). From my perspective, though, the most notable review is Marcus Rowland's harsh one of Twilight: 2000 (5 out of 10). Rowland's many criticisms are not for the rules themselves but for the game's basic set-up and "moral stance and attitudes," which he calls "fairly loathsome." By and large, he seems to find the idea of the aftermath of a limited-nuclear World War III an unfit subject for a roleplaying game, "one written for and by Americans, with little or no understanding of European attitudes or desires." 

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" continues to do what it always does: briefly – and snarkily – review science fiction and fantasy novels from the '80s that I either never read or don't remember, with a handful of exceptions here and there. He also continues to take potshots at L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth, which I can't really criticize but neither can I applaud it, since it's a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. Meanwhile, "Free the Spirit" presents two new additions for use with Call of Cthulhu, both of which are add-ons to the excellent "Haunters of the Dark" article from last issue: the clergyman profession and the hypnotism skill. Sadly, neither of these expansions are as good (or useful) as the original article.

"Beneath the Waves" by Peter Blanchard is the promising start of a series dedicated to aquatic adventures in AD&D. Blanchard begins by looking at the nature of the underwater environment, including how it affects one's movement and senses, as well as the need for some means of breathing. I give the article bonus points for referencing the 1960s anime, Marine Boy, which I strangely loved as a young child. I definitely look forward to future installments in the series, since underwater adventures have long held my imagination, even though (because?) I've largely never managed to make them work as well as I would have liked.

"Solo Series" by Simon Burley looks at the ins and outs solo adventuring in a superhero RPG. It's a very good overview of this topic, one made all the better in my opinion due to the prevalence of lone heroes in the superhero genre. "Lone Dragon" by Phil Masters is a lengthy but well-done scenario for Traveller that makes use of both Mercenary and Striker. The characters are hired by a mysterious "nobleman" from a nearby world that has fallen into political and civil unrest for what he presents as a quick smash-and-grab mission in search of wealth. Naturally, things are quite as simple as that. 

Speaking of Traveller, "The Travellers" comic begins a series of presenting its characters in game terms, starting with Captain Horatio Flinn and his sometime love interest Syrena Medussa. I'm a sucker for things like this, especially when, as in this case, the author understands the RPG system in question and uses it to humorous effect. The issue also includes further installments of "Thrud the Barbarian" and "Gobbledigook." In the former, writer/artist Carl Critchlow once again appears, this time as the narrator delivering useful exposition. 

I mentioned above how disappointed I was with the artificer class, right? Interestingly, the issue includes a very clever adventure by the same author, intended to highlight the utility of the class and its role in AD&D. Entitled "Star of Darkness" the scenario tackles the old trope of technology vs magic but does so in an intriguing and flavorful setting, complete with lots of maps, NPCs, and challenges. I did not expect to like this as much as I did, but it's an imaginative and fun little adventure for characters of levels 3–4.

"Words of Wonder" is a collection of new AD&D spells of varying utility, which is the usual pattern with articles of this type. "The Magic Frame" by Joe Dever continues to explore the question of photographing miniatures, with lots of thoughts on approaches and techniques. Dever's columns in White Dwarf continue to be my favorites, in spite of my own relative inexperience with miniatures. He clearly has a passion for the subject, not to mention remarkable skills, and he manages to convey both through his words and photos. As ever, I find myself wishing I'd devoted myself to this aspect of the hobby when I was younger and in a better position to acquire some skills of my own.