Early TSR/D&D advertisements & catalogs • Page 2 • Collecting General • The Acaeum

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Early TSR/D&D advertisements & catalogs
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Lordan
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Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:04 am

jasonw1239 wrote:Some of those 1980's Marvel comics are worth a fair price.

Here is an example of the Uncanny X-Men #98

http://www.comicspriceguide.com/p-indiv ... leID=80534

JasonW

Ya I pretty much know what their worth but honestly, I had such a great time reading them ( and I'm sure my sons will too ) the fun they will get out of them is priceless ( sorry to use such a clich'e ).

I did keep my xmen pre 50's plus all my old Neil Adams books
away for now ( or anything pre 1970 ish for that matter ).

Zenopus
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Posted: Wed Sep 20, 2006 9:36 pm

1983 TSR catalog (color; 22 pages)

-Seems to be the successor to the earlier "Gateway to Adventure" catalogs I posted above (page 1 of the thread).

-All of the products on the cover still feature the Face Logo. TSR products with the Angle Logo started appearing ~1983.

-In three years, TSR went from having a demonic image on the cover of the 1980 catalog to these tykes.

This scan is from a recent auction that received no bids due to a ludicrous $27 opening bid. :roll:

Mars
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Posted: Wed Sep 20, 2006 10:16 pm

zhowar wrote:1983 TSR catalog (color; 22 pages)

[ Image ]

-Seems to be the successor to the earlier "Gateway to Adventure" catalogs I posted above (page 1 of the thread).
-All of the products on the cover still feature the Face Logo. TSR products with the Angle Logo started appearing ~1983.
-In three years, TSR went from having a demonic image on the cover of the 1980 catalog to these tykes.

This scan is from a recent auction that received no bids due to a ludicrous $27 opening bid.

The previous two of these catalogs sold for about $30. I find that a lot of early miniature catalogs go for much more. For example:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

grodog
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 11:05 am

Yup, the Grenadier catalog was the same seller. I have the poster for that cover, recently recovered from the wall of my parents' basement, but the knight version of it (they were a pair) wasn't there, alas.

I considered bidding on the TSR catalog, but figured the price was too high (for me, anyway).

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Mars
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 12:17 pm

The 1983 catalog has a lot more TSR company info and marketing info than actually product info. The products inside are only the ones that had been released and show actual pictures of the items. There are some decent pictures of the Gateway to Adventure displays though.

If find that 1985, 86, 87 are the most interesting catalogs because they have a lot of mockups that are different from what was released and a few products that weren't released. Another good example of this is the 1985 catalog had one page devoted to TSR's new game Proton Fire (RPG) which was a robot game - not sure if humans had robot suits or if it was a man vs robot game. But TSR went so far as to aslo list the first 4 modules for it MX1 Planet Fall, MX2 Silent Thunder, MX3 Warbots Rising, and MX4 Warbots Embattled.

grodog
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 12:33 pm

Mars wrote:If find that 1985, 86, 87 are the most interesting catalogs because they have a lot of mockups that are different from what was released and a few products that weren't released. Another good example of this is the 1985 catalog had one page devoted to TSR's new game Proton Fire (RPG) which was a robot game - not sure if humans had robot suits or if it was a man vs robot game. But TSR went so far as to aslo list the first 4 modules for it MX1 Planet Fall, MX2 Silent Thunder, MX3 Warbots Rising, and MX4 Warbots Embattled.

Hmmm, I wonder if Proton Fire was later released as Cyborg Commando, which had at least three modules published....

Allan Grohe ([email protected])
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Zenopus
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 1:12 pm

This blog page has some interesting speculation/analysis of "Proton Fire" (doesn't consider Cyborg Com, though)

http://jrients.blogspot.com/2005/10/sha ... art-3.html

jamesmishler
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 6:23 pm

grodog wrote:
Hmmm, I wonder if Proton Fire was later released as Cyborg Commando, which had at least three modules published....

Nope, completely different products. There's an introduction to Proton Fire in Dragon #99. Very, very different product than Cyborg Commando.

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grodog
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 10:58 pm

Thanks James.

BTW, excellent issue this month on distribution. Reading your Q&A and John's "need to shift to a push market" article were like completely different views on the same industry....

Allan Grohe ([email protected])
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jamesmishler
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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 11:42 pm

grodog wrote:Thanks James.

BTW, excellent issue this month on distribution. Reading your Q&A and John's "need to shift to a push market" article were like completely different views on the same industry....

Thanks! It's interesting how people can look at the same data and come to completely different conclusions...

Sometimes, though, you just need to go against conventional wisdom. Like me with AGP, I'm not going to sell direct to consumers for at least three months after release, I might *never* sell PDFs, and I'll never be afraid of telling people *exactly* how many copies we sell of a product. But then, I'm crazy, anyhoo...

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Plaag
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Posted: Wed Sep 27, 2006 1:27 pm

Anyone have the GamesMaster Catalog (204 pages, 191 companies covered, 936 products listed, 646 photos & illustrations, 3 indexes, softbound)
Was put out by Boynton and Associates, Inc (88 Clifton House, Clifton, VA 22024) Did some Googling and seems they did other catalogs but wondering about this one in particular.

ShaneG.

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Zenopus
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Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 9:16 am

Here's a 1 & 1/2 page 1978 TSR advertisement that I haven't seen before...

Lizard Logo, advertises Monster Manual, Warlocks & Warriors and the Basic Set.

The banner on the second sheet is pretty cool - "Shown is the banner which informs the public that the shop has Dungeons & Dragons and other TSR games". The display stand with the large Lizard Logo is also great. Somebody here must have one of these?

This ad is being sold on Ebay (not by me) if anyone is interested. I normally don't post links to these type of ad-auctions because they are ripped from magazines. In this case, based on the second sheet it looks like the ad is from a retailer magazine so it might be fairly hard to find.

http://cgi.ebay.com/1978-Ad-Dungeons-Dr ... dZViewItem

Mars
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Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 11:33 am

I was looking at some of these a couple of months ago from a different seller. Your post just reminded me about them. Here are the other two that I found:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0024011753

** expired/removed eBay auction **

Badmike
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Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 11:53 am

zhowar wrote:Here's a 1 & 1/2 page 1978 TSR advertisement that I haven't seen before...

[ Image ]
[ Image ]

Lizard Logo, advertises Monster Manual, Warlocks & Warriors and the Basic Set.

The banner on the second sheet is pretty cool - "Shown is the banner which informs the public that the shop has Dungeons & Dragons and other TSR games". The display stand with the large Lizard Logo is also great. Somebody here must have one of these?

This ad is being sold on Ebay (not by me) if anyone is interested. I normally don't post links to these type of ad-auctions because they are ripped from magazines. In this case, based on the second sheet it looks like the ad is from a retailer magazine so it might be fairly hard to find.

** expired/removed eBay auction **

Wow, that setup looks EXACTLY like my local hobby shop back in the day, down to the hot chick in the tiger skin outfit!!!

But seriously, wouldn't it be cool to have one of those lizard logo standups? Do you think any even exist anymore?

Mike B.

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Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 4:56 pm

Howdy All,

I think that might be Heidi Gygax in the outfit there. What do you think Steve (Marsh)?

Futures Bright,

Paul

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Zenopus
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Posted: Thu Nov 23, 2006 1:26 am

Mars wrote:I was looking at some of these a couple of months ago from a different seller. Your post just reminded me about them. Here are the other two that I found:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

** expired/removed eBay auction **

Mars, the pics in those links are dead now, though I think I grabbed them, but I'm not sure which ones they were.

Anyway, there's an old Basic Set trade ad ("HIA trade show") up on Ebay now. It's one of the older ones I've seen picturing with a Holmes Set. Lizard Logo & shows geomorphs and M&T in the ad (presumably the same picture as on the bottom of one of the 1st-3rd print Basic Sets):

** expired/removed eBay auction **

Starting bid is $9.99.

Interestingly, the rulebook in the photo in the ad looks like it might have a yellow or white triangle in the upper left corner. Might be a pre-production version of the rulebook.

kevin mayle
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Posted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 10:21 am

zhowar wrote:March 1981 "The DUNGEON!" catalog rather than the usual 1981 "Gateway" TSR Catalog:
[ Image ]
Has the "The DUNGEON!" logo (adventurers in a cave w/ eyes/mouth)

Does anyone know what products had this logo and does anyone have a decent scan of the logo?

Zenopus
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Posted: Sun Feb 11, 2007 11:17 am

Kevin -

The original picture (much larger) used for that logo is on page 15 of the Blackmoor OD&D supplement.

You can download a pdf of the supplement for free from this Dave Arneson website:
http://www.jovianclouds.com/blackmoor/bmc.html

I'm not aware of it being used on any products other than the Dungeon Hobby Shop order forms.

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