What D&D set did you start with?
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Poll: What D&D set did you start with?

Chainmail 5%       5%  [ 4 ]
OD&D - Woodgrain 5%       5%  [ 4 ]
OD&D - White Box 7%       7%  [ 5 ]
Holmes "Blue Box" Basic Set 30%       30%  [ 22 ]
AD&D - pre Unearthed Arcana 8%       8%  [ 6 ]
Moldvay "Pink Box" Basic Set 22%       22%  [ 16 ]
Mentzer "Red Box" Basic Set 18%       18%  [ 13 ]
AD&D - 2nd Edition 4%       4%  [ 3 ]
D&D - Rules Cyclopedia or later Basic Set 0%       0%  [ 0 ]
D&D - 3rd Edition 0%       0%  [ 0 ]
Total votes : 73

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 12:51 am 
 

Holmes Basic, of course!

Take the poll & post your comments/explanation/stories.

[Edit: Oops - there was supposed to be an AD&D - post Unearthed Arcana, but it got lost in the editing (too many poll options and I can't seem to edit it now...). So, just put all AD&D 1E together.]

This was inspired by the "Columbus" thread.


Last edited by Zenopus on Tue Jan 30, 2007 12:55 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 12:53 am 
 

Holmes Basic Set

And then our DM bought Greyhawk and Blackmoor and we puzzled over what it might mean that they were "supplements."  Supplements to what?

And then AD&D began appearing and we went for it.


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 12:55 am 
 

Moldvay Pink set.  It was actually my older brothers and he was the one who taught me to play.  I think that I was 7 or so. :)


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 12:59 am 
 

AD&D 1e. I got the Monster Manual for Christmas, 1978, and was later able to add the DMG and PHB with my paper-route money. For a while there in 1979 and 1980, I played in like three or four steady groups and basically thought about D&D all the time. :)

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Edit: Argh. That one vote for AD&D 2e was me, hitting the wrong entry. Duh.

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 1:19 am 
 

Blue Holmes basic book only - all my friends had red basic sets so I was behind the times :cry:

(I remember buying the book age about 9 or 10 in a little beachfront shop in Wittering on the South coast of the UK. It had a dozen or so D&D items in the glass cabinet at the front of the store - the only other things it sold were buckets, spades, kites and all the other assorted seaside tat - to this day I have no idea why it stocked any D&D at all!)

Next birthday got a 1E DMG from my mum and dad, brought the PH with birthday money and savings (£9.50 was a lot of cash to me then) - followed by the MM at Xmas (So from November to Xmas we were using the monster listings from the back of the DMG - hell it had all we needed (XP and treasure type!!!)


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 1:30 am 
 

The OD&D White box for me... :)

  


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 1:34 am 
 

I am now 37 years old. I bought my first D&D boxed set in 1981 when I was 12 years old (25 years ago) and it was already the Mentzer Red Box Set.

  

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 8:01 am 
 

Started with the white box in the fall of 1978 when I was in grade 12. Began by playing somebody elses white box campaign and a few months later travelled from Moncton to Halifax and bought a set to start my own campaign with.

Of course after that point I just kept buying, first the Holmes blue book set then AD&D, Gamma World, Boot Hill,etc.  :D

That led eventually to other 'addictions' (Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, Avalon Hill & SPI games, etc.).  :wink:


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 8:24 am 
 

Holmes set for me. First adventure was actually the miniadventure in the blue book. Then we went on to B1.


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 8:37 am 
 

White Box, but w/ the Mounted Knight:
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We started gaming in the summer of '75 (WOW - it has been over 30 years) and I was in 5th grade. My friend's older brother had a friend who really loved Avalon Hill (war) games and sent away for Chainmail and this set. He would not tell us where or how he got it, so we could not see the rules, etc. I was not able to get the info until later, when I mail ordered my first White Box set, which was a 4th print. I still have it sealed in a Mylar bag, along with the Greyhawk, Blackmoor, Eldritch Wizardry, G,D-G&H, and Swords & Spells booklets :)

Truly great memories of really fun times, as we would all go to the beach early in the day, play football, snorkel, body surf and then come back exhausted, eat & drink soda, and then play D&D until we could go no further . . . or until that stupid Purple Worm :evil: showed up . . . AWESOME!! 8)


"Okay, we turn the corner and see a Purple 'WHAT' !?!" . . (the DM rolls a 20 or so he says) . . It all went black right after that.

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 9:32 am 
 

Holmes set for me.  Our grade 9 teacher lent it to us to play :D


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 9:58 am 
 

Moldvay Pink Box Basic Set.  A neighbor got one around the same time so we learned the rules together.

Later we began a hybridization of the light blue D&D expert and orange spine AD&D rules.  First adding the good/evil alignment axis and using creature stats from the Monster Manual.  Eventually elves, dwarves and halflings became races instead of race classes.  Switched to AD&D rules exclusively just prior to the release of the Unearthed Arcana.  Occasionally played some CM & M modules as one shots using AD&D PCs so we could try high level characters since we never could seem to get past 12th level.

  


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 10:06 am 
 

Holmsey!

By that time, the whitey was so out of style.  I recall seeing a set sitting somewhere in the background or on the corner of the table a time or two, and one of the guys I gamed with wanted to use it exclusively.  I don't know, it just seemed so primitive at the time.

Funny no one's entered woodgrain yet.


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 10:28 am 
 

Holmes, of course.  And the version with the "chits" instead of dice no less!  Imagine how excited we were when we finally got a set of dice and didn't have to draw those chits from a baggie!   :D


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:09 am 
 

Moldvay pink (with the Cook Expert set added in the next weekend).  Sometime around Easter 1982, I think...

  

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:27 am 
 

We started with the Holmes Boxed set, but we immediately went out and bought the PHB and MM (the DMG wasn't available yet) to play the "Advanced" game with all the extra rules, classes, monsters, etc.  Of course, now it seems mind boggling we had to game so long without the complete rules even being available!  I seem to remember using the To Hit charts in the Holmes set because the DMG's charts weren't available. I remember someone from our group having the Greyhawk supplement and we used a few of the magic item descriptions from there (again, because the DMG wasn't available).  
    Funny, I remember White boxes being for sale in the local hobby store, and our group members as "Advanced" players turned up our nose at them...."Who would want to use THAT when you can use all three of these really cool hardbacks instead?"

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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:29 am 
 

Howdy All,


Moldvay set. My brother got the set from a friend for his birthday in June 1981, by August we had purchased the Cook set.

Then I played with a group using the Holmes set. Then I bought the PH, DMG, and World of Greyhawk in that order. I don't remember when we bought the MM.

The first module we bought other than B2 and X1 that came with the boxed sets was S1 Tomb of Horrors. It was a great starter adventure for AD&D!  :twisted:


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Post Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:30 am 
 

Badmike wrote:We started with the Holmes Boxed set, but we immediately went out and bought the PHB and MM (the DMG wasn't available yet) to play the "Advanced" game with all the extra rules, classes, monsters, etc.  Of course, now it seems mind boggling we had to game so long without the complete rules even being available!  I seem to remember using the To Hit charts in the Holmes set because the DMG's charts weren't available. I remember someone from our group having the Greyhawk supplement and we used a few of the magic item descriptions from there (again, because the DMG wasn't available).  
    Funny, I remember White boxes being for sale in the local hobby store, and our group members as "Advanced" players turned up our nose at them...."Who would want to use THAT when you can use all three of these really cool hardbacks instead?"

Mike B.


Just thought of something else, we also knew of this guy who was typing in the complete Players Handbook into his computer (an old TRS 80 I think).  Of course he had to save everything to floppy disc since the computer memory was so low back then, and it was going to take him forever because he had to hand type the entire thing, but he seemed really determined, and I remember thinking "Wow, how cool, he's going to one day have the entire PHB on computer!!!!"  I wonder how many floppys that would have ended up being?

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