I'm selling a beautiful VF+ one of these soon but this isn't an ad - I want to make sure I have my facts straight before I write the ad because this is a big ticket item. The parchment/mono cover is the first printing, right? Mine says 1980 if that helps.

http://www.icewebring.com/ICE_Products/ ... nd_1.shtml should help to sort through the printings.

That sounds about right.

"There was an initial printing of 5,000 Iron Wind's on that golden parchtext with a B&W cover and interiors. After it had been selling for a few months the distributors talked ICE into doing a color cover so Pete Fenlon drew the color cover using an overlay process and they stripped the B&W cover off the remainder of the first printing and bound the new color covers back on them...."

From:

http://www.icewebring.com/ICE_Products/ ... Wind_1.php

[edited to draw attention to that misplaced apostrophe in the original quote, really, it is quite embarrassing...]

It's another doppelganger.  We gotta start clearing those puppies out.

mbassoc2003 wrote:You can try mate - but by the book, I save as a 10th level Fighter (rolls dice...)  

Now if you used the same avatar, that'd be funny.

Truth is I don't know.
However, let me conjecture. One the one hand, it seems likely, given the interest in rpgs back then and the state of the industry, that more than 5,000 copies would have been sold between 1980 and 1984.  1980 being the print date for 1st print (a) b/w cover and also 1st print (b) replaced colour cover, and 1984 being the print date for Iron Wind 2nd Edition.  If so, a 2nd print (colour cover no extra staple holes) would likely have been done circa 1982/83

During the same period however, ICE printed Arnor, Umbar, Northern Mirkwood, Southern Mirkwood, and worked on a whole host of other MERP titles (which came out in 1984).  These were big sellers.  Would they also have squeezed out a second printing of the 1st Ed. Iron Wind?  I don't have multiple copies of the colour cover, so can't check.  I do have a few emails of old ICE staffers - so will send out a few queries and see if I get a response...

Sounds about right. I was just wondering if there was a subsequent print with the red/white/blue cover, or do they all have the parchment insides?

Mars wrote:There is a later printing with the blue cover that has a completely different interior.

Cheers. Is it BW and colour on white paper?

Mars wrote:The first page is black text on white paper with a blue/teal image.  The rest of the pages are black and white.  The paper isn't really a bright white but more a bit yellowy.

I gotta get me one of those. Did they change the typeface? This one is hell to scan.