Today is May 25th the birthday of the great and fantastic David (Dave) Allen Hargrave who was known as The Dream Weaver and is the Author of Arduin his homebrewed fantasy world that started out as an OD&D campaign world. He passed away prematurely in 1988 at the tender age of 42.
He published the first book called The Arduin Grimoire which was an unofficial supplement to OD&D. Once TSR reacted negatively (and failed to do the wise thing and hire him) he filed the serial numbers off and labeled it a new FRPG - the actual process in making it a standalone FRPG took several years.
The Arduin Grimoire though is the kind of supplement we OD&D players from the early 70's always wanted and TSR always failed to deliver. It is a grab bag full of all manner of strange ideas and uncensored brainstorming of ideas. It has a little bit of everything and there is something for everyone. (TSR almost had its own Arduin Grimoire but failed to deliver it more about that on Dave Arneson Day)
Dave Hargrave had an imagination like no other and he was one of the first of those who were outside the circle of Arneson and Gygax who took the game and really ran with it and did exactly what Dave Arneson would have wanted and that was make the game entirely his own and so Arduin the OD&D campaign became Arduin the FRPG
But that is not what I set out to talk about today. Back in early 1978 when my gaming group got its hands on a copy of the Arduin Grimoire (my friends copy) we used a number of things from it. That first copy of my friends had the D&D reference right in the text. When I finally got a copy they had been removed. The thing that I loved the most about Arduin were the monsters.
DEODANTHS
Deodanths are surrounded in mystery and legend, so much so, that even they themselves no longer know the whole truth!
...evolutionary hybrid of “undead” Elven kind and some other dark and unknown thing.
...a vampire like ability to mesmerize, or charm, opponents.
...sole Warriors in sword to sword melees, and as Star Corsairs par excellence in spaceship to spaceship battles.
...seldom take prisoners, and those they do capture, they have a tendency to eat...
...some beings will commit suicide before allowing themselves to fail into Deodanth hands!
Deodanths have the natural ability to “time slip” forward in time d3 melee rounds (their space ships...
...only beings able to consistently match Phraints in combat...That is a limited part of the description of Deodanths when we used them back in 1978-1979 in college.
What is not to love and it opened ours eyes to extending OD&D to space and being able to use anything past, present or future in our D&D worlds and games. Now had we had a copy of First Fantasy Campaign by Dave Arneson we would have been privy to that, but it did not find its way to us even though it was published the same year. We knew OD&D was an open game, but Arduin and Dave Hargrave opened our eyes to just how open it really was.
PHRAINTS
These insectoid peoples are the decivilized remnants of an interstellar combat unit of the dread Hurakkuu Empire, a race of star Warriors unbeaten in 3,000 years of warfare between the myriad suns of space.
Phraints, having no emotional capacity of their own, cannot understand races that do, so they feel that, logically, they are superior, and should be the dominant species of the cosmos.
The Phraints are best known in combat for their leaping charges which have them throwing their light javelins at the apogee of their leaps, flipping over in midflight, drawing (and swinging) their twohanded swords, and landing behind their startled opponents ready for further action
They are perhaps best countered in combat by Deodanths who can also leap great distances,...The full description of the totally logical totally emotionless Phraints along with the Deodanths taught us how to play something alien, sometimes completely non-human. We had played different monsters as characters, in addition to the demi-humans. But those where just strange humans. It is when Arduin came along that we took our game to a new level.
SAURIGS
The reptilian race called Saurigs trace their long history back some 600,000 years and more, back to the dread elder race (the reptilian giants called “Kthoi”) that first ruled the world in the dim beginning of time.
They were the servants and drone soldiers of the Kthoi, and were bred for ferocity, tenacity, endurance, and fighting ability. Thus, they were never known for their intelligence or ability to think logically. They just fought, and fought, and fought.There were Desert Saurigs and Swamp Saurigs and they hated Phraints, but would team up with Deodanths and Orcs, especially Urukk Hai.
These are the creatures of Dave Hargrave that thought us how to create our own monsters and how to make them unique and special. Having the Arduin Grimoire was the next best thing to being connected to Arneson or Gygax. Since we did not have a chance to play in their campaigns and learn directly from them or their cohorts, having the Arduin Grimoire written by someone that served in Vietnam and who really got the real OD&D and who put it all into words that fully conveyed the excitement was like being there. Even though we had been playing since 1975 and had a pretty wide open campaign, Arduin opened our eyes to widening our vision of what could be.
Thank you Dave Hargrave! Happy Birthday!
No comments:
Post a Comment