Part 18: "Bruno Dies a Horrible Death"

Part 18 of a comparison of Holmes' manuscript with the published Basic Set rulebook. Turn to page 21-22 of your 'Blue Book' and follow along...

EXAMPLES

Who can forget Bruno's triumph in defeating the big goblin in single combat or his horrible death from a spider bite? These are the highs and lows of D&D. The combat examples are some of the best "flavor text" that Holmes contributed to Basic D&D, but also do an excellent job of showing how D&D combat is run, something that was missing but sorely needed in OD&D.

The first combat example, featuring Bruno versus the goblin, is identical in the manuscript and the published rulebook. Since there are only two combatants, the example doesn't reference rounds and thus doesn't show the two attacks per round for each combatant. 

SECOND EXAMPLE

This example is substantially the same as published, but with many small changes to the text, several of which result in significant changes, so I will go through it paragraph by paragraph.

First paragraph

The first difference is in the second sentence, where Holmes' original encounter was with "six giant spiders with 1 hit die each", which was changed to six large spiders with 1+1 HD. Giant spiders having but a single hit die may seem strange in light of later write-ups, but many of the "vermin of unusual size" (giant spiders, rats, centipedes, etc) never received a standardized write-up in OD&D prior to Holmes Basic. The first printing of the Holmes rulebook does not even contain an entry for spiders; they were added to the 2nd edition in November 1978, after the Monster Manual had been released.

Holmes' reference to the "Wandering Monster Table" (which we covered in Part 7) probably refers to entry 8 on the level 1 table, "Spiders". As I mentioned previously, this table is the same as in Greyhawk. Back in OD&D, Vol 2, vermin are covered by entries for "Insects or Small Animals" and "Large Insects or Animals". The former indicates that "These can be any of a huge variety of creatures such as wolves, centipedes, snakes and spiders. Any hit will kill the smaller, while larger beasts (such as wolves) will receive one Hit Die". This is possibly where Holmes sourced his 1 HD for giant spiders. I'll discuss this further in the section on Monsters.

In the third sentence, Holmes again used the name "Flubbit" for his wizard (see Part 9), and this was changed to "Malchor" by Gygax/TSR. As mentioned previously, the name "Flubbit" originated in the description of the spell "Magic Mouth" in the Greyhawk supplement.

In the eighth sentence, Holmes gives his giant spiders an armor class of "3 (plate)", which is scaled back to "8 (shield)". Thus as originally written in this encounter, Holmes' "giant spiders" had only a single hit dice but were heavily armored.

This sentence, in both Holmes' original and as published, also contains the statement that "the range is medium for the longbow", but this is after stating that the spiders are "50 feet away and coming fast", which per the missile fire table is short range for a longbow.

In the ninth sentence, the spider's hit point calculation is changed from "comes up a 4" to "comes up a 3 (+1), equalling 4 hit points". This change was necessitated by the hit dice change from 1 to 1+1, and also conveniently demonstrates how hit points are calculated for a creature with a hit dice bonus.

In the eleventh sentence, the last two missed arrow shots are changed from 8 and 12 to 6 and 9, because a 12 would hit armor class 8. The end of this sentence is also changed from "the shafts bounce off the beast's armor" to "the shafts miss!", either because Gygax did not envision armor class 8 as being armored or to avoid the potentially confusing idea that a "miss" can actually hit but not do damage. Note, however, that another reference in the next paragraph to the spider's "armored head" was not changed.

Second paragraph:

In the manuscript, this paragraph provides a clear example of two melee attacks per combatant in a single round, with the attacks alternating in order of dexterity. The entire paragraph is dedicated to a single round, ending with "The first round of melee is over!". 

TSR changes this single round to two rounds of melee. Thus, in the manuscript Bruno dies during the second set of blows in the first round of melee, but in the published version he dies in the second round. Bruno's second attack roll is also changed from a 13, which would miss armor class 3 but hit armor class 8, to a 10 which just misses armor class 8.

Third paragraph:

In the manuscript the first two sentences of this paragraph read "In the second round Mogo rolls a 4 and a 10, and so fails to strike a vital area through the spider's armor. The spider rolls a 6 and a 10, both misses". This again makes clear reference to each combatant getting "two blows" in a single melee round. In the published version these two sentences into one that removes the reference to the "second round". Each combatant is still given two attacks, but as we will see below, the published version instead counts this as two more rounds. Thus, in the published version four rounds have now elapsed instead of two. 

Fourth paragraph:

In the manuscript this paragraph begins with reference to the third round of combat, which is changed to the fifth round as published, and Mogo gets two swings in the last setence, which are changed to a single swing. The published version also adds a note that the saving throw is "(adjusted according to the weak poison of the spider)". This reflects the description of the "large spider" in the later published Monster Manual (Dec 1977) and the revised Basic rulebook (Nov 1978). As mentioned above, the early printings of the Basic rulebook do not include Spider in the Monster List, so in those printings this reference is cryptic. Presumably, Gygax was working off his draft of the Monster Manual material when he edited this section.

 
Fifth Paragraph:

Again, the reference the third round of combat ("three melee rounds have gone by") is changed to the fifth ("five melee rounds have gone by"). The only other change here is that "Clarissa the Cleric" becomes "Priestess Clarissa", giving her the "level title" for a third level cleric. On the OD&D74 forums, Manual of Aurania co-author D. Daniel Wagner remembered Holmes playing at character named "Eric the Cleric" in a game at Aero Hobbies.

Comment

This single paragraph section follows the combat examples and provides further commentary on combat. There are no changes between the manuscript and the published version. 

In this section Holmes presents a general order of combat: spells-missile fire-melee. This is not found in OD&D, but is present in the Warlock rules, which I've discussed previously; see "The Influence of Warlock on Holmes Basic Combat".

Holmes also gives some guidance on spell casting by magic-users: "If a magic-user is not involved in the melee he can get another spell off after 1 or more melee rounds have gone by". This statement makes it clear that only a single spell can be cast per round despite regular melee weapons getting two attacks per round. It is also the closest that Holmes comes to describing a "casting time", something not generally found in OD&D (although the Eldritch Wizardry alternate initiative system touches on this). 

Holmes continues, "If he is personally attacked he can't concentrate to use his magic but must draw his dagger and defend his skin!". There is no "spell disruption" in OD&D or Holmes, and while this statement is not crystal clear, it can be interpreted that if a wizard is engaged in combat they won't be able to cast the next round.

For the source of this rule in Chainmail and/or Swords & Spells, see here:
https://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=1953343#p1953343

Continue on to Part 19: "If One Wanted to Use a Red Dragon" (Intro to Monsters)

Or Go Back to Part 17: "Highest Dexterity Strikes First" (Melee)
Or Go Back to the Index: The Holmes Manuscript