A new thread on Dragonsfoot asking about Chevalier led to a reply linking a 2013 post on the Castelli & Chimere blog that I vaguely remember. Chevalier is the original, unpublished version of Chivalry & Sorcery that is an original D&D variant rather than a stand-alone game. The story goes that Ed Simbalist and Wilf Backhaus brought this manuscript to Gen Con with the idea of selling it to TSR, but ended up instead selling it to FGU, where it was published with further revision as Chivalry & Sorcery in 1977. A very limited reprint of the Chevalier manuscript was made by the authors in 1999, from which a few scans are shown on the C&C blog, including the "Forward" shown above, the title of which reproduces the font and mispelling found in Men & Magic (Vol 1 of OD&D).
What I didn't notice previously was the role of Warlock - the 1975 OD&D variant from Caltech - in the development of Chevalier. I've written previously about Warlock and its influence on Holmes Basic; for a general overview see the post "WARLOCK or how to play D&D without playing D&D?" and for other articles mentioning it click the Warlock label at the bottom of this post.
Ed Simbalist writes not only that "Warlock gave further ideas. And Petal Throne presented the concept of an integrated world" but also that "CHEVALIER is not intended to be a replacement for Dungeons and Dragons. Indeed, to play CHEVALIER, one requries at least the three D&D volumes and the Greyhawk Supplement. The other supplements make playing even more complete. If one throws in Warlock for good measure, the picture becomes complete. However, CHEVALIER changed a good many of the rules and, and the prospective player is forewarned to read very, very carefully."
The Introduction to the original Warlock made a similar statement that it is "not intended to replace D&D, nor is it intended in any way to interfere with it". Both games went on to develop their own complete systems, with C&S in 1977 and the Complete Warlock books in 1978-1980.
Furthermore, I can see some specific influences of Warlock in the scans posted on the posted scans in that blog article.
The Elf advancement table is formatted similarly to the one in Warlock and the Fatigue dice are pretty close to the Hit Dice for Elves in the original 1975 Warlock rules.
The M-U spell list includes not just spells from OD&D but also ones original to Warlock.
From the portion shown:
1st level: Match, Silence (as a 1st level spell), Sound Amplification, Telescope
2nd level: Awaken (one of the Holmes A&E stories has this on a scroll), Create Sound, Detect Experience [Group], Detect Evil/Good (as separate 2nd level spells), Freeze Water, Hallucination, Measure Distance, Measure Volume
3rd level: Ball Lightning, Cone Cold, Continual Darkness, Dark Cone, Detect Clairvoyance, Detect Clairaudience, Detect Teleport, Heat Cone, Illusion I, Light Beam
I don't have the 1st edition of Chivalry & Sorcery for further comparison, but I imagine much of this was changed by the time it saw print in 1977. Even so, it's clear that Warlock provided a template for Simbalist and Backhaus in assembling their own D&D variant, an important step in developing the game that eventually led to C&S.
What I didn't notice previously was the role of Warlock - the 1975 OD&D variant from Caltech - in the development of Chevalier. I've written previously about Warlock and its influence on Holmes Basic; for a general overview see the post "WARLOCK or how to play D&D without playing D&D?" and for other articles mentioning it click the Warlock label at the bottom of this post.
Ed Simbalist writes not only that "Warlock gave further ideas. And Petal Throne presented the concept of an integrated world" but also that "CHEVALIER is not intended to be a replacement for Dungeons and Dragons. Indeed, to play CHEVALIER, one requries at least the three D&D volumes and the Greyhawk Supplement. The other supplements make playing even more complete. If one throws in Warlock for good measure, the picture becomes complete. However, CHEVALIER changed a good many of the rules and, and the prospective player is forewarned to read very, very carefully."
The Introduction to the original Warlock made a similar statement that it is "not intended to replace D&D, nor is it intended in any way to interfere with it". Both games went on to develop their own complete systems, with C&S in 1977 and the Complete Warlock books in 1978-1980.
Furthermore, I can see some specific influences of Warlock in the scans posted on the posted scans in that blog article.
The Elf advancement table is formatted similarly to the one in Warlock and the Fatigue dice are pretty close to the Hit Dice for Elves in the original 1975 Warlock rules.
The M-U spell list includes not just spells from OD&D but also ones original to Warlock.
From the portion shown:
1st level: Match, Silence (as a 1st level spell), Sound Amplification, Telescope
2nd level: Awaken (one of the Holmes A&E stories has this on a scroll), Create Sound, Detect Experience [Group], Detect Evil/Good (as separate 2nd level spells), Freeze Water, Hallucination, Measure Distance, Measure Volume
3rd level: Ball Lightning, Cone Cold, Continual Darkness, Dark Cone, Detect Clairvoyance, Detect Clairaudience, Detect Teleport, Heat Cone, Illusion I, Light Beam
I don't have the 1st edition of Chivalry & Sorcery for further comparison, but I imagine much of this was changed by the time it saw print in 1977. Even so, it's clear that Warlock provided a template for Simbalist and Backhaus in assembling their own D&D variant, an important step in developing the game that eventually led to C&S.
See also:
WARLOCK or how to play D&D without playing D&D? (Overview of Warlock)
