The first volume of the revised second edition has dropped to $23.33 on Amazon:
Playing at the World, 2nd Edition, Volume 1: The Invention of D&D
This is down from a list price of $29.99 and an Amazon price of $27.85 in July just prior to release.
Read more about the book in my July post just prior to the release:
With a cover by Erol Otus!
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Cover by Erol Otus...! |
Playing at the World, Jon Peterson's 2012 groundbreaking history of the origin of RPGs, has been out of print for a number of years, with secondhand copies going for increasingly higher prices, but as I reported previously a revised second edition is coming later this year from MIT Press.
The expanded book will now be split into two volumes, with the first one, Volume 1: The Invention of Dungeons & Dragons, coming out on July 30th of this year. Per the publisher info, this volume "distills the story of how the wargaming clubs and fanzines circulating around the upper Midwest in the 1970s culminated in Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson’s seminal role-playing game, D&D".
The MIT Press and Amazon pre-order pages have now been updated with the cover art: a fantastic illustration by the legendary old school TSR artist Erol Otus (shown above)*. The first volume is now available for pre-order from Amazon for $29.95, and with a price guarantee:
Playing at the World, 2nd Edition, Volume 1: The Invention of D&D
I've pre-ordered it myself.
It will be followed later by Volume 2: The Three Pillars of Role-Playing Games, "a deeper dive into the history of the setting, system, and character of D&D". This appears to correspond to chapters 2-4 of the original edition, which were: 2: Setting - The Medieval Fantasy Genre; 3: System - The Rules of the Game; and 4: Character - Roles and Immersion.
*Thanks for captainjapan on the OD&D74 forums for this news.
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Cover of the original printing |
As mentioned recently by author Jon Peterson on X, a second edition of his seminal history of D&D, Playing at the World, is coming out next year, via MIT Press.
An Amazon pre-order page exists with a date of August 6th, 2024, with both print and digitial options. No cover image is yet available:
Playing at the World Pre-Order Page
Long out of print, second hand copies of the original printing from 2012 regularly fetch over $200.
Rather than just a straight reprint, the new edition will be "a pretty pervasive update" per the author, and the Amazon page indicates it will be published in two volumes.
See also:
A recent thread over on Dragonsfoot asks: How many AD&D players who started in the 80s knew about OD&D?
Here is my answer, which I posted there, and have expanded a bit here:
My first D&D set, from 1982, was (obviously) Holmes Basic, and the rulebook includes a Preface stating that it is "based upon the original work published in 1974 and three supplementary books published in the two year period after the initial release of DUNGEONS & DRAGONS", and then a reprint of the "Foreword from the Original Edition", where Gygax gives a brief yet evocative history lesson on the origins of D&D that begins, "ONCE UPON A TIME, long, long ago..." And my copy was the 3rd edition, which has a product listing on the back cover of "OTHER ITEMS FROM TSR" available for mail order, including the "Original Dungeons & Dragons Collector's Editions".
So I was aware of the original D&D rules basically as soon as I had my first rule set. I quickly moved onto AD&D from Holmes Basic, owning all of the hardcover rulebooks by mid-1983, but there again I encountered OD&D: my copies of the Monster Manual and the Players Handbook again have product listings that include it.
And I learned even more about the early history once I started reading Dragon. On the rack at B. Dalton at the local mall where I bought my Dragon magazines, I found the Best of Dragon #1 and #2, which reprint a number of articles from the early years, including "Gary Gygax on D&D: Origins of the Game" in BoD #1.
At some point I found a copy of Moldvay Basic at a Goodwill thrift store. This set included a copy of one version of TSR's Gateway to Adventure catalog, which had a page for the "Collectors Edition" which showed the OD&D set and supplements. This was the first place that I actually saw what the OD&D booklets looked like, other than Eldritch Wizardry, which early on I once spotted on the rack at B. Dalton.
Later in the '80s, I came across a still new-on-the-shelf copy of the Original Collector's Edition (OCE) of Whitebox OD&D at a game shop and bought it, and still have. I was actually somewhat surprised that the rules were so similar to what I was familiar with, as I was expecting more differences. In the next year or two after that I ordered Chainmail and the Blackmoor supplement directly from TSR's Mail Order Hobby Shop, which was still selling copies through '89 or so, although the copy of Blackmoor I received from them was essentially a high grade photocopy.
So, with different degrees of understanding, I was aware of OD&D throughout my years in the 1980s playing Holmes Basic and AD&D.
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The Chit Sheets, Front and Back. Source: The Dice Collector |
Later printings of the Holmes Basic D&D set came with an infamous sheet of chits, pictured above, in place of dice. I myself was one of those kids that received such a set, which only added to my confusion in understanding how the game was placed, despite the instruction sheet included for using the chits. It's long been rumored that the change was due to a dice shortage in face of D&D's popularity, and thus increased need for dice, but former TSR employee Jim Ward recently related (here on FB), how it was actually the result of management decisions by TSR during a time they were developing their own dice:
Young Jim Ward and the Dice Monster
© all rights reserved by James M. Ward
“Young Jim Ward” was a history teacher in a small rural school when the call came in. I had just finished writing Gods, Demi-gods & Heroes, Deities & Demigods for AD&D, and Metamorphosis Alpha the first science fiction role-playing game. I told Gary Gygax that as soon as he could pay my teacher’s salary of 13,400 dollars I would move back to Elkhorn and join his company. In 1980 he was able to do that and I moved.
“Young Jim Ward” started out in the sales department as the inventory controller. It was my job to order the boxes and parts for the games and especially the D&D box set. It was selling 100,000 units a month, steady as clock work. One of “young Jim Ward’s” jobs was to make sure the Hong Kong dice came in on time to fill the next batch of 100,000 boxes. It was a responsibility I took very seriously.
It took exactly six months for 100,000 sets of poly dice to be made, ship from Hong Kong over the water, and be delivered to the boxer in Madison; Patch Press at the time. Naturally, being a careful person “young Jim Ward” ordered the dice two months early so that 100,000 boxes in December had their dice ordered 8 months out. So in May “young Jim Ward” was ordering dice for the December publication and everyone was fine with that.
I’m proud to say there were some problems with getting things in on time before me. After “young Jim Ward” started, we were never late on getting product out. This included the day Patch Press printed 16 pages of the monster manual pages in the player handbook [sic*] and shipped the 100,000 to our warehouse.
So one day “young Jim Ward” is doing his job and the vice presidents of the company have a meeting and decide it would be much more cost effective to make our own dice. I had no problem with the concept. I told them my dice schedule and young Jim Ward went back to work. Two months later, the Vice President in charge of getting the dice molds made comes into my office and says I can stop ordering Hong Kong dice. I became very alarmed and asked the question, do we have finished dice molds? His reply was no but he was sure we would have finished molds in a few short weeks. That was why I could stop ordering dice. “Young and diligent Jim Ward” didn’t want to stop ordering dice since there wasn’t a finished dice mold yet. He went to his Vice President and got permission to order the next month’s 100,000 dice.
Weeks later the other Vice President comes storming into the sales office. “I thought I told you not to order dice,” he shouted. “Do we have a working dice mold?” I asked very meekly even though I wasn’t feeling meek. I had a job to do. “No we don’t, but that doesn’t matter, we will when we need the dice.” He stormed out of the office and I heard the lecture. I was told if a vice president of the company gave me an order I had to do it. I didn’t order the next month’s dice and it almost killed “young Jim Ward” with worry.
For two months “young Jim Ward” got real sneaky and tracked the progress of the dice mold. On the day we were going to be late if we didn’t have Hong Kong dice “young Jim Ward” sent out a memo detailing the schedule and our need for 100,000 sets of dice. “Young Jim Ward” gave it to all of the vice presidents. An hour later the mold VP brought the memo back to my office and threw it in my face. “We will have dice when we need them. You are not to worry about this matter any more.”
Naturally, “young Jim Ward” started to worry even more. I asked my Vice President if I would send out memos every week (I wanted every day, but held myself in check) on the dice issue. He made me send out one a month. On the day when it would be too late to order dice to get them in December I sent out a memo detailing that fact. All the vice presidents got together and were assured we would have dice. “Young Jim Ward” was ordered not to send out any more memos on the dice. Raw blades of inventory agony transfixed “young Jim Ward’s” body as the weeks went by. Still sneaky, I knew exactly what condition the dice were in that were being made by the mold. I begged my VP to talk to Gary about the matter. He did and Gary went to the dice mold VP and asked to see what type of dice were being made by the new molds. That VP opened his desk to pull out several pieces of what looked like popcorn with numbers on them. Clearly they would not be used for the D&D box set. Gary went to me and told me to order dice and get them as soon as possible. He also told me never to listen to anyone who said not to order dice again. That dice VP got a written reprimand and I got a huge smile on my face.
For three ugly months we used cardboard counters and a coupon for dice in our box sets. The only people happy about that were the prisoners in jail as they couldn’t get games with dice in them. From then on the dice VP didn’t like me at all and every time I was promoted into another position he would tell my supervisor what a trouble maker I was.
* It was the Dungeon Masters Guide that was misprinted with the pages of the Monster Manual, in what is designated the "Second Alpha" printing here on the Acaeum.
Chris also recently guested on the Save for Half podcast, Episode 26.5: North Texas RPG Con, and back in the spring was on the Appendix N Book Club podcast, Episode 67 Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan At the Earth's Core.
Interview: Chris Holmes
Today's interview was a real treat for me. Chris Holmes, son of Dr J. Eric Holmes, kindly agreed to answer my questions about his own experiences with roleplaying, as well as the life and works of his father, whose Basic Set was the very first RPG I ever owned. 1.
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The cover of Bayt al Azif issue #1. Art by Maria Nguyen. |
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Detail of Holmes' Bugbears |
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The original D&D Bugbear illustration |
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| "MINIATURES - Dr. Eric Holmes with a few of his D&D Figures" |
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| Some of the 200 lbs of minis collected by J. Eric Holmes - photo by Billy Galaxy |
