Scrum in Miniature: The Lost Art of Games Workshop's Holmes Basic

My fellow Scrum Club member Joe has started a series called the "Lost Art of D&D" on his blog Scrum in Miniature, and the second installment covers the replacement art by John Blanche and Fangorn that was used by Games Workshop in the first printing of Holmes Basic rulebook, first released in December 1977. The post goes through the rulebook and shows each replacement work contrasted with the original from the U.S. version (example above).

In a 2001 interview, Gary Gygax was asked about the UK version, and responded:

"Yes, I saw the work, and I approved. Ian [Livingstone] and Steve [Jackson of Games Workshop] convinced me that their audience didn't like the illustrations used in American versions of the game, so I gave them the okay to produce their own. I had a copy of the Basic Set rules, but it was lost when Lorraine Williams took over TSR..."

Lost Art of D&D No. 2: Games Workshop's Holmes Basic (1977)

After Games Workshop attained the license to print a co-branded edition of TSR's 1977 Dungeons & Dragons basic rules book, they set about putting their own stamp on it, designing a new cover and replacing a number of the illustrations they deemed too crudely drawn for their U.K. market.

UK Basic rulebook cover original art

Original art by John Blanche for the cover of the UK Holmes Basic rulebook, from Tome of Treasures

     While working on yesterday's post I was reminded that the original cover art by John Blanche for the UK Holmes Basic rulebook still exists and is owned by the burntwire brothers, two longtime Acaeum members and top collectors with a you've-gotta-see-it-to-believe-it game room. They've done a nice job of sharing their art collection via photos  available in the Acaeum Artwork Museum, Tome of Treasures Gallery of Original Paintings and Drawings (where I grabbed the above screenshot) and their photo gallery on the Illustration Exchange. Most of their collection is of more recent art; it's actually amazing that D&D art this old (1977) has been preserved. TSR disposed of a lot of early original art, but the UK version of the rulebook was published by Games Workshop under license from TSR. The burntwire brothers wrote in 2006 that they acquired the art from "a well known game designer in England" and that "when we heard it was available we had to have it. It is kind of cool owning the cover art to the first non-US Dungeons & Dragons product".

     The ToT entry describes the art as being 7.5 by 9.5 inches, ink on heavy art board. The composition echoes the original Sutherland artwork, containing similar elements of dragon, treasure hoard, wizard with wand, warrior and archway, though from a different perspective. In this regard it is similar to the interior artwork, much of which is even more straight-forward re-drawings of the original art by Fangorn (Christopher Baker).

Heroes (1979) revised

Left: Holmes Basic UK version (Dec 1977); Right: Heroes RPG (1979). Cover art for each by John Blanche.

      
     There's a new version of the long out-of-print 1979 non-fantasy medieval RPG Heroes available here (be warned, it's print only and expensive, particularly if you are outside the UK). It's been partially revised by the original author, Dave Millward. I don't really know much about the game except that the cover art was by the UK artist John Blanche, just a few years after he did the cover for the UK version of the Holmes Basic rulebook (above, left). He's gone on to do all sorts of art for Games Workshop products. The new version is absent his art on the cover, unfortunately. I don't know whether they wanted something fancier (i.e., color), couldn't afford to use his art now, or just wanted to distinguish the two versions. I've also learned that similar to the UK Basic rulebook, Blanche only did the art on the cover. The original Heroes had interior artwork "by an art student called Aiden which David explains, cost him a couple of pints" and this "is reproduced in the new version, alongside art by J.C.B.Knight. All very atmospheric" (geordie, OD&D Discussion forum).

     The first post in the OD&D thread is a capsule review by geordie from 2010, which Millward now has quoted in on the website:

"The bleak landscape of late-70's Britain (strikes, powercuts, social disorder, bombing and the cold war) wasn't ever going to birth a shiny happy RPG.

Before Warhammer, Dragon Warriors and Maelstrom, there was the ironically-titled Heroes, written by Dave Millward (with 18 months playtesting), with art by John Blanche (artist responsible for the UK Holmes D&D cover).

A roleplaying game set in the Dark Ages, 80 pages cover character creation and background, professions, equipment, combat, social interaction and advancement, scenario creation, religion, gambling, crime and punishment, political wrangling, land holdings, piracy, naval campaigns, commerce, raiding, medicine and healing. There is also a European-style setting, the Ouesterlands, included.

...No fantasy, no magic, just blood 'n' snot brawling with percentile dice."

This was followed up by an interesting post by one yoda, who explained its origins:

"Dave was my History teacher back in the late 70's, and the school wargames club which Dave ran were, together with the Birmingham Wargames club, the playtesters for Heroes. Most of the dedications at the front of the rules were for our personas.

We had 00's of hours of fun with this game, remember there was little or nothing in the market at the time and Heroes also made a good background for some skirmish wargames. It helped that Dave, with his Birmingham cohorts had access to beautifully painted wargames figures by the ton.

I managed to take my Character, a Polish mercenary type, through all the playtesting, and was the Captain of the City Guard in waiting. I was just waiting for deadmans shoes, which I was trying to arrange by raising finance to facilitate the incumbents 'retirement'. In the pursuit of which i got killed in a raid on a monastery - I suppose that was gods wrath, but the monks definitely needed to be relieved of a shipment of the emperors gold that was en route.

Wow, memories. I think I'll get Dave to go for a reprint. The basic rules set allowed you to make use of, or develop, your love of history, no spells or monsters as you say, just good old fashioned bar room brawls and swordplay. sometimes simple is best."

(As a fan of simple rules, I found the bolded bit interesting - it makes me ponder a simplified D&D Basic with no spells or monsters)

 And then earlier this year, a post by Millward himself:

"Hi… first, please allow me to introduce myself… I am Dave Millward, author of the original Heroes RPG.

I am currently engaged in reviewing the original rules for Heroes, with a view to initially publishing Edition 1.1, together with a set of Combat rules. If this is a success, I am thinking about a 2nd Edition and various expansion sets.

If you are interested, please drop me an e-mail and let me know what you think…"

Version 1.1 eventually morphed into version 1.2, as explained on the website.

There's more discussion of the original game here on Dragonsfoot.

UK Deep Dish

Move over bacon, now there's something meatier

     Acaeum member Gnat the Beggar posted the above picture today in the Recent Fun Finds thread. It nicely shows off the height difference between the US (left) and UK (right) versions of Holmes Basic Set (produced by Games Workshop) compared to the US version. As you can see, the UK version is much taller (more room to store modules!) and is missing the overlapped artwork on the box edges. Gnat also posted a photo of the contents of box:

     In addition to the rulebook, the module B1 and a set of standard Holmes dice, there are two loose sheets. One is an advertisement for White Dwarf magazine (which began its run in mid-77, just before the Holmes Set was published in the US). The other sheet replicates pages 31 and 32 of the module (player's background material), something which has been found before with UK copies of B1.

     The printing history of the UK Holmes Set is convoluted. The first two known printings of the rulebook were sold alone (without a box) and had different artwork on the cover by John Blanche of Games Workshop fame, and throughout the interior by Fangorn (Christopher Baker). I believe the text of these are the same as one of the earlier US printings (1st-3rd printings). After this, the UK version appeared as a boxed set with a rulebook that returned to the original cover and interior art (as pictured above). The interior of this rulebook appears to match the 2nd edition (Nov 1978) of the US version. Strangely, however, this UK version retains the Lizard Logo and F116-R code on the front cover instead of using the new Wizard Logo and 2001 code.

     The various printings are described on the Acaeum Basic Set Foreign Editions page, which has at least one error (the 3rd UK printing refers to Halflings, not Hobbits) and is missing a putative 5th printing with prices missing on the back cover.

     See also the Zenopus Archives website Foreign Editions page.

Obscure Art Friday: Fangorn in the Fiend Folio

Fangorn illustration from page 98 of the Fiend Folio (TSR, 1981)

     The Fiend Folio has a full-page illustration of two adventurers facing off against a dragon sitting on a pile of treasure on page 98. The artwork is by Fangorn (the signature is in white on an urn to the right), also known as Chris Baker, who later illustrated the UK covers of the Redwall series. My theory is this illustration was drawn with the intention of being a cover for the UK printing of the Holmes Basic Set. While the perspective is different, note the similarity in the elements of the composition: dragon sitting on a pile of gold facing off against two adventurers, one a wizard, one a warrior; torch light source; archway and columns. There's even room at the top of this picture for a "Dungeons & Dragons" title.

     There's supporting evidence for this. While the actual cover of the UK printing has a picture by John Blanche (with similar dragon/treasure/wizard/warrior/archway elements) all of the interior illustrations are by Fangorn. And while a few are original compositions, many are re-drawings of the original art by David C. Sutherland III (DCSIII). See this page on the Zenopus Archives website for to see the re-drawing of the picture in my blog header. That page links back to a Dragonsfoot thread where ifearyeti provides some juxtapositions of the images from the US/UK rulebooks (pg 1 of the thread) and greyharp (Dave of There's Dungeons Down Under) provides clear scans of all of the Fangorn illustrations (pg 2 of the thread). The re-drawn art is all from the first printing of the rulebook (1977) and includes the orc battle (title page), lizard warrior (pg 3), three dwarves (pg 25), purple worm battle (pg 31), treasure chest (pg 33), sword (pg 35), crystal ball/skull (pg 37) and skeleton battle (pg 44).

     Now take a look another look at treasure chest and crystal ball/skull illustrations:

     If these look familiar to you, and you've never seen the UK printing of the Holmes rulebook, it's because they were merged together and used at the bottom of the Treasure Type table in the Fiend Folio on page 99, facing the dragon picture posted above. I've pasted together the Fiend Folio picture with David Sutherland's originals for a comparison:

Click on this picture for a larger view

     My theory is that Fangorn re-did the cover of the Holmes Basic Set in addition to the many interior illustrations, but for whatever reason the Blanche version was used instead. The Fangorn picture doesn't look like it was colored (like the Sutherland original), but neither is the Blanche version (see link above). When Don Turnbull of TSR UK was preparing the Fiend Folio he decided to include the unused art, along with the merged treasure art.