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Internet Message Format | 1994-10-24 | 7KB

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From: [e-mail] (Chris)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd
Subject: Re: Where`s Gary Gygax
Date: Sun, 9 Oct 1994 22:00:15
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>> karl mamer ([e-mail]) wrote:
>>  Someone told me that T$R was taken over by someone a few years ago.
>>  Sorta bought up all the shares and then kick Gygax out. Any truth
>>  to this?

Gygax, back in the early '80s, had gone to Hollywood to work on production of
the D&D cartoon. When he returned, he found that the Blume brothers, whom he
had left to care for TSR, had done some bad business things. At that time,
Gygax was a majority stockholder, so he forced the Blumes out of TSR. The
Blumes sold their shares to the women who is current CEO of TSR. When Gygax
and his first wife split, she got some of his stock as part of the
not-so-amicable divorce settlement. Gygax's shares went to less than majority.
Ex-wifey then sold her shares to the same lady that the Blumes had. I'm
uncertain whether she had a clear majority, or got enough proxies that with
her shares *gave* her a majority, but the end result was that **SHE** forced
Gygax out. After he was gone, that was when the NO DEMONS, NO DEVILS, NO
GRAPHIC VIOLENCE rule went into effect. The date was late '85 or early '86.

>Gygax did sell AD&D. That's where all the real T$R crap started.  T$R has
>been waging a battle to prevent people like Gygax from getting new works
>published.  Gary created a new game called Mythus about a year ago.  I went
>out and bought the package (along with my pals).  What's interesting is that
>he took pains to avoid using *any* AD&D terms.  There were no stats which
>were named the same, the magic system was completely different. In short it
>was nothing like AD&D.  The bottom line was that T$R pressure killed the
>venture.

Every time Gygax has done something since leaving TSR, TSR has brought suit,
claiming violation of their copyrights. They did it with both NIPI (New
Infinities Productions, Inc.) and with the Dangerous Journey's multi-genre
system. They never won either suit. In the case of NIPI, they went bankrupt
within a year or two. With DJs (from GDW), the parties settled out of court
this past spring. The result of the agreement was that TSR bought all rights
to the DJs line, and neither Gygax nor GDW could publish anything else for the
line.

Rumor had it that Gygax had commented that at the end of it all, he'd felt
better about TSR than ever since their parting, and that he didn't rule out
the possibility of working with them in the near future. What form this
working would take has not yet been mentioned, nor has any other news, notable
or not, been forthcoming from either Gyagx or TSR.

>BTW, the game was unplayable.  The magic system just did not work and the
>set-up took weeks upon weeks.  It was a statistitians wet dream.

That was an unfortunate truth, but the world system was breathtaking in its
scope. If you can get hold of the 3rd book, Epic of Aerth, it could be used as
an excellent world sourcebook. (IMHO)

 >Leon [e-mail]

***************************************************************
*   Christopher G. Van Gorder   *   [e-mail]    *
***************************************************************
* Tried drowning my sorrows and damned if they couldn't swim! *
***************************************************************


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From: [e-mail] (Chris)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd
Subject: Re: Where`s Gary Gygax
Date: Sun, 9 Oct 1994 22:09:01
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>>BTW, the game was unplayable.  The magic system just did not work and the
>>set-up took weeks upon weeks.  It was a statistitians wet dream.

>    If the game was, as you say, unplayable how can you say that T$R
>pressure killed the venture?  Would it not be more likely that the games
>unplayability killed it?

It was reported in both Dragon and White Wolf magazines, not to mention the
press releases that were published in the AD&D echo of Fidonet, and quite
possibly here.

TSRs intervention via a lawsuit killed the game well before the public could
because little GDW, the publisher, and Gygax had to spend a lot of their time
and money defending against what most have deemed a **very** spurious suit.
The basis of the suit was that because Gygax had created (A)D&D, any work he
has done since belonged to them. This from the same people who went ass over
tip to remove all works in their catalog by ceasing publication and/or
reworking to get new copyrights.

With all of this in mind, perhaps before you so boldly went off shooting your
feet, **YOU** should have inestigated and offered up proof to counter what
another person said.

FTR, all of this information I have related can be found in various issues of
Dragon or White Wolf magazines, or from other sources in the industry.

>    Also, if you CAN prove that T$R pressure killed it what IS the proof?
>How did they do it?  Did they burn down the warehouse that stored all the
>stock of the game?  Did they leave threatening notes in Garys mail that
>any attempt to further support his game would have lethal consequences?

Undoubtedly this, among other tactics were used.

>    It irks me when people make accusations like this without bothering to
>support them with fact or argument.  I am not so much defending TSR as
>attacking you.  If nothing else it's bad form.  Any clear thinking
>individual who might have been paying attention to what you were saying is
>likely to begin tuning out at that point.    Then again, it may just be
>me.  I begin tuning out anyone who uses T$R over TSR because they all seem
>to do just what you did - accuse without proof in the hopes that if you do
>so enough times people will begin to believe your conclusions without
>having to muck about with all that proof stuff in between.

Wouldn't you be better off spending some time to collect info that you could
use to refute the argument than by wasting bandwidth by being so damnably
curmudeonly?
***************************************************************
*   Christopher G. Van Gorder   *   [e-mail]    *
***************************************************************
* Tried drowning my sorrows and damned if they couldn't swim! *
***************************************************************