The FBI's Gary Gygax file calls the original Dungeon Master "eccentric and frightening"

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Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2017/06/16/the-e-is-for-eccentric.html

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Isn’t that FBIeese for not-poor and self-actualizing?

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Names are omitted because Gary Gygax will hunt them down and kill them with a medieval weapon?

Gary Gygax could replace Chuck Norris in all the jokes.

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Makes me want to check my FBI file and see how badly I stack up to Gygax!

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Respect.

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“known to carry a weapon”

Sword, vorpal, +2

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I saw this over at Oakes Spalding’s OD&D blog, Save versus All Wands.

Apparently, of the eight pages of TSR-related files received from the FOIA request, two related to cocaine dealing in Lake Geneva, and six pages are about the Unabomber investigation, which Ciaramella never mentioned. The Unabomber claimed to belong to a group, “FC” – and since FC is, among other things, a wargamer term for “Front Center” – apparently the FBI sent someone to TSR investigate the most tenuous connection ever.

From the SvAW post linked above:

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Hasbro bought Wizards of the Coast? I have clearly not paid attention for the last two decades!

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For at least a decade now. Hasbro owns both Avalon Hill and Wizards of the Coast (who bought TSR, who previously bought SPI). Now I just have to wait for them to get bought out by Disney, and they will officially have bought pretty much my entire childhood.

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I mean, I guess I can’t complain, by all accounts 5th edition might be the perfect edition to interest my young Nieces and Nephews in RPGs. (And it is officially awesome that my brother-in-law reached out to me to ask me to DM…)

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That’s quite an honor.

A guy afraid of the FBI is typically what we’d call paranoid. If the FBI is afraid of that guy, that’s a whole different story.

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This whole thing is kind of strange - I’m used to notable people inappropriately having been surveilled and tracked by the FBI in the '50s, '60s and '70s, but this one comes from the '90s - and it’s not clear why they even felt the need to include him in their reports. He seems to have been incidental to something else, but given that the D&D panic was long over, I can’t imagine what it was.

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I was Gygax’s driver at an SF convention. Went to lunch with the guy and a couple of friends. He was mostly a nice, really nerdy guy.

I didn’t see any weapons, and if he had any blow he didn’t offer me any.

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Wow, that is not just a tenuous connection, but a series of tenuous connections if E.G.G. got caught up in the report. Jesus, it’s kind of nutty.

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carried a weapon

Even back in the day it was always said that you could tell who played with him by their hatred.

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He was known to carry a bec de corbin in his pocket, or sometimes a guisarme-voulge. Also suspected of concealing a bohemian ear spoon in his boot.

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Somebody once explained to me the D&D 5e is the descendant of AD&D 1e while D&D 4e is the descendant of the D&D basic set.

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They wanted Pokemon and were surprised by this “Dungeons and Dragons” thing they got.

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Did you make your saving throw?

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There are so many better RPGs out there then D&D. Here are a few I suggest.

  1. Fiasco
  2. Do: Fate of the Flying Temple, for yonger games.
  3. Blades in the Dark

I’ve wasted so much time with D&D’s tactical combat, when a compelling story is what I wanted.

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