Jeremy L. C. Jones

An abridged version of my Dave Arneson interview is up on koboldquarterly.com . The print version of the magazine is due out later this month. The magazine went to press three weeks before Mr. Arneson’s passing.

If Their Hearts Are Pure: A Conversation with Dave Arneson

“Dave Arneson’s impact on the concept and identity of the role-playing game is profound. His interest in story, setting, and character development helped RPGs offer players much more than endless serial combat, something far more satisfying than a tallying of dice rolls and stacked skill modifiers.”
–James Lowder, editor of the ENnie and Orgins Award-winning Hobby Games: The 100 Best

Before Greyhawk, there was Blackmoor. Before the Dungeon Master, there was the Judge. Before d20s, there were d6s, and a lot of them.

The seed for what we now know as role-playing games (RPGs) was planted in the mind of Dave Arneson during a college class when the professor asked Arneson and his classmates to role-play historical figures. But it would take many years—and many collaborations–for that seed to grow into the earliest RPGs.

An avid wargamer since he received Avalon Hill’s Gettysburg as a child, Arneson was heavily involved with Napoleonic miniature campaigns when he was struck with a bout of his characteristic mischievousness. What if, he wondered, instead of moving armies around, we move smaller commando forces? What if we deviate from historical events and make up our own stories? What if, instead of just combat, we add “other objectives”?

The next time he got together with his gaming group, he had a surprise for them in the form of a whole new world.

And Blackmoor, Arneson’s signature setting, was born.

Read the rest of the abrdiged interview here.