Gary Gygax 1938 - 2008

[jeriendhal]

It's very easy to laugh at Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 1st Edition these days. Clunky, munchkin inducing rules, a world view that reduced everything to targets for players to destroy, monsters that ranged from the all powerful to the wince inducing. A whole host of problems that required 2 1/2 more editions to finally bend into something easy to use and relatively balanced. It was an awful RPG.

And the Wright Flyer, judging by all the reports of contemporary pilots trying to fly reproductions, was a lousy airplane.

But they were both the first, and they both worked.

If it weren't for Gary Gygax, there would be no RPG's. Likely there would be no MMORPGS. No Steve Jackson Games. No GURPS.

Because of Gary Gygax I tried to write stories based on events from the long running campaign I played in at college. I'm still writing today.

Because of Gary Gygax I made my first professional writing sale to SJG's Pyramid Online.

Because of Gary Gygax and AD&D, I met the friends that would stay with me through college and whom I still keep in touch with.

Because of Gary Gygax I met my wife, moonshadowed.

Thanks, Gary, for everything.

Comments

[moonshadowed.livejournal.com]

Awww... that was so sweet... and well written. (And no, I'm not biased at all.)

[allyra.livejournal.com]

That is a lovely eulogy (if that's the right word...I feel like there's a better one). He clearly touched many lives in a wonderful way, even if indirectly. (My icon is of my very first MMORPG character, the one with whom I met many people who touched my life and remain in it today.)