#RPGaDay for 5 August: RPG With Great Writing

Today's prompt: RPG with great writing

Opinions about Gary Gygax run the gamut among gamers, but page for page, pound for pound, the 1e AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide remains the most influential roleplaying game rulebook/manual in my collection. Thirty-five years on, I still reach for it for refereeing advice, written in Gygax's uniquely florid style.

Like many gamers, Gygax's writing style, in particular his vocabulary, was influential far beyond playing AD&D. I distinctly recall lying on my bed, or the floor of the family room, with the DMG spread open in front of me and my red hardcover Merriam-Webster dictionary close at hand, so that I didn't miss any of the pearls secreted in that crowded tome.

But beyond the rules and advice and the lavender prose, what sticks with me still is Gygax's depth of knowledge, of history, mythology, and literature, fantasy and otherwise that came through in his prose. This was not at all surprising in the context of the time - scratch a wargamer and you'd find an amateur historian lurking beneath the skin. A love of books shines through in references to Bulfinch, Shakespeare, and Lives of the Saints alongside Anderson, Dunsany, Sprague de Camp, and Leiber, and Gygax's affection, enthusiasm, and respect for literature fed into my own. Gary Gygax spoke directly to my love of words and ideas, an abiding passion I still feel today.