Why Moldvay Basic D&D is the Best Thing Since Heroquest! (Ep. 229)

[@BobWorldBuilder]

“One foot in an unmarked grave” is my favorite Professor DM album

[@rhodenaros]

Inspiration for a young Beck

[@invisibledooley]

Accurate!

[@danielaguilar5540]

And this video is the perfect example of why Professor Dungeon Master is so great!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Many thanks.

[@KrustalHersh]

I think you meant, "The best thing about Professor Dungeon Master is this video!"

[@hehhehheh4588]

The best thing about Professor Dungeon Master is his cracking +1 Vest of Protection!

[@shaunhall960]

He channels Dwarf very well.

[@scullywags]

The best thing about Moldvay D&D is ... ...it came with a crayon whose purpose remained mysterious for many years. ...it was the first book many 10 year olds read from cover to cover. ...every party should have a "caller", but they never do. ...it taught us new words like "prime requisite" and "melee". ...it was "For 3 or More ADULTS Ages 10 and Up" ...

[@briansmith8898]

The crayon was to fill in the numbers on the dice.

[@plaidpvcpipe3792]

What is a "caller?"

[@scullywags]

@@plaidpvcpipe3792 From the glossary "caller - The player who normally tells the DM what his or her party will do, based on what the other players tell him or her". The best thing about Moldvay D&D is...it had a glossary.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

I would have mentioned the crayon dice if I still had them!

[@Mannahnin]

@@plaidpvcpipe3792 the caller was kind of like a party leader, and particularly helpful if you had a large group of players; groups of 8-10 were pretty common in early tournament play, and as many as 12-15 were sometimes used! When you have 8+ players and possibly some henchmen and hirelings, having a player whose designated job is to keep the players organized and relay quick group decisions to the DM (is the party going left or right at the intersection is usually not worth a lengthy debate) can be a useful time saver. I've been in groups within the last year that use one (the first time I played OD&D with Frank Mentzer at a Con, we had a dozen players divided between two tables, and each table had a caller. :) ). Often we rotate it, too, so people get to share the quasi-leader responsibilities.

[@RyanWBL]

"I'm trying to maintain a sense of dignity here" had me rolling. We've all had that DM moment when we're killing it acting out a NPC and a family member walks in. Confident to self conscious in 0.1 seconds.

[@thesonofdormammu5475]

Exactly this. My wife and kids intentionally come into the room where I play in hopes of catching me doing some crazy voice. So far they haven't caught me on camera but I'm just waiting for that day.

[@knghtbrd]

The whole video had me trying to catch my breath from laughter… The dignity bit just started fresh fits of it. The best thing about Moldvay D&D is this video.

[@Motavian]

My fondest memory of Moldvay was learning it and leaving 5e far behind.

[@jnlsnfamily8747]

Amen brother.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Still like 5E, but Moldvay is great.

[@GR-pv5jx]

Never went to 5e.

[@Vall112]

Jumped to 5e when it came out. Now its just the most generic everything. Spent the last year running in the direction of OSR products. It’s so much better imo.

[@Vall112]

@@hadeseye2297 haha. 3 definitely had it’s issues looking back. But it was my first edition I played in so automatically is a favorite. I think why I love Dungeon Crawl Classics so much is because it runs on the 3e engine

I have a deep nostalgia of my discovery of Tabletop RPGs in 83 with the Molway magenta box, it was a very nice start for a lifelong hobby !

[@JCSamuelson]

It's almost like looking in a mirror. I got the Moldvay edition at Christmas, and instead of laying under the tree inhaling pine I had my face buried in the rules, marveling at this amazing game and the incredible artwork. I couldn't wait to play, and to this day I still cant.

[@michaelgross1324]

That was terrific. Moldvay was the second D&D I played (OD&D being my first), but the first D&D I owned. Our Dungeon Master brought handwritten notes taken from her dad's LBBs to school and ran a campaign at recess with them. So, I never saw her LBBs because she wasn't allowed to take them to school. When the TSR catalog for winter 1980/1981 came to her house, she brought that in and pointed out the soon-to-release Moldvay set. It was a trip to Woolworth's I will never forget: my dad following me as I sought the prize that would bring D&D to our house and keep my brother and I out of trouble at our grandmother's, while our parents went away on a skiing trip.

[@erc1971erc1971]

My mom bought me the Moldvay boxed set 40 years ago, a decision she still regrets to this day :P Now I have a whole basement full of all things D&D :D

[@nickhayley]

Is she so regretful because it is HER basement? This is the burning question no one asked.

[@nickhayley]

Is she so regretful because it is HER basement? This is the burning question no one asked.

[@erc1971erc1971]

@@nickhayley lol, no. It is my own place.

[@Kosake82]

Thank you so much for this video. I never get tired of this "bardic" style review. You did such a cracking job.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks for watching it multiple times! It's one of my personal favorite 10 videos.

[@TonyJ1776]

Absolutely your most entertaining video to date, hands down.

[@brownshoeblues2014]

You an amputee?

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks. Share it. I want it to go viral!

[@elfbait3774]

I started with this edition too. We had moved neighborhoods and on one visit back to the old neighborhood, I visited my buddy Henry. Henry wanted to show me this new game that had a dragon on it. We played it all wrong but from that day I was hooked. A single, chance encounter led to a lifetime of fun. We played the game like a board game. We laid the map out and moved about it like you would a board game board, reading each room description as we came to. We would fight and move on. We didn't get the DM/Player concept yet. From there, I went home jazzed by this experience. I couldn't afford a set myself, so I set out over the rest of the weekend and into the following week to try to recreate the game from memory! I made a dungeon called, "The Temple of Elf Doom" and drew a map using my Crayola markers on some of my dad's graph paper from work. I composed a bardic tale about the temple and it's curse, set to the tune of "Green Sleeves". My mother and my father were kind enough to be my first players for my homebrew bastardization of the game. As we settled into the new neighborhood and I made new friends, I learned there were other D&D players just on my block and roughly the same age (5th Grade to my 3rd). As the years went by, we had a gaming group that grew into AD&D but we never left the B/X stuff behind. We met other nearby groups and soon we were having cross-campaign stories. It all started with a random encounter and I failed my save vs D&D.

[@monomakes]

How cool!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

We laid out the maps too!

[@ForeverYoungKickboxer]

That wasn't in Downingtown, PA was it,

[@elfbait3774]

@@ForeverYoungKickboxer Nope, WA

[@andrewtomlinson5237]

Pretty much the same. We literally played it like a board game for months before starting to expand our horizons. I was DM, and made my dungeon. The players would try to get as far as possible before everyone died, then they would either run the same character, or roll a new one and go through the exact same dungeon again, hopefully getting further each time, all monsters, traps etc would be reset each time. We ran that same dungeon over and over for months. It had little to no plot or story attached. Plenty of traps, monsters and a few puzzles... but no real sense of "Why are we doing this?" and the idea of "So... what happens when we get past level 3?" never entered anyone's head because no one got to level three. One day I moved and relocated a couple of pit traps that the players were well used to avoiding, and the notion that something in the dungeon could change was a mind blowing revalation to my players!!! 5 years later, when we'd been playing AD&D (properly I might add...) for a few years we went back to the Moldvay Basic/Expert boxes gathering dust on the shelf, and I wrote and ran one of the most entertaining campaigns we ever played. Mainly because so little time was spent with anyone's head in a Goddam rule book...

[@asthmatickobold7844]

What was brilliant about the art in early D&D was that most of the characters were leaning or running away from the danger. It implied that the adventures are life-threatening and your character could die. Today the art has the characters leaping into the fray, charging the dragon, or something similar. It implies you can be a hero without the chance of being killed ("Don't worry. Your DM wants you to 'win'".) As far as character creation goes, of course Moldvay was better since the adventures were deadly and you needed an easy way to create a new character and get back in the game! I think a lot of the "coddling" to PCs in 3rd to 5th Editions was that character creation became a lot more time-consuming so characters need to endure. The additional classes, races, spells, etc make this more time-consuming as players are constantly trying to optimize their characters and creation takes hours instead of minutes.

[@irishthump73]

Not to mention, the older art portrayed most adventurers as people of normal physique! A far cry from the bodybuilder tropes that seem to have become the norm in later editions!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

I'm going to have a video about this very subject.

[@allang9313]

What you say, Asthmatic Kobold, about the early art highlights the idea that "there is no courage without fear!" p.s. I'm glad I noticed the 'show more' option of your message as it allowed my to delete the sentence I'd typed that completely echoed what you say about length of time spent creating a character.

[@jltheking3]

Modern D&D is a totally different genre compared to old school D&D. It’s Lord of the Rings, not Game of Thrones. When you watch Lord of the Rings you don’t expect, nor want, any of your main characters to die. You want to live to be a hero and save the world. Character creation is complicated because the game is built for people that want to dive into their character’s backstories and customize their characters to their hearts content. These features are crafted intentionally to be time-consuming, because you are only expected to do it once a campaign. And that’s fine. That’s just the genre of storytelling 5th edition chose to support, and it happens to be different from the originals. Personally I love the OSR because there are many game design elements from that scene that I am pulling out to my 5e games. Lowered hit points and unbalanced encounters were the best things that I adopted to make a more dramatic game.

[@maclaird1]

I remember buying my first copy at B Dalton Booksellers at the mall. I can still see it on the shelf halfway down the store on the right side against the wall on the bottom shelf. Changed my life. Also forced me to be the DM for the rest of my life since nobody else wanted to do it.

[@lionelhutz3142]

Am I remembering right or did B Dalton have a TSR cardboard display case that surrounded the D&D rule books, dice and modules for sale on the shelf in their stores? Loved it then...love it now.

[@maclaird1]

@@lionelhutz3142 I don't remember that. Just the books on the shelf

[@trollsmyth]

Still my favorite version of D&D, largely because it's so incredibly hackable and versatile.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

YES!

[@shaunhall960]

Here are some guidelines, now go play.

[@JayOttawa]

This was my first D&D set and I’ve still got it! 1982 seems like yesterday! Hahah Great video and trip down memory lane!

[@cajbajthewhite4889]

I learned how to bind books just so I could make a replica of Moldvay Basic for my dad for his birthday last year. I even painted the miniatures to look die-cast, haha. Made a little extra copy just for me and I run it every Wednesday.

[@zac2314]

This sounds like a fun idea! Could you point me in the right direction for learning how to do it?

[@nickhayley]

​@@zac2314..and Cajabjthewhite just ghosted that request. So your answer is no, you can't.😂

[@thedeomon]

That final blooper had me dying! I personally didn't grow up with Moldvay I started with 3.5 but after discovering B/X and the OSR in general it's really changed how I run my games! I absolutely love playing Basic Fantasy RPG for most of the reasons you mentioned. Sit down with friends and just start adventuring!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Glad I left that bit in.

[@OffTheShelfGameReviews]

Not going to lie, you did a heck of a great job channeling the bard!

[@matthew7419]

And he's right. Cracking Professorial Review! 💥

[@tomyoung9834]

I remember getting the moldvay set, and poring over the contents like it was mystical lore! So many good memories of this set!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Coloring the dice!

[@thetowndrunk988]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 ah, the magic of crayons back then

[@caravanmaster5228]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 I still have one of those cruddy, olive-green d12s sitting on my bookshelf--and a worn-down, yellow (and red crayon) d20 from the Expert set.

[@AllenFeatherlin]

I was a little older.. 11 or 12 when I got my used copy of Moldvay. A friend invited me to ride bikes over to his house after school and his older brother and friends were playing AD&D... against a beholder of all things. I was totally poleaxed watching them play.. and my school friend sold me the 'old useless' boxed copy they didn't use any more for like 10 bucks. I never pedaled so fast in my whole life back home and stayed up all night under the covers with a flashlight reading the rules. Ran my first game the very next day.. completely wrong and cackling in glee. You can't buy memories like those....

[@thetowndrunk988]

@@AllenFeatherlin those memories last a lifetime. I’ve played, or ran, many an adventure since those days, but those were some of the most memorable of them all.

[@jakestaples8498]

My first D&D game was the Mentzer red box Basic set. I gave up those books many years ago when I needed to downsize for a move. I bought the pdf’s a few months ago for nostalgia. I have many fond memories of that version of the rules. I also own a copy of the Holmes rules I found at Half-Price Books several years ago. There’s something nice about the simplicity of the basic D&D rules

[@bobhastings6464]

I am a long time subscriber, but have never commented before. This was absolutely hilarious. Spot on my friend. I have long been a lover of this rule set. Well done! Cheers from Canada Bob

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks for the comment. They help send the video out to more people.

[@toddpickens]

How I started as a kid. Playing with adults. 9 or 10 years old. Played a dwarf, entered a sunken Castle, group turned left, I turned right got killed by a lizard man. First character dead and under 30 minutes. I cried, it took me 5 minutes to roll up another character, played the rest of the night and Loved it

[@biffstrong1079]

Dog Kobolds. The best. Yes paint over that Sistine Chapel. The Yarn beard is killing it.

[@nlwintle]

My favorite memory of Moldvay D&D was playing through the Caves of Chaos with about 7 other players at a convention. We started the session with character creation and ended when all the characters were dead. It was amazing.

[@ForeverYoungKickboxer]

I have my original copy of that, and am thinking of running the grandkids through it if we get snowed in anytime soon.

[@DeirdreCeridwen]

OMG the memories this brings back!! I too played this as a 10 year old in 1980 and my friend and I started playing without reading the rules LOL

[@owenbloomfield1177]

I was about 10 when my big brother got that edition for Christmas. I was completely enthralled. I bugged so much he let me play with his friends. My life was never the same since.

[@themasterofdungeons9196]

This is literally the best thing on the internet, perhaps only contested by the Bards Heroquest review. Thank you Mr. Dungeon Craft for your content.

[@DungeonMasterpiece]

This is exactly the same experience I had when I got my hands on my very first second edition revised copy at the ripe age of 10 years

[@tubebobwil]

This is actually the best "what makes Moldvay different" video in a quick concise way that I've seen.

[@TheDMGinfo]

The best thing about this video is THIS video

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks!

[@bluegnoll4515]

An edition slathered with magic and wonder like no other, even the internal typeface/font stands apart just like the illustrations. Cut and dry character creation and mechanics... What a work of art it was

[@ronoshmago1938]

Erol Otus, Jim Roslof, Jeff Dee, and Bill Willingham were my patron saints back then. Such great illustrations!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

They are still awesome!

[@Cr4z3d]

LMAO, That BardicBroadcasts impression is spot on, I was dying, absolutely awesome. Very good basic rundown on the Moldvay rules as well, awesome video as a whole.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks. This episode was a LOT of fun to make.And my dwarf will return soon in a video about orcs.

[@OldieWan]

I love it! The system I have been working on for decades is getting close to release! Caves and Lizards a classic take on Moldvay gaming.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Cool!

[@OldieWan]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 Thank you DC! You have been a huge inspiration in keeping me going in light of being fired from WOTC some time back for my old school ways. Who am I? Stand by, as I have been keeping this one close to the chest for some time now. I would be more than happy to send you a copy once I take that final step. No need for any plugs or anything like that. Just for the simple fact you're one of the few left out here who keep the dream alive!

[@OldieWan]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 Old School ways? I am sure I wouldn't have to explain it to you DC. For anyone that happens across this post, what that means is that many people in today's world take fantasy as some kind of dog whistle or project their own ills upon our fantasy worlds. When I write and DM a game I do not pull punches and I do not hold back on many of the core lores created by great men and women who came before me. In fantasy settings there are horrible things that can happen. Non of which represent my values in RL. Sadly, I was burned at the stake by high members at Wizards of the Coast for my work. They canceled me and called me the worst things you can call a person. All baseless nonsense because I didn't tow their party line. I don't even like politics or get into it. But because I wouldn't bend the knee, they treated me as their enemy. So be it. I went my own way and started creating new spaces for people like me and those they have done wrong.

[@glennbob5093]

The best thing about Dungeon Craft videos is the narrations. Just well-written and well-performed. Forget that. The best thing about Dungeon Craft videos is Deathbringer's intros and outro, the perfect way to being and end all videos, not with sponsored content about wireless headphones or mobile games.

[@nctinman8775]

This exactly! In '78 nobody "Knew" the rules, we all went with the DM and He/I/They pulled it out of our collective arse. No Rule Lawyers. No Optimizers. No 8+ Source Books. It was beautifully simple and crazy fun.

[@Loehengrin]

The sourcebooks were called gazetteers and there were more than 8.

[@helbent4]

@@Loehengrin This is true, but they came a lot later and did not seem to be central to the business plan. I bought my first one over ten years after I started playing D&D (blue box) and AD&D, "the Orcs of Thar", the only one I ever got.

[@AdamBlackArts]

Late summer of 1983 was the year I got the B/X box sets and they were great. Still are great! Took me till adulthood (and a bunch of editions later) to realize how simple and streamlined those old B/X rules were...and still are to this day! Now I just gotta find a group to run a game for!

[@enoa4]

This may be my favorite video ever. Well done Professor Dungeon Master.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks, Ernie. Please share. Trying hard to get this one to 100k.

[@enoa4]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1you bet good sir. I will.

[@allang9313]

My own D&D journey began with the blue book, Holmes edition, but I totally get the sense of nostalgia that it brings just seeing those images, and remembering back to when I first say them not knowing the journey it would take me on. I'm subscribed and have enjoyed many of your videos, but had to comment on this in particular. I sat, with a big smile on my face, throughout your whole video. Great impersonation of both the voice and sentence structure of BardicBroadcasts, the Bard. Even down to the rolling r's (and I'm Scottish, so I know a rolling r when I hear one!). Keep up the quality and may all your rrrrrolls be 20s!

[@udasu]

Hilarious, awesome vid. Yup, got the red box in xmas 1980, and life was changed forever. Truth be told, EO's artwork is what got me into buying the advanced books too.

[@rlgood]

Moldvay basic was all I played throughout the 80's. I didn't even have the expert rules! This is why I love Basic Fantasy Role Playing Game so much. Great video!

[@thesonofdormammu5475]

Awesome video!!! Moldvay D&D was my introduction too, I got it for Christmas from an aunt who thought it was a board game. I was too young to understand it so it sat on a shelf in my room for about 2 years. Then in 5th grade I cracked it open and the words became indelibly burned into my brain. I introduced it to all of my friends and we played until the end of high school. At that point a couple of those friends and my cousin formed a gaming group and we've been playing ever since (although online at this point since we all live so far away from each other). I will never forget not understanding how the d4 worked in that box set. The instructions said to use the bottom number, we were dumb kids so we thought that meant pick it up and add up the numbers on the bottom. We did that for a couple of months before we figured out how dumb we were being.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Lol! Bottom number! Thanks for sharing.

[@Sirwilliamf]

Yeah those old d4s were difficult at first, with number attached to the bottom edge vs the top point.

[@AllenFeatherlin]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 Hey! It took me a while to figure out out too.. especially since not all D4 have the numbers in the same orientation! First D4 that had the number in the apex corner blew my noodle. :)

[@wilmartinez1]

Was having a bad day until I watched this lol your best video ever. Great job on your version of Bardic broadcasts you should do more maybe with him in it

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Glad I cheered you up. The Bard does not make many videos. Hopefully we'll touch base, though. Check him out on Questing Beast.

[@FeelThePower215]

I was under the impression that this was an early April Fool's joke. But I agree with your assessment vis-a-vis Basic D&D. TSR-era D&D was way cooler to me than WotC/Hasbro-era D&D is now. Which is why I have the Basic Fantasy RPG books.

[@tohitAC0]

I just found out a out basic. Liking it so far? I've done every edition except 1e advanced, plus PF1 and PF2. Went back to 2e currently.

[@sirhamalot8651]

2:34 Man, seeing that old character sheet really brings me back.

[@AyarARJ]

I started with this version too. It was also a Christmas present from my uncle in mid 80's. I have that and I have this multi-headed screwdriver he also gave me a couple years later. Yet another reason to subscribe to Prof's channel.

[@GMWestermeyer]

Now this is how D&D KZbin videos should be done! I first opened this book on Christmas day 1980... it was life changing.

[@Rich_H_1972]

Great how you got the Bard in to do an impression of himself. Amazing stuff!!!

[@justferkicks1244]

the best thing about this video is the sheer excitement the Professor exudes with every "THE BEST THING..." Love it!!

[@stevenphillips5323]

This is the best video I have seen in as long as I can remember. A Dungeoncraft Masterpiece!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks! Please share!

[@kriswilliams9276]

Hysterical, but so true...the good old days! Truly the best version created. The artwork is nostalgic. Loved "one foot in an unmarked grave"! LOL... There were many first rolled characters that never saw the next adventure...RIP...but that made it tense and exciting as you knew your character's fall could be just around the corner!

[@liamcage7208]

Loved the video. "The Best thing about...". lol I played that version of D&D before I went for my 1st year of University the summer of 1981. It was directly responsible for my lack luster grades that semester (the partying or culture shock of college didn't help either). On our very 1st D&D session from the boxed set we did it all wrong too and ended up with a TPK on the very 1st encounter. Decades later, one guy who still plays in my group today occasionally tells stories to the young players of the legendary and mythical Mountain Lion who got 4 attacks vs each character per round at first level. [Picture the old grizzled dwarf sitting around the camp fire telling old war stories about magical beasts to the rookies].

[@euansmith3699]

"... and we called that mountain lion, "Meat Grinder"; and you can still hear his roars, and the screams of his victims echoing around Mount Teepeekay."

[@mikegould6590]

Moldvay Basic D&D was the first set I received as a gift from my mother and led to two things: - Being a DM for a very long time. - Being published. Sadly, she passed before the book went to print.

[@ChiefArcher0985]

Lets goo! I love basic, expescially Molvay. In my current campaign we are using these rules

[@irishthump73]

Newer players who were introduced to the game through 5E need to check out the likes of Moldvay/Mentzer Basic. It tends to get dismissed as being clunky and unrefined, when in reality it was a very well designed, streamlined game.

[@shaunhall960]

Newer players need to be converted you mean?

[@irishthump73]

@@shaunhall960 well if that’s how you want to say it…

[@shaunhall960]

Aye, no converting needed.

[@dwarvesanddragons6948]

"A characer who wasn't a superhero but a proud member of the woring class"... hahahaha, tears of joy

[@markhunt3792]

My version of D&D! 40+ years and loving it just as much as the first day!

[@kythian]

My uncle introduced me to D&D when I was 11 or 12. He used the Moldvay edition... which i still have, along with the box, the module (Keep on the Borderlands), the dice, and even the original crayon used for coloring in the numbers on the dice!

[@AllenFeatherlin]

I still have some of the original dice...they crayon is long gone but I still have the box, the 'books' and Keep on the Borderlands.

[@yeahnaaa292]

O Professor my professor, I feel this sweet, magical nostalgia so deeply. Santa bequeathed unto me this treasure one snowy winter of my youth. Such vivid memories! Thanks for sharing & with those pics! Well wishes for you & your loved ones in this new year!

[@PaulESchultz]

It was fall, 1981, some friends were talking about this mysterious game called "D&D." I convinced them to let me join their club. The idea of casting spells fascinated me. My DM told me I didn't want to play a Magic-user, but I knew better. Turns out he was right. I died in my very first encounter. Killed by a Pixie that I ticked off. But, by then I was hooked. I got the Basic set for Christmas. I had to beg my folks for it. The Satanic Panic, you know? I've played many RPGs over the decades, but I always return to my roots, either with my original books, or a few of the retro clones. By the way, this video was spot on. And hilarious!

[@HouseDM]

So glad that I just recommended my friends watch Dungeon Craft and THIS is the video that they will likely see first. Freakin love it.

[@aschergamer2213]

Nearly spit out my soda with laughter. Much concern from my coworkers in the lunch room. Moldvay was the version my father bequeathed to me when I were a lad. And I never looked back after playing for 28 years.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Glad you enjoyed it. Pleas share so this one goes to the moon.

[@NadavBrand]

Please more of this! Loved it - the fast pace is AWESOME - and you have such a great drama side (love the professor) but you are such a gem when you act!

[@ChrisWatkins]

Oh my god, Professor, you had me literally laughing out loud! I would pay cash money to see you and the Bard do a team-up :D

[@caravanmaster5228]

Frederick the Dwarf narrating!

[@benyaminleib613]

Loved it too and share your continued enthusiasm for this version. Despite its faults, this will always be D&D to me. Your'e awesome, Professor DM!

[@jacobdavidlet]

I have been playing Moldvay/Cook B/X for some time now and I am all about it. So simple, and you can easily take things from other games and add them in.

[@timothyherko3242]

Wonderful video. I watch your channel because almost everything you do is applicable to the Moldvay version. I got my copy Christmas 1981. At first I was intimidated by the massive for its time rulebook, and started playing sometime in January 1982.

[@ppwar]

This was awesome! I watch the Bard's Heroquest video every now and then and it still makes me laugh. Now I will add Professor DM's video to that list 😆

[@GIJoeFactotum]

My favorite memory was just not worrying too much about the rules back in 1977-78. We didn't quite understand the difference between Hit Points and Hit Dice, they all seemed to be the same to us. In my 14 year old mind anything... and everything was possible. I remember looking at the dungeon map and describing it to my friend. "How wide is the passage?", he asked. "Looks to be 10-feet wide", I informed him. "Thats HUGE, hey wasn't there the possibility to buy a wagon cart and horses in the equipment list?" Flipping some pages, "Yes there is", I let him know. "Heck a wagon and team of horses will easily fit down this dungeon corridor!" And just like that the dungeon adventure become some kind of fantasy/Mad Max hybrid with the PCs rushing as far as they could into the dungeon, loading up a bunch of treasure, and riding like bats out of hell, sliding around corners, and smashing into walls as a horde of goblins and hobgoblins chased in close pursuit. Fun was had by all!

[@MrHyde-bp1nb]

Thanks for the laffs! As for Moldvay Basic, I’ve tossed all of my 5e books and now just have OSE and the BECMI Rules Cyclopedia. I know those are technically slightly different but they’re hands down my favorite versions.

[@andrewhaldenby4949]

Me too - life is better

[@irishthump73]

The rule might differ but the important thing is the gritty and lethal vibe!

[@devinoliver2396]

I also received this for Christmas when it came out. It made a lifelong impact on me, and I’m so glad to still have it along with a handful of modules. Many fond memories playing through Keep on the Borderlands.

[@metalbeavis8429]

Dude your character is awesome - can only imagine what other characters you can conjure! I bet a d&d game with professor dungeon master is quite epic!

[@bntking1]

Another great video Professor. I got started on this version as well. My friends and I definitely lightly followed the rules, but we sure had a blast!

[@ivanvega1005]

One D4 for hit points? Anarchy. God, I love this channel. 😆

[@BrotherAlan]

yes, Yes, YES! I started playing in the very late 70s when my big brother brought it home during a visit and I was just in middle school. He had the booklets so when I convinced my parents I needed it and what I got was the Holmes Blue booklet box and I was enthralled. It was so sweet because it was so simple. Alas I grew up and so did D&D and things got, um, well complicated. Thanks for this video it made me recall what I loved about the game WAY back then.

[@pedroluisIV]

Man i am a new DM playing D&D for about 5 sessions now. Iread over a lot of stuff and did a lot of research but the simplest way I saw to interest people for the first time was to apply a lot of the rules that are on that book, i just wish I had known that book existed and it would have saved me a lot of time and worry for how I was going to make things work.

[@kirkbrown1267]

In Chicago, 1980, my buddies and I, started with a set of books that had been stapled together in a garage. Yep, I'm that old. We were military brats, with dads that played war games and crafted battle dioramas. That manila set was fun. This box set, however, became the best of my early memories. Five minutes to make a new character and the game was on. I still have the full box set proudly on display in my game room. Thanks for the video.

[@dungeondumbo]

I was there in ‘81 starting with Moldvay. We also got the rules all mixed up. I loved how we thought monster hit dice were hit points! Mohag the Wanderer…my Dwarf killing dragons at 1st level 😎👍

[@ImperialValues]

Same here. It was easily the most fun I ever had with DnD.

[@dungeondumbo]

@@ImperialValues it was a magical time, discovering the game. My best experiences of D&D were with B/X, BECMI, AD&D 1e and 2e….all kind of the same game with a few tweaks….but wow, that Moldvay set was special…I loved it!

[@ImperialValues]

@@dungeondumbo Seeing the blue expert set cover that referenced the red basic set cover exploded my mind into Elysium.

[@ForeverYoungKickboxer]

1980 here, great times!

[@tohitAC0]

We didn't know you were suppose to divide XP by how many characters where there. So we went up fast!

[@davidhobbs6292]

My dad ran us through the Caves of Chaos when I was in 1st grade. He had the mad hermit invite us to his camp for tea before trying to murder us. Fun times. I DID learn how to read and write maps at an early age, which didn't help AT ALL in the caves of the minotaur, he just kept making up what direction things went since we were 'confused'. >.

[@aaronsomerville2124]

The edition I started with as well. With Basic and Expert you could play all the D&D you would ever need for your entire life. The boxed sets that I got even came with B2 Keep on the Borderlands and X1 Isle of Dread, completely sufficient for multi-year campaigning if you fill them out. In my latter years I've actually ended up preferring the original 1974 box with the 3 LBBs + Chainmail, but that's leaning a lot into the DIY / wargame ethos. Moldvay Basic is superb and B/X is a complete and sufficient form of D&D with almost no flaws.

[@ericdavis4964]

I had forgotten all the adventures that were Alpha numeric and how each Alpha numeric module tied together...ah fond memories of those days!

[@michaelhoward6308]

A few weeks ago, i had been going through a seriously difficult series of challenges in my life and I was really down. Then I got to watch this video and it totally turned things around for my outlook. Thanks for this and for the recognition of Mr. Otus's artwork. I'm quite certain Michelangelo wouldn't take offense at being replaced.

[@0ldSch00l13]

Look at the art in the early editions compared to today. The characters are often in dire peril and it shows. Today they are either standing around smiling or doing something superhuman, but they rarely appear to be in any real danger.

[@christopherhunt1957]

Maybe it's because I'm reading Jon Peterson's "Game Wizards," but just this morning I dug up D&D Basic and flipped through the pages for the first time since the 1980s. So this video hits at a really fun time. I'd known about D&D for 2-3 years before I finally got my own copy (before which I'd actually ginned up my own homebrew...that my friends actually liked). I think I bought Basic with my paper route money and only a few weeks later got Expert. However, my friends and I used these rules for a comparatively short time, about a year; we were super eager to advance to AD&D. It was a real thing with us: progress through the different levels of the game and attain the prestige of possessing AD&D books and playing at the advanced level.

[@kurtoogle4576]

Excellent homage! This system was cursed! It was so rough, it instilled deep and perpetual compulsions for homebrewing on all who played it.

[@mudfarmer366]

One of the best things about it was that it was a horizontal slice of the rules: just enough to get new players (and new DMs) going with their first dungeon crawl adventures. You weren't being overwhelmed with everything from bandits to extra-planner encounters in one massive tome. When your group was ready for more, you could then start adding the expansions. Though I seem to remember the concept had gotten stretched out a bit by the end: The immortal level book was interesting reading, but I never ended up using it.

[@RobertWF42]

"Honey, the plumber is here, is this a good time?"

[@davidkobold5311]

The BEST thing about Professor Dungeon Master is this Moldvay D&D video!

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

One of my favorites.

[@anaximander66]

I have great memories of D&D as well. The art of "Dragonlance" was so incredible I still think it's stunning. That said I have no desire to go back to that era of gameplay at all. I think the advancements in mechanics have been great and I'm having more fun than I ever have.

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Ascending AC is an improvement for sure.

[@Lightmane]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 Sarcasm coming...: HELL NO! -4 armor class. Just try to hit me. THACO all the way, baby. None of this "simple" crap. My THACO is 16 and I have a +1 bonus to hit, so it's 15, but he's got a protection from good spell on him, giving him a +2 bonus, which lowers his armor class by 2, so it's a 17, so... um... so I need a... what do I need again? DM, shaking his head: Just roll the dice and if it's close, we'll do some math. Rolls a 13... did that hit him. DM: His AC is 1 Ok, so... lets see... 😱 😛😎

[@brettmajeske3525]

@@Lightmane Five hours later.... DM: You hit! I think?

[@Lightmane]

@@brettmajeske3525 Hah! I actually enjoyed THACO, along with 1st and 2nd edition D&D. Never played any other versions, other than the basic rules when we went through B2

[@andrewtomlinson5237]

@@Lightmane THAC0 was far simpler than most people think. My daughter is 17 and first played a few years ago with a group at school using 5E. (I still play AD&D with many... MANY... house rules...) She came to me after a few sessions and declared how THAC0 was stupid, and I asked her if she knew how it worked. Her reply... "NO ONE knows how it worked!" So I took five minutes out of my day, showed her, and she said... "Oh... So... your THAC0 is your target number, and the AC modifies your attack roll?" Yep... that's all. Any DM who made it any more complicated than that was a fool to themselves and their group. If your THAC0 is 16, you roll a d20. If the opponent has AC 3 you add 3 to the roll, if it has AC-3 you take 3 away from the roll. If the total is 16 or over... you hit. Your character sheet has a list of your weapons, and each weapon has its modified THAC0 written next to it. And there were FAR fewer situational modifiers than current versions throw into the mix. If that level of mathematics is too hard... I can't help with that. And back in Basic and 1E before THAC0 became a simplified version, you had a little bar on the character sheet that took up hardly any space at all listing all the ACs from 10 to -10 where you wrote in the target number for each AC below. All you had to do was look at the AC, and roll the number below it. The mental strain of this was too much for some, so over time it became simplified... (That's sarcasm... or maybe not...)

[@lostastar789]

My middle school had a D & D club. We would play once a week after school for about an hour. Even had a club picture in the yearbook. Man that was over 40 years ago. Crazy. Great video!

[@rowanhawklan9707]

Was my first experience of RPGs and all of your monologue resonated. I'm currently running White Plume Mountain for a modern group and one if them commented on the interior arts use of skin tight chainmail 😃

[@Michael-nx2sj]

Brilliant on so many levels, Professor. Well done! Moldvay Basic is where I started as a kid and is close to my heart. Your representation of "the bard" is extremely accurate (IMHO) and well played. I'm a longtime fan of your channel for many reasons (education, inspiration, etc.), but this is pure comedy gold. Thanks for keeping us rolling. :)

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Thanks. New episode Tuesday.

[@professorsimian1458]

This was fantastic. I found DnD with the Red Box edition with the Elmore cover. Similarly, my brothers and I had no idea what we were doing but still a lot of fun. Side note: Was fully expecting PDM to say, "Argh, what is it woman!" when Mrs. PDM walked in 😅

[@BXDisciple]

Still one of the best videos on youtube!! Would love to see some more in-depth philosophies or other stories on B/X D&D!!

[@johnedgar7956]

Tim Moldvay (RIP) also made invaluable contributions to the module X1, "Isle of Dread", from the Expert Set. Would love to see a video review of that one!

[@Jackalblade9]

This was the D&D I started on. Got it for Christmas when I was 7 and it remains my favorite to this day. Much love to the other editions (except 4th, 4th can get in the bin) but this will always be first in my heart.

[@juancholo7502]

OK, it is from Moldvay Expert D&D, but I love the art of the Bad Ass Halfling adventurer with his Hot halfling woman, staring down the Human Barbarian that is trying to say hi. Those weren't Tolkien Hobbits.

[@jimobrien7315]

This channel is fantastic. As a middle aged dude introducing the next generation to the wonders of table top gaming, having this knowledge is fantastic

[@aaron527]

Okay, I'm a cynic, so I was prepared to roll my eyes, but this was very, very good. Spot on impression and script.

[@mikeroman5032]

My first set. I got it soon after watching Tom Hanks in the made for TV movie, "Mazes and Monsters".

[@DUNGEONCRAFT1]

Tom Hanks...oh yeah...did he ever do anything else?

[@mikeroman5032]

@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 I think he did a TV show about a cross-dressing ad exec. But that was years ago too. Somebody should really cast him in something