NeoGrognard

Or at least I think it has been. Now nothing has happened to me personally. My new daytime gig is keeping me busy and productive, and I’m looking forward to an awesome summer of some fun activities. No, what’s made it a bad week has greater breadth.

The first blow was the death of Frank Frazetta. If you’re not familiar with this man’s work, do yourself a favor and just scan the Internet. He was the fantasy artist that created modern fantasy art—no one can refute that. Riffing on the romantic traditions infused with the design sense and vastness of art deco, what followed in his wake was either an imitation of his work or a reaction against it; often accomplishing both at the same time. As much as J.R.R Tolkien, Robert Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, Michael Moorcock, and Gary Gygax, Frazetta is firmly part of the modern fantasy’s pantheon.

I think my first run-in with Frazetta’s work was on old Creepy magazine story titled, “Werewolf”. When I was very young the stories in Creepy would scare the crap out of me, while the art did nothing but inspire. These days I look back at Creepy and laugh that the stories used to scare me, but much of the art still inspires. This is one of my favorite Frazetta panels from “Werewolf”.

The second blow came a few weeks earlier, but I stumbled across it only an hour after hearing about Frazetta. J Eric Holmes had passed. In the history of RPGs, Holmes is one of the early greats. The author of the first D&D Basic Set, early in the history of RPGs, Holmes saw the need to create an entry portal that allowed the interested to begin, and for beginners to become the veterans of at least one dungeon crawl. The basic set was a brilliant step forward in the evolution of RPG games. It took a sometimes crowded and cluttered store shelf or Xeroxed catalog and provided focus. And though I believe the age of the basic set is a fine way to market to the nostalgic (hell, I’m part of that audience), I don’t believe the basic set is the right way to grab a young new market, like it did in the day. Not unless through some strange case of Star Trek gobbledygook become real and all of today’s 13-year-olds were born in 1997.

Oh, and the thing is, I didn’t even start with Holmes blue basic set (that’s that Grognardia dude). I started later, around the release of the Moldvay set. I didn’t come across J Eric Holmes until a couple of years after I started playing, when I found a book titled Fantasy Roleplaying Games. Published in 1981, it had been out a few years by the time I got my grubby hands on it, but that didn’t stop me from devouring its geeky goodness.

A mix of how-to guide, state-of-the-industry survey of 1980, and the author’s DMing thoughts and methods, I found it more useful (and brief) than Gygax’s Role-Playing Mastery (subtitled Tips, Tactics and Strategies for Improving Your Participation In Any Role-Playing Game—Wowser!). Don’t get me wrong, there is gold in Gary’s book, you just need cyanide to leach it out.

Holmes book on the other hand was an inspiration. I was inspired by his use of miniatures to aid in narrative. He had a chalkboard table to illustrate his adventures at the table. Back then it was the only thing approaching RPG geek chic. I distinctly remember asking my parents if I could paint the dining room table chalkboard to enhance my player’s gaming experience. I’m pretty sure they laughed at me. They did buy me a chalkboard, though, and that served as my D&D tactical play space until I bought a Chessex Battlemat in the 90s.

If that weren’t enough to impress you, he basically presages at-will arcane attacks in a simple mini game he presents in the book. The man was ahead of the curve.

How about a moment of silence for these greats. Godspeed, gentlemen.

A picture of Dr. Holmes running some D&D with his magical chalkboard table from Fantasy Roleplaying Games. Take a close look and see all the awesome geek culture on and around this table.

Deaths were the morning; layoffs came nearer to lunch. I worked at Wizards of the Coast for almost 10 years before I got the walk and talk. I watched many a co-worker walk down the hall clutching a large envelope long before Ryan Bingham earned his first frequent flier mile. I always knew someday I would be that guy. Hell, some days I prayed for it.

Just so there is no misunderstandings, I love Wizards of the Coast. It’s a spunky company with a fantastic and often entertaining rise to dominance. It’s filled with great people, even though it seems to get emptier and emptier by the year. There’re many people within that big flash cube who I honesty like and deeply respect, even if all I seem to do is bust their chops all the time. But WotC has a problem. It’s a dream junkie. It was born on a dream, it grew fat on dreams, a crazy yellow rat sold it some more, and a bunch of Japanese kids make it hopeful for another. The problem is this junkie of a company had a junkie of a founder. His dream was to fix D&D. It’s a common dream in our circles; typically no more than a fleeting daydream, but he actually did it. Unfortunately he had a lot of monkeys on his back, and a new dealer who made choices for their best business interest so Peter Pumpkinhead quit cold turkey. God bless ‘em.

This left a lurching thing, shambling about and periodically shedding its skin. WotC is a virtual kingdom of Minos where when things are good, they’re ambrosia, but everyone knows a minotaur lurks the maze and you could be forced to taste the beast at any moment (and I mean that purely in that Role Models sorta way).

About two weeks ago, Peter Shaefer (D&D developer) sent me a note letting me know he was resigning. I had heard that Mike Donais (D&D developer) was leaving too, off to bigger and better things. I’ve worked closely with both these fellas, and I respect for their development chops. So as the names of those newly laid-off started to trickle in, I was stunned.  Torah Cottrill (managing editor, D&D), Andy Collins (manager of D&D editing and development), Jesse Decker (D&D brand), Ilja Rotelli (director of online media) and Greg Yahn (director of marketing, new business). I know all of them. I’ve played RPGs with all except Torah, but that’s only because in the relatively short time we worked together or gaming paths didn’t cross. Hell, half of them were my boss at one time or another.

This is a picture of the WotC offices in Renton, WA. Wizards takes up a little more than half the building; a little more or less at any given time due to the elasticity of reorgs. You can see why it’s called the flash cube. Every so often in the spring and summer a bird will slam into its mirrored sides to disgusting effect

That’s a lot of talent gone in the space of a couple of weeks, and that’s only the folks I know about. And since most of them worked on RPGs in some way shape or form, I’m not entirely optimistic it’s for the betterment of the D&D brand. Maybe I’m a worrywart. I’ll freely admit there’s a lot about the current workings of the company that I don’t know. While I still have friends at Wizards, we always make sure to say professional in our conversations. Hasbro is publicly traded, after all. You must keep a certain amount of decorum.

But sometimes we can find enlightenment in legends. One of my favorite legends is one about Sun Tzu. I find meditating on it often helps me understand the nature of some corporate maneuvering.

It’s said that the king of Wu, wanting the great general to prove his worth and his audacious claim that he could train any army, the king handed over his harem, 180 concubines strong, for Sun Tzuto command. The general made two of the king’s lead concubines company the commanders, and then gave the concubines instructions to perform simple drills. With instructions and command in place, the great general gave his first order, but the concubines just giggled. The Sun Tzu told the king the fault was with the general. If an army does not understand the commands, it is because the general had failed to explain it properly. He endeavored to rectify the error, and repeated the training and then the command; again his soldiers giggled. Sun Tzu ordered the two company commanders, the king’s favorite concubines killed, explaining that if the army understood the orders (and they must have, he had given them instruction twice) it was the fault of the army’s officers. After the executions, he promoted two new company commanders and the concubines performed the drill flawlessly.

It’s amazing story about ruthless efficiency and an utter waste of both talent and lives.