Gary Gygax

Ernest Gary Gygax (July 27, 1938 to March 4, 2008) is best known as the author of the well known fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D), co-created with Dave Arneson and co-published with Don Kaye in 1974 under the company Tactical Studies Rules (TSR). Although not alone in contributing to the origins of the industry, Gygax is generally considered to be the "father" of the modern role-playing hobby.

Gygax is the son of a Swiss immigrant father and an American mother. His gaming experiences began at the age of five and six with playing pinochle and chess as well as early developments of what is now considered to be live action role-playing together with Jim Rasch as referee/game master, John Rasch and Don Kaye as fellow participants. At about the same time Gary began educating himself in science fiction novels with Ray Bradbury's The Veldt in Bluebook and Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Conqueror.

It was in 1953 that Gary Gygax first started playing miniature war games with Don Kaye.

The game Gettysburg from the Avalon Hill company captured Gygax's attention. It was from the same company that he placed an order for the first blank hexagon mapping sheets that were available. He was also looking for new ways to generate random numbers, and used differently shaped dice (so-called platonic solids) to that end.

In 1966, the International Federation of Wargamers (IFW) was created by Gary Gygax and others

In 1967, a 20-person gaming get-together was organized by Gygax at his home including the basement sand table. This was later called "Gen Con 0" as it led to the start of the annual Gen Con gaming convention the following year, which is now the world's largest and longest-running annual hobby-game gathering. Gen Con is also where Gary Gygax would meet Brian Blume and Dave Arneson. Brian Blume would later enter into TSR as partner with Don Kaye and Gary.

"I'm very fond of the Medieval period, the Dark Ages in particular. We started playing in the period because I had found appropriate miniatures. I started devising rules where what the plastic figure was wearing was what he had. If he had a shield and no armor, then he just has a shield. Shields and half-armor = half-armor rules; full-armor figure = full armor rules. I did rules for weapons as well."

Together with Don Kaye, Mike Reese and Leon Tucker, a military miniatures society would be created under the name Lake Geneva Tactical Studies Association (LGTSA) which at the time also met in Gary's basement.

Gygax and Jeff Perren wrote Chainmail, a miniatures wargame from which D&D was developed, in 1971.

Gary Gygax and Kaye then founded the publishing company Tactical Studies Rules (TSR) and published the first version of D&D in 1974. For the spell systems, Gygax would be inspired by Jack Vance, but also draw upon such renowned fantasy authors as Robert E. Howard, L. Sprague de Camp and Fritz Leiber. The hand-assembled print run of 1000 copies sold out in nine months. In the same year, Gygax hired Tim Kask to help make the transition of The Strategic Review to the fantasy periodical today known as Dragon Magazine with Gygax as author and later as columnist.

After the death of Kaye in 1976, his widow sold her shares to Gygax. Gygax then owned a controlling share of the whole partnership Tactical Studies Rules, and created TSR Hobbies, Inc. He sold it soon after to Brian Blume and his father Kevin because of money problems. The Blume family owned roughly two-thirds of TSR Hobbies by late 1976.

Tactical Studies Rules published the two first printings of the original D&D and TSR Hobbies, Inc. went on with the game.

A few years later a new version of D&D was created, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) (1977–9). The Monster Manual would be the first rule book of the new system. The new rules were not compatible with D&D. As a result, the D&D and AD&D had distinct product lines and expansions.

Gygax left TSR in 1985 during changes in TSR's management. Problems arose while Gary was preoccupied with making the CBS cartoon series Dungeons and Dragons.

After leaving TSR, Gygax created Dangerous Journeys, an advanced RPG spanning multiple genres containing almost every rule that Gary could think of. He began work in 1995 on a major new RPG, originally intended for a computer game, but in 1999 released as Lejendary Adventure which some consider to be his best work to date. A key part of its design was to keep the gaming rules as simple as possible, as Gygax felt that role playing games were becoming too complex and discouraged new users.

Gary Gaygax passed away March 4, 2008.

Pseudonyms: Garrison Ernst , EGG , E. Gary Gygax

Selected Bibiliography
Complete Bibliography

Novels

• Greyhawk Adventures Book 2: Artifact of Evil (1986)
• Sea of Death (1987)
• City of Hawks (1987)
• Dance of Deamons (1988)
• Come Endless Darkness (1988)
• Shrike: The Coming Avenger (1991)
• The Anubis Murders (1992)
• The Samarkand Solution (1993)
• Death in Delhi (1993)
• Monstrous Manual (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, 2nd Edition) (1993) with Doug Stewart and Bonvillain
• Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (1999)
• Gary Gygax's Extraordinary Book of Names (2004)
• Gary Gygax's Insidiae (2004)
• Castle Zagyg Part I: Yggsburgh (2004)
• Gary Gygax's Essential Places (2005)
• Gary Gygax's Nation Builder (2005) with Michael Varhola
• Castles & Crusades Castle Zagyg Dark Chateau: Gary Gygax's Castle Zagyg (Castles & Crusades) (2005)
• Gary Gygax's Living Fantasy: Gygaxian Fantasy Worlds, Vol. 2 (2006) with Matt Milberger and Brian Swartz and Jason Walton

Collections

• Night Arrant (1987) with Pamela O'Neill

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Images #1 from fantasticfiction.co.uk, #2 from archive.gamespy.com