Where Can You Get 1st Edition Dungeons & Dragons Books?
Getting into earlier RPG games can be a lot of fun, but where do you get copies of the books to play with?
Recently, I posted on Notes a photo of the core four books I need to play 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. These books have been with me since I was a kid, and I finally decided to return to them full time after having played 5th edition for a few years. The new editions are well-made and very playable, but after much thought, I started to see that I preferred the structure of 1st editions. It’s hard for me to separate the “why” from nostalgia for the game of my childhood, but I am not going to dissect it further, and I am just going to enjoy the game.
If you are interested in playing earlier editions of D&D, you used to be able to run to a used book store and pick them up for a song. Nowadays, though, the prices have gone through the roof, with original books often going for over $100 and higher in better condition. Fortunately, options exist online to get add these books to your shelf. DriveThruRPG has every book from 1st Edition you would need to play and all of them are available as a PDF for those who like digital, or you can go print-on-demand. I have had a great experience with their printed books, each one I have gotten has been good quality, maybe even better than the originals. It allows me to use the books at the gaming table while I used my original books for personal research and session planning.
If you really need to get vintage copies of the books, you can save some money by trying to find a lot. Just make sure to check the condition, especially on Unearthed Arcana, the binding on those could be rough. If you do get a double of a book, buying them this way, feel free to send them to me. I will always make room on my shelf for more.
(If you have retro finds you would like for me to share, I want to hear them. What old useful website are still lurking on the web? Some old TV show streaming online? Old tech being brought back? Let me know.)
ONE COOL VIDEO
Dungeons & Dragons seems pretty well accepted nowadays, but that wasn’t always the case. You can still find evidence of the crusade against it during the time that most people lump into the “Satanic Panic.” Here is a report from Canada that is trying to get to the bottom of this whole Dungeons & Dragons thing. What I love about these videos, isn’t the discussion of fear, but the fact that they often include footage from gaming sessions. They really take me back to my childhood. The kid with the Dungeon Master hat, Daniel Green, is particularly awesome.
TEN THINGS RETRO
🎥 Movie - In 1964, before he was lighting the world on fire in The Doors, a very clean-cut Jim Morrison made an appearance in a film for the University of Florida.
📀 Physical Media - If you are a buyer of physical media, you have probably been noticing the ever-growing price of vinyl records. That is because they are now more than expensive than ever.
🕹️ Video Game - Most people remember the Atari 2600, and while that might be the best-selling console, the Atari 7800 was their second most popular console, and it has an interesting history.
🏋️♀️ Fitness - If you owned an Intellivision Keyboard Component, you could have gotten in shape with Jack LaLanne's Physical Conditioning. It might seem simple by modern standards, but this was actually cutting-edge at the time.
⭐ Celebrity - In the latter half of the Twentieth Century, Andy Warhol and Frank Zappa were major contributors to the arts and pop culture. They also did not like each other.
📚 Archiving - A big part of education used to be filmstrips. Sadly, they are quickly being forgotten and even more quickly disappearing. Thankfully, some people are trying to do something about that.
🖍️ Crayons - Any time is a great time for crayons, but with back to school around the corner, here is a great article about how Crayola make crayons.
🥣 Cereal - Corn Flakes were invented as a health food in 1894. The original recipe for their creation still exists, and surprisingly the end result is not that different from the ones we can buy today.
🕹️ Video Game - In 1980, Nintendo licensed its Game & Watch title, Time Out, to Mego. When Mego advertised the game on television, it became the first sort of Nintendo product to be advertised on American television.
🎥 Movie - A new movie is coming out this fall that will dramatize how Saturday Night Live got on the air. It has a great cast, a solid subject, and the trailer makes it look compelling.
SUBSTACK RECOMMENDATION
Why Rediscovered Realms? Because, I love pouring through the vintage RPG books, magazines, and ephemera. It makes me so happy to find someone else who enjoys it as much as I do.
FROM THE RETROIST ARCHIVE
Let's take a moment to look back at four posts from the Retroist's past. I have been at this a long time.
One Year Ago…
🎥 WPIX Revenge of the Creature in 3D
Five Years Ago…
🩸 Monkey’s Blood (Mercurochrome) for those boo-boos
Ten Years Ago…
🍍 The Great Dole Pineapple Orange Juice Mistake
Fifteen Years Ago…
🎙️ Retroist Knight Rider Podcast
Gaming is a weird beast among the nerdly arts. There isn't a big secondary collector's market, but a lot of sellers keep trying to start one. If you want original copies of old AD&D books keep looking. You'll eventually find affordable ones. They might not be in pristine shape, but they'll be usable. Game book prices are all over the map. I've often gone looking through ebay and found like, two dozen auctions for a book I wanted priced over $100, and one in the middle at $15. DTRpg.com is a great option. There are also a lot of old school D&D "retroclones;" streamlined versions of pretty much every edition of the old game. "Iron Falcon" is a decent stripped down AD&D clone, if someone wants just a taste.
D&D is one of my happiest memories from my teen years, and I keep meaning to play again. (Over Zoom?) I have my old books thank goodness, but I’d love to get a DMs Guide and some modules—what a great use for print on demand!