Post originally by Strephon Alkhalikoi at 2004-05-17 22:23:22
Converted from Phorums BB System

Does the reviewer have any idea of the game he is reviewing? The very first edition of Dungeons & Dragons that he is reviewing came as a boxed set, with books 1-3 in it and a reference sheet. It's not like AD&D, where you can review the Player's Handbook seperately from the Dungeon Master's Guide, and then do a further review on the Monster Manual.

Let me put this simply: It's a boxed set, and the reviewer, in attempting to review each book in the boxed set seperately, has shown that he has absolutely no idea as to how boxed sets work. This severely impacts his credibility, to the tune of totally eliminating it.

Other issues that I encountered in this review:

" New rules are bizarrely specific (dragons can be subdued, but orcs can’t?)."

It's not bizarre. Why would you want to subdue an orc? It's not as if they're going to earn you any money. A subdued dragon has inherently more value than an orc. Besides, if you really wanted to subdue an orc, there's nothing in the rules that says that you can't! This to me seems to be a 3d Edition type of mindset, where everything has to be balanced and politically correct to be acceptable.

"Unlike vol. 1, this volume cannot stand alone; you need vol. 1 to use vol. 2."

Considering that they came in the same box, this is a no brainer. A box set works like this: you get multiple books in one box, and you use them together. Simple concept, easily grasped. Except the reviewer seems to have missed the concept.

"However, playing with Men & Magic alone would be limited to a low fantasy, magic-poor campaign."

Not to mention creatureless. Perhaps that's because the books aren't meant to stand alone, but work together? The reviewer seems to forget that in the case of the D&D boxed set he is reviewing, the seperate components are all required to make a cohesive whole. Perhaps that is why they were boxed together?

For an example of how such a review of OD&D should have been conducted, I would recommend taking a look at the review I drafted for the small press game Space Infantry, a game broken up into three books just like Original Dungeons & Dragons (http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_7507.html).

I would rate the review itself as follows:

Style: 1
Substance: 1

The factual errors, the skewed misconceptions, and the author's lack of credibility would have made me give zeros for style and substance, if zeros were a valid number in RPG.net's rating scale.