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Author Topic: Secrets of Blackmoor  (Read 6751 times)

secrets of blackmoor

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on: November 26, 2018, 12:51:23 PM
Hi there,
This is Griff, half of the directorial team for the upcoming documentary: Secrets of Blackmoor: The True History of Dungeons & Dragons.

I received an email from Brant Guillory, inviting me to come to your forum and talk a bit about the film project.

You can find a lot of info on our KickStarter Project Page, here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/secretsofblackmoor/secrets-of-blackmoor-the-true-history-of-dungeons

But that is a pretty trimmed down marketing style page.

Brant also suggested I could do an interview for the site, which gave me an odd idea. I can just post here, and everyone can interview me and ask questions that they want answered.

I can start by telling you that, we're kind of stupid. If you want to make a movie and get a lot of fans, then you logically would do a movie about Gary Gygax. What we did was just wrong. It goes against common sense if your goal is to make money. We wanted to know how RPG's came into existence. The people we chose to interview aren't really well known or famous. Basically, we're making a film about the outsiders of RPG history, and we're just a couple of unknown outsiders as well.

Except Chris, Chris has already consumed his 15 minutes of fame. That's Chris in the tree.


So yeah, I am here. I will check back. Ask me almost anything, and not just about gaming either. I love talking about film making too.

Griff



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Reply #1 on: November 26, 2018, 01:15:15 PM
Hello and welcome!

“O Lord God, let me not be disgraced in my old days.”

'We few, we happy few, we band of brothers'


bayonetbrant

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Reply #2 on: November 26, 2018, 01:53:26 PM
Hi Griff!  Glad you found us.  I'm going to bump this over to the Adventure Gaming area, and we'll point people to this thread once we get a little more coverage together :)

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secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #3 on: November 26, 2018, 05:36:59 PM
Oh man, I came back and could not find my post.

I was about to go Post-al and had a string of symbolic commentary ready (see Example A)

Example A: $*@@@#*##($))$$!!!!

Then I noticed a button that allows me to see my recent posts..

Just checking back.



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Reply #4 on: November 26, 2018, 06:37:10 PM
OK, so a couple of questions


the interviews with the now-deceased...  recorded?  text and read by someone else?

how are you planning to tie in Totten's Strategos into the longer history of the original Kriegsspiel going back to the 1820s?

no mention of Braunstein?

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secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #5 on: November 27, 2018, 03:03:32 PM
OK, so a couple of questions


the interviews with the now-deceased...  recorded?  text and read by someone else?

how are you planning to tie in Totten's Strategos into the longer history of the original Kriegsspiel going back to the 1820s?

no mention of Braunstein?

It depends on the person. In the case of Dave Arneson himself, we know of several recordings with him. Not all are available to us. We have an entire set of videos from the Dragons in the Basement Documentary, but we never got rights to use them; those just sit in our archive for historical purposes. We finally received a video which the Arneson estate sanction us to use. That is what you see in the trailer.

Some of the guys we did interviews with, were fairly ill and in later stages of their illness. We consider ourselves lucky to have spoken with Duane Jenkins, the third ever RPG ref in history. We also, are always touched when we review our interview with Pete Gaylord.

As to sources and connections, we hint at some rule concepts the Twin Cities gamers used. We are fairly critical of some contemporary writings on the history of RPG's because it is too easy to play a big game of connect the dots. This kind of "looks the same" thinking leads to assertions that, although seemingly strong, are often attacked by at least half of the historical community.

The Minnesota Gamers had one text that they used as their source for everything that followed, and that book is Strategos. So while it can inferred that they are essentially using Kriegspiel via tottn, they had never seen a copy as they created their numerous RPG style games. And of curse this sort of funneling of ideas is an important aspect of how the Minnesota gamers came up with their ideas.

I often like to look at ideas and concepts by using the same sort of terminology and research done with genetics. So, there is an idea and it is evolving, and there is admixture coming in as well. But the lack of complete access to all the texts on war gaming through history, creates genetic bottle necks. We know for a fact that Wesely, Maker, Scott, Clark, and Nicholson were central to the adoption of Strategos variants for their wargaming beginning with a time around 1963-64. This is when they find the text individually and check it out from the U of M library.

They never speak of Kriegspiel, except when talking in general terms about gaming and what they have learned since those early days. How big a change occurs in the wargame RPG, as we call it, from the time of kriegspiel on down through to Strategos? Can we talk about it with confidence? And in terms of making a film, sometimes you have to ignore the tiny details. Again, the movie is about the Twin Cities Gamers.

So a long explanation, to basically say: No we do not explore Kriegpsiel. But we have reasons for not doing so.

Of course if you go and read the forward to Strategos, and even the body text itself, there are references in there. I have only read it maybe twice. It is ponderous to read without the actual play pieces at hand, so you can examine how it works. I do know that one of our research guys is very well schooled on the subject, and even runs straight from the Book, Strategos games. Of course, we also have David Wesely, who is in the film and is also one of the most versed Strategos scholars you could find.

You can say the same thing about Modern War in Miniature. We know that Wesely was aware of the game. I have letters were he speaks of it. Yet, people today do not understand that it was actually difficult to get copies of many games. Wesely says he knew of it, but hadn't gotten a copy yet. The one detail, I would like to know, is exactly what was the print run on MWIM? 500 copies? 1000?

And I had to get my own copy, not cheap for a perplexing little book, and study it closely to see how it was using RPG methodology during play. One of the things I discovered on reading that text, is that it is not clear how many players are in a game. It could simply be 2 players with a referee. The use of MWIM as a multi player game, may be something introduced by the actual users. How many groups were doing multi player minis games?

And then, it is implied that somehow this is an infusion into Wesely's Braunstein. The two or so distinctly mechanically different, as well the difference in scope for the players, that I think you have to seprate them. All you can do is say that it is parallel development.

I hope that helps you understand our views on these things, Griff

It is unfortunate that you moved this discussion here, as this first movie has so much about wargaming in it.



« Last Edit: November 27, 2018, 03:09:53 PM by secrets of blackmoor »



secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #6 on: November 29, 2018, 01:19:42 PM
Just to show yo the scope of the film - We have a new video update!

We're struggling to reach people. We are the underdog D&D movie.

So here is an update. If you you like it, please share it with your gamer friends. :)

Bob Meyer is in this video talking about his experiences with being unknown, having been there at the beginning of RPG's and also just gaming fun in general.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/secretsofblackmoor/secrets-of-blackmoor-the-true-history-of-dungeons/posts/2356094




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Reply #7 on: November 29, 2018, 01:39:57 PM
(shared through our FB page...)

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bayonetbrant

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Reply #8 on: December 02, 2018, 10:39:40 AM
some info on Strategos and it's place in the Kriegsspiel pantheon

http://grogheads.com/featured-posts/7212

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secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #9 on: December 02, 2018, 04:34:58 PM
To be honest the KickStarter is a distraction. I;d rather be editing the movie. :P

Pardon my fast appearance and disappearance as I add this...

We broke down and dropped the 35 minute GaryCon Draft on youtube.



secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #10 on: December 03, 2018, 01:41:25 AM
some info on Strategos and it's place in the Kriegsspiel pantheon

http://grogheads.com/featured-posts/7212

Well done article. Thanks.



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Reply #11 on: December 03, 2018, 06:08:28 AM
going to try to watch some of that video while catching up on email at work today :)

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secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #12 on: December 03, 2018, 01:08:26 PM
Whew, this is place is so much more mellow. I was on another forum. The resident trolls were on the prowl. It's hilarious because they are so blatant in trying to provoke the admins to shut down the thread about the movie.



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Reply #13 on: December 03, 2018, 01:13:43 PM
Whew, this is place is so much more mellow.

It's been a slow couple days.

Being able to Google shit better than your clients is a legit career skill.


secrets of blackmoor

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Reply #14 on: December 04, 2018, 12:21:20 PM
As I was rereading here. I realized I had overlooked your question about Bruanstein.

I have trouble reading things online and miss things, sorry about that. I often re read to make sure I did not do what I did.

Oh man. I can't say enough about Bruanstein. In fact, 24 minutes of the film covers Braunstein. And then there is a small section, maybe 5 minutes, about Brown Stone.

Perhaps the greatest problem working on a movie is that you are limited on time. We have a lot of cool interview clips where the guys talk about John Snider's Sci FI campaign from 1972.