How Gygax Lost TSR

[AGNKim]

A pretty fascinating and sad tale. I'd heard it all before, but this is probably the most insightful take on it I have ever read.

https://medium.com/@increment/the-ambus ... 29d07f6836

[tylermo]

Aarggh. This ancient computer won't display the link. Just a picture of some guy, and another icon or two. Otherwise, "done, but with errors" Oh well.

[Jyrdan Fairblade]

A sad tale, indeed. But Jon Peterson's knowledge and investigative skills are amazing, and I'm glad he documented this turning point in our hobby's history.

[Fiffergrund]

That filled in a couple of holes in my knowledge of those events. Very interesting read.

[Julian Grimm]

Interesting story. I have wondered what had happened over the loss of TSR to Williams and now it seems we know. The funny thing is that I cannot cast a role of hero or villain in the events. What I took away from it was that you have a company that grew too fast and the owners trying to ride the wave dealing with what had become a phenomenon.

The only real comment I have on the events is that it is something I have seen before where the owners cannot find a good compromise and some deeper business knowledge was needed. In the end what is done is done and it serves as a good lesson for other companies.

[seskis281]

The part that is really sad, though, is how Williams and TSR then went after Gary AFTER those events.... Dangerous Journeys and his efforts were derailed in a very vindictive way, and today there would be no way it would be seen as being covered under D&D proprietaries. It wasn't merely that they fought and won a corporate control war, that does indeed always seem to happen when companies succeed so wildly (Facebook anyone?) it was that they seemed intent on crushing the man personally.

[Arduin]

It is interesting that part of originally going underwater was printing costs. If D&D was started today (if you could overcome video games) Kickstarter and digital publishing (PDF's) could have changed the entire story...

[Julian Grimm]

The part that is really sad, though, is how Williams and TSR then went after Gary AFTER those events.... Dangerous Journeys and his efforts were derailed in a very vindictive way, and today there would be no way it would be seen as being covered under D&D proprietaries. It wasn't merely that they fought and won a corporate control war, that does indeed always seem to happen when companies succeed so wildly (Facebook anyone?) it was that they seemed intent on crushing the man personally.

I didn't comment on that part as I felt it did not pertain to the story above. However, you are correct. Williams seemed to have a personal vendetta against Gygax after he was removed from TSR and one that cost not only Gygax but GDW and ultimately TSR itself.

[Fiffergrund]

The part that is really sad, though, is how Williams and TSR then went after Gary AFTER those events.... Dangerous Journeys and his efforts were derailed in a very vindictive way, and today there would be no way it would be seen as being covered under D&D proprietaries. It wasn't merely that they fought and won a corporate control war, that does indeed always seem to happen when companies succeed so wildly (Facebook anyone?) it was that they seemed intent on crushing the man personally.

I wonder how much of that was his refusal to contribute any more IP to the brand?

[seskis281]

The part that is really sad, though, is how Williams and TSR then went after Gary AFTER those events.... Dangerous Journeys and his efforts were derailed in a very vindictive way, and today there would be no way it would be seen as being covered under D&D proprietaries. It wasn't merely that they fought and won a corporate control war, that does indeed always seem to happen when companies succeed so wildly (Facebook anyone?) it was that they seemed intent on crushing the man personally.

I wonder how much of that was his refusal to contribute any more IP to the brand?

Just a guess as I am not in the know but I would think Gary's resignation as an employee after being removed as CEO probably scared them... they certainly wanted to keep his name and creative endeavors under TSR for obvious reasons, and my best guess is they wanted to eliminate anything non-TSR with the name Gygax associated with it.

[Fiffergrund]

The part that is really sad, though, is how Williams and TSR then went after Gary AFTER those events.... Dangerous Journeys and his efforts were derailed in a very vindictive way, and today there would be no way it would be seen as being covered under D&D proprietaries. It wasn't merely that they fought and won a corporate control war, that does indeed always seem to happen when companies succeed so wildly (Facebook anyone?) it was that they seemed intent on crushing the man personally.

I wonder how much of that was his refusal to contribute any more IP to the brand?

Just a guess as I am not in the know but I would think Gary's resignation as an employee after being removed as CEO probably scared them... they certainly wanted to keep his name and creative endeavors under TSR for obvious reasons, and my best guess is they wanted to eliminate anything non-TSR with the name Gygax associated with it.

That has the ring of truth to it, guess or not. As soon as I read that there was a dispute as to the owner of all IP produced by writers for TSR, I had a feeling that's where it was going.

[Julian Grimm]

To me the William's era was a double edged sword. On one hand a lot of good material came from it. I still have fond memories of From the Ashes, Planescape, Tome of Magic and The Rules Cyclopedia. On the other hand we have the attacks on Gygax, the death of Greyhawk, a glut of repetitive material and the lawsuits.

One thing I have been thinking about is that had Gygax not been ousted there would not have been an SRD or an OGL and then there would not be a C&C. Yes, we may have seen Gygax's 2e, 3e and so on but we also have a large amount of D&D type games that do the job better than the originals. All in all I think all of this worked out for the best.

[Zudrak]

To me the William's era was a double edged sword. On one hand a lot of good material came from it. I still have fond memories of From the Ashes, Planescape, Tome of Magic and The Rules Cyclopedia. On the other hand we have the attacks on Gygax, the death of Greyhawk, a glut of repetitive material and the lawsuits.

One thing I have been thinking about is that had Gygax not been ousted there would not have been an SRD or an OGL and then there would not be a C&C. Yes, we may have seen Gygax's 2e, 3e and so on but we also have a large amount of D&D type games that do the job better than the originals. All in all I think all of this worked out for the best.

As soon as I heard the Underdark and Oriental Adventures material were going to appear on Faerun instead of Greyhawk, I was done with TSR. Even put the 2e books (PHB, DMG, & MM) on the shelf and kept using the 1e ones. I would buy modules for material on the two subjects I most looked forward to being fleshed out in GH, but that wasn't until many years later. At least the Gord books were still good -- even without the lovely Greyhawk logo on them after Book 2.