Looks awesome, but too

[Lord Dynel]

I've got it on preorder at my FLGS (yes, playing full retail...a small price to pay for brick-and-mortar support, in my opinion) as I do all the upcoming Wizards reprints. My wife's going to pick it up and wrap it up for one of my Xmas presents.

[Frost]

The Amazon deal got me... pre-ordered.

[Relaxo]

...
The bigger issue is simply the fact the rules are not well organized. ... I presume it was far less expensive at the time to print one book that detailed the rule changes (Supplement I: Greyhawk) than to typeset all new books. It wasn't until Holmes that there was sufficient money to allow for such a rewrite. TSR pared the rewrite down to 48 pages though and marketed it as an introductory product. The full results of the rewrite would not appear until AD&D, a couple of years later.
...

hey, thanks for the clear explanation of all that.
I'd say, like Tree, just get S&W or even Delving Deeper. They are great to read and play right out of the box. very clearly organized.

That phrase, "well organized" (or something like it) was all over the sales pitches for S&W from the get go.

Of course, you could just play C&C

[serleran]

Chainmail may not be "needed" but it is fundamental to understanding how combat, among others, are intended to work... at least, if you don't want to use the Supplements. Also, it helps explain a lot of things from S&S.

[Litzen Tallister]

The bigger issue is simply the fact the rules are not well organized. We're talking the beginning of the hobby here, and I presume it was far less expensive at the time to print one book that detailed the rule changes (Supplement I: Greyhawk) than to typeset all new books. It wasn't until Holmes that there was sufficient money to allow for such a rewrite. TSR pared the rewrite down to 48 pages though and marketed it as an introductory product. The full results of the rewrite would not appear until AD&D, a couple of years later.

Even with refinement, I think the D&D/AD&D product didn't really hit a good deal of coherency and clear organization until 2nd edition. That being said, I started out OD&D and then shortly after 1st edition AD&D, so the organizational issues never stood out too much until I started reading the 1st edition reprints. However, one of the members of my D&D group, upon reading the 1st edition AD&D PHB, was shocked at how it was put together in comparison to 4th edition, which was the edition with which he was familiar.

However, the boxed set reprint looks fairly nice, at least in the mockup that's been created. Unfortunately, with the limited time out there, I don't forsee it getting a whole lot of play, since my D&D group, the DM has planned to dabble in 1st edition until D&D Next comes out and then potentially make the jump there. And, my other, C&C group is going to stay a C&C group. But, it would be nice to see the reprinted materials as I do not own any of the OD&D materials (in the grand divvying of childhood belongings, my twin brother got the OD&D stuff).

[Traveller]

The focus of the two editions is completely different. 1st Edition focused on adventures while 2d focused on characters, support, and GMs. As a result, based upon the focus I would consider both editions to be fairly well organized. But 2d, despite being sanitized compared to 1st (no half-orcs, assassins, demons or devils), doesn't have Unearthed Arcana. That book is broken, schizophrenic, and reviled by gamers today for the changes it wrought to the game. Worse was that it had to exist in order for TSR to stave off bankruptcy due to mismanagement. Remove UA from the 1st Edition lineup and you have a very cohesive ruleset.

Supplement I: Greyhawk and UA brought changes to the game. The difference is that Supplement I's changes were for the better, while UA's changes were for the worse.

[alcyone]

Chainmail may not be "needed" but it is fundamental to understanding how combat, among others, are intended to work... at least, if you don't want to use the Supplements. Also, it helps explain a lot of things from S&S.

It seems like nearly 40 years later, some blog or another must have the dozen lines or so from Chainmail that are crucial enumerated in a document. Though it seems we are still to this day unearthing gems from it.