Blackmoor (supplement)

• 1. Introduction

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  Blackmoor, a sixty-page digest-sized booklet published by TSR, Inc. in 1975, quietly slipped into the hands of tabletop gamers carrying something no rulebook had ever carried before: the first role-playing game adventure ever published. Written by Dave Arneson, the man who had been running his own fantasy campaign since the first quarter of 1971, it arrived late, edited in a hurry, and under a title that promised a rich portrait of Arneson's legendary game world. What listeners will find, though, is a supplement that delivered almost none of that world and yet changed the game in half a dozen unexpected directions. Why did it arrive late? Who shaped its final form? And what exactly is a monk doing in a dungeon? Those are the questions this documentary will answer.

• 2. Arneson's Campaign World

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  Dave Arneson's Blackmoor campaign had its roots in the first quarter of 1971, making it one of the earliest ongoing fantasy role-playing campaigns ever run. When the original Dungeons and Dragons rulebooks appeared, Gary Gygax and Arneson agreed to publish expansions drawn from their own respective campaigns. For Gygax, that meant Greyhawk; for Arneson, it meant Blackmoor. The booklet was named after that campaign world, yet it includes almost no information about Arneson's version of that world. The supplement bears the official designation Supplement II and the TSR product number 2004, placing it squarely in the foundational library of the game's original edition, with Gygax's Greyhawk preceding it in the same year as Supplement I.

• 3. A Troubled Publication

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  In March 1975, Gary Gygax told a wargaming newsletter that Arneson was working on a final draft, and TSR began accepting preorders and advertising the product in The Strategic Review. The booklet did not arrive on schedule. It passed through two editors, Brian Blume and Tim Kask, and was temporarily misplaced at some point in the process. The final edit was done hastily, completed in only a few weeks. Tim Kask, who served as the supplement's editor, also did development work on it. Illustrations by David C. Sutherland III, Mike Bell, and Tracy Lesch fill out its pages. Some of the underwater monsters and magic items that ended up in the final text were contributed by Steve Marsh, added specifically to compensate for material by Arneson that did not survive the editorial process.

• 4. New Character Classes

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  Blackmoor added two new character classes to Dungeons and Dragons, each defined by a specific hybrid identity. The assassin was introduced as a sub-class of the thief, while the monk was described as a "monastic martial arts" sub-class of the cleric, intended to blend qualities of both the fighter and the thief. A third character type, the Sage, also appeared in the book's initial design, but the editor reclassified it as a Non-Player Character and moved it toward the back of the booklet. These class additions gave players new mechanical identities to inhabit, including one that drew directly on martial arts archetypes rarely seen in fantasy gaming up to that point.

• 5. Underwater and Combat Rules

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  Blackmoor introduced a full section devoted to underwater adventuring, covering swimming guidelines, equipment weight restrictions when fighting beneath the surface, and the effects of underwater conditions on weapons and spells. Numerous new water-dwelling monsters and items useful for underwater play accompanied these rules. The supplement also brought in a hit location system that assigned individual hit points to each body part of a character or monster. The odds of striking any particular body part changed based on the attacker's height and weapon reach, and if any single body part was reduced to zero hit points, the creature would be crippled or killed. A section on diseases rounded out the more clinical additions to the game's mechanical toolkit.

• 6. The Temple of the Frog

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  Tucked inside Blackmoor's sixty pages is The Temple of the Frog, the first role-playing game adventure ever published. Its presence alone gives the supplement a place in gaming history separate from any rule it introduced. Years after the original printing, The Temple of the Frog was revised and expanded, eventually published as a standalone product under the designation DA2 Temple of the Frog. That later release gave the scenario a second life and a broader audience, long after the original Blackmoor supplement had done its quiet, unassuming work of establishing the adventure module as a form.

• 7. The 2013 Reprint

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  On the 19th of November 2013, Blackmoor returned to print as part of a premium deluxe reprint of the original White Box, housed in new packaging inside an oaken box. The set included all three core volumes, Men and Magic, Monsters and Treasure, and Underworld and Wilderness Adventures, alongside all four supplements: Greyhawk, Blackmoor, Eldritch Wizardry, and Gods, Demi-Gods and Heroes. Each booklet received new cover art while keeping its original interior illustrations intact, meaning the work of David C. Sutherland III, Mike Bell, and Tracy Lesch reached a new generation of readers unchanged.