Merry B/Xmas!
Give Moldvay Basic to a 10-year-old "adult" in your life
Season’s greetings, fellow B/X players!
Many gamers who played Moldvay Basic when it was new received it for Christmas in the early 1980s.
It’s difficult or impossible to pin down an exact shipping date for the revised Basic Set. TSR is no more, and if the records still exist, Wizards of the Coast isn’t sharing them.
But Tom Moldvay gives us a small clue in the rule book itself. He dates the introduction “December 3, 1980.” Making today “B/Xmas.” :)
The front of the Basic rule book states:
“The Original Fantasy Role Playing Game For 3 or More Adults, Ages 10 and Up.”
TSR and Moldvay understood kids are vital to a healthy hobby.
Would you like to spread simple, immersive fantasy role-playing to a new generation? Consider giving the gift you may have received yourself.
Moldvay Basic has been available in .PDF form on DriveThruRPG for a decade1. We’re still waiting for the print-on-demand version. But at 64 pages, Basic is short enough to print out and place in a binder. You can easily give it to a new player in both .PDF and print.
After almost 45 years, there’s still no more concise, evocative intro to the game than Moldvay Basic. Please pass it along!
Feel free to share this post or to use the B/Xmas card graphic for non-commercial purposes.
Happy holiday adventuring, and merry B/Xmas to one and all!
Care to share how you first encountered Moldvay Basic? Please comment!
1 Neither I nor B/X Bandits has any commercial relationship with DriveThruRPG or Wizards of the Coast. I just want to help Moldvay Basic and B/X thrive in their original incarnations.
Thanks for sharing! I got Moldvay one summer. I think it was the summer of '82, before I started 7th grade. My older brother had introduced by to a "DIY" version of D&D based on his recollections of what he learned at a sleepover with his friends. I was blown away by the entire concept, and Moldvay made it all "click" for me.
OSE is great. So glad it's brought B/X back to such prominence in the gaming community. :)
I cut my RPG teeth on Moldvay Basic- got it Christmas '81 when I was 10 years old. Also got the Atari 2600 on the same Christmas- definitely my favorite Christmas ever. I moved on to AD&D within a couple of years and fell out of the hobby entirely for over 20 years but have been occasionally DMing using OSE for my kids and nephews for the last couple of years.