Dragon Warriors

I wasn't part of the dragwars online community, but I remember the first time I laid eyes on a copy of the purple covers was in a second hand record store in Glasgow, Scotland. They sold it to me for 45p UK. It was an amazing find, with all the other 4 books cept' 6 for the same price. Took me years to build up my collection, the final book I got was 6 from a public library.

Now that I have the pdf version I guess I could afford to lose my collection, but for a long while it was one of my most treasured possessions.

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And so the show begins!!!
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/dwp ... ssages/640

Book 5 was one I did find difficult - the story I have heard is that here in Australia, it's title (The Power of Darkness) and cover made bookshops reluctant to carry it in the face of the "Dungeons and Dragons is satanic" panic that was around at the time, and so it got a much more limited release than the other books. But my local library did have a copy which I had on loan as often as I could (they would only let you renew a loan twice before having to return it and if anybody reserved it, you couldn't renew it at all, so I occasionally had to give it back to them).

When I was in my early teens, my main stomping grounds on Saturday mornings (when I wasn't dealing with school) was a small area in the central activity area of Frankston (the suburb of Melbourne I grew up in and still live in). There was one block that contained the library, the only book shop in Frankston (Robinsons Bookshop) and just around the corner, the local games shop, Mind Games. I'd been trying to get a copy of Book 5 for years - having it on order at Robinsons, but they just couldn't get it. One morning I walked into Mind Games - and was stunned to see a copy of Book 5 on the rack with the Fighting Fantasy books. I sprinted back to the library to beg some money from my father, desperately worried that the copy would be sold in the few short minutes I wasn't there. Luckily it wasn't.

Over the years I picked up spare copies of the books in op shops and other second hand bookshops, but I never saw spares of Book 5. I gave away some of my spares in 1993 when I played in a Dragon Warriors campaign being run at a dedicated gaming venue being run out of a near derelict building in Melbourne (Gamers In The State, or GITS - it lasted about a year - the near derelict building is now what looks like a very nice hotel) and then after I started dragwars, I responded to other people who were looking for books by selling my spares at the price I'd paid for them plus postage. But Book 5s were still rare. Then one day, I went to Dandenong (a suburb about half an hour from my home) and in the space of less than half an hour found two copies of Book 5, one in a second hand bookshop, the other at the Dandenong Market. One of them seemed to be the library copy I had borrowed for years, now cancelled. I passed these on to people seeking them on the list.

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Life and Death Are Only a Dice Roll Away!

Shaun Hately
co-author A Weak Pleasure
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide

IIRC WH Smiths in Aberystwyth where I was studying biochemistry. It was close to the beginning of my 20-year gaming pause, but I loved the feel of the game so much I couldn't say no.

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Visit Tales from Karickbridge on Obsidian Portal, oh and Savage Legend - The Blog

Did you know that Book 5 was easily available to buy through UK school book clubs during the eighties? No kidding!

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Show me the mythic legends, mighty heroes and mysterious faerie creatures!

Your book clubs were cooler than ours. The only time I ever remember seeing anything even semi-gaming related in a school book club here when I was getting them as a kid (1980-1986) was one Fighting Fantasy book, once. And I already had it.

Today, the school book clubs are more gamer friendly - at least for computer games. My students all seem to want to order Minecraft books.

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Life and Death Are Only a Dice Roll Away!

Shaun Hately
co-author A Weak Pleasure
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide

Book 5 was the FIRST dragon warriors book I ever bought.

I was 13 years old, and the only bookstore in the small town I grew up in had a smallish D&D section. The dragon warriors books, were, of course, with the teen paperbacks instead.

After a week, we'd worked out we needed the other books, so I ordered in books 1 and 2 that arrived a month later... Book 3 seemed easy, Book 4 required a trip to the Big City 3 hours away, and I only managed to get Book 6 (and replacements for books 1 & 2) in small second hand book stores when I moved up to the Central North Island 10 years ago. I had lent the first two books to a friend and I got them back in very poor condition.

Now, however, these three books have school library stamps inside the front cover...

I found my first two copies of book 5 in newsagents, I may have just been lucky but I saw it a few times in country SA.

Since then I've picked up all the old books quite a few times in second hand stores. I've given away a few sets over the years to needy folks.

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co-author Fury of the Deep
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide
co-author Cold Fury
co-author Cadaver Draconis
co-author Ordo Draconis 1 and 2.

Finding gamebooks back in the 80s was like shooting fish in a barrel - you couldn't turn around without falling over a new title every month. Obviously, there were the FF books, which were available in my local newsagencies (no fancy 'bookshops' until the mid 80s graced my country Victorian town). Proteus and Warlock magazine at the local newsagency. Basically, all the big name series - GrailQuest, Lone Wolf, Demonspawn all at the newagency. I will say that the Golden Dragon books were at my local K-Mart which was different.

Same with DW - at the local newsagency for all of them, except for Book 6 which I purchased from Minotaur in 1989 I think when they were in Elizabeth St.

The rise of the chain bookstores here in Oz killed all that - nice in some ways, sad in others.

Of course, being the mercenary bastard that I am, whenever I saw any of the books in 2nd hand stores, I immediately slapped them on to ebay - got good money for Book 5, but gave another copy to a mate for cover price about ten years ago.

Memories...

My experience was a little different. I bought book 2 and 3 thinking they were adventure gamebooks back in 1985; I only had the dimmest awareness of roleplaying games, but when the penny finally dropped I realised I needed book 1 for it all to make sense. That proved quite difficult, and I got book 5 because my mum spotted it in a bookshop and thought it was the elusive DW numero uno I was frantically seeking. Needless to say, I was disappointed, and it was some time before I found the real thing.

Cheers,

-Kyle

I bought all the books as they came out from either Minotaur Books or Mind Games in the Melbourne CBD. Never realized that Book 5 was rarer than the others. It was my least favorite of the books as my group quickly saw that elementalists were far too weak. By contrast, I remember an entire week of excitement when I got book 6 and the world of Legend was revealed.

Man, it was great to visit the gamestore in those days. It was a trip I'd make maybe once a month and there were always unexpected gems to find. If you hadn't seen advertisements in Dragon Magazine or the like new products would drop totally out of the blue, and something like Book 6 was better than sex, drugs and rock'n'roll all put together, to my 15 year old mind.