Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon Master's Guide [Hardcover]

Gary Gygax (Author), David D. Sutherland III (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1995

Special Reference Work: a Compiled Volume of Information Primarily Used by Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Game Referees, Including Combat Tables, Monster Lists and Encounters, Treasure and Magic Tables and Descriptions, Random Dungeon Generation, Random Wilderness Terrain Generation, Suggestions on Gamemastering, and More.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 238 pages
• Publisher: TSR Games; Revised edition (1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0935696024
• ISBN-13: 978-0935696028
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #42,477 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 1979 printing is one of Gygax's finest, May 1, 2000

By 

Kent David Kelly "Author & Anthologist" (Denver, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon Master's Guide (Hardcover)

Here's the ultimate version of the DMG for Gygax purists. You get all of the charm, advice, and "dark stuff" that was frowned upon as being "too esoteric" in the cleaner versions to come... Highlights include classic illustrations, using monsters as PCs, assassins and the use of poison, tribal spell casters (makes those giants and orcs a lot more interesting!), magic items with XP AND GOLD PIECE values (WHY did they stop doing this? WHY? ), old school psionics (for all those Illithids in GDQ1-7), the original "down to the last hit point" monster XP value charts, building NPCs and evocative dungeon settings the "Gygax way," player creation of spells and magic items, and much more; my personal favorite touch is the endless extolling of the virtues of encouraging the PCs in the early levels, while only a few pages later, we're treated to a graphic depiction of a game in progress that STRONGLY implies it's good to kill the PCs at 1st level, even if they do everything right... :) (see pp. 97-100) Hehe! A highly recommended pride piece for your retro-AD&D collection.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Play 3rd edition all you want...but this is the best..., March 19, 2003

By 

FBRobertson "fbrobertson2" (SC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon Master's Guide (Hardcover)

Yes I roleplay 3rd edition, but I know that this ... the 1st edition AD&D is the best there is. The rules are simple but strong enough to provide hours and hours of games. I would suggest that you get this and the player's manual (and the Monster manual 1 and 2 from G.G.). Have hours of fun in this game.

What's good about this game manual for DMs is that there are so many suggestions, explorations of the different faces of the game, enough to make the DM ready for most anything the players might throw at him.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Imaginative First Edition, if almost unplayable in places, June 30, 2008

By 

Dmitri M. A. Hubbard (Hong Kong) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon Master's Guide (Hardcover)

This is a fantastic book, if purely because it shows the roaming imagination of Gary Gygax. Future editions of the game have cut down on the unplayable aspects of the first edition (with elegant variations in bonuses tables for different ability scores, impossibly low level limits for various non-human characters, terrible encumbrance tables, etc) but the first edition contains a darker side which feeds the imagination and was supported by a fantastic group of modules. Worth getting whether you play 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 3.5 or 4th edition as it contains plenty of detail on roleplaying and random things of interest. Almost like an unedited journey through Gygax's head.