Classic D&D Cache: Brother-in-Law Gets House, I Get “Junk”

Recently, my brother-in-law moved into a new house. The owner told him to just throw out some old boxes of junk left there. My brother-in-law spotted books and papers that said D&D. Would I want to look through them before they throw them out?

Yes. Yes, I would. The “junk” turned out to be an awesome, classic Dungeons & Dragons hoard. Here’s a rundown of the main items with pictures.

The Red D&D Basic Rule Book

I must admit, my heart jumped when I pulled this book out of the box. This was my first D&D rule book. Actually, I still have mine.

However, this one is in much better condition. The person who owned it was certainly older than me when he received it. As a child, I drew in mine and colored in all the pictures.

Side Note:

When I discovered my childhood D&D characters, I found a character named Borg. I was very proud of my 10-year-old self for coming up with such an amazing name. However, as I flipped through the basic rule book, I realized I stole it. Well, it’s still a cool name.

 

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition

By some quirk of fate, I never owned these books, until now. In fact, to this day I have never really played AD&D 2nd Edition. Once, a friend walked me through creating a character. However, we were never able to play.

I remember looking at these books in the local hobby shop and dreaming about dragons and dungeons. They were simply too expensive for me to buy, and they were too complex for me to get many friends interested.

Also, this was the era of West End Games D6 Star Wars RPG. I could explain the rules to my friends in 20 minutes and make characters in another 20. Everyone knew and loved the setting.

In addition, WEG’s supplements were incredible. It made sense to invest in them instead of D&D. But now I own “well-loved” copies of the Player’s Handbook and the Dungeon Master’s Guide (1st Ed.), and I couldn’t be happier.

Dungeon Geomorphs

This is a fantastic book. It has not been written in and still contains the dungeon and cave grid maps.

D&D Adventures and Maps

Oh man, I have a lot of reading to do. My players will most likely get a lot of old-school material woven into whatever I’m running in the near future. By the way, the artwork is incredible. It is no wonder I fell in love with Dungeons & Dragons when I was a kid.

Al-Qadim: Cities of Bone Box Set

All the original books and maps from the box set appear to be here. I know the setting still has hardcore fans, so I’m looking forward to reading it.

Monstrous Compendium Appendix

There are tons of notebook sheets of monsters (not pictured). These are well-used and marked up. Not sure what to do with them yet.

Someone’s Treasure

It’s sad to think that the original owner no longer wanted these treasures, and they were destined for the trash. Fortunately, I rescued them from that horrible fate.

I can only imagine the incredible adventures a group of friends created with these books and supplements. I hope they are still off adventuring somewhere today.