I'm glad I finally got to meet him in person at Gencon last year.  Certainly one of the most influential people in my life, if only for the amount of time and money I spent on his products!

I really don't think this is something to be too maudlin about guys. What EGG has given us can never be taken away. Where ever there is a battered set of three rulebooks, a sheet of graph paper, a handful of polyhedron dice, and more than a couple people with imaginations, his legacy will live on.

Interesting how maybe half the funnest memories of my life are things that happened around the table, or with people I gamed with...since 1978 the game he created has been a constant and reassuring presence in my life.  Even though I'm watering up a bit here, no tears for me. The game will go on.

Mike B.

Mars wrote:Sad news indeed!  I never did get a chance to meet him and that will probably be a bit of a regret - I figured I would make it to Lake Geneva Con or GenCon soon.  A couple of years ago, he was up at a con in Toronto that I was at but he wasn't around the Troll Lord booth when I was around so I missed him.  

I'm welling up here a bit too and feel his loss.  He will be missed.

I remember that day...I really regret not going back the next to meet Gary.  It was the only reason I went.  (But at least I got to meet Mars.)

For news junkies like myself, I'll add that reports are beginning to come in. Here's Wired News, for example:

http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/03 ... y-gyg.html

I would expect dozens of sites will have reported the news by this evening.

Xaxaxe wrote:For news junkies like myself, I'll add that reports are beginning to come in. Here's Wired News, for example:

http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/03 ... y-gyg.html

I would expect dozens of sites will have reported the news by this evening.

CNN picked up an AP news feed earlier today:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/03/04/obit ... index.html

Also, Wizards actually put up a pretty nice tribute:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dn ... ND062006FP

I am really at a loss for words myself. I am not usually emotional, but I can't remember ever getting so choked about a person that I never met in person before.  The world is a worse off place today than it was yesterday.

Paul over on the yog-sothoth forum had been scheduled to interview Gary Gygax for their next "Yog Radio" episode.

I sent him a PM that it might be nice after a suitable period of time for him to interview people close to Gary to preserve those memories.

Anybody here in the fan world that has connections to anybody that had been close to Gary might suggest that they contact Paul to see what can be done as a nostalgia/memorial Yog Radio episode.

Jason

i just got back in from running...it still hasnt sunk in - truly strange.

since a kid, i have always had an active imagination and D&D gave me that avenue to truly let rip. that is something the guy gave me and i will be forever thankful for that.

after all the many years, i got to meet him at GenCon last year. was a fabulous 5 minutes. they were all getting ready to go and i asked if i could have a few minutes with him as i had come all the way from england and the Gary said "sure". he asked ME, if we could talk about england!!!! didnt even cover anything RPG !!!!

he even signed my book "To Alan from Old Blighty" and commented that he would like to go back over there someday.

alas it wasnt to be.

feel totally gutted here

Al

I met Gary a couple times. Here in Michigan at Wintercon and at Michicon. I had a nice conversation with him both times and he came off as "just a guy" who cared about who and what he was talking about. I was on the MDG staff at the time and we simply talked about the convention.

I did not run into him again (many years later) until he was promoting Dangerous Journeys at Gen Con. I struck up a conversation and mentioned I had talked to him before. He actually remembered who I was and lamented over the estrangement that split TSR from the Michigan conventions. Of course, it had nothing to do with him - but it showed how much he cared about the hobby.

He really was a great guy. I would have liked to have had a chance to sit down and talked to him. Forget gaming with him; just to talk about the game and the stuff most of us never hear about.

It is a sad day for the hobby. I think his passing from the gaming scene is more significant that we may realize today. He was larger than life in the industry - whether he always acknowledged that or not - he will be missed.

I just finished reading the thread, the one at Troll Lord, the CNN article, the WotC page, and still I'm staring, a bit disoriented, at the screen. On one side, I know very clearly that this is not going to affect my life at all, but I also know that I'm gonna be sad for a while.

Ok, I knew that whatever I would write would have been quite stupid. Sorry for the rant.

Xaxaxe wrote:Great idea. And, for those who haven't given it a shot yet, there's not going to be a better time to test-drive the chat room and see if you like it.

I'll be there. Despite my brave words earlier I haven't got a thing done today after reading the news.  It's to my wife's credit when she called a from work this afternoon, she asked why I sounded a little sniffly, I told her the news, she understood completely.  She even suggested the same thing "Why don't you and your online friends get together on the chat tonight?"  I couldn't have put it better. Let's have a group hug.  

Mike B.