Atlas   Rules   Resources   Adventures   Stories       FAQ   Search   Links



Untangling the Worlds of Basic D&D

by Travis Henry

Worlds which have been depicted with BASIC D&D (not counting Original D&D):

As you can see, I'm not a lumper. I wish for each distinctly implied setting to come into its own.

P.S. I've been corresponding with Chris Holmes, son of John Eric Holmes, and he just wrote:
"I am fine with your project The Globe of Peril."

For anyone who's interested, this is my attempt to untangle the specifics of the Holmes BASIC implied setting, and how it relates (or doesn't relate) to Oerth. (Mystara didn't exist in a TSR context in 1977.)

THE GLOBE OF PERIL includes:

*Note about the Green Dragon Inn (aka Green Dragon Tavern in the Tales of Peril). A version of this inn exists in Oerth and in the Globe of Peril. In the Free City of Greyhawk. The outside of the inn is depicted in the 1979 AD&D Coloring Album, which is explicitly set in Oerth. Robilar bought this inn.

In the Globe of Peril, the Portown inn may look the same as the Greyhawk version (as seen in the Coloring Album), but it is located in different world, in a different city, and thus has different clientele.

Also, of course, the original Green Dragon Inn is in the Shire of Middle-earth; a world of which Holmes states: "The imaginary universe of Dungeons & Dragons obviously lies not too far from the Middle Earth of J.R.R. Tolkien's great Lord of the Rings trilogy."

**Note on the ruined Tower of Zenopus. "The ruins of Zenopus Castle" also exists in the ENCHANTED LAND of the D&D comic strips. And in 5E continuity, the Tower of Zenopus exists in the Forgotten Realms as an adventure site in the Saltmarsh on the Azure Sea coast (from Ghosts of Saltmarsh).

Places include:

Caladan (the proper name for what is colloquially referred to as "Portown")
Labolinn (elven homeland)
the Cold Mountains (dwarven homeland)
the Meadow Country to the South (hobbit homeland)
the Maze of Peril (a dungeon)
Amazonia (a great island kingdom)
the dungeons of Greyhead Tower
Byrithium (the equivalent of Byzantium)
Jungle Isle
the Sorcerer's Isle
Zamboanga (an Swahili-speaking land, 100 leagues/300 miles from previous adventure)
Lilliput
the Southern Jungle (an African analogue)
the Enchanted Forest
Mother Grillo's Hut
the Desert of Irem

(Also: the dungeon from Holmes' Fantasy Role Playing Games book.)

In Caladan/Portown: Green Dragon Tavern, Magpie Street, Ox-Cart Street. The various locales mentioned in Portown. Devil's Spire (10 miles out of town)

Caladan/Portown on THE GLOBE OF PERIL map is located where the Sea Cliff neighborhood of San Francisco would be.

Languages: Common, Latin, Elvish, Swahili. There is a whole sentence of Holmesian Elvish, and also several sentences of Dagonite specech.

Races, Classes, and Cutlures: Old People/Elidel, Dark Elf/Black Elf, Centaur, Serpentmen/Serpent Women, Satyrs, Atlanteans, Fighting Men, Amazons, Magic-Users, Druids, Witch-Doctors, Hobbits/Hobs, Vikings/Norman, (American) Indians, Africans, Witches, Psychics, Sages, Half-Orcs, Lizard Men, Lilliputians, (Wrinkled) Gnomes, Fish-Folk and Frog-Folk Dagonites. Also (by inference): Egyptians, Persians (Mithra), REH-style Gaels (Crom), Arabs (El-Borak).

Monsters and Animals: Were-Shark, Parrot-Hawk, Spawn of Cthulhu, Mi-Go, Mwanga Zombie.

Unique terminology: "unhumans/inhumans" (for demihuman), various oaths and curses ("Mithra's mother's mammaries!"), spell components (such as in Latin), and phrases: "Be ye for Law or be ye for Chaos?"

Also:

So, you see, though of course all these places could be plopped onto the map of Oerth or Mystara, THE GLOBE OF PERIL is really its own implied setting.

Now to the ENCHANTED LANDS: The World of the D&D Comic Strips. (Thanks to Havard for gathering much of the references in an earlier thread.)

A case could be made that the ENCHANTED LANDS "ought to" be placed in Mystara, since they were D&D-branded (not AD&D) stories, and since 1981-1982 (when the comics were run) was the same era as B/X D&D, which featured the Known World continental map, the Isle of Dread, the Haunted Keep (later known as Koriszegy Keep), and the gnome caverns (later placed in Highforge, Karameikos). However, the comics also advertised AD&D side-by-side. And the placenames don't fit either Mystara or Oerth.

A case could also be made that the ENCHANTED LANDS ought to be placed in Oerth. Since two Greyhawk characters (from the Rogues Gallery) share names with two of the comic strip heroes: Valerius the Fighter and Grimslade the Magic-User. And since Auric, Tirra, and Khellek were firmly placed in Oerth in the 3e-era DUNGEON magazine Age of Worms adventure path.

But in Greyhawk, Valerius (Erol Otus' PC) is a unarmored swashbuckler (that's a main shtick of the character), while in the ENCHANTED LANDS, Valerius is a heavily armored tank. Furthermore, the author of the comic strips, Stephen Sullivan explicitly states:

"As to the characters, the original ad people probably pulled those names from an existing product. [=Rogues Gallery] I wrote the rest of the characters as if they were original to us, despite where their names came from."

So he wrote an original setting, despite sharing those two names.

And Auric, Tirra, and Khellek could either have crossed over from the ENCHANTED LANDS into Oerth (like Warduke did, from MOTHERLAND who "appeared out of nowhere" during the Greyhawk Wars)...or they may exist as parallel characters in both worlds, in a similar way that the characters from the Keep on the Borderlands (the Mad Hermit, etc.) exist in Oerth, Mystara, and THE GLOBE OF PERIL.

And the placenames don't match Oerth either.

Lawrence Schick also seems to state that from 1981 onward, Greyhawk was reserved for AD&D:

"Up to that point [1981] most of TSR’s scenarios had been set in Gary Gygax’s World of Greyhawk, but we couldn’t use that [for the new 1981 B/X D&D], as it was Gary’s personal campaign setting, and was reserved for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game products."

As for features of the ENCHANTED LANDS:

First off: the Ruins of Castle Zenopus. This locale is shared with THE GLOBE OF PERIL setting. They are probably essentially identical in both worlds. The monsters and encounters in the comic strip Zenopus are presumably a lower level, hinted at in the "undiscovered (deeper) levels" mentioned by Holmes, BASIC p.45. (So this is relevant to filling out THE GLOBE OF PERIL's Zenopus' lower levels too.)

Newstand Series:
NPCS
• Grindal: Grimslade’s Mentor
• Oakthorne: Shapeshifter (wolf and raven). Hostile Druid.
• Mekron (A Lich?)
• Lobella (Black Dragon)

Monsters
• Shambling Mound
• Green Slime
• Goblin
• Red Dragon
• Black Dragon
• Werewolf

Locations:
• Zenopus Castle
• Dungeons of Zenopus’ Castle
• Gavin’s Inn [Note: there's no mentions of the Green Dragon Inn or Portown in the comic strips. So I'd suggest that Gavin's Inn takes the place of the Green Dragon Inn in this world.]
• Black Swamp of Lobella (named after skeletal dead black dragon seen in panel)
• The Dark Forest of Oakthorn
• The Mountains of Ash
• Ancient Castle

Magic Items:
• Heart of Mekron (Medallion)
• The Great Sword Naril
• Scroll of Dimension Door

Epic Magazine Series:
• "Fathomless Caverns"
• "Perilous Wilderness"
• The people of the Lowlands
• The ruined dungeons of Roakire
• [incld. treasure vaults of the dungeon Roakire]
• Auric the Fighter
• Tirra the Elf
• Khellek the Wizard (Wizard = 10th+ level MU by level title)
• Auric holds copy of Moldvay Basic boxed set! Auric actually knows of the game!
• Jackalwere
• Khellek's homeland (under siege)
• Khellek's master
• "Quest Through The Savage Country"
• Beautiful Sorceress [Khellek's apprentice; "Sorcereress" = 8th-level MU by level-title. Skylla? no, she was once an apprentice of Ringlerun's. Name her "Skhyla," Beautiful Sorceress? Skylla is called "la strega" in Italian action figure.]
• Shadrak gnome thief
• Rory Gallan, Ranger ("pathfinder" = 7th-level Ranger 1e level title)
• Dead Jackal Inn
• Evil Morgan (male; other apprentice of Khellek). fled with mystic objects of great power
• Khellek's flying boat
• symbol of Khellek's homeland: black eagle?dragon?wyvern? on red and white stripe (sail)
• storm giant

As for the relationship between Khellek (the "balding" wizard from the ENCHANTED LANDS) and Kelek (the Evil Sorcerer from MOTHERLAND - the world of LJN Action Figures)...and between Auric and Warduke, since Auric wears piecemeal armor like Warduke: from a straightforward perspective, they aren't the same characters, since Auric and Khellek officially exist in Greyhawk (in the 3E era); however, the connections are evocative. Tim Truman designed Warduke and Kelek around that time (1982).

And that's the whole reason why I delved into researching the ENCHANTED LANDS this week. Because I'm writing the MOTHERLAND worldbook, and I wanted to gather all the info about Auric and Khellek, as prototypes or parallels of Warduke and Kelek. I'm still pondering the exact details and connections. Stay tuned!

While researching the Green Dragon Inn, I found Stephen Sullivan's DRAGON magazine adventure from 1980:

Stephen is also the author of most of the 1981-1982 comic strips. It seems like the DRAGON submission is what got Stephen noticed by TSR.

This was a complete mini-setting, called "Narrion and the Land Surrounding." It was not tied to any existing campaign world. I suggest that this could serve as the setting for the D&D comic strips. There are suggestive similarities:

The Dark Forest (from the comics) = The Black Forest:

"THE BLACK FOREST
This dark, dense mass of trees stretches from just past the Mound
of the Oracle far to the southeast of the land beyond Narrion."

"The Savage Country" (from the comics) = "the wild country":

"The small town of Narrion is located precariously on the very
edge of the wild country, and as such is often a stopping place for
adventurers going from one area to the other."

"Being so close to the wild country, the town has
found it necessary to have a large (30’) wooden wall (with a small
parapet) constructed around its perimeter in order to keep certain
undesirable types from raiding the town after dusk."

And more specifically, "the Edge of The Wild" and the "Jarkung Lands" beyond the Edge:
"THE JARKUNG LANDS
If one were to follow the Moor Road northeast from Narrion for
many miles through the Moor and past the end of that desolate bog,
one would eventually come to the Edge of The Wild and the Jarkung
Lands.

The "ancient castle" (in the last panel of the comics) and the "very ancient castle" in the center of the Black Forest:

"No one knows what lurks at the center of the Black Forest, though it is generally agreed to be either a very ancient castle, or a dragon, or both."

Not that there couldn't be more than one "ancient castle", but it is an example of a similar milieu.

The "Mountains of Ash" (from the comics, which are evocative of Tolkien's Ered Lithui (Mtns of Ash), the border of Mordor) imply a Sauronic dominion. See "the Dark Lord" in the Narrion setting, as seen in historical glyphs on the dungeon's wall:

"The first pictures on either wall are bas-reliefs of a man in a long, flowing, floor-length robe with a face-covering, horned helmet through which only two evil, orbless eyes can be seen. This is the Dark Lord.
The first series of pictures shows the Dark Lord sitting on his iron throne, thinking of dark, vile schemes. He creates (mutates) the hideous toad-like Stalker and sends the creature to lead one of his many armies. While this war was being conducted in far-off lands, a powerful lord and mighty wizardess had the audacity to direct their army against the very stronghold of the Dark Lord himself"

If the comic strip's implied setting were melded with Narrion and the Surrounding Lands, then the Dark Lord would live beyond the Mountains of Ash.

Both milieus share a "jackal" motif. Jackalweres and "Dead Jackal Inn" in the comics. In Narrion's dungoeon, there's a jackal-faced idol (presumably a god/demon):

"a jackal-faced idol with a small, lidded vase in its hands"

An indirect parallel with the Portown + Green Dragon Inn + ruined Tower of Zenopus locales of J. Eric Holmes BASIC D&D sample setting, also seen in Holmes other works, such as his Maze of Peril novel (which is otherwise a distinct world from the D&D comics, and also distinct from Oerth.)

The town of Narrion is the parallel of Portown. Narrion has a Green Dragon Tavern. And the comics have a "ruined Zenopus Castle." So if Narrion and the Land Surrounding were to encompass the D&D comic strips, Narrion would be the stand-in for Portown, and it would have a similarly situated Green Dragon Tavern and Zenopus Castle.

Though not an exact match all around, there are evocative similarities, which is understandable since both were written by Stephen Sullivan, and were written in a similar timeframe: 1980 (Narrion) and 1981-1982 (comic strips). The two references to "the wild country" are especially close to "The Savage Country."

There's even a map of the Land Surrounding.

P.S. The barkeep (and presumed owner, since he lives upstairs with his family) of the Green Dragon Tavern (in Narrion) is named "Holliman." In the first comic strip, the adventurers are based in "Gavin's Inn." I'd suggest that the man's full name is "Gavin Holliman."

I posted these at Kuronon's D&D comics history site
Also some fb msg convo with Steve.
I fixed some spelling and typos for the Piazza.

BTW, I didn't even realize Steve's Mystara credits:

***
[July 28th, 2021, Kuronon's site]

Steve, I realize we're speaking of very short stories, yet can you say anything as to the implied "setting" and "continuity" of the two comic series?

You say: "As to the characters, the original ad people probably pulled those names from an existing product. I don't doubt that at all, though I don't remember anyone remarking on it at the time. I created Saren because we needed both a woman and a cleric, and of course Jeff and Bill gave her the visual. I wrote the rest of the characters as if they were original to us, despite where their names came from."

Basically, what you did is create a new micro-setting, with its own continuity, which only shares a couple names (Valerius and Grimslade) with the Rogues Gallery, which is set in Oerth.

In Oerth, Valerius is a lightly armored swashbuckler. There's a drawing of him by Erol Otus in the back of the Rogues Gallery. While in the Enchanted Lands of the D&D Comic Strips, Valerius is a heavy-armored fighter.

And the place names mentioned in the comics have no precedent in Oerth or the Known World of Mystara. Which further affirms that it's a parellel timeline and parallel world-setting, offset from both Oerth and Mystara.

As for the Zenopus connection. The dungeons of the ruined castle of Zenopus exist in your world, and also exist in another micro-setting, which also is seemingly distinct from Oerth and Mystara: which I call...

"THE GLOBE OF PERIL: The Basic World of the Boinger and Zereth Stories of John Eric Holmes" which is seen on the Holmes Basic set, and in the posthumously collected Tales of Peril.

For the world depicted in the D&D Comic Strips, I offer the name...

"Stephen D. Sullivan, Bill Willingham, & Jeff Dee's ENCHANTED LANDS: The World of the D&D Comic Strips."

(If we discover the name of the first artist, despite the naive style, I'd add her/his name to the title!)

***

P.S. DUNGEON magazine affirms that Auric, Khellek, and Tirra also exist in Oerth. Yet, rather than take that to mean that all the unique places of the Comic Strips must be plopped down into Oerth (or Mystara), I take it to mean that either parallel version of these characters exist in both Oerth and the ENCHANTED LANDS; Or that the 3 characters began their careers in the ENCHANTED LANDS, but actually crossed over via a planar gate into Oerth, where we find them in the Paizo adventures.

Stephen, which do prefer?

There are other "parallel personas" in Tim Truman's action figures: Auric's piecemeal stylin' armor apparently served as a model for Warduke's similarly piecemeal armor. And Khellek served as a substantial inspiration for Kelek, Evil Sorcerer.

I'm working with Mike Gray (author of XL-1, the only D&D adventure which tied in with the Action Figures) to co-design an aficionado-crafted campaign setting which fills out the World of the AD&D Action Figures. That's why I'm delving into the question of their relationship with Auric and Kelek.

***
[July 31st, 2021, Kuronon's site]

P.P.S. While researching the Green Dragon Inn, I found Stephen Sullivan's DRAGON magazine adventure from 1980

Maybe it was what got Stephen noticed by TSR?

This was a complete mini-setting, called "Narrion and the Land Surrounding." It was not tied to any existing campaign world. I suggest that this could serve as the setting for the D&D comic strips. There are suggestive similarities:

The Dark Forest (from the comics) = The Black Forest:

"THE BLACK FOREST
This dark, dense mass of trees stretches from just past the Mound
of the Oracle far to the southeast of the land beyond Narrion."

"The Savage Country" (from the comics) = "the wild country":

"The small town of Narrion is located precariously on the very
edge of the wild country, and as such is often a stopping place for
adventurers going from one area to the other."

"Being so close to the wild country, the town has
found it necessary to have a large (30’) wooden wall (with a small
parapet) constructed around its perimeter in order to keep certain
undesirable types from raiding the town after dusk."

And more specifically, "the Edge of The Wild" and the "Jarkung Lands" beyond the Edge:
"THE JARKUNG LANDS
If one were to follow the Moor Road northeast from Narrion for
many miles through the Moor and past the end of that desolate bog,
one would eventually come to the Edge of The Wild and the Jarkung
Lands.

The "ancient castle" (in the last panel of the comics) and the "very ancient castle" in the center of the Black Forest:

"No one knows what lurks at the center of the Black Forest, though it is generally agreed to be either a very ancient castle, or a dragon, or both."

Not that there couldn't be more than one "ancient castle", but it is an example of a similar milieu.

The "Mountains of Ash" (from the comics, which are evocative of Tolkien's Ered Lithui (Mtns of Ash), the border of Mordor) imply a Sauronic dominion. See "the Dark Lord" in the Narrion setting, as seen in historical glyphs on the dungeon's wall:

"The first pictures on either wall are bas-reliefs of a man in a long, flowing, floor-length robe with a face-covering, horned helmet through which only two evil, orbless eyes can be seen. This is the Dark Lord.
The first series of pictures shows the Dark Lord sitting on his iron throne, thinking of dark, vile schemes. He creates (mutates) the hideous toad-like Stalker and sends the creature to lead one of his many armies. While this war was being conducted in far-off lands, a powerful lord and mighty wizardess had the audacity to direct their army against the very stronghold of the Dark Lord himself"

If the comic strip's implied setting were melded with Narrion and the Surrounding Lands, then the Dark Lord would live beyond the Mountains of Ash.

Both milieus share a "jackal" motif. Jackalweres and "Dead Jackal Inn" in the comics. In Narrion's dungoeon, there's a jackal-faced idol (presumably a god/demon):

"a jackal-faced idol with a small, lidded vase in its hands"

An indirect parallel with the Portown + Green Dragon Inn + ruined Tower of Zenopus locales of J. Eric Holmes BASIC D&D sample setting, also seen in Holmes other works, such as his Maze of Peril novel (which is otherwise a distinct world from the D&D comics, and also distinct from Oerth.)

The town of Narrion is the parallel of Portown. Narrion has a Green Dragon Tavern. And the comics have a "ruined Zenopus Castle." So if Narrion and the Surrounding Lands were to encompass the D&D comic strips, Narrion would be the stand-in for Portown, and it would have a similarly situated Green Dragon Tavern and Zenopus Castle.

Though not an exact match all around, there are evocative similarities, which is understandable since both were written by Stephen Sullivan, and were written in a similar timeframe: 1980 (Narrion) and 1981-1982 (comic strips). The two references to "the wild country" are especially close to "The Savage Country."

***
[July 28th, 2021, private fb msg]

Hi Stephen, I really appreciated your thoughtful comments on the history of the D&D comic strips. I just posted a couple comments there about the "implied setting" of the comics
But to be more specific:

-Oerth/Greyhawk? The comics have a couple nominal similarities with Oerth: the names Valerius and Grimslade. But these are depicted quite differently. For example, in Oerth, Valerius (Erol Otus' PC) from the Rogue Gallery is an unarmored swashbuckler, vs. the heavily armored Valerius from the comic. And the various placenames from the comics (Mountains of Ash, The Savage Country, etc.) are not known in Oerth. Yes, Auric, Tirra, and Khellek later appear in Oerth (in the 3rd Edition era), but they might have crossed-over from the "world of the D&D comic strips" into Oerth via a planar gate or something. Or there might be parallel characters which exist in both settings (Oerth and the D&D comic strip world); for example, the characters and places in the Keep on the Borderlands officially exist in both Oerth AND Mystara.

-Known World/Mystara? The comics could theoretically be located in Mystara, since Schick & Moldvay's Known World had just been designated the default setting of the 1981 B/X D&D (first seen in Cook/Marsh's Expert Set). The 1981 timeframe of the comics matches this. But again, the placenames do not match any known places in Mystara.

Sure, anyone could easily adapt the comics to fit in either Oerth or Mystara. But, I'd like to hear your perspective. Some questions:

1) I realize its most likely that you just sort of made up an archetypal, fun, "generic" D&D story, and that's that. But did you have some idea that the story was loosely set in Greyhawk? Or the new Expert Set Known World Continent? Or was it basically a totally generic story?

Note: Lawrence Schick states (link): "Up to that point [1981] most of TSR’s scenarios had been set in Gary Gygax’s World of Greyhawk, but we couldn’t use that [for the new 1981 B/X D&D], as it was Gary’s personal campaign setting, and was reserved for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game products."

2) Were you playing AD&D or BD&D at the time? If so, do you remember whose world(s) you were playing in at the time? Did you DM? If so, what was your home campaign setting? (Or were you too busy working to play much?) Just wondering about the inspirational context for your comics writing.

3) The final coupon in your Newsstand Series speaks of "enchanted lands of dragons and magic." If your comic series were a standalone micro-setting, not tied to Oerth or Mystara, I feel that would be a fitting name, something like:

SULLIVAN, WILLINGHAM, & DEE'S ENCHANTED LAND [Edit: I meant to type LANDS (plural)]: THE WORLD OF THE 1981-1982 D&D COMIC STRIPS

Or do you have a better name for such a "world of D&D comic strips"?

4) With the upcoming return of Tim Truman's Action Figure characters, Warduke, Strongheart and crew (in the Sep, 2021 5E adventure The Wild Beyond the Witchlight), do you think it'd be worth trying to contact one of the WotC designers, such as Mike Mearls, to see if they'd pay you and Jeff Dee to finish the last panels of the Newstand and Epic strips? It's be a nifty promotion.

5) If not, I think there'd be a way to produce an "off-brand" finale, by naming the characters a bit differently (maybe they switch to using their last names), and by depicting them a bit differently (maybe they got a haircut and new suit of armor). If you and Jeff Dee did a Kickstarter, with the goal of finishing the final issues of the two strips, I think people would dig it!

6) Furthermore, you could even do a ENCHANTED LANDS campaign setting. It'd probably be successful and lucrative. You could map out the world. Just call the places from the comics by a slightly different name: e.g. The Savage Country > The Wild Land; The Mountains of Ash > The Lithui Mountains (to deftly snag a Tolkienian word), etc.

If you respond, I'd share you answers with the wider D&D community (except for if you speak about doing an off-brand finale or campaign setting; I'd keep that under wraps).
I love your contributions to D&D culture - thank you!

-Travis Henry
Austerlitz, N.Y.

P.S. A little about myself: I'm a interviewer for the Vaults of Pandius - the Official WotC-designated Mystara Fansite. You can see my interviews here

P.P.S. Here's a thread where I'm unpacking the ENCHANTED LANDS setting of your D&D comics

***
[Steve's responses, August 1, 2021, fb msg]

Hi Travis --

I’ll try to tackle these in order, more or less.

Because the first ad originated outside of TSR, I don’t really know where they got the names. Chances are, they picked them out of some product that I wasn’t aware of then and remain unaware of now. Though I think I went through all the products at the time, I certainly didn’t remember any origins for those names when the crew and I took over the ads. I remember that Rogues Gallery product a little, and it’s certainly likely that the art agency pulled names out of it, just to sound “authentic.” I doubt we’ll ever know for sure. Any appearances after 1981, though, would have to come from the gallery or possibly even from the ad comics themselves.

I leave that to historians to figure out. But I’m almost entirely sure that Bill, Jeff, and I were unaware of any previous uses of the 3 names in the first comic. I know I wasn’t, and I don’t remember either of the guys mentioning it to me when we took over. So, no history came attached with them. They were blank slates. We kept the 3 characters because we were continuing the ad series from where it started.
As to the setting… Again, I don’t know about any references in the 1st one that might have come from other TSR products -- and I don’t have it in front of me to look, BUT… The rest of it came purely from Steve & Bill Land, that is, out of our little heads.

You have to remember that we were also D&D creators and had our own game worlds beyond the official TSR ones at the time (or even now). So, we weren’t even remotely concerned with connecting the strip to any given D&D setting. Nor did I tie it into my game world, and I don’t think Bill tied it in to his. And the same goes for the ads he did on his own for Epic Illustrated. We were just making this stuff up -- though we did want it to sound adventurous and echo the excitement of D&D. That was our assignment, not to tie it to anything specific.

Even the early D&D modules, after Basic/Expert didn’t have to tie into any specific world, as I recall. Though I think Tom was trying to tie them into his own little sub-D&D world -- and maybe others were doing the same. This was the Wild West, and there wasn’t a lot of pressure to conform things. We were creating things, not adhering them to existing worlds or continuity, for the most part.

So, it’s possible that after 1981-2, when we were doing this, people took elements we’d created (or picked up from the 1st comic) and used them in other settings. Though I freelanced for TSR for decades after I left, I didn’t keep careful track of any product continuity they might have later imposed.

I strongly suspect that the 3rd E characters you mention were tributes to the comics, because I’m almost entirely certain that Bill made up the Epic characters, as I made up Saren (with Jeff & Bill) for the Marvel newsstand comics ads.
(And honestly, I don’t remember knowing until just now that it was Lawrence & Tom’s B/X world that had been named Mystara and the subject of so many later things -- though maybe I knew the name at the time.)

Anyway, the comics weren’t set there. :) They were in “Steve-Bill Land.” (Or Bill-Steve Land, if you prefer -- or just Bill Land for the Epic ones, though you might argue they were set in Ironwood, I suppose.)

Let me catch my breath a moment before looking at the numbered questions...

[Steve's responses, August 1, 2021, fb msg]

As I just explained, we were making the comics up to be a fun D&D adventure, and not set in any specific world. Bill (and Jeff) and I are proud guys ;) and just as capable of making up fantasy settings as our contemporaries at TSR. And that’s what we were doing. We were trying to encourage others to try the game by making things as exciting as we could within the strictures of the ad -- which started out fairly loose, but quickly grew more and more tight in response to fears about the Satanic Panic and other such nonsense. (And, yeah, the D&D stuff had to be set in non-Greyhawk worlds for legal reasons. Long story.)

Well, you have to realize that we created B/X while I was there. I was an editor on both, wrote some sections, and certainly did playtests while we were putting it all together. On an ongoing basis, I was playing as a handful of different characters in Frank Mentzer’s AD&D game, which was the “big game” going on at the time outside of work. Most of the time we played other games outside of work, including a very memorable Schick Call of Cthulhu campaign. Zeb and I later ran CoC, too. I only ran a few sessions of MY version of D&D -- which included slightly altered stat sets and spell points -- set in my world of Illion. THE TWILIGHT EMPIRE: ROBINSON’S WAR, my comic in Dragon, was also set in that world, and I”ve also written a story or two set there. (As well as a couple of unpublished novels.)

I think that’s a cool name for the world of the newsstand D&D comics. Though I do have to point out that the fill-in-the-blank ad copy was written by the advertising department, and not any of the three of us. Sullivan, Willingham, & Dee’s ENCHANTED LAND (of D&D) does have a pretty nice ring to it. :) Certainly, that could be an unofficial name until one of us tries to pick up the story again in some form. Though as I pointed out, Bill’s Epic ads seem very much like his IRONWOOD setting to me. (I’d be happy to lump it into Enchanted Land, though, if that’s easier for you fans.) ;)

That’s an interesting idea. I don’t know if Jeff or Bill would want to finish it, but I’d be willing to give it a stab. I don’t have time to track down whomever might be the person to authorize and pay for such an effort, though. Also, part of me has thought it might be fun to finish it on my own, possibly in prose, completely outside the official continuity, with renamed characters, etc. I do remember roughly how the 2nd set was supposed to end, and I may have actual notes somewhere in my files. If fans want to take up a “Finish the D&D ad comics!” cause, I doubt that I’d fight it. :D

Oh. Yeah. See, here you suggest what I’d been thinking. :D An off-brand finish or maybe not-quite-a-remake. I could ask Jeff about maybe kickstarting it or something -- but he doesn’t really even remember working on it, ‘cause he left after one ep! I think he might be more likely to be interested than Bill, and Bill can be hard to reach. But, I’ll think on it. It would be much easier for me to write a finish to it in prose. Do you think anyone would be interested in that? (Or even to produce a script for fans to draw it.)

A campaign setting would take a lot more work, and I’m not sure I’d have time for it. Though I have been working with another guy to bring my DR. CUSHING’S CHAMBER OF HORRORS into a game supplement (currently) and then a full campaign setting in the future. So, I suppose something like that might be possible -- if there was enough enthusiasm for it.

It’s fine if you want to share my answers with the wider D&D community. You can even talk generally about maybe continuing/finishing off-brand, to see if people would be interested.

Off-Brand would honestly be the best and easiest way to do it -- and the best way for me and any artists associated with it to profit. (Unless someone at WOTC could be persuaded to front some real money for it.)

I leave drumming up support for it with you and the other fans. I’m busy writing 3 or more books right now. So I don’t have time for any more!

Well… Unless people will really support it. ;)

I have restored all the comic strips and hope to find time to put them up on my site -- www.sdsullivan.com -- along with the story of their creation fairly soon.

Well, as soon as I can find time. ;)

Thanks for your interest!

-- Steve Sullivan

PS -- Your connecting the comics with my Pit of the Oracle module is fascinating. I haven't seen that for SO long. I'm not surprised, though, because it all came out of the same part of my mind, and the way I (and my friends) played and ran D&D, as opposed to the "official" TSR way.

I've had a couple of people suggest that I should re-do that module or do a sequel or something. So many things to do, and so little time!

Kuronon just did some research into the artist and author of issue #1:

Thanks to Steve Sullivan who left comments here few weeks ago and with whom we exchanged by email, I had been contacted by Dagmar Simoneit Knorr who was Senior Art director at TSR advertising dpt. According to her memories, this very first page was given to Ray Cioni Productions to be done. Ray Cioni was mostly working with artist Kurt Mitchell at this time. (They were given the cover page of Dragon Magazine n°43 - nov. 1980 for instance)
Trying to get confirmation and more info from Ray Cioni productions, I found out that Kurt Mitchell sadly passed away in summer 2020 and decided to contact Ray Cioni directly. I got a reply from his wife Sally that announced me that Ray passed away on january 2021. Nevertheless, she kindly got me in touch with an ex-colleague of Ray. But as he only worked at Ray Cioni Productions from 1984, he couldn't be of much help regarding this particular matter.
End of investigation.

My comments:
Good work Kuronon, on trying to track down the artist and author of issue #1.

I think your research will probably be the final word, unless Keenan Powell chimes in to affirm or deny. But Steve's memories of an outside agency match your findings.

Looking at the cover of DRAGON #43: though this is in pastels, versus the inked-line art of the comic, one can see similarities: the crumbly, "droopy", "bulbous," whispy/sketchy (light-handed) style is similar. See the sort of "droopy, bulbous" style of the witch on the cover, and then look at the Shambling Mound in the comic. Mitchell's signature on the witch cover is sort of cartoony itself.

I'm going to make an educated guess that Ray Cioni authored the strip. Because his LinkedIn resume calls him "Director" and "Producer" of Cioni Artworks (1977-1996). And that he "Directed and produced animated commercials" (which the D&D comic is), and that he "Expertly supervised creative team (both staff & freelance) of graphic artists". So best indications are that Kurt Mitchell was the artist, and Ray Cioni was the director/producer/supervisor (=author).

So looks like the Marvel/DC "Newsstand" Strip roster is: Cioni, Mitchell, Sullivan, Dee, and Willingham. [And that the Epic Illustrated Series was all Bill. Though Bill attributes some contribution to Steve, which Steve doesn't recall.]

From Steve's comments, it appears that he leans toward considering the Newsstand Series (authored by him) to be Epic Illustrated Series (authored by Bill Willingham) to be two different worlds. And he suggests that the latter is located in Bill's world of Ironwood (the setting of a series of erotic comics from 1991-1996; which is kind of fitting, since Epic Illustrated was an adult-oriented magazine)

I'll edit the OP to distinguish the two. (Though there's enough ambiguity to suggest that there's an alternate world where the two are combined.)

Also, because Steve calls the legacy names (presumably including the name "Zenopus") from issue #1 to be a "blank slate", there's no reason that the ENCHANTED LANDS includes any other aspects of Eric Holmes' GLOBE OF PERIL other than the dungeon Zenopus itself. And that vice versa, there's no indication that Holmes would go with the comics' depiction of further levels in Zenopus.

However, Ray Cioni (the outside animation agency) was explicitly given the name Zenopus as a dungeon, which presumes it is basically identical with Holmes' Zenopus. But no presumptions on sharing the same surrounding world (Portown, Northern Sea, etc.)

However, the red dragon in a lower level of Zenopus would match with the red dragon on the cover of the Holmes box! Still sussing this out. I'd want to check with the Holmes experts: Chris Holmes, Zach Howard, and Allan Grohe.

One more thing: the Sutherland Red Dragon is also seen in one or two Action Figure products - the Colorforms Adventure Set and (though less Sutherland-like in appearance) the Puzzleform. Is there also a Tower of Zenopus in MOTHERLAND? hmm.

From Steve, Aug. 1, 2021:

I actually knew that about Ray and Kurt -- at least that Ray was in charge of the job and Kurt likely drew it. But I’d been holding that back to publish on my site along with a more complete story of how the comics came about. :D

Props to Kuronons for tracking it down. I think my eventual post, along with restoration of the comics, will still have something to offer to the fans. :) He actually supplied me with the scans I’ve used for the restorations.

I think it makes sense to put the Epic stuff in Ironwood. It matches Bill’s style and sensibility. Of course, WoTC doesn’t own that setting, but… like me, Bill was working in the style and places he was/is comfortable. And why not? We knew the “feel” of D&D/AD&D of that time as well as anyone.

And honestly, since you’ve asked, I was really writing the D&D comics as if they were set in my game world of ILLION, though not in any specific place, and Narrion and the rest of that adventure as well. Heck, I wrote Pit of the Oracle while I was in college, before I went to work at TSR, so clearly it was/is more my world than anything from TSR. (Though the editorial change of my white box Balrogs into far more powerful demons probably completely unbalanced the setting! :o But they had to do that for legal reasons, I understand.)

Anyway, after picking up the pieces from the first episode, I basically did what I wanted with the stories -- or, I should say, Bill, Jeff, and I did what WE wanted.

So, whether y’all want to place the comic series in Illion or in its own Enchanted Lands, I’m good either way.

Technically, I did have another D&D world, too, the one I created for teaching D&D at the MIT High School Studies Program -- which was supposed to act as a bridging dimension between Illion and the world of my teaching partner, Marty Sirkin. That was a very small “half world” intended to teach concepts of the game to our students. (The first time D&D was taught in a college or university, so far as anyone knows. 1978-79, IIRC.) I think I called that world Nonar, and I did quite a bit of work on it, considering it was something like 100 miles square.

So theoretically, the D&D comics could have been set there, too. But, basically, we were just making up the place names etc. as we went along, rather than me using existing place names from my D&D worlds.

As I said above, I’m good with it being in one of my worlds or its own. I was just doing my own thing. We all were.

Glad you located DR. CUSHING and added it to the database. As I think I said, we’ve got a supplement out now, and I hope to have a full sourcebook (and game?) out at some point.

I’m glad you think that fans might be interested in a prose version of the finish -- or even the whole series -- as an off-brand item. Doing it as prose would probably be fastest and easiest, though Jeff Dee does seem interested if there could be some kind of actual payment involved. :) I don’t think it’s fair to ask an artist to draw a couple of comic pages for free. Doing a comic page can take a long while.

Of course, writing a prose story takes a long while, too, but at least I’m only “wasting” my own time -- not someone else’s. ;)

Frank and Bruce are both good friends of mine, but I wasn’t aware of them releasing stuff they’d done at/for TSR. Interesting that if there’s no profit involved, WoTC may just let it go.

But, I’d rather either get paid, or own my work, or -- better yet -- both.

So, please, if you can build support for an off-brand continuation, either prose or comics, or an “official” one with some type of pay… Keep me posted.

As I said, I to intend to post a History of the D&D Marvel Ads along with the page restorations at some point. Though I was hoping to us it to help cross-promote some kind of project when I do (either a continuation or to boost something of my own). :)

[Travis}:
Would love to see the restored comics and your own historic account at your website: I think it'd be a lasting resource. People keep coming back to these lost TSR gems. I myself have gone back to Kuronon's history several times over the years, and only now put the puzzle pieces together enough to reach out to you.

Yeah, Bruce just kept writing the Heldannic Gazetteer (which had been vaporware), and later a whole Alphatian series (with full-color hex maps), as if he never left TSR. All as Mystara fanworks. No problem. You can see his tremendous post-TSR output here

I would certainly like to help bring your story's ending (and possibly Dee's art) to fruition in a lucrative way. As a writer and designer myself, I understand the necessity of being economically supported for the work. It can be hard to get a hold of WotC folk. But I have a couple avenues to try. Also, just getting your nascent ideas and history posted at Kuronon's and your site is an action which may bring it to the attention of others who might help in some way. If it hadn't been for Kuronon's little site, the D&D comic strips would still be almost totally unknown and forgotten.

Grateful for your sharing on creative relationships between ILLION, Narrion (heck, they both end in -ION!), and the Marvel comic strip...and "NONAR." I think the aesthetic is the key thing. Like you say: the style and sensibility. It's all "Sullivanian aesthetic." It fits together. Even if you didn't actually plop the comic-strip locales on the map during your home campaign sessions back in the day, they're potentially there together...especially if you yourself affirm this. (Cool detail on the presence of proper Balrogs in ILLION.)

I'm not attached to the phrase "enchanted lands"...it's just that, even though they were coined by ad-folks, they are a part of the your comics, as printed. Whether that's a key phrase or not, ILLION itself surely features "enchanted lands of dragons and magic" in some sense of the words!

Your MIT High School teaching setting, Nonar too. Super interesting. Of course then more good questions arise about what Marty Sirkin's campaign was like, as it was linked to yours. But first things first. I think it's a shame that the first generation of home campaigns haven't been documented even better. If I had a ton of resources, I'd like to get your campaign totally documented and published (alongside Rob Kuntz's, Steve Marsh's, and so forth). I have some intention of proposing that to a few publishers with some resources (e.g. ENWorld Publishing), but as you know, only a few ideas come to fruition. :( Right, a campaign setting is a big thing; finishing a comic strip could be more doable.

This is all great history - I'm super appreciative. I'm a pretty deep D&D history grognard, yet honestly, I'd totally overlooked your name and role! I'm going to send this compiled convo to Shannon Appelcline - of the Designers & Dragons history books. You were right there, in the thick of the golden age of D&D/TSR. If you could remember which sections or facets of the B/X rulebooks you especially helped write or polish, that would be especially interesting. Or anecdotes of personalities from back in the day. Could be a great thing for your website. (Not to pile even more things on ya!)

Right, I would need to check with Bill W. to affirm a connection between the Epic Series and Ironwood, but what you say makes sense. At the very least, you (as author of the Marvel/[+DC?] Series) affirm that Bill's Epic Series is felt to be a different continuity, from your perspective.

Yes, from a strictly IP perspective of course whatever appeared in a TSR product can't be openly tied to an author's own IP. But this situation is similar to John Eric Holmes' world: though of course TSR/WotC fully owns the IP from Holmes' BASIC set (Portown, Tower of Zenopus, etc), it's clear that his self-published novel, the Maze of Peril (which is his own IP), and his many DRAGON magazine short stories (which have reverted to become his estate's IP), are of the same milieu. No problem. He just called Portown by another name: Caladan, and didn't explicitly refer to the name "Zenopus." Otherwise, it's clearly the same body of work.

I've really enjoyed your articulate and thoughtful sharings!

P.S. Sorry if I belabored the point about IP - I realize you're specialist in licensed IP. Just wanted to give Eric Holmes as an example of what could be done. :)

Sun 9:17 PM
Steve Sullivan

It's fascinating to me that this has become such a topic of interest, of all the stuff I did in D&D as an editor (first) and then artist/cartographer.

But it's something I loved doing, and would certainly have kept doing, had the campaign not suddenly ended. And, college work aside, it's my first published comics work -- and probably the same for Jeff & Bill, too, I guess.

And I kept trying to push TSR toward comics where I could, which got another shove when Tim was there. You can see our sample Dragonlance pages, which Margaret only recently found out about, on my site -- if you haven't seen it already.

I remember a few specific things that I did on B/X, as well as the few things I did, uncredited, on the Fiend Folio working with Allen. (Another story there! :D)

But, here are a few obvious B/X things that spring to mind.

I wrote the back cover copy for both sets. So, everyone that ever played read my words, even if they didn't know it. :)

(I did a lot of module cover copy when I was an editor, too.)

I'm pretty sure it was me who suggested the final format for how we described the monsters in those sets.

You have to realize that a lot of time it fell to Editorial (then known as Production) to organize things and make them consistent -- and, thereby easier to play. (We hoped!)

So, for instance, every description would start out with something like this, introducing the monster as if you'd never heard of it. I'm pretty sure something very close to this got into the final book:

"Dragons are an ancient race of huge, winged lizards..."

(I wish I'd put "reptiles" instead of lizards, but... Live an learn.)

Those of us in production -- Harold, Frank (I think), Jon Pickens, and I (and maybe Ed Sollers and Pat Price?) -- wrote a lot of stuff like that.

The credits as given in the sets were influenced by then current legal goings on between Gary & Dave, IIRC.

So, the actual designers -- Zeb and Tom -- had to be credited as Editors because of that.

But, they designed the work -- Production edited it, and then did layout dummies and everything that lead up to actual printing.

The workflow at the time was Design - Development (Devo) - Production. Devo took the designers' work and developed it and playtested, trying to get out all the bugs.

But, that still left the final organizing to Production, because we were to make it ready for printing and the public.

On B/X, the desire to make the game more "Mass Market" led to Production to a LOT of work rearranging and rewriting things -- often working with the designers when things needed expansion or clarification, but often just doing what we thought was best to make it all new-user friendly.

The "lucky" thing in all this was that my personal mission of making D&D more accessible to the masses when I was hired coincided with a great desire in the Production department and the company to do the same. So we busted our butts to do that -- and it seems to have worked. :)

We also developed some new monsters for the set, to fit the low level challenges. The one I remember specifically doing was the Cave Cricket -- though maybe I called it the Cave Locust -- which fed on shriekers. IIRC, Gary grabbed it for Monster Manual 2, or something like that, later, and used whichever of those 2 names wasn't in B/X.

As I said, we did a LOT of organizing -- usually by consensus within Production -- and made sure that both B&X were organized the same way (they weren't originally) and could hopefully be easily understood by people who had never seen the game before.

[Travis:
You sent Today at 12:11 AM]

This is awesome.
I hadn't seen the Dragonlance proposal before. Neat to see the first "DRAGONLANCE" logo, and how the subtle facets were remained in the published setting (e.g. First Nations-style feather in the prince's hair, later seen in the Que-Shu plains people.) This is also relevant to my own special research into the Action Figures, because Tim Truman's Dragon Lord is very Warduke-esque! Understandable, since they're both his designs!

I'm sure the B/X sharing, and on the role of the Production crew, will be of interest to D&D historians. Cool to know you're the inventor of the Cave Cricket/Cave Locust!

I'll post your sharing in the forums. If anything else comes up, feel free to write any time. And I'll keep you posted on any developments for sponsoring a completion of your D&D comic - I just wrote to Shannon Appelcline, WotC's contracted historian.

[Steve, August 2]

I'm such a hermit. I didn't know Shannon was the OFFICIAL contracted historian. :D Ha ha. Maybe I really should get out more.

I came aboard in the key '80-81 era, and worked on the entire line as an editor before switching into graphics/art. (Long frustrating story.) Edited Top Secret 2E and the 1st TS module, wrote the cover copy for that & helped on the 1st Boot Hill module (cover copy, too) Gamma World mod 1, co-edited US Fiend Folio, was the one who sent the original B3 to the printer, etc. etc. A LOT of stuff. But, maybe because I then spent the rest of my career in the Art Department and freelancing art, novels, Dragon Mag comics, etc... Nobody ever really talks to me about that era and doing editing/production on a pile of those games.

And it hadn't really occurred to me that the Logo Tim whipped up was probably the 1st Dragonlance logo -- but I guess maybe it was (unless Tracy had one of his own), because that was VERY early in the process, before we even knew .who the characters were going to be or anything about the world.

I'm sure the First Nations motifs were Tim's, as that's been very important to his work forever -- but I don't remember if maybe the designers picked it up from him, or the other way around. I'm sure Tracy saw the proposal, but... Just another comic opportunity that TSR passed by, like with me, Bill & Jeff.

Likely I'd remember more about the work on B/X if I looked at them. We put in super-long days at the printer (leaving before dawn & returning after dusk) doing final rewrites and proofs and overseeing layout, etc. But it was a long time ago now -- and a lot of other TSR (WotC... Hasbro) memories, plus Pacesetter & other companies -- layered on top of it. :)

Share as you like. I'm happy to talk to people as I have time.

Even though I'm a Hermit. :)

[Travis]:

Yeah, Shannon wrote all the (bazillion) official product histories for WotC's Classic D&D PDFs.

Pen & Paper database lists you working on the first two Basic modules: B1 and B2 (In Search of the Unknown and the Keep on the Borderlands). Do you remember any details on those? They were older than 1980, so maybe you worked on revisions? (e.g. I think they kept changing color covers and small textual changes thoughout their run.)

Do you have any stories to tell about the "infamous/famous" B3: Palace of the Silver Princess? At Pen&Paper, you're listed as Interior Artist, Editing and Production. Did you witness any of the drama about the recall of Jean Well's original Orange Cover "sado-masochistic" version? Do have any recollection of how long it was before it got recalled and sent to the landfill? Like, were they caught before shipping, or were the Orange Cover boxes already being shipped off to retailers? Was it a matter of a day or two, or matter of weeks?

Mystara aficionados would also be glad to hear of any details you remember from working on these products:
X1: Isle of Dread (1981) - Editing
GAZ4: Kingdom of Ierendi (1987) - Cartographer
M5: Talons of Night (1987) - Cartographer

Good questions keep arising; but whenever you need to sign off, no problem. I'm glad to share your work with the wider community.

P.S. I wrote to Bill Willingham (via an old email address from internet archive: info@billwillingham.com), asking him about his thoughts on the relationship of the Epic strip and IRONWOOD, and pointing him to your ideas I posted in the thread. Do you have a more reliable/current way of contacting him?

For ILLION, see Steve's comments earlier in this thread. It is his home campaign world. He may have a world map, but I don't know about it. He places these in ILLION:
-"Narrion and the Land Surrounding" from "The Pit of the Oracle" AD&D Module in DRAGON Magazine (1980). It's available on Internet Archive. There is a map of Narrion and the Land Surrounding.
-The Enchanted Lands of the Newsstand Marvel/DC D&D Comic Strips (1981-1982). (Just the strips which Steve authored, not the Epic Illustrated series which were authored by Bill Willingham.)
-The Twilight Empire: Robinson’s War Comics from DRAGON Magazine (1990-1994). It's compiled as a graphic novel here
-Also, there's a teaching world which Steve used for MIT high school, which is a gateway to ILLION, and which also connects with another designer's world. See the description earlier in this thread.

IRONWOOD is an erotic fantasy world by Bill Willingham: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironwood_(comics).
Steve says that Willingham's Epic Illustrated D&D comic series (the last comic strip) would fit here. Steve is credited by Bill as a co-designer of this strip, but Steve credits Bill entirely. I wrote to Bill about this but haven't heard back yet.
I don't know if there's a world map of IRONWOOD. Maybe in the comic books?