When did you first play TFT?

[Buzzardo]

1981, I think. Maybe 1982.

[JohnPaulB]

Santa Ana, California 1978 High School senior, springtime.
A school acquaintance introduced it to my friends. I had played a little bit of ACW tabletop wargaming, so I was aware of chits and hexes.

He showed us how to play, but without the rulebook. So for weeks, we were playing it with just what we remembered.

There were a number of gaming stores in a 50 mile radius that mostly had D&D and LOTS of miniatures in display cases. I don't recall blister packs then.

[Frost Giant]

I checked 1980s but it may have been summer of 1978 or sometime in 1979. I stopped drinking in January of 1978, read an article in the Sunday paper about comic book collecting in late spring or early summer, went to the shop on Monday and was off and running. I've been nut about games ever since. I gave up collecting comics in 1988 but my fascination with games continues. I just turned 69 July 4fth. LOL!

[malchidael]

Very early 80's. Probably right around 1980. I had just started to get into the hobby, playing a little D&D and Traveller, as well as games like Star Fleet Battles, and asked for more games for my birthday.

My mother bought me Metagaming's Artifact and Treasure of the Silver Dragon. At the time, she didn't realize that Treasure of the Silver Dragon wasn't a stand-alone game (she didn't read the back, obviously).

She was willing to return it and get me something else, but I took it, skimmed it, and decided that I'd try it using very simple rules that I made up.

After about a week, I ran back to the hobby store and bought Melee and Wizard.

[Soyt Gose]

I think it was 1980 and bought it in the game store in the local mall. We had already been playing D&D and it seemed to correct the problems of combat just being a dice rolling competition and restrictive character classes. I always preferred it after that. Plus, it was more economical for a 13-year-old's budget.

[zot]

We started playing Melee and Wizard in 1978 and we got all excited at Metagaming's announced "In the Labyrinth" (which it had announced the previous year). We waited 2 years for that but we loved it!

[CON_Troll]

Picked up Melee and Death Test in '78. Realized I was hooked when I played Death Test until 6 in the morning. Went back for Wizard. Later, got Advanced Melee and Advanced Wizard as well as In The Labyrinth.

[brionl]

That would have been back in late '77 and early '78. My friends and I would play Melee/Wizard at lunchtime in high school, then play D&D or Traveller during the weekends. I lived in Tracy, CA at the time. There was a fairly good gaming store in Stockton, but they mostly seemed to carry TSR stuff. ISTR having to mailorder almost all my micro-games.

I've still got the Death Test book, and all the maps/counters from Melee & Wizard, but nothing else. I used to have both of those, Advanced Melee, Advanced Wizard and Into the Labyrinth. But in the early 80's a trunk full of my rpg stuff got flooded out in the basement and ruined.

[zot]

Originally Posted by brionl

That would have been back in late '77 and early '78. My friends and I would play Melee/Wizard at lunchtime in high school, then play D&D or Traveller during the weekends. I lived in Tracy, CA at the time. There was a fairly good gaming store in Stockton, but they mostly seemed to carry TSR stuff. ISTR having to mailorder almost all my micro-games.

I've still got the Death Test book, and all the maps/counters from Melee & Wizard, but nothing else. I used to have both of those, Advanced Melee, Advanced Wizard and Into the Labyrinth. But in the early 80's a trunk full of my rpg stuff got flooded out in the basement and ruined.

The same thing happened to me! I lost probably over $1000 worth of games in a trunk in a basement flood (and that's in 1980s dollars!) TFT, 12 or 15 microgames, T&T, Runequest, Bushido, Gamma World, Star Probe, tons of Task Force and SPI games, etc., etc. And now I'm getting sad...

[Shadekeep]

Heh, I was cool before it was cool. ~_^

My brother and I were pretty much addicted to the Microgames releases when they came out, and from those we stayed with TFT:ITL as our primary RPG. We dabbled in a lot of the other ones too, some more than others, but TFT is what we spent the most time in, and what we enjoyed using the most. Grand old days!