I Ran D&D Before the OSR Existed — Here's How We Actually Played

Old-school D&D did play the way the OSR says, and it still wasn’t how everybody played. A Dungeon Master who started running AD&D in 1980 scores the 2026 EN World thread “OSR Is Lying to You” against his own table, Tim Kask’s 1976 foreword, and The Dragon #5 from March 1977. 📰 This is Tenkar’s Tavern Dispatch, the news and opinion channel. The main channel is here:    / @tenkarstavern   Snarf Zagyg’s thread on EN World takes aim at one line in Principia Apocrypha: that the elements of old-school play “were present in the early years of the hobby.” I take his five counterexamples one at a time: player skill, lethality, following the rules, diceless play, and random tables versus modules. Then I check them against the letters page of The Dragon, March 1977, where the editor’s reply calls the D&D field “sharply polarized.” Verdict: the sentence holds at my table, and it still wasn’t how everybody played. The Tavern's Handbook 2nd Edition: https://tenkars-tavern.games/Handbook Sources Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes (TSR Supplement IV, 1976), foreword by Timothy J. Kask, dated July 4, 1976. EN World thread, “OSR IS LYING TO YOU! A reasonable discussion about OSR,” started by Snarf Zagyg, Sep 18, 2026: https://www.enworld.org/threads/osr-i... The Dragon, Vol. I No. 5 (March 1977): letters from Mike Lueders and Garry F. Spiegle, editor’s reply (editor: Timothy J. Kask), the witchcraft supplement (author unidentified), Bill Seligman’s “Gandalf Was Only a Fifth Level Magic-User.” Principia Apocrypha, quoting Ben Milton’s definition of old-school play. #OSR #DnD #TTRPG #TenkarsTavern #Dispatch #ADnD