MONTY HAUL AND HIS FRIENDS AT PLAY
By James M. Ward
Author’s Note: Not many people have been exposed to the working staff of TSR. They are a very unusual bunch of talented people. Not all of them play Dungeons & Dragons (amazing though it may seem) and a good percentage of them have worked on or are developing a set of war game rules. I have the pleasure of often going down to Lake Geneva and talking with them about war gaming in general. Several concepts always crop up in the conversation. Many of the TSR guys have massive numbers of miniatures with which they are able to inundate the unwary with equally massive amounts of detailed information. Many of them have a period or periods of history that they are thoroughly familiar with.
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They all have this feeling of “disdain” for any judge, referee, or starship master they can call a “Monty Haul” type judge. While I can usually keep my head above water with the first two points, the last one makes my knees start to shake and my mind seek the inner recess of my skull. You see, I know myself for a semi-Monty-Haul-type judge and a plus one dagger twists in my heart everytime they are condemned. In an attempt to strike back, I created Monty Haul and his friends (all very clearly members of the TSR staff).
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These war gamers are your not too typical players and I have tried hard to exaggerate everything about them, but it wasn’t easy. Some of the TSR gang do have enough miniatures to fill a bushel basket. Some of them can quote page for page from war gaming books of all types. Some of them can paint miniatures at fantastic rates with amazing detail. So, when you read about them and their war gaming styles, remember that I tried to blow everything out of proportion and that wasn’t easy. The stories that follow detailing Monty and his gang are all things that happened or could have easily happened considering the TSR group.
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Editor’s Note: Now that Jim has assassinated our collective character, it’s my turn to return the favor. Jim is a junior high teacher and ass’t. football coach in Prairie du Chien, WI. If not for that minor detail, Jim would love to, and probably would, be one of us. (Which shows you just how mentally deranged the poor guy is.) In the months to come, TA of MH will poke some shots at our personal foibles, but usually within the framework of a much more serious satirical statement.
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We do not, for example, have any 30th level PC’s, nor do we play monsters as PC’s, Mike is not hung up on bi-planes alone; if we let him be a choo-choo, he’d be just as happy. Dave (II) is not really an EPT freak; it’s just too late now to repair the damage he received while bashing others/being bashed in SCA. As editors are perfect, all you read about me is a lie.
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It all started when we got together one Saturday for our weekly game of something. I was really up for a fantasy battle, but Monty had just painted ninety WW I tanks that morning and wanted to try a little skirmish against the Polish armies that all the rest of us had. We talked him out of that idea fast and the discussion began again on what we should do. I suggested the fantasy miniatures battle, but someone else wanted to D&D. This immediately ended the discussion because no one in their right minds could turn down a chance to D&D.
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We all got out our best player characters. While I had several thirtieth level fighters and wizards, I decided to pull out my ancient gold dragon for the trip. Looking over what the other guys were going to use, I saw the usual mix of balrogs, demons, monks, paladins, and iron golems. Freddy even decided to go have his plus eight purpose sword with its ego of eighteen and intelligence of twenty-eight, or was it twenty-nine? Well anyway, I saw right away that it wasn’t going to be anything more than an average game and so I sat back to take it easy. Then, to everyone’s horror, Monty pulled out his new universe, which he had just completed last night and we all went wild. Everyone started talking at once, wanting to use nine or ten wishes to find out about the universe or wanting to use their favorite artifact or X-15 computer for the same reason. We then all decided that the day could not be spent D&Ding.
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I again suggested we play some fantasy miniatures and we all agreed to try that, but Monty was strangely silent. He pointed out that since all twelve of us had chipped in and gotten a copy of “Swords and Spells” (I had gotten a coupon) we should go by those rules. Besides, Monty said, he had just read the rules a half-an-hour before he came.
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We then had the same fight we have everytime we want to have a fantasy miniatures battle. What exactly from our vast hordes of figures from all ages and universes (some not even known yet) could we use as fantasy figures. Freddie said he had just that morning painted the entire “12 o’clock high bomber wing” and wanted to use that saying he could cite examples from several books dealing with planes flying into fantasy worlds. We quickly shut him up and made him sit down. Another one of us said that just last night he had painted all his 300 space marines and wanted to use them and we made him shut up even quicker. I then said that the figures used should be from a culture or time where they commonly used swords and that brought some grumbling from the Tractics boys of our group. Monty was all for bringing out his 200 legions strong Airfix army; the one he had painted last Sunday during the commercials. That started us off again on how many figures we should use. Robert wanted to use his 400 French cavalry that he had just painted Tuesday night and naturally the thought of those pistols made everyone decide on an added definition of fantasy.
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It was agreed upon that the figures had to come from a sword using culture written about by a famous fantasy (not science fiction) author. This brought us back to the number of figures we should use and in the interest of getting the game started less than three hours late, we decided on an arbitrary fifteen figures plus one special being related to that culture. Almost everyone started reaching for their storm giants and dragons, but Monty with a wicked smile on his face pulled out fifteen Viking type men and women and an old dude in a chair. He had done an unusually fine painting job on them, but they were very colorful for Vikings. I figured the guy in the chair must have been someone mighty special with an artifact or something and we all started making guesses on the weapons the puny Vikings were going to use. It just wasn’t Monty’s style to bring out a batch of humans that could get blown away by something small like Ernie’s squad of iron golems or Jake’s flight wing of red dragons. Then Monty hit us with the bombshell. Since he was limited to sword using cultures written about by fantasy authors he had decided to use the fifteen toughest Norse Gods with Odin leading them. We all started shouting unfair at once, while we were putting away our dragons, golems, and undead and bringing out tougher things.
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After long debate, in which our first move was to make Monty put away his Gods, we decided on a new definition. We would use figures taken from sword using cultures. It had to be written about by a noted fantasy author. The fifteen figures had to be normal everyday beings of that culture with normal weapons and armor for that culture. The special being could have one weapon not above plus three, special armor not above plus three, or one spell, and they couldn’t be so strong that a direct hit from a panzerfaust couldn’t kill them with one shot. That last point was brought up by the Tractics boys, but it still sounded good to the rest of us.
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Mounts and movement factors were discussed when Tom brought out sixteen knights on sixteen platinum dragons. We thought that knight types generally were found on chargers (not the cars, he had those too) and this was how they were to be mounted. Dave pulled out some really strange Petal Throne things that nobody could make head nor tails of. I think he called them hooggies or something like that, but we made him put them away stating that they were never written about in a fantasy book. After all was said and done we had a pleasant mix of knights, dwarfs, elves, ogres, winged men from Mongo, nomadic horse archers, elephant riding Greeks, giants, Swiss pikemen, and Romans.
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Monty and I had wisely held back when everyone was digging into their bushel baskets of miniatures and bringing out things. In fact, while everyone else was grabbing figures Monty and I were deciding terrain and who would be on whose side. I said a desert area with a few big sand dunes and little other terrain would be fun and everyone but Pete with the wood elves agreed (he was shouted down). Monty decided a free for all with no one siding with another would be good. The point was brought up that natural enemies like giants and dwarfs shouldn’t ever fight together no matter what (which really hurt the two Diplomacy buffs that had the dwarfs and giants). Finally Monty felt he couldn’t hold back anymore and brought out sixteen of the prettiest tyrannosaurus Rex you ever saw. He also brought out two comic books and a novel none of us had ever read to support his use of them. Over a loud and long protest by the single F.I.T.S. lover in our group who wanted to argue logically for the fact that such a group would never realistically come together. All the rest of us surveyed the playing area; with its assemblage of monsters, magic, men, and his flying men of Mongo, and laughed him into silence. It was my turn to place my figures on the board and while I took out by black enamel coffer from its fishing tackle resting place I started to talk about Edgar Rice Burroughs. I mentioned the fact that no one could doubt that Burroughs was one of the greatest of fantasy writers. I saw the beads of perspiration start to form on eleven foreheads. I also mentioned as I opened the black coffer shielding its contents from all the others that his Mars series was certainly a culture using swords. I saw the Tractics and Diplomacy boys turn pale and Monty tried to pull back his dinosaurs, but I held his hand.
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With a gleam of triumph in my eyes, I pulled out sixteen of the nicest, best painted set of green Martians the world has ever seen. Each one had a radiation rifle, a radiation pistol, and two swords at hand. I could see the looks of fear in eleven eyes and the grim determination of eleven jaws. The battle was brief and when it was over the heaped bodies were laid around the Martians inches deep. Endit
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