The First Fantasy Campaign: Special Interests

JG 37 "The First Fantasy Campaign" contains an approach to awarding experience points very different from that used in OD&D:

Instead of awarding points for money and Jewels acquired in the depths of the Dungeon or hoarding items against the indefinite future, the players will receive NO points until they acquire the items listed below unless it happens to already fall within the area of their interest.

Dave Arneson, The First Fantasy Campaign

Descriptions are provided for seven categories of special interests defined for the purposes of gaining experience points (Wine, Women, Song, Wealth, Fame, Religion or Spiritualism, and Hobby).  Types of hobbies include animal, magical research, legend leads, and languages.

(There appears to have been an earlier reference to Hobbies under "Hunting, Armories and Animal Breeding" in the Internal Investments section of "Blackmoor, The Campaign" where "Player Motivation" might refer to "Special Interests".)

 

 

Chart for determining special interest(s) based on character type, from "The First Fantasy Campaign" (1977).

The method Arneson describes is to first roll percentile dice and consult Table II to determine a character's prime "special interest", based on character class (each of the rows add up to 100%), also referring to this attribute as a character's "motivation".

(Fighting-men are more likely to be motivated by fame, whereas clerics are more likely to be motivated by religion, for example.  However, it's possible for a fighter to be primarily motivated by religion, or a cleric by women or song, for that matter).

Players then refer to Table I in order to determine the percentage of experience points gained for gold pieces expended on various activities, based on the prime "special interest" column (the rows labeled a. to g. represent the seven categories of special interest).

Two alternative methods of determining the percentage of experience points gained for gold pieces expended on multiple special interests are given, although neither differ substantially from the first method, and one might involve 3d6 where percentile dice are mentioned.

What's interesting about the character classes listed, is that these include the three original classes, the ranger from The Strategic Review #2, the paladin from the Greyhawk Supplement, the assassin from the Blackmoor Supplement, the merchant, and the sage.

    

(Daniel Boggs makes a good case for this section to have been written by Arneson for the Blackmoor Supplement, in The Sage: Rescuing a lost Blackmoor Character Class, in which case the monk class may have indeed originated with Brian Blume.)

How to Become a Bad Guy (Basic Procedures): 

There is an additional section describing level advancement for monster types, with notes on alignment changes, for which I recommend checking out Experience Points, levels and Combat in Blackmoor over at OD&D Discussion.