A few years ago I started to try to get into Fantasy. I read Vance, Howard's Conan stories [0], Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique stories, Tolkien as an adult for the first time, and a bunch of other stuff referenced in the old DMG's Appendix N [1]. I like Smith's "evil as an aesthetic experience" vibe best but I wouldn't say that I'm a fantasy fan. Still, getting the S&S context has been neat.
I recently moved back to my hometown from NYC because of the pandemic. Being back here and living in a forest again got me reading the old AD&D books. And, AD&D is just more interesting than the third edition we played in high school. When I talked to Gygax about 3rd edition he just kind of sneered and said "It's for powergamers." [2]
Reading AD&D 21 years later, I see what he meant. AD&D has texture [3], it's bumpy, it's rough, it's great. But, beyond the mechanics, what's really grabbing me is that it hints at a style of play that I'd heard about from people who used to play with Gygax and his kids, but never experienced myself. The old D&D campaigns weren't epic, level 1-40, movie trilogies with a definite beginning middle and end like we think of them today. A D&D "campaign" was something a that could be played with a large number of players in a club. It was like the old military campaigns wargaming clubs used to organize. People in the campaign would have multiple characters of different classes and drop into or run individual games that exist in a shared time and place. Want to play, stop by. Someone can't make it, who else is available? Why does everyone meet in a tavern and then live together for the next forty levels? I'd rather play in a world that's populated with NPCs that used to be PCs.
Reading these old stories and the AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide for the first time really makes me want to run a shared world with a group of 10-20 people.
[0]: No one tells you this but Conan stories are basically Lovecraft Mythos stories. But with Howard's version of the Mythos you can just punch the cosmic horrors until they crawl back down their mystery wells.
[1]: https://goodman-games.com/blog/2018/03/26/what-is-appendix-n...
[2]: I met Dave Arneson too. I was digging through a bin of old miniatures at Gen Con in 2004. I turned to the old guy dressed as a wizard rummaging next to me and said something like "I really love these old miniatures." He said: "Me too" and we go to talking. About 10 minutes in I looked at his badge. He just smiled.
[3]: Look at the AD&D version of the "Animal Friendship" spell and then compare it to the 5th edition version:
Animal Friendship (AD&D): https://dungeonsdragons.fandom.com/wiki/Animal_friendship
Animal Friendship (5th Edition): https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/animal-friendship
Ask yourself, do you want to play the game where animal companions "follow you about" while you teach them tricks over the course of a month or the game where "Animal Friendship" just means "Bear go away now."? And no, I don't care about "balance". That's what a DM is for.