Back in October, the tabletop community lost a giant in game designer and publisher Greg Stafford. I am still not over it, to be honest. This week, I’m looking at some of the games that cemented his legendary status.

Let’s start as near to the beginning as my collection allows, with Dragon Pass. Way back in 1966, 18-year-old Stafford created the fantasy world Glorantha as a sort of creative exercise. In 1975, increasingly involved in game design, he founded Chaosium in order to publish a board game based in Glorantha. It was called White Bear & Red Moon. That game was successful enough to warrant a sequel called Nomad Gods in 1977. That in turn led some RPG enthusiasts to propose the creation of an RPG set in Glorantha, which would come to be known as RuneQuest. Dragon Pass is the 1980 remake of White Bear & Red Moon (huge thank you to the anonymous donor who sent this lovely box my way).

White Bear & Red Moon/Dragon Pass is a huge pivotal publication in tabletop RPG history. Without it, we wouldn’t have Chaosium, Call of Cthulhu (which arguably kept Lovecraft’s legacy fresh for modern audiences), Prince Valiant (from which Vampire: The Masquerade and other storytelling games sprang from) and more in their recognizable forms; without their ripples of influence, the entire RPG industry as we know it would be unrecognizable.

Dragon Pass also depicts a pivotal moment of Gloranthan history – the decisive battle between the rebels of Sartar against the Lunar Empire. Those familiar with the many editions of the RuneQuest and HeroQuest RPGs will recognize this as the always near, but not quite here, destination of those games.