Finally, after a long wait, nearly a year after the Player’s Handbook came out, we get the first edition AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide, just like that, no apostrophe in the title, hardcore! It has all you would expect from a DM guide and more, it’s the longest of the three main books (together with the Player’s Handbook and the Monster Manual) clocking in at 240 pages of dense text and tables, over 100 pages more than the PHB.

In terms of content it gives DMs a lot of useful information, of course, on possible encounters, effects of spells and details both on how to create their own campaigns but also on how to run the game itself, when to help or hinder players, etc. A lot of the content in this first edition has fallen by the wayside in later editions, this is the case with the extensive section on henchmen and hirelings something which was much more central to the early days of the game than it has become in later editions. Players went around with a bunch of followers as they gained in levels, this is much rarer now. 

However, much of the book is similar to what later editions of the DM would be, it’s recognizably the same game as the newer versions, with detailed descriptions of magical items and treasure to be found, tables for random generation of encounters, NPCs and so forth, all the behind the scenes things that make the world feel alive and that players neither need to nor should know lest it burst the fantastical bubble of the game. It also has some fun illustrations, although it’s very densely packed with text, and even some humorous cartoons.