Ads for the Basic and Expert versions of the Dungeons & Dragons game appeared regularly in comic books during the early 1980s. Many of my friends who collected comics at the time also played D&D.
It occurred to me that several of the Defenders would work reasonably well as characters within that game. 
- Dr. Strange was surely a Magic-User, and a high-level one at that.
- Hellcat's exceptional Dexterity and climbing abilities fit the bill for a law-abiding Thief.
- With armor and sword, Valkyrie was a shoe-in for a Fighter with the maximum Strength score allowable for a player-character in the game. D&D stats for a pegasus would easily apply to Valkyrie's winged horse, Aragorn.
- Daimon Hellstrom's religious motivation and healing powers approximated those of a Cleric (even if a trident wasn't one of the weapons available to that character class).
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ALL of the Defenders would be high level characters, I'd say! Dr. Strange and Valkyrie would be in the Immortal levels(at least: Sorceror Supreme and Demi-god!) in the Mentzer edited Series 1983-1989(Though the ad comes from the Moldvay set timeframe[1981-82]; these were largely similar with powers/abilities reworked for a larger level range in the newer sets.) Hellcat would definitely be about max as a Thief, I'd say. Likewise with Hellstrom as a Cleric, but his demonic parentage gives him powers that would be in the Immortals range to my mind. Gargoyle(with powers) could be one of those non-standard(and perfectly legit) monster guys you see every now and then. Deciding how to level him would be an interesting game discussion!
As an Old School D&D fan, now back into gaming(apparently there's a resurgent interest in Pen and Paper RPGs[Old School especially] lately!), this post in particular intrigued me. Might be fun to try this in a game sometime! Of course, the original Marvel Superheroes(Now free on the web) game was fun, too. And included the Defenders!
I just discovered the blog not too long ago, and am enjoying reading thru it. I like the no particular topic and order style. Thanx.
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