What novels have most influenced your game?

Piratecat

Sesquipedalian

• Oct 8, 2003

• #1

I thought about this when I recently picked up my copy of Zelazny's Dilvish, the Damned. Suddenly I realized that my entire campaign feel was trying to emulate this book. Sure, I've nabbed a lot of stuff from other sources (including the "country = personality type" from the Belgariad), but a tremendous amount of flavor has seeped into my game from this one set of short stories.

How about you folks?

 

Last edited: Oct 8, 2003

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Silver Moon

Adventurer

• Oct 8, 2003

• #2

I'd have to say that the vast majority of module subplots and a running and interconnected continuity in our 21+ year long campaign can be traced directly back to ideas drawn from my collection of over 10,000 comic books. We also have a half dozen playing characters who are pegasi riders, with a bond to their animals taken almost directly from the Dragonriders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey

 

CCamfield

First Post

• Oct 8, 2003

• #3

Dang, that's cool, Piratecat! I love the Dilvish stories. They owe something to H. P. Lovecraft at times, generally to old pre-Tolkien fantasy. The Bells of Habrohoring...

I'm not actually GMing right now but my always-being-slowly-worked-on campaign world is perhaps indirectly inspired by stuff like The Tower of Fear by Glen Cook, and Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson. Darker desert fantasy, not so much Arabian Nights.

edited P.S. Piratecat, I hope/presume you also have a copy of The Changing Land?

 

Last edited: Oct 8, 2003

Olive

Explorer

• Oct 8, 2003

• #4

Embarassingly enough, the original Dragonlance trilogy... I've always been obsessed with Tiamat and Bahamut since reading those when I was 12.

 

Berandor

lunatic

• Oct 8, 2003

• #5

In a way, I'm emulating Pillars of the Earth.
But the original Dragonlance trilogy has inserted a heroic feel into that; Ed Greenwood's early novels (and some other FR novels, like Raven's Bluff) brought humour to the game; Song of Ice & Fire rekindled my love for morally challenging plots.
I don't think I can really pinpoint my influences, as I've taken something from a lot of books I've read. The above choices are the ones coming to mind now, though, so perhaps they are the most prominent.

 

Eternalknight

First Post

• Oct 8, 2003

• #6

Olive said:

Embarassingly enough, the original Dragonlance trilogy... I've always been obsessed with Tiamat and Bahamut since reading those when I was 12.

Click to expand...

Well, I would also have to say Dragonlance as well.

Not a novel series, but the Lone Wolf gamebooks also have influenced my games immensely.

 

Hand of Evil

Hero

Epic

• Oct 8, 2003

• #7

Zelanzy and Moorcock come to mind but also ERB's John Carter of Mars (Carson Napier of Venus), Howard's Conan, and a few others, those are the books that lead me to gaming.

 

drnuncheon

Explorer

• Oct 8, 2003

• #8

Simon Greene's Hawk and Fisher books for my Freeport game. In fact, they directly inspired it - I was looking for a 'hook' for a 2-person campaign, and the idea of a pair of Watchmen who get involved with all sorts of bizarre supernatural crimes was too good to pass up. It's grown past that now, but that will always be the root.

J

 

Hand of Evil

Hero

Epic

• Oct 8, 2003

• #9

Others books I always loved;
Hiero's Journey by Sterling Lanier
Where Evil Dwells by Clifford Simak

Elizabeth H Boyer

World of the Alfar

The Sword and the Satchel
The Elves and the Otterskin
The Thrall and the Dragon's Heart
The Wizard and the Warlord

Wizard's War

The Troll's Grindstone
The Curse of Slagfid
The Dragon's Carbuncle
The Lord of Chaos

 

Last edited: Oct 8, 2003

A

Atridis

First Post

• Oct 8, 2003

• #10

Since reading "Perdido Street Station" and "The Scar", all my D&D-related thoughts keep swinging in their direction. In fact, I'm genuinely surprised that no one has a published a "d20 guide to Bas Lag."

While Gene Wolfe's "Book of the New Sun" hasn't made it's way into a game, it nevertheless has permanently skewed my vision of fantasy away from the Tolkienesque (and, subsequently, revived my interest in the genre). I have vague memories of a GURPS book, but don't quote me on that.

An excellent low-fantasy novel, without being Conan-like, is Guy Gavriel Kay's "Tigana." I think the ENWorld Book Club is currently bathing in this one (it's fairly long, but very absorbing - I was bummed out when it ended).