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Well, again, the question @Reynard asked was "to what degree" must such influence (I believe he called it campaign constraints) rise before you call it railroading, so one can ignore the many degrees (of whatever) below that point and just focus on what qualifies as railroading. If there's an...

I'm answering a question about when a "campaign constraint" meets the condition of a railroad, so the two states are railroad or not railroad, right? I think it's highly subjective and has to be interpreted from the player's point of view because it's their character that's getting railroaded...

What's silly is that you're positing a group where play has been predicated on the expectation of being able to go to Sigil even though the (presumably agreed upon) campaign setting is ancient Ireland. This group needs a session zero!

When they are imposed by someone other than the player, and they control the PC's decisions or opportunities for decisions in any way which, in the player's opinion, breaks the agreements and expectations which govern play for that group.

William Morris is acknowledged to have been inspirational to the Inklings in general. The Lady in TWBtW, with her dwarf servant, bears a strong resemblance to Narnia's White Witch, IMO, and CCaGtF is said to have been an important influence on Prince Caspian, although it's been a long time since...

I've been continuing to read the fantasy novels of William Morris and, so far this year, have finished The Wood Beyond the World and Child Christopher and Goldilind the Fair. TWBtW was surprisingly dark for the most part. After reading a few of his novels, I think Morris had some issues with...

Did the player feel that the situation you presented of being trapped in the Feywild did not meet the expectations set at your table regarding the opportunities their character would have to make decisions? If yes, then they are using the term correctly.

Appreciate the compliment. There's some more just above if you're interested!

I too am a fan of the lore about orcs having been bred from captured and twisted elves. I read the published form of The Silmarillion in my early teens, and, for many years, it formed the basis of my narrative about their origin. As you probably know, JRR Tolkien's writing on the matter never...

Thanks! I've included elves in Homo sapiens for a long time now, under Tolkien's influence, and, when I read Paracelsus' book describing undines, I recognized some of the folkloric elements Tolkien used to create his elves, such as their beauty, and how they of all the "spirit-men" most closely...

Personally, I lump humans in with elves as types of undine (trans. waveling) associated with the element water because of the physical resemblance of undines to humans according to Paracelsus.

This is basically the Paracelsian setup, except Air is "Sylphs", i.e. Wild Men/Wood Woses, i.e. Ents, and Humans partake of all four elements in equal amounts because they are the center of creation. I'd lump Goblins in with Orcs under Fire as types of domestic/hearth spirits.

For a product under the D&D brand name, I would basically ignore most of D&D's publishing history (because I'm not all that interested in most of it) and produce a heavily "Appendix N" influenced version. Here are my current race choices for that project: Man - no explanation required except...

I'm unsure why this is a reply to me. Are you arguing against the "Children of Different Humanoid Kinds" sidebar in the 2022 "Character Origins" UA by comparing it to the absolutely abhorrent Jim and Jane Crow era "one-drop rule" racial classification legal principal of most of the first...

Something that could make the half-elf stand out from the bog-standard elf is to lean into the touch of divine ancestry which makes JRR Tolkien's lineage of the Half-elven special, basically make them explicitly extraplanar. A fey-touched variant could be standard, like the descendants of...

Creatures of the Ethereal Plane are what's commonly referred to as "spirits" (i.e. disembodied spirits, because they lack materiality), whether they be fey spirits, elemental spirits, or undead spirits. D&D doesn't have a single creature type for these. As for a fifth type of elemental, in my...

That's what the dotted line is for, to show that generations are being skipped over. Also, there's the statement that Aragorn is "ultimately descended" from Elros. Apparently, for Tolkien, there was no minimum percentage of elven ancestry needed for someone to be considered Half-elven. The...

That's not my point. I'm not saying and don't agree that Aragorn is recognizing Elrond as human. I'm saying that Aragorn is recognizing himself as Half-elven. When he says "our race", he is talking about the race of the Half-elven of which he (Aragorn) is a member. For reference, here's a link...

You seem to have misunderstood what I was saying. I was positing that the quote shows that Aragorn regards both Elrond and himself as part of the same "race". I.e. that there is a Half-elven lineage that runs from Eärendil and Dior down through Aragorn and Arwen and their descendants. And I was...

An alternative to seeing half-elves as stuck between two peoples and as outsiders to both is to see them as members of a lineage that shares both elvish and human ancestry, like the House of Elros. As Aragorn says in LotR, Book 5, Chapter 8 (p 863 of my copy): 'Would that Elrond were here, for...