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D&D Has Never Been Suitable for Generic Fantasy
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<blockquote data-quote="Man in the Funny Hat" data-source="post: 5925402" data-attributes="member: 32740"><p>Generic Fantasy is 1st Edition D&D Appendix N. Or at least it can be said to begin there because that was what Gygax cited as influential fiction upon what he presented as D&D. That was a WIDE range of sources. He wasn't trying to build a game that could parrot them all - he was building a game whose final form was affected by them all. Sometimes the affectation is small and barely visible at all. Other times the effect is obvious and a direct imitation of something in that list of books.</p><p></p><p>In short, when we say D&D is Generic Fantasy we don't mean that it is supposed to be able to directly mimic many different approaches to fantasy which we see in written fiction and movies, although we have often desired for that to be the case and often pursue formal and informal projects that seek to bend D&D to just such a task. What we mean is that the end product of D&D is an AMALGAMATION of many elements from many different sources of fantasy. The result becomes an implied setting that is not specific to any given one of these but generic to many of them.</p><p></p><p>And Tolkien is really not a good example to present alone. I would suggest Howard first (Conan), and THEN you still have to add generous helpings of Tolkien (elves and orcs), Vance (magic system), Lieber (yada yada), with Anderson and Moorcock (alignment and etc.). And then you STILL need to keep adding other fantasy in order to fill in the gaps.</p><p></p><p>Now add 30+ years of manipulation and reformulation by people who came AFTER Gygax adding some of their own new sources of fantasy as well as the fictional worlds that <u>D&D ITSELF</u> did indeed spawn. Bizzarre but still a mix of influences. "Generic" is used as the opposite of "Specific" when referring to D&D as Generic Fantasy.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Man in the Funny Hat, post: 5925402, member: 32740"] Generic Fantasy is 1st Edition D&D Appendix N. Or at least it can be said to begin there because that was what Gygax cited as influential fiction upon what he presented as D&D. That was a WIDE range of sources. He wasn't trying to build a game that could parrot them all - he was building a game whose final form was affected by them all. Sometimes the affectation is small and barely visible at all. Other times the effect is obvious and a direct imitation of something in that list of books. In short, when we say D&D is Generic Fantasy we don't mean that it is supposed to be able to directly mimic many different approaches to fantasy which we see in written fiction and movies, although we have often desired for that to be the case and often pursue formal and informal projects that seek to bend D&D to just such a task. What we mean is that the end product of D&D is an AMALGAMATION of many elements from many different sources of fantasy. The result becomes an implied setting that is not specific to any given one of these but generic to many of them. And Tolkien is really not a good example to present alone. I would suggest Howard first (Conan), and THEN you still have to add generous helpings of Tolkien (elves and orcs), Vance (magic system), Lieber (yada yada), with Anderson and Moorcock (alignment and etc.). And then you STILL need to keep adding other fantasy in order to fill in the gaps. Now add 30+ years of manipulation and reformulation by people who came AFTER Gygax adding some of their own new sources of fantasy as well as the fictional worlds that [U]D&D ITSELF[/U] did indeed spawn. Bizzarre but still a mix of influences. "Generic" is used as the opposite of "Specific" when referring to D&D as Generic Fantasy. [/QUOTE]
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