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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Henry" data-source="post: 2503417" data-attributes="member: 158">Gotta disagree, there. while there are some outright Tolkienisms (ents, balrogs, elves as a major allied races, halfbbits, swords that glow when orcs are near, etc.), D&D still would have existed, because Howard's Conan, Moorcock's Elric, Feiber's Mouser, and Solomon Kane would have still existed. These were Gary's major influences, and Dave Arneson would possibly (not likely, but possibly) have taken his "role-playing ideas" to market himself. Even then, Marc Miller's Traveller stands as an idea he was developing independently of D&D; D&D gave him the push to finish his work, but his "wargame variant" would have seen press.None of this is to say D&D would exist in its current form, had Tolkien not produced his seminal work; it would be very different than it is today. Alas, that's a topic for another thread.</blockquote>