Did Tolkien create the D&D Ranger?

[pemerton]

[MENTION=6790260]EzekielRaiden[/MENTION], I can't speak to what might have happened at Gygax's table (or Arneson's), but [MENTION=336]D'karr[/MENTION] and [MENTION=87576]Scrivener of Doom[/MENTION] have posted examples of the sort of thing I had in mind.

 

[Dan_T_Head]

Tolkien was reportedly a fan of the works of James Fennimore Cooper, and Hawkeye was probably a big influence on Aragorn's development as a character. However, I would suggest that Hawkeye is only one of many influences, and I don't see a lot of particular features of the Ranger class, other than those dealing with woodcraft, that would suggest a strong connection to Hawkeye. The multiple borrowings from the abilities and exploits of Aragorn, on the other hand, are hard to ignore. It seems to me that Aragorn represents a specific crystallization of disparate elements from multiple literary sources which resonated particularly well with the tone of early D&D. No matter what his predecessors looked like, I think it's Aragorn who is being represented by the 1E and earlier Ranger. I can't speak for 2E and on, emphasis on the bow as a weapon, for example, is obviously a departure from both Aragorn and the 1E Ranger, but we still find many elements of the original even in the 5E version of the class.

No argument with that. It's like when a band says, "We were influenced by Metallica." Okay, great. But Metallica in turn clearly drew influence from Led Zepplin. They added their own ideas, but the influence is clear.

Aragorn is a distinctly British kind of Ranger. For example, the idea of being special by birth is totally UN-American. This is the antithesis of the American idea. That's not a negative for LORD OF THE RINGS, it's simply Tolkein putting his particular cultural stamp on an archtype he's building.

That said, I didn't realize we were specifically talking about the OD&D Ranger. When it came out, that class struck me as a Fighter/Thief build. This looks more to the Robin Hood archetype than what the Ranger has become.

 

[Hriston]

No argument with that. It's like when a band says, "We were influenced by Metallica." Okay, great. But Metallica in turn clearly drew influence from Led Zepplin. They added their own ideas, but the influence is clear.

True, and yet it would be disingenuous for the band that emulates Metallica to say that their primary influence was Led Zeppelin, as if the inovations of Metallica to be found in the band's music were of their own design.

Aragorn is a distinctly British kind of Ranger. For example, the idea of being special by birth is totally UN-American. This is the antithesis of the American idea. That's not a negative for LORD OF THE RINGS, it's simply Tolkein putting his particular cultural stamp on an archtype he's building.

Yes, but that stamp, the specialness of Aragorn, is what finds it's way into the character class as the magic-using ability of the Ranger. Without it you might as well have a fighter with some forestry skills tacked on. It simply wouldn't be the D&D Ranger.

That said, I didn't realize we were specifically talking about the OD&D Ranger. When it came out, that class struck me as a Fighter/Thief build. This looks more to the Robin Hood archetype than what the Ranger has become.

That's part of the problem with this thread. The "D&D Ranger" we're talking about has been many things over a period of forty years. I've limited my comments to the Fischer/1E Ranger and the 5E Ranger be ause those are the versions I'm most familiar with. It's strange to me that you see the earlier Ranger as having more in common with Robin Hood, however, as I would have said that the opposite evolution took place, beginning with something closely modeled on Aragorn and his ilk, and moving in later years towards expressions akin to Hank the Ranger and Robin Hood.

edit: Some of these changes came in with Unearthed Arcana when it was mandated that the Ranger had to have a bow.

 

[D'karr]

The choice by one of my players of that same theme ended up becoming the driving force of my (soon-to-finish) Neverwinter campaign. Oddly enough, he chose it despite playing a barbarian so it's resulted in something of a Conan-esque vibe. (BTW, I think the theme is Neverwinter Noble.)

Yes, I don't recall the exact theme but the gist of it was that the player could possibly be the true heir of Neverwinter. It was a very fun campaign as we were always hounded by different organizations. Lord Neverember whom we distrusted the entire time ended up becoming a strong ally, the sons of Alagondar became enemies (they wanted their own puppet on the throne), the Thayans were a constant thorn on our sides. The campaign went from dungeon delving in Undermountain, to discovery of the political undercurrent in Neverwinter, to diplomatic missions to gain support, to the crowning of the player as the true heir, to all out war, etc. It was a lot of fun.

 

[Samloyal23]

Another influence on Tolkien was the Merovingians and the legends of their lost heirs in hiding from the Carolingians. They were often referred to as "sorcerer-kings" and thought to have both divine and occult powers. After their fall some were said to be in hiding, watching over their followers. Moses, too, had similar tropes in his story, being the secret descendent of the Israelites while living among the Egyptians then dwelling in the wilderness to become purified and tempered.

The Rangers were all princes, dispossessed heirs of the Dunedain hiding in the wilderness while keeping watch for the rise of evil forces. They lived in the wild but were also educated, sophisticated, worldly. They combined the earthiness of those raised in the forest with the knowledge of those taught the ways of diplomacy and leadership. So, NO, they were not just "mountain men" or hunters, they were much more than that...

 

[Baron Opal II]

Yes, but I also draw upon the French-Canadian Voyageurs when I need a real-world example of a non-magical ranger.

 

[Samloyal23]

My note were lost when my laptop was stolen, but once I created a set of variant classes that included a huntsman class that was essentially a non-magic, non-Tolkienian ranger. He had survival and tracking abilities and specialized in ranged combat, wore medium or light armour, and had no shield proficiencies. If you want to get away from Tolkien, I think you might as well create a whole new class in place of the Ranger and just be done with it...

 

[Li Shenron]

Did Tolkien create the D&D Ranger?

Short > Yes

Long > I have no doubts that the D&D Ranger got the name and draft concept from Tolkien's Rangers. From there to the first final Ranger class in D&D however, other sources of inspiration very likely contributed. Had Tolkien called his Rangers anything else e.g. the "Kingfishers", there would have never been a class in D&D called Ranger, but very likely there would have been a class called Kingfisher.

 

[Bluenose]

I imagine the Ranger in D&D does come from Tolkien, or at least the name does (since the only ranger we really see much of is Aragorn, it's hard to say what the class should look like if he's not the only example you wish to use). Tolkien probably took it from medieval literature/history, ranger being a legal position. There's a poem, Robin Hood and the Ranger, which I imagine he was familiar with.

 

[Gadget]

Next we have the fighting advantage versus "giant class" humanoids. This emulates not only the many battles against orcs throughout the book, but also the climactic event of Aragorn's trajectory as an action hero, the single-handed slaying of a black troll at the Battle of the Black Gate, in which he nearly loses his life. The wounding of the troll's foot as it comes down on Aragorn's throat mirrors the wounding of the heel of Morgoth when he fought with the elven-king Fingolfin in giant form, so it's an important, symbolic moment in the book.

I was with you until this quote, as Aragorn vs the Troll at the Black Gate was wholly an invention of the movies, it never happened in the books; it was a last minute addition in post production as originally Aragorn was going to be fighting Sauron and losing when the Ring was destroyed (evidently the film makers thought that would be a little too cliche, even for them). So I highly doubt the scene in a movie released in 2003 had any effect on the SR or AD&D Ranger.

As for the word Ranger, people have rightly looked at the subtlety and nuance of how Tolkien used the word, but I think that people sometimes overemphasize that in Tolkien's work. While Aragorn is introduced as a "Ranger" to the Hobbits due to where and how they meet, he is rarely identified as such afterword, particularly after the party leaves Rivendell. Tolkien uses the word to describe Faramir's men in Ithilien, who seem to be much more in the tradition of U.S. Army Rangers: elite light infantry capable of extended operation in rugged terrain without much support, though there is the element of bringing the Kings' (or the Steward of the King's) Justice to the wilderness. Also, I believe that many of them were descended from the people of Ithilien who fled when Sauron rose to power again, so there is the sense of the disposesed and disinherited vagabond about them as well.

I wonder if the Texas Rangers, particularly the 'Lone Ranger' archetype has affected the class over the years. This is something that was not influenced by Tolkien, yet is part of the 'mythic tradition', at least in the USA.