High Level Literary Sources

[Psion]

Steven Brust's 'Jhereg' series.

Yup.

Add: The Belgariad.

 

[Psion]

I can't think of many books that have the save or die effects common in high level play. Having the protaganists die and then be raised isn't a common trope at all.

As far as most novels are concerned a sword blow could be a save or die effect. The author just writes the protagonist out of harm's way. Novels don't have HP.

 

[Infernal Teddy]

Do greek and babylonian legends count?

 

[Evilhalfling]

intrestingly many of the modern high level suggestions have all been heavily influnced by D&D
David Eddings, Raymond Feist, Robert Jordan and EGG were all gamers.

 

[the Jester]

I'm surprised that nobody has yet mentioned Stephen R. Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever.

Truly world-at-stake fantasy, with evil really evil and the powerful forces powerful enough to destroy or corrupt the entire Land. Monsters that hear their name spoken from anywhere in the world. Leper messiah...

 

[Vanye]

Tamora Pierce's Conan-ish-inspired books, starting with Alanna and moving on, all seem to have pretty damn high-level characters as protagonists. They wield magic capable of blasting huge ancient monsters to bits, they teleport around all the time, heal grievous wounds by force of will, wield super-ancient super-powerful weapons, "weave" magic to create worldbreaking effects like storms and moving continents, and sit around and chat with the gods once in a while. It does get fairly annoying after a while.

I must have blinked and missed any of the books where any of the characters, in either the Tortall novels, or in the Circle novels, wield super powerful weapons, move continents, or teleport.

Very few monsters get "blown to bits", at least in the Alanna novels, and even the later novels, featuring Daine and Numair, or the ones with Alanna's daughter certainly don't have gratuitous explosions.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

I'm surprised that nobody has yet mentioned Stephen R. Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever.

The thread is only less than 24 hours old... A lot hasn't been mentioned yet.

Truly world-at-stake fantasy, with evil really evil and the powerful forces powerful enough to destroy or corrupt the entire Land. Monsters that hear their name spoken from anywhere in the world. Leper messiah...

I don't think any of those are necessarily ingredients in high-level D&D play. A lot of those can be simply story elements that any character can encounter. High level, to me, is more easily recognized by what characters (especially PC-like characters) are able to do themselves, not the plot and story that they find themselves in.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

I freely admit that fantasy is not my genre of choice to read, so, what am I missing?

How about D&D fiction itself! Every Drizzt book out there. Every Elminster book out there. Paul Kidd's Greyhawk books. Dark Sun's Prism Pentad series starts with low-level characters and culminates with the deaths of several demigod-like sorcerer-kings.

Game fiction itself is ripe with high-level adventuring.

 

[The Forsaken One]

Jack Vance's Tales of the Dying Earth. Especially Rhialto the Marvellous which is an awsome example of epic mages imho!

And offcourse the based on that campaign and epic story hour of our very own Sepulchrave II. Whos SH imho is the very best piece of fantasy literature I've ever read so I can heartily recommend that.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Like others have stated, Vance's Dying Earth stories, classic mythology and pretty much all of Moorcock's Eternal Champion cycle are high-level RP stuff.

Fritz Lieber's Fafhrd & Grey Mouser stories are generally high-level.

The Conan and Gor stories, as I recall, are generally mid to high-level.

The Thieves World books run the gamut from low to high, as do the Xanth books.