How tokien ruined modern fantasy

[Desdichado]

Let's address each of your points: how would they look without Tolkien?

1.Uberelves now people think elves have to be demigods.
2.Legolas
3. dwarves hate elves
4.that alll dwarves are axe-weilding elf haters
5.he made everyone think gnomes suck
6. he made rangers gods
7. he created the half-orc barbarian
8.made halflingsa fat crybabies like sam gamgee
10. made gobilnoids universal cannonfodder

1. Whereas prior to Tolkien, elves had to either make toys at the North Pole, or help that poor old cobbler make shoes all night.
2. Uh, yeah. What's your point? Oh, looking below you apparently either are confusing Legolas with Drizzt, or projecting the movie Legolas (who never dual-wields, but who otherwise I guess maybe fits) into the book inappropriately.
3. Whereas before Tolkien, dwarves either were elves, or simply short people.
4. Actually, in Tolkien not all elves are axe-weilding elf haters, so that's just flat out wrog.
5. To Tolkien, the gnomes was an alternate name for the Noldor, who hardly sucked.
6. Umm, no he didn't. He made the king a hero, though.
7. So what? He also created orcs.
8. Actually, only Sam Gamgee was like Sam Gamgee. Nor was he fat nor a crybaby.
9. Uh, where's nine?
10. Tolkien had no goblinoids.

If you're going to show up on a fantasy message board and bash Tolkien, at least make the pretense of knowing what the heck you're talking about. You're not going to get a whole lot of respect otherwise.

Oh, and check out that shift key. There's one on either end of your keyboard.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I've read the books twice. The first time was before I read the great epics like the Illiad or Beowulf, and so I found portions of the LOTR cycle pretty tedious.

AFTER I found out about Tolkein's war experiences, as well as having read the epics, I understood the cycle much better- I understand why he wrote the way he did- it is an echo of the epic style as translated into the novel form.

The influence of other writers in D&D is plain to see, IF you've read the right stuff. Some of the magic items in the game come directly from Jack Vance' Dying Earth books, like Ioun Stones. Multiclassing probably exists because characters like Conan, Grey Mouser, and Fafhrd are so clearly not single classed characters. And if the standard D&D cosmology of multiple Prime Material planes doesn't have elements of both Michael Moorcock's multiplanar structure in his Eternal Champion stories as well as eastern religions, I've been hoodwinked.

Ogrork the Mighty- please reread that quote from Britannica.

"A different word orc, alluding to a demon or ogre, appears in Old English glosses of about AD 800 and in the compound word orcneas ("monsters") in the poem Beowulf. As with the Italian orco ("ogre") and the word ogre itself, it ultimately derives from the Latin Orcus, a god of the underworld. The Old English creatures were most likely the inspiration for the orcs that appear in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy."
- Encyclopedia Britanica

Did he change them? Yes. But he would undoubtedly be aware of the origins of the word, and probably chose it to get the resonance of "monsters" from Beowulf.

As for our troll:

I stand by my reasons most of you are Tolkien fanboys who can't accept change. Also he didn't create the orc he stole it from mythology in fact almost everything in LOTR is stolen from mythology. And he madew elvese bow obssesed that is enough reason for me to have thias thread. Hobbits are fat crybabies all they do is sit holes smoke and eat six meals a day. They are inferior to Kender and halflings in everyway. For that guy who said I have no #9 here it is 9. Sauron, and tolkien didn't make elves tall he stole them from celtic mythology

He needs to do his homework.

1) Tolkein never claimed to create anything in the LOTR books ex nihilo except the various languages. Almost everything was based on European and classical mythology/epic liturature. So your claim about celtic elves or things "stolen from mythology" is a non-issue, and one Tolkein himself might agree with. Tolkein didn't invent- he reshaped retold, and popularized.

2) The "bow obsession" is NOT a Tolkein theme. That aspect of RPGs came more from subsequent writers, game designers, and movies like Hawk the Slayer, although you will also find mention of elvish or fey archers in European folklore.

3) Given that haflings are as blatant a ripoff of hobbits as can be, right down to the 1st Edition's PHB & MM giving them a heightened resistance to magic...something that is an important plot point in the LOTR books, the statement "They are inferior to Kender and halflings in everyway." is truly laughable.

I WILL say this in defense of our troll, however: I sorely wish that the big book stores would devote less space to the multiple printings of LOTR and books about LOTR and more space to other classic fantasy series, like Earthsea, Eternal Champion, Fafhrd & Grey Mouser, Amber etc. I went shopping for some of those the other day (for a birthday gift). The various printings of LOTR took up an entire 5' x 5' section of shelving, whereas I had to special order what I was looking for.

That overcommitment to only one of so many classics of the genre can definitely skew the perceptions of those looking in from outside.

Of course, that is NO excuse for Warlord's...misperceptions.

 

[Dark Jezter]

Gygax can claim what he wants, but the whole idea of elves/dwarves/halflings being actual people instead of mystical mysterious demi-god types comes from Tolkien. For that matter, one wonders what D&D would be like if Tolkien hadn't had such a strong influence on modern fantasy. Maybe something along the lines of REH or Arthurian mythos... no demihumans, all the PCs would be human, and elves/dwarves and the like would be monsters. There wouldn't be halflings at all (did Tolkien invent these, or get the idea from all the 'little people' mythos of Ireland etc.?). Rangers would be likely to be absent, although I suppose there might be some type of woodsman PC.

Gygax never said that D&D had no Tolkien influences, rather that D&D was only marginally influenced by Tolkien. Pulp authors like Howard, Lieber, and Vance were much bigger in their influence in the game.

Elves, halflings, and dwarves as playable, human-like races is definately a Tolkien influence, but apart from that there really isn't much Tolkien in OD&D; the concept of adventurers pillaging dungeons and gaining treasure were a common premise in the stories by REH and Fritz Lieber, and the magic system is straight out of the novels of Jack Vance.

As you mentioned, if LotR had never been published, then its likely that demihuman races would be absent from the game, at least initially.

 

[Desdichado]

I stand by my reasons most of you are Tolkien fanboys who can't accept change.

It would be a lot easier to accept this as an opinion that merited some discussion if you didn't turn around and point towards hack authors like Salvatore and series like Dragonlance, who simply riff off Tolkien, as the new inspired fantasy. Or if you actually had an argument instead of what you did do: post completely incorrect "facts" about Lord of the Rings and then spout nonsense like that when challenged.

Also he didn't create the orc he stole it from mythology in fact almost everything in LOTR is stolen from mythology.

No he didn't. He didn't create the word orc, but that's the easiest part anyway. He created the concept of the orc whole cloth.

And he madew elvese bow obssesed that is enough reason for me to have thias thread.

Are you sure you've read the books? Legolas had a bow, and was a good shot, but no where else is it implied that any the elvese people are "obsessed" with the bow.

Hobbits are fat crybabies all they do is sit holes smoke and eat six meals a day. They are inferior to Kender and halflings in everyway.

Words fail me. Why don't you go post this stuff somewhere on Usenet where you can get a proper response to this level of ignorance?

For that guy who said I have no #9 here it is 9. Sauron, and tolkien didn't make elves tall he stole them from celtic mythology

Celtic mythology has no elves, it has the tuatha de danaan who devolved into the Sidhe, who don't really have that much in common with Tolkien elves anyway. Tolkien was quite obviously not very interested in Celtic mythology anyway; he was an anglophile through and through. Heck, he didn't even have any use for the Normans for crying out loud.

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

As you mentioned, if LotR had never been published, then its likely that demihuman races would be absent from the game, at least initially.

I think they probably would have made it in anyway, though perhaps not quite in the same form. If you think about it though, if you're going to include different classes (which is what the demi-humans originally were in D&D) giving them names everyone is familiar with is a natural. Everyone, even people who have never read Tolkien or D&D have heard of elves, gnomes, dwarves and such; I know that was the case with me waaaay back in the day.
Though their stats in the game might have been different to an extent.

 

[Galethorn]

Ahem, it seems people didn't read the most important part of my post;

Everying is IMHO, and of course, YMMV when taking each point with a grain of salt, and all that rot.

And, as for the new #9, well, I think it's been answered well already.

Aaaaand, as for being afraid of change, I think you've got me wrong at least. I'm not afraid of change; I love change, but I don't love what things seem to be heading towards. I didn't get uppity when the concept of good orcs first came to me. I didn't cringe and hide in a corner when halflings went on the atkins diet and got ADD. No, It's not fear of change, it's that I liked my fantasy the way it was. Now, I did start ignoring new things when dinosaurs, ninjas, robots, and ubersweet katanas became the common fare for new gaming developments, but I didn't tell other people they shouldn't play the game that way. Now, don't think of me as some guy who's been sitting around in the basement since '78 playing D&D with his now balding friends; technically, I can't even be nostalgic, you know, since I'm only 17.

So, I'm not a nostalgic old-schooler, and I'm not afraid of change, but I think D&D has done far more to 'ruin' modern fantasy than Tolkien could have if he wanted to. Put that in your pipe and smoke it! Oh, wait, you don't like the whole hobbit thing, what with the pipe-smoking and all...well, put that in your...coke(?) and drink it...!

Oh, sorry for bandying about the T-word. I was concerned by the spelling and gramar, combined with the fact that it appears this was in the wrong forum...combined with your...well, lemme put it this way; whether you know it or not, what you're saying is flame bait. It's like slapping a tiger with a pork chop!

But again, you have to remember not everything I say is completely serious. You're probably not a bad person, and it's within all of your rights to state your opinion, but you managed to do it in a very...inflaming manner.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

1.Uberelves now people think elves have to be demigods.

Having read the Silmarillion, I can say this is not true. Not only does the human Beren, who has no elven ancestry whatsoever kick Noldor "demigod" behind (two Calaquendi!), but only the Calaquendi get uber powers. (Plus, Beren survived the torture, the Calaquendi did not.) I can count the number of Calaquendi left on Middle Earth with one hand: Galadriel, Glorfindel. And we're not even sure about the second one. Maybe Cirdan, but I doubt it. (I'll check up on that.) Elrond only seems uber 'cuz he's got that powerful Elven ring, which lost it's power (so Elrond ran away). A character whose power is based solely on a magic item? I think that is a legitimate complaint about JRR.

2.Legolas

Okay, what's wrong with him, other than the Drizzt-like movie version? He wasn't better than everyone else. Yes he had good eyesight and a good sense of balance, but Aragorn could out-track him anyday of the weak, despite being a lot younger. And you know why? Elves aren't uber, unless they're Calaquendi.

3. dwarves hate elves

Good. We wouldn't want them all to be a big happy family

The Silmarillion explains this... twice. The dwarves have no love for nature and there was that fight over a magic item. Frankly I didn't like the second reason, but whatever...

4.that alll dwarves are axe-weilding elf haters

In the Hobbit, the dwarves wield mattocks as well. Plus, some even wield swords.

5.he made everyone think gnomes suck

They do suck. They're only good for making munchy mages.

6. he made rangers gods

Faramir had his behind kicked. Plus, Tolkien's rangers didn't have any spellcasting or TWF crud, you can blame TSR and WotC for that.

7. he created the half-orc barbarian

I saw no raging orcs or half-orcs in Tolkien's work.

8.made halflingsa fat crybabies like sam gamgee

This one is hard to counter.

10. made gobilnoids universal cannonfodder

He did the same thing to humans. And elves - in the Silmarillion. I mean, really, you should read about the Battle of Unnumbered Tears.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The Silmarillion explains this... twice. The dwarves have no love for nature and there was that fight over a magic item. Frankly I didn't like the second reason, but whatever...

Well, the second part is a conceptual lift from the Neibelungenlied a.k.a. Wagner's Ring Cycle of operas and Teutonic legends.

Quote:
8.made halflingsa fat crybabies like sam gamgee

This one is hard to counter.

Sam represents the Everyman, the salt-of-the-earth yeoman without whom great deeds don't get done. He may be somewhat of a groveler, but that would have been at least STEREOtypical behavior of a "commoner" in the presence of his "betters" in the age in which LOTR was written and the age LOTR echoes. He's the working-class average Joe who makes civilization possible.

Some might consider Sam the true hero of the story, and LOTR ultimately the story of the power of the Everyman...but I think that may be a bit of a hard sell. But this much is true...Without Sam, Sauron wins. Without the Everyman, the Hero can't complete his tasks.

Quote:
10. made gobilnoids universal cannonfodder

He did the same thing to humans. And elves - in the Silmarillion. I mean, really, you should read about the Battle of Unnumbered Tears.

EVERYONE was cannonfodder. The great battles of LOTR are intended to be echoes of the brutality of WW1 and WW2, in which war had been stripped of the illusions of chivalry or any other window dressing about honor and glory that had accreted over the centuries of civilization, and was revealed to be all about dying in the mud in a trench.

 

[The Spectrum Rider]

1.Uberelves now people think elves have to be demigods.
2.Legolas
3. dwarves hate elves
4.that alll dwarves are axe-weilding elf haters
5.he made everyone think gnomes suck
6. he made rangers gods
7. he created the half-orc barbarian
8.made halflingsa fat crybabies like sam gamgee
10. made gobilnoids universal cannonfodder

It is not Tolkien's fault that so many subsequent writers have copied the details of his books rather than coming up with something more creative on their own. Many of the things you list showed up in his books for the first time - they were certainly not stereotypes then. They only became stereotypes because others writers kept repeating them, over and over.

And even in his books, the races were not as "stereotyped" as you seem to think. Not all his elves were bowmen. (Did Elrond ever touch a bow? How about Galadriel?) The conflict between elves and dwarves was a specific part of his imagined history, and, by the end of The Lord of the Rings, Gimli and Legolas are the closest of friends (to the point that Gimli actually passes over the sea with Legolas). He didn't even *have* gnomes as they exist in D&D - he sometimes used the word "gnome" for a particular group of his elves, but that's all; he hardly was in a position to make everybody think that "gnomes suck."

As for Sam and the other halflings, you couldn't be more wrong. I think you simply missed the point of the whole book.

You, and everybody else, are free to create novels and D&D settings in which elves and dwarves get along just great, halflings are tough as leather an unsentimental, and "goblinoids" (Tolkien didn't have "goblinoids;" he had orcs, who were sometimes called goblins) write poetry and add a touch of class to civilized life.

Don't blame JRRT if you don't.

In the meantime, try reading Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. Or The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers. Or Zelazny's Amber series. There's tons of fantasy out there without bow-wielding uberelves. Again, it's not Tolkien's fault if you can't find it.

The Spectrum Rider

The Spectrum Rider

 

[warlord]

It's me again the 16 year old target of tolkien fanboy hate. He did make gnomes suck by not including them so people over look them a so comical because of the whole lawn ornement thing. I also have read fafhrd and grey mouser and I have no problem with that its just with tolkien as you can see people worship him as a god and his word is law. So when someone challenges this they call me a troll and I may be a troll but I am a troll with a message expand your herizons Tolkien fanboys read Conan, Dracula, Frankenstein or anything by H.P. Lovecraft and step out of your world and into a new like the realms of horror explored in many of the books I mentioned.