Mearls talks about his inspiration for the 4e classes

[Garnfellow]

What about those hunting packs (whose name I forget), where the members get progressively stronger as you kill other members, until the remaining few are nigh invulnerable?

I think about that notion quite often, but have never really gotten around to actually fleshing it out in game terms.

The Huntsmen of Annuvin -- a very cool idea. Lewis Pulsipher did a 1e AD&D interpretation that appeared in Dragon magazine No. 40 (August 1980). And I did my own 3.5e conversion of Pulsipher's take.

 

[catsclaw227]

Wow.... OK, then. As a kid, I read as much Moorcock (Elric, Corum, Hawkmoon), Leiber (Fafhrd & Grey Mouser), Donaldson (gotta love Thomas Covenant), and Eddings (Belgariad, Malloreon) as I could, but strangely never heard of the Chronicles of Prydain.

I may have to find the first one on ebay and read it.

 

[Punnuendo]

I had forgotten all about the Huntsmen until you mentioned them. Okay, those might have been scarier.

Back to the OT though, whichever episode of the Atomic Array podcast covered the PHB2 had one of the designers mention Batman as an influence on the Avenger as well.

 

[Klaus]

Judging the Chronicles of Prydain by the Disney version of The Black Cauldron is like judging D&D by the Dungeons & Dragons movie with Marlon Wayans and Jeremy Irons.

Alas, I live in the wrong hemisphere for fantasy literature. The first fantasy books I read were the Dragonlance Chronicles, imported from Portugal, back in 1990. The only Lieber I read were the Epic Comics adaptation by Chaykin and Mignola (also imported), I never read any Moorcock, and I only read Howard for the first time two years ago, when they released two volumes of his Conan stories here.

I did manage to read lots of Ravenloft, Eberron and Song of Ice & Fire, though.

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

Judging the Chronicles of Prydain by the Disney version of The Black Cauldron is like judging D&D by the Dungeons & Dragons movie with Marlon Wayans and Jeremy Irons.

To be fair to them, neither Marlon Wayans nor Jeremy Irons were the worst parts of that movie.

 

[Turjan]

I just finished reading the entire dying earth series (a couple of days ago). Great series.

I'd say it's really not taken whole cloth from Vance's dying earth. It's only vaguely taken from it in most respects. You essentially get two elements - memorization of spells, and naming of spells after famous spell-makers.

The rest seems to be mostly or entirely ignored. The power of spells (every wizard can kill any other non-wizard with a single spell unless they have magic to protect themselves), the nature of spells as living things that are wrestled with, their origin as demon-powered, the use of Ioun stones to further power spells themselves, etc... none of that actually was carried over to D&D.

So yeah, inspired by some Vance stuff, but not wholly carried over in my opinion.

Well, I guess that's why Grimstaff mentioned the "first 10 pages". I would say the first two stories, "Turjan of Miir" and "Mazirian the Magician" are the most influential. These are the early stories that leave out the demon and ioun stone stuff.

But I agree with the power level. D&D's "Prismatic Spray" is much less potent than Vance's, but that's understandable if you deal with a game, where certain death or certain survival are less fun. The element of guessing the right spells for the day is certainly there, and what you see is general purpose spells. Turjan, for instance, selected "The Excellent Prismatic Spray, Phandaal’s Mantle of Stealth, and the Spell of the Slow Hour" before he went on a dangerous journey. So, yes, you get two very high power spells and one medium, and that's about it. It's similar to D&D, but to make the game work, the power levels had to be adjusted from the literary source.

 

[Greg K]

I think my geek card will be revoked. Not only have I had not read The Chronicles of Prydian, I have not read Howard's Conan, Jack Vance, or L. Sprague de Camp (I tried the Complete Compleat Enchanter and put it down),

I think my entire list of fantasy books read (excluding Greek Mythology) is the following:

Lord of the Rings
The Hobbit
Chronicles of Narnia
Once and Future King
Book of Merlin
Le Morte d'Arthur
Idylls of th King
Riddle Master of Hed Trilogy
Guardians of the Flame (first three or four books)
Myth Adventures (entire series)
Xanth (the first six books)
Jack of Shadows
Chronicles of Amber (first five books)
Eye of the Dragon
The Misenchanted Sword
Magician: Apprentice
Mists of Avalon
Dragonlance Chronicles
Dragonlance Tales 1-3
The Prism Pentad (first three books)
Icewind Dale Trilogy
Dark Elf Trilogy
Saga of Old City
A little bit of Fritz Leiber's Fahfrd and Grey Mouser
A little bit of the Elric cycle.

On my book shelf to read are the first three Shanarra books, the first three Hambly Darwath books, Salvatore's The Spear Wielder Trilogy, and the Hardy's Master of Five Magics.

 

[Pseudopsyche]

Wow.... OK, then. As a kid, I read as much Moorcock (Elric, Corum, Hawkmoon), Leiber (Fafhrd & Grey Mouser), Donaldson (gotta love Thomas Covenant), and Eddings (Belgariad, Malloreon) as I could, but strangely never heard of the Chronicles of Prydain.

I may have to find the first one on ebay and read it.

The Chronicles of Prydain are marketed for young adults. The five books include a Newbury Medal and a Newbury Honor. Along with Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising Sequence, they played a critical role in igniting my love for fantasy as a kid. I think the books are still worth reading as an adult, although at the time I considered myself to be "graduating" when I picked up the Dragonlance Chronicles.

BTW, the Chronicles of Prydain are still in print. Amazon has the first book in paperback new for $7, used for under a $1.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Wow.... OK, then. As a kid, I read as much Moorcock (Elric, Corum, Hawkmoon), Leiber (Fafhrd & Grey Mouser), Donaldson (gotta love Thomas Covenant), and Eddings (Belgariad, Malloreon) as I could, but strangely never heard of the Chronicles of Prydain.

I may have to find the first one on ebay and read it.

I'm pretty sure they're in print.

His Westmark trilogy is also pretty good, and surprisingly dark.

Brad

 

[Particle_Man]

What about those hunting packs (whose name I forget), where the members get progressively stronger as you kill other members, until the remaining few are nigh invulnerable?

Sort of an explicit version of the Inverse Ninja Law?