Mearls talks about his inspiration for the 4e classes

[Mallus]

...Salvatore's The Spear Wielder Trilogy...

Replace this with some of Vance's Dying Earth stories, or his Planet of Adventure series. Your brain with thank me.

 

[Fifth Element]

When I was younger the Cauldron-Born were the freakiest villains I had ever read in a book.

Oh man, I haven't read any of these books in ages but just your mention of the Cauldron-Born gave me a bit of a shiver. I need to reread them to see if they hold up.

 

[MinionOfCthulhu]

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.

Sword & Sorcery did a monster like those in one of their monster compendiums. I'll see if I can find it, if you want.

On a (somewhat) related note to the topic at hand, where should I start with books about Fafhrd and Grey Mouser? Are there any omnibuses I should look for?

 

[catsclaw227]

If you use this search, you can read them like I did those many years ago:

Amazon.com: lankhmar

Just get Lankhmar Book 1 and go through Lankhmar Book 5. Book 6 - 8 came later, and I only sporadically read them over a few years.

 

[FriarRosing]

Now I'm worried I can't properly play D&D. The only fantasy books I've ever read were some R.A. Salvatore stuff in middle school, The Hobbit, and the first half of the Lord of the Rings. I am now concerned that I am doing it wrong.

I tried to read Wolfe's New Sun series, but didn't get too far. I've been meaning to read Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea books (which no one has mentioned, I don't think. I have no idea how D&D they are), but have yet to get started. That's all I've got for fantasy.

Maybe I need to read more.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Just get Lankhmar Book 1 and go through Lankhmar Book 5. Book 6 - 8 came later, and I only sporadically read them over a few years.

I'll second the first part of this--get books 1 through 5.

Avoid anything later. Especially avoid the last book. Seriously. Pretend it's the Black Plague, carrying a gun. It's not only awful, it'll seriously damage your appreciation for the earlier stories if you let it.

 

[Rechan]

I'll second the first part of this--get books 1 through 5.

Avoid anything later. Especially avoid the last book. Seriously. Pretend it's the Black Plague, carrying a gun. It's not only awful, it'll seriously damage your appreciation for the earlier stories if you let it.

So it's like The Dark Tower 4-6, eh?

 

[Mouseferatu]

Now I'm worried I can't properly play D&D. ... Maybe I need to read more.

All joking aside, I doubt very much that you're playing the game "wrong" because you're not familiar with a lot of the fantasy genre. If you're enjoying the game, you're playing right.

But I think you'll enjoy it more if you've read more--and I think, if you're the type to enjoy D&D at all, you're probably the type to enjoy the reading for its own sake. So I wouldn't say you ought to feel obligated, but I'd certainly recommend it.

(Of course, like anything else, there's a lot of fantasy that's crap, too. And tastes differ. So don't take anything you hear as holy writ. )

(Except for my own books. You can take those being worth buying as gospel. )

 

[Rechan]

There are so many books, movies, and games that I SHOULD play that I know I'd never get to them all in two life times.

 

[TwinBahamut]

It's nice to be hearing some talk about the Chronicles of Prydain here. For me, it was the series of books that bridged the gap between reading the Chronicles of Narnia when I was in elementary school and reading all of Tolkien's works when I was in high school. Which, interestingly enough, means I probably read it around the same time that I was working my way through all of Asimov's stories.