Question for the grognards: Why does D&D have dwarves/elves/hobbits etc.?

[Umbran]

Okay, I have known since almost day one that LotR was not a big influence on D&D...

Yeah, people say that all the time. But the proof is in the pudding, right?

Or, alternatively, it isn't a digital thing - as if there's any influence, it has to be huge and permeate through all systems of the game? No, some influences coudl be limited in scope.

So, they took some style and imagry points from Tolkien for a few races. Big deal. Denying that like it is some sort of sin seems a bit nonsensical to me.

 

[BroccoliRage]

I'd be interested to hear where orcs and half-orcs and half-elves came from from those that are claiming something other than Tolkien as a primary influence.

They appear in Tolkein's work, as well. Remember? "Goblin Men"? "Elrond Half-Elven"?


I'm a pretty big Tolkein fan.

I would guess the Gary maintains the position he does today (he likes Tolkein's work just fine, it just isn't his favorite) due to legal issues, and maybe not wanting past defenses to be voided or whatnot. Or maybe the guy is just tired of being asked questions about something he feels is resolved.

At any rate, Tolkein was an influence on D&D, regardless of intention.

 

[Aeric]

I have been told that gnomes were included in the game because of the popularity of the Gnomes book that was released in 1976. I have the book, and it's cute, but other than the name and the physical appearance, D&D's gnomes are nothing like the gnome in that book. Maybe the ability to speak with burrowing animals, but that's it. Proficiency with illusion could be chalked up to their faerie heritge, I suppose, and the earth elemental thing can be traced to the fact that in some mythology gnomes actually are earth elementals.

 

[T. Foster]

Tolkein was not a particularly big influence (and to the extent he was an influence, The Hobbit was moreso than LoTR) on Gygax, at least to hear him tell it;
However, Tolkein was THE big (and in many cases only) influence on most of the both existing and potential fanbases for fantasy wargames in the 1970s;
Therefore, Tolkein was an influence, but probably not the primary influence and certainly not the only influence, on D&D as published and as played (but not necessarily as envisioned or intended by its co-creator).

It's an interesting idle speculation to wonder what would've happened had Gygax not (bowed to pressure/been such a savvy marketer) and not included Tolkein elements (or at least no as many and not as prominent Tolkein elements) in Chainmail and D&D -- would the game have still caught on in the same way it ultimately did? would Tolkein fans lamenting the absence of Tolkein-style fantasy in the game have just added it on their own (creating an even greater perception-gulf between "Gygax's D&D" and "everyone else's D&D" than what developed in real life) or would they instead create/play another more Tolkeinesque spin-off game (and if so would that game have ultimately challenged or even surpassed D&D in a way that MERP was never able to do in real life)?

 

[MerricB]

On Gnomes: The Illusionist class, IIRC, was not of Gary's invention, instead appearing in early issues of The Strategic Review or possibly The Dragon. You might want to look up those issues and see if the gnome was allowed to be an illusionist in the original presentation, or if Gary added it as an option when he included the class in AD&D.

Cheers!

 

[T. Foster]

On Gnomes: The Illusionist class, IIRC, was not of Gary's invention, instead appearing in early issues of The Strategic Review or possibly The Dragon. You might want to look up those issues and see if the gnome was allowed to be an illusionist in the original presentation, or if Gary added it as an option when he included the class in AD&D.

The latter. There's no mention of gnomes in the original OD&D illusionist class write-up in The Strategic Review #4 (by a guy named Peter Aronson -- trivial OD&D factoid of the day ).

 

[Iorword]

I'm really tempted to cast my lot with the Gygax directly took any bit of Tolkein he wanted group. Theres the obvious stuff like no previous existence of Hobbits or Halflings before Tolkein, the descriptions of Balrogs perfectly matching that of the Balor, and if you want to get esoteric, has anyone read the Silmarillion. Ever heard of the 7 Mounting Heavens of Celestia? Anyone ever heard of Valmar? Its essentially a giant rock in the middle of a huge ocean, that has a mountain as its primary feature with different levels for the different Valar. Theres also charming other tidbits smacking of plagiarism ie. Angband of Tolkein matching several descriptions of the Abyss. All in all the evidence is pretty ridiculously overwhelming. From a more pragmatic point of view, no one can deny that the fan-boys of both D&D and Tolkein have synergized each other's profits to the moon.

 

[T. Foster]

Ever heard of the 7 Mounting Heavens of Celestia? Anyone ever heard of Valmar? Its essentially a giant rock in the middle of a huge ocean, that has a mountain as its primary feature with different levels for the different Valar.

The idea of "seven heavens" hardly originated with Tolkein. As for the "giant rock in the middle of a huge ocean" etc., that 1) doesn't sound familiar to anything in D&D (at least from the Gygax era) and, 2) does sound awfully similar to Dante's Purgatorio. So I'm not sure what it is you're getting at.

Balrogs, ents, wargs, and hobbits are all acknowledged borrowings from Tolkein -- which is why D&D no longer has creatures with those names -- they were changed to Type VI Demon (Balor), treants, worgs, and halflings respectively. Direct Tolkein references were also stripped out of the descriptions of orcs (to specific tribe names -- Red Eye, Mordor, White Hand, Isengarders, etc.), wights (to barrow wights), wraiths and spectres (to Nazgul), red dragons (to Smaug), and rocs (to Tolkein's eagles). Furthermore, while no direct reference was made in the descriptions, the ranger class and werebear (Beorn) are also clearly derived from Tolkein. Nobody is denying any of this (at least nobody who's actually seen an early-printing copy of Chainmail or OD&D). The points of contention are how much of Tolkein vs. other sources is in D&D's elves and dwarfs, and whether or not all this stuff was merely thrown in as a sop to Tolkein fans in a game that was (per Gygax's later claims) more proximately inspired by Howard, Leiber, Vance, Burroughs, Merritt, Anderson, de Camp & Pratt, and Lovecraft.

 

[tx7321]

Unfortunately, whatever Gary claims, Tolkien's influence on D&D was much stronger than initially suspected. Although it may have been an afterthought or a minor addition to draw in Tolkien fans, demihumans and the rest of the Tolkien legacy quickly became a core of the game, especially once people were drawn to the implicite promise of "just like Tolkien, except YOU are the hero!" I wonder if the disenchantment so many people had experienced with the game might have been caused in part by expecting heroic struggles against a dark lord and instead getting Vancian magic, 10 foot corridors and gelatinous cubes. Food for thought.

Melan, those are some interesting thoughts. When I first encountered D&D (1E in my case) I had already read "The Hobbit". And thats what I was told to expect. AD&D is "its own thing" in that respect. I remember when I first started playing it reminded me of a spagetti western with swords and magic in some ways as much as "The Hobbit". Conan and Howard didn't seem like much influence at all. The races seem more socially mixed, the magic and monsters more "out there" Treasure became the focus, and level advancement the goal.

So, in a way I can see why Gygax downplays Tolkein. Perhaps he wanted to put his own stamp on it (as many artists do when they create something very similar to another).

 

[kenobi65]

rocs (to Tolkein's eagles)

Rocs were originally from Middle Eastern mythology:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roc

I can't remember if this has changed from the original D&D rules, but at least these days, rocs have only animal intelligence (Int of 2), much lower than Tolkien's highly intelligent eagles.

OTOH, the "Eagle, Giant" in the current Monster Manual is intelligent, capable of speech, and of good alignment...and thus is pretty much spot-on to the Tolkien eagle.