D&D 5E The D&D Multiverse Part 2- The Remix Culture of the Gygaxian Multiverse

[Umbran]

One thing I'd also add is that with the emphasis on short stories, they were presented in the pulps at first, then later in anthologies like those Lin Carter edited and curated in the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, or Flashing Swords. In the pulps especially, you were being presented with an already remixed menu of stories, a wild array of weird fantasy, horror, and sci-fi ideas being hurled at the reader.

Goodness, I miss my subscriptions to Asimov's, F&SF, and Amazing Stories.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Asimov's seems to still be active, in both print and digital formats no less:

Home - Asimov’s Science Fiction

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www.asimovs.com

Goodness, I miss my subscriptions to Asimov's, F&SF, and Amazing Stories.

 

[Mannahnin]

It was all of it, and more. Because there were no particular preconceptions as to what had to be in D&D, or what had to be excluded. Where did your monsters come from? Well, anywhere! Little bit of Arabian mythology? Put in a djinn. Want to put in a little John Carter homage? How about some carnivorous apes, or giant white ones? Did you see some cool toys? Why not a ankheg, or an owl bear? Do you like 50s monster movies? How about some giant ants? Rakshasas, dinosaurs, critters from Japanese or Irish or Egyptian mythology? They were all fair game.

Everything was put into a blender, and became "D&D."

I agree that this was relatively representative of the fiction of the 30s-60s which inspired early D&D. Time travelers, men from our world going to a fantasy realm (Three Hearts and Three Lions for a prominent example), or vice-versa (Fafhrd and the Mouser went to Alexandria in one story, IIRC), Star Trek raiding the studio wardrobe department to go genre-hopping all over the place, Dave getting inspired by vampire movies to make the Cleric class, and Gary mashing that up with holy crusaders and Bishop Odo, monsters taken from the Creature Double Features, Monks existing as a class because of 70s kung fu movies, etc.

3. Weirdness and 5e
This is where I get to the more interesting, and likely controversial, part of my general thoughts; what does any of this have to do with 5e?

Here's the thing- there are times when I feel that for some people, OSR (and OD&D / 1e specifically) is viewed as a reaction to 5e.

I think there are a few curmudgeons like this who are reflexively anti-WotC era D&D in general, but the OSR started in the 2000s, in reaction more to 3E and 4E. 3E brought a ton of old gamers back (like 5E has again), but many were disenchanted with its rules and how unwieldy it gets after the mid levels. Especially trying to DM it and make those crazy rationalized monster stat blocks. Goodman Games started their Dungeon Crawl Classics line of modules for 3E many years before they made their own game. 4E marketing then alienated a bunch more folks. In practice most of the OSR folks I'm acquainted with like 5E much better than 3E or 4E, and for many of them it's their second favorite edition.

For example, I would say that it very common to see people on forums today make comments like, "I don't like science fiction in my fantasy." Or, "I don't let people bring their own characters into my campaign.

The first was already a common attitude in the 1980s when I started. The latter... increasingly so, I think, yeah. But the genre purists were with us I think at least since the late 70s, as fantasy epics became increasingly focused on the plausibility and consistency of their secondary worlds. I think as different RPGs proliferated supporting an increasingly wide range of genres and worlds that also reinforced the tendency to not just put everything in the bucket of one game.

 

[SkidAce]

The first was already a common attitude in the 1980s when I started. The latter... increasingly so, I think, yeah. But the genre purists were with us I think at least since the late 70s, as fantasy epics became increasingly focused on the plausibility and consistency of their secondary worlds. I think as different RPGs proliferated supporting an increasingly wide range of genres and worlds that also reinforced the tendency to not just put everything in the bucket of one game.

I mostly agree, but would change the shift like a decade later. We were still mixing genres in the 80's, and I never heard (personally) "keep sci fi out" until at least the 90s.

IME...

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

The first edition drinks from the speculative fiction of the XX century as main source of inspiration, but today in 2021 the speculative fiction is radically different, and not only because the arrival of the videogames and the manga but also new authors, for example G.R.R.Martin and the franchises created by other TTRPG publishers.

I guess Hasbro wants to create a "metaverse" with all their franchises/IPs within it, including the D&D multiverse but here there is a serious challenge for the game designers. D&D 5th Ed is not ready for a crossover with no-fantasy franchises. Rambo, Robocop and Terminator can be added to Mortal Kombat, Fortnite wellcomes Marvel and DC superheroes and action-heroes from movies, but in the tabletop the firearms can break too easily the power balance of the D&D game. Yes, in D&D an alien ship crasched is possible, and even there is a module about that, but we haven't learn how to redesign the power balance when at least one of the sides can use firearms. And there is a serious risk of classic classes (paladin, ranger, monk..) becoming lesser interesting for players if the machine guns are added to the game. What is the challenge ratin of a gobling with a machine-gun firing from the top of a watch-tower? And the same weapon, but not in the hands by a nPC but an automatic trap? Lots of gamers know the key of the victory is to have got a better weapon in the Battle Royal.

Maybe Hasbro will be future videogames to test experimental new rules and changes for a future edition.

 

[Neonchameleon]

But 5E does seem very "weird" friendly, at least compared to 4E.

Tell me when the Shardminds start turning up. Or the Wilden and other plant people. And I can't yet approach my old Iron Maiden PC - a warforged vampire brawler fighter, completely legal by the RAW. We're over seven years into D&D 5e (4e lasted six) and we only get a Feywild sourcebook later this month - and the Feywild and Shadowfell were created for 4e. And of course 4e Gamma World can be used with 4e; there is no 5e Gamma World that I'm aware of.

To me the purity editions are 2e, and especially 3.0, and 3.5, with literally dozens of sourcebooks round the Forgotten Realms. And when you start filling in the spaces to that level of detail they start to become boundaries. 4e and 5e, with their extremely relaxed publishing schedules and low number of sourcebooks for any given setting have both allowed the space for the weirdness to come back

 

[Desdichado]

1) OD&D and AD&D were exactly as weird as the players at the table made it. There seemed to be a strong pull towards "more verisimilitude" over time in printed products, which suggests to me that that's what the players were wanting to do.

2) All pop culture is an artifact of the time in which its created, no matter how much it may try not to be. Tolkien may have deliberately been writing a story that was based on the long-ago Anglo-Saxon epics that he studied professionally, but what he wrote was a novel with a very modern approach to structure, plot and characters, and for decades now critics have been analyzing how much his own personal experience in the trenches of the Great War impacted the work. The same is true for Gary Gygax, and D&D was written in a time where fantasy and science fiction were going through the "psychedelic van art" phase. That clearly had an impact on the early design of the game. But as more and more "mainstream" fans who had no appreciation for that type of fantasy joined the ranks, they "pulled" D&D into something that more closely resembled what they expected D&D to be like. Which was probably much more similar to Tolkien or Lloyd Alexander or whatever they were familiar with.

 

[the Jester]

Interesting discussion.

How many people still use alternate material worlds for adventures? Do the rest of you guys ever dangle plot threads that lead to different planets or planes-that-are-other-worlds-but-mostly-earthlike?

I haven't had a lot of plane travel in my 5e game yet, but I did drop a hook leading to a quest for the Regalia of Good, which were spread throughout three different alternate material worlds: a Gamma World one, a Star Trek-based one, and a low-magic low-fantasy setting I used for a side quest in 3e. The pcs haven't followed up yet but are apparently planning to.

 

[Voadam]

How many people still use alternate material worlds for adventures? Do the rest of you guys ever dangle plot threads that lead to different planets or planes-that-are-other-worlds-but-mostly-earthlike?

When I was running the Reign of Winter adventure path the plot eventually has the party

Spoiler

use Baba Yaga's dancing TARDIS to pop over to two other earth-like worlds including Rasputin-era Russia on Earth/Alt-Earth.

I was really disappointed the campaign ended in a TPK before that.

 

[Orius]

You seem to be treating D&D as if it was its own, independent thing, but, like all other bits of culture, it happened (an continues to happen) in a cultural context. And that context includes the science fiction and fantasy of the time. And while there were the Leibers and Tolkiens, the sci-fi/fantasy world was... really freaking weird in the 60s and 70s.

Yeah, Dune weird.

Star Trek went western at the OK Corral back in 1968 (ST:TOS Season 3 Episode 6, "Spectre of the Gun"). They went Alice In wonderland two years earlier in "Shore Leave". They went time traveling in "Tomorrow is Yesterday", "City on the Edge of Forever", and "Assignment: Earth". Played with Greek myth in "Who Mourns for Adonis". They mucked in with 1920s gangsters in "A Piece of the Action", fought in Roman gladiatorial games in "Bread and Circuses", and jumped into an alternate universe in "Mirror, Mirror". And this was all just one show!

Trek had practical reasons for doing that. By recycling sets, props, and costumes from period pieces they were able to keep the costs down on what was already an expensive show for the day. That's how Roddenberry was able to sell his initial pitch for the show, and even then it was a hard sell.

I think one reason D&D stepped back from the gonzo is that it's hell on game balance. And post-Gary TSR had a thing for "realism" in world building which often resulted in some fairly dry and dull settings.