D&D General What are your media sources of inspiration

[Wolfram stout]

So, all of my traditional inspiration has already been listed, so I will go with some of my out of left field ones:

Tombstone. And I mean that for D&D. There is just something about the party (3 brothers and Doc) that screams D&D to me. Heck, in my minds eye I see Doc with a wand not a rifle (shotgun? forget which) at the shootout.

One fantasy I have not seen listed yet, The Black Company by Glen Cook. Good look at how minimal world building can create awesome settings and stories.

Nothing I avoid.

 

[bedir than]

Carnival Row (Amazon Prime)
Assassin's Creed (all formats)
C.S. Lewis
Chaucer
1,001 Nights
Onward (Disney+)
Kid Who Would Be King
Chuck (yes, this isn't fantasy, but the components follow certain D&D tropes)

I still read Orson Scott Card, but now with a much more critical eye towards how his polemic works into the tales. There are series of his which I can no longer read for these reasons, while others still get re-opened.

 

[Stormonu]

Forgot about the Pyrdain books and Dark Crystal, as well as video games like Diablo (2 & 3 primarily for me) and the old gold box series (though that's sort of self-referential).

I'm also another that I like Lovecraft's themes, but I'm not much for his actual writing.

I read both Lovecraft's & Bram's Dracula way later than I was introduced to their themes and was somewhat surprised and underwhelmed by the actual fiction. Dracula though, fascinates me.

 

[Zardnaar]

Probably history and video games.

I try and use obscure sources though so the PCs won't notice what I'm cribbing from.

Most modern gamers not so familiar with Mystara for example.

 

[MNblockhead]

So many of my inspirations have been mentioned by others. Some others that I did see above:

The Scholars, by WU Jingzi. (儒林外史; pinyin: Rúlín Wàishǐ ) - I can't remember the publisher of the translation I read, the title is sometimes translated as "The History of Scholars" or "Unofficial History of the Literati". It was written in 1750 (Qing Dynasty) but is set during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). It is Dickensonian in the number of characters and the complexity of the relationships and plot, and it REALLY helps to get a translation with a glossary and a description of traditional Chinese social hierarchies and extended-family terms.

Journey to the West (Chinese: 西遊記; pinyin: Xī Yóu Jì) , published in the Ming Dynasty. Epic fantasy journey of a great monk, tasked by Gautama Buddha himself with the pilgrimage and given protectors of a monkey king, an awakened pig monk, and a fallen celestial cursed to the form of a man-eating sand demon. They also have a dragon-prince steed.

Both books offer a very different cultural take on the fantasy epic that could fit well into D&D. I've based wizards on the society depicted in the scholars.

The Holy Bible is a good source of inspiration, which itself an important influence on much Western fantasy.

Zhuangzi , the second most important book in Taoism after the Tao De Jing, is all a great source of interesting characters like the Mad Stammerer, the Stuck-up Scholar, and my favorite is his use of a Bandit Leader (Dao Zhi 盜跖, the "Robber Zhi" a slave rebel written about in many pre-Qin works). He has the Bandit Leader take the role of Taoist philosopher challenging Confucius on his teachings.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I still use the old stuff aka LotR and dragonlance and such, but for more recent inspiration:

Miyazaki and Ghibli
Legend of Zelda
Final Fantasy
Castlevania, both videogames and anime
Dragon Prince, AtLA, LoK
Carnival Row

Also big fan of the She-Ra and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts for their themes and use of light-hearted humor. I also tend to use a lot of recent songs and beats for battle scenes and character presentation, so Kipo gets another + for that

I generally present the adventurers like someone with a young heart, a kid wanderlust and a child-like amazement at the world they inhabit, no matter the grim attitude or bada** front they put up. The old cliché of the jaded, grim, only-out-for-money-and-blood mercenary who cares for nothing is....well just that...and old cliché But if you want a character that is still thrilled by discoveries of the stange wolrd around them while putting a front of an old-skool sword and sorcery hero, by all means, that's fun!

 

[aco175]

I loved the Elfquest books.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Wow that's hard for me to work out, but I'll try. I'll also try to keep it short.

Books:

• Tolkein, not just the trilogy, but Hobbit, and his various smaller works.
• Ursula Le Guin, especially Earthsea
• Guy Gavriel Kay, especially Tigana, Song For Arbonne, and The Fionavar Tapestry
• Dune
• Dumas
• Gaiman, especially Neverwhere and Sandman, but also very strongly his short stories
• Stephen King's short stories and The Dark Tower
• Joel Rosenberg's Guardians of The Flame books, and his other series though he finished none of them sadly
• Dragonlance
• Margeret Weiss's other books, like the Darksword Trilogy, Rose of Prophecy, and the Deathgate Cycle
• Mercedes Lackey
• Dragonriders of Pern
• Not really Lovecraft so much as other authors playing in his sandbox. (Gaiman's Lovecraftian short stories are really, really, good)
• Sadly, a many books that I could describe, but have never been able to find the titles of again, that I read as a kid.

Movies and TV

• Star Wars
• Star Trek
• Leverage
• Legend
• Princess Bride
• The Last Unicorn
• Pirates of Darkwater
• Galaxy Rangers
• Avatar The Last Airbender
• Krull

History would be hard to list, but I've done a lot of reading on Medieval Islamic cities and scholars and such, and it deeply informs the worlds and characters I build, as do Norse and Celtic history and myth.

 

[Voadam]

I thought of Sandman for comics and the Earthsea books and Glen Cook's TunFaire novels later as well.

 

[Coroc]

Just about any books I read, computer games I played, but also sometimes recent events IRL.