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Community
General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
What does OSR mean to you? What do you value most in an OSR game?
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<blockquote data-quote="Mannahnin" data-source="post: 9694694" data-attributes="member: 7026594"><p>I'm not sure the divide is so clear, for me. I might opine that they're more akin than split.</p><p></p><p>Spelljammer draws a bit on 50s-70s sci-fantasy, but to me it feels like one of the first products which really started to fall into the pattern of kind of fill in the blank design and D&D referencing itself for world-building. Ok, here is a high concept of fantasy races and magic in space (interestingly, Shadowrun came out the same year- fantasy races and magic in cyberpunk), and therefore here are the dwarf ships, and the elf ships, and the illithid ships. The large gamut of fantasy races and the Rock of Bral being akin to Mos Eisley bore some comparison to Star Wars, but not as much to older sci-fantasy which would often rationalize fantastic elements by reference to real world science (as you see Poul Anderson do in Three Hearts & Three Lions, say).</p><p></p><p>I agree that Planescape was definitely also high concept, drawing on D&D planar metaphysics and tying it into philosophical conflicts which drew from some of the same wells as White Wolf games. Sigil as a city campaign setting full of planar gates also reminds me of other contemporary concepts like Cynosure- the pan-dimensional city setting used by First Comics in the 80s. I saw this concept used multiple times in the late 80s and early 90s, including on BBS forums, the nascent social media of that era, and so when Planescape came out in '94 the setting fit right in with those concepts I had already been seeing in the fantasy & comics sphere. Edit: I've been reminded that '94 also saw the debut of TTRPG <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nexus:_The_Infinite_City" target="_blank">Nexus, the Infinite City</a>, which may, too, be inspired by Cynosure.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mannahnin, post: 9694694, member: 7026594"] I'm not sure the divide is so clear, for me. I might opine that they're more akin than split. Spelljammer draws a bit on 50s-70s sci-fantasy, but to me it feels like one of the first products which really started to fall into the pattern of kind of fill in the blank design and D&D referencing itself for world-building. Ok, here is a high concept of fantasy races and magic in space (interestingly, Shadowrun came out the same year- fantasy races and magic in cyberpunk), and therefore here are the dwarf ships, and the elf ships, and the illithid ships. The large gamut of fantasy races and the Rock of Bral being akin to Mos Eisley bore some comparison to Star Wars, but not as much to older sci-fantasy which would often rationalize fantastic elements by reference to real world science (as you see Poul Anderson do in Three Hearts & Three Lions, say). I agree that Planescape was definitely also high concept, drawing on D&D planar metaphysics and tying it into philosophical conflicts which drew from some of the same wells as White Wolf games. Sigil as a city campaign setting full of planar gates also reminds me of other contemporary concepts like Cynosure- the pan-dimensional city setting used by First Comics in the 80s. I saw this concept used multiple times in the late 80s and early 90s, including on BBS forums, the nascent social media of that era, and so when Planescape came out in '94 the setting fit right in with those concepts I had already been seeing in the fantasy & comics sphere. Edit: I've been reminded that '94 also saw the debut of TTRPG [URL='https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nexus:_The_Infinite_City']Nexus, the Infinite City[/URL], which may, too, be inspired by Cynosure. [/QUOTE]
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What does OSR mean to you? What do you value most in an OSR game?
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