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<blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 9044072" data-attributes="member: 71699">I see Tolkien as both storyteller and world builder. To the former, his lifelong interest in languages and European myth gave greatness. The latter is what drew me into Middle Earth past the end of the stories. Tolkien is always interested in why things are as they are in his world. Details such as the flame imperishable - which comes to serve a dramatic purpose on the bridge in Moria - are worked out beyond the necessities of the story: for their own sake. Narya's freedom from Sauron's influence and path to Gandalf's hand follows from world facts that extend like a web.Seeing the internal logic of Tolkien's world and being more interested in that world than the stories told within it does not diminish Tolkien as a storyteller, but recognises him as something more than that. He created a world that videogame designers today are mapping out and creating further stories within. To an extent it doesn't matter what Tolkien's motives were, but only the result: which is a world that goes beyond the stories and in which internal causes can be discerned.Where this discussion (of Tolkien) has gone wildly off-track is that his Middle Earth serves perfectly well as a reference set for a TTRPG game world, and in that respect used in simulation. Which is where the original claims lay. The internal causes of that world can be given the crown such as when establishing mountain ranges. Whether or not Tolkien intended that is beside the point.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="clearstream, post: 9044072, member: 71699"] I see Tolkien as both storyteller and world builder. To the former, his lifelong interest in languages and European myth gave greatness. The latter is what drew me into Middle Earth past the end of the stories. Tolkien is always interested in [I]why [/I]things are as they are in his world. Details such as the flame imperishable - which comes to serve a dramatic purpose on the bridge in Moria - are worked out beyond the necessities of the story: for their own sake. Narya's freedom from Sauron's influence and path to Gandalf's hand follows from world facts that extend like a web. Seeing the internal logic of Tolkien's world and being more interested in that world than the stories told within it does not diminish Tolkien as a storyteller, but recognises him as something more than that. He created a world that videogame designers today are mapping out and creating further stories within. To an extent it doesn't matter what Tolkien's motives were, but only the result: which is a world that goes beyond the stories and in which internal causes can be discerned. Where this discussion (of Tolkien) has gone wildly off-track is that his Middle Earth serves perfectly well as a reference set for a TTRPG game world, and in that respect used in simulation. Which is where the original claims lay. The internal causes of that world can be given the crown such as when establishing mountain ranges. Whether or not Tolkien intended that is beside the point. [/QUOTE]

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