(urth) Vance and Tokien as influences on D&D

[Bob Miller]

On 6/4/07, aaron <aaronsingleton at gmail.com> wrote:

>Any other Vance fans subscribe to the list?
>

One observation....  I've heard that Tolkien's work was a large inspiration
for the Dungeon and Dragons tabletop games.  Just after reading about 100
pages of Tales of the Dying Earth, I'd say that it looks like the D&D
creators took a LOT of inspiration for their magic systems from it, much
more than anything they would have gotten from Tolkien.  Gandalf's magic was
much more organic, subtle, and undefined than the mechanisms and
descriptions (including spell names) I've seen in the book I'm currently

Good points and observations.  I haven't seen an interview with Dave 
Arneson, but Gary Gygax who is the author of most of the first couple 
generations of D&D books will tell you that LoTR and Vance's work was, at 
least. om the back of his mind.  Magic item Robe of Eyes in D&D directly 
related to one of the short stories.  Halflings were originally called 
hobbits and the Tolkien Estate made TSR change the name.

I guess I'm a minority person on Vance.  I always thought the Dying Earth 
stories relatively weak beside much, not all, of his other stuff.  Of 
course, I never did read anything from Cugel's Saga inclusive on.
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