How would traditional games look like if Tolkien had died at Somme?

How would traditional games look like if Tolkien had died at Somme?

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We'd just be shitposting about whatever other fantasy literature was used to make whatever other roleplaying games there would be.

We'd probably get much the same, actually; stereotypes based on boiled-down fantasy stock that misses the point of the narrative in favor of literalism, and its incestuous propagation through derivation until these fantasy stereotypes are so ingrained as to be basically structural but so thin and divorced from their original source material as to be meaningless.

Just what we have now, but with maybe some differences, though I suspect they'd actually be much the same.

religious themes with a classical skin rather than nordic

>How would [...] look like
Why does this keep happening? Is it an ESL thing?

This is actually an interesting and pertinent question, and I'm saddened by the fact it will inevitably get shitposted to death. But in a futile effort to stave that off…

TGs as we know them today were founded by 70s wargamers who were into fantasy which was popular in that era, which basically means Moorcock, Leiber, Tolkien, and the resurgence of Lovecraft (and thus Howard and Smith and Burroughs and Dunsany as well).

Without Tolkien, I expect that TGs would place a far greater emphasis on all this "low fantasy", and attempts to inject high fantasy into it would come from other sources—probably Lewis, Baum, Carroll, and MacPherson. Which would mean two things: more whimsy (Baum and Carroll are the kings of absurd fantasy) and more traditional fairy-tale and classical myth (Lewis and MacPherson both used this to great effect, with none of Tolkien's preference for northern mythology).

I also wonder if there might not be a greater emphasis on sci-fi (and zany pulp science-fantasy too), since fantasy wouldn't be nearly as popular or well-regarded as sci-fi without the influence of Tolkien.

Slavic inspired mythology instead of Nordic.

I'd really really enjoy more whimsical Carrollian elements in games, which take themselves too seriously. I feel this is a result of most of them being admixtures of Tolkien with something else (usually Low fantasy or really bad generic fantasy I can't stand like Dragonlance). I'm not actually hating on Dragonlance, it was important, but it was a stepping stone and very deeply entrenched in Tolkien.

I would despise the Lewisian insertion. For him the passage of time and worldbuilding are secondary to obnoxious Protestant preaching done to a 10-year-old level, as children were his audience for proselytization. Nothing against faith, I'm a Christian myself, but Lewis' works are butcheries of both fantasy and faith.

I agree this deserves more discussion. I bet things would be much more heavily based on Conan and Lovecraftian ideas, and with a lot more revival of 30's pulp fiction elements. Can't say I'd be against that because it would be darker, however the noblebright aspects of these were what drew in many players. An interesting dichotomy.

What would your favourite fantasy be?

For me it would be ASOIAF pre-2000 when GRRM ragequit over his shitty R+L=J plot twist being discovered and stopped writing before selling his incredible world to be assraped by HBO

>I also wonder if there might not be a greater emphasis on sci-fi (and zany pulp science-fantasy too), since fantasy wouldn't be nearly as popular or well-regarded as sci-fi without the influence of Tolkien.
I think you're probably right

This would also be based, but not possible due to the Cold War. Witcher was created in the 80's under the socialist regime in Poland but was unique in the sense it was folktales combined with political commentary (pessimism being a primary theme).

However Slavic mythology wouldn't have flown due to political attitudes. In socialist countries of course such things were generally repressed (though not to as massive an extent as we believe) and in the West they'd be viewed with suspicion.

>I would despise the Lewisian insertion. For him the passage of time and worldbuilding are secondary to obnoxious Protestant preaching done to a 10-year-old level, as children were his audience for proselytization. Nothing against faith, I'm a Christian myself, but Lewis' works are butcheries of both fantasy and faith.

I'd disagree there myself. The Giant's Feast in the Silver Chair is likely one of the most memorable things I ever read as a kid. Showing a single scene through several viewpoints with different moralities about it was very interesting.

Some of his stories have issues (The Last Battle is particularly weak outside a few good moments) but I'd overall say he's a very good author who people overlook due to the Strong Christian Overtones.

I rather enjoy them once you accept 'This is stories based on Christian Mythology, like how other stories draw from less practised religions'.

As an aside: He was surprisingly heretical for his day. His books talking about 'Hey, if you are a good person you'll go to heaven even if you are non-christian' came out before Vatican 2. They look more generic and middle of the road religiously because history has more or less marched the same way his faith went.

Still, to each their own.

It would only sword and sorcery instead of high fantasy.

>Vatican 2
I vomited in my mouth a little.

If catholicism wasn't degenerate there would never have been a Vatican 2 in the first place.

>Calvin
Wouldn't that mean God preordained that Catholocism should be degenerate, meaning God willed, planned and made it unavoidable that the most degenerate sect of Christianity would also be the largest and most influential?
>Protestants
And don't even get me started on Swedish Protestantism, the "Church" of England and Evangelicals.

germany would have won the war and we'd all be playing a MYFAROG-variant now.

JRR was, AFAIK, not too taken with Narnia, though, precisely because the christian themes were too unsubtle for his taste.

Tolkien's influence on Lewis was considerable, and I'm not sure he would have written about medieval lands at all if it weren't for him(someone tell me if I'm wrong). There is very little Norse myth in Narnia though. It's all Greek- and Arthurian-based.

The Arthurian Cycle would perhaps have a heavier influence on OD&D?

Funny, as my copy of 'The Once and Future King', has this on the front cover:

>The over-all result is a great work, greater than THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING: a truly important book.

Very conceited, but amusing.

I have to wonder now given this thread if his importance would be greater without Tolkien around, and there would be more Arthurian Movies as a result.

It wasn't just that it was too unsubtle, he didn't like allegory in his narratives at all. He thought his stories should be applicable to people, but not in a direct way.

I've read that Lewis was an atheist until Tolkien converted him, so had Tolkien died maybe Lewis would've written something less Christian. Maybe "Narnia" wouldn't even be a household name.

I prefer the Space Trilogy desu

Maybe we'd all play Pendragon.

There's hardly any slavic mythology to draw from. Also, I think political divide and nationalism would stop that from happening very much.

Way more pulp based, Howard and Lovecraft and Burroughs. Also, as other anons have mentioned, probably a lot more Sci-Fi in the foundational role playing stuff.

Though, honestly, I feel like there might just have been less of it in general. LotR was huge in connecting a lot of not usually fantasy minded people to that kind of world and that kind of thinking.

You're absolutely right. There's no way Lewis would have written Narnia or been a Christian at all without Tolkien. In fact, it's unlikely Tolkien ever would've finished LOTR without Lewis. What a wonderful duo they were.

I could see Sword and Sorcery become a lot more popular.

I assume it would be based on classical mythology, as this was really the popular equivalent of fantasy before Tolkien showed up. Even back in Shakespeare's day, the OG otakus loved themselves some greco-roman historical fiction (Coriolanus) and straight up fantasy (A midsummer night's dream)

>Nothing against faith, I'm a Christian myself, but Lewis' works are butcheries of both fantasy and faith.

This just dumbfounds me. Not only to find another christian in this cesspool of scum and villiany, but how could you think this about Lewis?! Have you at least read his theology?

Not that guy, but I'm a big fan of some of his more theological books. The Screwtape Letters was quite an engaging read for me. I've always wanted to try and run a game based on the players orchestrating temptations on some poor sap and overcoming the challenges of him finding faith and whatnot. I think it could be a fun game.

He did. Highschool teacher was a big Tolkien and Lewis fan so he told me a lot about them. Like how they agreed to do 2 separate Trilogy stories. Lewis would write on Space and Tolkien would write on Time Travel.

Lewis made the Space Trilogy obviously, while Tolkien never got around to it because he was too busy rewriting his lore for the 50th time. So before Lewis died he decided 'fuck it, I'll do the Time Travel one myself'. He died right before he could finish the first chapter.

>Tolkien tackles time travel
Can you imagine? Shit would have been like Primer or something. That man was a maniac when it came to planning shit out. It would have been incredible.
I'm actually not familiar with the Space Trilogy Lewis did, though, what was that?

A rpg scene based not on the broken ass mess that is D&D, but on Das Schwarze Auge/The Dark Eye but with less elves? I think I can get behind that.

The screwtape letters is probably my favorite book of his, maybe of all time. That campaign sounds interesting.

Certainly.

>Died before he could finish the last chapter
So you're saying he ran out of time?

I would argue that a good portion of modern fantasy would be the same right up until the LotR movies were released which rebuilt a huge love for that sort of thing. Prior to that the biggest settings out there had very little to do with Tolkien and his influence is mostly felt through shit like orcs being orcs and giant spider monsters and shit. Before that you'd get pulp fantasy-adventure which fucking soared in the 80's and early 90's with everything from Conan to Red Sonja to He-man to fucking Flash Gordon and all of that shit being dredged up from the 30's and 40's. That all had a pretty enormous influence on modern fantasy. While Tolkien might have the single biggest influence, I don't think it's fair to give him all of the credit over people like Moorcock that practically invented planar mythology that huge segments of D&D are built on.

...

That's not true at all. Look at the Witcher series, for example- much of what makes up Polish mythology also applies to at least western Slavic mythology. Common myths with the Germanics and so forth.

Remember too that many of the older myths from what we consider today to be Slavic regions, like Ukraine, may well have been carried down by migrating peoples throughout the 5th and 6th centuries, so it's possible that even some German, French, Spanish, or North African myths could be partly derived from early Slavic peoples (if I'm correct in guessing that peoples like the Vandals and Goths and Alans shared some blood with what we now call Slavic peoples.) I could be mistaken about that last bit, but the point remains, there's plenty of Slavic mythology.

Well, the witcher series is a good example. It really is common western european fantasy, with some slavic history and a few legends thrown in their to try to stand out. We have hardly any documentation of slavic legend at all.

Didn't Tolkien start the Time Travel Story? It was set around the downfall of Numeonor. I could have sworn I read the first chapter in one of the 'making of' books that Christopher Tolkien put out.

>I would despise the Lewisian insertion. For him the passage of time and worldbuilding are secondary to obnoxious Protestant preaching done to a 10-year-old level, as children were his audience for proselytization. Nothing against faith, I'm a Christian myself, but Lewis' works are butcheries of both fantasy and faith.

Shit taste detected

Huh, if so I imagine Christopher must've put it out after I left high school then since he didn't mention it. Either that or he somehow forgot it, which I'd be inclined not to believe since my teacher was obsessed. He even learned fucking Old English so he could read Beowulf because Tolkien had a hardon for it. That guy was dedicated.

God is an ass, we've known that for centuries now.

Found it.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lost_Road_and_Other_Writings

>The Lost Road itself was the result of a deal between Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, where they agreed to an attempt at writing science fiction. Lewis ended up with writing a story about space travel, which would become The Space Trilogy, and Tolkien would try to write something about time travel, but he never completed it. It is just a fragmentary beginning of a tale, including a rough structure and several intriguing chunks of narrative, including four entire chapters dealing with modern England and Númenor, from which the entire story as it should have been can be glimpsed.

Oh, and I can't believe I forgot this: classic horror movies, like Hammer Horror and Universal movie-monsters and shit, were another major founding influence.

And of course their pedigree goes back to Shelly and Stoker (hey, look, Slavic mythology… :^)