the sources and resources of the "original" legendaria!

[tetramorph]

D&D itself is a cultural phenomenon (or set of phenomena) that has influenced our contemporary popular culture with regards to the very legendaria that it engages! It has become, as an industry, "self-referential."

As an Old Schooler, desiring the verisimilitude of a more "war games" feel, I regret this.

For example, I refuse to have "Liches" in my campaign. Vampires are the Lords of the Undead (duh!). I do not want a Gygaxian creation messing up the inherited legendaria! (I know I am being too purest, but, well, I am Old School!)

Like many other questions that Old Schoolers ask, I now ask this:

What if we froze the legendaria that D&D engaged in January 1974, before the game itself influenced itself in a kind of weird "feed back loop"?

What was that legendaria? How many sources and genres did it engage? This goes beyond "Appendix N."

How did it game-i-fy that legendaria and the various interesting tit-bits derived therefrom in its rules set? How successfully did it do so?

An obvious example, worthy to become its own thread, would be so-called "Vancian Magic."

How many others?

In terms of genres, I can think of: pulp fiction, "higher" fiction, fairy tales, folk tales, "B" movies, medieval Romances, their various receptions and rewrites -- the list goes on and on.

But this is interesting to me!

I would love a kind of "annotated" LBBs that described what aspect of the received legendaria G or A were game-i-fying!

[Necromancer]

This is a very interesting topic indeed, tetramorph. I've given it a lot of thought, but perhaps from a more personal point of view instead - I've been thinking about my own references and influences when I first started playing RPG's as a kid, how they affected my play and my view on fantasy in general, and how they have changed and developed through the years. I'd say there's a number of factors affecting this matter, such as what time one started to play (70's, 80's etc), at what age one started playing (it's probably quite a difference between starting out as a kid aged 10 or 12 compared to the later teens), where you were living (big city or countryside, US or elsewhere etc), and which game it was. But that is perhaps a slightly different topic, possibly better suited for another thread, so I won't go deeper into it here at the moment.

[Admin Pete]

tetramorph this is a great topic and worthy of being explored and Necromancer you inspired another thread!