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Pop culture references in early editions?
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<blockquote data-quote="Mannahnin" data-source="post: 8376661" data-attributes="member: 7026594"><p>I think everyone's aware of the LotR stuff. Plus Ents, Balrogs (until the Saul Zaentz company sued, and got Hobbits, Ents and Balrogs renamed), the Ring of Invisibility, the Pyrotechnics spell, goblins riding wolves/wargs... Though Elves in Tolkien are tall, like the Alfar in Norse or otherworld folk/Sidhe in Irish legends; not shorter than humans like D&D elves.</p><p></p><p></p><p>D&D spellcasting is directly based on how spells work in Vance's The Dying Earth and The Eyes of the Overworld, yes. Mazirian the Magician, in which the titular character memorizes his five spells (one of which makes him invisible, another of which stops time, and a third of which is The Excellent Prismatic Spray) being one of the most prominent examples.</p><p></p><p>And of course the episode in The Eyes of the Overworld where Cugel the Clever tries to use the Spell of Forlorn Encystment to lock a foe in a magical oubliette underground is the direct basis of the spell Imprisonment, and his getting a syllable wrong and accidentally releasing a bunch of other people who were so imprisoned in the area was both directly included as a small chance in the original 1E spell description, and of course embodied in the chance of Thieves (later Rogues) having a chance of a spell going awry when they try to cast from a scroll. That latter phenomenon also shows up in The Lords of Quarmall, a Fritz Leiber story where such a mishap happens to The Grey Mouser.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mannahnin, post: 8376661, member: 7026594"] I think everyone's aware of the LotR stuff. Plus Ents, Balrogs (until the Saul Zaentz company sued, and got Hobbits, Ents and Balrogs renamed), the Ring of Invisibility, the Pyrotechnics spell, goblins riding wolves/wargs... Though Elves in Tolkien are tall, like the Alfar in Norse or otherworld folk/Sidhe in Irish legends; not shorter than humans like D&D elves. D&D spellcasting is directly based on how spells work in Vance's The Dying Earth and The Eyes of the Overworld, yes. Mazirian the Magician, in which the titular character memorizes his five spells (one of which makes him invisible, another of which stops time, and a third of which is The Excellent Prismatic Spray) being one of the most prominent examples. And of course the episode in The Eyes of the Overworld where Cugel the Clever tries to use the Spell of Forlorn Encystment to lock a foe in a magical oubliette underground is the direct basis of the spell Imprisonment, and his getting a syllable wrong and accidentally releasing a bunch of other people who were so imprisoned in the area was both directly included as a small chance in the original 1E spell description, and of course embodied in the chance of Thieves (later Rogues) having a chance of a spell going awry when they try to cast from a scroll. That latter phenomenon also shows up in The Lords of Quarmall, a Fritz Leiber story where such a mishap happens to The Grey Mouser. [/QUOTE]
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