AXLER.Upenn-1100%Rand-Relay@sri-unix.UUCP (01/26/84)
From: AXLER.Upenn-1100@Rand-Relay (David M. Axler - MSCF Applications Mgr.)
A recent comment on the discussion about the Shannara books read, in
essence, that even "Lord of the Rings" could be considered a D&D adventure
in novel form. Sorry, but this is historically impossible, because of the
way D&D was actually brought into existence. I don't have the precise dates
at hand, but the basic story is this:
One of the fairly active wargame fan groups back in the 50s and 60s, with
a number of members who were also sf fans, was the one based in and around
Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, then primarily known as a summer resort town for
wealthy Chicagoans and the home of the first Playboy club. Like many wargamers
of that period, this group was very interested in developing systems for
running mock battles using scale miniature figures. One of the results of this
interest was the development of a system called "Chainmail", which was pub-
lished by the members of this group, calling themselves 'Tactical Studies
Rules, Inc.'. The Chainmail system had, as an afterthought, an appendix which
suggested some ways in which the characters from Tolkien's novels might be
brought into this style of wargaming -- a few simple rules for movement and
battle, and a few basic incorporations of magic into the (primarily medieval)
wargaming system.
It was out of the Chainmail system that Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, two
members of this group, developed the game that became the original version
of Dungeons and Dragons. Like Chainmail, its rules were distributed by Tactic-
al Studies Rules, which later re-named itself TSR; another similarity was that
the rules were published in 5x8 paperback booklets. Later on, assorted things
happened which led to a split between Gygax and Arneson. This split, in turn,
brought on a major lawsuit and the development of the Advanced Dungeons and
Dragons system. The AD&D rules were specifically developed by Gygax to be
sufficiently different from the D&D rules that there could be no legal claim by
Arneson to their content. (A friend of mine who's Gary's executive assistant
tells me that, in fact, Gygax doesn't actually use either system, but a cross
between them.) The lawsuit's results didn't totally please either party, but
was (from what I've heard) a fairly equitable settlement.
Anyway, the early forms of D&D were quite intentionally trying to incor-
porate Tolkien's concepts, so the similarities twixt books and game are for
real. However, the sequence is the reverse of that suggested in an earlier
sf-lovers comment. (By the way, the Tolkien estate raised a fuss with TSR
about the use of the copyrighted word "hobbit", which is why the game uses
the term "Halfling" for critters that are obviously pretty much the same.)
--Dave Axler