Thoughts on Aysle. [Archive]

skeloric

10-19-2008, 10:11 PM

I might scandalize my audience of one or two by saying that I find Aysle too stereotypical even with what we were given.

We get a classic Arthurian/Tolkien West European/British imagery of Fantasy that I could easily show you by trotting out Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms.
Heck, I'll trot out many of the Fantasy novels as well.
Dennis McKiernan's Iron Tower trilogy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Iron_Tower) and the follow-up Silver Call Duology.

And then there is this thread somewhere. (http://forum.rpg.net/archive/index.php/t-311323.html)
I'll quote it just in case:

Inspired by another recent thread, I'd like to see a list of epic fantasy novels which are very similar to Tolkien's Middle-earth.

The Tolkien Fantasy List (a few books to start thing off):

Kristen Britain -- Green Rider
Terry Brooks -- (original) Shannara Trilogy
CJ Cherryh -- Dreaming Tree Duology
Jacqueline Carey -- Banewrecker (Sundering Trilogy)
Lord Dunsay -- The King of Elfland's Daughter
Raymond Feist -- Riftwar Saga
Madeline Howard -- The Hidden Stars (The Rune of Unmaking)
Guy Gavriel Kay -- Fionavar Tapestry
Dennis McKiernan -- Iron Tower Trilogy and Silver Call Duology
William Morris -- House of the Wolfings
Mel Odom -- Rover Trilogy
Nancy Springer -- Book of Isle Tetrology (The White Hart, The Silver Sun, The Sable Moon, The Black Beast)

A few things to keep in mind:

Please stick to the thread , not about bashing or alternatives (someone I'm sure will mention Martin within a couple of posts)
no official game settings (D&D, Warrhammer and so on)
must contain elements very similar to Tolkien (Elves, Dwarves etc)

It continues to list others in multiple posts collected into a single quoted block:

Deed of Paksenarrion (Trilogy often now found in one omnibus) very Tolkienish (even pre 3E D&D in some ways) but one of the best stories of paladins written.

Memory, Sorrow, Thorn Trilogy (Dragonbone Chair, etc), also has shades Presbyter John and later Middle Age Earth legends/symmetry.
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Lloyd Alexander -- Chronicles of Prydain
Alan Garner -- The Weirdstone of Brisingamen
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Lloyd Alexander -- Chronicles of Prydain
Kristen Britain -- Green Rider
CJ Cherryh -- Dreaming Tree Duology
Lord Dunsany -- The King of Elfland's Daughter
Raymond Feist -- (Magician: Apprentice and Magician: Master)
Alan Garner -- The Weirdstone of Brisingamen
William Morris -- House of the Wolfings (archaic, bit excellent)
Nancy Springer -- Book of Isle Tetrology (The White Hart, The Silver Sun, The Sable Moon, The Black Beast)
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There is also the David Weber's Oath of Swords and War Gods Own books (which deal with an unlikely race but the rest is fairly "Elf and Dwarf and such)

There is also the series by Elizabeth Haydon (Rhapsody, Prophecy) which shares some of the tropes but does them a bit differently.

There is also the 'Villains by Necessity' book--humor which takes on a quest of the last villains to bring evil back in a world where good has mostly won out.
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The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant are in many ways an intentional inversion of the Lord of the Rings.
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The Worm Ouroboros, by Eric Rucker Eddison
The Well at the World's End, by William Morris
And lots of Lord Dunsany's stuff (some of which has already been mentioned).
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I should add the Pellinor Trilogy by Alison Croggon to the list. I have read the first two and found them very enjoyable.
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Memory, Sorrow and Thorn by Tad Williams were in his own admission a dialogue with LoTR.
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Patrica A McKillop's Riddle Master Trilogy is certainly Tolkienesque

most of her other stuff is significantly more mind bending and bizzare, though Forgotten Beasts of Eld and The Book of Atrix Wolfe are also pretty Tolkienesque and much more readable than the Riddle Master Trilogy.
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Eldon Thompson has out the first two books of the Legend of Asahiel (Crimson Sword and Obsidian Key) which I have not read yet. I have heard that it is similar to both LOTR and Shannara. They have gotten decent reviews thus far. Not sure if it belongs on the list or not.

Another series I have not read but is supposed to be similar to Tolkien is the Crimson Shadow trilogy by R. A. Salvatore. These novels are not set in the Forgotten Realms, nor do they deal with Drow.

I have also heard there are hints of Tolkien in the Tower of Shadows by Drew Bowling, with helpings of WoT, Eragon and Harry Potter.

Then someone asserted the qualities that these works all agree to enough of an extent which make them applicable to the list so far given:

-- a Quest
-- a famous sword
-- a powerful villain, who is but a servant or emissary of an even worse villain who captures and corrupts the innocent)
-- wizards
-- a character burns his fingers meddling in the affairs of wizards
-- an underground adventure
-- a bauble that throws light in dark places
-- Gurgi; a pitiful, self-deprecating character who occasionally makes himself useful
-- birds which spy
-- pursuit by the Undead
-- being stalked by wolves
-- a weatherbeaten hero
-- a powerful Good Guy who lives in his own small domain and who shelters the adventurers.
-- Fair Folk (although it isn't clear whether they're elves)
-- a great horse
-- waking up in bed after a grueling ordeal
-- a barrow
-- Sword-Maidens
-- understanding the speech of birds
-- a golden ring with its proper gem made by the Fair Folk

Which I call "Tolkienesque" as I see others have done before me.
As I think I can safely assert, "Tolkienesque" is quite unfortunately a term we desperately need to consider in earnest.
This is where Aysle takes us.
Thus, maybe there is no deeper value to Aysle.
Is Aysle salvageable in this context?
Should we send Aysle off in some obscure direction and thus lose the "stereotypically D&D" feel that they seemed to be so strongly striving for?
Or do we keep Aysle as the "stereotypically D&D" Cosm and in so doing commit to hewing even more strongly to those Tolkienesque roots?

Also, do the Axioms truly represent "Tolkienesque" AKA "stereotypically D&D" Fantasy or do they require changing?

Is this a conversation people (all three or so of you who visit this area) could enter into?

Stormchild

10-31-2008, 06:29 AM

I just re-read the Dragons over England novel. What I didn't realize the first two or three times I read it is, that there Uthorion's way to conquest is featured differently than the typical fantasy approach. Of course he uses brute force, but this is only on the outside. In a deeper underlying he uses a lot of intrigue and subterfuge. This is also based on the info given in the Aysle sourcebook which is a huge difference to how Aysle was presented in the boxed set.

I always had problems representing Aysle as a GM. It tended to become just another dungeon crawl. A friend with whom I played a lot told me after an Aysle session on a con "if this would have been my first Torg game, I had said, this game is boring as it was just the typical dungeon crawl". I dismissed that then, contributing it to the special circumstances of cons, where you have to keep adventures short and simple, but it kept nagging at me. Next time I tried a more horror-centered approach, but it soon degraded into a dungeon-crawl that happened to be out in the open (there surely is a word for hack and slay out in the open). The light and dark problems thrown in did not help to change the mood as I thought. The occasional Core Earth remnants also where nothing else but a little spice.

But after this novel, I think I know, how Aysle could work better. Uthorion and his minions are fighting not only for the conquest of the land, but also for the spirits of Stormers. They use subterfuge and lies to achieve this end as best represented by the story Three Soldiers (OK, here it was the Warrior of the Dark but in Myth Reality it is Uthorion). Maybe, other GMs have always understood Aysle this way, but for me this is a new realisation.