Gor as an inspiration for Blackmoor

[Deleted]

Jul 26, 2017 20:41:56 GMT -6 increment said:

Jul 26, 2017 13:06:46 GMT -6 @secretsofblackmoor said:

We doubt Peterson would keep to some of his his older assertions, because Jon relies on fairly direct attributions; even more so today.

Um, I think I'm still good here, but this isn't an area I'm spending a lot of time and effort clarifying.

Uh, citation of "The strong debt that Blackmoor owes to the Gor setting informs this." seemed like a bit of a stretch. Maybe you have sources stating that Gor was a major source. We certainly don't.

Of course this is only a forum comment and likely your dry humor at work.

[Finarvyn]

Jul 26, 2017 23:18:30 GMT -6 @secretsofblackmoor said:

Maybe you have sources stating that Gor was a major source. We certainly don't.

Perhaps we're hair splitting the term "major" here, but the FFC certainly has several references to Gor that show that it was at least on somebody's radar. Tarns are listed in the cost sheets, as are red-silk and white-silk slaves. Both are terms common in Gor and not common in other fantasy literature that I've encountered.

[increment]

Jul 26, 2017 23:18:30 GMT -6 @secretsofblackmoor said:

Jul 26, 2017 20:41:56 GMT -6 increment said:

Um, I think I'm still good here, but this isn't an area I'm spending a lot of time and effort clarifying.

Uh, citation of "The strong debt that Blackmoor owes to the Gor setting informs this." seemed like a bit of a stretch. Maybe you have sources stating that Gor was a major source. We certainly don't.

Of course this is only a forum comment and likely your dry humor at work.

What Fin said.

The presence of tarns, and red and white silk slaves, is not sufficient grounds? I mean, leaving aside how we judge that something is major, are there are any other, like any other, direct borrowings of entities specific to an existing world of fantasy fiction in the Blackmoor setting that don't also appear in D&D? The FFC is full of tarns, tarnsmen, cargo tarns, war tarns, and racing tarns.

On, and on the Sex thing, I would say that the Spanish Royal Family sheet provides an important stepping stone between Bath-like uses of these stats and how they ended up in Blackmoor, so I might qualify it a bit with that.

[Deleted]

I read about the first five Gor novels back when I was taking my own look into Blackmoor. While they are quite terrible, their influence - in particular - seems evident, especially because of the name-dropping.

Now, with a text* as complicated as Blackmoor, which relies on both a strong oral and a written tradition, one might never be able to tell what was intentionally, and what was normatively traded. (As in, you don't have to know Star Wars to know what a Stormtrooper is, and you perhaps don't have to know Gor to know what a Tarn is.) But in this case, given that the early 70s were probably the climax of these books' popularity, it seems pretty self-evident. - Like, the same way that, while we probably won't be able to prove for sure that the player of "Moorcok the Slayer" maybe had read works by Michael Moorcock, the writer, it is plausible to assume that he did.

Now, in this specific case, influence on the narrative frame is not the same as influence on the narrative action, I think: Meaning that the players could well be placed in an ostensibly very Gor-y scenario, and then make a very Lankhmar-y or Tolkien-y scenario out of it. So, the influences they experienced and the one that weregister today might be quite different.

...Or so I think.

[Malcadon]

Although I find the work troubling from a technical standpoint*, I always found it highly amusing that the Gor Saga stands as a notable influence in the development of the role-playing hobby. While there are people who really want Lords of the Rings to be the prime mover in D&D's development, I never liked that. To me, such a boring trilogy that drones on, acts self-important in its own writing and world-building, and cannot grasp me like a REH or ERB yarn. I find reading it always felt like an endurance-test. But that is fine, as the series has a huge fan-base who hang on to every word and read the books over and over again.

To me, role-playing games, much like fanfic writing and open-world video games, is the pinnacle of escapist fantasy, and the desire to satisfy sex fulfillment and to exert power and control over a chaotic world is apart of the catharsis that comes with it. I find it funny that in our modern society, we are free to indulge in
hyper-violence fantasy and horror, but sensuality and eroticism is still
vilified as "perverted" and "unhealthy". If find things like sex and violence in art and media to be healthy for the individual, and in turn, healthier for society if people embrace and indulge their own fantasies. Although not everyone shares in the same desires and indulgences, and that is fine, as long as people have their outlets.

I personally love the idea that D&D came out of the self-indulgent power-fantasy of John Norman's Gor.


*by that, I mean Gor is to Howardian sword & sorcery fantasy, as what Fifty Shades of Grey is to romance: Both a bad exercise and outlook on BDSM. BDSM is not about complete domination by someone powerful, but a role-play about submission, and usually with a sexual dimorphic twist where the dominant partner is the one in bondage. Fifty Shades of Grey, for as flawed and messed-up as it is, would make WAY more sense if Ana Steele was the Dominatrix in Christian Grey's bondage fantasies, as he already exerts enough power over her in day-to-day life, and the fact that running a major business empire might be stressful, especially if everyone is trying to stab him in back. I also find it funny how in the hyper-masculine power-fantasy world of Gor, most of the sex-slaves are woman. I'm not saying that hyper-masculine men are naturally gay or bi. I'm just saying that they tend to be highly homophobic, while also being really ironic about it.

[Deleted]

[Finarvyn]

Jul 27, 2017 19:29:58 GMT -6 Malcadon said:

Although I find the work troubling from a technical standpoint*, I always found it highly amusing that the Gor Saga stands as a notable influence in the development of the role-playing hobby. While there are people who really want Lords of the Rings to be the prime mover in D&D's development, I never liked that. To me, such a boring trilogy that drones on, acts self-important in its own writing and world-building, and cannot grasp me like a REH or ERB yarn. I find reading it always felt like an endurance-test. But that is fine, as the series has a huge fan-base who hang on to every word and read the books over and over again.

Forgive my memory, but I can't recall your age or when you started playing D&D. That information might shape the lens through which you look at the game.

I think that inspiration is one of those tricky things which is hard to quantify because you see something and it sparks an idea which may lead to something else. I don't think that anyone ever set out to "role play in the world of Middle-earth" but Tolkien's influence shows up in the form of elves which aren't little fey creatures, dwarves who aren't Disney dwarfs, magical rings, balrogs, and the list goes on. All of those elements of Middle-earth might have inspired parts of D&D as a rules set. Gary often said that Tolkien elements were added in order to attract the mainstream Middle-earth lovers and that Tolkien by himself wasn't the major inspiration for the game. Other greats of the era (Howard, Burroughs, Leiber) probably offered inspiration more in terms of adventure style, although they supplied elements like thieves and wizards with attitude and the like. The fact that Tolkien elements appear in D&D in no way trivializes Howard and Co, but instead supplements by adding in more ideas.

Gor is like that. If you can, strip away the social issues of the 20th century and focus on the story and I think you'll find some darned good fantasy novels in the first few books. (Eventually, the story seems to fade away a lot into the background, while the slave domination thing rises more to the surface. Also, Norman spends a lot of time world-building; Tarl might encounter a bird and Norman might spend three pages explaining the background of the species. Ugh.) The priest-king storyline is interesting. The kurii plot twists are interesting. There are some characters and situations that arise with a general of Ar (his name escapes me at the moment; haven't read Gor in 30 years) which lead to some fun adventures. If someone could re-issue the books in a way that was edited to be PG-rated instead of X-rated, I think that the Gor books would stand a lot higher in the world of fantasy literature. (By the way, I have similar issues with Game of Thrones on HBO; give me the PG-version please so that I can watch it with my kids. And a lot of folks blast Howard for racism in his works. We are a product of our times.)

My point is that "Gor was an inspiration" isn't a bad thing, even if you think that the Gor books are poor examples of fantasy literature. Likewise, saying "Tolkien was an inspiration" isn't a bad thing, even if you think the books are boring.

Just two coppers from an old guy.

[oakesspalding]

I haven't read the Gor books (that's virtue signaling on my part) and, like a few others, had a bit of fun using Arneson's fondness for them to defend Gygax's Appendix N selections a few months back on these boards.

However, this recent post at Castalia House makes the revisionist case that the earlier books were actually pretty good. I guess the point is that the "politics" isn't a bad thing but is actually more interesting or sophisticated than many think. And the emphasis on sex for mere titillation, came later:  

...as this site indicates, Gor was not always so poorly written. The first six books in particular stand out to that site’s owner as being very good, with the slide into perversion beginning in the seventh novel.

And having listened to the first three Gor books on audio, I have no reason to disagree so far; the Gor novels present a vivid world of natural beauty and vigorous people, with an epic scope that draws the reader in; the vocal talents of Ralph Lister amplify the effect further, adding a whole new dimension to both the narration and the characters.

Each of the three books has a given political theme: the first book, Tarnsman of Gor, has the theme of anti-imperialism. The city of Ar, mightiest in all of Gor, tyrranized its neighbors and sought its conquests in the name of bringing order; Cabot sought to take them down by stealing their homestone. He not only seizes the homestone, but the local princess as well, determined to maintain the liberty of his adopted home, Ko-ro-ba.

The second book, Outlaw of Gor, satirized modern society; though written in the 1960s, it looks like it could’ve been written today. The city of Tharna is portrayed as a dull and joyless place where the human passions are snuffed out in the name of efficiency, where the rules are numerous and oppressive, and where commerce rules all — common criticisms of modern Earth cities. To underscore this point, the book starts with Tarl in New York, denouncing its people for not being as attached to the city as Goreans are to their cities.

A specific point should be noted about Tharna’s government: the masked women who rule over it and treat men as livestock are an obvious slap at feminism, but there’s more to it than that — their policies are the female mirror image of Gor’s sex slavery. Where the men of Gor value attractiveness in their female slaves, the masked women of Tharna value their male slaves for the labor they provide. Taken together, both of these perspectives are meant to be a cruel parody of marriage in the United States (it should also be noted that he never explicitly compares Tharna to Earth.)

The third book, Priest-Kings of Gor, is a commentary on racism with a dash of animal rights...

...So read those first Gor books (or listen to the audio versions.) You’ll see that they’re deeper than most people give them credit for. Indeed, I had expected simple adventure stories and was quite surprised at what I ultimately got out of it...

[Deleted]

Jul 27, 2017 4:43:00 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

Jul 26, 2017 23:18:30 GMT -6 @secretsofblackmoor said:

Maybe you have sources stating that Gor was a major source. We certainly don't.

Perhaps we're hair splitting the term "major" here, but the FFC certainly has several references to Gor that show that it was at least on somebody's radar. Tarns are listed in the cost sheets, as are red-silk and white-silk slaves. Both are terms common in Gor and not common in other fantasy literature that I've encountered.

Well yeah. Lots of literary critter ideas, not sure if it is "inspiration". More old school plug and play style if you ask me.

[Porphyre]

Jul 28, 2017 9:05:04 GMT -6 oakesspalding said:

I haven't read the Gor books (that's virtue signaling on my part) and, like a few others, had a bit of fun using Arneson's fondness for them to defend Gygax's Appendix N selections a few months back on these boards.

However, this recent post at Castalia House makes the revisionist case that the earlier books were actually pretty good. I guess the point is that the "politics" isn't a bad thing but is actually more interesting or sophisticated than many think. And the emphasis on sex for mere titillation, came later:  

...as this site indicates, Gor was not always so poorly written. The first six books in particular stand out to that site’s owner as being very good, with the slide into perversion beginning in the seventh novel.

Haven' read them either, but your comment reminds me that my enjoyement of the adventures of Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser certainly wouldn't have been disminished by not reading the "Mouser Goes Below" novella. 

[Malcadon]

Jul 28, 2017 5:25:23 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

Forgive my memory, but I can't recall your age or when you started playing D&D. That information might shape the lens through which you look at the game.

About in my late-30s. I started playing when I was about 11 or so, as my parents were heavily into it, and this "Its like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, but you can do way more!" game really appealed to me. At the time, I was dyslexic to the point of avoiding literature, so my ideals of fantasy was shaped by (mostly '80s) movies, cartoons and comic books. Getting into D&D did not treat my dyslexia, but d**n did it help me a lot (especially the word-heavy DMG). From there, I started reading more. Being a child of the '80s, I gravitated to heroic fantasy like Conan, A Princess of Mars and Flash Gorden. Since then, I read as much as I can, from a wide range of genre. (Thank you, Gary!)

Due to my early fantasy influences, the setting I usually run tend to focus more on larger-than-life figures as well as ingenuity-over-magic. I tend to favor character-development, mystery, horror, political intrigue and exploration of exotic lands and cultures over grinding (combat) and the usual dungeon-crawls. I also like to put in vices (or what our culture considers to be "morally abhorrent", like drugs, prostitution, being socially/emotionally negative in any way, etc.) as a jab at how uptight the modern world is over trivial maters, and sometimes to highlight a fantasy culture with a bit of a cheap "culture-shock".

Growing-up with parents who were vary "casual" about things, I grew-up jaded to anything sexual. And growing-up in a rough neighborhood were the people were vary "casual" about... well... d**n near everything. I grew-up jaded to everything else.

I hope that was informative enough for you?

[talysman]

I do think that the references to tarns, red silk, and white silk are clear evidence that Gor influenced Arneson's campaign, at least partially. Gor was certainly talked about in fantasy circles, even by people who never read the books, but although maybe a few people might know the word "tarn", I doubt hardly anyone who didn't read the books would know the terms "red silk" or "white silk", since they were only mentioned in passing and kind of fell by the wayside once *every* slave became a Pleasure Slave in the later books. So Arneson had to have read Gor.

But don't read more into that than necessary.

I did read quite a few of the Gor books, myself. I have zero interest in BDSM, as it exists in reality or as it exists in the Gor books. I read them because the first couple books don't focus on that and are reasonably good, about like a slightly lesser-quality equivalent to the Barsoom series. Starting with Priest-Kings of Gor (the best of the series,) there's a focus on exploring new cultures in a little more detail than in ERB's books, so there's something worthwhile in the books even after the stupid male dominance obsession becomes more prominent. Also, the way John Norman's kink starts to weave its way into the novels is kind of an interesting psychology study in its own right. You start to look for clues about what happened in John Norman's life to make him so obsessed about dominating women.

So yeah, it's entirely possible that Arneson started reading Gor because he was looking for something like Barsoom and stuck with it for a while because of the cultural details, without being a perv.

Oh, and for those interested in giving the series a try: start at the beginning, and around the time you first see the words "They were the eyes of a Gorean male", or when you reach a first-person account of a woman's experience as a pleasure slave, stop reading. It all goes downhill from there.

[increment]

Jul 29, 2017 13:31:18 GMT -6 talysman said:

So yeah, it's entirely possible that Arneson started reading Gor because he was looking for something like Barsoom and stuck with it for a while because of the cultural details, without being a perv.

Sort of like "I only read Playboy for the articles."

I don't think this is a matter of any one person being a perv. It is a matter of a diverse group of rambunctious young males who collectively enjoyed a bit of adolescent sexual humor, perhaps mingled with some wish fulfillment. There is no shortage of evidence in their reports about games of the time of activities ranging from carousing to less consensual sorts of encounters. The presence of red and white silk slaves on price lists shows most of all that the members of the group would be expected to understand the reference, that it wasn't something isolated to an individual.

[ritt]

The Gor books are treated like seeping genital warts now, but at the time they had pretty deep penetration (LOL) into the mainstream. I remember them on the paperback spinner racks at local drugstores, grocery stores, etc. And this was in a very small town.

[geoffrey]

Jul 29, 2017 13:31:18 GMT -6 talysman said:

I did read quite a few of the Gor books, myself. I have zero interest in BDSM, as it exists in reality or as it exists in the Gor books...

So yeah, it's entirely possible that Arneson started reading Gor because he was looking for something like Barsoom and stuck with it for a while because of the cultural details, without being a perv.

Yep.

I enjoy reading H. P. Lovecraft, and I am not an atheist.

I enjoy reading J. R. R. Tolkien, and I am not Roman Catholic.

Etc.

The notion that someone who likes book X must therefore like every aspect of book X is so obviously false that I am always taken aback when I run into the notion. By all the orbital gods, there is not a single thing I've ever read that I completely liked. Does that ever happen? Is there ever a book that a reader thinks is absolutely perfect? (If so, he must be distinctly uncritical.)

[talysman]

Jul 29, 2017 14:38:03 GMT -6 increment said:

Jul 29, 2017 13:31:18 GMT -6 talysman said:

So yeah, it's entirely possible that Arneson started reading Gor because he was looking for something like Barsoom and stuck with it for a while because of the cultural details, without being a perv.

Sort of like "I only read Playboy for the articles."

Well, no, it's nothing like that at all, because the first several years of Playboy weren't all articles with no nude photos.

The blurbs on the back of the first several Gor books basically marketed the series as like any other sword and planet series, like Barsoom or another Barsoom knock-off the Drey Prescott series. There was barely any mention of slavery at all, and certainly nothing about male domination of women. It just sort of crept in over time... and even then, as ritt mentioned, it was still being marketed in the general fantasy section. There were semi-nude figures on some covers, but that's true of the Barsoom novels, too, and many fantasy novels.

As the series got progressively worse (in both quality and philosophy,) and word spread about it, it started falling out of favor, especially after the I-5 murders, and after Gerald Gallegos was caught and it turned out some of his inspiration came from his love of the Gor novels.

(Edit: Actually, I may be thinking of Leonard Lake and Charles Ng. They were all in the news around the same time, and usually did a news story about one followed by a news story about the Gallegos, for example, followed by a story about Lake/Ng. I just remember seeing a photo or video of either Gallego or Lake on the news, reading a Gor novel, and I recognized the cover. Don't think the news actually mentioned what he was reading... they probably had no idea of the significance yet.)

I don't think this is a matter of any one person being a perv. It is a matter of a diverse group of rambunctious young males who collectively enjoyed a bit of adolescent sexual humor, perhaps mingled with some wish fulfillment. There is no shortage of evidence in their reports about games of the time of activities ranging from carousing to less consensual sorts of encounters. The presence of red and white silk slaves on price lists shows most of all that the members of the group would be expected to understand the reference, that it wasn't something isolated to an individual.

That only shows that whoever made the price lists understood the reference. Probably some of the players understood it, too, but it's like a one-sentence explanation for those who didn't. I didn't know what a bastard sword was when I saw it on the AD&D price list, until I read an explanation.

The "perv" comment is not a reference to the sexual references in Gor. Gor goes way beyond that in its perviness. There's a weird philosophy about male domination of women and how women secretly want domination that John Norman starts to devote whole chapters to explain. I haven't heard any stories about Arneson or his players that suggests they were going full-on John Norman.

But the point I was making was that the most likely explanation as to why Arneson included Gor references is that he read a lot of fantasy lit that was marketed as "like ERB's Barsoom series" or "like REH's Conan stories", and that's what the Gor series was marketed as.

[Finarvyn]

Jul 30, 2017 10:53:00 GMT -6 ritt said:

The Gor books are treated like seeping genital warts now, but at the time they had pretty deep penetration (LOL) into the mainstream. I remember them on the paperback spinner racks at local drugstores, grocery stores, etc. And this was in a very small town.

Agreed (except for the bad "penetration" pun). My recollection is that Gor books were shelved in the regular SciFi/Fantasy section and nobody thought twice about someone buying or reading them. Of course, as the series progressed some of the topics covered got more and more graphic, but still mainstream enough in that era. It wasn't until a decade or so later that folks started to make a big deal about how horrible it was to be reading them.

[Malcadon]

It is the one thing that feels missing form the chronicles of D&D's history:

If the Appendix N was Gary's source of inspiration for AD&D, than what Dave Arneson's* own "Appendix N" for proto-D&D?

That would be a nice list to discover, if we ever.

Although, I totally hear that classic Star Trek was a part of it, with something about a time-traveling away team loosing high-tech items in his campaign setting. I find that really cool!



*and by extent, his former gaming/collaborative partner David Wesely.

[Deleted]

Jul 31, 2017 1:17:31 GMT -6 Malcadon said:

It is the one thing that feels missing form the chronicles of D&D's history:

If the Appendix N was Gary's source of inspiration for AD&D, than what Dave Arneson's* own "Appendix N" for proto-D&D?

That would be a nice list to discover, if we ever.

blackmoor.mystara.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=1010&view=previous


Now, take in mind that this is a relatively old thread; especially through the initiative that increment and the SoB-crew have created, we now know exponentially more about the early days of the hobby than we did back then.

I myself usually recommend people Elric and the Corum novels by Michael Moorcock; I also think Fred Saberhagen's YA fantasy novels might - even if just coincidentally so - catch a lot of the flair that Blackmoor had for me.


Personally, I think that, if Arneson had any specific literary sources for his personal take on the fantasy genre, sources that really might have distinguished his interpretation from the general look that the C&C society had on fantasy, then it might have been Poul Anderson, Tolkien, and perhaps, later, Robert Adams. - But that's just, like, my opinion.


For people looking into more progressive takes on the setting, I recommend British writer Angus Wells' "The Kingdoms": Basically, it Blackmoor without the license, so ostensibly inspired by it seems a bit ridiculous. - Maybe, just maybe, this is really just the matter of all coincidences, because Wells was a quality writer, but even so - much like with Gor, you know it when you see it. As a fan of the setting, they're perhaps THE books to read. --- Even if they came AFTER Arneson, not before him.

[Deleted]

I am giving talysman an Exalt for putting things in the correct context and defending Arneson and his friends from some not so subtle unjustified attempts to smear their characters.

[talysman]

Jul 31, 2017 9:57:38 GMT -6 @theperilousdreamer said:

I am giving talysman an Exalt for putting things in the correct context and defending Arneson and his friends from some not so subtle unjustified attempts to smear their characters.

THanks!

Although I'll say I don't think anyone was trying to smear anyone's character, per se. I just think some people were worried about what the Gor references meant, or speculating as to what it might mean about the psychology of Arneson and his friends. I don't think it necessarily meant anything at all, and I kind of think Jon Peterson was agreeing with that in his reply to me. He just sees it as maybe a little bit more about sexual interest than I do.

[Deleted]

Jul 31, 2017 9:57:38 GMT -6 @theperilousdreamer said:

I am giving talysman an Exalt for putting things in the correct context and defending Arneson and his friends from some not so subtle unjustified attempts to smear their characters.

Okay, folks, I'm going to interrupt here:

Nobody has done that so far, and please don't make any more comments accusing other board-members of something you think you spot between the lines of what they're saying.

We don't have to clarify every single time when we have an Arneson-related debate that both Jon Peterson as well as the SoB-team are among the LEAST likely people to intentionally "smear" Mr Arneson.
It's pretty self-evident that they don't do so, not here, and not in general. Any further accusations of the kind - make no mistake - will get the poster that acts in this way BANNED without further notice.

So, don't do this if you value being a member here.

---

Please, keep with the topic, gentlemen.

[Finarvyn]

Jul 31, 2017 1:17:31 GMT -6 Malcadon said:

It is the one thing that feels missing form the chronicles of D&D's history:

If the Appendix N was Gary's source of inspiration for AD&D, than what Dave Arneson's* own "Appendix N" for proto-D&D?

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that Dave left such a list. I suppose that it's possible that his family might have noticed titles on his shelf at some time, but no "Appendix N" style list seems to exist.

Jul 30, 2017 16:03:47 GMT -6 talysman said:

The blurbs on the back of the first several Gor books basically marketed the series as like any other sword and planet series, like Barsoom or another Barsoom knock-off the Drey Prescott series. There was barely any mention of slavery at all, and certainly nothing about male domination of women. It just sort of crept in over time... and even then, as ritt mentioned, it was still being marketed in the general fantasy section. There were semi-nude figures on some covers, but that's true of the Barsoom novels, too, and many fantasy novels.

<big snip here>

I haven't heard any stories about Arneson or his players that suggests they were going full-on John Norman.

But the point I was making was that the most likely explanation as to why Arneson included Gor references is that he read a lot of fantasy lit that was marketed as "like ERB's Barsoom series" or "like REH's Conan stories", and that's what the Gor series was marketed as.

As a point of interest, I thought I'd track down just how far into the series Gor had progressed while OD&D was in its infancy. There are 20 or more books in the series, but here are the first few listed along with publication date:

A list of Gor books' first editions.
1. Tarnsman of Gor (1966)
2. Outlaw of Gor (1967)
3. Priest-Kings of Gor (1968)
4. Nomads of Gor (1969)
5. Assassin of Gor (1970)
6. Raiders of Gor (1971)
7. Captive of Gor (1972)
8. Hunters of Gor (1974)

Clearly, the Twin Cities crew could have had access to many of these books when Blackmoor was being created but probably no farther than book 5 or so, depending upon specifics of when Blackmoor started and when #6 might have hit the bookstore shelves. If I recall correctly, the first three kind of make a "trilogy" of the priest-kings plotline and it's possible that those three could have marked the biggest influence on campaigns of the day.

Just speculation, of course. We will probably never know for certain.

[Finarvyn]

Jul 29, 2017 9:15:11 GMT -6 Malcadon said:

Jul 28, 2017 5:25:23 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

Forgive my memory, but I can't recall your age or when you started playing D&D. That information might shape the lens through which you look at the game.

About in my late-30s. I started playing when I was about 11 or so... <snip> I hope that was informative enough for you?

Very informative, but I realized also that my post was poorly worded because my comment was more rhetorical than demanding to see a gamer resume so sorry if it came off wrong. My point was mostly that one's perspective about Gor probably comes back to when you were first exposed to it. If you were exposed early on, the series typically comes off as decent fantasy with some odd sexual overtones blended in. If you were exposed after folks started blasting the series you probably see it more as S&M with some fantasy overtones blended in. Sounds from your background that you like to put non-traditional fantasy elements into your game, and certainly Gor has some of those. I know if my own campaigns I had a lot of Gor stuff in the 1970's when I played with high school friends, but lost most of that stuff in the 2000's when I played with wife and kids.

[talysman]

Aug 1, 2017 6:47:39 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

As a point of interest, I thought I'd track down just how far into the series Gor had progressed while OD&D was in its infancy. There are 20 or more books in the series,

AT least 30, although by coincidence, the last one I read was number 20, I believe. The one about the big chess championship.

but here are the first few listed along with publication date:

A list of Gor books' first editions.
1. Tarnsman of Gor (1966)
2. Outlaw of Gor (1967)
3. Priest-Kings of Gor (1968)
4. Nomads of Gor (1969)
5. Assassin of Gor (1970)
6. Raiders of Gor (1971)
7. Captive of Gor (1972)
8. Hunters of Gor (1974)

Clearly, the Twin Cities crew could have had access to many of these books when Blackmoor was being created but probably no farther than book 5 or so, depending upon specifics of when Blackmoor started and when #6 might have hit the bookstore shelves. If I recall correctly, the first three kind of make a "trilogy" of the priest-kings plotline and it's possible that those three could have marked the biggest influence on campaigns of the day.

Just speculation, of course. We will probably never know for certain.

The priest-king plotline actually begins with the third book. Before then, there's not much indication of the priest-kings plotting anything other than acting as a deus ex machina. But after the events of Book 3, Tarl Cabot becomes an agent of the priest-kings, and 4 and 5 cover specific missions he is sent on.

Raiders of Gor (#6, which as you mention was probably just released around the time Blackmoor was being created) marks a break in the series, in my opinion. Tarl starts out on a priest-king mission, gets captured and is humiliated by... by... a WOMAN! It's the first time you really notice that John Norman has some Issues he needs to work out, and a sign that he is going to repeat certain scenes over and over. There were hints of this scene (man is treated as a subordinate by a woman and feels humiliated, man eventually rebels and puts the woman in her place,) but it really becomes explicit here, and you start to notice the pattern from here on. As far as I can remember, we never find out what the priest-king's mission in this book was, and it is never resolved. This is also about the point where the Dejah Thoris clone is dumped and no longer matters in the books, although there are some loose ends that get wrapped up in a later book (Huntsmen, I believe.) This is a very weak book in the series, mostly consisting of the sentence "How high will the throne of Bosk be raised?" repeated at various intervals.

Captive of Gor (#7) is even weaker. It's told from the viewpoint of an Earthwoman captured by Gorean spacemen and forced to become a pleasure slave. There's no plot at all in the book. It's mostly the internal monologue of the main character alternately telling herself "I am a slave!" and "I am not a slave!" There's like one brief moment where something is hinted at which becomes part of the new priest-king plotline. But other than that, the book has no point in even existing.

I went into detail here because these were the latest books in the series during the formation of Blackmoor. There's a strong reason for many people who were avid readers of the series up until this point to lose interest. Before Book 6, it's a Barsoom knock-off that becomes increasingly risque, but still makes a good adventure yarn. Book 6 has some dumb pirate stuff and a sea battle, but is pretty much only about John Norman's personal issues and not a very good adventure. Book 7 has no adventure at all. Norman does start doing adventures again, but the tone of the series changes, and of course those books hadn't been written yet at the time of Blackmoor. I can't think of anything valuable from Books 6 and 7 that Arneson might have wanted to borrow and work into a game session, unless the group was heavily into roleplaying master and slave scenes. I could totally see borrowing the general slave culture and the tarns from the beginning of the series, the assassin background from Book 5, and a lot of stuff from Book 3. Maybe some stuff from Book 4, but basically this is just faux Mongols and there are better sources for that.

[increment]

As someone here ascertained...

www.thegoreancave.com/silks/whitesilk.php

.. the "red silk" and "white silk" distinction doesn't seem to have entered into the series until book 5; it then skips book 6, but seems to be big in book 7 and beyond. That at least gives a sense of when the terms had currency, and which you would have to be reading to pick them up.

[Finarvyn]

Aug 1, 2017 12:22:09 GMT -6 increment said:

As someone here ascertained...

www.thegoreancave.com/silks/whitesilk.php

.. the "red silk" and "white silk" distinction doesn't seem to have entered into the series until book 5; it then skips book 6, but seems to be big in book 7 and beyond. That at least gives a sense of when the terms had currency, and which you would have to be reading to pick them up.

Nice catch. It has been a few decades since I read the series and I just assumed that this lingo happened early on. Nice to have a better perspective on the timeline.

[Deleted]

Funny detail: I actually bought the first book as an audiobook, a few years ago. I will listen to it during my night drive tonight. That will be fun. OH HOW MUCH FUN THIS IS GOING TO BE.

[Malcadon]

Aug 1, 2017 7:04:13 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

Very informative, but I realized also that my post was poorly worded because my comment was more rhetorical than demanding to see a gamer resume so sorry if it came off wrong.

No prob.

[Vile Traveller]

This is all very interesting. I was aware of the Gor books in my early gaming days back in the 80s, but at the time I only read what I could find in the library and saved my money for minis. I saw everything in the world in "mini-equivalent" values then. I only recently came across the series again and started reading, having missed all the furore. I just started reading with the same vague impression I'd had when I used to see them on the shelves three-plus decades ago, that they were some kind of Barsoom-alike. And then, around book 5 or 6, I started to notice all this stuff. I don't think I finished book 7, but I think mostly because the adventure was gone. Seems like I re-discovered everyone else's experiences with the series long after the fact.