I don’t know that that’s actually true about D&D! When we play Grayhawk or whatever, it wasn’t LotR and we weren’t really playing toward those tropes. Although the LotR DNA is really hard to disentangle from all fantasy everywhere, so … maybe. But I guess what I’m getting at is that we weren’t all “we can play Lord of the Rings with this!” in the same reverential, conscious way that I’m talking about.

Attention-getting, yeah for sure. That’s a marketing thing for publishers and players. Good for setting expectations. I guess I don’t love that this is the best way to set expectations, although it’s convenient as heck.

“It’s like the movie Platoon” and “it’s about men struggling to keep it together as they’re physically and emotionally blown apart” are super-duper different, you know?