Common fantasy genre assumptions

[Derren]

Oh there are so many of them.

First the races. Humans are always the average, elves are always long lived use bows and love nature while dwarfs use axes and live underground.

The setting itself is always late medieval (15-16th century) but without guns. The society (nearly) always resembles a real world one, most often western European, and the existence of magic and monsters never affect the society in any way (you still have the same inheritance laws despite being able to raise the dead, castle exists even with flying enemies and no one prepares for those adventurers and high level monsters who can walk through a rain of arrows unharmed and can perform superhuman feats)
Every small town always has a Inn for strangers to stay and a blacksmith who can repair/make weapons while every large city has a canalization. Food is always plentyful and one can order whatever you want as if you were eating in a restaurant. Libraries are pretty common as everyone can read and different languages are nearly never an issue because of an world wide trade language. And there is of course only one kind of currency.

Swords are always the default weapon and you can get nearly every weapon everywhere even highly complex ones like composite bows. Same goes for armor.
And of course adventurers can walk around freely with their weapons and armor and no one objects while everyone trusts some armed strangers to solve their problems. And they never pay taxes of any kind and people can enter and leave towns at will.

It is also always pretty clear which intelligent nearly human being you can kill at sight and which not.

+ All the other things which were said in this thread.

 

[Rune]

Here are a couple:

• (Most) magic has no long-term cost.
  
  Consider what the world would be like if all forms of magic--minor or major--had a significant cost in creation or casting. Like, for instance, experience, or even life. Consider what the world would be like if these costs could be forcibly extracted from others!
  
  
• Elves are a dwindling race.
  
  Consider what the world would be like if this assumption were not changed, but emphasized. What if every elf has lived since the beginning of time and will live until the end of time--unless killed violently first. Consider the implications that would exist if the race of elves could never procreate!

 

[Ixis]

- Elves live in forests or cities. They also live forever which makes no sense as they are usually the rarest and most mysterious of the races.

- Dwarves live underground, drink ale and are Scottish.

- Orcs are green and angry.

- Gnomes are short and good with magic. Usually annoying too.

- Halflings are Hobbits, but very few people play them so they're always different.

- Half-elves are for people who want to play someone pretty and cool with stats that don't chain them to a particular class.

- Humans are numerous, varied and (usually) evil but not evil enough to be repelled like Orcs.

- Goblins are short and either really smart and cunning or depressingly stupid. They also like explosions and/or shinies.

- Dragons are either everywhere or nowhere at all. There are also many colors and breeds of dragons and they are either European reptiles, the long snaked asian variety or some weird Cthulhu-esque mass that are called dragons for no discernible reason.

- Even if gunpowder is available, people will still use swords.

- Airships are grandiose and common or don't exist at all.

- Monsters randomly roam around complexes. Anywhere a group of monsters happen to be where they could in no way be a part of an ecosystem is called a dungeon.

- Somebody somewhere fills these dungeons with traps and treasure. Usually it's a dark wizard or evil person or dragon or whatever. Traps can magically reset themselves and are always-always really-really old. Adventurers will also never cross a dungeon that is incomplete.

- Everyone will always fight to the death for no real reason. Even if the benevolent Dungeon Master remembers to keep a creature or character from dying by having them run away they will still be slaughtered by the party. Likewise, adventurers will always forget that they can stabilize the foes they've recently harmed to ask them questions. Creatures who aren't heroes will also always forget that they can heal or stabilize fallen foes to get them back up again.

- There is always the icy country, the fire/desert country, the forest country, the country full of beaches, the mountainous country and sometimes the underground country. All countries and continents usually follow just one of these unique geological types, with no variance.

- The thieves or mages guild will always be in the desert.

- There are always multiple taverns per town, and no restaurants.

- There is always one church or temple per town.

- There is always multiple gods, half of which are good and half are evil. There is also usually one god who was really awesome but got killed and will never come back, or one god who was really evil but got killed and will eventually come back.

- Deep underground in a forgotten labyrinth shrine to the giant king is the perfect place to store gauntlets that only a gnome could wear.

- Only vaguely european as seen through the eyes of Tolkein races are allowed. Sometimes lizard or cat people are ok. You may have other races, but they will not be playable.

- People spend ages and ages learning magic, but never take the time to learn how to use a sword as well, for fear of becoming "unbalanced."

- Everyone knows at least a little magic, or nobody knows magic except the heroes and just about everybody they'll fight against.

- Dragons speak perfect english or don't speak any language at all.

- Ugly races can claim lands or forge kingdoms, but never engage in trade or treaties. Which is strange as they can be just as economically stable and large as the various kingdoms of the pretty races that rely on trade and international laws.

- All magic is either to help kill somebody or to help steal treasure from underground tombs. There is no magic for various day to day tasks, or if there is the heroes never bother to learn them.

- Druids can do everything, live in the woods and are hippies.

- Paladins and Clerics have just as much power as other classes, but are in fear of losing them.

- Guildhalls are full of powerful adventurers, with a combined strength that could topple empires, yet they all live in fear of the (usually ineffectual) city watch.

- Trolls regenerate and always live with Orcs.

- Horses are the most common means of conveyance, despite summoned monsters and aurochs being superior mounts.

 

[NewJeffCT]

1) Dwarves & Elves warred long ago, but are now uncomfortable allies.

2) Dwarves have beards & like axes

3) Dragons are greedy, even good ones.

4) Non D&D dragons breathe fire

5) halflings use slings

6) orcs are bullying & chaotic

7) Elves and slender and fair

 

[Dausuul]

RPG settings are almost a fantasy genre of their own. RPG worlds have very little in common with worlds created for the purpose of fantasy literature once you get past the superficialities of bearded axewielding dwarves, wizards who wear robes, etc etc.

I agree with you, but would take it further. Bearded axe-wielding dwarves are in no way a staple of fantasy fiction nowadays. That's another D&D-ism (although D&D itself stole it from the Lord of the Rings). Likewise the graceful human-sized bow-shooting elves. You're not likely to find elves and dwarves anywhere outside of D&D and its derivatives*, and when you do find them, the elves are apt to look like Dobby and the dwarves like Tyrion Lannister.

Fantasy fiction long ago moved on from Tolkien. He is rightly admired as one of the great masters of the genre, but slavishly imitating him is mostly over with. Unfortunately, that was not the case when D&D was created, and the franchise has been stuck with those retread races ever since.

[size=-2]*I include pretty much all computer RPGs in the category of "D&D derivatives."[/size]

 

[Derren]

I agree with you, but would take it further. Bearded axe-wielding dwarves are in no way a staple of fantasy fiction nowadays. That's another D&D-ism (although D&D itself stole it from the Lord of the Rings). Likewise the graceful human-sized bow-shooting elves. You're not likely to find elves and dwarves anywhere outside of D&D and its derivatives*, and when you do find them, the elves are apt to look like Dobby and the dwarves like Tyrion Lannister.

Fantasy fiction long ago moved on from Tolkien. He is rightly admired as one of the great masters of the genre, but slavishly imitating him is mostly over with. Unfortunately, that was not the case when D&D was created, and the franchise has been stuck with those retread races ever since.

[size=-2]*I include pretty much all computer RPGs in the category of "D&D derivatives."[/size]

If that is so than I have a remarkably talent to not find any of those RPGs.
Midgard, The Dark Eye, Shadowrun, Warhammer or even video game RPGs like Dragon Age all have the same stereotype of short bearded underground dwarf and long, "hippie" archer elf.
Ok, Shadowrun mixes things a bit up because they don't use bows but at the core elves are still hippies.

 

[humble minion]

I agree with you, but would take it further. Bearded axe-wielding dwarves are in no way a staple of fantasy fiction nowadays. That's another D&D-ism (although D&D itself stole it from the Lord of the Rings). Likewise the graceful human-sized bow-shooting elves. You're not likely to find elves and dwarves anywhere outside of D&D and its derivatives*, and when you do find them, the elves are apt to look like Dobby and the dwarves like Tyrion Lannister.

Fantasy fiction long ago moved on from Tolkien. He is rightly admired as one of the great masters of the genre, but slavishly imitating him is mostly over with. Unfortunately, that was not the case when D&D was created, and the franchise has been stuck with those retread races ever since.

[SIZE=-2]*I include pretty much all computer RPGs in the category of "D&D derivatives."[/SIZE]

Oh, I agree with you, and among the likes of Martin, Erikson, Mieville and the rest of the new breed, axebeard dwarves etc are vanishing concepts. But there's still a load of older fiction floating around out there which uses them (Memory Sorrow and Thorn, Fionavar, and a zillion others) and they haven't completely vanished from modern writing either, although usually under different names (the Shadowmarch books have both, and the excellent Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone use elf-analogs as well)

 

[steeldragons]

You know everyone, it seems, nowadays wants to say "wah wah" bearded underground smith dwarves are sooooo lame. Fair, magical, wood dwelling elves are soooooo lame...soooo yesterday....sooooo overdone for the genre.

Where did they come from? D&D which came from Tolkien...

Noooo. NOT Tolkien. Tolkien took them from...what they ARE! Mythological creatures from germanic/norse mythology, in the case of dwarves. Bretonic and Celtic mythologies in the case of Elves. The Sidhe. The fair folk. The people from under the hill.

Tolkien made them his own cultures in his own world.

D&D used that and borrowed from it.

It does not make "magical elf creatures" and/or "smithy dwarf guys n' gals..WITH beards" unique or original nor lame or over-used. These are the mythologies off OUR REAL LIFE/WORLD cultures.

Could we please, understand the "fantasy genre" for what it is and stop assigning blame for "tired" or "old" concepts that have existed since before 1,000 BCA.

Putting a dwarf on a ship and giving him a pirate hat does not make this "original". Giving elves shotguns on cattle ranches in the American "New West" does not make them "original."

They are mythological creatures of the collective unconscious. They will always be. Stop fighting it. Stop trying to be "new and different"...revel in the creativity and the origins of what they are.

 

[Derren]

Putting a dwarf on a ship and giving him a pirate hat does not make this "original". Giving elves shotguns on cattle ranches in the American "New West" does not make them "original."

But why shouldn't you put a dwarf on a pirate ship?
One problem with the current stereotypes is that it makes those races one dimensional. All dwarfs have beards, all dwarfs use axes and all dwarfs are good at smithing. Thats simply boring and silly. No society can survive with just one profession.

It is as if you meet a single member of a race and use his looks and profession as template for the whole race. This is nowadays simply silly.
I wonder how the RPG humans would look like if your single template was a hispanic car salesman...

 

[TarionzCousin]

The hero is the chosen one to fulfill the prophecy. This is a total cop-out for an author. It's been done to death.

This frustrates me so much.