I'm Sick Of...(D&D tropes that you can do without)

[dd.stevenson]

Polytheism.

Gods that grant spells.

Traps that cost more money to construct than the dungeon itself.

Mortals freely traversing the planes.

Gods exhibiting childlike behavior.

Dragons and powerful outsiders exhibiting childlike behavior.

Dragons and powerful outsiders in general.

...boy, that was therapeutic! I feel like I'm just getting warmed up...

 

[Jon_Dahl]

Magic Marts, McMagic.

It's hard to imagine anything more mundane than a longsword +1. Even a spoon is less mundane; PCs use both but the spoon is mentioned less and therefore more interesting. Any game designer would struggle to create a system where magical items and buying spells is more trivialized as it is in D&D.

Market prices, wealth by level, easy magical crafting... It takes a considerable overhaul to fix it and - more importantly - it's not always easy to introduce ban of magic marts to gaming groups which are used to the fact that buying magical items is no less different than buying a horse. At least horses sometimes have names.

 

[Herobizkit]

Level One. You're a farmer and you spend the day killing skeletons, zombies, giant rats, goblins, or kobolds. Sometimes Orcs. 1st level adventuring is the pits.

Dragons that are scaled to the PC's level. Really...?

+x weapons. Boring as hell. +x armor isn't so bad.

Vancian spellcasting. Get over it.

Drow as anything. Elves get enough attention as it is.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

All clerics can heal

Really? Not just the ones blessed by the god of medicine or healing?

Why and how does the goddess of death grant her clerics healing powers?

Why does being a devout follower of the god of storms and battle allow you to cure disease?

Every single god and goddess, no matter what their "portfolio", seems to have called dibs on healing as well.

If we're bothering to go with a multitheistic pantheon, shouldn't the choice of which god or goddess you derive your power from have an impact on what powers you have?

I can't XP you, but I agree with everything you said!

 

[Fifth Element]

Polytheism.

Gods exhibiting childlike behavior.

Do not read any Greek mythology. You have been warned.

(I assume you mean childish, yes?)

 

[darkwing]

THAC0. Or BAB. Or the ability to build a character that can't hit because of where you placed (or rolled) attribute scores. All characters should have a fairly good but never guaranteed chance to hit regardless of how "bad" or "good" (munchkin wise) they are built.

 

[dd.stevenson]

Do not read any Greek mythology. You have been warned.

(I assume you mean childish, yes?)

Yeah, I'd been aware of the influences at work there. Doesn't matter--I still think they're bone tired D&D-isms.

Getting caught misusing a word does sting, though

 

[TwoSix]

If we're bothering to go with a multitheistic pantheon, shouldn't the choice of which god or goddess you derive your power from have an impact on what powers you have?

Polytheism in general bugs me in D&D. The gods are simultaneously super important but also one group of entities among many. I'd like a D&D where the division of supernatural ability among mortals actually drives the story of the cosmology.

 

[Nytmare]

I'm sure this is somewhere in the preceding pages, but what I absolutely despise is the stereotypical "X random strangers, who probably wouldn't even want to speak to each other, run into each other in a tavern and decide to go looking for adventure."

 

[Someone]

I have many. But the prizes go to:

Alignment, probably the worst morality system ever implemented, gets compounded in it's crappiness by the fact that several mechanics and spell interact with them so not only you have to house rule your game if you plan to at least ignore it, if you don't you can have people in the game world that can objectively measure each other's pup-kicking impulses.

The Vancian magic system, useless to model any magic system in any non-D&D based fiction, including Vance. Special mention for the aberrant abomination that's clerical magic.