Reinventing the Wheel: changing common D&D tropes

[Afrodyte]

The title is pretty-much self-explanatory, but I'll elaborate. How have you altered the standard setting and roleplaying tropes of D&D? Some (though by no means all) of the consistent elements in D&D gaming I've come across are:

1. adventurers as a separate class of people
2. PCs as exceptional characters
3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters
4. arcane/divine magic divide
5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure
6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)
7. race = culture
8. epic or heroic plot scale
9. other things you have noticed and altered.

I know that these things are far from universal. In fact, several published settings alter or reverse some of these trends, and that's cool. However, I am interested in what you have done beyond the "there are no elves in my campaign" sort of thing.

 

[VirgilCaine]

Actually, there are no elves IMC. Well, not in a recognizable form, anyway.

Also, IMC, you'll find different political systems than usual. Not just monarchies, but several democracies, maybe a republic, and an anarchy or two. Also, goblinoids are civilized--but not friendly.

 

[Aristotle]

long winded, but you asked...

1. adventurers as a separate class of people
This one is difficult to answer. I've never really seen adventurers as anything but people who are skilled enough to survive adventuring. In my campaign an adventurer might be a mercenary, a former soldier, a magi on pilgrimage, a noble with a pentient for traveling, or any of a number of other things. The Scout class (my campaigns version of the Ranger) has borrowed some of the flavor of early american 'mountain men' and wilderness scouts... so pretty much everyone in that Character Class is considered an 'adventurer'.

2. PCs as exceptional characters
My campaign is designed specifically to be 'Epic Friendly', so lots of people are exceptional in comparison to the average campaign. I'd have to say that the difference between player characters and non player characters in my campaign is more about 'luck'. The PCs' adventuring party finds the ancient tomb that holds the relic and gets to adventure in it, while the NPCs' party goes on a wild goose chase and ends up with nothing.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters
This I've stuck to. In fact, if I understand your implication, I've made the line between the two even more solid. There are very few things in my campaign that are sentient, and the more alien ones are pretty strictly non-playable.

4. arcane/divine magic divide
Heh... in my campaign magic is arcane (by fictional definitions) in the way that it works, but the only class that casts spells is an order of holy men. The first of their order were taught the secrets of magic by the one true god, and they have passed along the secrets of their trade along with their faith from master to aprentice from that time (the inevitable caste of turncoats who use magic to harm their brethren and the goals of the one true god exists, of course).

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure
That is entirely up to my players. I've had players play spies, or even assassins sent to kill another party member, but the role is always played out very well (I have a decent group of players who enjoy the story as much as their characters). Sometimes more than a year of play will go by before something like that even starts to surface in character.

6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)
I think of my setting as being 'fantasy', but the period it resembles most is probably Ancient Rome (late bronze age and early iron age, but with some asdvances in technology partially due to the availability of magic and other fantasy elements).

7. race = culture
I never really thought that was a staple of D&D. Well, it is in my campaign. In fact their are very few species of intelligent beings. All of the "core" races are descended from Humans. A select few of the other intelligent species, all of which are presented foremost as monsters, are also playable.

8. epic or heroic plot scale
Definately epic... That was a goal from the beginning of the design.

9. other things you have noticed and altered.
Lets see... There are multiple faiths but only one god; virtually all of the faiths worship the same deity (a few are animistic or demonic cults). There are no planes (technically there is a heaven and a hell, but nobody stays in heaven and nobody gets into or out of hell unless they are put there). There are no undead (sorta... that one is hard to explain). Law vs. Chaos is more important than Good vs. Evil (a chaotic person goes to hell for all of eternity, but an evil one just reincarnates in a lesser form to repent for a while). Only one base class has access to magic (technically two, but the other one is severely limited). The planet's surface is predominantly land (with a sizeable amount of shallow water and rivers/lakes). And more...

 

[Herremann the Wise]

A little of 5, 7 and 9

A slightly more recent "feature" is that of multiculturalism. The idea that the common races live together somewhat happily (with occasional laughs at half-orcs and gnomes).

I like the idea that:
"a Dwarf simply will not ever trust a non-Dwarf (unless they knew that persons great-grandparents really well). The thought that Elves could happily adapt to large stinking cities (and yes they should stink) was and is preposterous. These two races in particular are surely a bunch of xenophobes (in the main) yet somehow, they just become another part of the cosmopolitan melange of the fantasy city. I mean, half-breeds I can see trying to fit into such places (and in effect not belonging or fitting into either heritage). Dwarves and Elves however should get back to their roots."

In essence, the alteration that I have made in one of my campaigns is to revert back to how it "used to be". It has enforced an interesting outlook from the players in regards to their character's prejudices.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[Galethorn]

I just started on a new campaign setting this last friday (techically, I've been thinking on it for a very long time, but I only started putting pen to paper on friday), and I've changed the status quo quite a bit. However, I'm going to be using either Grim Tales, or a mish-mash of simplifications to the Grim Tales/D20 modern system to run it.

1. adventurers as a separate class of people

There's no such thing as an 'adventurer' in the common sense of somebody who looks for trouble, becomes insanely rich, and screws with the status quo. In my new setting, most notable people do only one of those, and they're about as common as hen's teeth. People who do all three are legends.

2. PCs as exceptional characters

Kept this one; I like PCs to be exceptional, but not 'programmed for greatness'.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters

The only intelligent race in this setting is humans. Hence, the only monsters they might face (small dragons and unusual animals in very isolated places) are unlikely to be close enough to the PCs in nature to even need distinction.

4. arcane/divine magic divide

No magic at all, save perhaps the occasional alchemist's or witch's potion that's got a bit more more to it than a light narcotic, and does more than turn one's urine green. Oh, and the gods only make themselves a little bit more present than they do in the modern world.

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure

If I got rid of this one, it would just turn into a deathmatch, at least with my group.

6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)

My new setting is a dirty, dangerous dark age, where every valley has its own self-proclaimed king, every road has its own band of brigands, and nature itself is as much of a foe as the brigands. Oh, and some not necessarily antagonistic groups keep slaves. Oh, and people die from simple wounds quite often, because of infection.

7. race = culture

Since there's only one race, the cultures drastically outnumber the races.

8. epic or heroic plot scale

The most grandiose possible plot in this setting (barring 'strange foes from across the sea, killing all in their wake') would be to try and unite the squabbling kingdoms, which would be something of about the same scale as Charlemagne's conquests. Hence, the fate of the world is not likely to rest on the PCs' shoulders.

9. other things you have noticed and altered.

1. PCs are constantly decked out in the heaviest armor possible.
In my new setting, iron itself is worth as much as copper, and good steel is worth its weight in silver. Hence, the PCs are unlikely to have more than two or three hauberks between them.

2. One pantheon, everybody chooses one deity to worship.
Everybody has their own view of the gods, and organized religions only account for about 80%, at the absolute most, of religious people in a given area. Some cultures have animist religions where each person is expected to thank every object that helps them. Others worship small groups of gods that show the various sides of the human spirit. And others yet worship entire pantheons of patron gods.

3. Alignment.
No alignmen. Some things are obviously good (though not [good]), others evil (though not [evil], and some people do more of one than the other. Period.

4. More than one plane of existance.
Just one in this world. No, not even elemental planes.

5. Giant bugs.
Simple biology tells us that the blood of insects past a certain size would leak out of their sides due to the non-scaling effects of surface-tension.

6. Unrealistic stuff
Ok, I don't have elves, fireball spells, or the like in this setting, so the because it's fantasy argument won't work. People almost always die from arterial wounds, nobody jumps fifty feet, no matter what their jump skill is, and swords can't shear through steel armor, even if you're really, really strong, unless it's a very good sword, the steel is in the form of light chainmail, and the person wearing it isn't so light that they're thrown back.



There, that just about covers it for my new setting...

 

[painandgreed]

1. adventurers as a separate class of people

No more separate than any other small group of mercenaries. It's pretty common for the child of a noble who will never inherit anything to join or create such a party and "adventure". Adventuring can be anything from going to tournies for the money, hiring out as mercs for a war, odd jobs for other nobles like clearing out monsters, or venturing off into the wilderness to kill monsters or explore ruins.

2. PCs as exceptional characters

My PCs aren't really exceptional in the begining. A good way for 1st level PCs to get their asses kicked would be to wander into a bar and start a fight as average people will be between 1st-4th level (although mostly commoners). If they want to be exceptional, they have to gain experience by actually do something exceptional.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters

I've had a PC that became vampire in a not too good campaign. This dragged him and everybody else into political infighting between the vampires. I've also been in games where the "monsters" bought us off and we changed sides.

4. arcane/divine magic divide

Always done this although I sometimes mess with arcane magic.

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure

That's up to the players. At the begining of the campaign, I ask them if they want a "do whatever they want" or "cooperative" type game. If they want a cooperative type game then they are to cooperate or I'll take their characters away. Funny thing, the best times for character cooperation have been evil "do whatever they want" campaigns because it was understood up and front that to mess with the party would mean death in horrible ways.

6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)

I wrote up my campaing world with the idea of being able to play in vatious times in the worlds history: Ancient(Babalon, Egypt), Classical (Greek). Imperial (Roman), Medieval, early modern (Reneisance), or modern (pulp 1800's).

7. race = culture

Not as a rule. Typically however, races do stick together and they do have their own cultures. The more they mingle, the more their cultures mix.

8. epic or heroic plot scale

Depends on the players and the campaign. Done plenty of down and dirty campaings where the players were neither heroic nor epic. My campaigns are hardly ever epic. If the players want epic, they're going to have to make it happen themselves (which I'm more than willing to let them do).

9. other things you have noticed and altered.

Religious scism in a good pantheon resulting in conflict. Same gods but one is lawful and the other is more accepting of other gods and not so subserviant to the major god. They won't attack each other on sight or anything but it has caused wars to determine which style of worship will be the standard in the kingdom.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

1. adventurers as a separate class of people

Adventurers? What're those? My PCs have recently been secret police (Kingdom of Ivalice) and mercenary spies (Dwarven Age). Both, however, were obviously apart from normal society.

2. PCs as exceptional characters

I always break this, in the sense that I don't use the NPC classes for anybody and there are a goodly number of equivalent-level characters with similar tasks. On the other hand, the PCs tend to be at the center of a major event, making them seem exceptional.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters

Monsters? What're those? The creatures available to PC and enemy beastmasters in Ivalice, and the occaisonal random encounter in the wilderness? I use almost exclusively NPC encounters, and PCs have access to any major intelligent race in the campaign.

4. arcane/divine magic divide

Divine magic? What's that? It's what the Murond Glabados Church's sorcerers call their foul, corrupting occult rituals, isn't it? I excise divine magic from my worlds as a general rule; the gods or God are a matter of faith, not casting the daily detect magic to see if you need an atonement.

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure

This one's just too hard to break conveniently, IMO.

6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)

One early industrial/late renaissance campaign with a fully steamtech hostile neighbor (Kingdom of Ivalice) and one WW1-equivalent late steampunk campaign. Check.

7. race = culture

Well, Dwarven Age had a goodly amount of race = culture, but Kingdom of Ivalice only has humans, and recently the hybrids who have no culture of their own. The human groups have lots of different cultures.

8. epic or heroic plot scale

Not really. I prefer clashes of nations, and the PCs usually have a limited role in those. Of course, they sometimes have to prevent (or fail to prevent) one faction or another from doing something that could, in theory, destroy the world. But that's rare, and not played up any more than conquest or the prevention thereof.

On the other hand, critical NPCs often begin at around 25th level, and PCs certainly acquire Epic status in D&D terms - that just doesn't mean as much as in standard D&D. An Epic PC is one who can duel the Shrine Knight Master at Arms Walthus Khamberman (a 7'1" holy swordsman who clocks in at Fighter 8/Kensai 18/Exotic Weapon Master 3) and live - not one who can singlehandedly defeat a whole army.

9. other things you have noticed and altered.

Outsiders are unique, wierd and universally hideous. They even use Rakham minis. That's how ungodly strange they are.

Alignment is excised in favor of a harsher, more period-appropriate scheme of morality and ethics.

Magic items are rare (Kingdom of Ivalice), and the handful that survive are in the hands of people like Master Khamberman. If a PC acquires a magic item, it will be a signature item that is henceforth identified with him.

 

[Qwillion]

1. adventurers as a separate class of people
My homebrew setting is a place called Questspire the City of Adventures, I dealt with the idea by embracing it adventures are the people of this city, they are the upper class of this city and as such, have very specific laws that deal with them and a powerful guild that controls them. It makes for a more interesting dynamic when there are hundreds of adventuring companies in the city many higher level than the party with epic reputaitons but these groups are often not in residence. The guild makes for a dynamic organization filled with intrigue, hooks and dm tools.

The most interesting part was creating the sub-culture of the guild itself.

2. PCs as exceptional characters
How exceptional are you when everyone else is just exceptional as you, yes you might be the nobles (like in the amber setting) but so are you rivals.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters
I use a great deal of savage species, monsters by aeg, and a number of hombrew racial classes. In questspire mosnters there are recognized intelligent races these are afforded all the same rights as everyone else, Many mosnters from companies and are members of the adventures guild. The non-intelligent mosnters are the charmed servent of House Vexbrute. House Vexbrute is about as powerful as the adventrues guild (heraldry is a chained tarasque, motto "we hold the leash")

4. arcane/divine magic divide
The magic system of D&D is its biggest strength and its biggest weakness but I have added other magic systems to the game so that, there is not "only" the standard two tear system. There are the channelers of the WoT and Midnight, Psionics, Steampunk, chaostech and the magic system of Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed.
though often poor in exectution I have been assisted by Mongooses Encyclopidea Arcana series with things like starmagic, chaos magic, Battle magic etc....

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure
I run character driven campaigns. parites of necessity, forced parties and the idea that the relationships between the characters are what can drive the game. It's hard work and it means letting you players create anything they want without consulting each other and then you having to tie it all together.
Family, obligations, compultions and blackmail can all be used to bring a group of varing backgrounds together.


6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)
I personally use a Rennisance themed setting where things are being discovered and we are no longer looking at the good old days of high magic, with various different levels of technology, magic, and culture. I would say it is very close to Monte Cook's Ptolus setting

7. race = culture
Bah I have a very old dragon article about culture, too many of us fall into the star trek culture issue of protraying fanatsy races as a new culture.
Don't just give things culture give them Sub-culture.

No the real thing here is do you reprsent culture with mechanics

8. epic or heroic plot scale
I do tend to run an epic tale, but that tale is not always heroic, I tend to run gritty no alighnment motivations. Some times it is the grand war other times it is simply vengence against a hated foe, sometimes it is simply I want money so I can buy a cool sword.

As to plot, I don't believe in plot driven games, I believe in character driven stories, go watch the maltesse falcon or cassablanca. the plots of these moves are laughable but the characters and the diaologe is what makes it marvaleous.

9. other things you have noticed and altered.
Preconceptions and cliche's

I dont' have the old man wizard, I have the prodigy little girl wizard
I don't have the big burly blacksmith, I have the tiny fey with ingenuity having problems with cold iron
I have a big ogre withs specticles who works as the churhes librarian.

If there is a cliche change it, twist it around and have fun with it.

 

[Tonguez]

1. adventurers as a separate class of people

In the past I've had the PCs be members of a travelling Circus Troupe (ironically with no bards), Agents of the Church, Leaders of a group of Settlers to a newly discovered (and virtually unexplored) island, and the juvinile survivors of a raid on their village. I tend to have PCs tied closely to a social group.

2. PCs as exceptional characters

I have run a short game starting with NPC classes (Expert, Aristocrat, Warrior, Adept) before multiclassing to PC.

3. clear distinction between PCs and monsters

Not too sure what you mean here, I allow goblin as a playable race and in the past have had an NPC Abberation (based on an half-fiend Otyugh) who 'asked' the PCs to find his daughter (another NPC who looked human but wasn't (obviously))

4. arcane/divine magic divide

No Arcane magic - all spellcasting is the work of spirits (those familiars are demons and the real source of the wizards spells!)

5. PCs organized into a cooperative party structure

um - see 1

6. medieval European setting (well, a more hygenic version, anyway)

My main campaign is set in Mythic Polynesia, a former campaigns have been set in Antediluvean Africa (when the Congo Basin was an inland sea), The Mongol Empire after Genghis Khan, and one set in 16th Century South East Europe/Africa and Setting which is Bronze Age/Ealy Iron Age which has aspects of both Europe (Greek/Minoan) and the Middle East (so lets call it Levantian)

7. race = culture

Nope I only ever have one type of each race any distinction (as say between the elfs of the Highgreen Forest and the Baijani (mariner) elfs) is purely cultural. eg I have two types of Gnomes (Common and Brownies) both with identical stats but brownies are hairier and have favoured class Barbarian (and a culturally more primitive)

8. epic or heroic plot scale

Yes only you can save mankind! Actually I have an uberarch which may never come into use if the PCs don't get involved (by discovering one of the five key artifacts or opposing the spread of the Zealot Cult)

9. other things you have noticed and altered.

No Cash economy - ie no gold coins to spare

One advantage of having the PCs tied to a social group is that I have introduced an Influence mechanic. Its identitcal to the Wealth rules of D20 Modern but measures the degree to which a PC can influence others in the community to get what they want (eg if Bob needs a Sword he has to see whether he can influence uncle Dave the Smith to make him one). Others might be influenced to put in labour to help Bob build a boat so he can get to a neighbouring island etc etc etc.

It also means Magic items can't be bought they are given as boons by more powerful NPCs

 

[Tonguez]

My new setting is a dirty, dangerous dark age, where every valley has its own self-proclaimed king, every road has its own band of brigands, and nature itself is as much of a foe as the brigands. Oh, and some not necessarily antagonistic groups keep slaves. Oh, and people die from simple wounds quite often, because of infection.
...

So exactly like medieval Europe then