What traditional fantasy conventions are you tired of?

[Desdichado]

The word was coined around 1938 by one John Campbell. A magazine editor (Astounding) and then friend of Professor Rhine, founder of the Rhine Institute. The professor would later lay claim to having invented the term, but by then he and Campbell had long been on the outs.

Oh, I know all that. It's still not a real word, though. See if you can find it in any dictionary.

Just because I can trace the etymology of the "word" chymical back to Perdido Street Station doesn't make it a real word either. And just because my wife coined the word hugemongous as a kid as a bigger and badder version of huge and humongous together doesn't make it a real word either.

 

[Desdichado]

I think it's kinda cool how we have all these people treating "fantasy convention" as synonymous with "D&D convention". Really shows how D&D has taken over their minds, even as they rail against it.

I think the concept that fantasy and D&D are entirely equal to each other is something that I'm quite tired of.

But, it's not a traditional fantasy convention, it's just a misplaced concept that I'm tired of.

 

[Sigdel]

I really don't care about women PC stat adjustments. It was never an issue for me. If you want to put that kind of flavor in your world be my guest. Well, you don't need my permission. But like I said, I recall a 2ed product covering that topic. So I figure that if your going to do it, use something that's been written by the pros. Or expand/fix it, your option. Just trying to help.
That's it, I'm done being off topic and I apologize to all and to Joshua Dyal
for adding to the off topic posts. If anyone would like to continue the "Clerics, magic, and god(s?) in D&D" discussion I urge you to contact me for a healthy debate (not argument).
Now for an on topic rant. I was always tired of the "Conan-esque" fantasy. You know, ripped men in loincloths with bikini-clad warrior women. Ever notice no matter how skimpy the cloths got for both sexes they always had head protection of some sort? To pull a line from a great underground comic, "If it's your head that told you to dress like that, it should be the last thing you protect."

 

[Incenjucar]

Well, technically, even that's too limited a definition of fantasy, but if we're going to open the field wide open, we very quickly aren't going to have a useful discussion. That's exactly the reason I said "traditional fantasy conventions." I mean, it'd be kinda pointless for me to talk about how I'm sick of the convention that fantasy has to include a bus full of cheerleaders, or bored housewives hitting on the pool guy.

Although, now that I think of it, I think those fantasies still have some life left in them...

I'm talking genres, and you said that X-Men is not of the fantasy genre, not 'traditional fantasy conventions'. Traditional Fantasy also needs to be explained, when you say it, as either "the traditions of the fantasy genre" or "the tradition formed within the most-acknowledged aspect of the fantasy genre".

Hence why I use "Classical Fantasy" as my term for Tolkein-esque stuff, since 'tradition' has different applications. There are several fantasy traditions, after all (mythology and mythological fiction is fantasy, but it certainly has different, if often related, traditions compared to Tolkeinesque fantasy).

As for words, if it's used by enough people, yeah, it's a word. Dictionaries don't hold language by the throat.

 

[Goblyns Hoard]

No, polytheism doesnt fit all themes... (snip)

Theres also many that it doesnt exclude but that it makes easier for D&D to avoid, like fightning within a religion.

While I agree with what you are saying polytheism can do this. And before I'm accused of going off-topic one of the fantasy conventions I've hated for years is the polytheistic system... so I went away came up with a sytem of gods and realised it was polytheistic... then I realised the thing I hated was a set of distinctly aligned (i.e. they had an alignment) one dimensional gods.

Solution (mine at least):

Gods do not have alignments - anyone from any alignment can worship any god. Faith and religion therefore become an issue and the concept of holy war between two religions of the same deity is an option (very much a factor in the real world - catholic vs. protestant, shiite vs sunni, and of course christian vs jew ve muslim)

This allows you to have gods that are much closer to the petty greek gods -fickle creatures that had wants and desires but were completely separate from mortal concerns. Zues was no shining light of good and decent behaviour for most of his time on the throne of Olympus, regularly forcing himself upon women! Not sure what alignment WotC gave him (if any... never bothered with deities and demigods)

 

[Merlion]

Oh you can still have fightning within a religion with polytheism...but *D&D* polytheism in particular doesnt usualy lend itself to these sorts of things as the gods are usualy to busy fightning each other and whatnot.


My whole problem with D&D religion, really, is that its forced on you. Since half the PC classes have "divine" powers that have to come from somewhere, its hard to remove it if you want to remove it (or to make it uncertain).

And certainly very nearly every D&D product out there assumes and some times hinges on polytheism based very much around the bizzare DnD alignment system.

 

[Warrior Poet]

The Cleric is a pure D&Dism. There are, in many stories, healer-characters, and characters that could be considered priests, and characters who draw their abilities from higher powers, but few of them even resemble the armor wearing, weapon swinging, spell flinging class that is the Cleric. The idea that priest/god magic equates to healing/defense magic is largely a D&Dism.

Any historians out there, please contribute and correct me if I'm wrong. Thanks.

I think that, in many ways, the idea of the cleric did come to its most recognized incarnation due to its development in D&D, but perhaps not entirely without historical precedent. Bishop Odo (although there does seem to be some question as to whether he was an ecclesiastical figure) was half-brother to William the Conqueror (William the Bastard of Normandy), and commissioned the Bayeaux Tapestry. I believe Odo was something of a bad man on the battlefield (present at Hastings?), wore armor, charged a Saxon shield wall, and wielded a mace or flail or club that was good for bashing armor.

Anyway, the holy warrior has long been a historical figure, throughout many cultures. Part of the convention of the armor-wearing mace-swinging priest is tied to the larger issue of the medieval western-centric setting which (correctly or not) has long held up the armored knight as the symbol of its age. And the church of that era and setting, while not "officially" fighters, had plenty of people aligned with them to shed blood, often in an "official" capacity. But other cultures may have had divinely-related figures that also contributed to combat. 3.0/3.5 D&D seems to have a lot of spells from the cleric that are about buffing the party, not entirely about slaying enemies. That seems consistent with a lot of religious figures across various cultures, i.e. praying for help for a cause, using magic and prayer to augment the faithful, witch doctors and shamans preparing warriors for battle to make them impervious to attacks, etc.

Anyway, this rambling, probably nonsensical post brought to you by someone probably not well-versed enough in history and anthropology/archaeology. So I await correction if these things are not the case.

Thanks,

Warrior Poet

 

[Desdichado]

Seems to me that the Paladin more closely resembles the Holy Warrior archetype. The cleric sits a bit uncomfortably as a D&Dism that sorta resembles a few different archetypes, and is grafted into others where it doesn't fit because there's not a better class out there in typical D&D.

 

[Merlion]

Anyway, the holy warrior has long been a historical figure, throughout many cultures

The Holy Warrior, yes. mechanically the Paladin embodies that quite nicely. Mostly a Warrior, but with some "divinely" granted advantages.


The Cleric however is another story. The Cleric is a bizzare mismash. Not just a Holy Warrior, but the Spellcasting Priest, with full progression of spells all the way up to 9th level, plus considerable combat ability.

I cant think of many figures like that from fantasy. Full plate, religion, and major spellcasting all at once.

I think back when Clerics only had 7 levels of spells, and their spell list was truly inferior across the board to the Wizards, it wasnt as bad, balance wise or archtypally...but now..no.

Me, I dont think the Spellcasting "Priest" archtype is common enough to even have a class (The Holy Warrior/Crusader/Champion is and should be embodied by the Paladin with the alignment restrictions removed).

At the very least I'd like to see the Cleric become just the Priest and just a spellcaster, and the Paladin fully assume the Holy Warrior role.

 

[Merlion]

Seems to me that the Paladin more closely resembles the Holy Warrior archetype. The cleric sits a bit uncomfortably as a D&Dism that sorta resembles a few different archetypes, and is grafted into others where it doesn't fit because there's not a better class out there in typical D&D.

Prexactly. One of the many reasons I removed it from my game. Besides being unbalanced, it has severe archtype commonality and confusion issues.