What traditional fantasy conventions are you tired of?

[Doctor Bomb]

Class hit dice. I've never understood why every fighter gets d10 hit dice, regardless of the race, or that ever wizard has d4 hit dice, even if it's a half-orc, or dragon for that matter. I'd like to try to implement a racial hit dice system, in which all halflings get d4 hit dice, regardless of class. Of course, this creates huge balance problems that I'd have to resolve. But it would make a lot more sense to me.

I sort of cured that problem in my campaign by giving hit die modifiers to the classes instead of class hit dice. So, Adept, Wizard, Sorcerer, Psion are -4, Expert, Rogue and Bard are -2, Ranger, Druid, Cleric, Warrior, etc get no modifier, Fighters get +2, and Barbarians get +4. These modifiers go to racial hit dice, so humanoids end up with the same numbers as old skool class hit dice, but fey (d6) end up with d2's for arcane classes and d8's for fighters, and dragons end up with d8's for arcane classes and 2d8 for barbarians. It seems to be working for my group (makes those annoying pixie sorcerers instant kills if anyone can actually hit them, while dragons get EVEN MORE POWERFUL!! AH HA HA HA HA!!)

I also get annoyed by the "all elves use bows, all dwarves are good at smithing, all gnomes are clumsy inventors" stereotypes. I split the RACIAL stuff (Stat bonuses, jump bonus due to kangaroo-type legs, etc) from the CULTURAL stuff in my campaigns (bonus to hit giants, favored weapons, favored classes) and ensure my players have a reasonable background for thier character. If they all grew up together in the city, they will all have the same set of cultural skills and abilities. For humans, the racial bonus is the Feat and the first three bonus skill points, while the cultural stuff is +1 skill point per level and ANY as the favored class.

Half orcs in my campaign, as well as half-elves, are self-sustaining races which have their own cities and cultures, and not the product of rediculous interbreeding. If they were, they would be a lot more like the Dark Sun Muls, sterile and enslaved, and rare except where forcibly created. I mean, really, how often do orc hordes have to overrun the local humans to create the number of half-orcs seen in the stereotypical world? A LOT. You would think the humans, with their bonus feat and natural flexibility, would have figured out a way around all the raping and pillaging by now, or would have moved.

Other than those quirks, I kind of like infinite variety in my subraces, but I don't allow them all to co-exist in the same world. I added a dash of Spelljammer to my campaigns, so after picking the 6 or 8 "local" races/subraces, all the others are assumed to be travelers from another crystal sphere, and therefore won't be encountered as villages or random passers by, but as moderate to high level trading parties in big cities or as adventuring groups exploring the planes. All the tauric creatures in my campaign fit under this category (no player has yet seen a centaur, hybsil, or wemic) as well as six legged critters of other varieties (only one displacer beast has ever been seen, an escape from some sort of traveling gladiator troupe, but they sure do run across a lot of Girillon/Yeti/Legendary Gorilla types in those mountains...)

 

[Li Shenron]

Just wanted to pop in and say that I cannot find specific fantasy / D&D conventions that I cannot suffer anymore. But indeed I feel like I want to change some of the aspects in the next campaigns.

It would be nice to have a campaign with no demihumans, or at least different ones but no elves and dwarves and halflings. It would be nice to have a completely different take on religion. It would be nice to try out a few completely different spellcasting systems. And of course it would be nice to run a low-magic-item campaign, which it's been taking month to me to think about

But I would like to just change one or two aspects at a time, and then in the next setting go back to the originals and change some other convention as well, so that there are still most of the cliches which make D&D familiar to me

 

[Ycore Rixle]

The problem there, Ycore, with humans and near-humans, is that it's hard to escape bias.

If by bias you mean a tendency to end up with men in some roles and women in other roles, then that is my point. I want that bias. Appropriate sexism is fun! Same way D&D is full of racism that adds to the fun of the game (elves get -2 Con, half-orcs get -2 Int and Cha).

Now, before everyone torches me like a spider web, let me point out that this doesn't prevent individual warrior women, smart half-orcs, etc. I used to hate the old D&D racism that said "all orcs are evil" because orcs are intelligent creatures, and they can make their own choices and be evil or good according to those choices. Individual exceptions to statistics always exist.

You also have the fact that there are -real, living- human cultures where the males and females have opposite roles when compared to typical Western Society. Women are, in fact, the burly warriors of the tribe, while men stay home and gab and gossip and gather roots and such.

I don't really have time to go through all of this right now, but a) this is a myth (counter-examples? of living cultures where the women are burly and warriors while the men do as you described?) and b) you are setting up a false dichotomy to demean the role of women in traditional Western society - it is your assertion, not mine, that if you are not out fighting then you are staying at home to gab, gossip, and gather roots, in that order. This part of the post is off-topic, however, so let's stick to whether or not women in D&D should have, say, a -2 to Strength.

 

[Sir Elton]

Errr... what was that again?

It's extremely simple. D&D is rooted in pulp sword and sorcery more than in LotR. However, there is nothing in the game that can help maintain such a flavor. The Economics of D&D are out of balance. Certain fights are unwinnable if you don't have certain magic, and adventurers collect too much money to continue adventuring by level 5.

D&D isn't Sword and Sorcery, it is its own genre of fantasy fiction when you compare it to T.V. shows that were spawned from it. Lodoss War, Slayers, Those Who Hunt Elves (that's not a bad campaign idea, actually!).

 

[Desdichado]

It's extremely simple. D&D is rooted in pulp sword and sorcery more than in LotR. However, there is nothing in the game that can help maintain such a flavor. The Economics of D&D are out of balance. Certain fights are unwinnable if you don't have certain magic, and adventurers collect too much money to continue adventuring by level 5.

Well, that might be too strict a definition of S&S, and I'm not sure I'd agree with you that D&D is firmly rooted in S&S; it's certainly one of the "Three Pillars of D&D" (I'd say the other two being Tolkien and mythology, but all three seem to be equally formative).

D&D isn't Sword and Sorcery, it is its own genre of fantasy fiction when you compare it to T.V. shows that were spawned from it.

Yep, I'd agree with that.

 

[Sir Elton]

Yep, I'd agree with that.

Whew!

 

[Sejs]

This part of the post is off-topic, however, so let's stick to whether or not women in D&D should have, say, a -2 to Strength.

And what, pray tell, do they get in exchange for said penalty?

 

[Hjorimir]

I was going to write this big post on how I’ve made all of these wonderful changes* for my equally wonderful campaign (see storyhour in my signature that will be updated soon…I hope), but this thread got me thinking on a different level.

How do you separate the campaign from the game? What makes it D&D? Is keeping it D&D important? My feeling is no, it isn’t important to preserve the feel of D&D (though I love the game). I’ve made a commitment to myself as I further design and polish my campaign that D&D (and d20 in general) only serves as a medium to resolve conflicts and form a basis of rules, but to not become limited in scope or application by what is (and is not) presented within the books.

A good friend of mine once said, “A D&D campaign is defined as much by what it excludes as much as it is by what it includes.” I don’t think I could have said it any better than that.

As DMs make changes in their games – be it by inclusion or exclusion or creation – the campaign setting starts to take on a life of its own. I will be watching this thread very closely and try to determine what the changes you all are making has on the feel of the game overall and if it translates well enough to bolster a campaign’s verisimilitude.

Great post, Joshua.



*Changed: Alignment, Classes (Bard, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, and Wizard), Cleric Spellcasting, Cosmology, Critical Wounds, Death, Elves, Experience Awards, Fire (yes, fire), Languages, Magic Item Creation, Magic Items, Monsters (too many to list), Player Race Availability, Religion, Skills (Knowledge and Social), Spells, Turning Undead, and Undead Abilities.

 

[Desdichado]

Whew!

I know you were holding your breath there, waiting for that...

 

[Galethorn]

And what, pray tell, do they get in exchange for said penalty?

Breasts...?

No! Wait; I was kidding! Ow! Stop pummeling me!


All jokes aside, I think that's just the problem; nobody can agree on what to trade for the various penalties which it would take to make the gender differences 'realistic'. Now, on the other hand, you could just leave female stats alone, and give male characters an optional bonus to strength for a penalty to wisdom. But, then again, I took the wis-penalty, so what would I know?