What tropes do you want to see more of in fantasy RPGs?

[aramis erak]

I'm quite surprised you didn't summon Snarf with such words.

I can't figure which leaves me more incredulous... Snarf as "cool" or Snarf as "Bard".... Edit: was thinking Snarf from the comic, not the user going by that handle...
Tho' my favorite expression of Barddom is the Tala role in Orkworld (by John Wick). Until the Tala tells your tale, you don't get your XP...

 

[aramis erak]

Apparent objective GOOD triumphing over apparent and objective EVIL.

GOOD guys who are GOOD guys. Villains who are BAD, knowingly EVIL, and NOT to be admired or emulated.

Protagonists who are HEROES with admirable qualities. NOT everyone being a misunderstood broody anti-hero, double-triple-quadruple crossing agents, or reformed villain with a heart of gold.

I want ETHICS to clearly mean something. MORES mean something. ALIGNMENTS mean something.

That's what I want to see.

Well, that utterly rules out Pendragon...
instead of Alignments, faiths comprised of 5 Personality Traits (out of 13 pairs). Evil is one such faith.
Most of the Good Guys have some major flaws.
Most of the villains have some good in them (ie, at least one high left-side trait)
Few are anti-heroes, and double crossers tend to wind up dead and dishonored...
One could could consider each of the thirteen Personality Trait pairs an axis of a very complicated alignment, I suppose...

 

[aramis erak]

I do not know if that is what Gygax had in mind, they are the only "bards" (=People who sing and play in battle) that existed though.
Sure there were also instances where people sang before the battle to hype themselves up and demoralize the enemy, but that stopped when the battle started unlike the D&D bard who is supposed to sing and play during battle.

Bards were a submission to the magazine before they hit the rules in AD&D.
Stategic Review 2-1 Doug Schwegman's Bard is a normal class... fights as a cleric, d6 hp/level to 10th, +1 thereafter, thieving as a thief of half (round down) his level. Cleric-like spell slots, but with magic user spells. 1st spell at 2nd level.

Very playable... but the XP table was way low for second... 1k... and wonky after... 4k, 9k, 16k, 25k, 50k, 100k, 150k, 200k, 250k, 300k, +100k/lvl... all the way to 25th...

I can't speak to motivation for the changes, but the effect of the changes was to make them almost unplayable because of so many prior levels under the Gygax version for AD&D. I recommend the SR version... it works fine if one merely corrects some XP entries that appear to me to be typos 1k becomes 2k, 9k becomes 8k, and pre-figures the chances.

 

[Azuresun]

Actually, I don't want tropes. I want things to be strange in fantasy games.

I've got bad news for you, then: The Tropeless Tale / Just For Fun - TV Tropes

 

[Bohandas]

Or at least polytheism done right.

What do you mean? Do you mean done more like real world polytheism, or done in a way that is less taxing to versimilitude and more internally consistent? Because the two are at odds with each other and I prefer the latter. I'm sick of game worlds where there's like five gods in different parts of the world who are all somehow the absolute ruler of something that's universal or that there's only one of like the sun and yet they're not aspects of each other, they don't work together, they're not rivals, they're not successors, and nor are they lying about it. Which seems to rule out every way that could conceivably happen.

 

[Ixal]

What do you mean? Do you mean done more like real world polytheism, or done in a way that is less taxing to versimilitude and more internally consistent? Because the two are at odds with each other and I prefer the latter. I'm sick of game worlds where there's like five gods who are all somehow the absolute ruler of something that's universal or that there's only one of like the sun and yet they're not aspects of each other, they don't work together, they're not rivals, and nor are they lying about it. Which seems to rule out every way that could conceivably happen.

Polytheism where people pray to all gods more on a barter basis when they need something instead of picking one god and worshipping exclusively it like in a monotheistic system.

Collections: Practical Polytheism, Part II: Practice

Part II of a series at the underpinnings of ancient polytheistic (Greek, Roman, Mesopotamian, Norse, etc) religious practice.

acoup.blog

 

[Marc_C]

Polytheism where people pray to all gods more on a barter basis when they need something instead of picking one god and worshipping exclusively it like in a monotheistic system.

Collections: Practical Polytheism, Part II: Practice

Part II of a series at the underpinnings of ancient polytheistic (Greek, Roman, Mesopotamian, Norse, etc) religious practice.

acoup.blog

That is why Christians have saints. There is a saint for just about anything you might need intercession for.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

That is why Christians have saints. There is a saint for just about anything you might need intercession for.

I think that as a lot to do with the origin of the saints, the co-opting of pagan deities but I would imagine in the polytheistic sense one would bargain with the deity directly as a power in its own right. The intercession of saints, always struck me as more like a medieval or early modern noble or royal court would work. Appeal to a sympathetic courtier to intercede with the big guy on your behalf.

 

[Bohandas]

Polytheism where people pray to all gods more on a barter basis when they need something instead of picking one god and worshipping exclusively it like in a monotheistic system.

Collections: Practical Polytheism, Part II: Practice

Part II of a series at the underpinnings of ancient polytheistic (Greek, Roman, Mesopotamian, Norse, etc) religious practice.

acoup.blog

I agree. We definitely need more of that. (although it still makes sense for Clerics to be clerics of one god in particular, as there seems to have been a good deal of that.)

That said, I'm still more worried about how Lathander, Tezca, and Ra-Horakthy can all be THE sun god in the same crystal sphere. There needs to be some kind of Interpretatio Graeca where they're all actually the same guy for that to make sense, but instead we get settings where they're explicitly different entities.

 

[Silvercat Moonpaw]

There needs to be some kind of Interpretatio Graeca where they're all actually the same guy for that to make sense, but instead we get settings where they're explicitly different entities.

Or the gods need to be made not "god of thing X everywhere" but "god of thing X in this region where they're worshiped.

Would lead to interesting implications like having a region that's perpetual night because long ago its sun god was killed, but the death not affecting the entire world.