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FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so


PhilFleischmann

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Here's the thread I've been threatening. Feel free to add more:

 

1) The idea that everyone is one of the four basic "classes": Fighter, Thief, Cleric, Wizard. Sure, there are Rangers and Barbarians, but those are just variants of fighters. Sure, there are Druid, but those are just clerics. etc.

 

2) The assumption that there's a neat dividing line between "divine" magic and "arcane" magic.

 

3) The perfect compartmentalization of the gods, and the perfect information about them: They're all completely statted out like PCs and they all have specific and fixed attributes. They each have one name, one specific symbol (usually detailed to a ridiculous degree), a favorite weapon that they want you to use, specific "domains" of spells that they grant to their clerics, etc.

 

4) The extreme proliferation of races and sub-races. That every race needs a "half-demon" version. That any two races can mate and produce a viable offspring, which then needs a whole new race package (the Star Trek School of Reproductive Biology). Seriously, how many half-elves should there actually be? A whole "race" worth?

 

5) The idea that each race has their own gods. There's a "god of elves" and a "god of dwarves," but never a "god of humans."

 

6) That certain abilities must be prerequisites for other abilities which are not necessarily directly related.

 

7) The assumption that large amounts of metal disrupts certain types of magic.

 

8) That magic always comes in individual, discrete spells. And there's a specific number of them, and each one is precisely defined.

 

9) That the function of a wizard is to be a walking artillary platform.

 

10) The assumption that the game needs thousands of different monsters to remain interesting. And in case that's not enough, there's dozens, if not hundreds, or "templates" that can be applied to monsters to create new variants. "An abyssal, undead, aquatic, blue-dragon-blooded, greater fire giant with 6 levels of Totemist? Didn't we already fight one of those?"

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

From Lord Ghee:

 

11) You missed the the Stuff. All the stuff you find wands, potient, rings, swords, rugs and stuff. All the stuff.

 

The idea that there's magic stuff lying around all over the place. You can buy magic items at a dozen different shops in town. None of this "one ring" stuff. Magic rings are a dime a dozen.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

14) That a person's moral and ethical belief system can be fully codified into a two-word "alignment". That these alignments have specific languages associated with them. That they are fixed and extremely important to a character, regardless of what kind of character he is. That each god or each religion has only one core alignment associated with it. That there can't be multiple interpretations of a particular god's commands or a regilion's teachings that would allow an adherent to arrive at any of several possible alignments. That alignment is even of any particular importance to every single god.

 

15) That good and evil are just game-mechanical choices with no real consequence. They determine how you "detect" to certain spells, and which magic items you can use. But being a hero or a villain doesn't really matter much.

 

16) That "law" and "chaos" are parts of ones "alignment" of equal importance to good and evil.

 

17) That there is a hard-coded link between your "alignment" and your skill set. Monks are all lawful. Barbarians are non-lawful. etc.

 

Pretty much anything to do with alignment.

 

A long time ago, someone taught me the word "blik". I have no idea where that word comes from. It means a non-rationally held idea that is absolutely fixed in ones mind and is just assumed to automatically be true because one has never bothered to question it. I was thinking about calling this thread "D&D Bliks", but I don't think it's a standard term known by anyone other than the guy I first heard it from.

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Not to defend D&D or anything, but...

 

14) That a person's moral and ethical belief system can be fully codified into a two-word "alignment". That these alignments have specific languages associated with them. That they are fixed and extremely important to a character' date=' regardless of what kind of character he is. That each god or each religion has only one core alignment associated with it. That there can't be multiple interpretations of a particular god's commands or a regilion's teachings that would allow an adherent to arrive at any of several possible alignments. That alignment is even of any particular importance to every single god.[/quote']

 

In 3.0, they stated that a god's followers can be "one step removed" from the god. So a lawful good god can have lawful neutral and neutral good clerics. It's only a small improvement, but still a step in the right direction, IMHO. :)

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

18) Random groups of unrelated monsters will congregate in dungeons. These groups will have no ecological reason for existing in close proximity.

 

19) The dungeons these monsters dwell in will have been constructed for no conceivable purpose ... except to house said monsters.

 

20) These monsters will collect treasure, even though the treasure does not serve any survival mechanism for said monsters. In fact, the only function the treasure serves is to attract adventurers to kill the aforementioned monsters.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

21) That priests will serve one particular god of their religion's pantheon, and may actually be hostile to the servants of a god of the same pantheon. Although there have been historical cults whose clergy have been devoted to one deity, e.g. the "virgins" dedicated to the Roman goddess Vesta, normally priests will venerate and propitiate all the gods their faith recognizes, at least on the appropriate occasions.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

That portraying a character in a pre-industrialized primitive setting is fun escapism allowing one to vicariously experience the adventures of hyper-competent heroes (or villains as you prefer) rather than the dreary, short, and oftentimes brutal existence our own history suggests life at such a time would really be like.

 

 

Oh...wait....

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

Word ones:

 

22) Various words for "classes" which bear little or no relation to their actual meaning:

- a "druid" is a "nature priest"

- a "monk" is a martial artist with mystical powers and need have nothing to do with a religious monastic order.

- a "paladin" is a "religious warrior"

- a "bard" is a guy who casts spells using music.

- a "factotum" is a solo adventurer who can use magic and lots of other skills from other classes.

Not to mention all the other new classes where they just co-opt a verb or adjective as the name of the class: lurk, ardent, erudite, incarnate, etc.

 

23) a) That an "orc" is distinct from a "goblin" even though the former is Tolkein's elvish word for the latter.

B) That a "kobold" is distinct from a "goblin" even though the former is simply the German word for the latter.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

25) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set of, say, banded mail or scale mail, to make it equal to, or even not quite equal to, a set of plate mail that he could have easily acquired for much less trouble and expense.

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary points out that we can come up with these all day if we want to.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

26) b That only certain "classes" are allowed to utilize certain armor.

 

27) That even the most noble and honorable people can acceptably make a living by "mugging ugly people and taking their stuff."

 

28) That killing things for money is the basis of a world's economy.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

As the palindromedary said, we can do this all day.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

I just want to say "Thanks." I am working on a new game and many of your points are why I am doing it in Hero but to see it written out gives me a nice list to keep on the side as reference as to why I want to get away from others games and do Fantasy Hero. What a great help this is. Again Thanks!

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

25) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time' date=' treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set of, say, banded mail or scale mail, to make it equal to, or even not quite equal to, a set of plate mail that he could have easily acquired for much less trouble and expense.[/quote']

 

Following up on this:

 

29) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set armor or a sword that he, himself, will never be able to use.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

24) Dragons are colour-coded for your convinience

24) B) And many other types of monsters are as well. Nice of the monsters to sort themselves into discrete types, isn't it?

 

29) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time' date=' treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set armor or a sword that he, himself, will never be able to use.[/quote']

And 30) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, to study magic so he could learn to cast spells that accomplish the same thing as mundane items and methods. How many D&D spells are there that can be replaced by a sword, crossbow, a suit of armor, a horse, a catapult, etc.?

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

31) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting an item that has no purpose but to screw over anyone who might come across it.

 

Cursed items in D&D make little sense, especially when you consider someone would have had to have made the darn thing.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

25) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set of, say, banded mail or scale mail, to make it equal to, or even not quite equal to, a set of plate mail that he could have easily acquired for much less trouble and expense.

 

25a) And can't even use himself, to boot!

 

Edit: Didn't read the rest of the thread before posting. Oh well. :D

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

And 30) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time' date=' treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, to study magic so he could learn to cast spells that accomplish the same thing as mundane items and methods. How many D&D spells are there that can be replaced by a sword, crossbow, a suit of armor, a horse, a catapult, etc.?[/quote']

 

Well, to be honest, a spell that replicates a catapult has the advantage that you don't need to lug a catapult around with you. You don't need to maintain the suit of armour, or wear the bulky, uncomfortable thing. And if you can go from wearing no armour to armoured up much faster with a spell.

 

Of course, you can wear your armour more than once a day :)

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

26) That the same spell when cast by different classes will not be of the same spell level. :confused:

27) Certain races cannot understand magic spells as a wizard, but they can use clerical magic.:eek:

28) A diety will almost always notice if their name is said in disrespect, but fail to hear when called upon for help in a dire emergency.:help:

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

Following up on this:

 

29) That a wizard would spend an insane amount of time, treasure, and irreplaceable magical resources, enchanting a set armor or a sword that he, himself, will never be able to use.

 

Which edition is this referring to? Crafting magical weapons and armor is really not all that difficult in 3e.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

31)

Cursed items in D&D make little sense, especially when you consider someone would have had to have made the darn thing.

 

Before I started my campaign, I worked out the mechanism that caused otherwise perfectly normal magic items to decay into either sentient and/or cursed items based on the fluctuations of the local mana and poor magical maintenance or neglect.

 

With the idea being, that no one would willing make a cursed item. And if a wizard makes an item was too complex, it might up and demand voting rights.

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Re: FRPG Ideas from D&D that ain't necessarily so

 

32) That magic can only be done by a select few who either spend years doing research or grovel at the feet of a god or goddess.

 

33) That magic is a simple act of memorizing or being granted a spell which when cast either works 100% perfectly or fails producing nothing.

 

34) That you can't do something until you reach a certain "level". Upon reaching that "level", you gain a complete understanding exactly equal to anyone else of that "level". (No mage left behind.)

 

35) All mages must keep spellbooks. Mage rarely share spells, and if they do, they fact that another mage is willing to teach a spell never makes it easier for the original mage to learn it.

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