Fantasy Cliches you hate?

[thedude3445]

Fantasy racism where all members of a species have a certain personality trait because that's "just the way it is with those lizardkin" or whatever.

[oshirockingham]

Fantasy cliches I hate?
Something with a very human-like (and not surprisingly attractive) female counterpart of humanoid creatures.
An explanation with a picture:

[demthorshie]

The polarizing concepts of good and evil. I find that in a lot of fantasy stories, there's no gray area with characters. The protag is always seen as good and virtuous and they always gotta save the world, universe, yadayada from the clear cut villain character.

[KRWright]

Every single trope they used in the movie Bright.

[LostSpirit]

To be fair, the orc in this picture looks a lot more attractive than its female, green, sickly counterpart!

[DualDragons]

The trope where warrior classes are only performed by dudes and classes like healers, mages and druids are all women.

[thedude3445]

Oh, another one. I hate the "busty elf warrior woman" stereotype in fantasy, at least in promo art. Like this sort of thing:

Nothing against the artist or anything, but it's impossible to take characters who look like this seriously in my eyes. Her name is probably Talia and she probably delivers about 90% of the exposition in the book, and she also is completely asexual and combat focused except that the story constantly describes her voluptuousness and whatnot. There, I just made an entire fantasy novel for you

[Adriano]

Villains that depicted as the most powerful and end u being killed wit one shot ==

[jensrichard77]

Hello all of you Fantasy lover.
I’m writing a fantasy comic script that @nathanKmcwilliams is doing art for.
Everything is still in concept but I can tell you this:

"Chosen one" who doesn't want to be the chosen one.

The ”Chosen one” is raised to be so, and will love to become the savior. But are in trouble to stay in that charter.

The evil people are an occult/satanists.

Nope. No satanist/Christians in our upcoming comic

Cliche villains who fancy themselves as gods only to get WRECKED by the mc and company they try to fight the heroes

The main villain(s) will hardly newer even fight the MC.

Oh, not only Medieval Europe, it is Medieval Western Europe.

This story is isolated on a big island. With Nordic medieval fantasy settings

Races in the story:

We give you this in our upcoming comic:
Rabbits, Wolves, Foxes, Bears, Goblins. And Humans and Elven.

Do not get me started on a "Mary Sue" race when a race is just perfect in every way imaginable.

We do have a "Mary Sue" race, but it is kept in balance. Don't you worry.

As much as I agree human sucks, why it must be always human to be the most uncool race?

The humans are not uncool here. And they can soulbond with other races to be stronger in their magic.
All other races are in need of the humans in our upcoming comic.

Good vs Evil race.

Well. Goblins are Goblins and can be good if not controlled by a Goblin Shaman. The rest of the races have a choice, we are creating a balance.

Why being non magical always sucks

You have not met the Foxes. They are non-magical and can’t be affected. But they are not the ones that suck.
You will love them.

Where are the competent and reasonable adults?

The try. Really hard for not sending "chosen" children to war. They really do, believe me.

I died and reincarnated in another world as...

Nope. None of this in our upcoming comic.

Epic Poetry just because Tolkien did it

Nope no poetry in our upcoming comic.

I like stories that are more gray.

Got one cooking right here. We are working hard.

Let's do everything in our power to make sure that the main animal of transportation is not a horse.

Riding horses in our upcoming comic.

Pointy ears...

Sorry. The MC is a Rabbit. There will be a lot of ears showing.

I love to read fantasy but it's more rare when I can read some fantasy other medieval timeline or japan culture too XD

Well. There are Nordic inspirations in what we are creating here.

One I tire of in fantasy stories is having a riddle or rhyme for the hero to decipher and only they can;

None of this in our story.

I would like to see more heroes have better resolve and care less about virtue when it came to killing the villain.

The heroes in our upcoming comic kill naturally when fighting. Even when they try to be the good guy, killig is faster.

I dislike characters who always use magic to overcome challenges. Even more so when they're the main characters.

The MC in our upcoming comic is getting in trouble when using magic.
Magic is something you really should have big respect or fear of

Try to have more diverse species. It makes your world immediately more interesting.

Rabbits, Foxes, Wolves, and Bears coming up

Fantasy racism

Here the racism is strongest between humans and humans.
But yes, there are some classic ways we use to describe races

Something with a very human-like (and not surprisingly attractive) female counterpart of humanoid creatures.

Nope. None of them.

The polarizing concepts of good and evil. I find that in a lot of fantasy stories, there's no gray area with characters.

Lots of Gray coming up

Every single trope they used in the movie Bright.

Not going there. The Elves might be the lesser in this story,

The trope where warrior classes are only performed by dudes and classes like healers, mages and druids are all women.

I got them mixed. Don't worry.

I hate the "busty elf warrior woman" stereotype in fantasy,

Nope. The Elves here are with class.

Villains that depicted as the most powerful and end u being killed wit one shot

Got me there, sort of. But that shot comes with scarifys.

---

To summon up.
We are creating something big and unique. We are working hard to let this project become the best of it.

Soon the entire Tapas will know the story of:

Bunneh The Rabbit

More will come to September.

Yours
Jens Richard and Nathan

[jmhenry]

I'd be interested in learning about the ones you like! Go for it

[Kiweevil]

Disney villain deaths be like

[Kiweevil]

This is gonna make me seem like an asshole because I know a lot of people love this theme or write/illustrate it for themselves, but the whole "magic is forbidden" thing. Or the "war between magic users and non-magic users". Or the "these children are secretly magic but have to hide it because the rest of the world thinks it's evil."

Only exception is probably, like, Harry Potter. You go, Harry Potter.

[nathanKmcwilliams]

Hmmm. Overall, cliches don't bother me much. If I don't like something, then I don't read, watch, consume it. Easy as that.

If I had one to pick: it would be:

TRYING TO MAKE FANTASY STORIES REALISTIC.

See for me...Fantasies are escapism, and why would I want to make that escape the exact same as my own world? I wouldn't.

Honestly I don't like these kinds of threads, where everyone bags on creators that are just doing what they like. It's gatekeeping at its finest.

Hey creators? Make what you want to make, if you want to change the status quo, then do it. If you want to make cliche stuff, go for it. Create what you want.

[DualDragons]

Same, I agree with you on these kind of threads. They give me anxiety with people telling what not to do. Especially when multiple points are present in my work.

[Darlynne]

I really dislike a soft magic system that is never fully explained. I'm fine with magic in the genre, but when there are no rules and the characters can do whatever they want whenever they want with little to no consequences is just giving them a deus ex machina ending. If they can literally conjure up whatever specific thing for whatever specific situation with zero limitations then (in theory) the character will have absolutely no problems in defeating whatever force they're assigned to defeat.

On the other hand, I absolutely love hard magic systems that are very clear-cut from the beginning, and the rules are solid and never change. (Think Full Metal Alchemist or... Avatar to the extent of only being able to bend your element). I think a lot of writers avoid writing hard magic systems cause they think it limits their creative freedom and it's really difficult to set a magic system that is relatively balanced without putting too many restrictions on the characters but that's why it's so good. Restrictions might cause problems down the line, but that just makes the character even more impressive if they can figure out a way to get over that hurdle through a creative method that doesn't break the rules of the world.

[Cavechan]

Honestly I don't like these kinds of threads, where everyone bags on creators that are just doing what they like. It's gatekeeping at its finest.

Hmm... it's funny I both agree with this but I also kind of like these threads. I think it's kind of fun to be like "Shit, does that apply to my story??" And also gives me ideas for when I write a new story.

[jmhenry]

Honestly, I'd love to see some threads about tropes and storytelling we like. The internet's already full to the brim with the negative

[Cavechan]

There was one here: https://forums.tapas.io/t/lets-talk-about-cliches-you-love-to-see-use/39911/15

It didn't get as many responses though.

[jmhenry]

Well that's a shame ^^; Not too late to fix though!

[nathanKmcwilliams]

@DualDragons first...I love the title! Second, I hate to see creators that are just getting started and are proud of their work, get dumped on. I struggled for a long time getting my own series off the ground worrying if it would pass the gatekeepers or not. Eventually I just said screw it.
Creating a story is hard, I prefer it if people make what they like, instead being coerced into making what's trendy or 'modern.'

@Cavechan I don't have a huge problem with it. Unless it causes a young creator to give up, because now they've been convinced by their peers that the thing they've worked so hard on is "cliche = bad"
But I also applaud innovation too. Both are good, as long as you keep creating what you want.
I also understand the venting process too, I'm not trying to devalue the people's right to complain, but I also wanted to voice my opinion as well.

@JMHenry yep. Same, it's all too easy to get sucked into the negative mindset.