Feels, Not Reals: What "feels like D&D" to you?

[Libertad]

Alright, so during 5th Edition's playtest Mearls and the developers put a large emphasis on getting the "feels like D&D" right. Although the game seems to have its good and bad points, it can replicate traditional dungeon-crawling relatively well.

But getting the feel of an RPG right is subjective, and given the 40 something years of iterations Dungeons & Dragons went through, you have entire player bases who grew up with what as well might be entirely different games.

So I posit to you folks, what feels like D&D to you? It doesn't have to anything concrete; it can be specific rules, themes, settings, characters, races, etc, whose inclusion is an important part of of the RPG.

What feels like D&D to me:

Race, Class, and Vancian Spells: Such archtypes are huge factors in character generation. They're so omnipresent that I can guarantee to find them in just about any sourcebook or Edition.

Dungeon Delves: Call them ruins, call them Underdark caves, call them them fortresses of evil. Making your way through an enclosed hostile space full of adversaries and treasure is a big part of the game.

Big Worlds: Many campaign settings are highly detailed, full of all sorts of places to explore. While games set around a small locale can be done (Ptolus), I've come to expect most D&D games to have big wide worlds for your PCs to stomp around in and get into trouble.

Cosmic Forces: Gods, religion, and the planes have a more direct affair in the worlds of D&D than most other fantasy settings. Evil as a tangible force which corrupts, deities who choose mortal vessels to channel their powers, and obvious marks of the otherworldly permeate throughout.

Adventure Paths and Sandboxes: There's a lot of adventures for many different games out there, but these two styles were popularized by Dungeons & Dragons and continue to be common trends. The adventure path is a linked series of adventures which often take PCs from "zero to hero" status, starting out as humble folk who become legends in their own right. Sandboxes are non-linear adventures akin to D&D Elder Scrolls; sure there's an overarching plot, but you have a whole world to explore full of dungeons, locations, and side quests unrelated to the main plot.

[Garryl]

There's more to spellcasting than magic missile and fireball. For all of the blasty spells, there are buffing and debuffing ones, subtle illusions and mind control, and plain old combat-useless utility spells. For every lightning bolt, you've got a haste, a major image, a hold person, an animate dead, a fly, a continual light, a Leomund's secure shelter, and so forth. Even if half of them never get used and another quarter only come up in one out of three campaigns, the mere fact that they exist, that there's more to being a wizard than acting like a glorified artillery platform and that you can use your magic to its fullest extent even without getting into a single fight in your life, lets magic be a full part of a living world instead of a combat resolution mechanic for random encounters.

[Unbeliever]

These are the ones that spring to mind to me. 

Races and Classes as the backbone of character creation.  Basically, it's a menu and archetype oriented character generation system. 

Fiddly bits in the rules.  D&D rejects a purely effects-based approach, opting for more unique sub-systems.  This kind of plays into what Garryl says, above, in that it contributes to having a series of wacky spells. 

Emphasis on progression.  D&D is defined by its leveling up and other forms of progression, starting at relatively low level and developing more abilities and powers as the game progresses.

Loot.  While not a necessity as far as a focus goes, games and settings where loot isn't a "big deal" are departures from the core notion. 

[bhu]

People making foolish and self destructive life choices that inevitably bite them in the ass.

[LordBlades]

If I had to narrow it down to the basics:

Race, Class and Level Progression: I find these are core concepts of D&D, and part of what makes me feel that I'm playing D&D

High-fantasy setting: for me, D&D has always been about high-fantasy, where dragons flying overhead isn't exactly unusual, nobody bats an eyelash at a traveling wizard and magic items are pretty common. something like Lord of the Rings for example (where magic is something rare and often subtle) just wouldn't feel 'like D&D' to me.

If it's in the world, you can have it (aka Freedom): I know this is a 3.5 thing, but having started with 3.5 and having played it so extensively it's become core to the D&D experience to me (subjectively I have a much easier time to accept arbitrary restrictions in systems that are NOT called D&D). I like a world where you have the possibility to play/own largely anything you could come across in the world, or a good motivation (more than 'this is NPC only') why you can't. In 3.5 you can bring to life pretty much any kind of character you could think of (from dragons to blind limp monks hitting people over the head with chair legs). It could suck, or it could break the world in half or anything in between, but if you want to, you can do it.

[kitep]

This conversation seemed so familiar that it wasn't until today that I realized it wasn't thread necromancy.  Thus, I refer you to What Ten Things?

[Unbeliever]

If it's in the world, you can have it (aka Freedom): I know this is a 3.5 thing, but having started with 3.5 and having played it so extensively it's become core to the D&D experience to me (subjectively I have a much easier time to accept arbitrary restrictions in systems that are NOT called D&D). I like a world where you have the possibility to play/own largely anything you could come across in the world, or a good motivation (more than 'this is NPC only') why you can't. In 3.5 you can bring to life pretty much any kind of character you could think of (from dragons to blind limp monks hitting people over the head with chair legs). It could suck, or it could break the world in half or anything in between, but if you want to, you can do it.

I had to do a spittake when I read this.  D&D in a lot of ways was defined for me by the opposite.  Which may, interestingly, be entirely a factor of what edition we got on board with it on.  If that's true, I feel like that's one of the nicest things someone has said about 3.5 D&D in a long time.

DM:  Did you hear of this cool thing called the Magister?  It's in this shiny new AD&D book I bought.
Player:  Rad, how does my character become one?  Do I have to outmagic the old one in a cool wizard duel?
DM:  [flips through book] you don't ...

Rinse and repeat.  I also find D&D pretty restrictive in concepts it can bring to life.  Fencing types, in particular, is something it's always seemed to struggle with.  Not that we can't do it, I've done it a dozen times and I'm sure the second any of you read the previous sentence numerous ideas will occur to you.  It's just the level of op-fu required (and this board has a very high baseline for op-fu mastery) is frustratingly high.

[Samwise]

Dice: Gotta have me some funky dice.

Hack AND Slash: I murderhobo, therefore I role-play.

Mountain of Skulls: Because you cannot murderhobo if you don't pile them up higher than the other players.

Dinosaur Choking Loot: Because you can't carry around a mountain of skulls to show off your leet murderhobo skillz.

Fantasy Tropes: Because an ordinary murderhobo is just a boring murderhobo, but a murderhobo on a dragon with a sword and spells is kewl.

Male Bonding Rituals: Because ALL of the time your mountain of skulls, dragon, sword, and spells are not just a mountain of swords, dragon, sword, and spells.

[The_Laughing_Man]

Social interactions with possibility to fail horribly or succeed stellarly.

Varying environment, such as toxic dungeons, inside a magma-spewing volcano, swimming in phlogiston, fighting horrors in Far Realms, city worlds.

Fear of TPK and just barely making it.

Same set of rules for both players and DM. Consistent rules, preferrably RAW. Banning or house ruling as little as possible.

Newer-ending rules debates, on a second thought, maybe no. 

[awaken_D_M_golem]

The core Tolkien-ish stuff "feels" more like
d&d to me, than the Fiend Folio stuff.
But long enough time to have adapted ... 

Psionics, regardless of it's constant mess,
has felt like part of the game ... perhaps
because the fluff captured my attention.
I understand I'm in the minority on this.

The Planes Of Existance and Planescape
were just incredible to my (so) younger self.
imho a critical part of the game.

People making foolish and self destructive life choices that inevitably bite them in the ass.

  uhh  hey that's a little too real life-y for some.

[Nanshork]

- Fantasy Setting

- Lots of character options (races/classes/options when you level/etc)

- Class and level based system that uses all the dice

- Loot