one of my biggest pet peeves in fantasy (also probably a hot take) is the presence of fantasy races and gods. my reasoning behind this is that i feel it detracts from the core of telling a story: considering the human human emotions and experiences we face every day in different lenses. im not saying a story with them cannot be effective in that regard, but there's a reason why the most popular alien races in fantasy are more outwardly human than not. it's hard to relate to a creature made out of space dust that doesn't have facial features. secondly, gods are a neat concept, but i feel the topics they usually explore can be done more effectively without uprooting a setting's background or power level. i find myself losing care for lesser conflict when a god in the setting are throwing stars at each other. it is cool, definitely, but not something that works in practical writing i think.