A Friday not-a-poll: fat fantasy

Tell me, o my beloved LJ readers, what sort of things do you love about "traditional" fantasy novels. What do you hate? What would you really really love to read about?

My personal hate-on is for bildungsromans. There are always exceptions, of course, but in general following a plucky young protagonist as they crawl through a horrid childhood into a training montage just does not rev my engine. On the other hand, I'm a total sucker for "getting the band back together" stories. I still have a soft spot for Dragonlance, of all things, for starting with the seasoned band of adventurers meeting again and seeing how everyone had changed.