Deities and wishes?

[sambouchah]

Can a deity grant levels with a wish/wish-like spell? One of the players in our group insists you can but I am not so sure. I would check deities and demigods if I wasn't distracted by this damnable astral construct

[Nettlekid]

I would think a Deity could do whatever it wanted. Wish can't make a character gain a level, but there are some Artifacts that grant players XP to like half or just up to their next level, so presumably a deity strong enough to create an artifact like that could just bestow that power on a PC. Why it would, though, is another matter.

[Urpriest]

Alter Reality (the Salient Divine Ability) itself won't work, as it specifies all of its capabilities. Wish and Miracle are intentionally left open to pretty much anything, though going beyond the explicitly listed abilities of either spell risks DM interpretation. Anyway, the characters are unlikely to know what levels are, and wouldn't be asking for them in the first place.

[fryplink]

Alter Reality (the Salient Divine Ability) itself won't work, as it specifies all of its capabilities. Wish and Miracle are intentionally left open to pretty much anything, though going beyond the explicitly listed abilities of either spell risks DM interpretation. Anyway, the characters are unlikely to know what levels are, and wouldn't be asking for them in the first place.

But they could ask for more power or to be a better X than they were before. Fantasy literature is rife with people being made smarter by the gods or their ilk. I think that is the plot of the earliest Faust stories, the devil gives Faust knowledge of all in exchange for his soul (and is sometimes ripped to shreds moments after the contract is completed).

So I guess the question is, can deities give players experience points ("knowledge" in their profession)? This doesn't help, beyond giving players a reason to be asking for something like this.

[tyckspoon]

Deities do not have any special options for their spells that a mortal caster would not have (subject to the deities available metamagics and/or Salient Divine Abilities, of course.) Wish cannot transfer XP into somebody, and it certainly cannot outright grant a level, at least not within the bounds of the regular safe options. The 'greater power' clause can potentially do whatever the DM allows it to do, and it wouldn't be too hard to figure out a mechanism for XP transferrals based on what happens when you use Wish to do other things that cost XP.. but you'd have to be careful once you established that that can happen, because XP-free Wishes would get even sillier than they already are.

[Urpriest]

But they could ask for more power or to be a better X than they were before. Fantasy literature is rife with people being made smarter by the gods or their ilk. I think that is the plot of the earliest Faust stories, the devil gives Faust knowledge of all in exchange for his soul (and is sometimes ripped to shreds moments after the contract is completed).

So I guess the question is, can deities give players experience points ("knowledge" in their profession)? This doesn't help, beyond giving players a reason to be asking for something like this.

You can gain power, sure. But then the DM decides what that means in that context, and most likely decides it means something that requires less bookkeeping: an inherent bonus to an ability score, spells known, or the like.

[ArcturusV]

Course there is the other, really horrible idea you could use. Have the God pop out a Deck of Many Things. I know at least one of the cards is "Instantly Gain a Level". Then see how lucky your players are feeling.