Opinions on deity-less Clerics? [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 02:17 PM

Oftentimes it depends. I don't run established settings... at all really. So I build them from scratch. And as such I try to find things where, yes, certain concepts might be alignment locked and limit your ability to find a god, but also create "outs" that would make sense to players. Like... an area where the "Old Ways" or the "Fallen Ones" worship animist style, revering spirits of nature and objects rather than the gods that all the "proper" people do. Or having a druidic based culture where those who don't live up to druid ideals can still dedicate themselves to nature and worship, but end up as Clerics of Lawful Good/Lawful Evil/Chaotic Good/Chaotic Evil instead.

And then I let them be a cause knowing and telling them that I expect their backstory to reflect on one of these cultures in some way.

I try to make sure whatever they DO worship, that it makes sense in context. I know some real life gods get pretty odd. "I am the god of Lightning, Earthquakes, and Oak trees!", as a mix. But if you're dedicated to ideals I expect a tightening of focus. It's usually how I limit it as I find players just interested in the perks (And who usually make crappy clerics RP wise because they're not into being a cleric outside of the powers), can't really tell me a decent hook or story about why they have what they have and what it means and where it comes from.

Which means as a DM that they are giving me nothing to use narrative wise. Which means their character is less interesting, less likely to get attention from me. Which they don't want anyway.

NeoPhoenix0

2013-09-09, 02:25 PM

I tend to feel a little bad when I make deity-less domain combinations, but being deity-less does have it's disadvantages like Curmudgeon pointed out.

I like Firechanter's suggestion. When doing this the deity should have domain combinations that make sense and an appropriate alignment. The DM should have the final say on any of this of course.

tadkins

2013-09-09, 02:34 PM

Firechanter

2013-09-09, 02:35 PM

JaronK

2013-09-09, 02:36 PM

Honestly, it's so minor as to not matter. As a DM, I'd happily let players mix and match domains if it actually fit a character concept well enough, and losing War Domain's proficiency doesn't matter since they could just as easily take Metal Domain (the same as War, but you pick any hammer... I recommend the Lucerne Hammer).

So... I don't think it matters.

JaronK

Yuki Akuma

2013-09-09, 02:37 PM

Would you guys say the drawbacks to not having a deity match well with the advantages? I think if it ever came down to it I would use that as part of my argument in favor of deity-challenged characters.

Those 'drawbacks' are just Curmudgeon being Curmudgeon. I cannot think of any DM I've met who would enforce those.

Chronos

2013-09-09, 02:41 PM

Were I DMing, I would allow it so long as the choice of domains makes some sort of coherent sense. Planning and Undeath is probably out, except for some very specific character personalities, but something like Strength and Pride (what I'm currently using for a clerzilla) seems perfectly plausible.

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 02:42 PM

Most DMs take a more logical step. Note how spells like... Spiritual weapon comes to mind... usually channels your deity's weapon into a form. But if you have none picks a generic alignment weapon instead. Think like it's Longsword for Lawful, flail for evil, etc. So your War bonus could be that generic alignment weapon.

Otherwise it's not really going to come up. Most spells like Lesser Aspect of the Deity don't actually have anything to really do with your Deity except "You look like them" in the flavoring description of the spell. If you worshiped a concept like.... the spirit of the mountain upon whom my people live... that might just mean that you take a rocky appearance, maybe with some glowing red lava eyes hinting at the volcanic nature of your home mountain.

Crake

2013-09-09, 02:43 PM

my friend is of the opinion that this is a cop-out.

Isn't, as you described it, picking that option for gameplay purposes entirely pretty much the definition of a cop-out? Forcing the fluff for the mechanics?

NeoPhoenix0

2013-09-09, 02:44 PM

When I DM, deity-less clerics suffer some drawbacks. One such drawback is When a deity-less cleric casts Miracle, he will not be granted any miracle that requires you to spend XP.

Doesn't come up really.

Tengu_temp

2013-09-09, 02:45 PM

tadkins

2013-09-09, 02:45 PM

Well it also depends on the played setting. If I remember correctly, a Forgotten Realms character without a patron deity can not be ressed if she dies. So that would be a _huge_ drawback, making the whole deal not worthwhile imho.

This is true. Already decided that in this instance, where the choice of a deity is nigh-unavoidable, the character would be a neutral cleric of Auril for the Cold domain, and I'd just suck up the loss of the other domain I'd want (Fate). Would also have to give up my preferred alignment (LG), but what can ya do?

aeauseth

2013-09-09, 02:47 PM

With no deity some of the flavor is lost. Spells like commune (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commune.htm), consecrate (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/consecrate.htm), miracle (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/miracle.htm), etc have interactions with your deity. There is also the war domain and your deity's favored weapon.

If you run a hack and slash campaign, you can probably overlook the whole deity requirement. If your heavy role play then I'd probably allow a deity-less cleric, but ban their use of any spell or ability that references their deity, since they don't have one.

tadkins

2013-09-09, 02:48 PM

Isn't, as you described it, picking that option for gameplay purposes entirely pretty much the definition of a cop-out? Forcing the fluff for the mechanics?

Gameplay mechanics in that there are no current "legal" deities that possess the domain and alignment combination for a character a person might want.

I suppose it would seem as a cop-out to some, yeah.

turbo164

2013-09-09, 02:52 PM

As a DM I'm totally fine with it, and as a player I have made several diety-less Clerics.

While it's ok to be devoted to "The forces of Good!" or whatnot, it can be fun to create something believable for your combo.

Undeath + Planning? "The Waking Sleep"
Time + Travel? "The Great Journey"
Law + Fire? "The Purging Flames"

Regardless, it still offers opportunities for roleplaying. As a cleric of Pelor, there are certain expectations, but you can also walk into most cities, donate to your temple, and ask for guidance/blessing. As a Neutral Good cleric of Knowledge and Plants who appreciates the work Pelor/Elhanna/etc do but not enough to devote your life to their names in particular...discussions at temples tend to be a bit more lively.

The DM has a bit more leeway in deciding how helpful various priests will be (without resorting to "the archbishop just doesn't like you", which can be fine in moderation), and any time you try to invoke a higher power through divination or Miracles, exactly WHICH "force of good" answers you could lead to some interesting story developments; "Wait, I pray for help against this evil lich living in the woods, and Garl Glittergold is the one that answers? Did the lich enslave a gnome village or something? Is this thanks for that gnome merchant I saved earlier? Or is this attempting to recruit me to rescue a gnome kingdom in the future?"

There's also the story potential of the fact that your character might still be "shopping around"; after 40 years (and 12 levels) of performing generic Lawful Neutral acts with Law and Travel, he might finally decide that Wee Jas matches his sense of Law better than Heironeous or Saint Cuthbert or whatnot (even though all 3 have Law but none have Travel). It's less jarring than switching from one diety to another, but can still have far-reaching implications (especially depending on what deeds you've already accomplished before the choice!)

The vast majority of my players still hand me sheets with Core dieties listed, but any time someone wants something a little more flexible I actually rather enjoy the opportunity :smallsmile:

Gwendol

2013-09-09, 02:57 PM

I would.

I don't think the deity-less cleric is a cop-out necessarily, it depends on how the said cleric is being played wrt ideals and domains.

Example: I play a dwarven Kaxanar with the domains War and Good. Naturally I praise the Luckmaiden a lot, adhere to the ceremonies, etc. I also love a good fight, and advocate violent solutions to problems, preaching the necessity of war to prevail over evil. However, I can also be merciful to the repentent, protect the helpless and even to those I've bested in combat, should they ask for it.

Take away the references to Haela, but keep the rest and you have a dwarven cleric worshiping the ideals of war and good.

tadkins

2013-09-09, 02:59 PM

@turbo164

I think I'd love to play in one of your games. :)

Telonius

2013-09-09, 03:02 PM

Away from my books at the moment, but weren't there rules about worshiping an entire pantheon of deities (rather than a specific deity)?

tadkins

2013-09-09, 03:03 PM

Away from my books at the moment, but weren't there rules about worshiping an entire pantheon of deities (rather than a specific deity)?

Could be wrong but I think that only applies to certain pantheons (the Olympian pantheon, Egyptian pantheon, Norse pantheon, etc).

Gwendol

2013-09-09, 03:08 PM

Don't the dwarves tend to worship the Moradinsamman?

tadkins

2013-09-09, 03:19 PM

Don't the dwarves tend to worship the Moradinsamman?

I'm not sure, but I doubt it. Given what I know of dwarves, I don't think a good dwarf would want to honor Laduguer, for instance.

But again I could be wrong.

Edit: I also double-checked, none of the dwarven deities have the Cold domain! :(

Venusaur

2013-09-09, 03:23 PM

Well, the Spell Compendium outright says you can assign the domains to existing gods, or leave them open for generalist clerics. If you ban generalists, I could see a cleric of Vecna using both the domains.

Curmudgeon

2013-09-09, 03:39 PM

Well, the Spell Compendium outright says you can assign the domains to existing gods, or leave them open for generalist clerics.
Where exactly does it say this?

Firechanter

2013-09-09, 03:41 PM

Where exactly does it say this?

Page 3. ...............

Honest Tiefling

2013-09-09, 03:43 PM

Depends on setting and the character. If the setting allows it and the character has a solid concept and is interesting to RP with, why the heck not? I would find the character in the OP to be more then acceptable and quite interesting. Particularly so as it seems to work with the dwarven fluff.

But as previous people have posted, it sorta bugs me when people try this in a setting where they know that it doesn't fly, through that is not so much an issue with godless clerics as an issue with play style.

I also tend to be a bit annoyed when the fluff I want is met with subpar mechanics. So I would not terribly care if a cleric got better access to Domains that matched the deity and their RP and they didn't outshine everyone in combat if the houserule is used fairly.

Gwendol

2013-09-09, 03:46 PM

I'm not sure, but I doubt it. Given what I know of dwarves, I don't think a good dwarf would want to honor Laduguer, for instance.

But again I could be wrong.

Edit: I also double-checked, none of the dwarven deities have the Cold domain! :(

Does Laduguer belong to the Moradinsamman?

Emperor Tippy

2013-09-09, 03:48 PM

tadkins

2013-09-09, 03:51 PM

Does Laduguer belong to the Moradinsamman?

This I'm not sure of, but isn't the Moradinsamman the collection of all the dwarven deities? Their pantheon, if you will.

tadkins

2013-09-09, 03:55 PM

supervillan

2013-09-09, 04:03 PM

Unless a setting specifically allows deity-less clerics and mentions that they exist, I am not okay with them. Cleric is one of the classes where the fluff is at least partially non-mutable: a cleric is the holy servant of a deity who receives power from that deity. Clerics who worship an ideal strike me as mostly an attempt at powergaming: the player wants the raw power of the cleric class, but also wants to avoid the responsibilities that come with it, or wants this very specific set of domain powers that no viable god provides.

This. I do not allow deity-less clerics in my own (homebrew) campaign, for the reasons Tengu_temp mentions. It doesn't make any sense in game. The gods are a real force in the campaign world, and in the multiverse. The very idea of a cleric of "a cause" that somehow has just as much "divine" power as the gods' own select servants doesn't feel right. How do they obtain and receive the same power that the gods grant, yet without a patron? Who trains them? How do they not get utterly extinguished by agents of actual gods just for daring to utilise divine magic without making obeisance to the gods?

I also require Clerics to have the exact same alignment as their god because they are supposed to be an example to and a leader of the god's worshippers, and therefore should fully represent everything the god stands for if they want the god's power and support.

Clerics and divine magic are a major force in the game world. I don't want this undermined by characters with all the power and none of the commitment or responsibility of belonging to a faith and a church/temple.

Thiyr

2013-09-09, 04:05 PM

Honestly, I've got no issues with the idea of a cleric-of-an-ideal. In part because more often than not i see divine magic as another flavor of magic rather than the magic of the gods. Like arcane, but different. Spells like commune aren't contacting your god, as you have none. They're contacting greater beings who are representative of your ideal. Something like miracle acts like wish. Wherever you're getting your power from is blowing a giant pile of major power in your direction. I tend to not play clerics myself, though.

That said, I'm also a fan of the idea of "gods ARE ideals" in the first place. There is no god of death, there is Death. Talking to Death wouldn't make sense as death isn't something which talks. Major concepts like that, or like the alignment extremes (LN, NG, NE, CN, TN) are good choices. Created by the overwhelming mass of consciousness of these concepts, all that fun jazz

EDIT:

This. I do not allow deity-less clerics in my own (homebrew) campaign, for the reasons Tengu_temp mentions. It doesn't make any sense in game. The gods are a real force in the campaign world, and in the multiverse. The very idea of a cleric of "a cause" that somehow has just as much "divine" power as the gods' own select servants doesn't feel right. How do they obtain and receive the same power that the gods grant, yet without a patron? Who trains them? How do they not get utterly extinguished by agents of actual gods just for daring to utilise divine magic without making obeisance to the gods?

In response to those questions: Where do the gods get their power? Where did the gods dare get their training? Why are Ur-Priests nonexistant for actively stealing the power of the gods (as opposed to getting it from another place)?

Who's to say they're not tapping into, say, a primal wellspring of divine energy, or the fabric of one of the outer planes themselves, like taking a bucket/pump of water from the ocean? Why would the gods care if an infinite expanse is having a fairly insignificant chunk taken out by a few individuals?

And why would there need to be any animosity between these groups anyway? idealist clerics aren't saying "screw you, gods", they're just apathetic to these people. They're not denying, they're just not drawing on them for strength. Rather than believing in a god of light and healing and fire and strength, they believe in the idea that light should be spread and they should heal those in need. (heck, it could easily be that they're not a worshiper but are close enough for it to "count" for divine purposes). I'd say it'd be an even harder road of devotion than obedience, so depending on the style of divinity present it could well even count for more.

MORE EDIT:

As a post-emptive disclaimer, this was not intended as a "rah you're doin' it wrong". Just me pokin' questions at you.

Crasical

2013-09-09, 04:12 PM

Playing a polynesian tiki/volcano druid right now who worships an entity she refers to as a Lord of Earth and Fire. I leave it to the interpretation of the other players if she's actually worshipping some other mainstream god in another guise, some ancient elemental entity, or if she's just crazy. Being a Druid, I get spells from nature either way, so.

Kuulvheysoon

2013-09-09, 04:26 PM

That said, I'm also a fan of the idea of "gods ARE ideals" in the first place. There is no god of death, there is Death. Talking to Death wouldn't make sense as death isn't something which talks. Major concepts like that, or like the alignment extremes (LN, NG, NE, CN, TN) are good choices. Created by the overwhelming mass of consciousness of these concepts, all that fun jazz.

Depends on my specific game. I recently ran a game loosely based on the Discworld realm, and the players ran into Death more than once.

supervillan

2013-09-09, 04:39 PM

In response to those questions: Where do the gods get their power? Where did the gods dare get their training? Why are Ur-Priests nonexistant for actively stealing the power of the gods (as opposed to getting it from another place)?

Who's to say they're not tapping into, say, a primal wellspring of divine energy, or the fabric of one of the outer planes themselves, like taking a bucket/pump of water from the ocean? Why would the gods care if an infinite expanse is having a fairly insignificant chunk taken out by a few individuals?

And why would there need to be any animosity between these groups anyway? idealist clerics aren't saying "screw you, gods", they're just apathetic to these people. They're not denying, they're just not drawing on them for strength. Rather than believing in a god of light and healing and fire and strength, they believe in the idea that light should be spread and they should heal those in need. (heck, it could easily be that they're not a worshiper but are close enough for it to "count" for divine purposes). I'd say it'd be an even harder road of devotion than obedience, so depending on the style of divinity present it could well even count for more.

MORE EDIT:

As a post-emptive disclaimer, this was not intended as a "rah you're doin' it wrong". Just me pokin' questions at you.

Valid questions :smallsmile:

No Ur-priests. Godsmite. I loathe that class and its concept. I've played more than one atheist arcane caster mind you, if you want to deny and challenge the gods.

The gods either are, or sprang from, fundamental forces of the multiverse. Without the gods, those fundamental forces do not interact with the life that exists in the prime material. The gods derive power from worship, and that is the very definition of divine power. If you don't worship, you don't get and can't get divine power.

Why do the gods care? If a mere mortal can obtain the same power as their most favoured servants, without being a servant, that is a threat to their ongoing power and future existence. It undermines faith. This is the reason for the animosity. There are plenty of stories of the jealousy of the gods in ancient mythologies.

Druids are different. They study and understand nature on such an advanced level as to gain supernatural power. It's not hard to assign Druids to specific deities (of nature, animals, etc) but I don't choose to do so. Druids are a separate tradition whose power comes from their intimate knowledge and connection to the material, natural world. Clerics of nature gods gain divine powers, but not the same powers as Druids. "Divine" is a misnomer for druids, useful only as a game tag.

Lord Haart

2013-09-09, 04:41 PM

Never would i think that this could be an issue. 3.5 has enough excessive fluff restrictions as it stands; what's the point in creating another one where it does, for once, explicitly permit deity-less clerics right here in the class descriptions? Appeals to supposed non-plausibility of such clerics kinda wash over me because, you know, D&D. If the player can imagine, describe, explain and roleplay such a character, what makes it less appropriate than a sorcerer who gets his innate powahs from no explained source and just happens to firmly believe in some ideal? Ah, right, the ability to cast in heavy armor.

I'd like to hear an anti-deity-less-cleric argument that doesn't amount either to "I don't really like how they contradict my image of a cleric" or to "Existence of deities somehow prevents you from having magical-powers-that-do-not-come-from-hard-study without worshipping them, unless you're a hippy or got a dragon/fey/outsider sleeping with your mom".

I can't be the only one who makes clerics who worship themselves, can I?
You ain't. I've had one self-proclaimed god incarnate running for two campaigns (most epic thing he did: flipped a bird to incredibly annoying DMPC paladin who tried to throw him, a real estate salesman definitely unfit for any sort of battle, on the frontlines in the name of Having To Defend Other Innocent Uncombatants; he did survive, despite the paladin being ten levels higher). In Eberron, to boot. However, he was a Psion rather than a Cleric. Something about powers having more direct, disassembler-y, adjustable-on-the-fly effect than pre-packaged Vancian spells, lending themselves well to the image of just making the reality his bitch, especially where his portfolio is concerned.

supervillan

2013-09-09, 04:49 PM

..what makes it less appropriate than a sorcerer who gets his innate powahs from no explained source and just happens to firmly believe in some ideal? Ah, right, the ability to cast in heavy armor....

I'd like to hear an anti-deity-less-cleric argument that doesn't amount either to "I don't really like how they contradict my image of a cleric" or to "Existance of deities somehow prevents you from having magical-powers-that-do-not-come-from-hard-study without worshipping them, unless you're a hippy or got a dragon/fey/outsider sleeping with your mom".

Not really a fan of the sorcerer class concept either :smalltongue:
Call me a traditionalist...

Lord Haart

2013-09-09, 04:53 PM

The gods either are, or sprang from, fundamental forces of the multiverse. Without the gods, those fundamental forces do not interact with the life that exists in the prime material. The gods derive power from worship, and that is the very definition of divine power. If you don't worship, you don't get and can't get divine power.

You're free to declare it this way in your setting (just like you're free to ban anything you dislike, with the sole possible repercussion of making your players unable to play a character they'd be satisfied with). However, in no WOTC-published D&D setting i know (certainly not in FR or Great Wheel Multiverse) is this true by default.

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 05:12 PM

I'd be more of a fan of the sorcerer if it was more akin to Warlock and less similar to a Bard/Wizard combo. :smalltongue:

Edit: Haart: That's true in Dragonlance. In Krynn it's exactly like that. And if you're some priestess of say... Shar in Faerun and get zapped to Krynn? No power at all until you bow down and start kissing the butt of Tahkisis or something.

tadkins

2013-09-09, 05:15 PM

PF had a good take on Sorcerers, with all the bloodlines you can choose. It really emphasizes a caster who draws on their inner power.

Thiyr

2013-09-09, 05:19 PM

Valid questions :smallsmile:

No Ur-priests. Godsmite. I loathe that class and its concept. I've played more than one atheist arcane caster mind you, if you want to deny and challenge the gods.

The gods either are, or sprang from, fundamental forces of the multiverse. Without the gods, those fundamental forces do not interact with the life that exists in the prime material. The gods derive power from worship, and that is the very definition of divine power. If you don't worship, you don't get and can't get divine power.

Why do the gods care? If a mere mortal can obtain the same power as their most favoured servants, without being a servant, that is a threat to their ongoing power and future existence. It undermines faith. This is the reason for the animosity. There are plenty of stories of the jealousy of the gods in ancient mythologies.

Druids are different. They study and understand nature on such an advanced level as to gain supernatural power. It's not hard to assign Druids to specific deities (of nature, animals, etc) but I don't choose to do so. Druids are a separate tradition whose power comes from their intimate knowledge and connection to the material, natural world. Clerics of nature gods gain divine powers, but not the same powers as Druids. "Divine" is a misnomer for druids, useful only as a game tag.

Then I have two last questions: first, if the gods can smite down things they don't like, wipe them out so completely as to eradicate them (as it seemed you were saying for the ur-priest), then why is there a campaign in the first place? Couldn't the gods just smite down ANYTHING that threatens them? if the threat is beyond them, then clerics are equally useless (being powered by the useless gods), if they are held back then how are they smiting the stuff they don't like in the first place? If a secret group of idealist-clerics can't survive, how could the cult of world-ending-doom do it? Wouldn't it make sense for rulers to be devout followers of any deity, just as a divine safety net?

Second, while jealousy does exist in some mythologies, there are plenty where it doesn't as well. And even if it does, they're skipping the intermediary and taking a harder road for it. These people are living to the god's ideals without being told how. That's not something most would really even want, not if they're of such faith and dedication that they're not only holding to that path with extreme devotion, but doing it so much as to actually be empowered by it. If you've read it, I'd say the difference is between Michael and Sanya in the Dresden Files. Michael is a traditional cleric in this sense, empowered by faith and devotion. Sanya is a cleric of an ideal. He has great faith in _doing_ good, in _being_ the better man, but not in any divine figure. He is empowered for it, and while it isn't easy for either, he doesn't have the guidance Michael does. Its a blessing and curse to not have that support structure, and especially for good-aligned gods and chaotic aligned gods it would seem fitting that the ideal, the intent behind it is more important than worshiping Moradine (with an e, don't confuse your worship with that false god Moradin, or Muradin (this is me being silly, not saying that you're actually running gods like that. Just to be clear))

edit: and why would they not smite any other casters as well? They're getting power rivaling those of believers without requiring devotion, just old fashioned study. wouldn't that drive the jealousy thing too?

Zero grim

2013-09-09, 05:36 PM

To any cleric out there who want to gain divine power but just doesnt want to be tied down to a deity like a sucker there is someone you need to meet who will tell you the secret: Sertrous

Sertrous is an elder evil who taught the first clerics to gain power without the need for gods.

As for my take, my setting uses its own gods who are part ideal and part divine being, so their is a god simply known as Death, to worship the concept of death is to worship him they are one and the same, but since my setting has very few gods (8 holy, 7 unholy, X misc) I let my players choose their own reasons for alignment and domains so long as I feel it fits the character but mostly i let them do whatever.

the way i see it the D&D gods and domains and alignments weren't perfectly built with balance in mind anyway and most of the books on religion say to updates the PHB gods anyway, so why make the process any more complicated then it needs to be, Clerics are going to really gain or lose to much power by limiting them or praising them for following a god beyond what the setting does to them. (in my setting who you worship is probably more important then who you are and what you can do most of the time)

Andraste

2013-09-09, 05:40 PM

Personally I am fine with it. If a player wants to have a character with clericy powers but not a deity, I don't want to force fluff they don't want onto them (I feel the same about fluff of other classes as well). In the game I am currently planning, I'm going to have lots of clerics be deity-less. There will be plenty of deities around that can make clerics, but forces themselves, represented by the domains, have a sort of semi-concious power that can be tapped into.

Agrippa

2013-09-09, 05:41 PM

Maginomicon

2013-09-09, 05:46 PM

Page 3.
Oh that's right! It's like how in earlier editions (and in 5th edition) there were/are "specialty clerics (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9G5PjlCMlGw)".

Hadn't considered that. It's basically identical in fluff to specialist wizards.

supervillan

2013-09-09, 05:53 PM

Then I have two last questions: first, if the gods can smite down things they don't like, wipe them out so completely as to eradicate them (as it seemed you were saying for the ur-priest), then why is there a campaign in the first place? Couldn't the gods just smite down ANYTHING that threatens them? if the threat is beyond them, then clerics are equally useless (being powered by the useless gods), if they are held back then how are they smiting the stuff they don't like in the first place? If a secret group of idealist-clerics can't survive, how could the cult of world-ending-doom do it? Wouldn't it make sense for rulers to be devout followers of any deity, just as a divine safety net?

There's the world-building answer, and the internally-consistent logical answer. The world-building answer is there are no Ur-priests and there never were any. They do not exist in my campaign. The logical answer is that the gods do indeed smite, but they do so through their agents. The gods very rarely manifest on the prime material for two good reasons. One, they're rather busy: so many worshippers! Two, it's likely to cause escalation. Osiris appears to crush an undead cult - undead cult summons Set to oppose him - whoops-apocalypse.

Also, rulers very often are devout followers of the gods. It helps to keep the temples on-side, and some rulers (in my campaign) are themselves divine casters/agents.

Second, while jealousy does exist in some mythologies, there are plenty where it doesn't as well. And even if it does, they're skipping the intermediary and taking a harder road for it. These people are living to the god's ideals without being told how. That's not something most would really even want, not if they're of such faith and dedication that they're not only holding to that path with extreme devotion, but doing it so much as to actually be empowered by it. If you've read it, I'd say the difference is between Michael and Sanya in the Dresden Files. Michael is a traditional cleric in this sense, empowered by faith and devotion. Sanya is a cleric of an ideal. He has great faith in _doing_ good, in _being_ the better man, but not in any divine figure. He is empowered for it, and while it isn't easy for either, he doesn't have the guidance Michael does. Its a blessing and curse to not have that support structure, and especially for good-aligned gods and chaotic aligned gods it would seem fitting that the ideal, the intent behind it is more important than worshiping Moradine (with an e, don't confuse your worship with that false god Moradin, or Muradin (this is me being silly, not saying that you're actually running gods like that. Just to be clear))

I'm not familiar with the Dresden files. Good example of your point though.

edit: and why would they not smite any other casters as well? They're getting power rivaling those of believers without requiring devotion, just old fashioned study. wouldn't that drive the jealousy thing too?

It could do. There are indeed gods that would seek to thwart, hinder, restrict or destroy arcane magic. But there are also gods of magic and these tend to be more prevalent. Isis, Boccob, Wee Jas, Hecate and so forth have more influence over mortal society than gods of Entropy because the gods of magic offer more to mortal society. But this is certainly a plot-driver for campaign stories.

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 05:56 PM

Sanya is more than just an Ideal cleric though. He's actually more akin to Ur-Priest in his status as a Knight of the Cross. He's an Athiest... who literally had a divine instrument of godly magic handed to him by an archangel... and still doubts God exists and just takes the power to do what he wants (Which happens to be good, but mechanically if you ignore the Alignment is more towards Ur-Priest ideals, or maybe a Favored Soul, than Cleric of an Ideal).

ryu

2013-09-09, 06:06 PM

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 06:10 PM

Depends on the presence of the Healing Shiv minor artifact in your campaign world.

DMVerdandi

2013-09-09, 10:13 PM

Personally, I adore the idea of deity-less clerics.
Rather than worshiping personified energies, they instead use their spirituality to gain power directly from the concepts. My favorite ACF for clerics is the spontaneous domain casting, because it just gets that much deeper.

I would rather play them like people who connect on an intuitive level with conceptual power. Arcane magic is the direct and overt CONTROL of the forces. Divine magic is unification with the idea of a thing, becoming closer to it, embodying it in fact.

That is why clerics can cast without directly gaining their spells from a deity, because divine magic comes from theosis.

For me arcane magic is the act of opening a door by forcing it in. Divine magic is becoming the door.

Totema

2013-09-09, 10:20 PM

I dislike them, but really only for fluff reasons. I envision clerics as being parts of a clerical order, built around interpreting the will of the gods and spreading their influence. A deity-less cleric can't take part in that.

This is rarely a problem in my campaigns, though; if a player wants to pilot a cleric with an unusual domain combination, I'll either shoehorn those domains into an existing deity, or just plain make up a brand new demigod to fit the bill.

Coidzor

2013-09-09, 10:30 PM

My stance is that a deity-less cleric has to cobble together a few sentences to describe the core belief if for no other reason than so we can be on the same page as far as understanding what the hell is going on from a roleplaying standpoint.

I'm also a fan of implementing the Eberronesque relaxation of alignment restriction on clerics on a case by case basis as well as having orders, sub-orders, heterodox factions, and alternative interpretations of deities for further customization as well.

Sort of grew out of having played so many obligatory clerics of pelor early on that I began playing with it by examining, say, how the gnomes would interpret Pelor as a deity and how they'd change things up in terms of their rites and organization and viewing the day-night cycle as a comedy that ends in tragedy and a tragedy that ends in comedy because early on our understanding of gnomes was kind of schizophrenic, being kludged together from many, many sources including the internet roleplaying communities' meta-interpretations of gnomes.

I'd be more of a fan of the sorcerer if it was more akin to Warlock and less similar to a Bard/Wizard combo. :smalltongue:

Sorta putting the cart before the horse there, mate. Bards are sorcerer-lite with rogue skillfulness tossed in.

There's the world-building answer, and the internally-consistent logical answer. The world-building answer is there are no Ur-priests and there never were any. They do not exist in my campaign. The logical answer is that the gods do indeed smite, but they do so through their agents. The gods very rarely manifest on the prime material for two good reasons. One, they're rather busy: so many worshippers! Two, it's likely to cause escalation. Osiris appears to crush an undead cult - undead cult summons Set to oppose him - whoops-apocalypse.

Should you really be calling it Godsmite if it's not actually gods smiting? :smallconfused:

Waker

2013-09-09, 10:37 PM

I don't really care for sans-deity clerics. Just cherry-picking domains seems rather lazy to me. I am however fine with the idea of adding certain domains to a deity's list if it makes sense though.

Malimar

2013-09-09, 10:38 PM

ArcturusV

2013-09-09, 10:43 PM

Sorta putting the cart before the horse there, mate. Bards are sorcerer-lite with rogue skillfulness tossed in.

I don't feel that way. Because Bards were in DnD before Sorcerers were. Least as far as I ever played the game and experienced it. So bards were "First" in my mind. The sorcerer then ends up as the bastard child. If I had only played 3rd edition I might consider it the other way though.

Kuulvheysoon

2013-09-09, 10:43 PM

tadkins

2013-09-09, 10:45 PM

I don't really care for sans-deity clerics. Just cherry-picking domains seems rather lazy to me. I am however fine with the idea of adding certain domains to a deity's list if it makes sense though.

Give Moradin the Cold (because dwarves live in mountains where it gets cold and snowy) and Fate (because it's the fate of dwarven souls to return to his forge) domains, and I'd have no problem worshiping him. :)

But I know that's a stretch and quite a lot to ask, hence this debate.

Coidzor

2013-09-09, 10:46 PM

I don't feel that way. Because Bards were in DnD before Sorcerers were. Least as far as I ever played the game and experienced it. So bards were "First" in my mind. The sorcerer then ends up as the bastard child. If I had only played 3rd edition I might consider it the other way though.

Weren't bards on a completely different casting mechanic in their earlier edition incarnations? My memory of having looked into them is a bit fuzzy, sure, but I'm not seeing the connection that you're even trying to draw here.

DeadMech

2013-09-09, 10:47 PM

I have no issue with deity-less clerics. Most religions that I am aware of believe in some sort of creator however it was never uncommon for people to revere forces other than gods.

Ancestor worshipers come to mind. Why pray to a god that may or may not even know that I exist? There are generations and generations of shaman, warriors, poets, craftsmen all linked to me by family or tribal ties. All of them presumably are far more interested in my well being and my goals.

At the end of the day I want players to have more choice, not less.

TrollCapAmerica

2013-09-09, 10:49 PM

Weren't bards on a completely different casting mechanic in their earlier edition incarnations? My memory of having looked into them is a bit fuzzy, sure, but I'm not seeing the connection that you're even trying to draw here.

Bards were the 1st ed version of a Prestige class where you had to take 3 others first before you could snag it

Lousifer

2013-09-09, 11:38 PM

If there's a deity that fits, I generally direct them that way. However, if nothing in the campaign fits their concept, I ask the player to invent the religion that their character represents in the campaign. It pushes the player to think of whether their two domains they want actually work together philosophically. If their deity makes sense in some way shape or form, their religion will eventually gain power as the church gains followers.

The last player I had do this spent a lot of time actively pushing the party to give his deity lip service to help form the first nucleus of worshipers. I like the system pretty well.

fluke1993

2013-09-09, 11:40 PM

I like the idea of a character so dedicated to an idea that it allows them to tap into a divine wellspring of power and I think that this concept can produce a number of interesting character concepts and RP opportunities.

For example a CE cleric with the domains of healing and pain who is so focused on the Idea that "Through Pain One Can Achieve Perfection" who torments his victims, constantly inflicting "Divine Enlightenment" on his subjects and then bringing them back from the edge of death, just to do it all over again. He has yet to find someone who can withstand his "Enlightenment" but he knows that all it will take is a little time and a lot of bodies.

Also I would like to note that there is are a couple of spell granting religions in Ebberon that do not actually worship a god or deity and The Blood of Vol actually worships an Ideal.

All this being said, if it makes sense in the campaign setting to deny non-deist clerics then it makes no sense to change that.

Thiyr

2013-09-10, 12:09 AM

Deity-less clerics annoy me. I mostly dislike it because it's a deliberate failure to engage with the setting.

Elaboration: Being affiliated with a church, guild, or government is something players should be seeking out! They're great sources of both plot hooks and help dealing with said plot; very useful and flavorful for the party and for the DM. Clerics are among the only classes which by default come affiliated with such an in-character organization and support structure. But if you go deity-less, you're choosing to throw that away for an inconsequential mechanical benefit.

See, this is something I'm not in agreement with. You can engage well with a setting without that structure through other means, and you an refuse to engage with a setting even when you have that affiliation. I could build a cleric of Lothian in my friend's ptolus game. The religion is well fleshed out, has a heirearchy, notable npcs at multiple levels of the organization. And I could ignore it easily by just paying my dues, saying a bit piece about spending offtime preaching or healing or something, and just blow off that end of things. Alternatively, if I'm playing a cleric of the ideals of, say, the strength of steel, I could choose to enter arena tournaments even if my divine powers aren't allowed, I could try to make buddys with notable forgemasters, let that be a defining trait of my character. I could have a character idealizing "The Greater Good at Any Cost", the guy who does horrible things in the name of paving the way for a world he has no place in. Give him good and evil as domains, and that lays out his entire approach to problem solving right there. To be a cleric of an ideal doesn't have to be something done for power, and a cleric of a deity will not inherently be better connected to the world. It just has extra stuff that may or may not be useful for the player's attachment to the world. The bigger problem with detachment is in the hands of the player anyway.

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 01:13 AM

I skipped 1st edition, and played 2nd where Bards were a base class, and the only class that allowed non-humans (Half-Elves) unlimited class levels. I seem to recall they were more or less like they are in third. Having a few thief skills like being able to move silently and hide, and some half-wizard casting, on top of singing at people.

So the idea of a charismatic natural spell caster who can be the party face, with limited cosmic powers just kinda went "Huh, they went full caster with Bard".

Then again my memory of 2nd is a bit hazy too. So I may be wrong. I just had that feeling when I saw Sorcerer.

LordBlades

2013-09-10, 03:03 AM

Personally, I have nothing against clerics of an ideal.

Not for mechanical reasons, as clerics are powerful enough to rip a campaign in half even with no domains. Cherry picking domains has about as much effect on a cleric's ability to break the game as painting a nuke yellow :smalltongue:

Not for fluff reasons either: I find any circumstance that forces the player to make a choice between the mechanics he wants and the fluff he wants bad for the overall health of the game.

That being said, I actually like the RP involved with being part of the church of a god, and as such whenever I play clerics I tend to negotiate with the DM if it's possible to get the domains that I want on a deity that I want.

Waker

2013-09-10, 03:21 AM

Not for mechanical reasons, as clerics are powerful enough to rip a campaign in half even with no domains. Cherry picking domains has about as much effect on a cleric's ability to break the game as painting a nuke yellow :smalltongue:
Though I agree with most of what you said, the bit about the domains I don't. If you strip away everything about domains from a cleric they are still powerful, but the choice of domains can give you a very nice array of choices. New spells, useful powers, extra skills or proficiencies.
I think the more apt analogy would be putting a nuke on an intercontinental ballistic missile.

LordBlades

2013-09-10, 03:25 AM

Though I agree with most of what you said, the bit about the domains I don't. If you strip away everything about domains from a cleric they are still powerful, but the choice of domains can give you a very nice array of choices. New spells, useful powers, extra skills or proficiencies.
I think the more apt analogy would be putting a nuke on an intercontinental ballistic missile.

The point I was trying to make is that, if a player wants to break a game, he has more than enough tools in the base cleric spell list, so he doesn't need the domains to do so for the most part (they do make it easier though).

On the other hand, if the player actively moderates himself not to break the game, giving him free domain choice is unlikely to alter his behavior.

Clistenes

2013-09-10, 04:38 AM

I would rather have the character take one among the f*ckton of divine casting classes that don't require of a patron deity (Ancestral Speaker, Druid, Oriental Shaman, Spirit Shaman, Green Ronin's Shaman, Mongoose's Shaman, Favoured Soul, Shugenja, maybe Archivist...etc.), or to become a Cleric of the Ancestors or the Spirits or even one dedicated to the Exemplars from one of the Outer Planes (Archons, Eladrins, Guardinals, whatever), if (s)he takes the proper Planar Domain.

I wouldn't allow a Cleric devoted to a non-existant deity who is empowered by his faith alone, or to some ideal like a kingdom or to some concept like Humanity, or Medicine or Death.

The Oni

2013-09-10, 04:58 AM

I've never liked the idea of restricting players if I can help it. That said, a Cleric gains powers through faith/devotion, so he's gotta be devoted to something.

On that note, I've suddenly become enamored with the idea of a True Neutral, nihilist Cleric, following Hemingway's Code Hero to surprisingly noble ends and somehow drawing power from that ideal. His domain powers include resistance to Divine spells because he doesn't believe in them (even his own - they're just like Arcane spells attached to an idea).

"Our Nada who art in Nada, Nada be thy name..."

Alleran

2013-09-10, 05:05 AM

That said, I'm also a fan of the idea of "gods ARE ideals" in the first place. There is no god of death, there is Death. Talking to Death wouldn't make sense as death isn't something which talks.
I see no problem with speaking to Death, personally. It just depends on how it's done. Have you ever read Sandman (http://www.geekosystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Death-full.jpg) and seen how Gaiman chose to treat the concept of anthropomorphic personifications?

zlefin

2013-09-10, 05:39 AM

By default I'd tend to not mind or give it too much though.
In hack and slash it doesn't really matter much.

If pondering it; i'd probably allow it in general, though insist they clarify what they're worshipping, and ensure that they properly venerate it in their play. Alternately, I might just have them spread their worship over multiple gods that have the domains they want; it's certainly plausible that a cleric who's highly devoted to say, Law, might venerate all deities with law in their portfolio for their lawfulness.
So if you support an ideal instead of a specific deity, you instead support all deities/organizations that have that ideal as one of their domains.

Inventing minor deities to fill in is also pretty feasible; in some areas i'd expect minor deities to pretty numerous.

Black Jester

2013-09-10, 06:11 AM

Godless priests are among those things I always ban in my game. It is one of the many player entitlement features (all the powers, none of the responsibility) that is actually by far the worst problem of D&D.
No change of domains to appease players, either; the consistency of the setting is more important than player self-entitlement.

In my campaigns, any divine spellcaster only has supernatural powers because they are granted by a deity, and they only have these powers as long as they behave according to the wishes of their patron deity. They basically trade in power for free will.

Zubrowka74

2013-09-10, 10:28 AM

PF had a good take on Sorcerers, with all the bloodlines you can choose. It really emphasizes a caster who draws on their inner power.

Actually, Pathfinder has a cleric archetype (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/cleric/archetypes/paizo---cleric-archetypes/separatist) exactly for the purpose of having an domain not related to the Deity.

You can start from there and create some sort of dissident order that has this extra domain. It's not in the god's portofolio and perhaps it steps on the toes of another deity. Lots of adventure potential right there.

Also it really depends on the setting used. Dragonlance has been mentioned, there's an age where the gods are gone and the cleric class is replaced by the star seekers or such. Personally, as a DM if a player has a good enough concept and backstory as to why he has access to these domains, I don't see the harm.

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 10:36 AM

Godless priests are among those things I always ban in my game. It is one of the many player entitlement features (all the powers, none of the responsibility) that is actually by far the worst problem of D&D.
No change of domains to appease players, either; the consistency of the setting is more important than player self-entitlement.

You do realize that the way you phrase that you're just sounding like you're demonizing the very notion of players approaching the game as people who would like to enjoy playing the game, right? :smallconfused:

Black Jester

2013-09-10, 10:59 AM

Yes, because it is *impossible* to enjoy a game without being entitled to every tidbit of the rules or obscure feature. It is likewise *impossible* to enjoy a game that is not a kitchen sink of 'Everything goes'. my bad.

The sheer mass of options and various gameplay elements in D&D 3.5 (especially if you, like me, does not categorically exclude 3rd party or homebrew stuff) is an almost ridiculously large box of tools, and thus it is ridiculously easy to make any of it redundant or let any of the features disappear in a white noise. It help to focus so that the parts in the game that actually do matter become more poignant. The fact that it is printed in a book written by some guy who isn't part of our gaming circle isn't reason enough to include it in the game. Especially if it is a concept as oxymoronic and flavorless as a godless priest.

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 11:07 AM

Yes, because it is *impossible* to enjoy a game without being entitled to every tidbit of the rules or obscure feature. It is likewise *impossible* to enjoy a game that is not a kitchen sink of 'Everything goes'. my bad.

Mostly it's the throwing around of "entitled" like it's candy without actually seeming to apply it entirely accurately. :smalltongue:

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 11:13 AM

Not that I can't, in part, understand his view. I often get irked when a player comes to me with material cherry picked so their character has stuff that was meant for Faerun, Eberron, Dark Sun, etc, all rolled into one and trying to take it into my Not Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Dark Sun game. Much less if they didn't ask me about it first. Or if they did ask me, I said no, and they put it on their character sheet anyway.

But that doesn't extend to "Cause Clerics" necessarily myself. I can think of a lot of stories where characters are empowered by a faith in vague senses of Honor, Goodness, Virtues, etc, rather than calling out to a god, and using that vague faith to pop a miracle in someone's ass. It's a thing that exists. I'm fine with it. I DO get a little miffed when I see someone trying to skirt obvious flavorings with it, like trying to play a Chaotic Good cleric who has domains of Pain and Suffering or Baator or something.

The Oni

2013-09-10, 11:17 AM

I dunno, maybe the Chaotic Good Cleric believes that pain is both liberating and therapeutic? :smallsigh:

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 11:19 AM

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 11:20 AM

Maybe... but how often do you see that as a character instead of it being the guy who actually wants to be evil but doesn't want the rest of a good aligned party to kick his ass, or an Archon to pop up and smite him, etc? Usually that's what I find things like that to be. Wants to be evil. Is going to play like they're evil. But writes good on their sheet and becomes a cause cleric so that their god doesn't have to be good/neutral and punish them for being evil.

Actually come up with a way for it to be interesting? And hopefully not like the usual "Death Cleric" who is going to go ultra Goth Mode and spew corny lines about how suffering is ecstasy or something, more power to you and I'd be happy to see it. Just has never happened in a game I've been in.

Yuki Akuma

2013-09-10, 11:24 AM

..I am now imagining a Cleric with both the Pain and Pleasure domains.

Obviously they'd be Drow or something.

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 11:39 AM

..I am now imagining a Cleric with both the Pain and Pleasure domains.

Obviously they'd be Drow or something.

Exactly. :smallbiggrin:

Maybe... but how often do you see that as a character instead of it being the guy who actually wants to be evil but doesn't want the rest of a good aligned party to kick his ass, or an Archon to pop up and smite him, etc? Usually that's what I find things like that to be. Wants to be evil. Is going to play like they're evil. But writes good on their sheet and becomes a cause cleric so that their god doesn't have to be good/neutral and punish them for being evil.

Well, you'd be onto something calling that kind of attitude entitled, due to finding perverse joy in trying to disrupt or destroy the game experience for everyone else, but I believe the more usual term is to call those people problem players. Or Trolls. Especially if they only play stupid evil even when sane, non-suicidal, non-boring evil is workable.

I'd probably have a rolled up newspaper on hand at every game session if I had to deal with them as often as you seem to have. That or I'd have a couple fake games run as a screen to funnel them out for the real game I actually was interested in running. Or something.

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 11:53 AM

Every group seems to have at least one person like that, I swear. It's not all bad, but there's always one.

Edit: Either that or even worse... he is playing an evil character, but honestly THINKS he's good... even as he's doing clearly evil things which makes me question his sanity.

NeoPhoenix0

2013-09-10, 12:20 PM

..I am now imagining a Cleric with both the Pain and Pleasure domains.

Obviously they'd be Drow or something.

Too bad it's mechanically impossible to be a cleric of the dichotomy of good and evil.

Curmudgeon

2013-09-10, 12:26 PM

Too bad it's mechanically impossible to be a cleric of the dichotomy of good and evil.
But it hurts so good! :smallbiggrin:

Kuulvheysoon

2013-09-10, 12:37 PM

..I am now imagining a Cleric with both the Pain and Pleasure domains.

Obviously they'd be Drow or something.

You know, if Loviatar (FR) doesn't get both of these, she really should.

fluke1993

2013-09-10, 12:41 PM

It is true that evil people rarely believe that what they're doing is evil. This can be because they are insane but often times it can be for entirely different reasons. The cleric I created in my example is possibly insane but consider this. Humans only change due to discomfort.

Whenever we are uncomfortable we do what we need to to get comfortable again. When we are asleep and have been laying in one spot for too long, we turn and don't move again until we get uncomfortable again. When someone becomes uncomfortable with their appearance the go to the gym and work out. Natural selection is what happens when creatures get uncomfortable but refuse to change.

Obviously this is an over simplification but imagine this mindset taken to an extreme.

Karnith

2013-09-10, 12:48 PM

..I am now imagining a Cleric with both the Pain and Pleasure domains.
"I worship Michelangelo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Agony_and_the_Ecstasy_%28novel%29), why do you ask?"

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 12:52 PM

You know, if Loviatar (FR) doesn't get both of these, she really should.

Agreed.

Every group seems to have at least one person like that, I swear. It's not all bad, but there's always one.

Edit: Either that or even worse... he is playing an evil character, but honestly THINKS he's good... even as he's doing clearly evil things which makes me question his sanity.

I haven't experienced that to be the case and I've encountered others who haven't had to deal with this issue at all. :/

When you put it that way it sounds like you've got the same recurring jackhole who has established that he can get away with pushing your buttons and it's become such a habit that he does it without even being conscious of it anymore. :smalleek:

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 12:59 PM

The latter edit was a one time thing. The former of most groups having a guy who just is a troll and trouble maker, and will do things disruptive and such just seems to be a common theme among the many various groups I've had over the years. It's not ALWAYS a bad thing. Sometimes they instigate something that's fun and you roll with it. But I can usually spot them a mile away and they're usually (but not always) the person asking for special exceptions, homebrew, or unusual options.

Thiyr

2013-09-10, 01:21 PM

I see no problem with speaking to Death, personally. It just depends on how it's done. Have you ever read Sandman (http://www.geekosystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Death-full.jpg) and seen how Gaiman chose to treat the concept of anthropomorphic personifications?

Oh, I've got no issues with the possibility of anthropomorphic personifications. I love me some Pratchett-Death and all. I was just using that as an example of what I was going for, of a god as an ideal without being an anthropomorphic personification thereof. Death as an ideal exists, it can be drawn upon, it is more than just the status of a once-living thing, but it is not a person. You're not going to sit down for a cup of tea with Death, or Law, or Evil.

While not quite the right way of describing it, I ascribe some manner of sentience and intelligence to these, but in such a different manner from our own as to be utterly incompatible, if not outright imperceptible.

That said, I also do at times enjoy a more traditional pantheon, and more personified deities. I was just throwing that idea out there as another fun one.

Morgarion

2013-09-10, 01:26 PM

Having started with 3e, which explicitly allows for the deity-less clerics (almost wrote 'clericless deities', which is a whole other topic), I've never understood all of this fuss. I don't understand why a cleric, as a divine caster, ought to be restricted to worshipping a deity in order to cast their spells when druids, rangers and paladins don't have to.

MukkTB

2013-09-10, 02:29 PM

3.5 rules include the dietyless cleric. As a DM I would allow it but I wouldn't feel too good about it if the player didn't have a really solid explanation for what their PC was doing.

Black Jester

2013-09-10, 02:46 PM

Mostly it's the throwing around of "entitled" like it's candy without actually seeming to apply it entirely accurately.

The contents of the campaign determines the option of the players, not vice versa. What matters is the word of the GM, not the contents of any book. After all, he will do the majority of the work and the game will follow his vision anyway, so why make that unnecessary complicated or bloated?

The idea that everything published within the official source material is by default part of the game, and can therefore be used accordingly is just self-indulgent. The idea that I should be able to play whatever I want, with whatever stats I want, and do whatever you want is pure player entitlement, and yes, I think it is okay to take issue with tat. In fact, I do.
If I cannot make my character concept fit into the framework of a setting the group has agreed upon and which is represented and governed by the GM, the concept is not good enough and I will try again, or adjust the concept because the mutually agreed framework affects anyone (including myself) and is just more important than the opinion of any one player, even especially if the player is me (and expecting higher standards from others than from oneself is a bit unrefined).
It's like the toppings of a pizza. Jut because you *could* put up anything you like on it, it doesn't mean you *should* do so, right? Especially if you will share that pizza with other people who might have a different taste.

Coidzor

2013-09-10, 03:56 PM

The contents of the campaign determines the option of the players, not vice versa. What matters is the word of the GM, not the contents of any book. After all, he will do the majority of the work and the game will follow his vision anyway, so why make that unnecessary complicated or bloated?

You see it as unnecessary complication or campaign bloat, I see an opportunity to see where the rabbit hole goes by hearing other people out, who knows, it might even be interesting even if it does take them a few minutes to make their pitch. I can always say no later rather than saying no to the possibility of collaborative storytelling.

If I cannot make my character concept fit into the framework of a setting the group has agreed upon

Well, I suppose that mitigates 90% of what I was getting from you anyway. XD

Ranting Fool

2013-09-10, 06:00 PM

I can't be the only one who makes clerics who worship themselves, can I?

There is just so much role play opportunity in a character who honestly and devoutly believes that he is a god and he can even prove it, after all he grants himself magic and made his own holy symbol that works. :smallbiggrin:

No no you are not :smallbiggrin: While I haven't quite had someone worship themselves enough to grant themselves powers (though I'm sure any God of Madness or God of Self delusion with a sense of humor might just go ahead and grant them power) I have had a bunch of clones clerics who worship their creator as a God:smallbiggrin:

tadkins

2013-09-10, 07:14 PM

Do you guys think it would work if instead of calling themselves a "cleric", a deity-less character with the cleric class called themselves a champion? Basically a paragon of certain ideals that allows the person to call upon special powers from their devotion to them.

In my above example, I'd see the dwarf as more of a warrior-type with powers than a priest, anyway.

ArcturusV

2013-09-10, 07:16 PM

tadkins

2013-09-10, 07:28 PM

I don't think it really matters. I don't use class names "in character" anyway. My rogue doesn't go around saying "I'm a rogue!" he might say something like "I am a procurer of valueable objects and fine arts, appraiser, and merchant thank you very much. I am no rogue... I am sophisticated and respected."

Exactly. A "rogue" can be any number of things; spy, assassin, agent, sniper, merchant, scout...the list can go on.

Goes with any class, really.

MukkTB

2013-09-10, 08:14 PM

137beth

2013-09-10, 11:00 PM

If you're going to argue about the DM limiting books and material at his pleasure, well that's fine as long as we know the banned/accepted list going in. However I would like to point out that the offending text is in the players handbook, the most core basic book. I think we need to grapple with an important question.

By RAW, where does cleric magic come from? The gods? The positive/negative energy plane? Some inherent thing?
IIRC Deities and Demigods says (this is from memory, I don't have it in front of me) that it comes mainly from devotion, but that the domain powers are more directly granted by the deity. That's why deities (even those with no caster level) can still cast their domain spells, but not normal cleric spells unless they have cleric levels.

Mnemnosyne

2013-09-11, 01:19 AM

Depends largely on the setting, for me. In any game I DM, it pretty much falls under one of three options:

If there are real gods, and they are the source of divine power, then no. There are no clerics without a deity in this setting. In fact, there are no divine classes at all without a deity in this setting - druids, rangers, paladins, and any other divine class must pick a deity. This is the standard status of the Forgotten Realms: all divine characters must have a patron deity to receive spells and other divine abilities.

If there are not real gods, and/or the status is unclear in the setting, then yeah. There can be clerics of a cause, and indeed, all clerics in this sort of setting (when I run it) are clerics of a cause. There are no real gods, although people and organizations may be devoted to gods. Those gods are actually fictional; the characters gain their power purely from their devotion. I would even allow a cleric that believes in himself, but I would warn the player right from the start that this is a very dangerous road to follow, because if the character shows what I judge to be too much self-doubt, he'll lose his power.

The final type of setting I see would be one in which there are real gods, but they aren't the source (or only source) of divine power - both clerics of a god and clerics of an ideal can exist. I would not use this setting lightly, however. In any setting where I arrange things like this, the fact that gods are not needed is going to be a very big deal throughout the campaign setting, and it's going to be a major theme of the world. It's not going to be something just tossed into the world casually, it's going to be a major part of the campaign, possibly the major plot throughout the game, and something that will affect the characters regardless of whether they follow a deity or an ideal or neither.

As far as domains go, though, I'm willing to add domains to deities in either case, as long as the domain is reasonable for that particular deity.

Daebu

2013-09-11, 08:30 PM

The contents of the campaign determines the option of the players, not vice versa. What matters is the word of the GM, not the contents of any book. After all, he will do the majority of the work and the game will follow his vision anyway, so why make that unnecessary complicated or bloated?

For every DM who has run into a player ignoring flavour of the setting; there is another reasonable player trying to fit a well developed character into an overly restrictive setting with a railroading DM. To be honest, minus your last paragraph of your last post, YOU sound like the entitled one.

Squirrel_Dude

2013-09-11, 08:52 PM

Depends on the player and what alignment they would want their character to be. I probably wouldn't want a new player or a player new to divine characters to roll up a cleric devoted to a cause. I feel it's better I gave you at least get a taste for the roleplaying hangups, possibilities, and expectations of a divine-powered character before you try and create your own concept of for one.

More specifically, I wouldn't let a player be a cleric without a deity if I thought they were playing it simply to get out from under the yoke of roleplaying responsibility.

Knaight

2013-09-11, 09:15 PM

I'd consider this setting dependent. For one thing, even in a setting with gods there may well be cases where a deity-less cleric makes perfect sense as a character - maybe they pull from a natural area, or ancestors, or whatever else. Maybe they are unwitting dupes who have power provided for them by some god, but don't actually know where it comes from. Then there's the matter of a setting which doesn't have gods (or doesn't have any which interfere, and is thus ambiguous). In that case, the deity-less cleric would be the only option.

QuickLyRaiNbow

2013-09-12, 01:07 AM

To be honest, in my experience the more militant a DM is about:

1. Protecting the integrity of his setting (no Clerics without deities; this is distinct from stuff like "there's no telephones in Grayhawk, dude." A certain level of buy-in from players is essential. It's a cooperative relationship, not an adversarial one.)
2. Ensuring that the player characters have formalized places within the setting (guild memberships, relationships with NPCs and setting locations and other plot hooks)

the less confident that DM is in his ability to create an engaging world or convey that world to his players. He doubts that he can make the world something that matters to them organically, so he tries to force it by adding Paladin/Knight-style codes to everything. Barbarians must behave like this, Druids must be hermits befriending the creatures of the wood and so forth. There's sort of a noble DM struggles to bring the light of their visionary setting to the savage players sort of thing that happens. It's a backwards way of thinking, where the player characters are a mechanism for the DM to tell the stories he wants told about his world. From my perspective, the ideal is that the characters use the tools given to them by the DM to paint their own pictures, and the setting is the canvas, not the final product.

In the specific case of the deity-less Cleric, in my opinion it actually fills a vital niche that's otherwise lacking from the game. I ran a Core-only game a few years back and had a player who wanted to play as a hermit of sorts. Her idea was something like an empathetic, sensitive character forced to leave her home community by social anxiety; she drew pretty heavily from the Empaths of Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar series. Said character was sort of drawn to help people by nature, could not handle being around lots of them for long periods of time and set up a healing station in the wilderness so others could seek out her abilities; circumstances forced her to take a more active role in saving the universe and blah blah blah she joins the party. In the core ruleset this character is quite hard to model without the Cleric class; she's got no focus on nature and is therefore not a Druid, she's not performance-based and actively avoids public places and is therefore not a Bard, she's quite low level and doesn't fight and is therefore not a Ranger or Paladin. What's left? The only other class with healing as part of its purview is Cleric. You just have to accept big-C Cleric as being distinct from small-c cleric. The table of class features and progression is completely fine sans deity. The priest or religious figure derived from monotheistic Middle Ages religion is inextricably linked to a deity figure.

Edit: Likewise, it's important to distinguish Bards from poets and reciters of oral history, Crusaders from religious warriors sent to liberate/conquer/pillage the Holy Land and Wizards, Warlocks, Sorcerers, Beguilers, Dread Necromancers, Psions, Wu Jen, Battle Sorcerers, Domain Wizards, Ardents, Erudites and Wilders from each other, because any of 'em could be a warmage, even though there's already a Warmage class. What a character is is totally separate from what the character sheet lists for Class and Level. Sometimes they're the same, but often they're very different.

Black Jester

2013-09-12, 03:53 AM

For every DM who has run into a player ignoring flavour of the setting; there is another reasonable player trying to fit a well developed character into an overly restrictive setting with a railroading DM. To be honest, minus your last paragraph of your last post, YOU sound like the entitled one.

No character concept that doesn't fit the parameters of a campaign or setting can be under any circumstances considered as well developed. The relevance of any character comes from the interaction with his fellow other characters and his environment, not some abstract concept created in a white space. If everybody wants to play this small circle of Magi, playing a fanatical inquisitor who wants to purge the world from magic would just be a horrible idea, even though the character concept is good and the player really enjoys to channel his inner Cotton Mather.
It doesn't matter how much one might enjoy to play that android struggling to discover his own humanity and role n a human society, when there are no androids in Middle-Earth.
And when you play in a setting where deities are real, are playing their god games and using mere mortals as their pawns (I want to write something like 'like every D&D setting ever', but there is Dark Sun, so it is more like almost every D&D setting ever) then a godless priest is not

I am not saying you can't discuss this - maybe Middle-Earth would be really fun with androids around and a refocusing on issues of alienation and technocracy - but that might not be what the Gm has in mind for the game or what the other players want.
Once the GM or even better the consensus of the group has come to a verdict, it is binding. The refusal to accept the GM's authority over the game is a blatant example for player self-entitlement. Of course, it works the other way around, too. When the whole group really wants no androids whatsoever in Middle-Earth, the GM should better not include one.While the opinion of the GM concerning the game and its contents is always more important than the opinion of any individual player, the desires of the whole group is still the most relevant factor.

And wow to something completely different: railroading is actually a real issue and quite problematic, but one that bears no real influence on this one. It's like discussing cars, traffic and commuting, and then mention that there are migratory birds as well. It is just as if you tried to blur the lines between two different topics to make one look worse by associating with a known problem...

Berenger

2013-09-12, 05:06 AM

Personally, I prefer clerics to worship at least some sort of higher being.

One of them involved a dwarven cleric who believed simply in the power of his mountain home and the people he served as a champion for.
In such a case I'd recommend to worship the genius loci of that particular mountain home. An ancestral spirit can accompany the dwarf during travels abroad to grant him a connection to his (regional) source of power.

Waker

2013-09-12, 08:36 AM

Edit: Likewise, it's important to distinguish Bards from poets and reciters of oral history, Crusaders from religious warriors sent to liberate/conquer/pillage the Holy Land and Wizards, Warlocks, Sorcerers, Beguilers, Dread Necromancers, Psions, Wu Jen, Battle Sorcerers, Domain Wizards, Ardents, Erudites and Wilders from each other, because any of 'em could be a warmage, even though there's already a Warmage class. What a character is is totally separate from what the character sheet lists for Class and Level. Sometimes they're the same, but often they're very different.

I agree with you on this portion. Generally speaking, fluff is mutable. There are certain aspects of a class that are somewhat important though. A Cleric isn't just some guy who said to himself one day, "I sure wouldn't mind having some magic powers. Better start talking to myself and hope some intangible universal force grants them to me." Clerics are supposed to be representatives of a greater power, with training and knowledge passed down from their Church. If you are a Paladin, you are expected to be a champion to some greater power. If you are a Fighter, you are expected to be a combatant of some sort. If you are a Druid, you are going to have some kind of ties to Nature. The Cleric is no different, they aren't just a collection of spells and proficiencies slapped together.
In your example of a hermetic healer, there aren't too many options, since you restricted it to Core. However they could have used a Bard, nothing twists their arm saying that a Bard must be a super diplomat always at the center of attention. And if you expand the list of classes outside of Core, you have: Archivist, Shugenja, Spirit Shaman, Healer and so on. None of those classes are explicitly servants of a deity, can heal and are completely capable of being reclusive.

supervillan

2013-09-12, 09:35 AM

One of the great things about D&D as a game is that it admits many different play styles.

One of these play styles, clearly favoured by many on this forum, emphasises player choice. If a player wants to play a godless cleric, well the rules say that's OK and it's the player's choice so good, we want our players to be allowed that choice.

Another play style emphasises story and world-building. In this style the DM sets the scene and sets limits on player choice, for the sake of the story and the consistency of the setting. (This doesn't mandate railroading in my experience, though it's a potential danger).

Both these play styles are perfectly valid. I prefer the latter myself, which tends to work against limitless player choice. But as long as my table is enjoying playing in my world then that's all good. If and when the players want a different play style, likely someone else will take over as DM. That's how it's been in my other groups, and sometimes I want a break from the DM seat anyway :smallsmile:

fluke1993

2013-09-12, 10:08 AM

Outside of Faerun and similar settings, you might as well be talking to yourself. The gods in greyhawk are generally uncaring and don't typically care about what mortals do unless they are a major threat to either their worshipers or the world itself and they are fairly active compared to many settings. There is no particular raw support for this idea but I'm gonna throw it on the table anyways.

My idea is this: gods do not grant clerical power, faith does. A cleric has to have absolute faith in whatever he believes in whether or not it is an ideal or a god. A cleric of Moradin has faith that his god will protect him. A cleric of Lolth has faith that her goddess will grant her power. A cleric of Bocob has faith that through worship he will gain knowledge. That pain/healing cleric has faith that this ideal will truly make the world a better place. A cleric that believes in a god that doesn't exist has faith that, in her worship she serves a higher power. All of these clerics can cast spells and have domains because they all have true faith. Gods may be powerful, and they may imbue a favored servant with their power but this will never result in a cleric unless the servant is truly faithful; Conversely, someone can be a cleric of a god even if that god doesn't want them.

Finally to address the issue of falling. A cleric falls when he looses faith in what he believes in. The cleric of Moradin falls when he is exiled from the church for fleeing from a battle to defend his homeland because this fundamentally violates his beliefs. The cleric of Lolth falls when she teaches ancient rights of demon-binding to a male because this fundamentally violates her beliefs. The cleric of Boccob falls when he burns a BoVD stopping an ancient lich from resurrecting but permanently destroying rare knowledge because this fundamentally violates his beliefs. The Pain/Healer falls after years of experimenting and never having a single success with doubt flowering in his heart because this fundamentally violates his belief. The worshiper of a false god falls after being acknowledging that her god doesn't truly exist.

QuickLyRaiNbow

2013-09-12, 11:49 AM

I agree with you on this portion. Generally speaking, fluff is mutable. There are certain aspects of a class that are somewhat important though. A Cleric isn't just some guy who said to himself one day, "I sure wouldn't mind having some magic powers. Better start talking to myself and hope some intangible universal force grants them to me." Clerics are supposed to be representatives of a greater power, with training and knowledge passed down from their Church. If you are a Paladin, you are expected to be a champion to some greater power. If you are a Fighter, you are expected to be a combatant of some sort. If you are a Druid, you are going to have some kind of ties to Nature. The Cleric is no different, they aren't just a collection of spells and proficiencies slapped together.

No, they exactly are a collection of class features. Crunch and fluff are not the same thing. In the crunch, there are specific provisions for a nontheistic Cleric. The DM and the player collaborate to provide fluff. Taking your example - a Cleric is supposed to be a representative of a greater power with knowledge and training passed down from their Church - would you object to any of the following:

1. An atheist Cleric
2. A Cleric of God X who is not part of a church
3. A Cleric of God X who was part of a church but is not any longer
4. A Cleric of God X who is naturally miraculous, if you will

By my reading, your answers should be not acceptable, not acceptable, yes allowable but no longer allowed to advance as a Cleric, and not acceptable. And that seems really weird to me.

Daebu

2013-09-12, 12:06 PM

No character concept that doesn't fit the parameters of a campaign or setting can be under any circumstances considered as well developed. The relevance of any character comes from the interaction with his fellow other characters and his environment, not some abstract concept created in a white space. If everybody wants to play this small circle of Magi, playing a fanatical inquisitor who wants to purge the world from magic would just be a horrible idea, even though the character concept is good and the player really enjoys to channel his inner Cotton Mather.
It doesn't matter how much one might enjoy to play that android struggling to discover his own humanity and role n a human society, when there are no androids in Middle-Earth.
And when you play in a setting where deities are real, are playing their god games and using mere mortals as their pawns (I want to write something like 'like every D&D setting ever', but there is Dark Sun, so it is more like almost every D&D setting ever) then a godless priest is not

I am not saying you can't discuss this - maybe Middle-Earth would be really fun with androids around and a refocusing on issues of alienation and technocracy - but that might not be what the Gm has in mind for the game or what the other players want.
Once the GM or even better the consensus of the group has come to a verdict, it is binding. The refusal to accept the GM's authority over the game is a blatant example for player self-entitlement. Of course, it works the other way around, too. When the whole group really wants no androids whatsoever in Middle-Earth, the GM should better not include one.While the opinion of the GM concerning the game and its contents is always more important than the opinion of any individual player, the desires of the whole group is still the most relevant factor.

Straw Man. A very well constructed and obtuse Straw Man, but a Straw Man none-the-less. We're not talking about androids (mechanically I'll go with Warforged) in Middle Earth. (Some people don't like Eberron in their Faerun, that's cool.) We're talking about a deity-less cleric. A deity-less cleric that is detailed in PHB of the game you're trying to argue about. Not a splat book, not some random magazine. The PHB. The player can be forgiven for thinking it a core mechanic since itis kind've in a core book.

Now I'm not trying to say you HAVE to let it occur. The DM is allowed to say "I don't want that in my game, sorry". But again that's not what we're arguing here. Your premise is that if a Player wants to use an option detailed in the PHB and expanded on in later books, he's "entitled". (Read: overdeveloped sense of entitlement.) Don't kid yourself.

Rather, be honest with yourself: Because YOU as a person find some sort of cognitive dissonance with a deity-less cleric, you have unilaterally decided that it's not belonging in your universe, and you won't be making any effort to meet the player halfway. You know what? You're allowed to do that. But don't sneeringly try and brand that player as "entitled".

And wow to something completely different: railroading is actually a real issue and quite problematic, but one that bears no real influence on this one. It's like discussing cars, traffic and commuting, and then mention that there are migratory birds as well. It is just as if you tried to blur the lines between two different topics to make one look worse by associating with a known problem...

Any DM who doesn't work with his players so that they can have a mutually satisfactory character and character development is guilty of the same rigidity that causes railroading. Both instances are DM's telling players how to play their characters. The two topics are linked, and linked in a relevant enough manner to use the term. And in case you or anyone else think I'm being too harsh, let's review:

It is one of the many player entitlement features (all the powers, none of the responsibility) that is actually by far the worst problem of D&D.
No change of domains to appease players, either; the consistency of the setting is more important than player self-entitlement.

You called someone wanting to use a deityless cleric Part of one of the worst problems in D&D. A simple read of this thread will show you myriad cases where the player used such an option to create a highly interesting, and sometimes amusing, character. Worst of all, not to be outdone, you then ban the player from attempting to meet you half way by refusing to budge on arbitrary domain choices for gods. The irony is that this wouldn't change "consistency of setting" at all. A Deity credited with the Shadow domain granting a cleric the Darkness domain is still fully within character.

Again, It's ok for you as a DM to make that your choice. Just don't be calling a disappointed player "entitled" because he believes it to be the wrong decision.

Irony in all this? I don't like Deity-less clerics much either.

Katana1515

2013-09-12, 01:39 PM

Don't want to get involved in pre-existing arguments and I apologise in advance if someone else has covered this already but i wanted to share a few things that have come up for me in the past.

My first response to players wanting to build a deity-less cleric is to ask why. If its simply because they want access to an unusual mix of Domains I will generally encourage them instead to either invent a new deity or we will work together to find an existing deity whose current portfolio can be expanded to fit a new domain. Often this can be done without altering the existing deities fluff in any serious way. For example Vecna In the PHB at least doesn't grant access to the trickery domain despite being depicted very much as a schemer or manipulating figure. I would have no problem with a Vecna worshipping cleric choosing that domain.

If the desired domains clash or are really incompatible with existing deities then I sit down with the player to create a new deity that will fit. Perhaps this is easier for me because I never use established settings so adding in player driven content is not only easy, its a welcome addition because it adds new depth and complexity to the world as well as giving that player something of a personal investment. My only requirements are that the new deity has to be something more than just 50 words of vague flavour text followed by a short list of I WIN domains. The player has to answer a whole set of questions about the exact features of the new deity, his cult, his rituals, his servants on both the material plane and beyond, His allies and enemies amongst the other gods etc. This has three advantages, 1 the player is now involved in the world building process which is a plus in so many ways, 2 whatever the details of the new deity and religion are its often awash with opportunities for new plot hooks and adventures and 3 if the domain choices are simply some cherry-picked combination that Google told him was awesome (and I hold my hand up here we have probably all done it/thought about it at some point) he will most likely drop the idea or become so involved in the process that the rewards of having the player have such a built up background out way the costs of permitting an unusual domain combination.

If a player is intent on having a Deity less cleric because its essential to their character concept (such as the I Worship Myself concept discussed above) I will permit it. I prefer clerics who have deities because they generally provide more role-playing opportunities (at least in my experience) and I make this clear to players, but I don't ban it. Though I will insist on having a conversation about how this alters the fluff of certain spells like Consecrate/Commune/Spiritual weapon/Planar Ally etc that have deity dependent effects. Gameplay effects are identical but the fluff aspects of these spells are almost equally important IMHO.

anyway thats my 2 pence on the idea :)

Honest Tiefling

2013-09-12, 02:42 PM

Actually, Katana1515, that seems like a pretty good idea of balance between shoving crap or inappropriate domains onto someone and letting someone cherrypick without regards to RP. And in saying that...YOINK! Stealing this next time I run a campaign if that is okay. And mind also posting some questions you would propose to the player creating the god if you don't mind me stealing more? :smallbiggrin:

ArcturusV

2013-09-12, 03:08 PM

It is a good approach. And to help you out a few questions I'd have asked:

1) Where did the God come from?

This is a big one. If it's some family pantheon thing it instantly can tie in your character in the racket. e.g: All of Zeus's spawn, or Odin's, etc. It can tell you instantly who you're allied with, where you might have gotten some of your powers, unusual domain mixes, which Gods may not like you, etc.

If it's some mortal transcendency (Like Raistlin Majere before time travel shenanigans took it away), it also gives a clear role and narrative to your God.

Knowing where the God came from, presuming they didn't just pop out of nowhere, is a big first step.

2) What are the core tenants of the faith?

Important. If your god asks that his followers do... well... the exact same set of stuff that other gods do, there's not too much point in choosing him over something else. Note that established campaign settings sometimes have this problem where you'll have 5 different Gods all dedicated to "promoting the natural world" or something similarly vague to the point where you can't tell the difference between a Druid, a Cleric of Obad-Hai, and a Cleric of Ehlonna. In order for your God to really make sense, they need not only clearly different goals from other gods, but also different means of worship and ideals for their cults to live up to. Thus you could have two "Gods of Tyranny" where one is focused on creating suffering and misery, and the other is more focused on establishing a sense of order in the world. But having them both caring about the same ideals just means there's no real in character reason for someone to say they worship one or the other (Only the mechanical reason of perhaps separate domains/favored weapons).

3) What role does the god's cult play in average lives?

Not every worshiper is a divinely powered cleric/paladin/crusader or the like. So you have to keep in mind what someone who's just the Fighter who worships this god, or the Rogue, or the commoner, might all share in common. There should be a reason why someone who doesn't actually get divine power would want to follow that faith. If the faith is one dimensional and focused only on boons for casters and what casters can do... well you're not exactly going to have a lot of worshipers. Which makes for a weak god. And a boring one.

4) How Active/Powerful IS your God?

Related is knowing just how important they want the God to be. Is this a God who might manifest to the faithful without requiring magic? Granting boons or even appearing as an Avatar in particular times of Crisis? Is it one who walks the earth banging a ton of chicks and hatching monsters (... because that is very classical)? Is it someone who just sits brooding in their otherworldly domain, seemingly more concerned with the politics of the divine than the mortal world? Is your god nigh all powerful or a weak being who is on their way to becoming a dead god, forgotten by mortals?

PersonMan

2013-09-12, 03:45 PM

Deity-less clerics annoy me. I mostly dislike it because it's a deliberate failure to engage with the setting.

I dislike deity-using clerics. Mostly because it's a deliberate failure to try and make a unique character. Rather than building something new and getting into the RP, they just pick some random deity off a list, depending on what they want and then don't care about it in game.

Oh, wait, that's a false choice, isn't it? Deity-less clerics can work with a setting and deity-using clerics can ignore it.

Godless priests are among those things I always ban in my game. It is one of the many player entitlement features (all the powers, none of the responsibility) that is actually by far the worst problem of D&D.
No change of domains to appease players, either; the consistency of the setting is more important than player self-entitlement.

There is a discussion going on about this already, and I just want to mention that I can see why the parallel to railroading was driven.

In my experience, just about every time someone says "player entitlement", they're a control freak DM who hates their players doing anything they didn't expect or plan for. "Player entitlement", to me, generally means what I mentioned above, or (in some cases), that the DM has been 'traumatized' by players who are constantly trying to munchkin and go for power grabs to the point that their default response to a player doing something new is "he's obviously trying to whip out some absurd overpowered combo, crush him".

Reading your further posts makes me think that this isn't the case, but starting with "Everyone who does this sucks and is bad, and they are the biggest problem in DnD. Oh, and none of this other stuff, either. It sucks, too." kind of turns people away from what you're actually saying, which is "Characters should be made with the group's game in mind", which is totally different and a heck of a lot more rational. I doubt you'll find anyone in favor of someone ignoring the group's preferences and trying to force their character into the game despite that, but there's a huge difference between that and "Hey, I have an idea for a character I'd like to use and the Cleric class seems to be a perfect fit. However, they wouldn't worship a deity, could I play a Cleric of a cause?", which you lumped together before.

The railroading this is less like commuting vs birds and more like 'hey you mentioned not liking soft pillows; in my experience, that's often linked to using pillows that are too hard (a known problem)'.

Morgarion

2013-09-12, 03:47 PM

Perhaps a workaround to a cleric not having a deity would be a cleric that has no single deity.

It's hard to have a D&D world where a character believes in, say, St. Cuthbert but not in Fharlanghn or Olidimmara. A cleric of Pelor casts spells just as well a a cleric of Obad-Hai and no better than a cleric of Kord. A reasonable conclusion is that they all exist, so why worship one and not the rest? Consider also, that the array of gods in D&D is referred to as the pantheon, which literally means 'all the gods', so that at least implies that they all exist. I can't imagine the mass of men feeling compelled to choose one god over the others, let alone disbelieving in them when they all offer the same metaphysics, cosmology and eschatology. With so many people praying to the whole pantheon, shouldn't there be priests in charge of managing those worshippers?

I would certainly expect cults dedicated to meditating on the teachings and mysteries of one of the gods over the other for various reasons (Wee Jas is vain and jealous, and you know St. Cuthbert), but it seems unlikely that there would be no temples or clergy who serve the pantheon at large (minus the evil gods). They should probably have free access to any two domains that can be found in the gods of the pantheon.

Daebu

2013-09-12, 04:43 PM

Bookmarking this thread for future examination. I'm loving the ideas and analysis coming out from PM, Morgarion, Katana, Arcturus and others.

Biggest reason being, despite my opposition to BJ (teehee, sorry :smallbiggrin: ), is that I'm not a huge fan of deity-less clerics too. I'm liking the alternatives I'm finding in here to help facilitate player's needs.

Waker

2013-09-12, 05:24 PM

No, they exactly are a collection of class features. Crunch and fluff are not the same thing. In the crunch, there are specific provisions for a nontheistic Cleric. The DM and the player collaborate to provide fluff. Taking your example - a Cleric is supposed to be a representative of a greater power with knowledge and training passed down from their Church - would you object to any of the following:
I am well aware that Crunch and Fluff are different things. Fluff is mutable, but I'm of the opinion that certain fluff aspects of a class are intrinsic to it's nature and influencing it's crunch. While there are specific provisions for nontheistic Clerics, I'm giving my reasons for disliking them. To me a Cleric is a representative of a Deity or some other Greater Power. Even if that is a single Deity, Group of Deities, a Devil Archduke, Demon Prince or whatever, you represent their interests and in exchange they grant you powers. If you want to play a Divine Character who doesn't get your powers from a God, there are many options for such a character.

1. An atheist Cleric
2. A Cleric of God X who is not part of a church
3. A Cleric of God X who was part of a church but is not any longer
4. A Cleric of God X who is naturally miraculous, if you will
1. No, since that doesn't even make sense in the majority of settings, where Gods and their servants can be visited in person.
2. If the character received some training from another Cleric of that faith, it would be fine.
3. Provided that whatever got them kicked wasn't a major atonement worthy affront to their Deity, sure. It they repent they are similarly fine.
4. If some Divine Intervention took place and the Deity directly imparted knowledge into the Would-Be Cleric, sure. That would require some DM approval though, since the setting may not allow such direct acts by the gods, such as Eberron.

ArcturusV

2013-09-12, 05:38 PM

Although the "Directly makes you a..." line tends to favor things like Paladins. As Paladin "fluff" (I hate to call it that because so many mechanics are tied into, created, or determined by fluff that it's not really as light and pointless as people tend to make it out to be) is basically that. You don't train to be a Paladin. You don't choose to be one. You ARE one. You may choose to walk away from it. But you were called and you always had that spark, if you chose to use it. Similarly if you wanted a less martial version, that would be the Favored Soul.

Certain classes have a hard enough time as is. No need to go trampling over their toes.

Yuki Akuma

2013-09-12, 06:22 PM

Perhaps a workaround to a cleric not having a deity would be a cleric that has no single deity.

It's hard to have a D&D world where a character believes in, say, St. Cuthbert but not in Fharlanghn or Olidimmara.

Worshipping a god and believing a god exists are two different things in a polytheistic religion.

A member of the Cult of Zeus believes that Poseidon and Hades exist, but worships Zeus.

Thiyr

2013-09-12, 06:37 PM

1. No, since that doesn't even make sense in the majority of settings, where Gods and their servants can be visited in person.

To this I have only 3 words: Sufficiently Advanced Aliens.

(What? Not saying people have to AGREE with the sentiment, but its something somebody could hold as a personal belief, and deny the divinity of while acknowledging the existence of these things. Again, I point to Sanya from the Dresden books, who uses this exact reasoning in remaining a staunch agnostic, despite having been given a holy sword by an angel and regularly fighting demons, alongside an individual who brings the holy smackdown with blatant divine power. To some, denial. To him, reasonable doubt.)

Morgarion

2013-09-12, 07:36 PM

A member of the Cult of Zeus believes that Poseidon and Hades exist, but worships Zeus.

Yeah, I mentioned cults in my post.

And the people who don't belong to one, who do they worship?

Daebu

2013-09-12, 07:38 PM

Worshipping a god and believing a god exists are two different things in a polytheistic religion.

A member of the Cult of Zeus believes that Poseidon and Hades exist, but worships Zeus.

It was extremely rare for even a cleric/priest of such a deity to worship only the god they represented. In such a culture it was typical for the entire populace to worship multiple gods, particularly at different points in life or on different occasions. In fact, some priests represented multiple gods. This shared veneration was particularly true of multiple faces of one deity (such as Hekate), or allied and related deities (Apollo and Artemis).

I could very easily see a cleric who worships both Rao and Zilchus, or Heironeous and Murlynd. Does this have to be allowed? No of course not, but it's another option for a cleric who wants to represent the values of peace and prosperity, or war and honour.

Conversely, WotC would sometimes add domains to gods as the domains were created. Other times, not. For example, why does Lendor The Prince of Time not have the Time domain? That's truly quite ridiculous. Or Zilchus, The Money Counter, doesn't have the Trade domain. These are obvious additions to fit the fluff.

fluke1993

2013-09-12, 07:45 PM

@morgarion

A Greek peasant would probably pay lip-service to most of the better known gods while primarily giving worship to whoever has the most to do with their lifestyle.

For example a fisherman might revere Poseidon while an undertakers venerates Hades and the local blacksmith worships Hephaestus.

Yuki Akuma

2013-09-12, 07:47 PM

Yeah, I mentioned cults in my post.

And the people who don't belong to one, who do they worship?

All of them, to various degrees. And they wouldn't be Clerics.

It was extremely rare for even a cleric/priest of such a deity to worship only the god they represented.

They would still be a Priest of Zeus, and devoted primarily to Zeus. They can revere the others too, the same way anyone else can (and I'm fairly sure they were even able to fill in for other priests in some circumstances), but a Priest of Zeus is primarily a Priest of Zeus.

There are totally rules for worshiping an entire pantheon in D&D, anyway. In Deities and Demigods, if I remember correctly.

Edit: I think it's also important to remember that not all priests are members of the Cleric class. PC classes are special. Most priests would be Adepts or even Experts.

(A priest of a God of Magic might even be a Magewright or Wizard but that's veering even more off topic...)

137beth

2013-09-12, 07:55 PM

I find it very depressing that people look at a wonderful roleplaying opportunity like a nontheistic cleric as a munchkiny power grab. If a player comes to you with an interesting character idea, and you look at it only in terms of mechanical advantages and disadvantages...you and the player have already lost.

And while we're on the subject, the idea that a non-theistic cleric has "none of the responsibilities" of a normal cleric is complete rubbish. Non-theistic clerics should still have a personal code of some sort.
IMHO, a non-theistic cleric should have to work harder to stay within their own code of ethics. I could explain why, but Rich Burlew already explained it better than I could (note, this explanation was referring to the lawful alignment in general, but it can apply to any philosophy of any non-theistic cleric):

And in order to get this back on track, I will try to get at what I was saying again.

In my personal interpretation of Lawfulness in D&D, I believe that yes, it is possible to be Lawful using a personal code rather than the societal definitions of law and order. However, I believe that the burden of upholding that code has to be much stricter than that of the average person in order to actually qualify as Lawful. You must be willing to suffer personal detriment through adhesion to your code, without wavering, if you want to wear the Lawful hat.

Because almost everyone has a personal code of some sort; Robin Hood had a personal code, and he's the poster child for Chaotic Good. The reason his code doesn't rise to the level of Lawful is that he would be willing to bend it in a pinch. And since he's already bucking all the societal traditions of his civilization, there are no additional penalties or punishments for him breaking his own code. He's unlikely to beat himself up if he needs to violate his own principles for the Greater Good; he'll justify it to himself as doing what needed to be done, maybe sigh wistfully once, and then get on with his next adventure.

Conversely, a Lawful character who obeys society's traditions has a ready-made source of punishment should he break those standards. If such a character does stray, she can maintain her Lawfulness by submitting to the proper authorities for judgment. Turning yourself in effectively atones for the breaking of the code, undoing (or at least mitigating) the non-Lawful act.

A Lawful character who operates strictly by a personal code, on the other hand, is responsible for punishing herself in the event of a breach of that code. If she waves it off as doing what needed to be done, then she is not Lawful, she's Neutral at the least. If she does it enough, she may even become Chaotic. A truly Lawful character operating on a personal code will suffer through deeply unpleasant situations in order to uphold it, and will take steps to punish themselves if they don't (possibly going as far as to commit honorable suicide).

People think that using the "personal code" option makes life as a Lawful character easier. It shouldn't. It should be harder to maintain an entirely self-directed personal code than it is to subscribe to the code of an existing country or organization. This is one of the reasons that most Lawful characters follow an external code. It is not required, no, but it is much, much easier. Exceptions should be unusual and noteworthy. It should be an exceptional roleplaying challenge to take on the burden of holding yourself to a strict code even when there are no external penalties for failing.

So as far as vigilantism goes, if a character has a specific pre-established personal code that involves personally punishing those who commit offenses, then yes, they could still be Lawful. Most characters do not have such a code; most characters simply follow general ideas of their alignment on a case-by-case basis. Certainly none of the characters in OOTS have such a code except perhaps for Miko. And we all saw what a slippery slope that turned out to be.

And, if you are really, really concerned about the small amount of mechanical power someone can get from choosing any combination of domains, I'll point out that
a)A theistic cleric could select ONE of the domains they wanted. Even if you gave all clerics the ability to choose a third domain from any in the game, it wouldn't make a huge difference in their power (they are full casters, after all). And a non-theistic cleric doesn't even get that much.
b)Someone who puts a lot of work into their character's backstory and personal philosophy, and who is willing to take more stringent roleplaying restrictions than other clerics based on what their character would realistically do, is probably not out to break your game mechanically.
c)A lot of crunchy character options reference specific deities. Someone who plays a non-theistic cleric is giving those up.
d)You allowed tier 1 casters in the game to begin with:smalltongue:
e)If you really, really want to curb mechanical power in a way so that picking any two domains is too good but having tier 1 prepared casters is not too much for some reason, you are perfectly justified requiring any domain combinations to be available from existing deities.
f)Most importantly, the domain choices need to make sense. What "makes sense" is a matter of getting DM approval: if the player comes with a detailed backstory and philosophy that suggests a particular two domains, that is fine. If they just pick two weird domains because they have a good mechanical combo together, then you can require them to either justify it or pick different domains.

Now, there are some legitimate reasons to reject a non-theistic cleric. The main one being that it doesn't make sense with how divine magic works in your campaign setting. Also, if the player submits a non-theistic cleric whose crunch is not justified at all, and you would normally require a rationale for which deity a (theistic) cleric picks, then it is completely reasonable to reject that submission. But blanket-rejecting nontheistic clerics purely on the basis of mechanical power is ridiculous.

Morgarion

2013-09-12, 08:20 PM

All of them, to various degrees. And they wouldn't be Clerics.

They would still be a Priest of Zeus, and devoted primarily to Zeus. They can revere the others too, the same way anyone else can (and I'm fairly sure they were even able to fill in for other priests in some circumstances), but a Priest of Zeus is primarily a Priest of Zeus.

There are totally rules for worshiping an entire pantheon in D&D, anyway. In Deities and Demigods, if I remember correctly.

Edit: I think it's also important to remember that not all priests are members of the Cleric class. PC classes are special. Most priests would be Adepts or even Experts.

(A priest of a God of Magic might even be a Magewright or Wizard but that's veering even more off topic...)

We're sort of running up against the old question of, when it comes to D&D, whether history constitutes reality.

Mnemnosyne

2013-09-12, 08:58 PM

My idea is this: gods do not grant clerical power, faith does. A cleric has to have absolute faith in whatever he believes in whether or not it is an ideal or a god. A cleric of Moradin has faith that his god will protect him. A cleric of Lolth has faith that her goddess will grant her power. A cleric of Bocob has faith that through worship he will gain knowledge. That pain/healing cleric has faith that this ideal will truly make the world a better place. A cleric that believes in a god that doesn't exist has faith that, in her worship she serves a higher power. All of these clerics can cast spells and have domains because they all have true faith. Gods may be powerful, and they may imbue a favored servant with their power but this will never result in a cleric unless the servant is truly faithful; Conversely, someone can be a cleric of a god even if that god doesn't want them.

Finally to address the issue of falling. A cleric falls when he looses faith in what he believes in. The cleric of Moradin falls when he is exiled from the church for fleeing from a battle to defend his homeland because this fundamentally violates his beliefs. The cleric of Lolth falls when she teaches ancient rights of demon-binding to a male because this fundamentally violates her beliefs. The cleric of Boccob falls when he burns a BoVD stopping an ancient lich from resurrecting but permanently destroying rare knowledge because this fundamentally violates his beliefs. The Pain/Healer falls after years of experimenting and never having a single success with doubt flowering in his heart because this fundamentally violates his belief. The worshiper of a false god falls after being acknowledging that her god doesn't truly exist.
The problem with this in most settings is that people are incredibly good at self-delusion. They can justify almost anything to themselves, and they do. Without an actual being and entity judging them and how well they follow its teachings, they can be almost wholly opposed to the teachings of the religion while still firmly believing they follow it.

This is an interesting thing to explore. It actually works really well in a setting where that's part of the core concept, where it's a big deal in the world. But it's not something that really fits into a setting where you're supposed to expect that a follower of god X actually follows a well-known and very thoroughly defined set of tenets and beliefs. Because people can and will twist their own beliefs around, and you absolutely will get two different groups claiming belief in the same god but with critically opposed central tenets in their theology. It's a great concept for a campaign setting, but it just doesn't fit every setting, and it introduces a lot of implications that are ignored in most settings.

I prefer to maintain as much internal consistency as I can in my settings, and see what the logical extension of certain features is. And the logical extension of this feature would be very, very factional religions with many branches that probably fight amongst themselves at least as much as they oppose other religions. Therefore, deity-less clerics are something that can seriously screw with the setting and its basic premises, and it's very reasonable to want to say that's not the campaign theme we're going for, so deity-less clerics can't exist in this setting. The other option is to willfully ignore all the consequences that deity-less clerics would introduce into the setting, and just say that they exist and yet somehow have no major effect on anything else.

Edit: Note, editing in responses to other things I feel like answering as I read more of the thread.

To this I have only 3 words: Sufficiently Advanced Aliens.

(What? Not saying people have to AGREE with the sentiment, but its something somebody could hold as a personal belief, and deny the divinity of while acknowledging the existence of these things. Again, I point to Sanya from the Dresden books, who uses this exact reasoning in remaining a staunch agnostic, despite having been given a holy sword by an angel and regularly fighting demons, alongside an individual who brings the holy smackdown with blatant divine power. To some, denial. To him, reasonable doubt.)
The Athar are a good example of this in D&D, but I feel there's a difference between denying the existence of gods and denying the divinity of gods. The Athar certainly don't stand in front of Olympus and dance around with their fingers stuck in their ears pretending the gods don't exist. They simply don't believe they are gods, whatever that term means to them. They believe they are tremendously powerful entities. They do not dispute that these tremendously powerful entities have the power they have, nor do they dispute that they can grant power to others. They dispute that they fit their definition of 'divine'. However, that's pretty much a semantic argument in that they're arguing over the definition of what it means to be a god. The Athar have never proved particularly compelling or interesting to me because of that.