Fluff discussion: Where does the ranger get his spells?

[PseudoPanda]

I was thinking the other day how ex-bards and ex-monks keep all their class features while that's not the case for ex-paladins/clerics/druids and then just attributed that to their divine nature (yeah I know barbarians lose rage when lawful, not the point anymore). Then I thought about the Ranger and how there is no Ex-Ranger despite his divine link.

Now, I know this is mechanically convenient but, at least in core, divine magic comes from dedication to something greater. It can be assumed Paladins get their spells from an uptight LG deity while clerics get it from a deity or something greater than themselves and a Druid gets his magic from nature. It's said that Rangers get their spells from nature like a druid but then why don't they have the alignment restrictions? Why is it ok for them to wear metal? A Ranger could disrespect nature in ways that a druid can't without any penalties or drawbacks.

It just seems weird to me. I don't think Rangers need to be gimped by giving them alignment restrictions but you figure for fluff reasons that would all ready be the case. Have you guys ever wondered about or had problems with this?

(In before "From the Ranger spell list")

[Troacctid]

Yeah, it's from nature, Druids are just weird is all.

[Brova]

It's the reverse of the deal with Clerics and Paladins. The Paladin has more restrictions than the Cleric, despite them nominally drawing power from the same source (the gods). For whatever reason, Paladins must be Lawful and Good, and do all sorts of "honorable" stuff to get their spells while Clerics don't. Presumably, the Druid and the Ranger are in a similar situation. The Ranger just happens to worship nature in a way that involves more fighting with two swords and less not wearing metal.

[PseudoPanda]

Yeah, it's from nature, Druids are just weird is all.

That's fair, the whole armor restriction and not teaching anyone druidic seems more like a cultural edict for the druid. So why would that cause them to lose their magic if (as evident by the Ranger) nature doesn't actually care? Is it because they think they deserve to lose it? Kind of interesting reasoning actually...

[Extra Anchovies]

Druids commune with nature spirits, Rangers draw their power from ley lines. Spirits don't like metal, but ley lines couldn't care less.

[Brova]

That's fair, the whole armor restriction and not teaching anyone druidic seems more like a cultural edict for the druid. So why would that cause them to lose their magic if (as evident by the Ranger) nature doesn't actually care? Is it because they think they deserve to lose it? Kind of interesting reasoning actually...

Presumably it's like being a Cleric of a god versus a Cleric of a concept. There's nothing you actually get for being a Cleric of Pelor to get the Good and Sun domains, rather than worshiping "the sun" or "nothing" or "the me who believes in you" to get the same thing. It's just that you lose your powers if you ever punch an orphan, or support the undead.

[Andezzar]

Presumably it's like being a Cleric of a god versus a Cleric of a concept. There's nothing you actually get for being a Cleric of Pelor to get the Good and Sun domains, rather than worshiping "the sun" or "nothing" or "the me who believes in you" to get the same thing. It's just that you lose your powers if you ever punch an orphan, or support the undead.There are some domains that do not work with clerics following ideals (e.g. War domain)as they give a benefit based on the character's deity.

I can see supporting the undead a gross violation of Pelor's code but punching an orphan might not be.

[PseudoPanda]

It's the reverse of the deal with Clerics and Paladins. The Paladin has more restrictions than the Cleric, despite them nominally drawing power from the same source (the gods). For whatever reason, Paladins must be Lawful and Good, and do all sorts of "honorable" stuff to get their spells while Clerics don't. Presumably, the Druid and the Ranger are in a similar situation. The Ranger just happens to worship nature in a way that involves more fighting with two swords and less not wearing metal.

Yeah, when I was trying to explain this on my own I figured it was because the divine abilities of a ranger are lesser in comparison to a druid but then what about the divine power of a cleric over a paladin? Seems inconsistent on the part of Wizards. Of course if we count "spells" as a singular ability and disregard how many you get, at what level and how powerful they can be (which the playground probably wouldn't but Wizards might have) then Clerics only have a few divine abilities in comparison to the paladin.




I can see supporting the undead a gross violation of Pelor's code but punching an orphan might not be.

Depends on the orphan...

[Brova]

There are some domains that do not work with clerics following ideals (e.g. War domain)as they give a benefit based on the character's deity.

I always kind of assumed you could declare that the favored weapon of your philosophy was whatever martial weapon you happened to want to wield. So I guess there are a lot of philosophies that favor the greatsword.


I can see supporting the undead a gross violation of Pelor's code but punching an orphan might not be.

Maybe not as specifically as supporting undead is, but I can't imagine the god of goodness and light condoning orphan punching. Maybe if it's a zombie orphan?


Yeah, when I was trying to explain this on my own I figured it was because the divine abilities of a ranger are lesser in comparison to a druid but then what about the divine power of a cleric over a paladin? Seems inconsistent on the part of Wizards. Of course if we count "spells" as a singular ability and disregard how many you get, at what level and how powerful they can be (which the playground probably wouldn't but Wizards might have) then Clerics only have a few divine abilities in comparison to the paladin.

Honestly, I don't think WotC put much thought into it. I'm not a D&D historian, but I imagine if you go back the whole "no metal" restriction is on Druids because they are based on Celtic priests and Rangers use metal because they did in LotR.

[Andezzar]

I always kind of assumed you could declare that the favored weapon of your philosophy was whatever martial weapon you happened to want to wield. So I guess there are a lot of philosophies that favor the greatsword.That is a (probably widespread) houserule. The rule says you get the feats for your deity's favored weapon. If you do not have a deity there is no way of determining what your deity's favored weapon is.


Maybe not as specifically as supporting undead is, but I can't imagine the god of goodness and light condoning orphan punching. Maybe if it's a zombie orphan?For the cleric to lose his powers the action must not only be against the deity's tenets, it must be a gross violation. So even if the orphan punching is a minor or normal violation the cleric can keep his powers.

[Brova]

That is a (probably widespread) houserule. The rule says you get the feats for your deity's favored weapon. If you do not have a deity there is no way of determining what your deity's favored weapon is.

Huh. That seems about expected (substitute domain has the same problem). It does kind of screw over Clerics that want War and some other, random domain (like Spell or Rune).


For the cleric to lose his powers the action must not only be against the deity's tenets, it must be a gross violation. So even if the orphan punching is a minor or normal violation the cleric can keep his powers.

Pelor is supposed to be all about compassion, and not having the strong dominate the weak. It seems like punching orphans is probably a violation of that. Unless there's some game mechanical definition of "gross" versus "normal" violations.

[Andezzar]

Huh. That seems about expected (substitute domain has the same problem). It does kind of screw over Clerics that want War and some other, random domain (like Spell or Rune). It's the flip side of making up your own dogma and choosing your domains from a much larger list.


Pelor is supposed to be all about compassion, and not having the strong dominate the weak. It seems like punching orphans is probably a violation of that. Unless there's some game mechanical definition of "gross" versus "normal" violations.No there is no mechanical distinction, nor is there a list of wrongdoings that constitute gross violations. As such it is difficult to prove that any violation is a gross violation. As PseudoPanda put it it depends on the orphan, and probably on the punch too.

[Troacctid]

I think Clerics of an ideal would more likely use the default weapon for their alignment, as hinted at in the Spiritual Weapon spell.

[Sagetim]

I always kind of assumed you could declare that the favored weapon of your philosophy was whatever martial weapon you happened to want to wield. So I guess there are a lot of philosophies that favor the greatsword.



Maybe not as specifically as supporting undead is, but I can't imagine the god of goodness and light condoning orphan punching. Maybe if it's a zombie orphan?



Honestly, I don't think WotC put much thought into it. I'm not a D&D historian, but I imagine if you go back the whole "no metal" restriction is on Druids because they are based on Celtic priests and Rangers use metal because they did in LotR.

Well, from what I recall of reading through some of the ADND books, there was a time when clerics actually had Very different class abilities depending on who their god was. This was back when Kits were a thing, like Archetypes are now. As a cleric you could pick up a priest kit based on your god and it would change around certain things, some priests got turn undead, where others didn't, some priests got a full bab, most didn't. And there was even a kit for a priest to punch people and do martial arts.

Druids, on the other hand, have always had metal restrictions because they were based on the game designer's mental model of real life druids plus actual magical powers. So, you know, skewed by what they thought they knew of druids, and it didn't really matter if they were right, they were the ones making the rules for the class. Bear in mind, that most clerics also had weapon prohibitions based on their faith, with the default cleric being restricted to bludgeoning weapons. As mentioned above, some kits had different weapon restrictions (or none at all), depending entirely on the god your priest was attached to. And as I recall, there were no priests of concepts, it was patron deity or you're not a cleric. Paladins were also super restricted, requiring (among other high stats) 18 charisma and being Human. That's right, until third edition, paladin was human only (and also very limited in what gods had paladins).

To get back to Rangers, however- they're basically souped up hunters. I would say they have an instinctual attunement to nature (mmm, wisdom based casting). As their spells are few and relatively weak, this informal arrangement with the powers of nature isn't really worth bothering with the restrictions that Druids undergo. Druids, by contrast, are part of a long tradition and part of their vows with nature are prohibitions against certain weapons and manufactured armors and what not. As it is, Rangers get...what, some spells from nature? The rest of their stuff is being a highly trained hunter. Druids, by contrast, have all of their class abilities derived from their connection to nature.

[Taveena]

It's the reverse of the deal with Clerics and Paladins. The Paladin has more restrictions than the Cleric, despite them nominally drawing power from the same source (the gods). For whatever reason, Paladins must be Lawful and Good, and do all sorts of "honorable" stuff to get their spells while Clerics don't. Presumably, the Druid and the Ranger are in a similar situation. The Ranger just happens to worship nature in a way that involves more fighting with two swords and less not wearing metal.

One theory is that Paladins don't actually necessarily draw power from the gods - like Clerics of Demon Lords and Archdevils, they instead draw power from the PLANES. The Lawful and Good ones - probably Celestia or Bytopia. This is why they lose their powers if they commit an Evil act or shift to NG, even if their deities would be in full support of it. This is ALSO why some Paladin prestige classes can shift the goalposts a little - the Bone Knight is now drawing their power from a different source.

[holywhippet]

I see it that druid is like a shepherd of nature and works to look after it. A ranger just has a lot of familiarity with it due to their line of work. Along the way they learn some tricks like casting spells. As a result you can get ex-druids who can no longer cast spells because they are out of touch with nature. Rangers still know their tricks as they didn't rely on being overly linked to nature. In 2nd edition you could get fallen rangers like fallen paladins. They were expected to follow a code of ethics and had to be of a good alignment.

[Curmudgeon]

I think Clerics of an ideal would more likely use the default weapon for their alignment, as hinted at in the Spiritual Weapon spell.
That's what you can do for Spiritual Weapon specifically because that spell says so. There's nothing in the War domain to allow a deityless Cleric such an option. Weapon Visage of the Deity doesn't work for deityless Clerics, either.

[Troacctid]

That's what you can do for Spiritual Weapon specifically because that spell says so. There's nothing in the War domain to allow a deityless Cleric such an option. Weapon of the Deity doesn't work for deityless Clerics, either.

I know, I meant it's more likely than making up your own favored weapon, which--wait, wait, hang on, double take, if Weapon of the Deity doesn't function for non-deity-worshipping Clerics, why does it list alignment weapons?

[Curmudgeon]

That's my error; I was thinking of Visage of the Deity, except that's not a weapon spell.

[Sagetim]

I know, I meant it's more likely than making up your own favored weapon, which--wait, wait, hang on, double take, if Weapon of the Deity doesn't function for non-deity-worshipping Clerics, why does it list alignment weapons?

As a cruel joke.

My actual guesses are going to be: The alignment based weapons are there for a reference in case the DM is using gods that someone forgot to write a weapon for, or has made their own and forgot to give them some kind of appropriate weapon.

Alternate possibility: The alignment weapons are listed to give clerics an option to either summon up a weapon in line with their god (as all good little clerics do) or they can walk the path of near heresy by calling upon an alignment weapon just because it suits the situation better.

Alternate explanation: The gods hate non deity worshipping clerics and the alignment weapons were included as a cruel joke to give such clerics hope that they could use such an awesome spell without the divine sponsorship of a god.

Anyway, aren't we talking about rangers? They're like...prime murder hobo material. Set up by class abilities and stereotype to be able to murder hobo their way around the woods and not have to actually come in to town for anything except maybe for social interaction with other people. But depending on how psychotic they might be, their animal companions might take the place of any sentient interaction they would normally require.

[Taveena]

Anyway, aren't we talking about rangers? They're like...prime murder hobo material. Set up by class abilities and stereotype to be able to murder hobo their way around the woods and not have to actually come in to town for anything except maybe for social interaction with other people. But depending on how psychotic they might be, their animal companions might take the place of any sentient interaction they would normally require.

Further aiding this hypothesis is the fact they get racism against green people as a class feature.

[Prime32]

Now, I know this is mechanically convenient but, at least in core, divine magic comes from dedication to something greater. It can be assumed Paladins get their spells from an uptight LG deity while clerics get it from a deity or something greater than themselves and a Druid gets his magic from nature. It's said that Rangers get their spells from nature like a druid but then why don't they have the alignment restrictions? Why is it ok for them to wear metal? A Ranger could disrespect nature in ways that a druid can't without any penalties or drawbacks.The original ranger class was a dabbler who could use both arcane and divine magic - he learned nature-based spells not out of respect for nature, but simply because they were useful for someone who spent a lot of time away from civilisation.

[Bronk]

...this informal arrangement with the powers of nature isn't really worth bothering with the restrictions that Druids undergo. Druids, by contrast, are part of a long tradition and part of their vows with nature are prohibitions against certain weapons and manufactured armors and what not. As it is, Rangers get...what, some spells from nature? The rest of their stuff is being a highly trained hunter. Druids, by contrast, have all of their class abilities derived from their connection to nature.

I agree with this. Druids in AD&D were crazy annoying. To level up, a druid had to seek out, challenge and defeat another druid in order to take the new place int he hierarchy! Every single time! Well, until they defeated the one at the top for the entire world and hit their level cap. Rangers didn't have to deal with any of that.

[SkipSandwich]

Back to paladins for a minute. I've always fluffed a Paladin's powers not being granted directly by any specific god but are actually provided by the paludin's oath itself. Swearing the oath of a paladin is basicly a sort of ritual magic that grants supernatural power in exchange for having to live and act under a very stringent set of moral restrictions. If the terms of the contract are violated, the powers are lost and nothing short of divine intervention can restore. (Intervention privided by yet another ritual where a cleric has to cast an attonement spell and provide a task of redemption for the petitioning ex-paladin).

[Brova]

Back to paladins for a minute. I've always fluffed a Paladin's powers not being granted directly by any specific god but are actually provided by the paludin's oath itself. Swearing the oath of a paladin is basicly a sort of ritual magic that grants supernatural power in exchange for having to live and act under a very stringent set of moral restrictions. If the terms of the contract are violated, the powers are lost and nothing short of divine intervention can restore. (Intervention privided by yet another ritual where a cleric has to cast an attonement spell and provide a task of redemption for the petitioning ex-paladin).

Presumably that would also work for Druids then. For whatever reason you can get real and tangible power in D&Dland for not wearing metal.

[Flickerdart]

Druids are guardians of nature who strive to get closer to it (by not wearing metal, remaining at least slightly neutral, etc). Rangers are soldiers who beat up nature along with their enemies. They don't seek to get along with nature, but to master it.

[marphod]

Well, from what I recall of reading through some of the ADND books, there was a time when clerics actually had Very different class abilities depending on who their god was. This was back when Kits were a thing, like Archetypes are now. As a cleric you could pick up a priest kit based on your god and it would change around certain things, some priests got turn undead, where others didn't, some priests got a full bab, most didn't. And there was even a kit for a priest to punch people and do martial arts.


Darn Kids. Get off of my LAWN!

Er, Uhm. Hi.

Sort of.

AD&D 1st/2nd//D&D Color Series default Clerics had a predefined set of abilities. They could wear heavy armor, could only use blunt weapons, didn't get strength above 18 (18/percentile was a fighter thing in AD&D), single attack per round (which was true for everyone but fighters), moderate THAC0 progression (think BAB), and there was no Miracle spell. They also had their Very Own XP chart (like most other classes) and you got +10% XP if you had a Wisdom of 16 or higher (Prime Requisites).

Then came (at various points) Faiths and Pantheons, Deities and Demigods, the various setting books (Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Lankimar, Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun, etc.), many of which added alternatives for Clerics. Increased spell access. Increased weapon options. Other weird abilities. This was independent from the Kits brought in by the Complete Cleric Handbook.

For instance, IIRC, Eilastree (CG daughter of Lolth/Goddess of the Good Drow) offered her clerics full Cleric and Druid spell access, use of the longsword, and gave up heavy armors. Yeah, it was broken. And we loved it.


Druids, on the other hand, have always had metal restrictions because they were based on the game designer's mental model of real life druids plus actual magical powers. So, you know, skewed by what they thought they knew of druids, and it didn't really matter if they were right, they were the ones making the rules for the class.

Something like that.

Also, there could only be one level 15 Druid in any given world, one level 14 on any geographic body, and a finite number of level 12s and 13s. You had to defeat one in combat and demote them to take their place (or the level 15 would gain an additional level and there'd be a single opening available for all contenders). (And a Druid 20 had, by far, the highest XP requirement of any class. 5 million total -- 3.5 million XP for the final 5 levels, plus another 1.5 for the first 15. Plus potential demotions. As opposed to 3.2 million or so for the Wizard. WHY DO I STILL REMEMBER ALL OF THIS)


And as I recall, there were no priests of concepts, it was patron deity or you're not a cleric.

Not exactly. Clerics had a god, nominally, but for the most part, there was no differences. Then there were settings where Gods became more nebulously defined (Dark Sun, Ravenloft, Spelljammer) and the necessity of a specific god was more-or-less ignored.




Paladins were also super restricted, requiring (among other high stats) 18 charisma

I'm pretty certain it was 17, not 18, but whatever


and being Human. That's right, until third edition, paladin was human only (and also very limited in what gods had paladins).

Except for settings which broke those rules.

Don't forget, except for a few classes for the Half-Elf, even if you were allowed to play a class with a non-human, you had a level cap. From as low as 8.

And Multiclassing v Dual Classing. And ...

[icefractal]

I think of it as Ranger:Druid :: Wizard:Cleric - a Druid is dedicated to nature and lets it guide them, a Ranger is just someone who understands nature enough to learn some of its magical side. Sort of like the Archivist.

[Urpriest]

Adepts and Archivists both have Divine casting via specialized knowledge: a few specific prayers to effect particular outcomes, not a personal connection to a deity. It seems reasonable that Rangers work the same way, just for Nature, and that the same applies to most of the "casts as Ranger" PrCs.

[Spore]

First of all, I prefer my rangers without spells because I heavily dislike the fluff of spells. Paladins should feel like Warpriests to me but Rangers aren't "Wardruids". They are nature attuned warriors and hunters. Hunting (and having a fully levelled AC) should be their schtick imho.

Personally I've seen Ranger spellcasting as some kind of "found it along the way" kind of style. The ranger has such a profound connection to nature that he can control nature to some extend. Maybe he befriended a treant or a dryad that thought them a miniscule part of druidic spellcasting. Maybe he saved a green dragon whelp. Or in the case of evil rangers, maybe he extorts and rips the spells out of nature at his whim.

[Wardog]

That is a (probably widespread) houserule. The rule says you get the feats for your deity's favored weapon. If you do not have a deity there is no way of determining what your deity's favored weapon is.

For the cleric to lose his powers the action must not only be against the deity's tenets, it must be a gross violation. So even if the orphan punching is a minor or normal violation the cleric can keep his powers.

You get feats for your deity's favored weapon.
If you have no deity, "deity's favored weapon" is null.
Therefore you get the feats for a null blade (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons/technological-weapons#TOC-Null-Blade)?


Further aiding this hypothesis is the fact they get racism against green people as a class feature.
You can be racist against your own race if you want. Although in one edition, only if you were evil. (Being racist against other races was apparently good).

[nedz]

Well, from what I recall of reading through some of the ADND books, there was a time when clerics actually had Very different class abilities depending on who their god was. This was back when Kits were a thing, like Archetypes are now. As a cleric you could pick up a priest kit based on your god and it would change around certain things, some priests got turn undead, where others didn't, some priests got a full bab, most didn't. And there was even a kit for a priest to punch people and do martial arts.



AD&D 1st/2nd//D&D Color Series default Clerics had a predefined set of abilities. They could wear heavy armor, could only use blunt weapons, didn't get strength above 18 (18/percentile was a fighter thing in AD&D), single attack per round (which was true for everyone but fighters), moderate THAC0 progression (think BAB), and there was no Miracle spell. They also had their Very Own XP chart (like most other classes) and you got +10% XP if you had a Wisdom of 16 or higher (Prime Requisites).

Then came (at various points) Faiths and Pantheons, Deities and Demigods, the various setting books (Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Lankimar, Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun, etc.), many of which added alternatives for Clerics. Increased spell access. Increased weapon options. Other weird abilities. This was independent from the Kits brought in by the Complete Cleric Handbook.

That's not how I ran it.

1E: Single set of Cleric spells, spell levels 1-7 only, and most spells were reversible.

2E: Cleric spells were divided into Spheres (about 17 IIRC) and different gods granted, several, different spheres. You also had the option of creating unique classes for each god. I think that there was a later book which provided kits for these — but I'd already worked out my own.

E.g. From my take on the Egyptian pantheon
Anhur, god of War
Spheres: All, Combat, Guardian, Healing, Necromantic, Protection, Sun, War, Wards
Clerics of Anhur are all joint classed Cleric/Fighters
Joint classed was a bit like gestalt only with a more expensive XP table.

[Sagetim]

Darn Kids. Get off of my LAWN!

Er, Uhm. Hi.

Sort of.

AD&D 1st/2nd//D&D Color Series default Clerics had a predefined set of abilities. They could wear heavy armor, could only use blunt weapons, didn't get strength above 18 (18/percentile was a fighter thing in AD&D), single attack per round (which was true for everyone but fighters), moderate THAC0 progression (think BAB), and there was no Miracle spell. They also had their Very Own XP chart (like most other classes) and you got +10% XP if you had a Wisdom of 16 or higher (Prime Requisites).

Then came (at various points) Faiths and Pantheons, Deities and Demigods, the various setting books (Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Lankimar, Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun, etc.), many of which added alternatives for Clerics. Increased spell access. Increased weapon options. Other weird abilities. This was independent from the Kits brought in by the Complete Cleric Handbook.

For instance, IIRC, Eilastree (CG daughter of Lolth/Goddess of the Good Drow) offered her clerics full Cleric and Druid spell access, use of the longsword, and gave up heavy armors. Yeah, it was broken. And we loved it.



Something like that.

Also, there could only be one level 15 Druid in any given world, one level 14 on any geographic body, and a finite number of level 12s and 13s. You had to defeat one in combat and demote them to take their place (or the level 15 would gain an additional level and there'd be a single opening available for all contenders). (And a Druid 20 had, by far, the highest XP requirement of any class. 5 million total -- 3.5 million XP for the final 5 levels, plus another 1.5 for the first 15. Plus potential demotions. As opposed to 3.2 million or so for the Wizard. WHY DO I STILL REMEMBER ALL OF THIS)



Not exactly. Clerics had a god, nominally, but for the most part, there was no differences. Then there were settings where Gods became more nebulously defined (Dark Sun, Ravenloft, Spelljammer) and the necessity of a specific god was more-or-less ignored.




I'm pretty certain it was 17, not 18, but whatever



Except for settings which broke those rules.

Don't forget, except for a few classes for the Half-Elf, even if you were allowed to play a class with a non-human, you had a level cap. From as low as 8.

And Multiclassing v Dual Classing. And ...

I knew there was someone who would correct and specify my random wanderings about ADND around here, thanks for that. I just didn't feel like getting really into a tangent to explain ADND stuff. But I like to think of ADND as the system that was 'broken and it was fun that way'. Like bloodlines from the Birthright setting. Good lord, you could roll up and get Regeneration as a natural ability. That's crazy and awesome. When I briefly tried running it, my players rolled up some very potent things, one of them even started with 20 intelligence as a dual classed fighter/wizard. Another had permanent protection from evil and whatever the attached ability for that was, and he was playing the party's dual classed rogue/wizard (I started them out at like, 250k xp, most of them were dual classed, one was a multiclass half elf ranger...druid? and the last one was a full on bard.)

[PseudoPanda]

I realized that "they learn it along the way" is an answer but felt like in core that was such an arcane thing and isn't really comparable to any other divine base class besides Archivist which needs a prayer book and such plus I was mainly focusing on what was around when Ranger was made in order to find the logic. Though I did forget about the adept so there's some support in core for someone simply learning divine magic. In a way a Ranger is like an Ur Priest in that he takes magic from a source (nature) and uses it against it though he's not necessarily evil (and not as OP but this is a conversation about the fluff).

[Sagetim]

That's not how I ran it.

1E: Single set of Cleric spells, spell levels 1-7 only, and most spells were reversible.

2E: Cleric spells were divided into Spheres (about 17 IIRC) and different gods granted, several, different spheres. You also had the option of creating unique classes for each god. I think that there was a later book which provided kits for these — but I'd already worked out my own.

E.g. From my take on the Egyptian pantheon
Anhur, god of War
Spheres: All, Combat, Guardian, Healing, Necromantic, Protection, Sun, War, Wards
Clerics of Anhur are all joint classed Cleric/Fighters
Joint classed was a bit like gestalt only with a more expensive XP table.

Joint Classed sounds a lot like multiclass. Did it average stuff between the classes? I think that's how some of the early multiclass systems worked. But yeah, in pre-3.0, clerics only had spells going from 1 to 7 (while wizards were called Mages or Magic Users or Illusionists or what have you and I think they had 1 to 9). Yes, that meant that level 0 spells was a new thing for 3.0, though some spells were specified as cantrips even though they were first level spells. I can't recall if that had any special effect on them.

[nedz]

Joint Classed sounds a lot like multiclass. Did it average stuff between the classes? I think that's how some of the early multiclass systems worked. But yeah, in pre-3.0, clerics only had spells going from 1 to 7 (while wizards were called Mages or Magic Users or Illusionists or what have you and I think they had 1 to 9). Yes, that meant that level 0 spells was a new thing for 3.0, though some spells were specified as cantrips even though they were first level spells. I can't recall if that had any special effect on them.

There was an optional system in the DMG (I think) for creating your own classes. You were also encouridged to do this for Clerics — Clerics of a Specific Mileaux. So the Joint class thing was sort of homebrew — using these rules. I think there were later books which did something like this for you, but I did this before they were published and saw no reason to change.

[DrMotives]

Darn Kids. Get off of my LAWN!
Don't forget, except for a few classes for the Half-Elf, even if you were allowed to play a class with a non-human, you had a level cap. From as low as 8.


Pretty sure most people house-ruled away those level caps, 8 isn't even the worse one after all. I remember the race Rastipedes, a centaur-centipede thing from the Complete Spacefarer's handbook, could be either fighters or wizards. It said no dual classing or multiclassing allowed, and the fighter cap was around 8-10 or so, but the wizard cap was 2. Who wants to make a wizard, single class only, that stops leveling up after hitting level 2? Yay, I got an extra 1d4 hp & another 1st level spell per day! Time to retire, I'm at my career's pinnacle!

[Andezzar]

You get feats for your deity's favored weapon.
If you have no deity, "deity's favored weapon" is null.
Therefore you get the feats for a null blade (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons/technological-weapons#TOC-Null-Blade)?Assuming this is not a joke, a) the PF war domain (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/cleric/domains/paizo---domains/war-domain) works quite differently, you don't get those feats for your deity's favored weapon. b) null is not equal to null blade.

[Sagetim]

Pretty sure most people house-ruled away those level caps, 8 isn't even the worse one after all. I remember the race Rastipedes, a centaur-centipede thing from the Complete Spacefarer's handbook, could be either fighters or wizards. It said no dual classing or multiclassing allowed, and the fighter cap was around 8-10 or so, but the wizard cap was 2. Who wants to make a wizard, single class only, that stops leveling up after hitting level 2? Yay, I got an extra 1d4 hp & another 1st level spell per day! Time to retire, I'm at my career's pinnacle!

As far as I can tell, every game of ADND had it's own binder of house rules that had things that particular DM came up with to make sense of the rules. I tried to run an ADND game, rules as written, but had to start house ruling the core rules to make things consistent. This was the result of the writing style. And sometimes it was a result of different books having the same rules (but written slightly differently) in them. I think it's fair to assume that a lot of DM's threw out the level cap rules, though in the DMG there was an optional rule to allow people to go beyond their racial level cap based on their prime ability score in that class.

I think a lot of the racial caps were also so low that the classes didn't get their mid level sweet spot. For example, mid level fighters (around level 9 or 10) became Lords, could get land, a fortress, and fighting men to follow them around and beat things up. Clerics of sufficient level could establish a shrine, mages could build a mages tower, and rogues probably got something too. Rangers, to get back towards a tangent near this topic, could gather animal followers if I recall correctly. So you could get like, 2d6 bears or tigers or something to follow you around and be a ranger with.

[Wardog]

Assuming this is not a joke,

It was a joke.

[Andezzar]

Ha Ha then.