New DM. Cleric deity question.

[raspin]

Hi, I'm a new Dm and I've been running a game for four other players through roll20.

My question relates to an instance in the game involving a PC who is playing a cleric of tempus but has one level in wizard. He was an initiate of the steel fang if anyone is up on FR (I just read the wikia).

Now tempus is CN god of war who believes in settling disputes with conflict, cowardice is forbidden, diplomats are thought of as underhand people who make things worse. So concerned is tempus with honour that his dogma states that unarmed foes should be armed before being attacked. It also states combat is the preferable resolution to conflict. Conflict and combat should be embraced and you should only flee from combat If it becomes apparent that it is unwinnable.

Now the pc has one level in wizard and has learnt the identify spell. In the second to last session he identified some items and there was a minor dispute about who should get them with another pc. After the session he asked if I would whisper him the outcome of his future identifications and I agreed.

Now the next session they had come across an item and he detected magic radiating off it. During camp he ritual identified it. It was a "charm of shifting priorities, +1 to attack or +1 ac for one hour once a day (they are low level). I whispered him the info and he was then asked about the item. He basically misled his comrades and told them it was a magic item usable by mages only and that was it. They accepted this explanation.

Now afterwards I messaged him and said his action weighed on his mind. Was it an honourable act to mislead his comrades. I also said he wondered why he misled them. Was it to avoid the possible conflict about who should receive the item?

Now I haven't told him to do anything or enforced anything, it's just a gentle reminder of the doctrine of the God who grants his power.That maybe lying for personal gain at the expense of comrades in arms might not be honorable and that misleading them may be at odds with his own doctrine.

He replied that he has done nothing wrong in terms of his doctrine. That strengthening himself is fine. That he is fine as long as he honors enemies in combat That he is CN so he should be able to lie and cheat as he likes. Now I have reminded him he can do as he wishes but his deity, in my eyes, may take a dim view of him misleading his allies.That he may be CN but as a CN cleric his doctrine trumps his meta alignment. Now, again, he is free to do whatever he likes but the issue seems to be he believes these sort of actions are in line with his faith and I don't agree.

I hoped the nudge of his conscience would nip in the bud a situation with him keeping all the best items and powering up as he manipulates his comrades in arms. He obviously feels he has found a clever way to power up which he feels he can argue isn't at odds with his deity. I disagree but am prepared to be wrong as I'm new to d&d and to dming. He has more experience with the game so I thought I'd seek impartial opinions.

anyone care to weigh in?

Thanks

[DanyBallon]

You gave him a good reminder that his actions might not please Tempus, do it a few more time if this ever come again, and if after all those reminder, then, one day he might end up not receiving any new spell after pryaing to his god after a long rest. This should remind the player that selecting a deity is not only for picking a domain.

Just don't do this after the next offense, your player must feel he had a chance to redeem himself before using such a punishment.

Aslo try to keep this within the roleplaying aspect of the game. The character is punished in game because he displeased his deity, it should not be a DM punishing the player.

[Satinavian]

Before you force any consequences per diety, ask yourself :

Do you really want him to solve intra-party conflicts like loot-distribution via force and violence ?



Doctrin is important for clerics, yes. But a bit metagaming and compromise to avoid PvP is usually in order and even expected.

[raspin]

Thanks for the reply and advice. So would you agree his actions are at odds with his deities doctrine?.

[raspin]

Satinavian conflict doest have to end in violence but avoiding conflict by dishonesty for a cleric whose deity is based on embracing conflict and honour can't be right either can it? He could have just said " this is the item, this what it does, I'm keeping it, any arguments? "

[downlobot]

Did everyone get an insight check vs the deception? And is everyone on board with this type of gameplay?

[Satinavian]

I think, avoiding conflict by lying might be against his faith.
But i don't think, trying to get loot he wants is against his faith. And i certainly don't think, his faith should lead him to share or look out for weaker party members.

So, a way to act more in line with his faith would not have been to give up the loot even if he wanted it, it would have been to fight over it. Which is not something, you, the DM, should encourage.


You are basically saying, his god is angry that his priest got the loot with lying to his allies instead of maiming or killing them.




PCs often need contrieved reasons to work together or travel together. You should not make it even harder by fueling open conflict.

[Douche]

I don't see how you're going to be able to do anything about the charm without it seeming like you're targeting him. Just make sure the next few items you give out are totally unusable by him. Perhaps give him a taste of his own medicine and say "This is a magic item usable only by not mages/clerics of Tempus"

[raspin]

His god would prefer he fought his allies than misled them like a diplomat but I have no doubt there are more than just those two resolutions to this situation.

As I said they disagreed previously over loot distribution, discussed it and agreed. Also he didn't actually have to take the loot, he chose to do so. It was found by the paladin who handed it in to be identified. Is his own PCs greed justification to ignore his doctrine? He didn't really need the item.

Maybe his characters greed is a compulsion. That's fine but it's the "this is perfectly reasonable and normal behaviour for a cleric of tempus cos I'm CN" I disagree with.

As I said before. I'm prepared to be wrong in my opinion.

[Satinavian]

The problem is :

You want a fair, diplomatic solution
We have an unfair, deceptive solution.

What his god wants is a forceful violent solution. He doesn't care about fair/unfair and he dispises deception as much as diplomacy.

So ... you won't get what you want by bringing the god into it.

[raspin]

No, tempus very much does care about both honour and fair and unfair. He frowns on fighting those unable to defend themselves or picking fights you know you can easily win for the sake of it. He is not mindlessly blood thirsty but more a chivalrous war monger

Also, all I want is for him to do what he likes but understand his religion has rules he doesn't have to follow, but that if he doesn't it may have consequences. The issue is he seems to think it is in line with his faith. Hence I am seeking people views who are impartial.

[Satinavian]

Honor can mean a lot of different things. In Your OP you pretty much talk about tempus preferring to settle disputes by conflict and diplomats being seen as underhanded (probably honorless) and making things worse.
Yet you somehow want that the group talks loot disputes out until they reach a reasonable solution. As in "solving conflicts with word in a diplomatic way".

I have a very hard time bringing those two things together. You might be correct that what the cleric has done is not Tempus' way. But talking it out is neither.

[DanyBallon]

The character could have made a strong argument, that the charm would be better for him to use, no fight needed there. But he lied out of greed instead. This goes against Tempus doctrine, but is still a single offense. The character can believe he was doing the right thing. But repeated similar offense should have an impact someday. This could all be part of roleplaying the character an could lead to interesting character development.

[Ninja_Prawn]

There are a lot of factors in play here.

Metagaming. If the player's selfishness (and misconceptions about the meaning of alignment*) is making the game less fun for everyone else, something needs to be done. Ideally, this should be solved out of character, away from the table, because that's where the problem is. If the others are fine with it, you might not need to do anything.

Clerics. When someone decides to play a cleric, they are volunteering to place their character at the mercy of their god(s). It's an open invitation for the DM to mess with them - but you should only use that invitation if it advances the game.

Tempus himself. Different people will have different interpretations when it comes to religion, but I view Tempus as quite a hands-off deity. As long as wars happen, he's okay. Helm and Torm are the chivalrous, lawful war-mongers. You might be able to make an argument about Tempus being displeased with the use of subterfuge, but I wouldn't advise it. Deception is a vital aspect of war that a cleric of Tempus should understand and deploy when required.

*I'm referring to "he is CN so he should be able to lie and cheat as he likes". The word 'should' implies moral truth; that he has an inviolable right to do as he likes, but this is absolutely not true. No man is able to do (let alone lie and cheat) as he likes because actions have consequences. If he lies to, steals from, cheats and undermines his friends and allies, they're going to kick him out of the party sooner or later. NPCs could do much worse than that. Having an alignment doesn't give you the right to do anything. Writing 'evil' on your character sheet doesn't mean it's suddenly ok that you do evil acts!

[SharkForce]

i would say it doesn't fit tempus' doctrine, though it certainly is within the bounds of CN alignment. i would say you don't need to tell him he feels bad about it, but telling him that he feels like it is against tempus' doctrine is perfectly reasonable, and warning that continued behaviour may result in consequences he won't like.

also, i don't see why he would be compelled to kill or maim allies in the process of loot distribution. combat can mean you fight until someone surrenders or otherwise gives up, for one thing, and while priests of tempus are *encouraged* to use combat to resolve conflict, i very much doubt that tempus literally expects his clerics to use combat to resolve *all* conflicts without exception.

i would say that a probable method of loot distribution that follows the doctrine of tempus would more likely be that, once the properties of the magic item are known (and i definitely agree that using deception, against allies no less, to get what he wants is not going to please tempus), anyone who feels they should be entitled to the item can fight for the privilege of having it.

of course, he should also accept that if the rest of the group wants a different method of loot distribution, honourable combat could be used to resolve what method of loot distribution is used, and if he doesn't have the strength of arms to compel the rest of the group to do things his way, then the conflict was still resolved with violence.

[raspin]

Thanks ninja.

The party haven't yet realised. Noone asked if they thought he was lying.

Shark force. ..that is pretty much nailed on how I see it

[endur]

Anyone can figure out what a magic item does in 5e-- all you have to do is observe the magic item during a short rest. page 136 in DMG. Identify is no longer necessary (unless you want to figure out the magic item faster than during a short rest).

So the other characters will see that the magic item(s) aren't "restricted to mages only."

[raspin]

Hi endur, we play items need identifying so items hold a bit more mystery for a little longer. The excitement was palpable when they had a black pearl with arcane itching on it they couldn't identify. Now its less of an issue.

Ironically they trust the pc cos he's a religious type. :-p

[raspin]

Did everyone get an insight check vs the deception? And is everyone on board with this type of gameplay?

Sorry. Missed your post. No one asked for a check or asked do I think he is lying". Doesn't it need to be prompted from the players? If so, no, they took what he said as the truth.

[Sir cryosin]

How many magic iteams does he have because you can only have 3 iteams attune to you. So there is only so many things he can use. I nevered played any other dnd besides 5e but my Groupe has years playing other editions were you can have a magic iteam attune to each part of your body and they were metapower gaming and was hit by that wall after that we talked out how loot will distributed. And if someone had something the other liked or need you trade or sell at a lower price because we are in a party together after all.

[raspin]

Hi, well most of them have one and they are very low level. They are more magic trinkets. He has two.

[downlobot]

Sorry. Missed your post. No one asked for a check or asked do I think he is lying". Doesn't it need to be prompted from the players? If so, no, they took what he said as the truth.

This is my bias against the kind of stuff this guy is pulling, so if your party is cool with this kind of game, don't worry about it. but I don't think they need to ask for a roll. If you don't want to offer a roll, compare other pcs passive insight vs this guy's passive deception.

Edit, in non gake terms, we don't spend a lot of time actively looking to see if someone is lying to us, especially (let's call them coworkers) or other people we work closely with. But we can realize it, or suspect, without actively looking for it.

[mgshamster]

This is my bias against the kind of stuff this guy is pulling, so if your party is cool with this kind of game, don't worry about it. but I don't think they need to ask for a roll. If you don't want to offer a roll, compare other pcs passive insight vs this guy's passive deception.

This is solid advice. Sometimes players don't think to ask for something, but you want them to get a hint anyways. Use their passive scores for these situations.

[Laserlight]

Sorry. Missed your post. No one asked for a check or asked do I think he is lying". Doesn't it need to be prompted from the players? If so, no, they took what he said as the truth.

I wouldn't necessarily require the player to ask for a check. You probably don't go into every conversation consciously thinking "I wonder if he's lying? How about now? How about that sentence?"; you just pick up little cues that make you suspicious. At my table, I'd roll for the liar's Persuade vs everyone else's passive Insight. I wouldn't tell anyone the reason for the roll, unless someone's Insight was good enough for them to be suspicious. I might tell the cleric "You don't think anyone saw through your lie...except Tempus, of course." (shadow monked)

FWIW, IMO, YMMV:
a. A player who's willing to lie to the other players to grab some extra loot will probably cause other problems within the group. It's okay if I'm running that type of game (Paranoia, for example) and everyone's on board with it, but otherwise I make it clear at the character design stage that I don't want characters who screw over their nominal allies.
b. There are other options for loot distribution than "lie to the party" and "fight to the death over it."
c. All warfare is based on deception, but that's against the enemy. I doubt Tempus would approve of lying to comrades in arms.
d. When I'm playing CN, I have no moral inhibitions about lying or breaking laws etc....but that doesn't mean I get a free pass from anyone other than my own conscience. "It's only illegal if I get caught", not "I don't have to worry about consequences".

[JoeJ]

If this character was lying to an NPC, wouldn't you require them to roll Deception vs. the NPC's Insight? You should give the other PCs the same consideration. If metagaming is a concern, make the Insight checks passive and ask the lying player to roll a d20 without saying what it's for.

[JNAProductions]

How does this player play for the rest of the game? Is he a good player? Does he cause trouble? Because, from what little we know, he does sound kinda like a problem player. It might help if we knew more.

[BiPolar]

You could also give the item a quirk (from page 143 of DM Guide) It wouldn't show up on the identification but could make it difficult to use (Hungry, Painful, Possessive, Slothful.)

[raspin]

When he did it I was a little surprised so wasn't sure what to roll if anything.. What is passive insight? Is that just your insight skill without a roll. At the time I felt, without a prompt from the players, it would have been unfair to call for insight. I was a little surprised no one did query it.

[JNAProductions]

Passive Insight is 10+your Insight score. (Dis)Advantage is (-)+5 to that.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Before you force any consequences per diety, ask yourself :

Do you really want him to solve intra-party conflicts like loot-distribution via force and violence ?



Doctrin is important for clerics, yes. But a bit metagaming and compromise to avoid PvP is usually in order and even expected.

Yes.

Take turns giving each other friction burns on their arms. Strength Check (Athletics) versus Con Saving Throw (contest).

Whoever wins gets the item.

(not my fault that endurance isn't a skill anymore, con saving throw replaces that.)

[raspin]

Thanks for the replies, opinions and advice guys. I might just point the player to this thread so he can see it isn't just me being a bad dm :-)

Maybe he will post how he sees it if he feels I've not represented the situ correctly.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Thanks for the replies, opinions and advice guys. I might just point the player to this thread so he can see it isn't just me being a bad dm :-)

Might want to watch out...

Online forums. You will never find a more wretched hive of minchins and powergaming.

[downlobot]

I wish I'd known this before. When he did it I was a little surprised. What is passive insight? Is that just your insight skill without a roll? The players not believing him would make it very tough to pull off and ruin his credibility. At the time I felt, without a prompt from the players, it would have been unfair to call for insight. I was a little surprised no one did.

This might give some insight into what game the other players think they're playing vs what game this guy is playing, if you haven't discussed it before now. I think the default assumption, at least where i've sat, is that players are honest with each other about rewards. It's fun to roleplay out characters lying to each other (hey brother, could you cast remove disease on me? Why, are you ok? Yeah, yeah, just a cold... ... ...ok, it burns when i pee, happy now?), but the assumption is that doesn't cross over into "stuff"/rewards. Because then that's players lying to players, not just characters lying to characters.

That is my bias, though. It's up to your group. How this guy reacts to getting called, though, will likely be telling.

[raspin]

I've explained to the player that I should have made insight checks and shown him the thread. He is going to not risk getting found out by the group and, if he wants a item just say so and sort it by arm wrestling, dueling or rock, parchment, dagger but not deceit. Thanks guys. :-)

[Safety Sword]

You need to break this into two issues.

The intra-party issue: A party member is being deceptive and that could lead to conflict later if it's a pattern.

The Cleric-Deity issue: Clerics are the mouthpieces and examples of their faith to the world. It's totally OK for a God to send a message (or my favourite, a sign) of their displeasure at the Cleric's actions, if in fact they are not fulfilling their expectation.

Start with something small. Perhaps a predator with odd behaviour (running from its usual prey). Two animals who are actively in conflict, suddenly stopping, staring at the Cleric for a few seconds and running away together in (*spit* *curse*) harmony.

If your Cleric player doesn't pick up on these sorts of things, then allow an insight check to "read the signs" and go a bit heavier. Temporary loss of a domain power, spell slots or similar are usually a strong enough warning that everything isn't so rosy with the guy upstairs (or downstairs, as the case my be).

Edit: I was a little late to the party here...

[Crusadr]

I see this issue has apparently been solved but I still feel the need to put in a few words. I think it's just assuming a bit too much that a god, any god, would really bother going into that much detail into the lives of every one of their followers. Surely the gods, unless they are very interfering care more for the big picture, and long term goals rather than something minute like this?

I feel like the gods having a broader view of things would care more about their followers working on the spirit of the law as it were, they surely would know better than to expect a follower would be perfect and match their ideals at all times. I would never even think of threatening to have a god threaten to take the powers of a follower away unless they were completely betraying that god for a new one, or were perhaps a high enough level that that particular follower actually did matter more than the thousands, or tens of thousands more followers the god actually has.

[Safety Sword]

I see this issue has apparently been solved but I still feel the need to put in a few words. I think it's just assuming a bit too much that a god, any god, would really bother going into that much detail into the lives of every one of their followers. Surely the gods, unless they are very interfering care more for the big picture, and long term goals rather than something minute like this?

I feel like the gods having a broader view of things would care more about their followers working on the spirit of the law as it were, they surely would know better than to expect a follower would be perfect and match their ideals at all times. I would never even think of threatening to have a god threaten to take the powers of a follower away unless they were completely betraying that god for a new one, or were perhaps a high enough level that that particular follower actually did matter more than the thousands, or tens of thousands more followers the god actually has.

In the Forgotten Realms the power of the Gods is directly tied to their numbers of followers and their devotion. The Gods routinely "interfere". Also, Clerics are a special case since they are the representatives of said Gods.

[Suteinu]

I love situations like this as a GM and as a player. Tempus has his standards, and a cleric aught to be a paragon of that for which their deity stands (more so, in some ways, than paladins.) Sure, even clerics will fall short, but they will be held to a greater standard than other worshipers. A cleric whose personal tendency runs counter to the god he owes may be played with a "Why'd you pick me, then," attitude, which can be lots of fun; a hero being chided! The heroic journey could lead the character to learn how to deal with the short comings with which the god confronts him, or perhaps to rebel against that god and allying with another. There are many ways to make this situation into, potentially the best part of the whole story!

[raspin]

...unless the player feels strongly his actions are permitted by his god and will then feel he is being targeted unfairly by the dm, rather than having his knuckles justifiably wrapped by his god, which was the main issue here.

[Satinavian]

And probably still is.

Or do player and GM suddenly agree on what Tempus wants ?

[raspin]

Tbh I think the major contributing factor is that I should have rolled insight and will in future situations like this. If you get caught lying to comrades what do you do? What do they do? Tempus may or may not like it (he wouldn't, I'm DM) but the other pcs certainly wouldn't.