What Is the Cleric? [RANT]

[GreyBlack]

First of all, I apologize in advance for the rant; this is something which has been gnawing at me for a long time which I have been meaning to address and ask for feedback on. Quite frankly, it bugs me and I want answers.

Also, to be clear, I think that this has been a very gradual thing over the years since 3e, and not something systemic to only 5e. Also, I understand the role they are supposed to play in the party; they are supposed to be support casters whose shindig is that they gain various powers based on religion. Great, I can get behind that. But, there's something that still bugs me.

Okay, so. Clerics. What, exactly, is their deal?

In the origins of D&D, we had a strong theoretical basis for clerics to be something along the lines of Archbishop Turpin or a holy exorcist who followed some ordained mission. In the origins, they were designed to be something of 60% of the Fighting-Man (fighter) and the Magic User: They could use armor (but not weapons) like the Fighter, but could also cast spells (but not as many) as the Magic User. If I may adopt modern nomenclature, they would be considered something of a 2/3 spellcaster rather than the full spellcaster of the magic user. Their deal was that they were basically the inquisition come to town to kick your [REDACTED] and steal the treasure from the nearby keep.

Obviously, this did not last because the Paladin became an even more watered down version of that Fighter/Magic User hybrid. While the Fighter required significant stats to maintain, they still occupied that same middle-ground role, except focusing more on the fighting side than the spellcasting side. Think more of a 1/4 spellcaster than a 2/3, as they didn't get spells until much later levels. In addition, the alignment requirement of the Paladin changed them quite a deal, and as such they could not play the same way as that ordained exorcist did. Paladins weren't representatives of the gods; they were just really special fighters.

This similar delineation lasted into 2e, which was fantastic. Priestly spell progression only went to level 7 spells instead of out to level 9. that maintained that middle-ground 60% of all classes role they occupied in 1e. The Cleric was 60% fighter, 60% magic user.

Then something weird happened. I don't know if it was a shift in the culture or in 3e itself, but we then began to see the Cleric looked on less as that 60% hybrid and more as something akin to a full spellcaster. However, they retained that same armor ability and higher HP which put them in that more frontline role that they had formerly been made to play. In getting level 9 spells, there was a shift away from clerics as the Inquisition, as it were, into more the role of being Priests.

And here is where my trouble comes in. Ever since, and even into 5e, there has been a gradual shift in the focus of Cleric, away from the role of vampire hunter/exorcist that they had been originally and into more of a priestly role. In doing so, I feel that they have confused players as to what clerics actually are.

I'd like to take a moment to illuminate this point by asking about archytypal characters.

Who is an example of an archetypal fighter from fiction? How about a barbarian? How about a wizard? Monk?

Now, ask yourself what character from fiction you picture when you picture a cleric. Dollars to donuts, you'll picture something less like an Archbishop Turpin, the Knights Templar, or the Teutonic Knights and something more like Anduin Wrynn from Warcraft. Which is fine; I think Anduin is an interesting character in his own right, but it tells me something fundamental about how we view the cleric nowadays.

Now, this isn't me just saying "THINGS WERE BETTER IN THE OLD DAIZ!!!" Rather, I think that, because the concept of the cleric has evolved, maybe we should update it to be something more flexible than the current, somewhat confused model of the cleric. This is especially pressing because, in the 5e update, Paladins were given a significant spellcasting boost (a needed boost, to my mind, but one which does undermine the mental space that the Cleric is supposed to occupy). However, given my previous Cleric examples, I would argue that the Paladin now occupies those places, leaving the Cleric with no real sense of what they're about to the outside viewer; they look like they should be Anduin, but they're supposed to get up in the battle too much, which they're really not equipped to anyway.

Now, before someone points out that the different domains grant different powers to model the different types of priests... I agree. That's an excellent model to bring out. That said, thematically and structurally, I think that there's too much overlap with the Paladin. If we were to allow for more of those archetypes for the Cleric to play out, I think that more would need to be stripped out of the Cleric's base abilities and more focus would need to be put into their domain powers and spell abilities. We should make the Cleric on par in terms of spellcasting potential with the Wizard, with various domains tinkering with the types of weapons and armor they can get (e.g. all clerics can only wear Light armor, but can get access to medium or heavy armors based on what domain they take).

As is, the Cleric and the Paladin occupy too much of the same ideological place, which only makes them feel redundant. If Clerics and Paladins are to persist, it is my contention that their niches should be even more cleanly delineated than the 5e model currently allows. Clerics should, going forward, either move to reoccupy their previous niche of being 60% spellcaster, 60% fighter, or should fully embrace their role as a primary spellcaster.

./rant

Sorry for the rant all! Just needed to get that off my chest!

[Grey Watcher]

First of all, I apologize in advance for the rant; this is something which has been gnawing at me for a long time which I have been meaning to address and ask for feedback on. Quite frankly, it bugs me and I want answers.

Also, to be clear, I think that this has been a very gradual thing over the years since 3e, and not something systemic to only 5e. Also, I understand the role they are supposed to play in the party; they are supposed to be support casters whose shindig is that they gain various powers based on religion. Great, I can get behind that. But, there's something that still bugs me.

Okay, so. Clerics. What, exactly, is their deal?

In the origins of D&D, we had a strong theoretical basis for clerics to be something along the lines of Archbishop Turpin or a holy exorcist who followed some ordained mission. In the origins, they were designed to be something of 60% of the Fighting-Man (fighter) and the Magic User: They could use armor (but not weapons) like the Fighter, but could also cast spells (but not as many) as the Magic User. If I may adopt modern nomenclature, they would be considered something of a 2/3 spellcaster rather than the full spellcaster of the magic user. Their deal was that they were basically the inquisition come to town to kick your [REDACTED] and steal the treasure from the nearby keep.

Obviously, this did not last because the Paladin became an even more watered down version of that Fighter/Magic User hybrid. While the Fighter required significant stats to maintain, they still occupied that same middle-ground role, except focusing more on the fighting side than the spellcasting side. Think more of a 1/4 spellcaster than a 2/3, as they didn't get spells until much later levels. In addition, the alignment requirement of the Paladin changed them quite a deal, and as such they could not play the same way as that ordained exorcist did. Paladins weren't representatives of the gods; they were just really special fighters.

This similar delineation lasted into 2e, which was fantastic. Priestly spell progression only went to level 7 spells instead of out to level 9. that maintained that middle-ground 60% of all classes role they occupied in 1e. The Cleric was 60% fighter, 60% magic user.

Then something weird happened. I don't know if it was a shift in the culture or in 3e itself, but we then began to see the Cleric looked on less as that 60% hybrid and more as something akin to a full spellcaster. However, they retained that same armor ability and higher HP which put them in that more frontline role that they had formerly been made to play. In getting level 9 spells, there was a shift away from clerics as the Inquisition, as it were, into more the role of being Priests.

And here is where my trouble comes in. Ever since, and even into 5e, there has been a gradual shift in the focus of Cleric, away from the role of vampire hunter/exorcist that they had been originally and into more of a priestly role. In doing so, I feel that they have confused players as to what clerics actually are.

I'd like to take a moment to illuminate this point by asking about archytypal characters.

Who is an example of an archetypal fighter from fiction? How about a barbarian? How about a wizard? Monk?

Now, ask yourself what character from fiction you picture when you picture a cleric. Dollars to donuts, you'll picture something less like an Archbishop Turpin, the Knights Templar, or the Teutonic Knights and something more like Anduin Wrynn from Warcraft. Which is fine; I think Anduin is an interesting character in his own right, but it tells me something fundamental about how we view the cleric nowadays.

Now, this isn't me just saying "THINGS WERE BETTER IN THE OLD DAIZ!!!" Rather, I think that, because the concept of the cleric has evolved, maybe we should update it to be something more flexible than the current, somewhat confused model of the cleric. This is especially pressing because, in the 5e update, Paladins were given a significant spellcasting boost (a needed boost, to my mind, but one which does undermine the mental space that the Cleric is supposed to occupy). However, given my previous Cleric examples, I would argue that the Paladin now occupies those places, leaving the Cleric with no real sense of what they're about to the outside viewer; they look like they should be Anduin, but they're supposed to get up in the battle too much, which they're really not equipped to anyway.

Now, before someone points out that the different domains grant different powers to model the different types of priests... I agree. That's an excellent model to bring out. That said, thematically and structurally, I think that there's too much overlap with the Paladin. If we were to allow for more of those archetypes for the Cleric to play out, I think that more would need to be stripped out of the Cleric's base abilities and more focus would need to be put into their domain powers and spell abilities. We should make the Cleric on par in terms of spellcasting potential with the Wizard, with various domains tinkering with the types of weapons and armor they can get (e.g. all clerics can only wear Light armor, but can get access to medium or heavy armors based on what domain they take).

As is, the Cleric and the Paladin occupy too much of the same ideological place, which only makes them feel redundant. If Clerics and Paladins are to persist, it is my contention that their niches should be even more cleanly delineated than the 5e model currently allows. Clerics should, going forward, either move to reoccupy their previous niche of being 60% spellcaster, 60% fighter, or should fully embrace their role as a primary spellcaster.

./rant

Sorry for the rant all! Just needed to get that off my chest!

I strongly suspect this is part of why 5e Clerics don't get heavy armor by default (specific Domains do, but not the base chasis). I think you're right in that this is partially due to the Paladin stepping into the part-priest-part-warrior archetype.

The armor proficiencies are probably a concession to the fact that the Cleric is essentially the combat medic; she has to keep well protected because she's gotta get within touch range of the Fighter to heal him, which ALSO entails getting within the enemies' reach.

I agree there's room for a more pure priest type character, similar to the original Final Fantasy's White Mage. But I don't mind having multiple settings on the dial between Warrior on one end and Priest on the other. The D&D Cleric is more priest than warrior, the Paladin more warrior than priest.

You're not wrong in that the roles are not clearly delineated, I just happen to see that as a case of "it's not a bug, it's a feature."

[GreyBlack]

I strongly suspect this is part of why 5e Clerics don't get heavy armor by default (specific Domains do, but not the base chasis). I think you're right in that this is partially due to the Paladin stepping into the part-priest-part-warrior archetype.

The armor proficiencies are probably a concession to the fact that the Cleric is essentially the combat medic; she has to keep well protected because she's gotta get within touch range of the Fighter to heal him, which ALSO entails getting within the enemies' reach.

I agree there's room for a more pure priest type character, similar to the original Final Fantasy's White Mage. But I don't mind having multiple settings on the dial between Warrior on one end and Priest on the other. The D&D Cleric is more priest than warrior, the Paladin more warrior than priest.

You're not wrong in that the roles are not clearly delineated, I just happen to see that as a case of "it's not a bug, it's a feature."

I'd be down with that dial; I guess I just wish there was an even more extreme end of the dial, too. Maybe make it more like:

Priest: Full spellcaster
Cleric: 2/3 spellcaster, 1/3 warrior
Paladin: 1/3 spellcaster, 2/3 warrior
Fighter: ... fighter.

[napoleon_in_rag]

As is, the Cleric and the Paladin occupy too much of the same ideological place, which only makes them feel redundant. If Clerics and Paladins are to persist, it is my contention that their niches should be even more cleanly delineated than the 5e model currently allows. Clerics should, going forward, either move to reoccupy their previous niche of being 60% spellcaster, 60% fighter, or should fully embrace their role as a primary spellcaster.



I agree that cleric are kind of redundant. With short rests and long rests, you don't need a party healer as much as in previous editions. I also feel that some of the domains overlap too much with certain classes:

Nature Domain overlaps with Druid.
War domain overlaps with Paladin.
Trickery Domain overlaps with Bard.

It comes down to 5e giving most classes spell casting ability. Being a spell caster in 5e isn't as special.

[No brains]

It's too close to real world history/religion to get into detail, but a lot of archetypal clerics can be found as figures in real-world epics.

Marvel's Thor could count as a cleric. He uses a bludgeoning weapon, wears armor, wields powerful magic, and does so in the name of Odin.

Again, this is very hard to discuss without crossing forum lines. Doing research with an open mind can be useful.



On a freer topic, I also think that balance and fun are part of why the cleric gets heavy armor. In Final Fantasy, the player plays as the whole party, so a White Mage with no armor is an acceptable part of the player's entire strategy. In D&D, where one player often only gets one character, the responsibility of using their magic to heal the party needs to come with some sort of reward or at least a fallback. Armor proficiency is who watches a party's watchman and keeps everyone from being screwed out of hp or a fun time. Low offense and a high AC keep the party's lifeline from being a strategic arrow magnet and keeps the player from just getting everyone else snacks while they wait for a revive or re-roll.

[Unoriginal]

Thematically, Clerics and Paladins are separate by the fact the Cleric is a Chosen One of a deity, which makes them miracle-makers, while the Paladin is a combatant whose intense dedication to their convictions and Oath empowers.

Mechanically, the Cleric is a not-blasty spellcaster who hit you with a stick in melee rather than use damage cantrips, while the Paladin is a martial who has spells for nova power.

[caden_varn]

I think the overlap is an improvement - it gives multiple ways to get the same base concept with slightly different focuses, so you can get closer to your ideal concept. I also think having no single class as needed is a definite improvement. Having to have at least one of a specific class in a party limits choice & can force people to play classes they'd rather not, be that cleric, rogue or whatever.

[Tanarii]

The problem here is, you're not comparing them to the right class when thinking about the design space and what they are. Clerics share the design space with Bards & Druids, that of Healer / buffer / debuffer. Paladins are in the same design space as Barbarians and Fighters, that of warriors.

Each class started with which of the four roles the class generally occupies:
- Warrior
- scout / skirmish
- healer/buffer/debuffer
- arcane nuke

Then they do some special features and add a dash of what other roles or classes do.

It's basically the same as the way 4e did it, but with different roles and not called out explicitly.

[GreyBlack]

The problem here is, you're not comparing them to the right class when thinking about the design space and what they are. Clerics share the design space with Bards & Druids, that of Healer / buffer / debuffer. Paladins are in the same design space as Barbarians and Fighters, that of warriors.

Each class started with which of the four roles the class generally occupies:
- Warrior
- scout / skirmish
- healer/buffer/debuffer
- arcane nuke

Then they do some special features and add a dash of what other roles or classes do.

It's basically the same as the way 4e did it, but with different roles and not called out explicitly.

If that's true, then I argue that they should go farther with the cleric; they should make them even more back line than they already are. I would love a character concept of some robed priest being in the back line channeling divine power to improve his allies capabilities. That's a tough sell when clerics are, baseline, proficient in the same armor type as a ranger or barbarian.

[Tanarii]

If that's true, then I argue that they should go farther with the cleric; they should make them even more back line than they already are. I would love a character concept of some robed priest being in the back line channeling divine power to improve his allies capabilities. That's a tough sell when clerics are, baseline, proficient in the same armor type as a ranger or barbarian.
Clerics, Druids and Bards aren't "back line" :smallconfused:

And you apparently missed the part where I said they splash other roles and classes. Clerics generally splash a little to a lot of the warrior's role. Just like Rangers, which are scouts/skirmishers, splash quite a lot of the warrior role. Enough so that many people confuse them both classes for warriors.

Insisting that each class be "pure" for their role misses the point.

[napoleon_in_rag]

I think the overlap is an improvement - it gives multiple ways to get the same base concept with slightly different focuses, so you can get closer to your ideal concept. I also think having no single class as needed is a definite improvement. Having to have at least one of a specific class in a party limits choice & can force people to play classes they'd rather not, be that cleric, rogue or whatever.

Maybe the issue is in early editions, you needed a cleric in the party. I think you were given back 1d3 hp per night's rest in editions 2e and earlier. Without the cleric, most adventures could not be completed. It also meant that, as a low level cleric, all your spells were Cure Light Wounds. Which was pretty boring.

I also remember fights over who played the cleric. "I was the cleric last time. It's John's turn to be the cleric."

In 5e, no one class is required for a successful party. You can argue that you need at least 1 martial, 1 caster, and 1 skill monkey, but there are many different classes that can fill each role.

[GreyBlack]

Clerics, Druids and Bards aren't "back line" :smallconfused:

And you apparently missed the part where I said they splash other roles and classes. Clerics generally splash a little to a lot of the warrior's role. Just like Rangers, which are scouts/skirmishers, splash quite a lot of the warrior role. Enough so that many people confuse them both classes for warriors.

Insisting that each class be "pure" for their role misses the point.

Just as I believe you missed mine.

My argument is less about pure mechanics and more about the fluff and how that interplay has changed the role of the cleric over the years. In my opinion, the concept of the cleric has changed over the years while the mechanics haven't changed enough with it; as such it may be time to consider either scrapping the classic conception and mechanics to move forward to something less tonally dissonant or returning it to that former conception, which would put it in direct competition with the paladin.

[Tanarii]

A healer/buffer/debuffer with a medium to strong splash of warrior capabilities is not dissonant with what the cleric used to be.

[Naanomi]

Archetypical Paladin: knight of the round table, or companions of Charlemagne... inspirational warriors defined by their unwavering moral strength, which may include peity but not in particular

Cleric: any of the sainted crusaders... especially prominent templars (though de Molay is more paladiny) or hospitillars, or more martial arms of the inquisition

Paladins are easier to find examples of, because we tend to tell stories of high-Charisma types. I’d argue that by making Paladins not require rare and exceptional stat rolls, you broaden their scope into Cleric territory, rather than it being clerics that are poorly defined

[PhoenixPhyre]

From a fluff perspective they're completely different, although with unifying themes.

Clerics channel the might of their chosen God. Their power comes entirely from that source and depends on their faith and understanding of divine will. Since adventuring clerics are constantly in the line of fire, they're trained as secondary combatants (with some having more martial focus than others). Without their spells they're relatively weak.

Paladins gain their power from their Oath--more precisely they're arm-wrestling the universe into submission through force of will and strength of conviction. You can be a completely atheistic paladin (except in the FR, where being an atheistic anything is a bad idea). They're front-line combatants first, spell-casters secondarily (if at all--many paladins use their slots for Divine Smite and rarely if ever cast a spell).

If anything (in the default fluff) there's more overlap with druids than with paladins.

And you can make a robed support just fine with a cleric--take Light, Trickery, or Knowledge domains, push DEX (so you're wearing light armor) and focus on playing support instead of blasting.

From a mechanical perspective, they play completely differently. Clerics are tough, but aren't very smitey. Paladins are tough and smitey. Many clerics can get by wearing light armor and dumping strength (Knowledge, Trickery, Death), while yet others rarely wield weapons at all (the various laser cleric builds). Paladins are built around heavy armor and martial weapons.

Clerics are support (buffs/healing) with survivability built in, while paladins are focused around absorbing damage and dealing damage.

Their spells are very different as well--most cleric spells are utility or buffs (even the damaging ones tend to have riders that help others) while a huge chunk of the paladin list is about making them better at blowing things up.

From a game design perspective, having a "stand in the back and heal" person who can only buff (but can't actually fight) is boring. That's an NPC, not a PC. Either they're required (ugh) or they're useless (ugh). And having yet another robed, no-weapon spell-casting-only person invokes serious overlap with sorcerers and wizards.

[GreyBlack]

Archetypical Paladin: knight of the round table, or companions of Charlemagne... inspirational warriors defined by their unwavering moral strength, which may include peity but not in particular

Cleric: any of the sainted crusaders... especially prominent templars (though de Molay is more paladiny) or hospitillars, or more martial arms of the inquisition

Paladins are easier to find examples of, because we tend to tell stories of high-Charisma types. I’d argue that by making Paladins not require rare and exceptional stat rolls, you broaden their scope into Cleric territory, rather than it being clerics that are poorly defined

So. I'm just going to put this out front: I'm personally aware of the different orders in history whom could be considered clerics. This isn't a question of my not being able to find answers. I'm more concerned that, at least in the circles I've played in, the immediate image which jumps to mind isn't someone like Tomas De Torquemada or Jacques De Molay, but rather someone more like the pope or Anduin. The archetype has changed since it was conceived. Shouldn't we create some room for that?

[PhoenixPhyre]

So. I'm just going to put this out front: I'm personally aware of the different orders in history whom could be considered clerics. This isn't a question of my not being able to find answers. I'm more concerned that, at least in the circles I've played in, the immediate image which jumps to mind isn't someone like Tomas Dr Torquemada or Jacques De Molay, but rather someone more like the pope or Anduin. The archetype has changed since it was conceived. Shouldn't we create some room for that?

No, because those don't work in the framework that exists. Even most MMOs have moved away from the helpless healer design, because no one wanted to do it. Having to switch specs to do anything is bad design. There are no non-combat PCs.

For a no-armor divine support, go with a divine soul sorcerer instead. It can be very effective and fits the archetype very well.

[Corpsecandle717]

@OP

I think I get you. I never played any additions to 3.0, but I've played everything since. I once attempted to create a 'caster priest' in 3.5, someone who stood in the background and serenely directed the wrath of their god on the battlefield without being soiled by the taint of it themselves. In the end it just didn't work out well, there just wasn't much to do if I wasn't really willing to wade in to a fight from time to time. Many of my class features simply sat unused and it lead to crap healing (never got high enough level to take Hierophant). I haven't tried to do anything like that since, but from what I've read, I feel like it would end up in a similar situation. I think it would be much better than the 3.5 experience depending on domain I picked, but there does feel like there's an intrinsic tie to a cleric at some point going into melee.

[Naanomi]

So. I'm just going to put this out front: I'm personally aware of the different orders in history whom could be considered clerics. This isn't a question of my not being able to find answers. I'm more concerned that, at least in the circles I've played in, the immediate image which jumps to mind isn't someone like Tomas De Torquemada or Jacques De Molay, but rather someone more like the pope or Anduin. The archetype has changed since it was conceived. Shouldn't we create some room for that?
I can’t think offhand of a historical or fictional setting where the Pope would be slogging through a dungeon in his vestments... if I were to make such a character, Acolyte background would be more inpotant than class... maybe Sunsoul monk, Lore Bard, Celestial Warlock, or Divine Soul?

((As an aside, I love the ‘pure healer’ archetype in games...))

[2D8HP]

Okay, clearly you need the archetypes explained

A Cleric is one such as Brother Maynard
http://subversiveinfluence.com/images/brothermaynard_168x190.png
holder of divine wisdom, such as the use of holy objects like:
http://www.seemsgoodmagic.com/sites/default/files/Holy%20Hand%20Grenade%20of%20Antioch.jpg
The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch! 'One of the sacred relics Brother Maynard carries with him.

"....And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, "O Lord, bless this Thy hand grenade that, with it, Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits in Thy mercy."
And the Lord did grin, and the people did feast upon the lambs and sloths and carp and anchovies and orangutans and breakfast cereals and fruit bats and large chu....

.....the Lord spake, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then, shalt thou count to three. No more. No less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, nor either count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then, lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it."
(angels sing)
(boom)

A Paladin is one such as Sir Galahad the Chaste
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/c4/b0/ea/c4b0ea846ad175450577d2eac14dd176.jpg
who faces terrible peril such as Castle Anthrax where there's eight-score young blonds and brunettes, all between 16 and 19 1/2, cut off in the castle with no one to protect them, living a lonely life: Bathing, dressing, undressing, making exciting underwear...

IT IS TOO PERILOUS!

Galahad: "Well, I could stay a bit longer..."

A Magic User is one such as Tim the Enchanter
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/7c/90/ff/7c90ff24302f1f9f0fbb1de1df6440e5.jpg
who uses eldrich arcane power to
(boom)

A Fighter is the class that I usually play
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fEvwlYaOuFI/VZ_Ix6FPr6I/AAAAAAAAG2A/AM-EPWNSS7g/s1600/Run-Meme.jpg




Each class started with which of the four roles the class generally occupies:
- Warrior
- scout / skirmish
- healer/buffer/debuffer
- arcane nuke


Each class started with which of the four roles 2D8HP the class generally occupies:
- Warrior
- scout / skirmish
- healer/buffer/debuffer
- arcane nuke

Fixed that for me.

[rbstr]

I think the current Cleric covers the cloth-armor priest-y type pretty well with the potent spellcasting domains.
Certainly it's not a d6 hit-die no-armor squishy class like you seem to want but you certainly can play a cleric that way if you want. Or do a Divine Soul.
D&D's baseline, even for casters, is to have light armor proficiency, with the exception of Soc and Wiz. It simply makes sense to wear some armor as an adventurer.

I suppose it would be neat to have an Alt-Life Domain Cleric that dropped the armor/weapon bonus proficiency for something else and traded Divine Strike for Potent casting.

[Pex]

When people ask why the gods don't answer when they pray for help against the forces of evil, the truth is they did, the answer was yes, and sent the cleric.

[ImproperJustice]

I think someone already touched on this, but most examples of Clerics could conceivably come from real life historical religious texts.
It is a fine line and I don’t want to cross forum lines, but conceivably from the Judeo/Christian background Elijah, any of the prophets, some of the Judges, and Christ’s Disiciples could all be examples of Clerics.

People going forth and doing miraculous things in the name of their God, who is also their source of motivation and power.

I am culturally ignorant of many other faiths, but I imagine there could be many examples found in other cultures and religious traditions.

It’s a tricky topic, since real life religion is a complex, serious, and sensitive issue and the Cleric is based on fantasy religions inspires often times by real world religions.

[KorvinStarmast]

1. The armor proficiencies are probably a concession to the fact that the Cleric is essentially the combat medic; she has to keep well protected because she's gotta get within touch range of the Fighter to heal him, which ALSO entails getting within the enemies' reach.

But I don't mind having multiple settings on the dial between Warrior on one end and Priest on the other. The D&D Cleric is more priest than warrior, the Paladin more warrior than priest.

I just happen to see that as a case of "it's not a bug, it's a feature." Got it in one. There isn't a problem to solve.
I think the overlap is an improvement - it gives multiple ways to get the same base concept with slightly different focuses, so you can get closer to your ideal concept. This too. Flexibility is better than pigeon holing.

Clerics share the design space with Bards & Druids, that of Healer / buffer / debuffer. Paladins are in the same design space as Barbarians and Fighters, that of warriors.

Each class started with which of the four roles the class generally occupies: - Warrior - scout / skirmish - healer/buffer/debuffer - arcane nuke This also.

If that's true, then I argue that they should go farther with the cleric; they should make them even more back line than they already are. No, this is a poor idea. This "either / or" false dichotomy is IMO the root of your problem. Classes need some room to work, to be flexible, and to have some overlap. I do not agree at all that they should be pigeon holed or pre-optimized before the player even touches them.

A healer/buffer/debuffer with a medium to strong splash of warrior capabilities is not dissonant with what the cleric used to be. Indeed. If anything (in the default fluff) there's more overlap with druids than with paladins.

From a game design perspective, having a "stand in the back and heal" person who can only buff (but can't actually fight) is boring. [/QUOTE] A lot of people don't like to play heal bots, except for a few odd people like me.

When people ask why the gods don't answer when they pray for help against the forces of evil, the truth is they did, the answer was yes, and sent the cleric. That too.

Aside: you can make the Arcana Cleric a robe wearing caster with little to no problems;

[PhoenixPhyre]

From a game design perspective, having a "stand in the back and heal" person who can only buff (but can't actually fight) is boring.

A lot of people don't like to play heal bots, except for a few odd people like me.


I played healers all through several MMOs, but even then there was more to do than just healing. And it's stressful and boring at the same time--"playing the raid frames" was a common complaint. I mean it can be fun, but there's a reason it's one of the most thankless jobs out there.

Someone who does little but buff and heal is either uber-powerful and nigh-on required (if not explicitly required) if you can't survive without it or is pretty useless if deading things faster is a better strategy.

[Sigreid]

I could think of it in terms stolen from Ivanhoe. The cleric is the staff of support. The paladino's is the rod of punishment.

[GlenSmash!]

As is, the Cleric and the Paladin occupy too much of the same ideological place, which only makes them feel redundant. If Clerics and Paladins are to persist, it is my contention that their niches should be even more cleanly delineated than the 5e model currently allows. Clerics should, going forward, either move to reoccupy their previous niche of being 60% spellcaster, 60% fighter, or should fully embrace their role as a primary spellcaster.

I actually think 5e has done a really good job of making Paladins more distinct from Clerics by making them derive their power from an Oath rather than from a god. I think there are plenty of Paladin Archetypes where being Oathsworn to say a liege lord is either synonymous or even more important than than obeying a god.

I'd actually be fine leaning more toward the spellcaster side as a Melisandre (from Game of Thrones) inspired Cleric may be the more archetypal cleric in this day and age. As in the God grants very powerful magic as a means to fulfill their possible nefarious or possibly benevolent ends.

Things like Heavy Armor proficiency seem less to fit the Cleric bill to me than ever except in the rare case where it makes sense like the Forge Cleric.

[Theodoxus]

I’d argue that by making Paladins not require rare and exceptional stat rolls, you broaden their scope into Cleric territory, rather than it being clerics that are poorly defined

This is the slippery slope of change that pushed clerics and paladins closer together.

Other things:

Making spells the same level despite classes. Once upon a time, a wizard would get fireball at 5th level, and an arcane focused cleric would get it at 7th. Some sorcerer spells were lower than the same spell for a wizard! This created real choice, and tangentially, another reason why sorcerers in 5E are so bland.

Cleric spells of 7th level in 2nd ed were on par with Wizard spells of 9th level. Miracle vs Wish, for instance. So, while yes, one could argue that Clerics were 7/9ths casters (75% not 60%), and the number of spells per day reflected that, their overall ability to make the universe (physics) sit down and shut up wasn't nearly as limited as you'd otherwise assume.

All that aside, i would prefer a little more granularity on the dial. There should probably be some trade off, though how you'd codify that into a single class is beyond me (and really, the last thing we need are more classes, and certainly not prestige classes boosting spell levels).

But something like Heavy Armor proficiency limits your spells to 6th level, Medium Armor proficiency limits yours spells to 7th level, Light armor proficiency limits your spells to 8th level and only no armor proficiency grants access to 9th level spells.

Your Pope would be the most powerful divine caster, while your inquisitor in plate would be the least...

It's a trade off. Short term survivability (heavy armor @ 1st level) vs longer term potential. Think Wizard needing companions to help him survive the low levels to gain mastery over the universe.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Think Wizard needing companions to help him survive the low levels to gain mastery over the universe.

I don't like this because it smacks of mandated party composition and someone being "the load" at least part of the time. It means that the following don't work:

1) a party of casters (at low level)
2) a party of martials (at high level, unless the casters can trivialize everything)
3) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play baby-sitter at low levels.
4) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play second fiddle at high levels.

It means that during a normal 1-20 game, everyone only gets to really play 2/3 (at best) of it. That's horrible game design. It guarantees that someone's going to be miserable for most of the game. Different someones during different parts, but someone's miserable. It also doesn't play nicely with games that don't go to higher levels--if wizards come online at level 10, but 90% of games end before then, you've got a useless class.

[napoleon_in_rag]

I don't like this because it smacks of mandated party composition and someone being "the load" at least part of the time. It means that the following don't work:

1) a party of casters (at low level)
2) a party of martials (at high level, unless the casters can trivialize everything)
3) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play baby-sitter at low levels.
4) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play second fiddle at high levels.

It means that during a normal 1-20 game, everyone only gets to really play 2/3 (at best) of it. That's horrible game design. It guarantees that someone's going to be miserable for most of the game. Different someones during different parts, but someone's miserable. It also doesn't play nicely with games that don't go to higher levels--if wizards come online at level 10, but 90% of games end before then, you've got a useless class.

Play a BECMI Magic User starting at level 1. You have 1d4 hp and can only memorize one spell at a time.

[Willie the Duck]

So. I'm just going to put this out front: I'm personally aware of the different orders in history whom could be considered clerics. This isn't a question of my not being able to find answers. I'm more concerned that, at least in the circles I've played in, the immediate image which jumps to mind isn't someone like Tomas De Torquemada or Jacques De Molay, but rather someone more like the pope or Anduin. The archetype has changed since it was conceived. Shouldn't we create some room for that?

Mechanically, I think if you are willing to include divine-soul sorcerers, celestial warlocks, and even lore bards on one end and maybe straight fighters with acolyte background on the other, that the spectrum of all potential levels of martialness to squishy casterness has been covered thoroughly with massive overlap.

Flavorfully, while the cleric was originally the vampire hunter to Sir Fang that Van Helsing was to Dracula, and then quickly became associated with other characters like Archbishop Turpin or Bishop Odo (or Torquemada or Molay), it has been a long time since the cleric has been anything but 'The Cleric.' They do not really resemble any characters in history nor classic fiction nor fantasy fiction (except that that is directly influenced by D&D). They have become a meme and a theme and a concept unto themselves, not unlike color-coded dragons and races of minotaurs or chimera, etc. instead of individual cursed beings, and inexplicable dungeons full of treasure and all the rest of the D&D-isms that had some initial inspiration but have become their own self-sustaining mental framework within the fandom.

[Pronounceable]

Cleric is stupid. There's the crux of the issue here.

Not only is the cleric stupid, it has ever been stupid since day 1. The only reason it even exists as a class is because some dude in Gygax's (or possibly Arneson's) group became a vampire and therefore a big pain in the ass, so cleric had to be invented just to bring that dude in line. That's why you can't really find any good fictional examples. Cleric is a unique DnD invention of a mashup between medieval crusaders and Prof Van Helsing.

The later healbot matter is an issue of pure unadulterated game mechanics and makes no goddamn sense in a fluffy manner. There's absolutely no reason why the specialist wizard from the Healication school can't cast healing spells beyond the vague notions of "balance" and "teamwork". That's also the whole reason why the standard arcane/divine divide exists in DnD magic. The only reason it still persists is because "that's how our forefathers did it".

However the worst problem of the cleric class is the ludicrous idea that polytheism works exactly like the medieval monotheism the older generations of DnDers stole their cliches from. Why the **** would a divinely chosen servant of the goddess of love and beauty be wearing plate mail and wading into orcs with a mace? How the hell is a compulsive murderer worshipping the god of evil and darkness and kitten killing %85 identical to the wise old combat medic helping out the knights in shining armor crusading against evil? It's all a pile of stupid that still persists through inertia and nothing else.

Here's more points illustrating why cleric as a class is ****ing stupid: most favored servants of the god of thieves aren't thieves (unless they multiclass to rogue), same for the god of wizards, there's a god of paladins and he can have clerics and paladins serving him but there's no such thing as the god of clerics who's worshipped by clerics (cos that'd be just silly).

Solution is to trash this dumbass class and hand out various feats/skills/abilities/spells/thingamajigs that let all PCs use "divine magic" (whatever you define that as) x times per level per day. Down with the pointless class bloat.

[Willie the Duck]

The later healbot matter is an issue of pure unadulterated game mechanics and makes no goddamn sense in a fluffy manner. There's absolutely no reason why the specialist wizard from the Healication school can't cast healing spells beyond the vague notions of "balance" and "teamwork". That's also the whole reason why the standard arcane/divine divide exists in DnD magic. The only reason it still persists is because "that's how our forefathers did it".

Perhaps, but at the same time, there's no particularly compelling reasons why a specialist wizard from the Healication school is a better or more appropriate solution. Classes as a system at all are an artifact of the original system that have been grandfathered in to each subsequent one for no particular reason except that it's familiar and works (for various levels of 'works'). I mean, if you were looking for a pure TTRPG that starts with coherent design principles, Dungeons and Dragons isn't where you'd start, much less finish, your search (maybe something like GURPS or Hero System, but even that's a controversial statement).

[KorvinStarmast]

it has been a long time since the cleric has been anything but 'The Cleric.' They do not really resemble any characters in history nor classic fiction nor fantasy fiction (except that that is directly influenced by D&D). They have become a meme and a theme and a concept unto themselves, not unlike color-coded dragons and races of minotaurs or chimera, Which is fine, within the niche of Swords and Sorcery genres like D&D.

Cleric is stupid. Nope. It is fit for purpose for the game that it is in, and for the stories from that game.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Play a BECMI Magic User starting at level 1. You have 1d4 hp and can only memorize one spell at a time.

As I said. Horrible game design. At least if you want to actually play a character instead of a disposable game token.

[Doug Lampert]

I'd be down with that dial; I guess I just wish there was an even more extreme end of the dial, too. Maybe make it more like:

Priest: Full spellcaster
Cleric: 2/3 spellcaster, 1/3 warrior
Paladin: 1/3 spellcaster, 2/3 warrior
Fighter: ... fighter.

2/3 X and 1/3 Y is normally a crappy character unless there's a lot of synergy. A level 11 character needs to be doing level 11 stuff, if he's a caster that means multiple level 5 slots and one level 6 slot, if he's a warrior it means something like 2 attacks per action with something else that adds to attack (a third attack for fighters, smite for paladins, ext...). The rogue gets 6d6 sneak attack rather than a second attack, but he needs that at-will 6d6 sneak attack to keep up.

A hybrid character, such as a cleric or paladin, still needs to be able to do SOMETHING of the correct general power for his level.

For the Paladin he's got a good melee attack that's competitive with other warriors, for a cleric he's got full spell-casting. The cleric's melee ability, is, as others have pointed out, an attack cantrip replacement, not a fighter level attack.

It's not Paladin: 1/3 spellcaster, 2/3 warrior; it's Paladin 1 warrior + 1/2 spellcaster, and that's balanced because when the chips are down he's a warrior. He's not casting spells against deadly encounters. He's using spells to smite or for minor added abilities.

It's not Cleric: 2/3 spellcaster, 1/3 warrior; it's Cleric 1 spellcaster + 1/2 warrior, and that's balanced because when the chips are down he's a caster. He's not hitting things with a stick to beat deadly encounters. He's using weapons like they were a cantrip.

[Pex]

I played healers all through several MMOs, but even then there was more to do than just healing. And it's stressful and boring at the same time--"playing the raid frames" was a common complaint. I mean it can be fun, but there's a reason it's one of the most thankless jobs out there.

Someone who does little but buff and heal is either uber-powerful and nigh-on required (if not explicitly required) if you can't survive without it or is pretty useless if deading things faster is a better strategy.

I don't mind playing the healbot occasionally as long as there is other stuff I can do and I don't always play it. In an old Pathfinder game I played a Life Oracle who was the healbot I always wanted to play. He was absolutely perfect.

5E doesn't really have a healbot character, not even the Life Cleric. Certainly its healing is nice, but it's more a bonus than a relief someone is playing one. 5E spread the healing around, which is a good thing. Players can heal themselves by class feature or game rules. Classes besides the cleric can do decent enough healing of others. Healer and Inspiring Leader (pre-emptively) lets anyone do significant healing if they want.

[SirGraystone]

First I would make a difference between what I would call the priest and cleric class, most holy men in a campaign are priest, they preach at the church, help feed the poor, etc... they don't need to wear armor or weapons. Then you have the cleric, let call it the Adventurer Priest that go out in the world to bash some head.

In BECMI, the cleric had the same armor and shield then the fighter, but couldn't have slashing or piercing weapon for some reason they were not allow to spill blood, but breaking a skull with a mace was fine. They would fight in melee, turn undead and when needed heal someone. At the time the only class were fighter, rogue, cleric and wizard.

Now in 5e with the domain, you have a wider range of possibility for cleric, play what you want, how you want.

[Theodoxus]

I don't like this because it smacks of mandated party composition and someone being "the load" at least part of the time. It means that the following don't work:

1) a party of casters (at low level)
2) a party of martials (at high level, unless the casters can trivialize everything)
3) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play baby-sitter at low levels.
4) any mixed party where the martials don't want to play second fiddle at high levels.

It means that during a normal 1-20 game, everyone only gets to really play 2/3 (at best) of it. That's horrible game design. It guarantees that someone's going to be miserable for most of the game. Different someones during different parts, but someone's miserable. It also doesn't play nicely with games that don't go to higher levels--if wizards come online at level 10, but 90% of games end before then, you've got a useless class.

No, it means there's teamwork at worst. Some people (I won't go all the way to calling them crazy) actually enjoy the challenge of surviving the "time I was nearly killed by a house cat".

Look, I get the current "Big Thing" is murderhoboism, and that Lone Wolfing your way through Tales of the Yawning Portal is super cool, so being reliant on anyone other than yourself is totally out of the question. Kinda reminds me of our current political climate... but that's not what the games' premise is really about. That's more in tune with that fringe group of MMO players who tackle dungeons solo as close to appropriate level as possible... which is totally cool when you're solo, at home, drinking beer.

D&D is not that game. Never was that game. Never will be that game.


Play a BECMI Magic User starting at level 1. You have 1d4 hp and can only memorize one spell at a time.

Heh, totes.


As I said. Horrible game design. At least if you want to actually play a character instead of a disposable game token.

Really? It sounds to me your "Play a character" is actually "play in God-Mode so I can solo all the content, get all the loots and win the girl." A character without a flaw isn't a character, its a Mary Sue protagonist going from encounter to encounter killing for no reason other than you can.

Playing with 3 HPs actually makes you feel more alive; and certainly more tactical if you like the character - just to stay conscious in the middle of battle.

It's my primary issue with CRPGs based on TTRPGs. Inevitably, you start, at 1st level, with hundreds of hit points. So you can beat down hundreds of more enemies for fractions of the xp in a real game. Because god forbid a turn based game with the table top system actually be exciting. Or something.

[Willie the Duck]

Really? It sounds to me your "Play a character" is actually "play in God-Mode so I can solo all the content, get all the loots and win the girl." A character without a flaw isn't a character, its a Mary Sue protagonist going from encounter to encounter killing for no reason other than you can.

Playing with 3 HPs actually makes you feel more alive; and certainly more tactical if you like the character - just to stay conscious in the middle of battle.

It's my primary issue with CRPGs based on TTRPGs. Inevitably, you start, at 1st level, with hundreds of hit points. So you can beat down hundreds of more enemies for fractions of the xp in a real game. Because god forbid a turn based game with the table top system actually be exciting. Or something.

That's some truly amazing mental gymnastics to get from horrible-game-design to I-want-everything-on-a-silver-platter-without-being-challenged. Color me impressed.

[visitor]

I see it as just the development of D&D and the hobby over time. Maybe it’s more obvious to me coming back from AD&D.

Back then, healing was sparse and zero hit points was dead. The cleric was needed for healing and curing. He was the priest/holy man, so blunt weapons only to not spill blood. His spells were healing and curing, and only at late levels he got the cleric “ultimate” : finger of death spell (which I see sadly got stolen by the wizard).

The paladin was a subclass of the fighting man, an ‘elite’ class, requiring higher stats, a stringent code of conduct and more XP per level.

D&D’s conventions were so dominate, and engrained in the hobby, that with the emergence of computer games, these conventions were kept.

Everquest, perhaps the first breakout mmorpg copied much of D&D. The paladin class (all hybrids actually) needed more XP to level compared to “pure” classes. People realized this was unfair as playing/grinding time was unequal and unequal XP is not a great way to balance classes.

With World of Warcraft and Diablo and other PvP games starting to dominate, the desire to balance classes against each other became the standard.

I didn’t play tabletop RPGs at that time, but my perusing of them gave me the impression that now it had reversed, and TTRPGs were trying to emulate online computer RPGs.

So now in 5e, healing is not hard to come by. With short and long rest mechanics even resources are mostly intact (kind of how you would play a CRPG).

Clerics are still the heal/cure casters, but they don’t need or want to be healbots. Their abilities and class features are greatly expanded. The paladin is by present convention it’s own class, balanced with the very class it was an elite version of.

So no suprise nowadays the cleric and paladin classes are harder to differentiate at times.


EDIT: just thinking about it; While PVP games pushed the idea of balance, a lot of the mmo’s pushed the “tank, dps, healer” idea. Thank goodness 5e doesn’t stick with that

[Naanomi]

A properly built Life Cleric 1/Lore Bard 19 can be a really focused ‘heal bot’ with spell selection oriented that way...
Protector Aasimar for more healing

[Kane0]

Why not just burn down the class list to the core archetypes and use the subclass concept to get more specific

Warrior (100% Fighter)
Cleric (50% Fighter, 50% Spellcaster)
Mage (100% Spellcaster)
Bard (50% Spellcaster, 50% Thief)
Scoundrel (100% Thief)
Ranger (50% Thief, 50% Fighter)

The base warrior would split into barbarian, champion, warlord and more, same thing for Clerics with inquisitors, paladins, etc and mages with sorcerers, warlocks, wizards and so on. Give one or two options for each class to dip into another, or just leave that for MCing or feats. Extra classes could be super-generalists (33% each archetype), setting specific or mechanic specialists.

Edit: Wait, that reminds me of Mass Effect. Hmm.

[rbstr]

Or a Cleric could be 100% Cleric and a Ranger 100% a Ranger and they can do as much warrioring or spellcasting or thieving as seems to be balanced according to the concept.

Trying to mush the Barbarians and Fighters into one class within the 5e framework would be useless since the entirely of the "class" would actually be subclass features save for "Extra Attack" at level 5.

This focus on explicit percentages of casting this or warrior that is exhausting. These things are not laws of nature, they're essentially arbitrary within the bounds of balance.
Go make up a wizard-esque, robe-only divine "Priest" class - it could be as simple as replacing the fighty cleric features.

[napoleon_in_rag]

As I said. Horrible game design. At least if you want to actually play a character instead of a disposable game token.

If BECMI/OD&D was such a horrible game design, why did it last so long? 1st level Mages having 1d4 hp and only 1 spell as a thing for twenty years at least through 2e.

[Naanomi]

If BECMI/OD&D was such a horrible game design, why did it last so long? 1st level Mages having 1d4 hp and only 1 spell as a thing for twenty years at least through 2e.
I still maintain they were generally more survivable than Supplement I thieves

[Willie the Duck]

If BECMI/OD&D was such a horrible game design, why did it last so long? 1st level Mages having 1d4 hp and only 1 spell as a thing for twenty years at least through 2e.

Because the game was not designed horribly. It did, however, probably fit PhoenixPhyre's definition of failing "want to actually play a character instead of a disposable game token," at least at low level.

I've played BECMI, both as a kid when the boxed sets were being released, and again when the RC came out, and now interspersed with OSR games of a similar power level/lethality (or even less lethal, as my favorite, Beyond the Wall, has some luck-point mechanics and AD&D-like hp-down-to-minus-ten effects). I've also heard old school people who've been playing since before D&D was published (folks like Rob Kuntz and Mike Mornard and Ernie Gygax). We all agree on one thing--maybe you did play better (more tactically, more cautiously, more likely to try to sneak or negotiate of problem solve then to resort to fighting), but mostly that's a bunch of old-farts talking about how when they were kids they walked to school uphill both ways barefoot, etc. etc. -- what you really did was not get too attached to your characters until they had a couple of levels under their belts. And up until that point, you just died a lot (or had hirelings who died for you).

But yes, Mages had 1d4 hp and one spell for 25 years (they started with 1d6, but that got changed in the Greyhawk expansion so that they would get a hit dice every level). But, there was an assumption that a huge part of the adventure was stuff that anyone could do--exploring, hiding (not thief-skill, but like hiding behind things or in empty rooms), negotiating, etc. The less of the overall adventuring took place by things described on your character sheet, the less important the fact that the magic user only had one character-sheet-derived ability per day was.

[Pex]

If BECMI/OD&D was such a horrible game design, why did it last so long? 1st level Mages having 1d4 hp and only 1 spell as a thing for twenty years at least through 2e.

Because that's what existed at the time and the realization it didn't have to be that way hadn't kicked in yet. I played and enjoyed 2E for over 10 years despite my gripes of the game. Then 3E came out getting rid of every single gripe of 2E I had. The game has evolved and moved on since then, but I would not go back to playing 2E. I even tried to a number of years ago before 5E even existed for nostalgia sake, but all the gripes came back as well as the frustrations of not being able to do what I could have done in 3E/Pathfinder. The campaign was fun. I was miserable with the game system.

[HolyAvenger7]

I agree that cleric are kind of redundant. With short rests and long rests, you don't need a party healer as much as in previous editions. I also feel that some of the domains overlap too much with certain classes:

Nature Domain overlaps with Druid.
War domain overlaps with Paladin.
Trickery Domain overlaps with Bard.

It comes down to 5e giving most classes spell casting ability. Being a spell caster in 5e isn't as special.

Actually that was one of my peeves coming back to 5e after 30 some years, most classes have lost their niche. Could you have ever envisioned an evil teifling paladin in earlier additions? Paladins were always the White knights and fought for good. We've added so many classes, multi-classes and domains that everything is now convoluted for "flavor". More likely to produce new content for revenue and to keep players interested. :smallannoyed: END RANT

[Naanomi]

Could you have ever envisioned an evil teifling paladin in earlier additions? Paladins were always the White knights and fought for good.
Antipaladins were in 1980’s Dragon #39...but Tieflings were not until 1994 Planescape setting book. So even before there have been Tieflings, they could be Antipaladins

People complained when ‘thief’ was added... heck, people complained about the inclusion of ‘cleric’ in the first official publications

[Tanarii]

I went back and played BECMI as intended (no handholding, very large group of players + retainers, many character deaths) some time before 5e came out. IMO, overall it's still a superior system in many of the minor details, especially low survivability, and wizards being a slow roll option. All it really needs added is the 5e ability checks system to round it out / replace thieving skills.

Unfortunate getting a large BECMI campaign off the ground was a non-starter. :smallamused:

(Don't get me wrong, obviously I still like 5e a lot.)

[Willie the Duck]

I went back and played BECMI as intended (no handholding, very large group of players + retainers, many character deaths) some time before 5e came out. IMO, overall it's still a superior system in many of the minor details, especially low survivability, and wizards being a slow roll option. All it really needs added is the 5e ability checks system to round it out / replace thieving skills.

It is really unfortunate that BECMI came out a mere 2 years after B/X or that it didn't truly contain all the same material (despite 95-99% of the rules being the same, the gaming advice, etc. was quite different). Most people missed out on Moldvay's advice on how to use ability checks to model success. Mind you, that'll never change that it ran parallel to the thief skill system (and later the Gazateer/RC skill system) in incompatible lanes.

I don't know about superior system (looking at racial level limits and how it never-even-remotely-worked-as-a-balancing-agent-but-only-to-enforce-Gary's-opinion-about-humanocentric-games, it's hard not to see a whole bunch of failures that should have been fixed in 1975, much less 1983-91). It is, however, a purer system that is better at design-for-intended-use compared to the modern games which want to be all things to all audiences (mind you, 5e is an hole-in-one attempt at this, but trying to do so at all is still a questionable strategy). BECMI is great for playing exactly the type of game it was intended to be -- 1-3 levels of nameless expendable characters wandering explanationless, purposeless dungeons in search of treasure, followed by 6-9 levels of fairly enduring squad leaders wandering said dungeons plus (the now survivable) overland hexcrawls with a cadre of hirelings and meatshields, followed by 26 levels (okay, this could have cut off after 6-10 levels of name-level-play, at some point your level doesn't matter) of being domain ruler and plan-hopping god-wizards.

[Tanarii]

Level limits, racial class restrictions, and different XP tables, are also something I wish 3e hadnt done away with. In retrospect they were all good for the game. Nor am I a fan of the post-3e multiclassing sysyem. I was at first, but it turns out it has far too many flaws to be viable.

[KorvinStarmast]

I see it as just the development of D&D and the hobby over time. Maybe it’s more obvious to me coming back from AD&D.
Back then, healing was sparse and zero hit points was dead. The cleric was needed for healing and curing.
And For Turning Undead. Remember, Specters, Wraiths, and Wights used to drain experience levels. Vampires did as well.

Why not just burn down the class list to the core archetypes and use the subclass concept to get more specific
Everyone plays a bard, right? That covers all roles. :smallbiggrin: Get rid of all other classes.

Warrior (100% Fighter)
Cleric (50% Fighter, 50% Spellcaster)
Mage (100% Spellcaster)
Bard (50% Spellcaster, 50% Thief)
Scoundrel (100% Thief)
Ranger (50% Thief, 50% Fighter)
Edit: Wait, that reminds me of Mass Effect. Hmm.[/QUOTE] Reminds me a little bit of Ultima, where the idea was IIRC originally to be classless? (Diablo I's alpha version was apparently intended to be not class based but they then changed their minds).

I still maintain they were generally more survivable than Supplement I thieves Yeah. Traps triggered by a level 1 or 2 thief were often fatal.

[Naanomi]

I never understood the love for different exp tables... if wizards are that much better per level than rogues, can’t we just split up the benefits of wizard levels to remove that disparity?

[Pex]

Level limits, racial class restrictions, and different XP tables, are also something I wish 3e hadnt done away with. In retrospect they were all good for the game. Nor am I a fan of the post-3e multiclassing sysyem. I was at first, but it turns out it has far too many flaws to be viable.

You are so not me. :smallsmile: That's all the gripes, and some others not mentioned, of 2E I was thrilled 3E got rid of.

[Tanarii]

I never understood the love for different exp tables... if wizards are that much better per level than rogues, can’t we just split up the benefits of wizard levels to remove that disparity?What's the gain? It's much easier to design it first, then scale an XP table based on perceived contribution to the party, than it is to make all levels equal. As every version since 3e has proven. And is also the primary reason the 3e/5e multiclass system doesn't work.

[KorvinStarmast]

I was under the impression that making a cleric level up faster was intended to get healing on line sooner, and reward someone for making a choice to play a compromise character, but I can't find the old GG discussion on clerics that I read a while back.

[Millstone85]

Warrior (100% Fighter)
Cleric (50% Fighter, 50% Spellcaster)
Mage (100% Spellcaster)
Bard (50% Spellcaster, 50% Thief)
Scoundrel (100% Thief)
Ranger (50% Thief, 50% Fighter)My triforce of classes would look like this:




Fighter

Paladin

Cleric / Druid

Wizard












Barbarian

Bard

Sorcerer














Ranger / Monk

Warlock
















Rogue

[Doug Lampert]

I still maintain they were generally more survivable than Supplement I thieves

Original rules, a sleep spell from a level 1 Magic User was typically MORE than sufficient to take out the entire party or a group substantially "stronger" than the entire party would have been if you'd replaced the Magic User with a Cleric or Fighting Man (or a Supplement I thief).

So, level 1 Magic Users were "weak" if you consider "only able to one-shot something that would otherwise kill the entire party once per day" to be weak.

Given that you were usually trying to sneak past most encounters, and the Fighting Man had only 1d8 HP (so he could still roll a 1), the Magic User was NOT weak at level one and a party of four Magic Users was much better off than a party of four anything other given class would have been at level 1. (Yeah cleric! No spells at all! No edged weapons! 1d6 HP. That's ever so much better than one battle winning spell and 1d4 HP.)

[KorvinStarmast]

Given that you were usually trying to sneak past most encounters, and the Fighting Man had only 1d8 HP (so he could still roll a 1), the Magic User was NOT weak at level one and a party of four Magic Users was much better off than a party of four anything other given class would have been at level 1. (Yeah cleric! No spells at all! No edged weapons! 1d6 HP. That's ever so much better than one battle winning spell and 1d4 HP.) FWIW, Sleep was power creep introduced in Greyhawk. :smallbiggrin: Added in Greyhawk, page 21. Charm person was the awesome spell at first level: you could charm an foe to fight for you.

Charm Person: This spell applies to all two-legged, generally mammalian figures near to or less than man-size, excluding all monsters in the "Undead" class but including Sprites, Pixies, Nixies, Kobolds, Goblins, Orcs, Hobgoblins and Gnolls. If the spell is successful it will cause the charmed entity to come completely under the influence of the Magic-User until such time as the "charm" is dispelled (Dispell Magic). Range: 12". My first MU charmed a Hobgoblin. He survived the first fight we had after I charmed him. I then charmed a gnoll. And then an NPC dwarf. They all eventually died, but man they were helpful to the party and to keeping ghouls off of me. (Freaking ghouls, our first DM seemed to love sending them our way).
I read on a few of the grognard boards that the original players usually got half of a die's worth of HP at level 1 if the roll was a 1 or 2. This is the old "it's what they did, not what they wrote down" deal. Once at second level, you'd roll the dice (or the DM would). If you had below average a lot of DM's would roll again, or give the average.

We played a thief campaign in the City State of the Invincible Overlord where our goal was to achieve 4th level and thus qualify for the thieves guild. Our job was to survive that long, and each day the DM would roll our dice and tell us 'how we felt" before he headed out.
No, never did make 4th level but we had insane fun trying to. (A guy in one of the other groups made it).

[Willie the Duck]

Reminds me a little bit of Ultima, where the idea was IIRC originally to be classless?

Well, if so they abandoned the idea before the first game came out. Class didn't do as much as it does in D&D until the Age of Enlightenment (Ultima iv-vi), as spells were basically potions by D&D terms.


I never understood the love for different exp tables... if wizards are that much better per level than rogues, can’t we just split up the benefits of wizard levels to remove that disparity?

You sure can, but then you have to do so, and balance it perfectly, or you will get complaints (ex. 3e). There are advantages and disadvantages to each method, but there is a value to each. If instead you just design a class as you think it ought to work, and the end result is something like 'takes off really quickly, but then plateaus for a long time, and then chugs along fine' or the like, you just adjust the xp table to match. Not, mind you, that I'm sure any pre-3.0 edition got that balance right.


I was under the impression that making a cleric level up faster was intended to get healing on line sooner, and reward someone for making a choice to play a compromise character, but I can't find the old GG discussion on clerics that I read a while back.

That's a reasonable interpretation. Same with Thieves. Of course how much clerics were supposed to be defined by their healing seems to be a point of contention amongst those who think they know what the intentions of the early game were.

[Tanarii]

You sure can, but then you have to do so, and balance it perfectly, or you will get complaints (ex. 3e). There are advantages and disadvantages to each method, but there is a value to each. If instead you just design a class as you think it ought to work, and the end result is something like 'takes off really quickly, but then plateaus for a long time, and then chugs along fine' or the like, you just adjust the xp table to match. Not, mind you, that I'm sure any pre-3.0 edition got that balance right.Yup. Especially that last part. I think it's easier to just balance the XP tables than try to balance each individual class level from 1-20. But that doesn't mean I think they were good at it. :smallwink:

5e kinda took a middle ground. They roughly tried to make sure each class was about equal, but acknowledged it's really over the span of levels, not each one gained. Which is one reason multiclassing is an optional rule. Of course, the bigger one is that many classes are fairly front-loaded, which is another aspect of all levels not actually being created equal.

[KorvinStarmast]

That's a reasonable interpretation. Same with Thieves. Of course how much clerics were supposed to be defined by their healing seems to be a point of contention amongst those who think they know what the intentions of the early game were. Based on what Gary wrote in Dragon Magazine 5, and later confirmed by Mike Mornard, "what were there intentions" was a bit contentious in some cases between Gary and Dave.
Edit; Sorry, it wasn't 5, I now need to figure out which issue it was.

[Tanarii]

Based on what Gary wrote in Dragon Magazine 5, and later confirmed by Mike Mornard, "what were there intentions" was a bit contentious in some cases between Gary and Dave.
Edit; Sorry, it wasn't 5, I now need to figure out which issue it was.
Speaking of level 1 wizard's ability to survive and Mike Mornard, apparently his wizard Lessnard survived a solo trip to a level 3 dungeon.
http://blogofholding.com/?p=3806

Edit: to be clear, it was Gary's Greyhawk Dungeon. I get the feeling surviving Gary was a matter of knowing the GM. There's also a story (later in the blog) about him killing off 8 groups of tourney players in a few hours, because rank after rank they all walked through an illusionary black wall and fell into a pit. That's a pretty clear story of "know how your DM thinks".

[KorvinStarmast]

Speaking of level 1 wizard's ability to survive and Mike Mornard, apparently his wizard Lessnard survived a solo trip to a level 3 dungeon.
http://blogofholding.com/?p=3806

Edit: to be clear, it was Gary's Greyhawk Dungeon. I get the feeling surviving Gary was a matter of knowing the GM. There's also a story (later in the blog) about him killing off 8 groups of tourney players in a few hours, because rank after rank they all walked through an illusionary black wall and fell into a pit. That's a pretty clear story of "know how your DM thinks".
Great link, thanks. :smallsmile: In our original D&D game, we used graph paper to map, and we all took turns mapping.

[Tanarii]

Great link, thanks. :smallsmile: In our original D&D game, we used graph paper to map, and we all took turns mapping.
In case you missed it, it's part 1 of 12. :smallbiggrin:

[KorvinStarmast]

In case you missed it, it's part 1 of 12. :smallbiggrin:

I read the first 2, and then decided not to get caught diving into the worm hole. :)

[Theodoxus]

It is really unfortunate that BECMI came out a mere 2 years after B/X or that it didn't truly contain all the same material (despite 95-99% of the rules being the same, the gaming advice, etc. was quite different). Most people missed out on Moldvay's advice on how to use ability checks to model success. Mind you, that'll never change that it ran parallel to the thief skill system (and later the Gazateer/RC skill system) in incompatible lanes.

I don't know about superior system (looking at racial level limits and how it never-even-remotely-worked-as-a-balancing-agent-but-only-to-enforce-Gary's-opinion-about-humanocentric-games, it's hard not to see a whole bunch of failures that should have been fixed in 1975, much less 1983-91). It is, however, a purer system that is better at design-for-intended-use compared to the modern games which want to be all things to all audiences (mind you, 5e is an hole-in-one attempt at this, but trying to do so at all is still a questionable strategy). BECMI is great for playing exactly the type of game it was intended to be -- 1-3 levels of nameless expendable characters wandering explanationless, purposeless dungeons in search of treasure, followed by 6-9 levels of fairly enduring squad leaders wandering said dungeons plus (the now survivable) overland hexcrawls with a cadre of hirelings and meatshields, followed by 26 levels (okay, this could have cut off after 6-10 levels of name-level-play, at some point your level doesn't matter) of being domain ruler and plan-hopping god-wizards.

This has basically been my experience with AL. Though less outright death of a character and more swapping out for something different. Some AL DMs are a bit more ruthless though, and consider anything in tier 1 to be fair game for killing off, either because they'll get a faction rez or they can just remake the character and play a bit more cautiously.

Tier 2 really starts to emulate the squad mentality and more overarching world changing quests. The best is sticking with the same DM through different campaigns with different characters and seeing the persistence play out, where things done by your level 7 group affect things happening to your level 2 group. But that's more AL specific than edition.

[MaxWilson]

FWIW, Sleep was power creep introduced in Greyhawk. :smallbiggrin: Added in Greyhawk, page 21. Charm person was the awesome spell at first level: you could charm an foe to fight for you.

...permanently.

I'm told that Bigby was originally a hostile NPC whom Mordenkainen co-opted via Charm Person.