PhoenixPhyre
2020-08-23, 08:24 PM
Wizards published a free set of style guides for people writing 5e adventures and fiction. One of these is specific to the Forgotten Realms.
It contains lots of interesting things (a bunch of ways that the races, especially, deviate from the PHB, for instance).
The ones I want to point out here are about classes:
Spellcasters in General: Except for extremely unusual circumstances (such as a college of wizardry) spellcasters are individuals. They have personalities and personal stories and unique spell lists. You shouldn’t encounter the same wizard stat block in an adventure used to represent different wizards, for instance.
This makes doing CR for FR spellcasters a lot more interesting and difficult--the spell list is 90% of the offensive power. And requires adventure writers to customize those stat blocks.
Barbarians. The Forgotten Realms has cultures described as barbarians and D&D has the class called barbarian, but they are not synonymous. People with the barbarian class are special warriors even in barbarian tribes.
Pretty obvious, IMO. And how I'd always played them.
Clerics. Clerics are special individuals gifted with divine power by a deity, but they don’t have the gods on speed dial nor are the gods constantly watching their every move. Clerics of a deity can go astray of a deity’s ethos or even betray their deity. Judgment of such infractions might be immediate or saved until the afterlife, based upon the whim of the deity.
The bold parts solve a lot of complaints I've heard. Yeah, you're chosen. No, the gods don't actually speak with you frequently, nor do they constantly reach down and smack you for doing the wrong thing. You still have to use the high-level commune type spells.
Druids. Druids are not clerics by another name and do not devote themselves to a single deity.... Instead, druids (regardless of race) pay homage to the “First Circle,” which is a pantheon of human gods that represent the basic elements of the natural world (Shar for night and darkness, Selune for the moon, Silvanus for forests, Talos for storms, Kossuth for fire, and so on). Druids from non-human races often pay homage to nature-related deities of their own as well, but the power of druidic magic stems from the First Circle. Most druid characters should acknowledge a circle of druids from which they originate, the circle being a group of druids that serves all the druids that are part of it as a body of wisdom, lore, and news.
I'm not fond of shoving gods in everyone's faces, but that's a FR thing. I'd much prefer treating druids as entirely god-orthogonal (drawing their power from nature and nature spirits, not gods). And note the human-centric nature--even elven druids pull from the human gods, like it or not.
Monks. Monks are not monastic priests in the Christian sense, but meditative martial artists in the Eastern sense. Monks are rare in Faerûn and quite common in Kara-Tur. There are dozens if not
hundreds of orders of monks in Kara-Tur, but Faerûn hosts only a few. Most monks of Faerûn are associated with a human religious order, acting as protectors of holy sites and sometimes as enforcers or assassins. Some of the few Faerûnian monastic orders are Dark Moon, Shining Hand, Yielding Way, Yellow Rose, and Sun Soul.
More human-centric god-bothering :smallwink:. But monks as enforcers and assassins does bring a slightly different spin on things, plus the focus on "meditative martial artists". Punch first, pray later.
Paladins. Paladins are warriors of unusual virtue and piety rewarded by a good god with divine power. Paladins follow a common code of ethics but paladins of different deities emphasize
different aspects. (A paladin of Sune would emphasize aspects of courtly love and courtesy, whereas a paladin of Tyr would be more concerned with justice and fair treatment of foes.) As with clerics, paladins can go astray of their code, but paladins are typically judged more swiftly and harshly by their gods.
Now this is something I actively dislike. Makes too strong of an overlap with clerics, except clerics (the chosen agents of the gods) are less harshly bound to their one particular god's will! Makes very little sense to me. And this is something that I absolutely would change if I ever ran in FR.
Rangers. Low-level rangers can be depicted like mountain men and wilderness guides. Once a ranger has spellcasting, that ranger has been chosen by a nature deity and granted power. Rangers
with spellcasting should show devotion to a specific nature deity depending on the ranger’s alignment (Malar, Shaundakul, Gwaeron Windstrom. Milikki, Silvanus, Eldath, Shialia).
More god-bothering. Ugh.
Sorcerer. The source of a sorcerer’s power should be a significant element of the character’s story.
Yes. That's the entire entry for sorcerers. Poor folks.
Warlocks. Warlocks always have a patron and a bargain. Those things should be a huge part of such a character and that character’s part in any plot. Ask for appropriate options for a patron and
details. Note that not all the Great Old One patrons mentioned in the Player’s Handbook are appropriate to the Forgotten Realms. Of the ones mentioned, Ghaunadar, called That Which Lurks; Kezef, the Chaos Hound, and Dendar, the Night Serpent, exist in Faerûn.
Now that's something lots of people won't want to hear. Yes, you need an explicit patron, and yes, you need an explicit bargain in FR. No "I brushed up against it in my dreams and now I have this power!" self-awakening stories here! There's always a conscious bargain that the warlock is aware of. Quid pro quo.
Wizards. In addition to a spellbook, a wizard in the Forgotten Realms crafts a sigil that is the wizard’s symbol and is used in various spells and rituals to represent the wizard. Also, it is extremely rare for a wizard to have a familiar.
Heh to all those "find familiar for life!" characters. :smalltongue: Interesting note about the sigil.
Note who's missing? Bards, Fighters, and Rogues. Guess they're pretty much stock-PHB then. Although there is mention of bards and fighters in the "game terms in the world" section:
Bard. This word is reserved for people who have the bard class. They have magical powers that
regular minstrels, musicians, and singers lack.
...
Cleric. A priest is anyone who devotes themselves to the service of a deity and/or the maintenance of a shrine or temple (to one or more deities). A “cleric” is someone who is granted spells by a particular deity. People in the world would call a cleric a priest, but they would not call a priest without powers a cleric.
Druid. A druid is always a member of the class. People do use the word “druid” to refer to them.
Fighter. People in the world use the word “fighter” like we do. It’s a word for someone who fights; a boxer is a fighter. An adventurer who has the fighter class would likely refer to himself as a warrior.
The druid entry is interesting to me, on a bunch of levels.
It contains lots of interesting things (a bunch of ways that the races, especially, deviate from the PHB, for instance).
The ones I want to point out here are about classes:
Spellcasters in General: Except for extremely unusual circumstances (such as a college of wizardry) spellcasters are individuals. They have personalities and personal stories and unique spell lists. You shouldn’t encounter the same wizard stat block in an adventure used to represent different wizards, for instance.
This makes doing CR for FR spellcasters a lot more interesting and difficult--the spell list is 90% of the offensive power. And requires adventure writers to customize those stat blocks.
Barbarians. The Forgotten Realms has cultures described as barbarians and D&D has the class called barbarian, but they are not synonymous. People with the barbarian class are special warriors even in barbarian tribes.
Pretty obvious, IMO. And how I'd always played them.
Clerics. Clerics are special individuals gifted with divine power by a deity, but they don’t have the gods on speed dial nor are the gods constantly watching their every move. Clerics of a deity can go astray of a deity’s ethos or even betray their deity. Judgment of such infractions might be immediate or saved until the afterlife, based upon the whim of the deity.
The bold parts solve a lot of complaints I've heard. Yeah, you're chosen. No, the gods don't actually speak with you frequently, nor do they constantly reach down and smack you for doing the wrong thing. You still have to use the high-level commune type spells.
Druids. Druids are not clerics by another name and do not devote themselves to a single deity.... Instead, druids (regardless of race) pay homage to the “First Circle,” which is a pantheon of human gods that represent the basic elements of the natural world (Shar for night and darkness, Selune for the moon, Silvanus for forests, Talos for storms, Kossuth for fire, and so on). Druids from non-human races often pay homage to nature-related deities of their own as well, but the power of druidic magic stems from the First Circle. Most druid characters should acknowledge a circle of druids from which they originate, the circle being a group of druids that serves all the druids that are part of it as a body of wisdom, lore, and news.
I'm not fond of shoving gods in everyone's faces, but that's a FR thing. I'd much prefer treating druids as entirely god-orthogonal (drawing their power from nature and nature spirits, not gods). And note the human-centric nature--even elven druids pull from the human gods, like it or not.
Monks. Monks are not monastic priests in the Christian sense, but meditative martial artists in the Eastern sense. Monks are rare in Faerûn and quite common in Kara-Tur. There are dozens if not
hundreds of orders of monks in Kara-Tur, but Faerûn hosts only a few. Most monks of Faerûn are associated with a human religious order, acting as protectors of holy sites and sometimes as enforcers or assassins. Some of the few Faerûnian monastic orders are Dark Moon, Shining Hand, Yielding Way, Yellow Rose, and Sun Soul.
More human-centric god-bothering :smallwink:. But monks as enforcers and assassins does bring a slightly different spin on things, plus the focus on "meditative martial artists". Punch first, pray later.
Paladins. Paladins are warriors of unusual virtue and piety rewarded by a good god with divine power. Paladins follow a common code of ethics but paladins of different deities emphasize
different aspects. (A paladin of Sune would emphasize aspects of courtly love and courtesy, whereas a paladin of Tyr would be more concerned with justice and fair treatment of foes.) As with clerics, paladins can go astray of their code, but paladins are typically judged more swiftly and harshly by their gods.
Now this is something I actively dislike. Makes too strong of an overlap with clerics, except clerics (the chosen agents of the gods) are less harshly bound to their one particular god's will! Makes very little sense to me. And this is something that I absolutely would change if I ever ran in FR.
Rangers. Low-level rangers can be depicted like mountain men and wilderness guides. Once a ranger has spellcasting, that ranger has been chosen by a nature deity and granted power. Rangers
with spellcasting should show devotion to a specific nature deity depending on the ranger’s alignment (Malar, Shaundakul, Gwaeron Windstrom. Milikki, Silvanus, Eldath, Shialia).
More god-bothering. Ugh.
Sorcerer. The source of a sorcerer’s power should be a significant element of the character’s story.
Yes. That's the entire entry for sorcerers. Poor folks.
Warlocks. Warlocks always have a patron and a bargain. Those things should be a huge part of such a character and that character’s part in any plot. Ask for appropriate options for a patron and
details. Note that not all the Great Old One patrons mentioned in the Player’s Handbook are appropriate to the Forgotten Realms. Of the ones mentioned, Ghaunadar, called That Which Lurks; Kezef, the Chaos Hound, and Dendar, the Night Serpent, exist in Faerûn.
Now that's something lots of people won't want to hear. Yes, you need an explicit patron, and yes, you need an explicit bargain in FR. No "I brushed up against it in my dreams and now I have this power!" self-awakening stories here! There's always a conscious bargain that the warlock is aware of. Quid pro quo.
Wizards. In addition to a spellbook, a wizard in the Forgotten Realms crafts a sigil that is the wizard’s symbol and is used in various spells and rituals to represent the wizard. Also, it is extremely rare for a wizard to have a familiar.
Heh to all those "find familiar for life!" characters. :smalltongue: Interesting note about the sigil.
Note who's missing? Bards, Fighters, and Rogues. Guess they're pretty much stock-PHB then. Although there is mention of bards and fighters in the "game terms in the world" section:
Bard. This word is reserved for people who have the bard class. They have magical powers that
regular minstrels, musicians, and singers lack.
...
Cleric. A priest is anyone who devotes themselves to the service of a deity and/or the maintenance of a shrine or temple (to one or more deities). A “cleric” is someone who is granted spells by a particular deity. People in the world would call a cleric a priest, but they would not call a priest without powers a cleric.
Druid. A druid is always a member of the class. People do use the word “druid” to refer to them.
Fighter. People in the world use the word “fighter” like we do. It’s a word for someone who fights; a boxer is a fighter. An adventurer who has the fighter class would likely refer to himself as a warrior.
The druid entry is interesting to me, on a bunch of levels.