[3.5] Learning New Spells for Non-Wizards

[The Neoclassic]

So, if one has a bunch of homebrew or splatbook spells for, say, clerics, are all clerics expected to have access to them? In other words, one could pray for pretty much any spell that exists in the world as long as they're the right class and level? To me, this seems a bit silly, since I'd imagine clerics could only pray for spells they'd seen or heard of, or learned to pray for during their training (or perhaps when they gain new spell levels a bunch of potential spells are divinely revealed to them by their deity).

So, if that's the case, then how could clerics learn to cast new spells? Could it be as simple as reading a divine writing that... well, I don't know what it could say to take up pages and pages, but somehow explain to them how they could pray for and prepare the spell?

Sorry if this sounds confusing (it's hard for me to explain, and I keep getting distracted by the sounds of Mass Effect in the background), but essentially I want to know if a "spellbook" of new or unique cleric spells would make sense and could be read and other clerics could learn the spells from it.

[AmberVael]

Cleric spells are pretty much flavored as prayers and divine blessings from their gods. It makes sense to me that they could pray for some kind of benefit that they'd never even heard of a god giving before, and that they could get it without too much difficulty or incident.

Why would they need to know if another cleric got it? Why would they need writing? All I'd think is that they need to commune with their god and see what they can get.

*shrug*

[Assassin89]

All I know from the SRD is that independent research for divine spells is possible, but I am not sure about the process.

[Keld Denar]

You could run it similar to an Archivist, where the cleric has a prayer book and has to learn spells from holy texts in order to augement his or her prayer book. Really, this is kinda throwing it in the face of one of a clerics most powerful class features though, the ability to know every spell.

If you really wanted to do it, I'd do it like this. Core PHB spells are all open access. Spells outside of there, like from SpC or CDivine require the PC to find access to them from some source. That would give the player a strong base to build on, yet make exotic spells...you know...exotic.

[arguskos]

If you really wanted to do it, I'd do it like this. Core PHB spells are all open access. Spells outside of there, like from SpC or CDivine require the PC to find access to them from some source. That would give the player a strong base to build on, yet make exotic spells...you know...exotic.

This is how I run clerics in my games, with the add-on that most gods have a few unique spells that they and only they grant to their followers. Mechanically, these are just SpC spells that I feel fit the god somewhat and auto-give the cleric.

I feel that personalizing the spell list just a touch is a nice tweak for clerics, and still permitting every cleric to go out and find some new divine spells, if they want.

[holywhippet]

If you are running a custom game world, you could require clerics to take a pilgrimage to learn about all of the spells they can cast. Give them access to all spells from level 1-2 or 1-3. For all other spells they need to visit certain holy sites - temples, shrines, monuments etc. Each location is dedicated to particular school of magic - so visiting the "temple of the all seeing eye" lets you cast all of the higher level divination spells.

Alternately, each major temple could have access to holy scriptures that teach you about spells at certain levels. In order to access them you have to prove yourself worthy to the temple and/or the God they worship.

[Thurbane]

One relatively common houserule I've heard of is as follows: for classes with access to every spell on their list (Clerics, Druids etc.), if they want to incorporate spells from new sources, they dump one of the core spells of the same level from their list. Some people find this horribly restrictive, but others finds it helps balance things against the other casters such as Wizard or Archivist who have to hunt down and scribe spells into their books, and against the casters like Favored Soul and Sorcerer who have limited spells known. This still leaves the question of being balanced against spontaneous casters with access to their entire lists, such as Beguilers, Dread Necros and Warmages, but typically these classes have a narrowly focused spell list, and have to use Advanced Learning to add new spells to their repertoire.

[The Neoclassic]

Iyou really wanted to do it, I'd do it like this. Core PHB spells are all open access. Spells outside of there, like from SpC or CDivine require the PC to find access to them from some source. That would give the player a strong base to build on, yet make exotic spells...you know...exotic.

This sounds ideal! Thanks for the suggestion. And those other sources could be magical texts or prayer books or such...