Convincing Cleric to get religious

[Pinjata]

Hey, guys,

So, I have a guy in my party, playing a cleric of Torm. Thing is, in-character, he is about as religious as a wet napkin.

For the time being, I’ll grant him his spells, but I’ll have them fade away, if he does not step up his game.

Now, there is a sort of interesting backstory here. This guy was a cleric, had lost his memory in an accident and is now re-starting (from lvl 1).

I was thinking of Torm sending him a vision, that explains two things:
- I am god of specific s***. Be specific. I do not award divine powers to every schmuck who wants to help his friends occasionally
- Get your ecclesiastical s*** together

How would you shape this vision? Or perhaps you would handle this in another way?

thanks

[Elvensilver]

Are there any in-game mechanisms to obtain spells, like praying for an hour each morning? If so, and he at least follows those, I'd start smaller than with full divine dream: If he has any other powers (like the Domain powers in pathfinder), he'll first find that his daily amount reduced, or simply describe, how it feels harder to reach his god's power when casting.

A dream seems like overkill, except in the case that the god is specially interested in this 1st level priest. If this isn't the case, it is a weird precedent.
Instead you could promise small XP-awards for everyone, if they play to their class identity, e.g. behaving like someone who is actually religious.
Or just let some NPC ask some good natured questions: Aha, Torm. And who's that?, or a request for help in a Torm specific field, just to remind him of his allegiance to a higher beeing. If such subtle props won't change anything, maybe a highpriest shows up, and warns him, that if he doesn't up his game, he'll lose the church's benefits.

[Pinjata]

Are there any in-game mechanisms to obtain spells, like praying for an hour each morning?

Absolutely, it's 5e we're running.

If so, and he at least follows those, I'd start smaller than with full divine dream: If he has any other powers (like the Domain powers in pathfinder), he'll first find that his daily amount reduced, or simply describe, how it feels harder to reach his god's power when casting.

A dream seems like overkill, except in the case that the god is specially interested in this 1st level priest. If this isn't the case, it is a weird precedent.
Instead you could promise small XP-awards for everyone, if they play to their class identity, e.g. behaving like someone who is actually religious.
Or just let some NPC ask some good natured questions: Aha, Torm. And who's that?, or a request for help in a Torm specific field, just to remind him of his allegiance to a higher beeing. If such subtle props won't change anything, maybe a highpriest shows up, and warns him, that if he doesn't up his game, he'll lose the church's benefits.

Oh, man, this is great. Perfect.

[MoiMagnus]

Did you talk to the player?
Do the player is actually interested into playing a cleric, serving a god, ...?
Or did he just liked the technical powers?
Or did he felt pressured to play a cleric because there was no healer in the team, but really doesn't want to have the roleplay of a cleric?

A lot of players just don't want to have their belief dictated by the setting, or to play a religious character at all. Forcing him to have such behaviour will usually end up in the player not having any fun playing because they feel the character doesn't belong to them anymore.

So you have to first determine if the player want to RP a cleric. If he does, then yes, sending him dreams about "you should be more religious" is a good solution, and you would be able to have some nice RP scene where the PC question its beliefs and actions. If he doesn't then you have to decide if:
1) You roll with it, and accept a non-religious cleric, possibly retconing few things for this to be possible. Example: he is cleric not because the god actually likes him, but because he is destined to eventually do unwillingly something very good for the god, and the god decided it was worth the sacrifice to give him power. Or you might suggest him to be cleric of a god who doesn't really care about what their cleric do.
2) You talk with the player about this class not being adapter to his RP, and that if he doesn't want to RP a cleric, he should not chose the cleric class.

[Kyutaru]

DM: "Okay, you want to play D&D! Let's start by picking your class."

Player: "I want to be a healer. So I guess Cleric."

DM: "Good choice. Now which god do you want to worship?"

Player: "Oh my guy is an atheist. He doesn't believe in gods."

DM: "Okay, clerics get their powers by praying to their god every morning."

Player: "Ya no, I just want the healing powers without the Big Brother."

...

Start with negative levels. Cleric levels go up, Cleric levels go down. God stops letting you have access to your lvl 5 spells one morning. I'm all for creating a custom class for healer wannabes but when you neglect your deity in a class based around a deity then you stop getting magic. It's like falling as a Paladin, wearing metal as a Druid, becoming lawful as a Barbarian, breaking your pact as a Warlock, or multi-classing as a Wizard. Automatic loss of your rights to play.

[MoiMagnus]

Start with negative levels. Cleric levels go up, Cleric levels go down. God stops letting you have access to your lvl 5 spells one morning. I'm all for creating a custom class for healer wannabes but when you neglect your deity in a class based around a deity then you stop getting magic. It's like falling as a Paladin, wearing metal as a Druid, becoming lawful as a Barbarian, breaking your pact as a Warlock, or multi-classing as a Wizard. Automatic loss of your rights to play.

Dealing with problem with the player by punishing the character is rarely a good solution.
Either you accept the wishes of the player (at the cost of watering down the RP of your table, sure), or you try to convince him by talking to him directly (either to change its RP, or to change class), or you ask him to not come back next sessions.

But saying "sure you can play, but you don't have powers unless you agree with my playstyle" only kill the mood. And you will end up in a very unpleasant situation where you "police him" and constantly check if he RP in a "religious enough" way. You can't have fun session without the cooperation of the players. If the player don't cooperate with you, you're better without them than forcing them.

[Pinjata]

Did you talk to the player?

A bit. he disagrees about cleric being all that religious and believes gods bestow their powers upon any do-gooder.

Do the player is actually interested into playing a cleric, serving a god, ...?

On the first count yes, on the second part ... not so much.

Or did he felt pressured to play a cleric because there was no healer in the team, but really doesn't want to have the roleplay of a cleric?

This.

A lot of players just don't want to have their belief dictated by the setting, or to play a religious character at all. Forcing him to have such behaviour will usually end up in the player not having any fun playing because they feel the character doesn't belong to them anymore.

Example: he is cleric not because the god actually likes him, but because he is destined to eventually do unwillingly something very good for the god, and the god decided it was worth the sacrifice to give him power.

This is GREAT. Lovely solution.

[Quertus]

Feeling pressured into playing the healer, then being punished for it? Not so good.

An alternate solution would be to let him play what he wants, and for the healer to be an NPC. Or let the healer be his cohort - perhaps even giving him the Leadership feat for free, out of respect for his sacrifice.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Dealing with problem with the player by punishing the character is rarely a good solution.

This.

Perhaps the most important GM skill is differentiating between in-game and out-of-game stuff. Is a character frustrated in-game, or is the player frustrated in real life? Are two characters clashing because their players think it's fun, or because the two real people keep getting into fights? Is the Cleric not acting religious because the character isn't a good believer, or because the player isn't that interested in roleplaying religion?

You can solve in-game problems with out-of-game conversations, but you cannot solve out-of game problems with in-game solutions. You just can't.

So...talk to the player. Maybe they wanted Cleric mechanics but weren't interested in the faith part, in which case you should refluff things. Maybe they've got a plan for character development, in which case you should do what you can to go along with it (and, at times, challenge it). Heck, maybe they're just shy or not sure how to roleplay this particular character, in which case you should find gentle ways to draw him out.

[Keltest]

Your player is mistaken about the mechanics of where the spells come from (he's probably thinking of Paladins, which really are just empowered by their dedication to whatever cause they picked) but if he doesn't want to roleplay as a super pious priest, then don't force him to. Its his character, not yours, and ultimately he gets to make that decision.

Furthermore, its not like D&D is a computer game where the rules are the rules and they cant be helped, you can change things on the fly if you want or need to. He doesn't really want to follow a god in that way? Ok, what does his character believe in then? Maybe his powers come from that. Maybe he's right, and some sympathetic gods answer the prayers of poor silly mortals who really do have faith in some non-deific concept and pray to it for spells out of sympathy/pity/a desire to encourage goodness/lawfulness/whatever. There are lots of ways to accommodate this player without declaring him unable to play the class he was more or less pigeonholed into playing in the first place.

[johnbragg]

Now, there is a sort of interesting backstory here. This guy was a cleric, had lost his memory in an accident and is now re-starting (from lvl 1).

Is this the player's backstory, or the DM's? In other words, is the player invested in this backstory, or is it just baggage his character is carrying around? If it's something more-or-less imposed on the player, I don't think it's a good idea to whack his character if the character doesn't follow what his former self wanted.

Or did he felt pressured to play a cleric because there was no healer in the team, but really doesn't want to have the roleplay of a cleric?

This.

So, cleric really wasn't really Player Bob's first first choice, but We Live In A Society, Karen, and the party needs a healer, so he plays a cleric.

And now the DM wants to punish him for not REALLY wanting to play a cleric.

Is that an accurate summary? Because that's abusing the social contract of the table.

Feeling pressured into playing the healer, then being punished for it? Not so good.

An alternate solution would be to let him play what he wants, and for the healer to be an NPC. Or let the healer be his cohort - perhaps even giving him the Leadership feat for free, out of respect for his sacrifice.

What IS the player roleplaying as? Can we just retcon the character to be a Fighter or a Paladin for roleplay purposes, who just happens to have a subclass that exactly duplicates the Cleric mechanics in every way?

[Mastikator]

A bit. he disagrees about cleric being all that religious and believes gods bestow their powers upon any do-gooder.

You're the DM, your word is fact. Just tell him he can believe whatever he wants but you decide whom the god bestows their favor.

[KineticDiplomat]

So, it sounds like your catching the side effects of playing D&D. It’s a mechanistic and numeric power system where certain “tactical” roles need to be filled. It’s basically a game assumption that they will be.

D&D is not a role playing system at its mechanical core.I mean, it CAN work for RP, but intrinsically it discourages it. And since you chose to run a fairly crap RP system, you’re going to catch RP you don’t like.

I imagine the conversation went like this:

Group: “We need a healbot”
Player: “Ugh, I guess I can. I’m not big into gods or religion though”
Group: “Cool, whatever, just pick a cleric because they are the bet healbots. It doesn’t really matter.”
Player: “Ok, I guess Torn does some stuff like that.”
GM: “You aren’t personally enraptured with being a servant of the gods? Why did you play a cleric! It better not be just to be a healbot!”

So, you have three options if he doesn’t decide to jump on board.

1. Sacrifice your ideals of what a cleric should be, and let him heal.

2. Keep your ideals, cut off his powers, but still make the game fun and challenging without the group being screwed. No one is going to like it if you keep smirking at them going “oh, don’t like buying healing potions? Finding these fights hard?Guess SOMEBODY should have found {Scrubbed} -Torn.” So you’ll have to hack what an encounter looks like.

3. My personal recommended option. Don’t play D&D. Play a game where the RP and the mechanics are more aligned.

[johnbragg]

So, it sounds like your catching the side effects of playing D&D. It’s a mechanistic and numeric power system where certain “tactical” roles need to be filled. It’s basically a game assumption that they will be.

D&D is not a role playing system at its mechanical core.I mean, it CAN work for RP, but intrinsically it discourages it. And since you chose to run a fairly crap RP system, you’re going to catch RP you don’t like.

I imagine the conversation went like this:

Group: “We need a healbot”
Player: “Ugh, I guess I can. I’m not big into gods or religion though”
Group: “Cool, whatever, just pick a cleric because they are the bet healbots. It doesn’t really matter.”
Player: “Ok, I guess Torn does some stuff like that.”
GM: “You aren’t personally enraptured with being a servant of the gods? Why did you play a cleric! It better not be just to be a healbot!”

So, you have three options if he doesn’t decide to jump on board.

1. Sacrifice your ideals of what a cleric should be, and let him heal.

2. Keep your ideals, cut off his powers, but still make the game fun and challenging without the group being screwed. No one is going to like it if you keep smirking at them going “oh, don’t like buying healing potions? Finding these fights hard?Guess SOMEBODY should have found {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}-Torn.” So you’ll have to hack what an encounter looks like.

3. My personal recommended option. Don’t play D&D. Play a game where the RP and the mechanics are more aligned.

I think this is kind of a chicken-and-egg case--if the Cleric weren't an early D&D fixture, would there be much demand for a class that roleplays devotion to a particular pagan god expressed through murdering monsters and plundering ancient tombs?

(I suppose that RP space would be filled by the Warlock...)

[Kyutaru]

Dealing with problem with the player by punishing the character is rarely a good solution.
Either you accept the wishes of the player (at the cost of watering down the RP of your table, sure), or you try to convince him by talking to him directly (either to change its RP, or to change class), or you ask him to not come back next sessions.

But saying "sure you can play, but you don't have powers unless you agree with my playstyle" only kill the mood. And you will end up in a very unpleasant situation where you "police him" and constantly check if he RP in a "religious enough" way. You can't have fun session without the cooperation of the players. If the player don't cooperate with you, you're better without them than forcing them.

{Scrubbed}

I'm all for creating a custom class for healer wannabes but when you neglect your deity in a class based around a deity then you stop getting magic.

Clerics are god dependent. This is like having a Sorcerer who doesn't believe in magic. He just thinks he's Fonzie.

[patchyman]

3. My personal recommended option. Don’t play D&D. Play a game where the RP and the mechanics are more aligned.

4. Play a Bard, a Paladin, a Druid, a Celestial Warlock or a Divine Soul Sorcerer.

[Galithar]

So, it sounds like your catching the side effects of playing D&D. It’s a mechanistic and numeric power system where certain “tactical” roles need to be filled. It’s basically a game assumption that they will be.

D&D is not a role playing system at its mechanical core.I mean, it CAN work for RP, but intrinsically it discourages it. And since you chose to run a fairly crap RP system, you’re going to catch RP you don’t like.

I imagine the conversation went like this:

Group: “We need a healbot”
Player: “Ugh, I guess I can. I’m not big into gods or religion though”
Group: “Cool, whatever, just pick a cleric because they are the bet healbots. It doesn’t really matter.”
Player: “Ok, I guess Torn does some stuff like that.”
GM: “You aren’t personally enraptured with being a servant of the gods? Why did you play a cleric! It better not be just to be a healbot!”

So, you have three options if he doesn’t decide to jump on board.

1. Sacrifice your ideals of what a cleric should be, and let him heal.

2. Keep your ideals, cut off his powers, but still make the game fun and challenging without the group being screwed. No one is going to like it if you keep smirking at them going “oh, don’t like buying healing potions? Finding these fights hard?Guess SOMEBODY should have found Jesus-Torn.” So you’ll have to hack what an encounter looks like.

3. My personal recommended option. Don’t play D&D. Play a game where the RP and the mechanics are more aligned.

{Scrubbed}

1. Clerics aren't the best healers. Druids are superior, though the best is a Druid with a Life Cleric dip. Celestial Warlock / Divine Soul Sorcerer also has some potent healing potential, though maybe not as much in early levels.

2. Heal bots are not required in 5e. In combat healing is nearly always a net loss, with the exception of healing word when someone drops to 0. Bards, Druids, and Divine Soul Sorcerers do this as well or better then a Cleric. Clerics are controllers and damagers that happen to get access to healing magic.

3. 5e has a section (I believe in the DMG) that talks about allowing a Cleric to get their powers from their devotion to an ideal (much like 5e's Paladin does) meaning that even a Cleric can be dedicated to something other than a deity.

4. The RP and mechanics in D&D have no contradiction at any point. Sure you can CHOOSE to RP in a way that is contrary to the world you are playing in, but nothing in the mechanics prevents you from RPing anything. The notion that a Cleric must RP as super devout and is mechanically required is just not true of 5e at all.

[KineticDiplomat]

Galithar, we know the following to be true:

1) The Player chose a cleric because the group wanted him to do healing.

2) The group believed it needed a healer, and the end result of their conversation was he chose a cleric - presumably because he/they did not do internet D&D character class optimization. Yes, there very well may be "better" healers, but jumping up and down to pretend that because there are he should obviously suck it up for being Teh Newbz and not choosing Druid-Dip-Opti-Class is electing to fight semantics to avoid the point piñjata has already explained. Which is that he, in the grandest of D&D traditions and popular imagination, chose a cleric to be a healer. Which he only did because of point 1.

3) Regardless of what the mathematics of in versus out of combat healing are, the group self evidently thought they needed a dedicated healer. As part of the system of playing D&D, they did not think "Ah, right then, we could use another mace wielding fighter - know what? We don't need a healer in the party." They likely thought "^&*! if no one takes the healer role, we're all screwed." Hence, again, why he's a cleric. And given the speed in which other people guessed that, we can fairly say that the idea your party should have a healer is not some fringe concept.

4) The Player doe not like religion. We do not know, but it's entirely possible he does not particularly want to be a nature-lover, celestial warlock, or divine sorcerer either. He took on the role of cleric as a MECHANICAL role to serve the party's needs - this is no guarantee that he would be enthralled with ideological options A, B, or C.

From this we can conclude that the Player, for solely MECHANICAL purposes, in a system where the party thought it would in trouble- possibly to the point of not being viable in game- if it did not have a specific MECHANICAL ability, took on a role that he is only interested in MECHANICALLY. And someone was going to, for this and most parties, have to eat that MECHANICAL role. You'll note that no one, at any point that Pinjata has explained, did something because they thought they would like the RP of it. We don't know, but since he didn't jump up and down for another class he either a) doesn't know they are viable healers or b) doesn't want to RP them either. Hence the D&D-ism. A player is perforce conscripted into a role he doesn't want in order to satisfy the power mechanics.

The fact that those power mechanics match the internal lore is irrelevant; you have, as we very clearly have here, all sorts of players taking on roles because they are system optimized for power, not because they want to RP them. And then we complain when people aren't into the charcters that they mostly developed as Dice-Chess pieces.

[Beleriphon]

Nevermind that the player picked a pretty good backstory. Torm is a the god of paladins and in setting lore, pretty damn forgiving of his followers. If the character used to be a devote and powerful cleric, what's to suggest in the future he wont be as well?

Honestly, let it ride, ask the player how they envision the character worshipping Torm in any capacity and go with it. Remember, Torm isn't about proselytizing as much as curbstomping evil.

[Lord of Shadows]

Torm is a the god of paladins and in setting lore, pretty damn forgiving of his followers. If the character used to be a devote and powerful cleric, what's to suggest in the future he wont be as well?

Honestly, let it ride, ask the player how they envision the character worshiping Torm in any capacity and go with it. Remember, Torm isn't about proselytizing as much as curbstomping evil.

This is good advice..

You could also have the Cleric (or the party, if appropriate) "happen" to encounter another Cleric of Torm, and perhaps some pilgrims. Their reaction to the wayward Cleric should prove insightful to the player. Or, maybe the party needs to find shelter or a safe place for a night and "happens" across a temple/monastery/whatever dedicated to Torm. Just don't do everything all at once (encounters and penalties) or the player may start to (rightly) feel singled out.

YMMV..

[Keltest]

Galithar, we know the following to be true:

1) The Player chose a cleric because the group wanted him to do healing.

2) The group believed it needed a healer, and the end result of their conversation was he chose a cleric - presumably because he/they did not do internet D&D character class optimization. Yes, there very well may be "better" healers, but jumping up and down to pretend that because there are he should obviously suck it up for being Teh Newbz and not choosing Druid-Dip-Opti-Class is electing to fight semantics to avoid the point piñjata has already explained. Which is that he, in the grandest of D&D traditions and popular imagination, chose a cleric to be a healer. Which he only did because of point 1.

3) Regardless of what the mathematics of in versus out of combat healing are, the group self evidently thought they needed a dedicated healer. As part of the system of playing D&D, they did not think "Ah, right then, we could use another mace wielding fighter - know what? We don't need a healer in the party." They likely thought "^&*! if no one takes the healer role, we're all screwed." Hence, again, why he's a cleric. And given the speed in which other people guessed that, we can fairly say that the idea your party should have a healer is not some fringe concept.

4) The Player doe not like religion. We do not know, but it's entirely possible he does not particularly want to be a nature-lover, celestial warlock, or divine sorcerer either. He took on the role of cleric as a MECHANICAL role to serve the party's needs - this is no guarantee that he would be enthralled with ideological options A, B, or C.

From this we can conclude that the Player, for solely MECHANICAL purposes, in a system where the party thought it would in trouble- possibly to the point of not being viable in game- if it did not have a specific MECHANICAL ability, took on a role that he is only interested in MECHANICALLY. And someone was going to, for this and most parties, have to eat that MECHANICAL role. You'll note that no one, at any point that Pinjata has explained, did something because they thought they would like the RP of it. We don't know, but since he didn't jump up and down for another class he either a) doesn't know they are viable healers or b) doesn't want to RP them either. Hence the D&D-ism. A player is perforce conscripted into a role he doesn't want in order to satisfy the power mechanics.

The fact that those power mechanics match the internal lore is irrelevant; you have, as we very clearly have here, all sorts of players taking on roles because they are system optimized for power, not because they want to RP them. And then we complain when people aren't into the charcters that they mostly developed as Dice-Chess pieces.

This is an excellent analysis for where the priorities of the party lay, but not at all helpful for determining if they could actually have gotten away with either having a non-cleric as a healer, or going without a healer entirely. What the players perceived to be necessary is, frankly, mostly irrelevant to what D&D as a system allows them to do.

[Anymage]

What the players perceived to be necessary is, frankly, mostly irrelevant to what D&D as a system allows them to do.

What the players believe will strongly inform the social contract at the table. Sometimes it's better to be a team player, even if something else winds up mechanically stronger. Also, people's memories being what they are, any time your new healer is unable to save the party from themselves will be "proof" that the new healer is complete garbage.

There's also the part where a new player is unlikely to know the ins and outs of a system, or the depths of char-op. Not to mention that most parties that have a traditional expectation of party roles (fighter/mage/thief/cleric) will also tend to get bristly when someone is too far from baseline. Involved builds will tend to invite blowback, which can be more hassle than it's worth when you just want a night out with friends.

[Inchhighguy]

I always liked positive refinforcment.

First off, if the player really wants to be a ''wet napkin" cleric...just let them and move on. There is no point in wasting any time on a player that does not want to do anything more.

And, unless the player is open to ''negative" gaming, any thing you do ''against" them or to punsh them is pointless.

But the positive way....

Simply offer the player things for being a good cleric of Torm. Magic items, spells, or even just general aid. It does not even need to be Torm himself, but it can be a divine servant (say a celestial talking lion) or even just another cleric.

While you might be able to find something in a book to use....but chances are you will need to make up something new. But this lets you also tailor it to the player a bit for something they will like.

[Keltest]

What the players believe will strongly inform the social contract at the table. Sometimes it's better to be a team player, even if something else winds up mechanically stronger. Also, people's memories being what they are, any time your new healer is unable to save the party from themselves will be "proof" that the new healer is complete garbage.

There's also the part where a new player is unlikely to know the ins and outs of a system, or the depths of char-op. Not to mention that most parties that have a traditional expectation of party roles (fighter/mage/thief/cleric) will also tend to get bristly when someone is too far from baseline. Involved builds will tend to invite blowback, which can be more hassle than it's worth when you just want a night out with friends.

Again, this was in response to the idea that he was "forced" to play a cleric specifically because D&D as a system requires that sort of thing.

[Galithar]

Galithar, we know the following to be true:

1) The Player chose a cleric because the group wanted him to do healing.

2) The group believed it needed a healer, and the end result of their conversation was he chose a cleric - presumably because he/they did not do internet D&D character class optimization. Yes, there very well may be "better" healers, but jumping up and down to pretend that because there are he should obviously suck it up for being Teh Newbz and not choosing Druid-Dip-Opti-Class is electing to fight semantics to avoid the point piñjata has already explained. Which is that he, in the grandest of D&D traditions and popular imagination, chose a cleric to be a healer. Which he only did because of point 1.

3) Regardless of what the mathematics of in versus out of combat healing are, the group self evidently thought they needed a dedicated healer. As part of the system of playing D&D, they did not think "Ah, right then, we could use another mace wielding fighter - know what? We don't need a healer in the party." They likely thought "^&*! if no one takes the healer role, we're all screwed." Hence, again, why he's a cleric. And given the speed in which other people guessed that, we can fairly say that the idea your party should have a healer is not some fringe concept.

4) The Player doe not like religion. We do not know, but it's entirely possible he does not particularly want to be a nature-lover, celestial warlock, or divine sorcerer either. He took on the role of cleric as a MECHANICAL role to serve the party's needs - this is no guarantee that he would be enthralled with ideological options A, B, or C.

From this we can conclude that the Player, for solely MECHANICAL purposes, in a system where the party thought it would in trouble- possibly to the point of not being viable in game- if it did not have a specific MECHANICAL ability, took on a role that he is only interested in MECHANICALLY. And someone was going to, for this and most parties, have to eat that MECHANICAL role. You'll note that no one, at any point that Pinjata has explained, did something because they thought they would like the RP of it. We don't know, but since he didn't jump up and down for another class he either a) doesn't know they are viable healers or b) doesn't want to RP them either. Hence the D&D-ism. A player is perforce conscripted into a role he doesn't want in order to satisfy the power mechanics.

The fact that those power mechanics match the internal lore is irrelevant; you have, as we very clearly have here, all sorts of players taking on roles because they are system optimized for power, not because they want to RP them. And then we complain when people aren't into the charcters that they mostly developed as Dice-Chess pieces.

Yet you are missing my point.

1. The player chose a Cleric for their character to be a healer. This is true, but it didn't need to be. There a many other ways to heal in addition to 5e not needing a healer to begin with.

2. While I pointed out that there are better healers it is also irrelevant to the fact that he didn't need to be a Cleric to heal. There are also classes that heal equal to or slightly less then a Cleric. The idea that the system is at fault for a players uninformed choice is very thin. It is also completely missing the point that a Cleric need not be devoted to a deity at all. My entire point is that blindly following the traditional trope of devout healing Cleric is not the fault of the SYSTEM. It gives way more options for a healer if you insist on having one, some of which even out perform the Cleric. (which was only a preemptive argument to "but clerics are the best at it" because they aren't. Even a straight class druid is superior.) Also the idea that I'm "jumping up and down to pretend that [he should suck it up because he made a poor choice]" (brackets are my paraphrasing) is also completely avoiding my point that he need not have made that choice to begin with. He shouldn't have to play a character with dissonance between mechanics and RP because the system provides the tools to prevent it, if only you use them.

Not all divine powers need to be derived from deities. In some campaigns, believers hold enough conviction in their ideas about the universe that they gain magical power from that conviction. In other campaigns, impersonal forces of nature or magic replace the gods by granting power to mortals attuned to them. Just as druids and rangers can gain their spell ability from the force of nature rather than from a specific nature deity, some clerics devote themselves to ideals rather than to a god. Paladins might serve a philosophy of justice and chivalry rather than a specific deity.

3. This is a fault of the group then, not the system. Groupthink can be very dangerousDon't pin a player problem on the rules. I could go to any system and assume I need a dedicated healer. I could be right, but I could be wrong. I could blindly insist that we need someone dedicated to being a medic in a CoC game. And that the reason everyone says the game always ends in insanity or death is because they never have enough dedicated medics in the party.

4. Again, the Cleric need not be devoted to a deity if you don't want it to be. Acting like their are hard coded rules where there aren't misleads people. The DMG talks about Clerics that don't worship gods in its first chapter. So maybe a player wouldn't have read that and realize that in 5e the designers thought about the people that want the magic without the deity baggage. That's why I'm here pointing it out to a DM.

The player may have chosen something based on mechanical reasons. That's going to happen in every system except for a totally freeform collaborative story-telling. Which borders on being an entirely different genre of game, but that's a whole different subject. It also doesn't mean that the system is designed to create a disconnect here. 5e is fully designed to allow someone to play with the full mechanical package of a Cleric and they can RP however they want. Does it require the DM and the player to think about it and figure out what they want? Yes. That's why good DMs will recommend a session 0 where you talk about things like this. D&D is a system of exceptions. Generally a Cleric does worship a deity. But specifically in the OPs campaign he can choose to allow this character to be 'chosen'. He doesn't even have to acknowledge the deity, they just bestow these powers because they are a deity and decided to. He could also allow this player to be a Cleric with absolutely zero connection to a deity, maybe he has a devotion to an ideal? Maybe he just has magic because he's magical? The rulebook touches on this and gives the power to the DM. If there is an issue with a Cleric player not wanting to play a devoutly religious character the disconnect is not between player and system, it is between player and DM (or player and game world).

clerics choose domains, not deities, so your world can associate domains with deities in any way you choose.

They could also simply look a bit further into the system and find all the other options for being a healer. Maybe they ARE interested in roleplaying as a traditional Druid? Or maybe they didn't realize that a Celestial Warlock can put out any significant healing? Or maybe they just want to keep playing with the Cleric toolbox, but open up the DMG and reimagine what it means to be a Cleric in their world?

In any case D&D 5e gives you the tools to make your character match your RP. The only question then becomes if your DM will let you use them, or if they insist you lock yourself in the box of what it means to be a Cleric in The Forgotten Realms.

Personally, I suggest opening your mind to let this player RP how they want. If that isn't by being a devout Cleric, then don't try to force them to. Or maybe they could be convinced that a healer isn't required in 5e and they should feel free to not only RP how they want, but to create a character that has the mechanical goodies they actually wanted to begin with also.

[Zakhara]

Can someone explain to me why a Cleric player can't just play whatever class they wanted, however they wanted?

Trying to retrofit setting, mechanical, or role-playing tactics to tailor the player closer to the DM's idea is, in my opinion, dishonest. They provided a perfectly fine explanation--one that I cannot conceive as negatively affecting the game or the table.

[False God]

Perhaps quite simply, Torm gives powers to the character because Torm believes in him and that while the character may not be Torm's most pious follower, Torm supports the character's actions and how they're putting Torm's powers to use.

I'd think this would be a pretty open and shut case.

[patchyman]

I’m going to take a different tack from most of the posters here and suggest that maybe the problem isn’t the player’s class, but instead his choice of deity. I see a lot of clerics of Torm, Helm and Pelor, and they mostly come off as generic gods of generic goodness.

I would propose that you allow the player to switch to the worship of a deity that he can be excited about, and that breaks the stereotype of “cleric as generic priest and wet blanket”. Some suggestions below.

- Waukeen: “Getch’r holy relics right here! Two for 1 gp! Get them while they’re holy!”
- Sûne: “The Hammer is my p.....”
- Avandra: “...so then, I totally convinced those cultists that I was an exarch of Loviatar”

Even being a cleric of Oghma allows the player to focus more seeking knowledge than doing good.

In other words, start by finding what engages the character, than choose their deity based on that. Also, while domains may reflect the principal interests of gods, there isn’t a rule stating that Sune can’t have a few War or Tempest domain clerics (after all, falling in love is often described as being struck by lightning).

[M Placeholder]

May I suggest the player becomes either a Defier or a Godsman?

The Athar doctrine is that the Gods themselves are frauds - they are certainly powerful, but they are not worthy of worship and if they are all powerful, why do they need mortal prayer to sustain themselves? They are just ordinary beings that have been given power through sheer luck, and the Great Unknown is the only true divinity.

It's not hard to see how a Priest would look at the gods of Toril and see a lot of berks that just got lucky, and how they need the Wall of the Faithless to enforce worship. Anyone that needs that abomination to enforce worship isn't worthy of it, and the player playing a priest that wants to tear down the walls and show that the "deities" of Faerun pale in insignificance compared to the Great Unknown.

The Believers of the Source believe that life is a test for everything in existence and that everything has the potential to become a god. All life springs from the Source, and belief in this is what grants clerics their powers. With the amount of mortals that have become gods in that setting, the player character could have seen how he too could one day become a diety and join The Godsmen.

Having a Cleric that wants to expose the so called "gods" as just berks that aren't fit for worship and literally tear the walls down, or one that believes that life's trials are just his (and others) test in order to become something greater might interest the player a lot more than being a White-Bread dude wearing a set of robes in service of Torm.

[Willie the Duck]

Hey, guys,

So, I have a guy in my party, playing a cleric of Torm. Thing is, in-character, he is about as religious as a wet napkin.

For the time being, I’ll grant him his spells, but I’ll have them fade away, if he does not step up his game.

Now, there is a sort of interesting backstory here. This guy was a cleric, had lost his memory in an accident and is now re-starting (from lvl 1).

1) The Player chose a cleric because the group wanted him to do healing.

Without knowing the edition, we can't be too sure how many option there are other than cleric to fill said role, however, for the sake of argument, let's say that cleric is the only really good option for taking on the role of party HP battery. There's really two ways to take this:
1) In this game (and you the DM's world), taking on the party role of a healer does require the PC to show some adherence to a specific D&D-style god, and see if you can package/sell that as an interesting challenge for the player. There's certainly room for fun in this: the PC is an amnesiac. Having a god (directly or through intermediaries) working with them, making statements like, "right, I know it's hard to feel genuine devotion to a god you don't remember, but if you just keep faking it in front of the laity, I promise you'll start to feel it in your heart," and they PC going, "I don't know... " could be a lot of fun.
2)In this game, adventuring clerics totally can be lip-service faithful. Perhaps clerical magic is genuinely just a special form of magic, the knowledge of which the various churches simply have a monopoly (or exclusive rights to be seen performing in public). The real world European middle ages certainly had their share of secondborn sons or the like enter the church not for any real faith but because it's 'what one did' or the like. No reason one couldn't explore the same dynamic in your game.

Regardless, it's going to depend on what you and your table will find fun. DMs imposing limits on the players works exactly as well as it is seen as being a positive challenge.