Changes to Divine Casters for a Dark Ages Game

[Lackhand]

I think the cleric and druid are both overpowered, and besides which, they don't do exactly what I want them to.
The obvious fix, of course, is to smack them over & over again until they're shaped right.

I also have no qualms about rewriting d20-- but I'd like to run this by you guys, since you'll catch my stupid errors before my players do

Changes:
The wizard absorbs the cleric's spell list. This isn't really all that overpowering-- it means that the guy with the d4 hit die can actually cast most of the spells in the game.
I feel like this is not unbalancing, but I'm willing to be convinced that it puts too much power into the hand of the wizard. Convince me

The cleric ceases to exist (gasp! But wait, we already gave away his/her spell list. Ah, well).

The sorceror ceases to exist, replaced by Complete Arcane's Warlock, though I still need to come up with some minor fix for the warlock's eldritch blast, as I don't like that it's untyped.

The druid loses the animal companion and wild shaping abilities (WTF mate?!) and uses the sorceror table for spells. S/He gains 1 domain, as a cleric, in return, and may cast each spell 1/day, at the 'proper' level, ie, 1 level early for the sorceror table.

The ranger also loses the animal companion, and the paladin loses his/her mount.

These beastly-friends can all be replaced by taking a feat.


What does this accomplish?
I always felt that the cleric was all over the place; too powerful, and sort of monotheistic but polytheistic; it felt wierd.
The druid has the whole "tie to nature" thing going, which is nice, but also is a core class that turns into animals and has a bear that follows it around; the "bear following it around" is a cool thing that I feel like anyone should be able to have; the turning into an animal trick really feels like it should take magic to achieve.

So, therefore, the wizard is made a bit stronger, because they have more options; the cleric is removed from the picture, and the druid is... changed. I feel like I may have taken a problem and made it worse-- here is my defense.
the druid has worse armor than the cleric, and is supposedly balanced via the animal companion and shapeshifting, both of which I have removed.

A little all over the place, but thoughts?

 

[Nyaricus]

dude, i am sorry to say this, but your ideas are all over the place, and they (basically) stink.

you cant just give stuff to different classes at random. There needs to be balance; and what you suggest has none at all. A wizards with clerics spells? a (WotC) Druid with no wild-shape or animal companion? these things are in there for more than just flavour or just game balance. To put it blunty, the game itself is more than the sum of its parts. I dont agree with many things myself; like the Druid having Wildshape. BUT you need to compensate if you take away. Thus, everyone loses their effectiveness.

there are basically four main staples in fantasy. TSR created a game for them:

a Warrior
a Priest
a Scoundrel
a Mage

I am not saying that TSR or WotC did these perfectly. i think many classes are fundamentally flawed and have the wrong flavuor/associated abilities; others are just wrong, but you need to have balance; otherwise, your games will be a big mish-mash of people trying to get the most out of the least. You will find that many implications of your actions will not please your players and will not be fair in game play.

I won't really address your want to re-invent the wheel that is d20, but my thoughts are that it doesnt belong in a d20 house rules forum. I do not mean to sound unfriendly or mean, but your ideas, simply, sound ill-conceived and just not very well thought out.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

The guys with 1d4 HD DOES become that much more powerful... The wizard, in an of itself, at least at higher levels, is one of the most powerful characters available. His strength lies in versatility: with his spells, he can do basically anything. With your version, he can do even more.

If you want to have a generic spellcaster in your game, maybe introduce the Spellcaster from Unearthed Arcana (again). He's made for running generic classes, but I think he could fit well in a campaign where he's the only spellcaster.

If clerics don't exist anymore, what are you going to do about religion? Are wizards going to be sages AND priests?

I'll say it for the third time, but check out the various class variants in Unearthed Arcana (I think most of the stuff is available as SRD). They'll push you in the right way if you want to change your classes while preserving balance.

Good luck!

AR

The druid, when played right, is indeed a powerful class. Stripping Wild Shape is a bit much, IMO, even when replacing it with a domain. Perhaps you should consider replacing it wild Aspects of the Wild from Unearthed Arcana?

Are there going to be religions in your world

 

[Thia Halmades]

Without hesitation: your ideas utterly break the game. If you want to limit Clerical magic, there are new core classes in Complete Divine that have the same effect. Clerics are powerful at higher levels, but they're also very well balanced. As Nyaricus pointed out, and I agree with him completely, we have four fairly-well balanced classes. Stripping a car of its engine, then force-fitting that engine into another car gives you a more powerful car that would never, ever be street legal, nor would it have any identity. It would just be an ugly mess that made a lot of noise.

The rules are there so that you don't have insane balance issues; like the other two folks who posted, I don't always agree with RAW, but it's far better to use RAW and have a consistent approach than to attempt to reinvent the wheel. You'll just frustrate yourself and your players as you attempt to continually fix the bits you broke. So. Here are some simpler ideas that can help get you where you're going.

Druid Animal Companions: Don't allow Druids. I don't. They were too powerful for my game and I'm not a fan of animal NPCs. They also lacked the flavor I was looking for. I run a sublime reality; these guys have to have a "save the world" quest in order to leave a forest, and my party is composed of soldiers. Didn't fit, I chucked 'em.

Clerics: They aren't overpowered, they're spell casters in armor who have to survive long enough to deliver heal spells. I can't even begin to list the ways that giving wizards Divine magic makes wizards absurdly unbalanced. Don't go here. You can limit which domains are available, or use the low-magic rules from either the DMG or Eberron to tweak Divine magic, but knocking the Cleric off the list doesn't work in D&D.

Wizards: Altamont is absolutely correct. Wizards are considered the most powerful class at 20th, before magic items are added. And Wish isn't even their best spell, just a great example. Now you want to give them Wish AND Miracle AND Heal AND Fireball AND Cloudkill? I suggest avoiding making any adjustments to any core class unless you've gone through the four Complete books and flipped through those classes and their abilities.

Warlock: This makes sense, except I think the Warlock is too powerful. By all means, removing a class (Sorceror) and replacing it with another class (Warlock) is far from unheard of. However, I submit that you should read the Warlock rules very closely, as they can (literally) build anything with a good UMD check. Wand of Heal? No problem. Go, go gadget UMD! Second, remember that the Warlock's Eldritch Blast is based on a heavily modified Magic Missile, which is untyped damage. The structure of the Warlock allows them to change the type of their blast later on, if I'm not mistaken. This is their versatility option in lieu of having Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Cone of Cold, and other element typed spells, they can manipulate the energy of their Eldritch Blasts. If you limit them to a type (say, Lightning, which is the only one that wouldn't completely screw them) then the moment they encounter something which is Electric resistant, they're done. If you make it Fire, again, you're forcing them into a very small niche which can be easily defended against.

Consider this: All Warlocks are now Fire aligned. We assume that the World At Large knows what a Warlock. We assume they've dealt with Fire damage, and obviously they live in a world of magic. It would take ONE INCIDENT to convince everyone to invest in Amulets of Fire Resistance. If you're concerned about balance, forcing Warlocks into that is a poor idea.

If you're concerned about FLAVOR, then I would suggest channeling which Domains you give Clerics (if any), or you can opt to really nerf them and remove their Heal on the Fly ability. None of that would work for me, because I'm a big proponent of Clerics and what they do, but it sounds like that's the sort of thing you're looking for, without you breaking your game before it begins.

 

[Nyaricus]

id also lke to say that instead of limiting my D&D game, i expanded on classes for my campaign world. i now boast 15 base classes, and thast removing Monk and Sorcerer classes and fundamentally changing the Cleric, Barbarian, Druid, Paladin classes, and not using any other "standard" classes from other books (Complete Series, etc etc). These classes are all balanced against the pre-existing ones, and i havent had any problems with the players who have chosen these classes.

Also, i am also interested in knowning about your Campaign concept, so we could perhaps help to guide you in creating viable ideas and choices for it. I am, first and foremost, not trying to "jack" your campaign, but knowing some details could help you find balance IYG and IYC. (are there religions as such IYC?)

and, again, apollogies if i sounded "snarky" etc in my initial post.