Lalato
Adventurer
That may well be true... but the archetype found in D&D has little to no connection with the real world or the majority of fantasy fiction. It's a completely different type of holy person. The cleric in D&D is closer to a holy warrior... than a holy priest...Umbran said:On clerics, there's a bit of a problem. Fighters and rogues from different fantasy worlds are still pretty much the same. Wizards are too, though they vary somewhat as the metaphysic of magic varies from world to world.
On religion, though, fantasy books may as well not be lumped together as a genre, because they have little in common. Religion (and it's role in society) in fantasy worlds varies so greatly form one book to another that it's not really fair to ask D&D to provide an archetype that covers many of them.
There have been holy warriors throughout history and literature... however, very few, if any, had the awesome spellcasting abilities of D&D clerics.
--sam