War Domain and Non-devotional Clerics

[phillipjp]

If a non-devotional cleric chooses the War Domain, do they get to choose the martial weapon they get Proficiency and Weapon Focus with? Or, do they only get Proficiency? Or, does it automatically become Longsword?

 

[Shin Okada]

I have never seen written rule or clarification about this. So it is up to DMs call. I can think of several ways.

a) Disallow War Domain for non-deity clerics. They are not well-organized to fight a War for his/her faith.
b) Non-deity clerics with War Domain do not get weapon feats, as there is no "favored weapon" for his faith.
c) Non-deity clerics with War Domain use weapons listed in Spiritual Weapon spell. The problem .... there is no weapon for neutral.

 

[Li Shenron]

If a non-devotional cleric chooses the War Domain, do they get to choose the martial weapon they get Proficiency and Weapon Focus with? Or, do they only get Proficiency? Or, does it automatically become Longsword?

IIRC, there is a "favored weapon" for each alignment:

Good - Longsword
Lawful - Warhammer
Chaotic - Battleaxe
Evil - Flail

If you are a deityless cleric you can indeed select the War domain, and choose the weapon accordingly with your alignment (you probably have 2 choices if you are LG, CG, LE or CE). If you are True Neutral "any" weapon can be your faveored weapon.
I think it is explained in PHB, probably in the Religion chapter...

Please notice the "IIRC" above .

 

[Zhure]

Clerics, Page 31, PHB,

"Some deities have favored weapons (see Deities, page 90), and
clerics consider it a point of pride to wield them. A cleric whose deity’s favored weapon is a martial weapon and who chooses War as one of his domains receives the Martial Weapon Proficiency feat related to that weapon for free, as well as the Weapon Focus feat related to that weapon."

Spiritual Weapon, Page 256, PHB,
"The weapon that you get is often a force replica of your deity’s own personal weapon, many of which have individual names. A cleric without a deity gets a weapon based on his alignment. A neutral cleric without a deity can create a spiritual weapon of any alignment provided he is acting at least generally in accord with that alignment at the time."

Combining the two seems to indicate the cleric would get whatever weapon is closest on the chart from page 256. That's my interpretation.

 

[hong]

Using the OA shaman as a precedent suggests that a cleric without a specific deity gets to choose the weapon they want to have Weapon Focus in.

 

[Thanee]

Giving them the alignment based weapon (or one of them, if multiple choices are applicable) makes sense to me.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Squire James]

I'd probably allow him to select any simple or martial weapon. No exotic weapons, including those who need the feat for one-handed use (though I'd allow it if they only use them two-handed).

Yeah, they'll probably pick greatsword. Be sure they get swallowed and grappled a lot if they do... and be sure to explain to them that they could have attacked it if they were using a dagger!

 

[strongbow]

OA Shaman

Just verifying that the open choice of the OA Shaman is correct, and therefore sets a precedent