[Homebrew] In a godless campaign what do you with clerics?

[Ath-kethin]

At least three major officially published settings have taken the "no gods," or at least "no gods that are just really powerful monsters" approach: Dark Sun, Al-Qadim, and Eberron. Some would argue that we should add Mystara to the list, but the "gods" in Mystara are really powerful (former) PCs instead of just powerful monsters. To my eyes it's the same thing.

Dark Sun's approach is interesting because it just replaces "gods" with elemental forces - an almost Lovecraftian take if you think about it. The Plane of Fire doesn't care if you draw power from it, it has no use or concern for you in the slightest, but you can use it as a path to power. Dark Sun also had those who worshiped the Dragon Kings and drew power from them - a more on-the-nose take on the typical "massively powerful monster hands down divine power" trope. All in all, Dark Sun is a very Lovecraftian/Howardian take on religions: you can worship physical, mortal beings as gods or draw power from unconcerned entities barely within your comprehension. And that's a cool approach.

Al-Qadim, despite being nominally a part of the Forgotten Realms, had a completely different take on gods and religions, stressing the "religion" part far more than the "god" part. There were no statted out deities (well, at least until Hackmaster got ahold of them), because deities weren't monsters to be found and conquered or served, they embodied principles and ideas and how you specifically followed those principles and ideas mattered. There were literally different class options for characters who felt that their deity was the only one and characters who just felt that while others existed theirs was the best and characters who just followed them all. The game effects were minimal, but the world-building and social implications are huge. There were also class options for characters who followed none of the major gods and instead worshiped nature or minor regional gods or what have you. So I'd call this approach gods-as-religions. Which is also cool. And is among the reasons Al-Qadim fits awkwardly at best within the Forgotten Realms; the entire cosmological basis of the setting is different. The Al-Qadim gods never wandered around getting into card games or orgies or whatever with mortals - there was in fact no definitive proof that the Al-Qadim gods were anything more than distant ideas.

Eberron took more of the Al-Qadim approach and had pantheons of gods worshiped in different ways and under different names depending on what culture you were from. They also had ancestor worship, an ancient half-dragon lich who was the head and focus of her own religion, and more, but also stressed that people follow religions for different reasons, and allowed that good people could follow incredibly evil organizations and vice versa. Eberron also avoided the gods-as-big-monsters trope, and stressed that the power of clerics and paladins and so forth came form their own personal convictions within, not by tapping into some other being like a battery. So I'd call this one a more removed, self-focused religious structure that fully decoupled clerical and magical power from the beings that were the subject of worship. I'd say that approach might just be my favorite, since it lays the onus of power squarely on the individual and how firmly they believe in what they are doing and the cause they serve. No giant monster in the sky is going to save your butt when your faith flags; sorry, Cardinal.

D&D works fine without gods, and in my opinion is far more interesting without them. Faith in a creature you know will show up and devour you for failing to prove your loyalty is far less impressive than a devotion to your ideals that is literally so strong it can change reality.

YMMV.

 

[Oofta]

First an aside: paladins don't need to worship a deity, they get their power from their oath. So unless you're talking about getting rid of all divine magic, I think the main question is clerics.

There are a lot of variations of the "no gods" theme as others have pointed out. In my own campaign world, certain regions worship ancestral spirits. Others revere the primordial elements or forces of nature (although some of those could be construed as kind-of-sort-of-deities). One of my oldest PCs didn't believe in gods. He was an atheist and believed that the power of the clerics came from the worshipers and any manifestation of a deity was just an illusion or other mystical construct. I've hinted off and on in my campaign that he could be correct.

I could easily see a world without gods that either is more based on philosophy such as Eberron or Buddhism, or one where religion is real but the deities as entities may not be. From a tactical standpoint, clerics are usually the primary healers, although that role can be filled by other classes or just the ability to by a jug o'potions if necessary.

But a related question: are you going to have undead, fiends or fey? Are there other planes of existence? If there are, do some of those beings step in to the role of deities? If there are undead can they be turned?

Ultimately I find it hard to envision many worlds not having any religion at all even if a large percentage of the population does not venerate them. If you have clergy do they cast spells? If they cast spells do they believe there are gods or is it a scam? Do you just have hybrid spellcasters like Divine Souls?

Lots of decisions, hopefully some of this helps you flesh out your idea. Good luck!

 

[sunrisekid]

It really depends what you want to do with a "No Gods" setting.

Possibilities
__C> No "Divine" Magic, BUT allow Arcane healing. Basically, pull the key divine spells (Healing, Resurrections) and add them to the Arcane list. Heck, Bards already get Cure Wounds, Healing Word, Mass Cure Wounds, and Power Word Heal. Either add them at the same level Clerics get them if you want to keep healing consistent with normal, or bump them up a level or two, and add/increase costly components if you want to reduce healing to make it feel harsher.

This is what I am leaning towards. The game does become unbalanced without access to highlevel healing magic later in the game. I was thinking the Warden and Scholar classes from "Adventures in Middle Earth" 5E source book were a good solution. The healing mechanic is barely magical, almost more of a "mysterious knowledge" or knack. Even the Druid and Ranger can be described in such terms rather than spells.

On the one hand, I don't mind the mechanics of the Cleric - they're about as "D&D" as you can get, and (I think) may have been invented as a stop-gap mechanic to affect HP fluctuations.

On the other hand, for gamers who don't want to be saddled with a pantheon and the assorted narrative baggage those goes with, it would be nice if there were a simple option in one of the books. Given how central HP, healing, and by extension classes whose purpose is to affect those mechanics, it becomes a sticking point. The DMG does provide alternate narratives of the game world but some differences imply a fairly different take on certain class assumptions (i.e., the Cleric).

I recall seeing something posted in a D&D subreddit about tooling the Warlock chassis into an explicit priestly sort, with very different mechanics from a Cleric. I'll post a link if I can find it.

For a fantasy setting, I prefer the secrets-man-was-not-meant-to-know when it comes to pantheons and "gods". And it's in this vein that I think the Asmodeus/Lolth/Archfey/Cthulu etc model of power- and spell-granting makes very strong narrative sense.

 

[smbakeresq]

My friend had a high magic campaign setting that he pitched. Magic was everywhere, even peasants could cast create food and water. However there were people who magic could not use magic and magic could not affect.

In that setting there wasn’t any gods that would/could grant powers, however one god sacrificed himself, and his body became the only material that could be used to power clerical type classes. It was a finite amount and very fought over

 

[sunrisekid]

First an aside: paladins don't need to worship a deity, they get their power from their oath. So unless you're talking about getting rid of all divine magic, I think the main question is clerics.

...

But a related question: are you going to have undead, fiends or fey? Are there other planes of existence? If there are, do some of those beings step in to the role of deities? If there are undead can they be turned?

Ultimately I find it hard to envision many worlds not having any religion at all even if a large percentage of the population does not venerate them. If you have clergy do they cast spells? If they cast spells do they believe there are gods or is it a scam? Do you just have hybrid spellcasters like Divine Souls?

That's what I was thinking. The 5E Paladin is explicitly not a Cleric due to the source power of the oaths and because of that is easier to ignore.

Extra-planar entities that grant spells was in 4E if I recall (Bahamut, Orcus... I think those were worshippable options). I was thinking that religions would be as prevalent/complex/simple as desired for the gamers, but not necessarily as a source of spells. Do you see what I mean?

 

[Oofta]

That's what I was thinking. The 5E Paladin is explicitly not a Cleric due to the source power of the oaths and because of that is easier to ignore.

Extra-planar entities that grant spells was in 4E if I recall (Bahamut, Orcus... I think those were worshippable options). I was thinking that religions would be as prevalent/complex/simple as desired for the gamers, but not necessarily as a source of spells. Do you see what I mean?

Yep. Then it's not a question of removing all sources of divine magic (which for paladins anyway doesn't mean it comes from a deity).

So at that point the source of the power becomes fluff. That means people could organize together in any way you choose. I do think religion serves a purpose in most societies by giving a sense of community, belonging, tradition and spirituality to at least a significant percentage of the populous.

So you could still have clerics with no need to worship a deity. Perhaps they worship a philosophy or much like sorcerers they don't really know where their power comes from.

 

[Satyrn]

That's what I was thinking. The 5E Paladin is explicitly not a Cleric due to the source power of the oaths and because of that is easier to ignore.

Extra-planar entities that grant spells was in 4E if I recall (Bahamut, Orcus... I think those were worshippable options). I was thinking that religions would be as prevalent/complex/simple as desired for the gamers, but not necessarily as a source of spells. Do you see what I mean?

I do.

Have you read what the DMG has to say about changing the way religion works? Starting on page 10, it gives ideas about to do this sort of thing and explains how clerics might exist.

One of the interesting things it says right at the start is this:

As far as the game's rules are concerned, it doesn't matter if your world has hundreds of deities or a church devoted to a single god. In rules terms, clerics choose domains, not deities, so your world can associate domains with deities in any way you choose.

You can readily choose not to associate domains with deities at all, too. Whatever makes sense to you will work.

 

[Auraword]

Some ideas:

- Decouple clerics and religions. In the real world divinity is understood in diverse ways and the divine is either subjective or concealed, rather than an obvious presence.

Clerics could represent:

- A form of magic primarily devoted to a metaphysical study of reality that channels its powers from the positive, negative, and astral as contrasted with a scientific and mechanistic wizard.

- A power innate to a specific race and its cognates connected to lore in the far past in the mold of Tolkien's elves. Those of strong will and wisdom may channel this legacy.

- Imagine a deist view positing a divine world that instigated creation and set its laws then absented to observe the results of free will. Clerics could be students of the mysteries of creation seeking signs of the Originator and drawing magic from this understanding.

- Take a look at some modern occult traditions that focus on personal will and self development and cultivating a relationship with the Universe. A cleric could be seem in the light of being an awakened will.

I hope these might be of help to you.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

I'd say all "clerics" are very religious Wizards or Sorcerers and that their "spells" are "holy prayers only taught to the deserving". I might go so far as to create unique spells usable only by "clerics" such as a spell of "Divine Rebuke" (Turning undead, for example). Based on the "god" they follow certain spells would be favoured and others would be seen as works of "the devil" (whatever opposite god/religion is to theirs...or ones they don't like and are effectively 'competing with' for worshipers/followers).

I'd make sure to NOT include any "Cleric Only" spells as 'new wizard spells'; so a cleric might have the Prayer of Light (light cantrip) because it's a wizard thing...but there would be no Prayer of Raise Dead, because that is a Cleric spell in the normal rules. If I started just saying "Oh, yeah, you have Raise Dead, but it's a Wizard spell now"...then what's the point?

...OR...

I'd just say Clerics don't get spells or any other 'cleric stuff'...they are, effectively, religiously devoted fighters. "Templar's" I guess.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Quartz]

If your campaign world had a different take on the pantheon, how do you handle the cleric class? If there are no gods, then logically there would be no clerics, possibly no paladins.

I think you're missing - or at least inverting - the issue. The issue is what D&D calls divine magic; gods are just SFX. If you specify that in your campaign that there is no divine magic do you simply block the lot, fold them into arcane spells, make them rituals, or what? From there, you can decide about classes. Or, if you want divine magic to explicitly exist as something separate from arcane magic, you'll need to invent a source - there are many posts with good suggestions in this thread.