Yes. What you describe is, roughly, 4e's default set-up. (It treats Devils as gods rather than equating them with Demons as "fiends".)Thoughts?
As far as Erythnul is concerned, I think he works best as an Exarch of Gruumsh.
Yes. What you describe is, roughly, 4e's default set-up. (It treats Devils as gods rather than equating them with Demons as "fiends".)Thoughts?
If you worship a demon do they grant you access to spell domains? Drat, I suppose these days clerics don't have to worship gods either. But that wasn't the case back in the day when they set this whole system up.
In the late 70s and early 80s I don't think many people had trouble with "anti-clerics", evil high priests and the like who got their powers from Demons and Devils. DDG formalised this by making the Archdevils and Demon Princes into Lesser Gods.I was wondering if this might have been the thinking behind it early on - that is, since the demon princes and archdevils aren't gods, they can't provide spells to their priests/cultists. Think about how priests of the various elemental cults in Princes of the Apocalypse are statted up as sorcerers rather than clerics.
I feel like this thread has rapidly descended into quibbling over minor points.
Meanwhile, I am still wrestling with how I want to proceed with my homebrew world. Partly, I'm debating how much effort to put into it, knowing that my core group of players tends not to care about this sort of thing that much. I'm also trying to figure out where the line is (for me) between adopting/reskinning material from other settings/stories and just giving up and using the original setting/game instead.
(In the meantime, I'm just continuing with my mechanical conversions with the intention of sorting out the setting details later.)
I didn't say good. I said N as in Neutral.
You can run a true neutral cleric of Nerull.
I think it is accurate.
Warlocks, as we see them today, didn't exist.
If written today many of the clerics of fiends would be warlocks. Clerics of fiends and celestials more or less disappeared within the reinvention of warlocks
As for Paladins. Well 5e doesn't even them domains anymore. So they are all Paladins of Causes. So yes they could follow fiends but they would be exceptionally rare as fiends cannot create paladins and lack the clerics and churches to formally and openly indoctrinate warriors into paladins.
So its Clerics and Paladins vs Warlocks.
Having portfolios vs Covering portfolios.
1) Nerull wants all life to end. Not to end all life. There is a big difference. So yes, a Neutral cleric of Nerul is possible. But unlikely..Then you can run a true neutral warlock of Orcus. Again, what's your point here? Nerull is such a capital E Evil that you have to stretch to get Neutral, and you can easily do the same for any being in existence. His plans are MORE extreme than Orcus's. Nerull wants the destruction of all life.
So, they used to have clerics. Therefore "Fiends don't get clerics in base lore.... ever." is flat out wrong. They got them until 4e at least. Proven by the books I quoted. Partially because until mid-3.X Warlocks didn't even exist.
And if fiends cannot create paladins, because they are paladins of causes, then Gods can't really create Paladins either. If the point is that the paladin willingly swears an oath, because they have chosen devotion to a cause, then there is nothing that the Gods can do to bring that about that the Nine Hells can't. Sure, the gods can be more open, but that does not necessarily give rise to the levels of devotion needed for a paladin. Meanwhile, the forces of Hell are if nothing else, very manipulative, and taking an individual and secretly twisting them in isolation is what they exist to do.
But being rare also has nothing to do with the point. Since they can exist, an evil paladin could be part of the fight against the party.
So, at the end of the day, if we look to the time period when many of these Demon Lords and Archdevils were created, them being equivalent for the most part to the gods... is exactly what was intended. Sure, they didn't have cavaliers and paladins, but they did have clerics and secret temples. So, we really are losing nothing by going back towards that model that I can find.
Just to step in a bit. In 2e the listed worshipper alignment for Nerull was Any Evil. You could not be neutral.I didn't say good. I said N as in Neutral.
You can run a true neutral cleric of Nerull.
I think it's right that a lot of prior clerics of fiends would be Warlocks under today's rules, but I think that there would still be a fair number of clerics. Warlocks are people who are making deals with fiends for power. Clerics are those that worship them as gods. It's a different mindset and someone who worships the ground that fiends walk on isn't going go the warlock route. They'll worship and gain clerical spells and abilities from their faith.I think it is accurate.
Warlocks, as we see them today, didn't exist.
If written today many of the clerics of fiends would be warlocks. Clerics of fiends and celestials more or less disappeared within the reinvention of warlocks
It wasn't a domain that made a paladin a paladin of a cause. It was the lack of a being to pledge to. In 5e a paladin of a god or other powerful being is not a paladin of a cause, even with the lack of a domain.As for Paladins. Well 5e doesn't even them domains anymore. So they are all Paladins of Causes. So yes they could follow fiends but they would be exceptionally rare as fiends cannot create paladins and lack the clerics and churches to formally and openly indoctrinate warriors into paladins.
Clerics, paladins and warlocks vs. clerics, paladins and warlocks is more accurate. It's just the percentage of each that will vary between the two sides.So its Clerics and Paladins vs Warlocks.
Having portfolios vs Covering portfolios.
"Clergy1) Nerull wants all life to end. Not to end all life. There is a big difference. So yes, a Neutral cleric of Nerul is possible. But unlikely..
Not as PCs, no. As NPCs they'd exist all over the place. As I mentioned in my other post, whether you go to a fiend to bargain for power or whether you worship them involves two very different mindsets. The cleric mindset would still exist in a world where there are warlocks.2) Yes they had these clerics even in 1ed. But remember that these clerics only had access to 1st and 2nd level spells top. It was only through the introduction of Banak that they finally got "full power " clerics. I bet that if warlock existed then, that these clerics would not even have seen the day...
The neutrality part was in third edition if I remember correctly. Either a misspelled sentence or intentional, it opened that interpretation. Since people insists on not sticking to 1ed canon... I thought it would be appropriate to add this point. But as of 1ed. Yep, hard to accept neutrality there..."Clergy
Nerull's clerics are feared throughout the lands as cold, calculating murderers. Named clerics of He Who Revels in the Slaying of the Living include..."
"Dogma
Nerull's faithful believe they will be rewarded for acts of murder, for every living thing is an abomination in the eyes of the Reaper."
That doesn't sound like neutrality would be possible for one of his clerics.
Not as PCs, no. As NPCs they'd exist all over the place. As I mentioned in my other post, whether you go to a fiend to bargain for power or whether you worship them involves two very different mindsets. The cleric mindset would still exist in a world where there are warlocks.
This is the 3e write-up.The neutrality part was in third edition if I remember correctly. Either a misspelled sentence or intentional, it opened that interpretation. Since people insists on not sticking to 1ed canon... I thought it would be appropriate to add this point. But as of 1ed. Yep, hard to accept neutrality there...