D&D General Rethinking the class name "Druid".

[Yaarel]

But do you know what alternative medicine that's proven to work is called?

It's called medicine.

Working. And understanding how and why it works.

Two different worldviews.

Most of scientific medicine comes from examining the folk medicines of many cultures.

 

[Greg K]

Yes, in the real world neither ghosts or elementals are generally considered to be things in the domain of science, because they're not real.

I don't know. According both the Philosophy of Science class and lower division science classes I took, when discussing the misconception that science is anti-God/ religion, it is more like, science is not concened with the existance of the supernatural, because we cannot empircally study God, ghosts, spirits, etc. and predict their behavior. This inability/limit makes them supernatural rather than natural. If new technology were ever to come along and change that limitation, they would move to the natural. Until then, the existence of God, ghosts, spirits, etc are a matter of faith.

 

[Greg K]

At the same time, D&D freely misuses terms like "shaman", "nature spirit", "animism", Druid, etcetera.

At times, I almost want to pull my hair out, but then I remember that I still have my hair and should not change that.

 

[cbwjm]

I tend to use the titles of cleric, priest, druid, and shaman somewhat interchangeably, largely depending on who it is. A primitive tribe of lizardfolk may have a shaman who is the tribal spellcaster with druid or cleric caster levels. In another area of the world, the wyld faith is an old religion that has lasted since the gods first arrived and they tend to be druids in both name and class. I think finding a title for the class to fit your world is a good idea, kind of like all of the name changes in the Planegea setting.

 

[Greg K]

Most of scientific medicine comes from examining the folk medicines of many cultures.

Otherwise known as ethnopharmacology!

 

[Charlaquin]

I am more critical of earlier D&D history that occasionally abuse terms like "shaman" (including witchdoctor) offensively.

Sure, those terms have some baggage and should be treated with care.

But the 5e tendency to turn every thing into a "god", or serving a god, or created by a god, is somewhat offensive.

That seems strange to me. In the various D&D worlds, gods are real, and most things are governed by one or more. It’s a very ahistorical take on polytheism, but it’s not trying to be historical.

The Celtic peoples seem mainly theistic, so Druids as "priests" of a temple seems plausible.

But nontheistic, nature revering, animistic Druid-class concepts are something different.

In real life the spiritual leaders of animistic religions certainly are very different from those of theistic religions. In most of the various fictional worlds of D&D, members of the Druid class is mostly priests of gods of nature. It doesn’t need to model real-life religions, it’s made-up.

 

[Blue Orange]

This was the game that made wraiths, specters, haunts, phantoms, and ghosts entirely separate beings, not to mention used to have conjurers, magicians, enchanters, warlocks, sorcerers, wizards, and mages all levels of the same class, so I wouldn't feel too bad about using the titles any different way you want. A lot of it goes back to Gygax and his thesaurus.

 

[Lanefan]

Druids became Nature Clerics round here a very long time ago, and we tied them to deities just like other Clerics.

There's only ever been one Druid in any of our games, and that one's a Nature Cleric who wound up on Golarion (i.e. a world that runs on the PF engine) and converted over a few months.

 

[Yaarel]

The following sentence sounds frequent enough in the context of D&D:

A primitive tribe of lizardfolk may have a shaman who is the tribal spellcaster with druid or cleric caster levels.

But conversely, in the context of cultural sensitivities, the same sentence can mean:

Reallife tribal ethnicities and reallife indigenous shamanic traditions, are subhumans with lizard brains who are "primitive".

One can see how these D&D traditions can go wrong, yeah?

 

[cbwjm]

The following sentence sounds frequent enough in the context of D&D:


But conversely, in the context of cultural sensitivities, the same sentence can mean:

"Reallife tribal ethnicities and reallife indigenous shamanic traditions, are subhumans with lizard brains who are "primitive".

One can see how these D&D traditions can go wrong, yeah?

Sure, if people are wanting to do the mental gymnastics to take that sentence completely out of context in an effort to be offended.