D&D (2024) I have the DMG. AMA!

[Emerikol]

Fun and engaging to who? The DM who Lucy's the football out from under the player or the player who is left with a useless character because they didn't do what the DM wanted them to?

You are talking about a bad DM. And yes if the player chooses to have their cleric abandon the faith knowing the consequences then it is a roleplaying opportunity. They will likely in time go to another God and start advancing there as a cleric. They may lose a level along the way if I'm DM but it can still be a great roleplaying opportunity.

I already said a bad DM cannot be solved with rules.

 

[TiQuinn]

Hard to say. One person is the tip of the spear here.

I think that's something some folks want to believe in order to have a target for their frustration.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I think they are influenced by the preferences of their designers.

Also the playerbase.

I've got at least twenty years of data on how much players hate RP traps like the 3e falling mechanics and evidence that they've been steadily removed as WotC realizes they don't play well with the people they want as customers.

 

[mamba]

There's a huge difference here. A bounty gives you something to interact with. It leads to more interesting situations. Actively ripping away the class features prevents the character interacting with the world. It leads to a character that can't carry their weight.

yes, the impact is not the same, but that wasn’t the point I was making. That point was that both are / can be natural consequences of player actions.

As the two are different in impact, the cleric should need to have to do more than rough up some town guards to get to that point however

I have advocated for consequences. In specific I've advocated throughout for changing subclasses - and I've advocated for orders of clerics policing their own. It's stripping away the abilities that's the problem.

all of these are options, they just are not the only ones. You make it sound like stripping away the powers is the go to for any offense when it is more a last resort

And a tyrant DM will not limit themselves to clerics - but once you've got the idea that this is fine despite it being terrible religion and terrible storytelling and terrible DMing you may continue.

we disagree about what this is, I see nothing terrible here

 

[Laurefindel]

Realisation:

It's is possible that some DMs see a cleric going against tenets be somewhat disrespectful of their world building? Like if it was the player somehow commenting/disapproving on this particular cosmology element?

A comment/disapprobation isn't necessarily disrespectful but otherwise yes, as a DM I tend to see a player going against the tenets of a religion (as opposed to a character going against those tenets) as a comment/disapprobation on my world-building.

Sometimes I got to agree with the player in the end though.

 

[Emerikol]

I don't think so. I don't see it as this adversarial thing.

Clerics channel the powers of the God's. That power can be withheld if the Cleric works against the goals and desires of their God.

It's not about the DM at all. If the Player wants to spit at the feet of their God, they have the ability to do so. Player choice.

I agree.

It's never gotten all the way to the point where a cleric has lost everything. Usually when the DM says "Your Deity would view this as an evil act or a chaotic act or whatever," the player turns back. They want to play a certain type of cleric which is why they chose cleric and often they just weren't thinking and where about to make a mistake in the eyes of their Deity.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I already said a bad DM cannot be solved with rules.

They can be encouraged by rules though.

Like ones that give thme ammunition to use against the players through their characters with a perfect 'that's what my character (the god) would do' justification.

 

[Vaalingrade]

It's never gotten all the way to the point where a cleric has lost everything. Usually when the DM says "Your Deity would view this as an evil act or a chaotic act or whatever," the player turns back.

See, I view this is a huge violation of the player's agency on par with 'your character wouldn't do that'.

 

[Remathilis]

I disagree because we give up good rules that are fun and engaging to try to avoid something unavoidable with a bad DM.

I see nothing of value lost.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

A comment/disapprobation isn't necessarily disrespectful but otherwise yes, as a DM I tend to see a player going against the tenets of a religion (as opposed to a character going against those tenets) as a comment/disapprobation on my world-building.

Sometimes I got to agree with the player in the end though.

But, having my cleric go against tenets in a crisis of faith or whatever isn't a barb toward your efforts;
It's a role-playing choice!

It does not mean that, as a player, I find the tenets you wrote for that faith bad or anything.