D&D General building a faith around the assumptions of the cleric instead of in spite of it?

[HammerMan]

DIVINE INTERVENTION
Beginning at 10th level, you can call on your deity to intervene on your behalf when your need is great.
Imploring your deity's aid requires you to use your action. Describe the assistance you seek, and roll percentile dice. If you roll a number equal to or lower than your cleric level, your deity intervenes. The DM chooses the nature of the intervention; the effect of any cleric spell or cleric domain spell would be appropriate.
If your deity intervenes, you can't use this feature again for 7 days. Otherwise, you can use it again after you finish a long rest.
At 20th level, your call for intervention succeeds automatically, no roll required.

High level 5e clerics call on their god for aid and something completely DM determined happens.

The default 5e setup seems to leave plenty of room for ambiguity from the mortal perspective.

again, there is a difference (in my mind) between lacking faith and just out right denying reality. In a world where gods intervene (direct or indirect) regularly it seems it is almost crazy to NOT believe in the gods,

 

[Mind of tempest]

If so, the race will be extremely setting-dependent, and problematic to port into other settings.

As I mention above, it is possible for the community to form an astral domain, within which, the gods are virtually true. Then the race can import into any setting that has an astral plane.

the Morndinsamman and Seldarine are multi planer so I was building to a similar spec so I was going with more or less whatever system they have.

 

[Yaarel]

the Morndinsamman and Seldarine are multi planer so I was building to a similar spec so I was going with more or less whatever system they have.

Those arent in my Eberron setting, Dark Sun or any other settings I use. It would be problematic to import any options that required them.

 

[Blue]

When I run, PC classes are not the templates for all NPCs. The NPCs in the MM and other books don't mirror them, don't have the all same abilities, etc. Even multiple NPCs of the "same class" aren't all the same. The outgrowth of this is that everyone, PC or NPC, manifests their own gifts. The PC class is not considered a template of what must be in a particular class.

So for this, that a PC cleric is one unique person among thousands of other unique individuals. It has no inherent weight or multiplicity to grown a religion from - the other way is more true that to be blessed with powers the cleric needs to fit the religion, but we can't assume all will be blessed in the same way. I could even separate that further from church or sect, as a PC cleric could easily be a hermit or outlier who has amazing belief in the god but is not a formal member of a church.

So, what has multiplicity? That well may vary by DM and setting. The majority of NPC clergy I create can cast, so that seems a common gift. But really spell selection are 95% the same, so it's hard to grow religions from that. Often they can turn undead but I've created NPC clerics that had that power towards fiends instead, as well as NPC clerics that bolster or command instead of turn. Or turn celestials. So for my own settings the multiplicity is the ability to affect certain types of supernatural allies or enemies of the church.

 

[Mind of tempest]

When I run, PC classes are not the templates for all NPCs. The NPCs in the MM and other books don't mirror them, don't have the all same abilities, etc. Even multiple NPCs of the "same class" aren't all the same. The outgrowth of this is that everyone, PC or NPC, manifests their own gifts. The PC class is not considered a template of what must be in a particular class.

So for this, that a PC cleric is one unique person among thousands of other unique individuals. It has no inherent weight or multiplicity to grown a religion from - the other way is more true that to be blessed with powers the cleric needs to fit the religion, but we can't assume all will be blessed in the same way. I could even separate that further from church or sect, as a PC cleric could easily be a hermit or outlier who has amazing belief in the god but is not a formal member of a church.

So, what has multiplicity? That well may vary by DM and setting. The majority of NPC clergy I create can cast, so that seems a common gift. But really spell selection are 95% the same, so it's hard to grow religions from that. Often they can turn undead but I've created NPC clerics that had that power towards fiends instead, as well as NPC clerics that bolster or command instead of turn. Or turn celestials. So for my own settings the multiplicity is the ability to affect certain types of supernatural allies or enemies of the church.

I was trying to build a culture that has cleric as its favourite class like in 3e then I realised how difficult it would be as I have no idea what a revision built around the cleric would even make sense as?

you got any idea about that?

 

[Hussar]

DIVINE INTERVENTION
Beginning at 10th level, you can call on your deity to intervene on your behalf when your need is great.
Imploring your deity's aid requires you to use your action. Describe the assistance you seek, and roll percentile dice. If you roll a number equal to or lower than your cleric level, your deity intervenes. The DM chooses the nature of the intervention; the effect of any cleric spell or cleric domain spell would be appropriate.
If your deity intervenes, you can't use this feature again for 7 days. Otherwise, you can use it again after you finish a long rest.
At 20th level, your call for intervention succeeds automatically, no roll required.

High level 5e clerics call on their god for aid and something completely DM determined happens.

The default 5e setup seems to leave plenty of room for ambiguity from the mortal perspective.

Unless the dm actually exist in your world the dm determining the results don’t really matter.

Cleric says hey god I need a miracle. Poof it happens. Not a whole lot of ambiguity.

 

[Voadam]

Unless the dm actually exist in your world the dm determining the results don’t really matter.

Cleric says hey god I need a miracle. Poof it happens. Not a whole lot of ambiguity.

The verbal component for a magical power is ask god x and poof, maybe a spell happens in a way that might or might not be noticeable.

Ergo gods are unambiguously proven in a land where a mortal arcane caster can cast wishes?

 

[Hussar]

The verbal component for a magical power is ask god x and poof, maybe a spell happens in a way that might or might not be noticeable.

Ergo gods are unambiguously proven in a land where a mortal arcane caster can cast wishes?

Nothing in the rules state any sort of verbal component.

This just happens.

Plus we know it’s not a spell because it cannot be counterspelled and even functions in dead magic zones.

This whole meme about how gods are unknowable in DnD is so bizarre. You literally have gods appearing. They objectively exist. No believing in a god in a DnD world (typical world mind you, there are exceptions) is flat earth territory.

Ok. Since literally showing up and presenting yourself isn’t proof, what would count as sufficient?

 

[Voadam]

Nothing in the rules state any sort of verbal component.

True, I guess they could silently call upon their god. So less unambiguous proof for an observer?

This just happens.

The effect just happens.

Plus we know it’s not a spell because it cannot be counterspelled and even functions in dead magic zones.

I guess we can infer it is not a spell because it is the effect of a spell. I don't see any specifics on whether such spell effects can happen in dead magic zones or not so that seems a DM ruling issue.

This whole meme about how gods are unknowable in DnD is so bizarre. You literally have gods appearing. They objectively exist. No believing in a god in a DnD world (typical world mind you, there are exceptions) is flat earth territory.

Ok. Since literally showing up and presenting yourself isn’t proof, what would count as sufficient?

Proof is hard.

There is little about D&D gods that is unique to a god as a god.

Magic is not proof of a god. It is proof of magic in a high magic cosmology.

Magical power of a god is not proof of a divine status. It is just proof of magical power in a context where lots of beings have magical power.

Granting magical power is not proof of divine status. Warlock patrons grant magical power and are generally considered a different class of powerful supernatural beings than gods (though this can vary from campaign to campaign and cosmology to cosmology such as the different treatments of Asmodeus as a god or not and a fiend patron to warlocks).

In part it will depend on how you define gods and what the natures of the gods are.

This is going to vary from campaign to campaign under the core rules.

Under the core rules a god might never show up. Even clerical divine intervention when the objectively real god is intervening might just be a subtle magical effect that the cleric might not be able to notice.

Under the core rules gods might be manifest in the world, live in a specific place where you can go see them, and show up for divine intervention in the flesh in showy ways.

Gods might be transcendent and conceptual beings. They might be concrete powerful magical beings of a specific sort. It can vary.

So someone believing that gods definitionally are immortal and transcendent could look at the FR gods and see them as powerful beings who call themselves gods but who can die and are not actually really gods.

If the proof you have about gods is clerical magic and stories of the gods there is room to be skeptical about the existence of gods. Magic such as true resurrection happens in 5e without gods (True Resurrection is on the bard spell list) and so a tradition of spellcasters who claims their magic comes from gods is just a group with claims. Their magic is real, and they assert their claims, but it is just a story which might be true or not. In 3e FR the Red Wizards of Thay said they were not bad guys, they were just out to sell magic items in foreign nations. A story to be believed or not.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

true I think it like depends on the organisation as if the gods what a large organisation to deal with the task they will get one likewise wandering preist like are the original system is fairly common for small gods or for gods who hate organised structure.

any idea how to build interesting gods?

1) Don't try and build "gods". Build interesting religions. Some of these might have gods, some might not. They might even share a god with a different faith. So much of the blandness of D&D religion comes from a belief that it has to be this bizarre mismash of 12th-century Catholic crusaders who for reasons never explained worship Zeus or Thor. (Basically a antiquity-era polytheistic faith shoved into a medieval era monotheistic religion)