Can a neutral cleric of a neutral deity cast good/evil lawful/chaotic spells?

[NightShadow]

I'm playing a True Netural cleric of Fharlanghn. My DM says that she cannot cast divine spells with any alignment descriptors due to the following rule:

Chaotic, Evil, Good, and Lawful Spells (PHB pg 33) "A cleric can't cast spells of an alignment opposed to his own deity (if he has one). For example, a good cleric (or a neutral cleric of a good deity) cannot cast evil spells."

But it says an "opposed" alignment, not just that it does not match the deity's alignment.

Basically, we disagree on what the wording means. Has this been addressed before? Please provide sources where possible.

-NS

 

[ccs]

You're going to have to work this out with your DM.
Because the DM trumps any printed rule & any opinion expressed by a game developer.

 

[Dandu]

Spell Descriptors

Appearing on the same line as the school and subschool, when applicable, is a descriptor that further categorizes the spell in some way. Some spells have more than one descriptor.The descriptors are acid, air, chaotic, cold, darkness, death, earth, electricity, evil, fear, fire, force, good, language-dependent, lawful, light, mind-affecting, sonic, and water.
Most of these descriptors have no game effect by themselves, but they govern how the spell interacts with other spells, with special abilities, with unusual creatures, with alignment, and so on.
A language-dependent spell uses intelligible language as a medium for communication. If the target cannot understand or cannot hear what the caster of a language-dependant spell says the spell fails.
A mind-affecting spell works only against creatures with an Intelligence score of 1 or higher.

 

[NightShadow]

ccs,

Yes, but he's a reasonable DM and if I give a solid argument he'll listen to it.

EDIT: He also specifically asked me to see what other people have to say about this question.

 

[NightShadow]

Dandu,

I'm not seeing what you are out of the spell descriptor passage. Could you clarify?

 

[Nagol]

The restriction can be found in the cleric's description.

[h=5]Chaotic, Evil, Good, and Lawful Spells[/h] A cleric can’t cast spells of an alignment opposed to his own or his deity’s (if he has one). Spells associated with particular alignments are indicated by the chaos, evil, good, and law descriptors in their spell descriptions.

Evil opposes good;
Chaotic opposes Lawful.

Neutral-Neutral is not opposed to any alignment. It can cast all aligned spells.

 

[NightShadow]

Neutral-Neutral is not opposed to any alignment. It can cast all aligned spells.

Yes, that is my argument, the problem is not having the source material to back it up.

If it helps, his argument is that Fharlanghn would not be able to provide the spell in the first place because he doesn't have the appropriate domains. Essentially, Pelor can provide good spells because one of his Domains is Good.

 

[Igwilly]

Well, I think this means nothing. All spells in the “normal” Cleric spell list are available for all Clerics, save for the “no opposing alignment" restriction. Yes, one could ask why the cleric has a fire spell if his god is Poseidon, but... That is how the rules are written.

 

[Celebrim]

True Neutral is a sufficient enough advantage that I don't see why it should get even more advantages. I'd rule the same as your DM - balance is opposed to all imbalance.

 

[Grogg of the North]

I had a friend that played a TN cleric and had access to all of the alignment spells. He was also able to be affected by them all. As the story goes, he used Word of Chaos on some devils and wound up stunning himself in the process.

What if you ask your DM if, even though you are TN, that you pick an alignment that you oppose? It would work similar to how a TN hierophant works.