Cleric shenanigans (metaphysical, no right answers)

[Paul Farquhar]

By the way, does anyone not ignore the last few edition's insistence that most priest aren't clerics/don't have spellcasting powers? I know I have always ignored that, partly because the entire rest of the game's published materials (adventures, NPC statblocks, etc) ignores it and gives every NPC priest spellcasting. I'm not sure why they somehow felt they needed to start saying that in recent editions. One of those solutions in search of a problem it looks like.

By "last few editions" you mean 1st edition onwards?

It's always been the rule that adventuring classes are rare - explicitly 1 in 10,000 in 1st edition, with most of the rest of the population zero level chumps. Most editions have stats for zero level humans, but it not really necessary, since they are so weak as to be pretty much irrelevant in any fight. They run away screaming, usually with their robes on fire. 3rd edition was a bit more generous and added weaker "NPC classes" to the game, some of which could cast spells.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

By "last few editions" you mean 1st edition onwards?

It's always been the rule that adventuring classes are rare - explicitly 1 in 10,000 in 1st edition, with most of the rest of the population zero level chumps. Most editions have stats for zero level humans, but it not really necessary, since they are so weak as to be pretty much irrelevant in any fight. They run away screaming, usually with their robes on fire. 3rd edition was a bit more generous and added weaker "NPC classes" to the game, some of which could cast spells.

Okay, good to know. And they still didn’t *do* it in actual products. Just grab a module, find a priest, and you will find spellcasting. I personally like it that way and dislike the idea of clerics without divine power, but the main point, which apparently goes back further than I thought, is that they say one thing in the PHB/DMG but then do something different for the entire rest of the product line.

That makes me actually want to think of how many other areas the game has consistently said one thing in the core books and ignored it everywhere else. I’m sure there are others.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Okay, good to know. And they still didn’t *do* it in actual products. Just grab a module, find a priest, and you will find spellcasting. I personally like it that way and dislike the idea of clerics without divine power, but the main point, which apparently goes back further than I thought, is that they say one thing in the PHB/DMG but then do something different for the entire rest of the product line.

That makes me actually want to think of how many other areas the game has consistently said one thing in the core books and ignored it everywhere else. I’m sure there are others.

There is no contradiction. Most priests are not clerics and don't cast spells, but those aren't detailed in the modules because there is no point fighting them. Only the small proportion that can cast spells are worth the time of adventurers. Things only get stat blocks if they can actually pose a threat or offer meaningful aid.

There are far more sparrows in most fantasy worlds than their are dragons, but there are lots of stat blocks for dragons, and none for sparrows. That is because the sparrows are irrelevant to the adventure.

 

[Celebrim]

By "last few editions" you mean 1st edition onwards?

It's always been the rule that adventuring classes are rare - explicitly 1 in 10,000 in 1st edition, with most of the rest of the population zero level chumps.

Except, Gygax very much ignored his own guidelines in every thing he ever wrote. If he followed this guideline with Village of Homlet it would have been very different. Heck, even the Monster Manual and the DMG violated this idea many times, both with the sort of levelled characters you'd randomly encounter in urban areas (DMG) and the levels of characters you'd meet when encountering "Men" entries from the Monster Manual. Nor do any of his settings suggest that adventuring classed characters are so rare as that, as nothing about the populations of this regions indicates that there are 10,000 0th level characters for every 1 adventuring classed character. The populations of his cities and his regions just aren't large enough to allow that.

 

[ccs]

By the way, does anyone not ignore the last few edition's insistence that most priest aren't clerics/don't have spellcasting powers? I know I have always ignored that, partly because the entire rest of the game's published materials (adventures, NPC statblocks, etc) ignores it and gives every NPC priest spellcasting. I'm not sure why they somehow felt they needed to start saying that in recent editions. One of those solutions in search of a problem it looks like.

BEcmi --> AD&D --> 2e --> 3x --> PF --> 5e: I've always had non-casting priests in my games.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

There is no contradiction. Most priests are not clerics and don't cast spells, but those aren't detailed in the modules because there is no point fighting them. Only the small proportion that can cast spells are worth the time of adventurers. Things only get stat blocks if they can actually pose a threat or offer meaningful aid.

There are far more sparrows in most fantasy worlds than their are dragons, but there are lots of stat blocks for dragons, and none for sparrows. That is because the sparrows are irrelevant to the adventure.

I'm sure someone can find a priest in a D&D adventure somewhere (probably Eberron) that doesn't have spellcasting ability, but for every one of those you find there are quite possibly 99 that do have spellcasting. They even went out of the way to make sure that monsters that weren't allowed to be clerics got their own way to be divine spellcasters or some such.

Yes, when you are talking about the monster the party is fighting, it makes sense to have them be a spellcaster. But when they are describing the inhabitants of towns and villages, at any temple, inevitably the priests have spells.

How many priests in just 5e published adventures (let's say only new adventures, not updated ones) are there that lack spellcasting?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

How many priests in just 5e published adventures (let's say only new adventures, not updated ones) are there that lack spellcasting?

That's the point, the ones who don't cast spells aren't in the adventures. The game fiction assumes the world is full of people who aren't plagued by monsters or hatching evil plots for world domination. The farmers farm, the laborers labour, and if they get hurt the local priest can't cast Cure Wounds on them. They are just part of the background scenery, like trees, birds and squirrels.


It's pretty much essential to the standard D&D plot set up that villages have few, if any, people with class levels. If they did, they could deal with the monster infestation themselves, and wouldn't need to pool their life savings to hire the first group of adventurers who happen along.

 

[Scott Graves]

I like to see anyone playing a Cleric or Paladin play something of a religious fanatic. Someone whose devotion to a particular god or set of gods is greater than the average person. Someone who has had some kind of experience in their life that made them BELIEVE hard in a god. I like to see backstories where they were sure they were going to die and swore if they lived they would devote their lives to the god whose element they were threatened by. For instance I made a Cleric once who swore he'd follow a god of the sea and swear eternal vengeance upon pirates because he was trapped in the bowels of a sinking ship that had been attacked and looted by pirates. He awoke the next day safe upon the beach and from that day he entered the temple and became a cleric. That's the kind of thing I like to see in a Cleric or Paladin.

 

[Celebrim]

It's pretty much essential to the standard D&D plot set up that villages have few, if any, people with class levels. If they did, they could deal with the monster infestation themselves, and wouldn't need to pool their life savings to hire the first group of adventurers who happen along.

Well, that's precisely my point. You are looking for logical consistency, and when you start citing supposed 1e AD&D demographics as the basis of logical consistency, things fall apart very quickly.

For example, if it is essential that villages have few if any people with class levels, consider the most iconic village in the game, Hommlet from T1: The Village of Hommlet.

It addition to the PCs it contains a 6th level cleric, 8th level M-U, 6th level fighter, 4th level thief, and 7th level Druid. Each of those characters has a backstory that gives them the motivation and means to "adventure", as well as largely compatible goals and a common purpose. They are vastly more capable group of "adventurers" than the 1st level PC's the module is intended for, and they have at least as much reason if not more to want to protect the village from the dangers of the moat house. They could indeed deal with the monster infestation themselves, and claim the treasure for themselves.

So why don't they? Because this the set up to a game.

Nor is there any sign that there are 10's of thousands of nameless 0 level characters hiding some where in the setting. Pretty much every man, woman, and child in the village is detailed. And those aren't remotely the only leveled PC class individuals in the little village. Nor do the entries for pilgrims, bandits, pirates, or beserkers suggest level NPCs are rare.

Why are they not as rare in practice as you'd expect in theory? Because this is the set up to a game. In particular, my suspicion is that the Village of Hommlet is filled with potent PC classed NPCs to dissuade the players from looting and pillaging the Village, or to at least make it a considerable challenge for the PCs to do so should they decide to do so.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*