cleric switching god

[Elephant]

You're not the one I'm glaring at right now.

KaeYoss - if you could express your views in a less confrontational fashion, I'd appreciate it.

-Hyp.
(Moderator)

To be fair, the timestamps make me think he didn't see your "cool it" post before he posted his reply. (doh, I replied before I read his reply!)

To the original poster: I recommend that the new church be skeptical and cool at first, sending him on a quest or two - to echo others, not something trivial, but nothing suicidal, either - and cut off his spell and undead turning access until he's been initiated as a cleric of Tyr.

Oh, one more thing. He should lose his domain benefits until he gains his first "Cleric of Tyr" level and picks up new domains.

 

[Sigurd]

Role Play solution

The thing I like about this story is that it is plausible. Punishment should contribute to the shared goals of the two gods - not cripple the cleric necessarily. This is how I would handle a low level change.

I would give the cleric a small tap on the wrist (literally). The cleric would have to be willing to place his hand in the mouth of a World Serpent Statue and submit to the will of Tyr. Hey thats the diety after all. The cleric would not know what will happen in this case and the clerics of Tyr must be really clear "Is this the center of your heart????". (I'd have a few clerics present without hands just for atmosphere )

If the character is accepted by Tyr he will hallucinate the serpent crushing his hand and draining his magic then collapse into a fever. In the Fever Tyr himself or mory probably a valkirie will appear to him and give him a new set of spells - domain change, the works. (the character's only 3rd level after all).

When the char awakes he is to understand that his God is one of war and action. The Cleric will renew spells 1 day in 7. After each vengeful death accepted he will receive spells on another day in 7. He must surrender any items signicant to his previous diety - including any weapon that has ever held a blessing - and must either destroy them (bad idea) or offer them to his old church. The Church of Tyr will advance the char similar equipment.

(He can receive an experience bonus if he can arrive at a gold price for his person and give them that much as well to pay them for his body. Until he does so expect relations to be strained. If he needlesly destroys what he once held sacred that would be an evil act in my estimation and his former deity will consider him so.)

Limitations:

He must throw the final stroke and send the soul to the other world or it will not count for his quest.

If it is only a monster of the same race but of no actual relationship to his capture he must return the right hand of each creature slain to a consecrated alter to Tyr. If it is actually a creature involved in his torture it happens immediately - he also receives a blessing for the remainder of that encounter.

Until he has achieved this he may not consecrate alters himself or perform clerical services for others. He can not honourably fulfil his duties until he has proven himself.

No more than one hand per encounter will count. The rest of the slain are to be piled and offerred to the pantheon as a whole. Lawful deities will not deny their fellow dieties.

After the seventh successful encounter he will be given a vision and a sense of peace. Other information might be imparted to him - whatever the DM wants to put.


Anyway thats how I'd handle it I think.

If he had truly uber powerful items that were hard to replace I'd have him make a quest for each one.


Do people think this is too hard?



Sigurd

 

[Wilphe]

Let's see if I get this correctly:

Ilmater is supposed to be the crying god who spends his time suffering a lot right?

And said character has just spent several months being tortured and beaten up.

That sounds like a good way of developing a first hand experience of your deities teachings and beliefs.


I'd treat that as a Test from Ilmater - which, when he turned round and says "Ilmater Sucks for not rescuing me", he just flunked badly

 

[Sigurd]

Let's see if I get this correctly:

Ilmater is supposed to be the crying god who spends his time suffering a lot right?

And said character has just spent several months being tortured and beaten up.

That sounds like a good way of developing a first hand experience of your deities teachings and beliefs.


I'd treat that as a Test from Ilmater - which, when he turned round and says "Ilmater Sucks for not rescuing me", he just flunked badly

This would be a pithy remark if it was indeed Ilmater who was the god being abandonned but its not . 'Lathanda' - FR god of the Sun, Renewal, and Self Perfection.

I had to reread it to.

S

Maybe the God would understand, seeing this as the self perfection of his cleric.

 

[Seeten]

This is why I rp with friends, instead of Draconian DM's who believe in punishing players for good roleplay.

 

[MoonZar]

This is why I rp with friends, instead of Draconian DM's who believe in punishing players for good roleplay.

Hello,

If this good roleplay like the case of this topic why not, but sometime people change from a good god to an evil good for no other reason that they want to be allowed to make slaugther and murder. If have see this case a couple of time when i was a player, even in a tournment in montreal. This very disturbing when most of the group is good.

 

[smootrk]

Clerics ought to be the epitomy of Devotion.

 

[BalazarIago]

Putting the rules aside, my comments have to do with the actions of the Player.

It is not the place of a priest to decide if the actions of his God were appropriate or not. What exactly did he expect his God to do? Send an Avatar to kill the goblins and rescue the important and obviously devout 3rd level cleric?

How is he to know that his God did not help him? He is still alive when his friends were killed, and he was rescued. Who is to say that his God did not arrange for the arrival of the adventuring party or that He stayed the hand of the goblin leaders. Perhaps the God was not able to protect his Follower directly because of the God of the Goblins taking offence. Gods deal with politics too. Who is to say that the priest was not being punished for his lack of faith, or even tested to see if he is worthy.

The point is, this priest is having a crisis of faith. He is deciding to turn his back on his God because he feels that his God turned his back on him. Perhaps an Elder in the Chuch shoud sit down with him and explain the fact that the priest serves the God, not the other way around. That Gods do things for a reason that lowly priest are not always privy to, and that expectations are not going to be met, no matter which diety he decides to worship. If the priest feels that at the first sign of personal anguish, lose and setback, is a sign that his God has forsaken him, then he obviously places more value on his role in the Church that is reasonable.

As for him changing Gods. An Evil God might take him, just for spite, but a Lawful Good God would not. Who is to say that at the first sign of difficulty, this priest won't bail again. He obviously feels that a God is required to earn his devotion, instead of learning that it is the God who requires a level of devotion and repays that devotion with granting the priest special powers and divine spells.


Personally, I think that this priest needs a kick in the ass and be told that he should be on his knees begging forgiveness and thankful he still alive so that he may spread the Word.

But this is just me.

 

[MoonZar]

Who is to say that his God did not arrange for the arrival of the adventuring party

hehehe well this a very insighful comment, after all i think that god act in the shadow of the world and not directly.

If this was true, as the DM you could give him a sign that this was the will of the god priest that he was save. This a miracle that this guy is still alive, he should be grateful.

After all, if the god had turn his back on the priest, he would not have access to his spells.

This when life is very hard on us that we should truly who we are...

I won't blame the priest to be human, this was very very hard on him and i would probably did the same as the players who play the priest in a moment of anger against the situation.

Maybe after a couple of month the priest will see all these event with more wisdom and will give another chance to his god...

 

[Seeten]

Hello,

If this good roleplay like the case of this topic why not, but sometime people change from a good god to an evil good for no other reason that they want to be allowed to make slaugther and murder. If have see this case a couple of time when i was a player, even in a tournment in montreal. This very disturbing when most of the group is good.

We werent discussing Joe Random's God Change, we were discussing a God Change brought on by roleplay, where the god change did, in fact, make sense. Lathander did NOT send help to his "Faithful" cleric. He didnt send one of his Paladins, a lay person, an adventuring party, he did NOTHING for months while his devoted follower was tortured and abused. The character feels abandoned, and the player, quite rightly, thinks that a switch in gods is not only warranted, but justified. I agree with him. Lathander FAILED this cleric, for whatever reason, when his need was great. Now, he has a burning desire for justice and retribution, which Lathander does not stand for.

Lathander and this cleric no longer have anything in common, and Lathander has already abandoned him.

If you want to discuss Joe Random bad player who switches gods every other game session, feel free, but it should have nothing to do with this thread. I play D&D to roleplay, not to move miniatures on a battlemat, so when someone institutes new Draconian lawful evil rules to punish my characters for rp, I dump them and their game as a bad habit.