Early clerics and the gods

[Quasqueton]

In the earlier editions of D&D, there were no gods listed in the PHB. Those of us who started with the earlier editions, how long did you play without clerics having gods? How long did you play before you actually started noting the gods, or having clerics mention, refer to, or in some way acknowledge a god or the gods?

My game(s) probably went 3 years before any thought was put to actual gods. Clerics were no different than magic-users or fighters – just characters with certain abilities innate to the class, not because of another being.

My first exposure to gods as actual beings came from Dragon magazine – EGG’s articles on the Greyhawk Gods. Purchasing the D&DG book came much later.

Quasqueton

 

[Crothian]

I think we started having Clerics follow the gods around second edition. It never seemed important to do so in first edtion even after we got D&Dg.

 

[WayneLigon]

How long did you play before you actually started noting the gods, or having clerics mention, refer to, or in some way acknowledge a god or the gods?

Always used them, even when we were playing OD&D. Every campaign I've played in, one of the first three questions asked are 'what are the gods in your world?'; I've never played a game of D&D without knowing the answer to that question and picking an appropriate patron deity even when people were not playing a cleric.

 

[Lanefan]

Always used them, even when we were playing OD&D. Every campaign I've played in, one of the first three questions asked are 'what are the gods in your world?'; I've never played a game of D&D without knowing the answer to that question and picking an appropriate patron deity even when people were not playing a cleric.

Yeah. What he said. (thoguh OD+D was before my time...)

Right from the start, it's made clear that Clerics pray for spells. It is not a huge leap to ask who or what they are praying *to*...

Lanefan

 

[diaglo]

have always used the "gawds"

 

[MerricB]

I'm trying to remember a player playing a cleric in the early years... there must have been some, but I can't remember any!

Cheers!

 

[Mark Hope]

We used them right away, designing a simple pantheon which was further developed and elaborated upon as our games progressed. It was clear that clerics were figures of religious devotion, so as DM it was my job to make sure that they had someone to be devoted to. And, as I recall, Isle of Dread (which I got the same week that I started playing D&D) makes reference to a deity worshipped by one of the clerics on the plateau (Olorun, Lord of the Skies or something like that), so the concept was part of our games right from the beginning. When we shifted to AD&D about a year or so later, we continued in the same vein. I'm also pretty sure that the old AD&D character sheets had a section for religion and patron deity, so that would likely have been a big motivator to develop such things, had we not already done so.

 

[Piratecat]

During our 1e game in '80, every time my friend Tom left the room, we'd erase his correct deity from his character sheet and replace it with "Garl Glittergold."

 

[AFGNCAAP]

Honestly, we just picked a deity to follow that more-or-less went along the lines of the cleric's alignment and outlook, for homebrews, or when playing Mentzer OD&D. More or less, the cleric's focus was more on his/her AL than anything else. More often than not, my clerics (& PCs) followed Thor.

With specific deities to a setting (like Greyhawk & FR), just picked a deity we were interested in & shared an AL with. It wasn't like the spell list or weapon proficiencies changed because of it.

That changed a bit with the specialist priest rules of 2nd ed. AD&D, but that's about it.

 

[Psion]

In the earlier editions of D&D, there were no gods listed in the PHB. Those of us who started with the earlier editions, how long did you play without clerics having gods?

1 game. That was a basic set game. My first character. Got killed by a dire wolf.

By the time I ever got around to playing a cleric again, DDG was out, and picking out a patron deity was the "thing to do", even if you weren't a cleric.

(In fact, I was at one time so so obsessed with this, I forced it on the players. In the 1e DMG, there's a line about saving throws going up being due to the "favor of the gods". So I announced a house rule that if you did not have a patron deity, you were not currying the favor of the gods and your saves never advanced. )