[Homebrew] In a godless campaign what do you with clerics?

[Staffan]

I had an idea for a setting where clerics tapped into certain universal principles (which happened to co-incide with the various domains - funny how that worked out) and studied them in order to gain magic power. This study was on a more intuitive level than the intellectual study of a wizard (hence, Wisdom-based - it's more about connecting with and "grokking" the domain than learning facts).

This setting would also have had religions (with non-manifesting deities like in Eberron), but they would not be directly connected to the cleric class. Certainly, a priest of Melora (I was using the Dawn War pantheon) might be a cleric of Nature, but they could also be a ranger, a druid, or for that matter a fighter or wizard with a penchant for the natural world.

The point of this was to make the clerical toolkit available without necessarily including religions and churches in the same context. For example, in pre-Spellplague Forgotten Realms one of the leaders of the Zhentarim was Fzoul Chembryl, cleric of Bane. That meant that the Zhentarim were strongly tied to the church of Bane and, to some extend, Bane's direct edicts. My setting would allow a cleric in a high position without forcing a religion-based link - their leader could be a cleric of Trickery, but that just gives them an appropriate toolkit.

 

[dregntael]

I'd take a look at the section on "Other religious systems" in chapter 1 of the DMG, in particular "Forces and Philosophies" on p 13:

In other campaigns, impersonal forces of nature or magic replace the gods by granting power to mortals attuned to them. Just as druids and rangers can gain their spell ability from the force of nature rather than from a specific nature deity, some clerics devote themselves to ideals rather than to a god. Paladins might serve a philosophy of justice and chivalry rather than a specific deity.

 

[abirdcall]

Fluff is flavour and very meaningful for your world: a better word than meaningless is malleable. Fluff is completely malleable for the DM and the players even. When my friends and I roleplay we roleplay to create stories we enjoy in a world we enjoy with characters we enjoy. If another designer or rulebook has fluff which makes our story unenjoyable, then it is best for us to change it.

It needs to be represented to be real. Otherwise I don't see the point to the game.

This very thread is discussing changing the fluff - there are no gods. So okay, what does that mean?

Here's another example. I have a character. I decide that I'm going to ignore the fluff of the character's stats and play them as though they have all 20s because I don't like the fluff of the stats.

At that point I ask, what are we doing? What is the goal here?

I am certainly within my rights to play in a game where we completely ignore what the stats represent. But for someone who does that, I would find it puzzling. Why play D&D?

I'm not saying the OP isn't allowed to play a game where there are Clerics but no Gods. But if that is going to be a plot point, it should be well represented. Otherwise, what is the point of that bit of fluff? If the game is the exact same as a game with gods, then there is no distinction.

As an aside, we had a player come to our table once who wanted to play a godless Cleric. We said no. Clerics having gods is an important aspect of our world. Having a player disrupt that isn't fun. The point of this anecdote is that to change things, the entire table should be on board. So I suppose my advice to the OP would be to have a conversation with their table and say 'I'd like to have a game of no gods, is everyone down for that?'

 

[sunrisekid]

I remember Dark Sun (loved it) but the elemental stuff in a more-typical D&D setting sounds like Sorcerer. Religions without actual gods is interesting, but it seems like the Warlock would be a better chassis for that angle (especially in a Robert Howard way). Clerics/Paladins as characters that tap into the Positive and Negative planes is interesting but I have trouble understanding the justification for why their armour and weapon proficiencies are what they are. That the Cleric (Positive plane character) is traditionally an anti-undead class (Negate plane monster), is fine to me. And I do recall previous editions of the game offering cleric options that were anti-some-other-monster (anti-devil, anti-plant, etc), based on the god they worshipped.

The idea of there being a cosmic Positive vs Negative conflict is well established (eg, Diablo). Certain paladin and cleric options fit into that narrative. Even the idea that epic planar foes can grant spellcasting abilities to warlocks (eg, Asmodeus, Lolth) is also well established.

Druids and Rangers need not be considered divine magic, just nature magic. So there's certainly room for a cleric concept but a setting without a pantheon I just don't see a justification for them. For the chassis, sure, I guess, but I'm back to finding a campaign element that would fit.

 

[guachi]

A D&D with clerics but no gods sounds like the D&D you got for BECMI before the Immortals were introduced.

It didn't play any different. You can play a campaign - several campaigns - with no meaningful interaction with deities even if they existed.

 

[Laurefindel]

In the Lankhmarr supplement for AD&D, the cleric was just another type of wizard with a different flavour, not unlike the 5e bard and the warlock. They had a white magic/black magic divide, but that shouldn’t be necessary.

Taken further, you could forget everything about arcane magic/divine magic and have each class exist as its own magical tradition, with or without an associated ethos (like the colours of Magic: the Gathering).

If in the absence of omnipotent gods you still want to keep a fantastical/spiritual element, you could go the « manga » way and have clerics (and druids) serve local spirits, while arcane magic users have learned to draw magic from the land without channeling through them. This could introduce an old vs new magic traditions, with the newer arcane magic disturbing the old established divine magic users’ power.

I’ve long wanted to play in a D&D game where divine magic =/= religion.

 

[MarkB]

I recently ran a Shadowrun-esque campaign set 30 years into the future in the real world. A dimensional accident had brought magic, fantasy humanoids and all sorts of other D&D trappings into our world, but there was no direct evidence of any actual gods being involved, or even existing.

Instead, Faith itself was a means of accessing the world's new-found ambient magical energies. Some (though by no means all) particularly devout priests manifested the abilities of Clerics, but so did many others whose faith wasn't strictly religious in nature. Self-help gurus, philosophers, and even one particularly devoted Klingon cosplayer in Las Vegas.

So, that's one approach. So long as there are still people in the setting who believe in gods, or ideals, or pretty much anything with sufficient intensity, that faith could be what grants them access to divine magic.

 

[TiwazTyrsfist]

It really depends what you want to do with a "No Gods" setting.

Possibilities
1> There is no divine. Therefore there is no Divine Magic.
__A> There are no Divine casters at all. No Clerics, No Paladins, probably no Druids or Rangers. Maybe allow Paladins and Rangers with spell casting swapped out for a number of bonus feats?
__B> Divine magic is reskinned. You have orders of mages. One order uses Wizard spell list. Another order, Still using the Wizard class (HP, Saves, Profs, etc) uses the Cleric Spell list. The types of magic are "Incompatible", which is why Wizards from one order can't learn spells from the other list. This allows for healing etc without having Gods or Divine. Rename anything with the word divine in it.
__C> No "Divine" Magic, BUT allow Arcane healing. Basically, pull the key divine spells (Healing, Resurrections) and add them to the Arcane list. Heck, Bards already get Cure Wounds, Healing Word, Mass Cure Wounds, and Power Word Heal. Either add them at the same level Clerics get them if you want to keep healing consistent with normal, or bump them up a level or two, and add/increase costly components if you want to reduce healing to make it feel harsher.

2> There are no GODS. There IS however a metaphysical substrate of divine energy. Clerics either follow Ideals, or perhaps believe in gods that don't actually exist, but their faith and dedication give them a channel to the divine power.
__?>Why would it matter, in such a setting, if gods were real or not? Answer: Existence of factual gods Enforces moral systems and social systems. If Lorgblad god of cheese exists, and Lorgblad says "You will behave in this way, and you will accept the leadership of Timmy whom I have appointed by Divine Right as your king." you do these things because otherwise you are divinely punished. If Lorgblad DOESN'T EXIST, then suddenly you don't HAVE to eat a pound of cheese every meal, sacrifice a dairy goat every 17th of Grune, and KING TIMMY IS GETTIN' THE AXE.
Or in other words, in a fantasy setting the existence or non-existence of gods may effect morality and social structure.

Junk I learned by binge watching "The Good Place"
Moral Dessert - the concept that you act in a certain way (i.e. GOOD) because you expect some sort of reward. You obey the rules of morality for the promise of eternal reward in the afterlife. How does morality and human behavior change/differ between settings where you KNOW the gods exist because sometimes they physically manifest and do stuff, and settings where you KNOW absolutely without doubt that no gods exist, and therefore there IS NO MORAL DESSERT?



PERSONALLY, I find that removing access to healing unbalances the game, so I usually either lean towards "Clerics faith provides them spell casting even without gods" or "Wizards and Sorcerers can now pick up these spells from the Cleric list"

 

[Tallifer]

[Fluff] needs to be represented to be real. Otherwise I don't see the point to the game.

This very thread is discussing changing the fluff - there are no gods. So okay, what does that mean?

Here's another example. I have a character. I decide that I'm going to ignore the fluff of the character's stats and play them as though they have all 20s because I don't like the fluff of the stats.

At that point I ask, what are we doing? What is the goal here?

I am certainly within my rights to play in a game where we completely ignore what the stats represent. But for someone who does that, I would find it puzzling. Why play D&D?

I'm not saying the OP isn't allowed to play a game where there are Clerics but no Gods. But if that is going to be a plot point, it should be well represented. Otherwise, what is the point of that bit of fluff? If the game is the exact same as a game with gods, then there is no distinction.

As an aside, we had a player come to our table once who wanted to play a godless Cleric. We said no. Clerics having gods is an important aspect of our world. Having a player disrupt that isn't fun. The point of this anecdote is that to change things, the entire table should be on board. So I suppose my advice to the OP would be to have a conversation with their table and say 'I'd like to have a game of no gods, is everyone down for that?'

Stats are not fluff. They are crunch. They are part of the rules which govern the mechanics of combat, skills and adjudication.

Fluff as I said is important but malleable. But not malleable by one player against everyone else. Indeed, because fluff is malleable, it is adaptable to each table, to each story, to each DM, to each mood, to each world. A player who wants all 20s is either breaking the RAW or the houserules which make encounters fair and fun; a player who wants a godless cleric in a world with gods is not adapting to that world: but because fluff is malleable, he can play the exact same character mechanically but change the fluff to worshipping a god. The mechanics of his sheet would be unchanged (the spells, the stats, the skills, the class, the equipment); but all the fluff (the background, backstory, ideals, personality quirks, holy symbols) would change.

In a godless game, the clerics stats, spells, skills, proficiencies, starting equipment and features could remain the same; but his class name (and spell names), backstory, appearance, philosophy, language and raison d'être would be different. Why bother? I might do such a thing because I want a godless world, but I recognize the mechanical simplicity of playing a standard game with a magical healer, and I cannot be bothered to design a whole new class of arcane healer or to analyze some third party class for broken rules.

 

[abirdcall]

Stats are not fluff. They are crunch. They are part of the rules which govern the mechanics of combat, skills and adjudication.

But what the stats represent to you are not. You could choose to play your character as though they had all 20s. Just change the 'fluff' of the stats.

You could also be a half-orc and just say that you're an elf. Argue that the mechanics are what really matters.

I wouldn't want to play with someone like that. The 'fluff' is the game.