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

[Oofta]

But where does their oath get power from?

Or ... to put it another way, where do sorcerers, bards and wizards get their spells? Wizards get it because they believe that the incantations, gestures and material components shape magic but does it really? Or is it just a way of focusing the mind to manipulate the underlying essence of magic? Bards think word and song can channel that magic while with sorcerers it's "just because".

The spells a paladin cast may have the "divine" label, that doesn't mean their power source is really that much different than bards.

 

[Celebrim]

Short version? Magic.

Slightly longer version? From the power of their conviction.

So, if that is the case, are insane people in the setting invincible? Because no one has more perfect conviction than insane and delusional people. If just conviction turns into magic, why doesn't it work for everyone and in particular why doesn't it work really, really, REALLY well for the completely deluded?

What I am beating around the bush about here is that however you want it to work, it has to be internally coherent. You can't just willy-nilly take a religious argument about Faith, and apply it to a situation where the setting has completely changed. Faith isn't powerful because it's conviction, or at least, the people who believe that Faith is a virtue don't believe it is powerful just because stubbornness is a super-power. They believe that the power of faith comes from what you believe in.

Back in ancient times when people took oaths, they didn't believe that the oath had any particular power. The power the oath had came from whom or what witnessed the oath, and how that power would respond to it. That's why when they took an oath, they swore by or on something, because in doing so they were attracting the attention of something that would hold you to the oath or empower you to keep. That's true of pretty much any oath making culture.

So if you remove the culture and the setting things that make oaths and faith and whatever have meaning, you need to look around for some other answer than 'oaths' or 'faith'.

So even in a generic D&D campaign, the power doesn't necessarily come from the gods.

Sure, but what do you mean by 'gods'? Because if your setting has nature spirits, or ancestral powers, or primal cosmic forces and swearing an oath on them actually draws upon power, those things are the gods of that setting. And as evidence, I point to all the vast numbers of people throughout human history who when they thought about the idea 'gods' pointed to those things.

Again, what are you actually saying is going missing when you say, "There are no gods." Tell me what that is like, and then maybe I can brainstorm up some help.

 

[Celebrim]

Or ... to put it another way, where do sorcerers, bards and wizards get their spells?

Good question.

Wizards get it because they believe that the incantations, gestures and material components shape magic but does it really?

Well, does it work? Presumably, wizardly spells work whether you believe that they are going to work or not. In fact, priestly spells in D&D traditionally work whether you believe that they are going to work or not. Belief has nothing to do with it. D&D priests pretty much have no use for 'faith', any more than a priest of Thor or priest of Zeus spent any time thinking about faith. Faith or belief is not how religions work generally.

Or is it just a way of focusing the mind to manipulate the underlying essence of magic? Bards think word and song can channel that magic while with sorcerers it's "just because".

No.

The spells a paladin cast may have the "divine" label, that doesn't mean their power source is really that much different than bards.

Divine magical sources are extraordinarily different than arcane sources. Divine sources are external to the user. Arcane sources are internal to the user. Divine sources are like receiving aid. You call up Thor in your designated time slot, and he dispenses a Flamestrike spell for you to use. You don't have to know how its works. You don't really have to do much work yourself. Thor or his designated agent builds the spell and sees that it gets to you. And those beings can do magic because they are inherently more 'real' or 'powerful' or have 'authority' that you don't. All divine magic works by using someone else's power.

Arcane magic on the other hand, is basically technology. It's not technology that would work in the real world, because the real world has a periodic table of elements and so forth and we can be reasonably convinced that magic is impossible in it. But it's technology within the setting were it occurs because it is based on manipulating something in the setting using words, movements, and potent ingredients as levers to get something moving using relatively little force. So wizards build the spells themselves, slowly while 'memorizing them', winding up the spring as it were so they can let it lose in a single powerful event. Bard, use basically the same approach, just with more music in it and less numbers and crazy diagrams. But then again, music is numbers. Sorcerers on the other hand are in some way inhuman, and have inherited whatever mojo that gods, spirits or other powerful beings have.

There is not 'just because' about it.

The easiest way to think about this is imagine a world were just one spellcasting class exists, and think about what that implies about magic in that world. A world with just wizards means that there are no external power sources, or at least none anyone can tap into, but its a world where reason can somewhat deduce how the world works and nudge it to produce occasionally spectacular effects. A world with just sorcerers is a world of mutants, where the only people who can do magic are the people who are born with it. It's a world where people have knacks for different things depending on their birthright. The world of Avatar the Last Airbender might be considered just a world with only sorcerers that have to be from one of 4 bloodlines (plus the Avatar, who is special). The world of Mistborn is a similar sort of thing with just a very limited spell selection and a cool take on what powers spells. Although, spoilers, it turns out there is more than one sort of magic - more than one spellcasting class - in the world.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

So, if that is the case, are insane people in the setting invincible?

Certainly they would tend to be very powerful spellcasters, kept locked away in a very secure establishment.

What I am beating around the bush about here is that however you want it to work, it has to be internally coherent.

I've never noted internal coherency as being much of a factor for any religion or person with a strong faith. It generally boils down to the ability to believe six impossible, and mutually contradictory, things before breakfast.

Faith isn't powerful because it's conviction,

Wrong, that is exactly why faith is powerful. it enables people to do brave, stupid or terrible things because of thier conviction that the universe is one way and not another, despite any evidence to the contrary.

Back in ancient times when people took oaths, they didn't believe that the oath had any particular power.

Wrong again. Back in ancient times most people believed in God as an all seeing cosmic policeman who would punish them if they did wrong, which would include breaking oaths. Kings where often portrayed as divinely appointed, so to disobey the king would invite punishment by the cosmic policeman.

 

[Coroc]

Well that is pretty simple. Darksun shows one way on how to do that. Make them worship the elements. Another option is to use principles or ethics as foundation of faiths. This can be as specific as "Truth" or "Honor" or as simple as "Light" or "Dark" or "Good" or "Evil". If you need more diversity use "church of the light of hope" or "cult of the dark damnation" e.g.

 

[akr71]

Echoing others: No gods means there is no need for cleric or paladin classes.

I would create a new class - possibly as a new druid circle - called a mystic healer (or something). You could either drop the life domain cleric in here, whole cloth, or create something new. A class that is a dedicated healer and buff/debuff person. Their magic is would be very nature based or even shamanistic, ancestor worship.

Edit: Alternately, if someone really needs to play a cleric, play a warlock whose patron aligns with the cleric domain they are interested in. Borrow heavily from the domain spell list for their patron spells.

 

[Oofta]

[MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION]: Obviously you believe that the "divine" descriptor means something universal. I disagree ... it's just a label for a type of magic. Since there is no "source" for most magic users other than material/somatic/verbal components I don't see why paladins need anything other than their oath. You do still have to get the components right, which is why it takes time and practice to cast higher level spells.

The book is quite clear, unlike clerics paladins do not necessarily get their power from their oaths.

Ultimately there's no real answer other than "whatever the fiction of your world dictates". So that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

 

[Celebrim]

Certainly they would tend to be very powerful spellcasters, kept locked away in a very secure establishment.

Which, if you decided that you really wanted a setting where belief itself is powerful would be a really cool and unique setting.

I've never noted internal coherency as being much of a factor for any religion or person with a strong faith. It generally boils down to the ability to believe six impossible, and mutually contradictory, things before breakfast.

*waves hand* The religion and politics forums are that a way.

Wrong, that is exactly why faith is powerful. it enables people to do brave, stupid or terrible things because of thier conviction that the universe is one way and not another, despite any evidence to the contrary.

Like I said, you want to debate that, lets do it somewhere else.

Wrong again. Back in ancient times most people believed in God as an all seeing cosmic policeman who would punish them if they did wrong, which would include breaking oaths. Kings where often portrayed as divinely appointed, so to disobey the king would invite punishment by the cosmic policeman.

Err... aren't you just now repeating my point back to me?

 

[Laurefindel]

Divine magical sources are extraordinarily different than arcane sources.

That has been the default assumption of D&D since its beginning, but it's simply fluff.

Mechanics can be dissociated from their "flavor" without hurting the game whatsoever. Darksun, the Lankhmar box set and, to a lesser extent, the world of Eberron, have set precedents to that. Even in the "vanilla" version of D&D, fluff has been changed and dissociated from their mechanics since its origins; elves and dwarves can become paladins, rangers can be of non-good alignments, clerics can cast fireballs and arcane casters can cast "cure wounds" and other traditionally divine spells.

At their core, arcane and divine casters are very similar: both need to know or prepare spells, both use spell slots to power their spells, both use "pre-packaged" spells to work their magic. Heck, some of these spells are exactly the same regardless whether they were cast from an arcane or divine spellcaster and they use the same spell progression. They are more similar than they are different.

Some DM may be reticent to refluff classes and concepts in their game; that is their prerogative. But things can be changed for a campaign or homebrew setting, by the DM no less, without hurting internal consistency. These alterations may not be coherent with default D&D but as long as they are applied consistently throughout the whole creation process, you have internal consistency.

 

[lowkey13]

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