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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5601135" data-attributes="member: 4937">Although I don't necessarily agree with where you go with that, there is some truth to the general complaint.I think the root cause is that there is a strong tendency of many players/DM's to filter Cleric through the lens of a Christian priesthood, so that it takes on large numbers of trappings that are very particular to the Christian religion and not necessarily to religion generally.So for example, there is a tendency to attribute all of the following to the class of cleric generally:1) They are men of Faith, either at the superficial atheistic level of 'believing in the deity' or the more naunced theistic understanding of faith as 'believing in the benevolence and power of the deity'.  2) They are pious and devoted servants of their deity.2) They are miracle workers whose power comes directly from a deity or his intermediary as a result of their empowering Faith or faithfulness.3) They are evangelists promoting belief in their deity and service of the deity.  4) Members of some organized religion.None of those things in fact has anything to do with the cleric class as described they are just things we think of if we aren't careful when we think of Cleric.  It's not that any may necessarily not be true for a particular cleric or particular in game religion, it's that none of those need be true.  So that conversely, a cleric in game may be:1) Men who have through study knowledge of the esoteric characteristics of the deity.2) Shrewd practicioners of ritual who bargain with and trick the deity or his servants.3) Magicians whose power comes from using their knowledge to empose their will on the deity or who recieve power from the deity as a result of esoteric bargains.4) Hoarders of secret knowledge so as to better leverage their power over the masses.5) Isolated practicioners.Personally I think western Monk should go under Fighter or Expert.   Western monks are by definition laity and not clergy.  I hate the Monk class for a whole host of reasons.   However, I think that the question is flaws, since by and large the religion of most game worlds is not supposed to be either 'eastern' or 'western'.   Pick classes that fit with your game world and if you want to include a class, figure out what it means within your game world.</blockquote>

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