D&D 5E How to play an evil cleric

[Helldritch]

I'll try

 

[Coroc]

Isn't Greyhawk much like that? You have evil deities like Vecna and Hextor, and then you have the likes of Erythnul and Tharizdun. There's a clear distance between the acceptability of the first two and the second two.

Blue Box Greyhawk city, although claiming to be a major force of neutrality, says evil cults are forbidden in the city.

 

[Coroc]

Many cats lay murdered mice and birds at their owners' feet. Does that make the cat, the owner, or the sacrifice evil?

They want to share a part of their food with you, that is neither sacrifice nor murder. Or are you suggesting a hunter who shoots some deer, and brings it to the butchery afterwards, is making a sacrifice to the butcher?

 

[Coroc]

Almost the entirety of the worship toward evil deity is the kind of worship you do to placate that deity into not acting against you, your family or your community. No one in his rightful mind will worship an evil deity for what it is supposed to do. You want the deity of plagues to be calm and at peace with you. Not the other way around. That is in our world. There are the rare case where you might want the deity of plague to affect a rival person/community/nation but that is not the norm.

In a world where magic and gods are real and have temporal powers that can be seen and felt; it is an other matter entirely. Now we have people that know that the deity will answer their prayer. Let's take Hextor for example. Evil God of War, Discord, Conflict and Fitness in Greyhawk. In a martial society, this god is revered in two ways. The first is the placating thing. You want the god to not bring the ugliness of war, discord and conflict in your life/country. A cleric of Hextor will insist about frequent sacrifices but not necessarily persons of his country but of captured enemies. In time of peace, the clerics will be charming and warn of the ugliness of war and of the importance of staying fit for war. You wish a conflict to end fast? Worship Hextor, placate him with offerings so that he will make sure things go your way. A very tempting prospect.

In times of war, the true ugliness of Hextor will come to the fore. Sacrifices of prisoners will be frequent and bloody. Massacres of enemies (both in soldiers and in civilians) will be more frequent by armies with clerics of Hextor in their midst. Hextor is all about the ugliness of war and the unnecessary bloodshed that comes with it. The clerics of Hextor will go to war with passion and might not hesitate to suggest that war is necessary to solve problems. If things goes to well, they will not hesitate to sow discords and conflicts and even force events into full fledged wars. Of course they will make it appear as if someone else is responsible and they will make sure that the events will not be attributable to them. As a Lawful Evil fate, Hextor will maintain a servile facade as they are the servant of the country (in appearance only).

The fate is opened in the Great Kingdom but in other places, the fate of Hextor is seen for what it really is. In the Great Kingdom, the fate of Hextor was kept in check by the fate of Pholtus, Heironeous and a few others. When Ivid took the throne, he put the fate of Hextor to the front, unchecked and uncontrolled. This led to the events known as the Greyhawk wars and the fall of the kingdom. As said in an other campaign setting: "Evil always turns upon itself."

Hextor is one of the most tolerated evil deity and yet, its ugliness and evilness is evident. Only a power hungry individual bordering on psychopathy would worship him. They will be pleasant in times of peace but their ugliness will be evident on the battlefield. They will pretend that this is due to the ugliness of war and that monsters you have to be to protect your loved ones from the monsters fighting you. The end always justify the means for these clerics.

To give a RL example of the past: Odin/Wotan was sometimes honored with human sacrifices in dire circumstances (like wartimes), no one would refer to this god as being thoroughly evil though.
Still the Vikings and other Germanic tribes probably were quite tuff, they did not have a word for mercy in their language, suggesting they neither asked for it and rarely gave it.

 

[Ogre Mage]

Yes but that is a perfect example of neutral evil you have got there.

Her devotion is not just to Mystra but the Church of Mystra as an organization. She wholeheartedly believes in the church goal of acting as a caretaker of magic. Thus, she would be willing to endanger herself if something was of great importance to the church. Depending on circumstances she would consider helping other clerics of Mystra. After all they are brethren and sistren in faith. In general her thinking is that the better off the Church of Mystra is the better off she is. Of course, Mystra's religion is also the source of her power and status so she wants to exploit it as a tool to better herself. She is evil.

But other clerics of Mystra are not "the common people" that I mentioned earlier. Those folk can be subjugated for all she cares. They are lessers and should know their place.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

They want to share a part of their food with you, that is neither sacrifice nor murder. Or are you suggesting a hunter who shoots some deer, and brings it to the butchery afterwards, is making a sacrifice to the butcher?

Isn't that what a sacrifice is? Thor, I'll share my virgin daughter with you. Please don't blow down my cottage.

BTW. You should really tip your butcher a piece of meat once in a while. Every butcher needs a little pick-me-up (e.i. sacrifice).

 

[tetrasodium]

I've come across this delicious description on Quora. Here's the start:

Really want to mess with the rest of the party? Then support them wholeheartedly.

LAWFUL GOOD PALADIN: Excuse me, uh, Father…. Zorgoth?

CHAOTIC EVIL CLERIC: Yes, my son? Do come in, I was just making tea.

LGP: Um, Father, I couldn’t help noticing, when you cast that ritual to destroy the goblins, that you rather let slip you were a priest of…. ahem…. “Bloodgar the Smiter.”

CEC: Yes, of course. Biscuit?

Enjoy!

I played a lawful evil grave cleric of the Dark Six in a curse of strahd game & regularly served as the group's moral compass while the LG vengeance paladin was pretty much the very definition of an indiscriminate murderhobo bullying party members into going along with his "good deeds"... After all, The Six are denied their due in this foul place... nobody pays the keeper or devourer what is rightly theirs, of course those sickly crops are blighted... the people are all depressed & waiting for death.. of course they are without The Fury's passion to fuel them... So on & so forth. I think the party really started to see just how inverted things were when the paladin & ranger instigated a battle with one of the bad guys (a mayor or something) who was about to preside over an execution & the pair cut short discussions with violence that resulted in dozens of dead villagers ( riding down a crowd on a warhorse or rain of arrows & such). It's a shame the alignment system along with a few other parts of d&d still play lip service to setting speciic absolute morality leading to things like this & worse all too often

 

[Coroc]

Isn't that what a sacrifice is? Thor, I'll share my virgin daughter with you. Please don't blow down my cottage.

BTW. You should really tip your butcher a piece of meat once in a while. Every butcher needs a little pick-me-up (e.i. sacrifice).

Hm, never knew that Thor was into virgin daughters, you always learn, I cannot remember having read that in the Edda though.
I am also not aware that the Germanic tribes offered their daughters to save their huts from bad weather
But your post sounds wrong to me anyway somehow, or sharing has a different meaning I do not know about (I am a non native English speaker).
To enhance on what you wrote, you probably know, that e.g. if some ancient cult offered an animal to their gods, they slaughtered it on the altar and afterwards instead of throwing it into the fire or such they ate its meat (they "shared" their meal with their god).
So on your "Viking and his daughter living in a ruined shack which is in danger to succumb to bad weather" example .... at least I hope he did not "share" his daughter with the local butcher also.

 

[Flamestrike]

Almost the entirety of the worship toward evil deity is the kind of worship you do to placate that deity into not acting against you, your family or your community. No one in his rightful mind will worship an evil deity for what it is supposed to do.

Plenty of people would find the dogma of Bane to be ideal!

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

Hm, never knew that Thor was into virgin daughters, you always learn, I cannot remember having read that in the Edda though.
I am also not aware that the Germanic tribes offered their daughters to save their huts from bad weather
But your post sounds wrong to me anyway somehow, or sharing has a different meaning I do not know about (I am a non native English speaker).
To enhance on what you wrote, you probably know, that e.g. if some ancient cult offered an animal to their gods, they slaughtered it on the altar and afterwards instead of throwing it into the fire or such they ate its meat (they "shared" their meal with their god).
So on your "Viking and his daughter living in a ruined shack which is in danger to succumb to bad weather" example .... at least I hope he did not "share" his daughter with the local butcher also.

I think you took my post much more seriously than I did : )