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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6666163" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't know what was in the 2nd ed core books. I don't remember anything like what I quoted in 3E. And I don't know about 3.5/PF. So no correction in respect of any of those!In 4e the PHB had this (p 54):Drawing on magical energy that permeates the cosmos, the arcane power source can be used for a wide variety of effects, from fireballs to flight to invisibility. Warlocks and wizards, for example, use arcane magic. Each class is the representative of a different tradition of arcane study, and other traditions exist. . . . Divine magic comes from the gods. The gods grant power to their devotees, which clerics and paladins, for example, access through prayers and litanies.This is not as detailed as Gygax's DMG description. To me, it also gives rise to the usual confusion over why, exactly, a warlock counts as arcane. The use of "traditions" for arcane magic is also a bit weird, because a sorcerer doesn't really strike me as an exponent of a tradition.With divine magic, there is also the following found on pp 61-62 (clerics) and p 92 (paladins):As a cleric, your deity does not directly grant you powers. Instead, your ordination or investiture as a cleric grants you the ability to wield divine powers. Clerics are usually formally ordained by existing clerics who perform a special ritual to do so, but on rare occasions a deity moves to directly ordain a worthy worshiper without any sort of priestly hierarchy involved. What you do with your powers once you are ordained is up to you, although if you flagrantly and openly defy your deity’s tenets, you quickly earn the enmity of the faithful. Paladins are not granted their powers directly by their deity, but instead through various rites performed when they first become paladins. Most of these rites involve days of prayer, vigils, tests and trials, and ritual purification followed by a knighting ceremony, but each faith has its own methods. This ceremony of investiture gives a paladin the ability to wield divine powers. Once initiated, the paladin is a paladin forevermore. How justly, honorably, or compassionately the paladin wields those powers from that day forward is up to him, and paladins who stray too far from the tenets of their faith are punished by other members of the faithful.This seems to contradict divine magic "coming from the gods", and also makes it even less clear how warlocks are different! It's actually closer to 5e, insofar as ordination/investiture seems just to be an alternative pathway to gaining control over "the Weave".Is 5e wildly different in this respect?</blockquote>

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