Running clerics as spiritual counselors?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have two clerics in my campaign, and this sort of role is becoming increasingly important as time goes on. Even if it's only the commoners asking for them to perform the religious duties of a village priest, it makes a difference, IMO.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

The adventures of Father Slaughter, Village Priest of Erythnul.

A village youth: "Father Slaughter, I have a problem. Gwendolyn and I wish to marry, but her father has promised her to Sir Baltaff."
"Kill them! Slaughter the men and make their entrails an offering to the Great Lord Erythnul! It will fix everything and make you feel better! If the woman disapproves, kill her too!"

A fellow cleric: "Father Slaughter, I have a problem. Brother Mayhem keeps stealing my sacrificial victims and now he's trying to kill me."
"Kill him! Butcher him on our high altar! We will drink his blood together!"
"You told him the same thing, didn't you? What is your Wisdom anyway, like 7?"
"Aaaagh!" [swish] [hack] [thump]

A local noble: "Okay, we know you are dedicated to murdering everybody in this province, but look: if the peasants die of the plague, they can't die screaming at your hands. So help us cure this plague, will you?"
"Err... [hand quivers near axe hilt]... fine. [reaches for axe again] This time. [fiddles with axe handle] But someday I will bathe my axe in their blood!"
"Yes, well, we --"
"Aaaagh!" [swish] [hack] [thump]

That might work for humorous adventures and campaigns, but it's unlikely in more "straight" games.

I mean, unless such clerics are recruited by the deities or associated outsiders directly (which isn't outside of the realm of possibility, depending on the setting), the cult has to spread somehow.

What I'm imagining is that such priests will observe the people around them until they find someone with, for example, anger issue. There's always someone who is just too eager in bar fights, or who gets upset for minor reasons. They will learn more about such people, talk to them, listen to their life stories and feign sympathy. They will tell them not to feel guilty about such urges and instead tell them how to get away with it. Eventually, they will establish enough of a level of trust - which these people probably can't find anywhere else - and then introduce them to the cult.

And thus, the cult spreads. Simply going on an orgy of slaughter is unlikely to do that.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

I the Eberron campaign I was in, I played a cleric of the Sovereign Host. One of the other players ran a cleric of no deity, she said she was a cleric of agnosticism (is that a word?). She kept trying to convince me that there were no real gods to be worshipped, and the fact that she had miraculous powers despite her lack of faith proved it. I countered that the Sovereign Host worked through her, despite her lack of faith, because the Host was present in everything good.

We had a good time going back and forth trying to "save" each other.

 

[Piratecat]

Huh. We've always emphasized the spirituality and advice-giving aspect in our games. I find it really fun, and a nice reminder of the cleric's other duties in the church.

 

[Clueless]

I've not had it come up in a DnD game, most of the folks who like to play cleric in our group like to play the 'I kick rear for my god/dess' sorts. Once or twice my character has had a talk with the cleric about party direction and alignment issues, but only for my current Planescape game, and that really only because our party is a hodgepodge mix of LG to NE (with C tendancies)...

The best example of cleric counselors I've seen in one of my groups actually was our Serenity game. We had ourselves a 'gen-u-wine' Shepard. He may not have been a terribly good shot (kneecaps aside), but he was very influential and nice to talk to.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I disagree about them being historically primarily counselors. Servants of the divine, not counselors for fellow mortals is the primary focus.

You say as if this is mutally exclusive - but it isn't.

Historically, having a full-time priest within one's community meant having one extra mouth to feed that didn't produce any food or physical goods for the benefit of the community. Yet a priest caste sprang up almost everywhere where humans created communities, so they must have provided some useful services - or else the communities without priests would have been more successful than those with priests.

And these services were councel and mediation. Priests were - and still are, in many areas - responsible for keeping the community together. Not from a legal point of view, but on a spiritual level. Peasants might hesitate in approaching their lord because he had the power of life and death over them, but priests usually don't have this power - yet they represent a different kind of authority that is respected without (usually) being feared.

 

[Slife]

And these services were councel and mediation. Priests were - and still are, in many areas - responsible for keeping the community together. Not from a legal point of view, but on a spiritual level. Peasants might hesitate in approaching their lord because he had the power of life and death over them, but priests usually don't have this power - yet they represent a different kind of authority that is respected without (usually) being feared.

Except in DnD, the priest DOES have the power of life and death. More so than the nobles.

 

[Wolfwood2]

But throughout history, priests have primarily been counselors - people to whom other members of a community turn for advice and mediation. If someone has trouble of any kind, they will talk to the priest about it. If they have a dispute with someone else about property or other issues, they will ask the priest to mediate it.

I find your premise faulty from the start, Through-out history, "priests" (that is, those you talk to the gods) have most certainly not been counselors. While some of them sometimes took that role, their primary function was to mediate between people and the uncaring universe. A priest would call for rain or help determine the best time to do something or help appease the gods.

Throughout history, priests have primarily been people who serve as intermediaries between men and their gods, convincing the gods to smile upon human endeavours. It's just that priests in D&D, having some very concrete and observable magic available, are able to produce some very concrete and observable results.

That wishy-washy counseling stuff is for those who lack any other way to help because they can't deliver miracles on demand.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I find your premise faulty from the start, Through-out history, "priests" (that is, those you talk to the gods) have most certainly not been counselors. While some of them sometimes took that role, their primary function was to mediate between people and the uncaring universe. A priest would call for rain or help determine the best time to do something or help appease the gods.

Throughout history, priests have primarily been people who serve as intermediaries between men and their gods, convincing the gods to smile upon human endeavours.

But in actual history, as far as anyone knows priests didn't really have the power to do that. At least, the number of proven divine interventions is rather small.

Of course, in D&D priests can do more than that, depending on the setting. But the role of couselor and mediator is nevertheless an important one that should be filled - and why shouldn't it be filled by clerics? Or do you want to have a caste of "mundane" couselors and mediators in addition to priests?

 

[Jdvn1]

What are your thoughts on this issue?

Different members of clergy have different roles.

But, do you have to have levels in Cleric to be part of the clergy? I see no reason to require it. A counselor type just strikes me as having a high Wis, and maybe K(Religion). This can be done with any class (those with K(Religion) as a cross-class skill can do it, but just are less common).

I imagine those with more K(Religion) and access to spells can rise in the ranks faster, but not necessarily.