D&D (2024) The Cleric should be retired

[Mirrorrorrim]

The cleric has three fundamental problems as a class. The first is that there are basically no fictional clerics outside near-explicit D&D fiction that match D&D clerics. The second is that their holy spellcaster schtick is pressed on from all sides by people who do it better. And the third is that thanks to the nature of prepared casting that their magic is very cookie cutter with, other than domain spells, all clerics being able to prepare the same spells.

There are between two and five archetypes for fictional divine casters, all of which are better filled by non-clerics because the cleric-exclusive combination of strong armour (at least medium + shield), divine magical healing, and turn undead is so rare.

• The Final Fantasy White Mage - wears robes or cloth armour not solid armour, and is almost all about the magic. Possibly lives in a cloister. Far more a Divine Soul Sorcerer than a cleric.
• The Holy Warrior with some magic. This is where the cleric started but hasn't really been the cleric since divine magic got jacked up by 3.0. And at least since 4e Essentials the Paladin has felt like a better fit here.
• The Agent of the Divine. Generally low key magic and knowledge until they absolutely bring it. Frequently looks either like a humble priest or not a follower of the divine at all. The Celestial Warlock is both thematically and mechanically a better fit here.
• The hermity wise man who lives in the middle of nowhere. This always feels more druidic (or even rangery) than clerical to me.

I'm not saying the cleric can't do any of these roles - but they are squeezed by classes that do it better.

First, the Cleric is the OG of D&D. It has been around for the entire life of the game, almost 50 years, longer than most of those themes in fantasy, and is the oldest D&D class that has never had its name changed. The Fighter started as Fighting Man. The Rogue started as Thief. Wizard has been a Magic-user* (thanks for the reminder @Willie the Duck). The Cleric has always been a Cleric.

The Cleric is often pretty damn strong, being able to be armored and able to select domains that can enhance their blastiness and/or armaments. Sure, some people prefer not to be pigeon-holed as a healer, but the Cleric is not unique with this problem. If they didn't exist, any other "healers" would also suffer from players that don't want to be the healer.

Clerics, being an iconic base class with prepared spells, often have a similar loadout of prepared spells, which means they can always be able to fulfill the common roles required by an adventuring party, but they do get good variation of abilities at the Subclass level. If in the 2024 PH the Divine Order ability lets them choose to focus between being stronger casters or warriors, without that being tied to Domain, that gives them even better diversity in their themes.

There are lots of Arcane casters that focus on different specialties and I don't think they need to be culled either. I think it is great that the core Cleric can be a strong armored Divine class that can cast 9th level Divine spells, and have other classes have subclasses that also dabble in the Divine. They each focus on different things.

They are iconic, and awesome, and are D&D. Who cares what other universes reskin or name their fictional holy casters? That doesn't matter to D&D. I love Clerics and am glad that they aren't going anywhere.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

In my experience, no one felt uncomfortable about a D&D setting. The discomfort is the core class whose rules require roleplaying worship of a D&D god.

The problem is the Cleric class. It lacks reallife cultural sensitivity.

There are so many things in D&D (and fantasy in general) that so many people can find problematic. What makes Clerics more insensitive than any of these other themes?

• Some people are pacifists and could be turned off by games centered around killing.
• Some don't like the idea of magic, or witches and warlocks, or demons and devils.
• Some don't like the depiction of Druids or Shamans or other themes borrowed and repurposed in a fantasy way.
• Some don't like the ethnocentrism that exists in lots of fantasy with different races and species, which can be depicted as racist.
• There is slavery and mind control and dark necromancy and soul-snatching and other nasty, evil themes. There is evil in the game, and some like to play with that evil.

Do we remove anything that could be problematic?

The entire game is subject to Session Zero for anyone who has a problem with any themes. It doesn't mean that the game has to be transformed into My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (But I am SO DOWN for such a game as well). The gamers at the table get to pick and choose what they want to focus on, and some people just don't want to be a part of some things. If the group doesn't click, they don't all have to play.

Finally, with all the reskinning that the game allows, one could literally ignore certain themes, change the story, and re-imagine the mechanics in another light. A Cleric could be re-imagined purely as a "Light" or "Dark" magic defender gish that draws its magic from the Akashic Memory of the Astral Sea or Philosophies of weird Outer Planes, without being tied to gods at all.

Of course a DM and group would have to accept that flavor is malleable.

 

[Clint_L]

The entire game is subject to Session Zero for anyone who has a problem with any themes. It doesn't mean that the game has to be transformed into My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (But I am SO DOWN for such a game as well).

Critical Role has you covered!

 

[Mistwell]

That gatekeeping sounds noninclusive toward reallife players.

D&D is for everyone, from any culture.

There are people who come from a real life background thinking spells and magic are evil and nobody should play a game with those elements involved with the game.

D&D isn't for someone who doesn't want spells and magic in a game. It's a basic premise and modifying that much of the rules to accommodate a players personal preferences isn't an acceptable demand on a DM or other players. It would be better to play a different game that doesn't have spells and magic.

 

[Storyteller Hero]

The first is that there are basically no fictional clerics outside near-explicit D&D fiction that match D&D clerics.

The concept of a holy mage empowered by divinity is pretty heavily used in a lot of novels, graphic novels, comics, videogames, and animation with a lot of variations just as a DnD cleric is capable of fielding. The keywords "Saint", "Saintess", "Apostle", "Prophet", and "Prophetess" bring up a lot of examples, collectively at least.

 

[Scribe]

Just one more "thx for the srd wizards" thread.

 

[Aldarc]

You don't need to get rid of the cleric, per se. Simply make them start with light armor and simple weapons only as the default, with armor and/or weapons or better spellcasting and cantrips as a low-level opt-in feature.

The conceptual problem of the cleric is that is has two "core" identities; one as the champion/chosen of a single god in a henotheistic pantheon, and the other as a defensive/healing magic specialist, the mirror to the offensive blasting core of the wizard. And those two cores can be difficult to reconcile, especially if the god is evil or focused on concepts that aren't amenable to being healers and protectors.

One would think that it would be possible to decouple the inherently religious aspect of the cleric given that 5e Backgrounds include being an Acolyte in a religious institution, making it possible for any character to be a priest. Honestly, more robust backgrounds would probably help with other similar issues and not just the cleric.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Totally disagree with this as well. I have players with zero interest in religion, fictional or otherwise, who enjoy playing D&D, and if players want to express any concerns about content Session 0 is the best time to do it, so we all know we are on the same page. Maybe we will agree, and maybe we won't.

Edit: That said, I've never, in more than 40 years, encountered a single player uncomfortable with the idea of religion in a fictional setting, and I live in a very secular part of the world. So I don't think this is an actual issue, either, much like retiring cleric as a class.

I’ve played Clerics when I had zero interest in religion. In my experience, most players who play a Cleric have little interest in the religion. To them, it’s no different than playing a Fighter. But they’re not uncomfortable with the setting which I think is the salient point here. If someone is uncomfortable with fictional religions and gods, they should choose a different game.

I think this ignores the huge swath of D&D that doesn't dive deep into the well of (complex and well-defined) fictional gods. Most of oD&D-BECMI/RC, and AD&D up until the specific settings left religion as super vague. It undoubtedly exists to explain the clerics and temples, but requires no specific level of buy in. 2e and 3e made explicit that religion can be of whatever nature the group desires, with plenty of options for designing religion around philosophies or elemental forces or whatever is desired.

Interesting for me is that I've also run into a lot of people playing clerics that not only didn't want to get elbow deep into fictional religions, but didn't really have an interest in playing a devout person at all -- it was merely the only way to get the deemed-game-necessary ability to cast cures, negative status removal spells, etc. (the classic cleric=healbot issue). By making non-magical healing effective (or too effective, depending on viewpoint), and opening up the spell lists to other classes (divine sorcerers and lore bards in particular), 5e means you genuinely don't need to do this.

There is a bit of nuance here. I've had players who didn't have a ln issue with fictional religions but didn't feel comfortable playing a follower of one. I've allowed such players who want to be a cleric but not a worshipper of Thor* by saying they worship some generic "The Light" and leaving it at that.

* or any other fictional or mythological deity.

Many of us that started with the basic-classic line certainly did a bunch of that. Immortals becoming effectively deities happened well into the 90s, so for most of the run there wasn't any real mention of to whom all the clerics were praying, so most of ours were praying to 'gawd' or 'the light', or 'church of Crom, scientist' (as Gronan so charmingly put it).

The Fighter started as Fighting Man. The Rogue started as Thief. Wizard has been a Mage. The Cleric has always been a Cleric.

Magic User.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Interesting for me is that I've also run into a lot of people playing clerics that not only didn't want to get elbow deep into fictional religions, but didn't really have an interest in playing a devout person at all -- it was merely the only way to get the deemed-game-necessary ability to cast cures, negative status removal spells, etc. (the classic cleric=healbot issue).

Every edition has tried to do something about the 'healbot'
1e tried giving the Cleric bonus spells, and had some spell levels with no healing at all, notably 2nd level spells, so, as there was no clear official rule like upcasting, the cleric got to cast some spells besides healing, some of the time.
2e brought us not one, but two or three systems to customize clerics or Priests to different deities or even forces or philosophies
3e gave the cleric spontaneous healing, domain spells, self-buffing spells, access to better weapons, ...and WoCLW... and created CoDzilla.
4e moved the resource burden from the healer to the character needing healing (ie from spells to surges), expanded the healer role to 'leader,' which tho it did not include leading the party, did include attacking-and-healing in one go, buffing allies, granting allies actions, and arguably de-buffing/'setting up' enemies (which was also arguably secondary control), and included a Leader class in every Source, so, regardless of the broad sort of character you might want to play, you could fill the role. Even an all-martial party would not be disadvantaged for lack of da healz, for the only time in the games long history.

By making non-magical healing effective (or too effective, depending on viewpoint), and opening up the spell lists to other classes (divine sorcerers and lore bards in particular), 5e means you genuinely don't need to do this.

5e also made in-combat healing pretty ineffective outside of whack-a-mole, which ... limits the the range of ways you can run it.... and while HD are a universal healing resource, it's a smaller one than surges were, and slots can be entirely devoted to healing, tho, IMHO, the incentive to do that is very low, since they're so much more powerful used in other ways.
At least nominally religious characters (Cleric, Paladin, Druid -divine sorcerer, apparently) aren't the only healers there are also Bards.

Magic User.

(TBH, I remember hearing "Mage" quite a lot back in the day ... and being, like, 'but, that's a the title of a 16th level magic-user?')

 

[Scribe]

Every edition has tried to do something about the 'healbot'

I think I'm just warped by my time playing WoW. The idea of not needing healing (and having it baked into the game design assumptions) is just...flawed to me at this point.

Fighter/Barb Front Liner
Thief/Trap Guy
Healer
Caster/Ranged Damage

This should just be a basic assumption. The whole 'bring 4 Fighters, YOLO!' kind of open design is just way too far for me.