D&D General The Role and Purpose of Evil Gods

[Chaosmancer]

What is fun about D&D is that it is such a melting pot, that you can find anything and adjust it to your own tastes.

It will always work out fine. It might not be to the taste of someone else, but if it fits you and your table, it is all good.

I've never said otherwise, sooo thanks for the random vague platitude?

 

[Helldritch]

I've never said otherwise, sooo thanks for the random vague platitude?

What else did you want? I have told you everything, shown you that evil gods were useful and nothing was required to remove them and yet, you keep saying that removing the gods is not homebrew but a necessity since they are redundant with archdevils...

You do not want them, don't use them. I prefer my way but for some reasons, you seem to try to convince us that your way is the way. It is one way, but certainly not the only way.

I gave you the example of the immortal set to show you a bit of one possible way to interpret the interactions between gods and how it might influence your gaming world (or any other for that matter).

Re read what McCrae quoted and in many editions, devils and demons might have the power to stand against some gods but they are not. They are "considered". Some of my friends that are members of the first nation consider me one of them, but I am not. I do have ancestors but I am not a first nation person.

The same can be argued for the archdevils. They can be considered, but they are not.

 

[SkidAce]

Not sure if it has been mentioned yet;

Wild Beyond the Witchlight has an example cleric...

Spoiler

 

[Helldritch]

Not sure if it has been mentioned yet;

Wild Beyond the Witchlight has an example cleric...

Spoiler

View attachment 144289

In 5ed, you can worship a picture of a sunset and still get spells... I am not certain that this could have any bearing.

For me it is not the fact that clerics can get spell that makes evil gods obsolete or not. It is the very existence of the clerics that I am starting to question. So many character classes can be as efficient healers as the clerics that it brings this question:"why would we have clerics in the first place?".

A paladin can fill the religious role perfectly leaving the druid, the bard and the artificer the true source of healing (I know of the celestial warlock).

In earlier editions, clerics and druids were THE source of healing so the religious aspect of these characters was a quite defining aspect of them. Now, bards and artificers can do it and so can clerics without gods... I am a bit ranting here but it is perfectly feasible to have successful group without any religious class, thus bypassing the divine magic aspect of the game completely.

For some reasons, this bugs me to no end.

 

[SkidAce]

@Helldritch , no worries...not siding in the debate.

Posted the example simply to show that fiends can have clerics in 5e, as they did in other editions.

There was some verbiage in earlier posts claiming fiends cant have clerics. That was my only point.

 

[pemerton]

The 1974 D&D cleric is heavily influenced by Christianity, with spells such as Turn Sticks to Snakes. It seems plausible therefore that the "Anti-Cleric" (Book I, pg 34) who casts reversed versions of some cleric spells is a Satanist.

<snip>

The clerics in B2 The Keep on the Borderlands (1979) worship demons. There is a "demon idol" in the "chambers of the evil priest." Anyone who picks up the "relics of evil" in the "chapel of evil and chaos" falls under "the influence of a demonic spell." One of the clerics plans to sacrifice the captive medusa as part of "a special rite to a demon."

Thanks for these references. I'd forgotten about B2. And I knew that there were anti-clerics somewhere in Men & Magic, but hadn't found the reference on my quick flip-through the other day.

In I2 Tomb of the Lizard King (1982), the clerics allied with the lizard king Sakatha are "demon-worshiping." The Type I demon, Grzzlat, "was ordered by a cleric to carry a few spells up to this plane." I think that's a reference to this passage in AD&D 1e Deities & Demigods (1980): "Third, fourth and fifth level spells are granted by the supernatural servants or minions of the cleric's deity."

This idea is also found, prior to DDG, in the DMG (p 38; italics original):

Cleric spells of third, fourth, and fifth level are obtained through the aid of supernatural servants of the cleric's deity. That is, through meditation and
prayer, the cleric's needs are understood and the proper spells are given to him or her by the minions of the deity.​

There is a somewhat contradictory treatment of the same matter in the PHB (p 40):

First, second, third, and even fourth level spells are granted to the cleric through meditation and devout prayer. This spell giving is accomplished by the lesser servants of the cleric's deity. Fifth, sixth, and seventh level spells can be given to the cleric ONLY by the cleric's deity directly, not through some intermediary source.​

It's not clear to me what problem arose that led Gygax to change his mind about this between the PHB and the DMG. What DDG adds to the DMG is that (a) demigods have no suitable minions and hence (i) grant 3rd to 5th level spells directly and (ii) can't grant spells above 5th level; and (b) that lesser gods can only grant 6th but not 7th level spells.

 

[pemerton]

Before the invention of warlock, there was only one class for gifted power. So all beings of high power created clerics because that's all their were.

After warlocks were added and made mainstream, there became more ways to grant power. Cleric creation was gated between the previous concept of divine rank. Warlocks and binders were not.

You haven't responded to my posts about 4e which suggest this is wrong. In 4e, Asmodeus is a god and as a result there are clerics of devils. And Orcus and Demogorgon have cleric-like cultists (eg Deathpriests of Orcus). There is no suggestion in 4e D&D that fiends only bestow power upon warlocks. And in fact, whereas there is an Infernal pact for warlocks, there is no "demonic" pact (unless you count Dark pact warlocks).

 

[pemerton]

I never bought the idea that gods are the same in multiple settings.

It's a stupid idea in my opinion.
Asmodeus and Bane cannot the same being in both places because they act different.

On this we're agreed. It's part of the broader cosmological incoherence that really gets going with MotP and reaches its pinnacle in Planescape.

 

[pemerton]

What else did you want?

I think that @Chaosmancer is hoping that you will engage more forthrightly with the fact that, in classic D&D (ie OD&D somewhere up at least to the mid-80s with AD&D) it was not uncommon for the published material to contemplate, or expressly put forward, clerics of devils and demons.

And also with the fact that the 2nd ed AD&D/3E approach was not universal even within those editions. The 3E texts put forward their approach as a default but expressly contemplated alternatives, as per the quotes from Book of Vile Darkness (p 123)and the 3E MotP (sidebar on p 8).

And here is an example from 2nd ed AD&D: The City of Greyhawk boxed set includes a number of adventure cards, including the scenario To Slay a Hierarch. The Hierarch in this adventure is a 14th level priest, with a full spell load out including the 7th level Symbol (he has the beneift of the 2nd ed AD&D spell table for clerics, which gives 7th level spells at 14th rather than 16th level), and is described as "busying himself with some last-minute proofreading of a new Unholy Text of Asmodeus." The hierarch has a secretary who is a 9th level priest, also LE and presumably also a priest of Asmodeus.

So in fact it has never been the rule, in D&D, from 1974 at least until the end of the 4e era, that archdevils and demon lords do not and cannot have clerics.

 

[Maxperson]

Just before someone like @Maxperson only reads the initial bolded section

"ARCHFIENDS AND CLERICS

The demon lords and archdevils described in this chapter cannot grant spells to clerics. Instead, they act as patrons for clerics who devote themselves to abstract sources of divine power, and they assist the clerics of evil gods. They have worshipers who perform sacrifices in their name, but they don’t run organized religions the way gods do.

If you want the demon lords and archdevils to have organized faiths and grant spells, it’s easy to do so. Chapter 6 identifies which domains each archfiend would be associated with (see the Cleric Domains section in the spell lists). If you have the Deities and Demigods book, you can give each demon lord and archdevil divine rank 1 and adjust their statistics accordingly."

So, the book said yes and no at the same time.

It does not say yes and no. It says no(cannot grant spells), but you the DM can change that rule if you want to. That's homebrew territory.