Thoughts on Cleric Domains

[ManicFuel]

...as well as some more specific Animal domains: Reptiles and Birds mainly, but maybe Fish as well.

Here's the list of domains in Nyambe (a terrific supplement, BTW, well worth the price):

Birds
Confusion
Dance
Darkness
Exile
Fertility
Fish
Flesh
Greed
Hunting
Iron
Lightning
Love
Plague
Serpents
Wisdom

These are all OGC. Has anyone compiled a document with all the OGC domains and domain spells? If not, would anyone be interested in helping me piece one together?

 

[Spatula]

From a game mechanics perspective, I'm all for more domains of any sort. It makes it easy for a player to get a handle on what a deity is all about when you can be specific with the domains. The evil gods all seem to have Chaos, Evil and Destruction

That's because dieties get the alignment domains that correspond to their own alignment, in addition to their normal portfolio-related domains. FRCS adds in racial domains as well, where every diety of a racial pantheon gets the appropriate racial domain.

Add Pain, Darkness, Torture, Deceit, and maybe Lolth will look different than Maglubiyet.

The difference is that clerics of Lloth can take the Destruction domain (plus the Drow, Darkness, and Spider domains in FR) and clerics of Maglubiyet can't.

 

[ManicFuel]

The difference is that clerics of Lloth can take the Destruction domain (plus the Drow, Darkness, and Spider domains in FR) and clerics of Maglubiyet can't.

According to DotF, the domains for Lolth and Maglubiyet are the same (Chaos, Destruction, Evil, Trickery). The additional FR domains for Lolth is basically the direction we're going - finding more domains to help differentiate the deities. Actually, Lolth is the perfect "before and after" reasoning behind the idea that the core books need more domains. With the FR additions, she looks (mechanically) like the Drow Spider-queen of Darkness.

 

[Omand]

ManicFuel,

Thanks for the Music Domain stuff, I will have to look through my copy of S&S and check on those spells. I think the domain power might be a bit too powerful, but I have not seen it in play.

Also thanks for posting the Nyambe domains. Can't help you at present with compiling a list. Work is busy, and as I noted at the top of the thread, I buy few books, so I don;t have much to draw from.

Finally, my take on additional domains.

I like having the flexibility of adding domains to create the right flavour for a deity. That said, there is too much of agood thing. I fell that most gods only need four domains. By varying those domains among deities you differentiate portfolios. Only the most powerful deities get 7 or 8 domains, and even then you may be pushing things, depending on your campaign.

For Lolth, as an example, I can see her having Darkness, Spider, Chaos, Evil and Destruction domains. Trickery? maybe, but that is pushing it in my book. The Drow domain is out for me due to my lack of use for racial domains. If you do have a Drow domain, why not merge the Spider and Drow domains. They have much the same flavour, yes (I have not actual knowledge here of FR as I have mentioned).

Well, that's my view at the moment. A night's reflection may change things.

Cheers

 

[MerricB]

G'day, Omand!

Here's the list of Clerical Domains I've seen published in WotC books - there are probably more in the many FR books I don't own.

Clerical Domains

Air – PHb
Animal – PHb
Artifice – Dt&Dg
Beastial – BOVD
Cavern - FRCS
Celestial – BoED
Chaos – PHb
Charm – Dt&Dg, FRCS
Community – Dt&Dg, BoED
Corruption – BOVD
Courage – CW
Craft – FRCS
Creation – Dt&Dg
Darkness – BOVD, Dt&Dg, FRCS
Death - PHb
Demonic – BOVD
Destruction - PHb
Diabolic – BoVD
Drow – FRCS
Dwarf – FRCS
Earth – PHb, FRCS
Elf – FRCS
Endurance – BoED
Evil – PHb
Family – FRCS
Fate – CW, FRCS
Fey – BoED
Fire – PHb
Glory – Dt&Dg, BoED
Good – PHb
Gnome – FRCS
Greed – BoVD
Halfling – FRCS
Hatred – FRCS
Healing – PHb
Herald – BoED
Illusion – FRCS
Joy – BoED
Knowledge – PHb
Law – PHb
Liberation – Dt&Dg
Luck – PHb
Madness – Dt&Dg
Magic – PHb
Mentalistm – FRCS
Metal – FRCS
Moon – FRCS
Nobility – Dt&Dg, CW
Ocean – FRCS
Orc – FRCS
Pain – BoVD
Planning – CW, FRCS
Plant – PHb
Pleasure – BoED
Portal – FRCS
Protection – PHb
Renewal – FRCS
Repose – Dt&Dg
Retribution – FRCS
Rune – Dt&Dg, FRCS
Scalykind – Dt&Dg, FRCS
Slime – FRCS
Spell – FRCS
Spider – FRCS
Storm – FRCS
Strength – PHb
Suffering – FRCS
Sun – PHb
Time – FRCS
Trade – FRCS
Travel – PHb
Trickery – PHb
Tyranny – CW, FRCS
Undeath – FRCS
War – PHb
Water – PHb
Weather – Dt&Dg
Wrath – BoED

Cheers!

 

[Omand]

MerricB,

Thanks for all of that work. It will take me a bit of time to work through things there.

I think your list proves part of my initial point, however. While there are a large number of domains in print, if you want to use them you are flipping through many books at the gaming table.

Cheers

 

[MerricB]

I think your list proves part of my initial point, however. While there are a large number of domains in print, if you want to use them you are flipping through many books at the gaming table.

Pretty much. I get around that by copying them into a Word document and taking that with me around to sessions... at least, I would if I used many of the non-standard domains!

Cheers!

 

[Omand]

Pretty much. I get around that by copying them into a Word document and taking that with me around to sessions... at least, I would if I used many of the non-standard domains!

Cheers!

Merric,

Yeah, I have considered doing that. The thing is, with non-standard domains that use non-standard spells you end up having to copy the spells out as well. That is just a pain and a waste of my time as a DM from my POV.

Cheers

 

[Knightfall]

I have a ton of custom domains for my campaign, btw.

Yep, Jester has some great domains, which can be found at his Cydra Yahoo Group. > Files > Religion in Cydra.doc

I have a similar document for my own homebrew, World of Kulan. Jester and I shared some domains so there is some overlapping. However, both documents are different enough to be useful.

Mine can be downloaded from my World of Kulan Yahoo Group. > Files > Spells and spell Lists > Cleric Domains List 3.5.doc

Cheers!

KF72

 

[I'm A Banana]

I am doing what I can to fix this problem. Honest. With luck, the whole world can enjoy it within the year.