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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kobold Stew" data-source="post: 6296769" data-attributes="member: 23484">I do understand your position, I just don't agree with it, and the rhetorical colouring of "merely" points to your presuppositions.  "Priest" carries different baggage than "acolyte", but neither are problem-free. I note that you combine "officiant" with "the pulpit", which is pretty religion-specific.  This at least overlaps with the trait that you get when choosing the background, and so this is a good association......rather than no association. I agree that breadth is good. I believe I am arguing for a broader use of backgrounds than you are. The use of "acolyte" (whether as temple functionary (as you present it) or generic religious person (as presented above)) is limiting. I suggest the societal function of "priest" (which I can take to be any religious functionary, in a term everyone will understand) should be divorced from the character class of Cleric. I'm not saying that gamers don't know the word. I am saying its a word that (in its normal sense) only makes sense if priests exist somehow. I'm also saying it's a word 95% of gamers would not use in a context independent of their games. And this is exactly the step backward I am talking about. The huge benefit that the backgrounds introduced -- the thing that I am reluctant to lose -- is the separation of these two things: now the guy-who-marries-you doesn't have to be a cleric. That is the breadth that the backgrounds introduced -- this association was no longer the default. It could still exist (did all of the cleric pregens have priest as their background? they might have), but the system allowed for other possibilities.</blockquote>

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