Why do the gods answer clerics in D&D? Pride or balance?
- Thread starter Emirikol
- Start date
Treebore
First Post
Emirikol said:
I'm taking this to mean in the "god call" aspect, rather than daily granting of divine spells.
My gods answer due to a succesful percentile roll. Why do they bother to answer? Because it helps to keep your worshippers alive, its good PR to have it known your god may take a personal interest in you at a time of need. Plus it gives me another way to help players to keep from dying and preventing a TPK.
Geoff Watson
First Post
Neither.
The gods don't have to do anything to 'grant' cleric spells, all the work is done by the cleric.
Geoff.
The gods don't have to do anything to 'grant' cleric spells, all the work is done by the cleric.
Geoff.
Moon-Lancer
First Post
i think all clerics are alittle odd in the head. They may think that a god is talking to them, but in reality they are just crazy.
WhatGravitas
Explorer
Another take is something like "divine cold war": The deities feel rivalry, compassion, hate or friendship among each other, just as villains and heroes on the material plane.
But unlike mortals, they're beings of vast energy, tied to reality itself, therefore outright battle among gods will cause tremendous havoc, which will affect to lifespan of the deity in a less enjoyable way or diminish their powers, and unravels their creations, their portfolios and so on.
Good deities don't want that because of compassion for their ilk, for reality, and the mortals, evil gods don't want it because of pride, fear of death (they have no afterlife, after all), and greed for power.
Therefore, the deities do not battle each other face-to-face, but they still feel the need to crush their opponents, at least, they want to annoy them - and they do so by proxy: They imbue mortals (clerics, paladins and blackguards) with a tiny sliver of their might to wage war for them. And the mortals gladly accept for a variety of reasons.
Of course, YMMV, since the answer is highly campaign-specific. But if you're dealing with non-faith-empowered (FR-style) gods, and rather place them at "greek soap deities" than "inscrutable higher entities", the "divine cold war" is a somewhat reasonable model.
But unlike mortals, they're beings of vast energy, tied to reality itself, therefore outright battle among gods will cause tremendous havoc, which will affect to lifespan of the deity in a less enjoyable way or diminish their powers, and unravels their creations, their portfolios and so on.
Good deities don't want that because of compassion for their ilk, for reality, and the mortals, evil gods don't want it because of pride, fear of death (they have no afterlife, after all), and greed for power.
Therefore, the deities do not battle each other face-to-face, but they still feel the need to crush their opponents, at least, they want to annoy them - and they do so by proxy: They imbue mortals (clerics, paladins and blackguards) with a tiny sliver of their might to wage war for them. And the mortals gladly accept for a variety of reasons.
Of course, YMMV, since the answer is highly campaign-specific. But if you're dealing with non-faith-empowered (FR-style) gods, and rather place them at "greek soap deities" than "inscrutable higher entities", the "divine cold war" is a somewhat reasonable model.
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
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