Why Is the Cleric Unfun?

[Zweischneid]

1) You don't have to play a cleric to play a religious PC.
2) The thinking is not meta-game at all.

1.) You don't have to, but it seems the obvious choice if someone flips open the rulebook. Why make it difficult for people?

2.) If not meta-game thinking, what than?

 

[Henry]

I'm talking about higher levels where heal is almost the only viable source of in-combat curative magic.

My mistake - when you said "a few spells could have saved him" I thought you spoke of lower levels, where most people fuss about a cleric hoarding his spells. However, even there, there are spells that could be included into the game to alleviate this - fortunate fate, for one. At higher levels, I'd think that PCs would use some of their funds to purchase heal spells on scrolls to make sure that the cleric did not run out of healing at a critical time - even if the cleric acquiesced to using all his higher level spells for healing, there's only so much that can go around, so it makes more sense to have it in a resource like that where the cleric can prepare to do other things. Heal is a nice spell, but if my cleric never used those bolts of glory he was packing, there was more than one moment in a Planescape game that a head demon or Slaad Lord would have destroyed us for sure.

 

[ThirdWizard]

1.) You don't have to, but it seems the obvious choice if someone flips open the rulebook. Why make it difficult for people?

Why consciously? I don't think they purposely designed the cleric so that it would have to be a medic. That's just how it worked out. They're hopefully fixing that mistake now.

2.) If not meta-game thinking, what than?

The fact that there is only one person in the party capable of curing your wounds. If the big bad takes out 1/3 of your hp (however you want to describe that in character - doesn't matter) and retreat would just leave the wizard exposed to be easily killed, the only person between you and death is generally the one who can cure your wounds. That's the cleric. It doesn't really matter if he wants to cure or not. How is that meta-gaming?

My mistake - when you said "a few spells could have saved him" I thought you spoke of lower levels, where most people fuss about a cleric hoarding his spells.

We don't even go adventuring without at least half a dozen heal scrolls after about level 13.

The real problem is the cost of actions in combat. A half-ogre cleric can do some amazing things with a little divine power + righteous might, but it rarely happens because he can't take the time to cast both of those and attack before someone is almost dead. And, with combat going only about 4-6 rounds on average it doesn't leave much room for doing his own thing. There was a PC cleric of Thor in a game I ran who had a lot of fun before level 10 (or around there) because he actually got to do other stuff. After that point the damage started ramping up so much that he couldn't do all those other cool things he used to. It really hurt his enjoyment of the game.

 

[Henry]

We don't even go adventuring without at least half a dozen heal scrolls after about level 13.

O ho! Great minds think alike!

..it rarely happens because he can't take the time to cast both of those and attack before someone is almost dead. And, with combat going only about 4-6 rounds on average it doesn't leave much room for doing his own thing.

And 4E, if it does as advertised, will do both of those things. I've never had a problem with either of those while playing clerics, but hopefully 4E will fix one without messing up the other. That's my main concern.

 

[Zweischneid]

The fact that there is only one person in the party capable of curing your wounds. If the big bad takes out 1/3 of your hp (however you want to describe that in character - doesn't matter) and retreat would just leave the wizard exposed to be easily killed, the only person between you and death is generally the one who can cure your wounds. That's the cleric. It doesn't really matter if he wants to cure or not. How is that meta-gaming?

In just about every possible way. If Brave Dave sets out into the wild and gets cut up by the big bad, the in-game thoughts should be more along the lines of....

"I shall thank the gods for being alive at all. Obviously that dire wound is a warning for my foolhardiness in tempting death."

"I shall train 1001 days and nights to improve my warrior skills, so I shall be able to master this challenge better next time."

"I shall use more guile and better strategy, luring big beast into cunning ambushes where I can dispatch them without threat."

....or whatever else fits your character, alignment, etc. Did you ever see Aragorn, Conan, Prince Valiant, Elric, Hercules or any other fantasy hero yell "I'm down 1/3 of my HP, where's the Cleric?" when they fail their tasks? I haven't.

 

[ThirdWizard]

In just about every possible way. If Brave Dave sets out into the wild and gets cut up by the big bad, the in-game thoughts should be more along the lines of....

"I shall thank the gods for being alive at all. Obviously that dire wound is a warning for my foolhardiness in tempting death."

"I shall train 1001 days and nights to improve my warrior skills, so I shall be able to master this challenge better next time."

"I shall use more guile and better strategy, luring big beast into cunning ambushes where I can dispatch them without threat."

....or whatever else fits your character, alignment, etc. Did you ever see Aragorn, Conan, Prince Valiant, Elric, Hercules or any other fantasy hero yell "I'm down 1/3 of my HP, where's the Cleric?" when they fail their tasks? I haven't.

Lets say that I'm at my job at the office and one of the servers running the virtual machines go out. Do I nod shake my head and talk about how we should have kept them in a cooler spot or checked them more often and then continue on with three servers instead of four? Or do we call in the guy who is certified and knows how to get the server back up and running?

Lets say I'm fighting a demon in the Abyss and he claws me in the chest, blood gushing out but I'm still standing somehow, but my vision is blurring and going dark. Do I think to myself, "gee that sucks. I'll just keep whacking him and hopefully I'll kill him first." Or do I hope that the cleric, the guy who has a supernatural ability to cure wounds - which I've seen occur a few hundred times before - reaches over and touches me to patch me up?

What is metagame about wanting to live?

 

[cougent]

Umm, what? You mean that no one expects the cleric to heal? No one expects the rogue to check for traps? No one expects the wizard to be artillery? I'm somehow imagining all of this? Haven't we had role definitions for the classes for about 20 or 30 years? It's not about giving the wizard free will. Good grief. Sorry, I guess I wasn't overly pedantic enough for the internet.

You have consistently reflected the same very narrow viewpoint in several posts, I just pulled the one quote that was the most narrow. I get it, your games are structured and disciplined and everybody better play their assigned roles, or else. Fine for you, just not for me.

Jeez, talk about fixating on the minutia. :\

Hey the devil is in the... minutia

EVERY CLASS HAS A ROLE. How's that for clarity. EVERY class. But, part of the cleric's role is to play medic. That means he's going to be spending time helping other people do fun stuff, rather than do it himself.

PART being the key word here, your other postings have very much indicated that to be ALL, not part.

Hey, people like playing the bard too. Some people enjoy playing support roles. But, in a RPG, deliberately designing things so that you require a particular role (support healer) to be filled makes it somewhat unpalatable.

You keep reasserting your opinions as facts, which they are not. Others have stated that they have played without Clerics. While others have stated that they have played Clerics NOT as healer bots. Yet you keep coming back to your narrow defined fixation of roles (now for everyone , not just Clerics) and insisting that this is the way it must be. I know this is the Internet and there is a strong desire to "win" the argument (that I did not want to even have) but just try to understand that not everyone is seeing the game through your particular rose colored glasses. Run your game as you and your players see fit, it just sounds boring to me. Mine would undoubtedly sound <something> to you too. So be it.

The question was originally asked as to why the cleric is considered unfun. The basic answer is twofold: A. Clerics are pretty much required in most campaigns. B. Lots of people don't like playing support roles.

And the real answer is:
1) Assumptions made by other non-cleric players put pressure on the cleric player to conform to narrow minded perceptions of the class. This is unfun
2) Cleric players who balk at these assumptions often run into narrow minded DM's who then impose them upon the cleric player under the guise of ROLES. This is even more unfun

I fail to understand why this is difficult to understand.

I know, it's so simple, why don't you get it?
Take away the preconceived notions and it is quite fun to play a cleric.
Shackle ANY class with a "you must do this all the time" role and it becomes unfun. It's RPG, not RG.

 

[roguerouge]

You shouldn't need bags full of potions to keep going just so the cleric doesn't have to cast healing spells.

And thus, the dwarves created the keg of cure light wounds.

And it was good!

*hurp!*

 

[Zweischneid]

Lets say that I'm at my job at the office and one of the servers running the virtual machines go out. Do I nod shake my head and talk about how we should have kept them in a cooler spot or checked them more often and then continue on with three servers instead of four? Or do we call in the guy who is certified and knows how to get the server back up and running?

Lets say I'm fighting a demon in the Abyss and he claws me in the chest, blood gushing out but I'm still standing somehow, but my vision is blurring and going dark. Do I think to myself, "gee that sucks. I'll just keep whacking him and hopefully I'll kill him first." Or do I hope that the cleric, the guy who has a supernatural ability to cure wounds - which I've seen occur a few hundred times before - reaches over and touches me to patch me up?

What is metagame about wanting to live?

If the live-and-death thrill of mortal combat becomes akin to repairing a server, there's something seriously wrong with your game.

If you "just keep whacking things and hopefully I'kill him first", there's something seriously wrong with your conception of thrilling life-and-death combat.

If you've come to rely on a cleric to perform divine miracles of healing on you hundred times before, these serious wrongs have been going on for a long, long time it seems.

 

[ThirdWizard]

If the live-and-death thrill of mortal combat becomes akin to repairing a server, there's something seriously wrong with your game.

This is about meta-gaming, not about anything else. I'm saying that people have roles in the real world. Why is it any more meta-gamey for them to have roles in a game?

If you "just keep whacking things and hopefully I'kill him first", there's something seriously wrong with your conception of thrilling life-and-death combat.

Note that that was the "wrong" answer from my viewpoint.

If you've come to rely on a cleric to perform divine miracles of healing on you hundred times before, these serious wrongs have been going on for a long, long time it seems.

I just don't see the alternative. I see a very binary situation: either a) the cleric heals and the fighter lives or b) the cleric doesn't heal and the fighter dies. Depend on the cleric's healing? Just out of curiosity, how many 15+ level games have you been a part in in which a healer was not a necessity? In all high level games I've been in (12th and up generally) a cleric refusing to heal would mean death and lots of it (TPKs all around!). In fact, in most games I've played in a cleric actively healing still means many deaths (I see 1 per 3 sessions, roughly, due to damage). And, these are MMI creatures. The MMs progressively get more dangerous.