Question about clerics.

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O.K. I've been working on a story as of late and I was wondering about clerics. I have a cleric in my book who is one of the leads and I understand that clerics get their spells via their deity right?

I've never really believed in gods and I'm sure there are also a lot of people in for example Faerun who don't believe in a god. Does that mean that those people cannot get any clerical spells.

I mean that Clerics "BELIEVE" in a deity, but what if one would "BELIEVE" in something as much as the cleric does his/her god but that something isn't a deity. It could be anything, for instance he could believe in himself. But his/her believe is as great as the cleric who believes in a deity. Is there anyway in the D&D rules that that person could have spells without becoming a mage?

 

Not as a Cleric, but as another class.

Druids get their power from Nature, and sorcerers get their power from innate ability. That's not what you're looking for though.

Otherwise, have a look at the prestige classes, more specifically the Adept. On page 37 of the DMG.

Incase you don't have it:

Adept
Some tribal societies or less sophisticated regions don't have the knowledge to train wizards and clerics. Reflecting a lesser knowledge of magic yet an intruiging combination of arcane and divine skills, the adepts serves these cultures as both a wise woman or holy man, and a mystical defender.
Adepts can be found in isolated human, elf, dwarf, gnome and halfling communities but are most prevalent among more bestial humanoid and giant species such as orcs, goblins, gnolls, bugbears and ogres.

Excerpt:
Adepts, unlike wizards, do not acquire their spells from books or scrolls, nor prepare them through study. Instead, they meditate or pray for their spells, receiving them as divine inspiration or through their own strenghth of faith.
/excerpt:

Spell List:
0 Level - create water, cure minor wounds, detect magic, ghost sound, guidance, light, mending, purify food and drink, read magic.
1 Level - bless, burning hands, cause fear, command, comprehend languages, cure light wounds, detect chaos/evil/good/law, endure elements, obscuring mist, protection from Chaos/evil/good/law, sleep.

and so on.
-----

As you can see, the spell list is similar to that of a cleric, but they don't need a god to get them. Yet they aren't as powerful as either mages or clerics, spells only go to 5th level and they can't memorize more than 3 spells of each level.

Just an idea.

 

Let me correct this first. The Adept isn't a prestige class, it is a NPC class, something a normal PC shouldn't choose as a class. It doesn't mention where the Adept gets its powers from, but it says that the Adept is a holy man, or a mystical defender.

Yep. Most of the times. See below for details.

The gods and the afterlife are basically common knowledge in Faerun, which means almost everybody believes in a god. People who don't believe in a god get to be a wall when they die, and I guess this isn't something many people want. Because of the many interventions by deities in Faerun, I guess it is a bit hard to be an athiest.

The rules in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting contradict the rules in the PHB on this one. In the Forgotten Realms, a cleric needs to worship a god to be able to cast spells (rangers, druids, and paladins also need to worship a god to get spells). In the PHB however, it says that clerics can believe in another mystical force, and they can just choose two domains and cast spells like any other cleric, without believing in a deity.

 

Interesting, specially the part about the part where people turn into a wall when they die. The creator of D&D must be a very religious person

@Mesmero, if I've read your post correctly it says that I can't have a non-deity-believing char in the Forgotten realms, but it may happen in a different D&D universe?

But this may create a middle way for my char, thanks for the info so far, I'll have to ponder a while on how I am going to implent that in the story.

 

A cleric may have no devotion, yet still have domains and spells. For example, a Chaotic Evil priest who worships Chaos and Evil in general might have Chaos and Evil as domains, and a crusading Neutral Good cleric might have Good and War as domains. This is perfectly fine in PHB, but in my opinion, highly infrequent and irregular, and not in line the general idea of the cleric.

Gopher: Eek! You've taken excerpts and game information right from the DMG! That's what the SRD is for.

 

Apeman: What Mesmero means, is that you can have a character without a patron deity (Very stupid though), but you can't have a cleric without a patron deity. In Fearun, at least.

The souls of dead humanoids gather at the Fugue Plane, and are picked up by a deities agent to bring them to a particular realm where this deity is. The souls of nonbelievers are not taken away and Baatezu (devils) come to get them and turn them into lemures and possibly later devils to serve the nine hells. Not a good idea to not have a patron, methinks.

 

Just use the Mystic Class from the Dragonlance Setting. Sorcerer-type cleric who relies on inner strength. There you have it.

 

I meant it like MoN said. Not having a patron deity in Faerun, would however be very unlogical, for there is much evidence that the gods exist. There are of course a few stubborn people, and that is why is said in my previous post, that "almost everybody" worships a god in Faerun.

The point of my previous post was, that in Faerun, every cleric needs to worship a god, but the PHB has rules in it for clerics who don't believe in a god, for the use in other worlds. (Just to summarize it)

This is not entirely true. The soul goes to the Fugue Plane and has to wait until it is picked up by the agent of the deity of a character. This waiting time can take days or weeks. In that waiting time, devils may pursuade the soul to come with them (they may not trick the soul into coming with them however). The souls that are not picked up, and do not go with a devil, are send to Kelemvor (God of the Death). He judges what to do with the soul, and in most cases, the soul becomes a part of a wall surrounding Kelemvor's city. After a long period of time, the soul vanishes from the wall, and dissapears completely.

This is not part of the general discussion in this thread, but I will mention it: The demons sometimes break through the interdimensional boundries and steel souls from the Fugue Plane or from the wall, against their will. Unlike the devils, Kelemvor doesn't allow the more chaotic demons to enter the Fugue Plane.

 

Thanks for the info people, I'll have to further ponder on it before I implement anything in my story.

It's a Novelization of the game Icewind Dale BTW, I thought it would be a nice first try too write a story that already exists but where the game has focused on battle, I will focus on story. When I'm a bit further and I've decided how to implement this character I'll post some at creativity surge.

 

Oops, soory for being incorrect about the Fugue Plane and such!
Mesmero: Where did you find that info about Kelemvor's city? FRCS I guess? Could you tell me what page?

 

Are you too lazy to look it up yourself?

Page 258 and 259 of the FRCS. It contains all the info on the afterlife, which was almost entirely summarised in this thread.

 

I've read some rules for clerics who are devoted to an idea, such as justice or whatever, rather than a specific deity. However I'm not sure what system that's in and I think it refers to paying homage to all deities relevant to said idea, rather than none and just believing in the idea.

 

Oaz, what was that all about? What is an SRD? And Mesmero, in reference to your first post; PC can in fact take the Adept class. They can also take any other one of those classes (Expert, Warrior, Aristocrat etc). They are merely discouraged from taking the Warrior (Fighter is better) etc, but there is nothing stopping them.

And yes, in the Forgotten Realms, people become a wall in Kelemvor's (God of Death) City of the Dead if they do not believe in a diety.

 

I never claimed it wasn't possible. I said that they shouldn't take a NPC class, not that they couldn't.

 

In the D&D 3rd Ed source book, "The Book of Vile Darkness" (totally sophmoric, lousy read, highly not recommended), there's a "bad guy" prestige class called an "Ur Priest"

The idea is they either don't worship, or hate the divine powers, but they're able to somehow steal their divine power from the entities. They in effect operate the same way priests do, but without the worship, also they steal spell-like abilities from devils, etc.

It sounds like its sort of what you're after.

 

Ooh, speaking of which, don't forget those crazy Planescape berks from 2E (and unofficially in 3E). There are various factions, and each faction can have divine spellcasters. These guys devote themselves to a certain philosophy of the multiverse, rather than a single entity. By "opening themsleves up to the multiverse", they can channel positive/negative energy, cast spells, and so on.

Or something like that. I've never been particulary familiar with Planescape.

 

Not entirely because I'm looking more for a 'good' character but it's good to see I have options.

Stupid Question: Is Planescape part of the forgotten realms?

 

There are no such things as stupid questions.

Planescape isn't part of FR, it is a different campaign setting. It focusses on the non-conventional planes. I don't know really much about it, except what I saw in Planescape: Torment.

 

That reminds me of a specific Southpark episode where that sentence is followed by:

Remember <8yearoldkid> there are no stupid questions, only stupid people.

That got me laughing out so loud.

Anyway before I linger, thanks again all!

 

IIRC: people that don't pick a patron diety (not necissarily not believing in the gods) become part of the wall because they are never collected by their patron diety and those that don't believe in gods at all become a "resident" of the city of the dead. But i supose it wouldn't matter much- they end up in the same place.