Do you use this rule as it is described in books?
Clerics do face some tough restrictions while wandering away from their deities' plane. Canon rules say that they lose caster levels - and this can make them about as useful to the party as a commoner. Of course it isnt all about stats and spells, but this can make players choose other classes to play, replacing clerics with wands and arcane magic.
Do you use this rule as it is described in books?
In 3E, I apply the alignment-based penalty from the MotP to the effective caster level.
For example, the MotP says a mildly evil-aligned plane causes all characters to suffer a -2 penalty on Charisma-based skill checks and ability checks. To this I add "... and effective caster level, if they are divine spellcasters."
Clerics do face some tough restrictions while wandering away from their deities' plane. Canon rules say that they lose caster levels - and this can make them about as useful to the party as a commoner. Of course it isnt all about stats and spells, but this can make players choose other classes to play, replacing clerics with wands and arcane magic.
Do you use this rule as it is described in books?
Heck, no. I treat divine magic the same as arcane, as far as how the planes change spell effects go. Actually, psionics should be modified the same way, too: it's much fairer that way, and it makes more sense. The planes don't care what kind of mystical energy was used to cast that spell - Limbo will wildsurge a clerical spell or psionic power just as readily as it will anything else. Water will put out a fire made by a psion as readily as it will one made by a sorcerer or a tinderbox.
Even if you decide to go with reduced caster level (and it seems like more hassle than it would be worth), you might not want to screw with spells/day for simplicity sake.
So I adjusted some of the ideas in the Manual of the Planes and now, all divine spellcasters just lose casting levels when on a plane. They don't loose actual spells though, so they can even cast their highest ones, but they're all less effective.
Needless to say that led some multiclassing.
But as a reward for half finishing the Dead Gods adventure ("showdown" with Orcus) my cleric recieved an ultimate power key recently. To be honest I am quite surprised myself how strong a cleric with full spell access can be, I am just not used to it
Kilamar
On the other hand I am really humming and hawing about whether to use and/or maybe reduce the magical items negatives especially since my entire group is new to D&D. Some of them are new to Roleplaying entirly others have played 4-5 VTM sessions.
You could try to apply the line of thinking that some universal concepts, such as Good or Evil, have certain planes that power them, and thus the cleric is limited by domain, but this fails in many cases, such as Death, Healing, or Magic, which touch the each plane in a very real way every day, thus establishing a metaphysical presence of the plane that governs that domain in each of the other planes.
Thus, with a bad alternative on the one hand, and an artificial incentive to "go godless" on the other, I can only conclude that giving this particular rule the axe is the best option available.
Let's take a cleric of Odin (Norse) in my campaign as an example. He reveres Odin but also is a cleric of the Pantheon so to speak and not a priest of Odin.
So Ysgard (Odin and others), The Grey Waste (Hel), Pandemonium (Loki), and the Outlands (The Norns).
So depending on how you interpret the Norns whether or not they are considered Deities you could actually allow a Cleric of Odin (Norse) to never have more than a -1 penalty on the Outer planes. Otherwise and how I will likely run it is that the counting of planes can start in Ysgard, The Grey Waste, or Pandemonium whichever is closest. That is unless of course the cleric gives some slight to the rest of the Pantheon causing Loki or Hel to withdrawn their mutual Pantheon support.
As for generalist elements like good, law, neutrality chaos, and evil you are supposed to count from the closest plane representing that I would think. In the case of druids revering Nature in third edition I have decided to pervert their spells like wizard spells which can be especially interesting with their summoning focus.
Obviously there can be some kinks converting from 2nd to 3rd but they can easily be worked out.
Check out http://www.planewalker.com for a lot of information and conversations to third edition. The main project rolls giving the official unofficial 3E Planescape so to speak with details on Sigil, new faction setup (after Faction war), planar skills, Races, and working towards a full online campaign supplement. It has many sections of user submitted articles on rules, characters, book reviews, equipment, art, fiction, and also forums to discuss all things Planescape. Heck there is even an Urban Planescape section working on a Cyberpunk or futuristic Planescape Variation.
Thus, with a bad alternative on the one hand, and an artificial incentive to "go godless" on the other, I can only conclude that giving this particular rule the axe is the best option available.
While I agree with your assessment, there was always the option in 2e of playing an Athar cleric of the Great Unknown. You'd only get a -1 on the Ethereal and -2 on the Inner Planes. Having a connection to the astral quite definitely rocks.
While I agree with your assessment, there was always the option in 2e of playing an Athar cleric of the Great Unknown. You'd only get a -1 on the Ethereal and -2 on the Inner Planes. Having a connection to the astral quite definitely rocks.
The situation was a bit different in 2e as I understand. I don't have much experiance with that rule set, but isn't it true that you had to have a god to be a cleric? If that's the case, then Athar cleric of the Great Unknown would have been necessary for the playing field to be level, and since there would be players who didn't want Athar but wanted to play clerics, it wouldn't be as much of a problem.
I didn't know other than druids that there could be a universal belief cleric.
It was a change in 3e, as far as I know. While it obviously was officially stated as working as such in Planescape, it suits the setting quite well, since belief is a much more tangible force.
If you do the level loss for clerics, do you guys implement the other class detrimental effects?
It seems to me that the level loss of clerics is supposed to be offset by detriments suffered by other classes. For e.g., wizards need spell keys for certain spells, fighters/rogues lose their weapon enchantments.
If you do the level loss for clerics, do you guys implement the other class detrimental effects?
These were somewhat minor to the setting, IMO, and I wouldn't have much of a problem with removing them.
However, a more intriuging idea would be granting bonuses instead of penalties on appropriate planes, etc. For example, clerics would gain a +1 caster level boost on her/his diety's plane, or on the plane of closest association with the the cleric's primary domain (if godless; alignment would match the clerics -- for example, a chaotic good cleric with chaos as her/his primary domain would get the bonus on the CG plane, the name of which I don't remember off the top of my head). Alternativly, the cleric could recieve a different bonus more suited to individual planes, such as immunity to the ravages of the plane, or a custom tailored bonus, such as gaining a rep bonus with Demons or Devils.
Certain items could recieve bonsuses on certain planes -- Holy Avengers gain an extra +1 on LG planes, etc.
Spell Keys would give bonuses to spell, especially ones with heafty material costs or xp costs, when used in ways resonating with the plane. Doing so is considered a lawful/chaotic/good/evil act, however, so not all casters will do so. For example, killing a creature and using it's intestines for divination in the Abyss would grant an xp break, while an act of charity on a good plane 500gp less than the diamond needed for Raise Dead suffices as the material componant.
What I plan to do with the spell casting restrictions is give extra experience possibly for overcoming issues and see what I can do to supplement them in little ways.
When it comes to clerics, I've taken away the "clerics can do anything anywhere even if it seems to break the rules" so that they face the same restrictions as wizards. They may be drawing their power from a divine source, but they are still flawed mortal vessels.
I use the modifications to spells that are given in the 3.5 DMG and the MotP for the most part, though I do throw in some of the most flavorful and appropriate restrictions from 2e (needing to kill a sentient creature and use its entrails to cast any divinations on Gehenna, for example). Spell keys can bypass these changes, though, or give a bonus to your spellcraft check to cast impeded magic.
Well the big problem with just allowing clerics to cast whatever they want is simply the idea then why is it that the upper and lower planes don't simply launch massive legions of forces against each other in a huge planar war. Or more likely I suppose high level followers of dieties take it on themselves to attack other planes. It seems the best rational for keeping it maybe in the planar politics of it rather than ease of play by player characters.
Planes are like strongholds for their natives, with the powers, etc. attuned there. Perhaps there are limiting factors on the movments of power?
In any case, there are several more pressing reasons why this hasn't happened, largely the Blood War. Demons invade the upper planes, the Abyss gets attacked by devils, etc. The Upper Planes don't march to war, because that wouldn't be "good", or something like that, upsetting the cosmic balance, mortal free well, etc.
On the law/chaos side, there's no reason to believe that such conflicts happened in the past, and failed. A creature of chaos/law is going to be off-base on an opposed plane, after all, and easier pickings.
Anyway in the basic boxed set and I am sure in other places that I can't think of right off the top of my head it talks about how much effort it takes for one power to kill another. How much it weakens the victor and etc. They go on to explain that one of the things the powers do to prevent whole scale warefare is limiting their followers in this manner. So to me it seems like its mostly an unspoken pact between the powers and/or it takes more divine energy to extend their will like that and the powers as much as they may hate another one aren't into endangering themselves often when they might have enterity to plot.
Well the big problem with just allowing clerics to cast whatever they want is simply the idea then why is it that the upper and lower planes don't simply launch massive legions of forces against each other in a huge planar war.
A reduction of the powers of celestials and fiends on other planes would explain away the problem you mentioned, but a reduction of clerical powers doesn't explain anything. How many tanar'ri and baatezu are clerics? Some are, but it's not the rule. The same is true for devas, eladrins, guardinals, and archons: most of them aren't going to be affected by the clerical spell loss rule one way or the other. The Upper and Lower Planes can destroy one another in an all-out Armegeddon regardless of what clerics can or can't do.
The real reason this doesn't happen is just that: it's Armegeddon, and no one feels ready for that just yet. The last time the forces of Good invaded the Lower Planes in force they got their tailfeathers handed to them. Meanwhile, Evil wants to unite the Lower Planes first.
There are some skirmishes between Good and Evil, but the real battle has been postponed.
Agreed but I also believe that till that point the powers are reducing clerical powers to prevent something like that from starting now
I don't understand what good reducing clerical powers is going to do. Yeah, it'd prevent gods of wildly varying alignment and different pantheons from sending armies of clerics into one another's realms, but they could just as easily send armies of fighters or rogues - and a mortal army isn't going to be effective against a god in any case.
and/or possibly sappying their energy.
Are you suggesting that the reason clerics lose spell levels on distant planes is that the local gods are draining them away? If that were true, does that mean that a cleric of a Celestian god who takes a portal to the Abyss and then another portal to Mount Celestia a few minutes later isn't at full power? And if they are, the gods of Baator couldn't have sapped any of it, right?
They go on to explain that one of the things the powers do to prevent whole scale warefare is limiting their followers in this manner. So to me it seems like its mostly an unspoken pact between the powers and/or it takes more divine energy to extend their will like that and the powers as much as they may hate another one aren't into endangering themselves often when they might have enterity to plot.
But then we are back at the problem of clerics with no deities. How do you explain their penalties? They draw on the power of abstract concepts, as given by domain, and there are some concepts in given domains where you simply can not justify limiting their influence, except in a few instances. One could argue that the gods limit all clerics by divine pacts, but then you run into an Athar Ur-Priest, and shortly thereafter every deity-less cleric is going to gain a new PrC (depending on alignment restrictions that the DM imposes).
Personally, simply granting bonsuses to clerics on their gods' or primary domains' home plane makes much more sense than the penalties from 2e. It nealty answers the question of why invasions don't happen without the issues of godless clerics.
How do you explain their penalties?
You use a plane with the same alignment as the priest as his source of power.
Kilamar
You use a plane with the same alignment as the priest as his source of power.
Kilamar
That doesn't reallty fit IMO. Clerics without gods draw their power from their domains much more than their alignment -- that's why there are alignment domains, IMO. A NG cleric with healing and sun doesn't have the same tie to good as a NG cleric with healing and good. So, a cleric with death and destruction, for example, would draw power from death and/or destruction, which aren't limited to any single plane.
Kilamar
But his alignment is an influence. You can say that the cleric worships the aspects of the domains that correspond to his alignment.
Kilamar
Alignment is an influence on the cleric's personality, but it's not the cleric's source of power unless that cleric chooses the proper domain. Clerics always receive power form an outside source -- it's part of the class. Drawing on your own energies is the province of psionics.
Drawing on your own energies is the province of psionics.
I never said that.
As we all know the power source is a concept (if you allow that in your campaign) the cleric believes in. But his believes correspond to his aligment.
A LG cleric cannot revere the aspect of murder, torture, etc. because the concept and his alignment do not correspond to each other.
He might revere death, but only as part of the natural cycle of life. He would never kill just to worship death.
Kilamar
I never said that.
That was the implication I interpreted. Sorry if I misunderstood you.
As we all know the power source is a concept (if you allow that in your campaign) the cleric believes in. But his believes correspond to his aligment.
A LG cleric cannot revere the aspect of murder, torture, etc. because the concept and his alignment do not correspond to each other.
True, to a degree, but that doesn't change the fact that the cleric's POWER comes from outside. Said cleric wouldn't draw from the power of murder, for example, but he/she could.
He might revere death, but only as part of the natural cycle of life. He would never kill just to worship death.
Why not? As you said, the cleric could revere death as the natural cycle of life, and would see nothing wrong with simply worshipping death. Most good clerics see nothing wrong with brining death in the defense of others, and additionally, life as we know it can not exist without death. Death is often demonized in D&D, but it isn't difficult to think of a good character who worshipped the power of death as a constructive force in the world.
However, just this domain isn't the issue. Take healing, a class "good guy" domain. Everyone uses healing; the power of healing is in almost every plane, except for, perhaps, the negative energy plane. Even fiends make use of it, so a good cleric with the healing domain would have a metaphysical "connection" to her/his power source in almost every plane, even the deapths of the Abyss.
You could also play neutral healer (heals only for money) or an evil healer (heals only the strong and does not "waste" his powers on lesser beings).
Why should these three clerics have the same strength on any plane?
The first one is more comfortable on a good plane, the second one on a neutral pane and the last one on an evil plane.
Kilamar
A good cleric with Healing would use the Healing for good. In my opinion his magic would be stronger on a good aligned plane. I do not say that he cannot heal on a evil plane, but he would be weaker.
You could also play neutral healer (heals only for money) or an evil healer (heals only the strong and does not "waste" his powers on lesser beings).
Why should these three clerics have the same strength on any plane?
The first one is more comfortable on a good plane, the second one on a neutral pane and the last one on an evil plane.
Kilamar
Becaues of the basic prinicples of mythology and metaphysics that D&D is built on with Domain. Think of it in terms of gods -- they have their spheres of influence, and their strength depends on that influence in general mythology. "Greater" gods had power over death, fertility, life, seas, war, etc were more powerful than gods with power over smaller spheres like specific villiages, getting drunk, or family members.
Thus, a cleric of a god of healing gains power from the god, who gains power from healing. The more healing there is, anywhere, the more power there is available to that god.
A godless cleric is like that, but cuts out the "middle man" in the form of the god, gaining power directly from the spheres worshiped.
So, for example, a cleric who draws power from healing gains strength from any sort of healing -- it's the very concept itself that powers her/him, and any act of healing strengthens that concept. It doesn't matter where that healing occurs, who does it, or why. Each and every act strengthens that cleric's source of power.
Thus, take the average fiendish battle field. There's going to be healing, in the form of mundane healing (heal checks), spells, natural healing, fast healing, regeneration, etc. Each and everyone one of those gives the cleric's source of energy power, and more so, due to the principle of sympathy, and because the cleric doesn't worship a god (so her/his source of power doesn't have a specific point of origin), the cleric has a very real connection to her/his cource of power on any plane with a significant amount of healing -- ANY healing -- and thus, a good cleric of healing would have full access to her/his powers in the deapths of the Abyss.
However, said cleric would have weakend powers in the negative energy plane, since nothing there heals, or even lives for the most part. There just isn't that metaphysical connection to the cleric's spiritual power source in the form of real world acts of healing.
I do not see it that way.
Clerical Power comes from the gods and not some beeing/concept above them.
Kilamar
According to your interpretation the domains are like gods above the gods.
I do not see it that way.
Then you don't see it the way D&D says it works. Clerics without gods draw their powers from abstract concepts/sources. It states it clearly in the rules.
Clerical Power comes from the gods and not some beeing/concept above them.
Then you have clerics without gods other than Ur-Priests HOW, exactly?
Forces: Entropy, the Elements, Nature, Life-Death-Rebirth Cycle, Magic. Druids tended to be priests of the Force of Nature.
Philosophies: An idea so commpelling that it attracts magical energy and faith to it. Includes Oneness with Nature, Peace, Good, Evil, the Divinity of Mankind, the Sanctity of Life, and Nihilism.
It was never really clear how this worked with Planescape, but Godsman clerics of the Source gained their spells from the Ethereal Plane and Athar clerics of the Great Unknown gained their spells from the Astral. I think we can assume that Dustmen clerics of True Death gained their spells as if they came from the Negative Energy Plane, though A Tiefling's Exultation has some interesting stuff about Dustmen worshipping Azrael as the Crown Archon of Death, located in Chronia.
We tended to assume that druids worshipping the Force of Nature got their spells as if their god lived in the Material Plane, though planar druids would obviously be another story.
It's all insanely complicated, really, which is one of the reasons I think we're better off without the clerical spell level rule.
Clerics without gods draw their powers from abstract concepts/sources. It states it clearly in the rules.
I meant clerics with gods, sorry. Clerics without a god may have a concept as source (if you allow that), but clerics with a god have a different souce (their god) and not just a middleman to a source.
Kilamar
I meant clerics with gods, sorry. Clerics without a god may have a concept as source (if you allow that), but clerics with a god have a different souce (their god) and not just a middleman to a source.
Kilamar
Yes and no. Clerics draw power from their gods, but the gods in turn gain power from mortal worship and the strength of their domains. The gods certainly are more than just middlemen of divine power, and my analogy, like most, isn't perfect. It does, however, describe the certain realities of deific situation quite nicely in many mythologies, mythologies D&D draws on -- in such mythologies gods are tied to specific concepts/features/nations/peoples/etc., and reducing the prevelence of that sphere of influence reduces the power of that god. A god of nation A, for example, would lose and gain power as nation A lost and gained power, for example. Clerics without gods draw from the strength of that sphere directly, without relying on a god.
Emphasizing strength of worship makes gods much less reliant on, and thus distinct from, their spheres of influence, differentiating them from Clerics without gods; either approach is valid, and, in the end, upto the DM.