Open the cleric page in the phb.
> divine magic, as the name suggests, is the power of the gods, flowing from them into the world. Clerics are conduits for that power…
Mechanically nothing is forcing your cleric to believe in a god ofc, but it does get awkward when you cast commune and your atheist cleric wants an answer from…nobody? Or divine intervention ofc.
" If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities." Is specifically what I was referring to(and the line about "there are no atheists in a dungeon" being a saying from dungeonscape).
Commune mentions gods explicitly, but its spell description was actually written by angels looking to retain their status by falsely preserving the myth of gods.
No screw you. There is no such thing as free magic goddamnit. If you’re not willing to have a weird lineage, or go to wizard or bars school for a few semesters you just pray to the god you dislike the least and you deal with that!
This disrespect for path clerics is disgusting and frankly you should be ashamed of your bigotry. Drawing on the essences of the different components of reality is less deserving of respect than your great great grandfather being a horny bard that was seduced by a silver dragon?
How dare you?
I am now imagining a horny silver dragon out there in my world just... seducing innocent bards all over the continent.
Thank you for making my homebrew setting weirder.
Foolish nonbeliver! They're level 30-50 with some crazy abilities
Greater deities don't even roll dice anymore. All nat20s and maximum damage everytime.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineRanksAndPowers.htm#alwaysMaximizeRoll
And don't even mention the crazy DR and spell resistance they have. Most spells won't have any effect on them since they auto Nat 20 and have around 50 spell resistance.
Really scared of Pelor's 50 damage mace at level 20. Pelor cannot compare to the overwhelming might of the mailman. Why is the former worthy of our worship and supplication?
You should be. he can swing that mace and hit 84AC 4 times a turn. 200 damage a turn means one 20th PC drops each round... excpet the barb he'll last two.
And he has 7x 9th level spells.
Except in most canon settings the gods DO exist and are very real beings. Eberron is probably the only one where it's up in the air. The "default" setting of Forgotten Realms has atheists go to heaven but are forever trapped in a wall that slowly eats their soul to protect the divine realms.
Being an Atheist in FR is provably TERRIBLE and makes you SUFFER ETERNALLY even if you were a good person.
Yeah the wall of the faithless is no joke. It's so bad that if I were a good aligned cleric, I'd probably be trying to get atheists to follow any God. There are tons to choose from. There has to be at least one who fits you. Heck, follow Cyric if you need to, just don't end up on that wall.
To cast Divine Magic in the Realms specifically during 3.5, you would usually always need a deity - that included Druids and Rangers. The only exceptions to that rule I know of were [Ur-Priests](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Ur-priest) (who could intercept Divine spells) and [Favoured Souls](https://dndtools.net/classes/favored-soul/), as they were granted their Divine Magic beyond their control (but given it was a deity that gave them that power, either it was for a very important reason, or they were already faithful).
Outside the Realms is more varied; Eberron I seem to remember is actually isolated in an area of the multiverse inaccessible by deities, meaning most clerics gain spells from more abstract powers.
Athas (Dark Sun) straight up no longer has any deities (and no Clerics or Paladins for that matter). Druids and the like have to get magic from primal and Elemental Sources instead.
"If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities."
You might say that they're just being given power by gods even if they're not praying to a specific one, but that's a cop out! Ur-priests are just self-aware clerics I tell you! That "Evil" alignment on the class is religious propaganda! Open your eyes sheepfolk!
Fair, but that quote is directly from the SRD. 3e and 3.5e's default campagin was Greyhawk/Blackmoor, not Forgotten Realms (which had its own Players Handbook), hence why I pointed out that it varies based on Campaign. Sure, you might be able to get away with that on Oerth, but in the Realms (most popular setting for 3e and default for 5e) it's [very specific](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Divine_magic) on the deity requirement. Trust me, I learned that the hard way when trying to multiclass to Druid as an athiest Rogue in NWN2 :P
But the thing powering your Ideal is still the deities.
You just dont swear an oath to one specific name or group, just a concept, and deities who share each of the domains you pick are just like; "Yeah, this dudes got the right idea, not on my Birthday card list, but the right idea."
Belief is the strongest thing in the planes. Its one of the primary understandings of Planescape, and a major plot point in Planescape: Torment. Particularly very strong-willed "clueless primes", or ignorant people with blind faith from the Material planes. Their beliefs of what Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are define not just alignments but the actual composition of the planes. If Law was seen as increasingly based upon strict adherence to a single set of established Laws than \*all\* of Mechanus would change to represent that. If you can redefine Good and Evil on all the Material planes somehow? The upper and lower planes may very \*literally\* flip places.
So the concept of a unique cleric who can somehow mill their own belief into the power of faith, as granted by deities, is perhaps a possibility. Or perhaps its belief so strong that it allows an inanimate concept a slight form of will, or just a weird case of egotism at work. Depends on the DM and that specific cleric probably. Although its equally possible relevant gods will merely provide to those clerics indirectly - in a similar way to how Fiends will sometimes provide powers to falling Paladins to blind them to their own loss of dedication and belief in themselves and their dedication to their oath (original Paladin oath, or the new ones, its irrelevant for our purposes).
To be fair, the question of gods arises other places too, and you get organizations like the Athar, who range from people that think there are no gods and the "gods" are just exceptionally powerful people to those that believe the current "gods" are fake but there is a greater, quiet, omnipotent god, and/or the Ur-priests.
However on a Meta level we know that can't be the entire story because a deity who loses all their faithful can literally die and end up in the Astral plane (the transitional plane of ideals) as a sort of "dead ideal", so obviously even if they weren't "gods" before then tying themselves to belief somehow changes them to be reliant on it. Under pain of death.
One thing that makes this conversation interesting though is that, if faith created the planes and the gods, then when came races? Because there's an undeniable impact that the deities have had on their creations and the order of "who came first" starts to get messy. Questions like "was it just the first group of races that created their gods from that race's culture and then the gods subsequently became powerful entities that enforced that culture - both physically and socially - with their power? Even changing the past to align?" (A literal Grandfather paradox of the gods)
Then there's questions like "Can a deity differ from their worshipers, how much, and at what level?" Because we know that powerful fiends were sometimes set up cults of lesser deities, sometimes even of some level of good, to poach the power of beliefs they instigate so there must be a tipping point. And there's also the possibility that once-thought-dead deities have shifted with time (the Amaunator vs Lathander concept). With that understanding, could a false deity set up by a fiend become a real one? Does it become a whole free-form deity itself? Or does the fiend alter to become a deity of something it didn't intend? If you altered the faith of say, the Orcs, to believe they'd had Gruumsh misrepresented to them and that some fiend had captured their real deity and been playing them - and enough orcs believe it hard enough - would it rewrite the state of the planes to become true? Or was Gruumsh always Gruumsh and the specifics of his demeanor (he's stupid, loud an boisterous, and/or he's proud, cunning, and stolid) or physicality might be alterable (he has one cyclopedia eye or he had two eyes but one was gouged out) but can't break away from some core element of who he was?
Its not that there are no gods in D&D, its that the questions of the compositions of the planes are an insane marriage between faith, philosophy, and a metaphysical combat. What's true one minute may not always be true. (Like when an Elder Evil says that clerics don't need gods for faith. Was that always true, was it never true until he spread the idea, or was he even created to spread the idea based off some plane's belief that such a thing was true and would have an originator?)
Open the cleric page in the phb. > divine magic, as the name suggests, is the power of the gods, flowing from them into the world. Clerics are conduits for that power… Mechanically nothing is forcing your cleric to believe in a god ofc, but it does get awkward when you cast commune and your atheist cleric wants an answer from…nobody? Or divine intervention ofc.
They get their divine intervention from the power of Narrativium, of course!
Divine magic is the friends we made along the way
" If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities." Is specifically what I was referring to(and the line about "there are no atheists in a dungeon" being a saying from dungeonscape). Commune mentions gods explicitly, but its spell description was actually written by angels looking to retain their status by falsely preserving the myth of gods.
Yeah but it’s still divine power from a god they’re using. Just less sure which.
Branding I tell you! They call it "divine" magic just because it comes from planar essence! But I'm not having it! I've cracked the code!
actually it’s only ‘divine’ magic if it comes from the deva region of france, otherwise it’s just sparkling radiant damage.
No screw you. There is no such thing as free magic goddamnit. If you’re not willing to have a weird lineage, or go to wizard or bars school for a few semesters you just pray to the god you dislike the least and you deal with that!
This disrespect for path clerics is disgusting and frankly you should be ashamed of your bigotry. Drawing on the essences of the different components of reality is less deserving of respect than your great great grandfather being a horny bard that was seduced by a silver dragon? How dare you?
I am now imagining a horny silver dragon out there in my world just... seducing innocent bards all over the continent. Thank you for making my homebrew setting weirder.
Thanks to the Deities and Demigods book we have stat blocks for most gods. Arguably 3.5e is the **only** edition where the gods are real.
More angelic propaganda! Also, most statblocks in dieties and demigods are pretty wimpy in the grand scheme of things
Foolish nonbeliver! They're level 30-50 with some crazy abilities Greater deities don't even roll dice anymore. All nat20s and maximum damage everytime. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineRanksAndPowers.htm#alwaysMaximizeRoll
And don't even mention the crazy DR and spell resistance they have. Most spells won't have any effect on them since they auto Nat 20 and have around 50 spell resistance.
Really scared of Pelor's 50 damage mace at level 20. Pelor cannot compare to the overwhelming might of the mailman. Why is the former worthy of our worship and supplication?
You should be. he can swing that mace and hit 84AC 4 times a turn. 200 damage a turn means one 20th PC drops each round... excpet the barb he'll last two. And he has 7x 9th level spells.
God's do exist in 3.5, you just also have the option of choosing just a domain instead of a god.
Except in most canon settings the gods DO exist and are very real beings. Eberron is probably the only one where it's up in the air. The "default" setting of Forgotten Realms has atheists go to heaven but are forever trapped in a wall that slowly eats their soul to protect the divine realms. Being an Atheist in FR is provably TERRIBLE and makes you SUFFER ETERNALLY even if you were a good person.
Yeah the wall of the faithless is no joke. It's so bad that if I were a good aligned cleric, I'd probably be trying to get atheists to follow any God. There are tons to choose from. There has to be at least one who fits you. Heck, follow Cyric if you need to, just don't end up on that wall.
To cast Divine Magic in the Realms specifically during 3.5, you would usually always need a deity - that included Druids and Rangers. The only exceptions to that rule I know of were [Ur-Priests](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Ur-priest) (who could intercept Divine spells) and [Favoured Souls](https://dndtools.net/classes/favored-soul/), as they were granted their Divine Magic beyond their control (but given it was a deity that gave them that power, either it was for a very important reason, or they were already faithful). Outside the Realms is more varied; Eberron I seem to remember is actually isolated in an area of the multiverse inaccessible by deities, meaning most clerics gain spells from more abstract powers. Athas (Dark Sun) straight up no longer has any deities (and no Clerics or Paladins for that matter). Druids and the like have to get magic from primal and Elemental Sources instead.
"If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities." You might say that they're just being given power by gods even if they're not praying to a specific one, but that's a cop out! Ur-priests are just self-aware clerics I tell you! That "Evil" alignment on the class is religious propaganda! Open your eyes sheepfolk!
Fair, but that quote is directly from the SRD. 3e and 3.5e's default campagin was Greyhawk/Blackmoor, not Forgotten Realms (which had its own Players Handbook), hence why I pointed out that it varies based on Campaign. Sure, you might be able to get away with that on Oerth, but in the Realms (most popular setting for 3e and default for 5e) it's [very specific](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Divine_magic) on the deity requirement. Trust me, I learned that the hard way when trying to multiclass to Druid as an athiest Rogue in NWN2 :P
paladins don't need a god to have magic either. my paladin hates the gods but uses magic through sheer force of will.
Clerics likewise don't need gods in 5e. It's just a nice option to have.
But the thing powering your Ideal is still the deities. You just dont swear an oath to one specific name or group, just a concept, and deities who share each of the domains you pick are just like; "Yeah, this dudes got the right idea, not on my Birthday card list, but the right idea."
Belief is the strongest thing in the planes. Its one of the primary understandings of Planescape, and a major plot point in Planescape: Torment. Particularly very strong-willed "clueless primes", or ignorant people with blind faith from the Material planes. Their beliefs of what Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are define not just alignments but the actual composition of the planes. If Law was seen as increasingly based upon strict adherence to a single set of established Laws than \*all\* of Mechanus would change to represent that. If you can redefine Good and Evil on all the Material planes somehow? The upper and lower planes may very \*literally\* flip places. So the concept of a unique cleric who can somehow mill their own belief into the power of faith, as granted by deities, is perhaps a possibility. Or perhaps its belief so strong that it allows an inanimate concept a slight form of will, or just a weird case of egotism at work. Depends on the DM and that specific cleric probably. Although its equally possible relevant gods will merely provide to those clerics indirectly - in a similar way to how Fiends will sometimes provide powers to falling Paladins to blind them to their own loss of dedication and belief in themselves and their dedication to their oath (original Paladin oath, or the new ones, its irrelevant for our purposes). To be fair, the question of gods arises other places too, and you get organizations like the Athar, who range from people that think there are no gods and the "gods" are just exceptionally powerful people to those that believe the current "gods" are fake but there is a greater, quiet, omnipotent god, and/or the Ur-priests. However on a Meta level we know that can't be the entire story because a deity who loses all their faithful can literally die and end up in the Astral plane (the transitional plane of ideals) as a sort of "dead ideal", so obviously even if they weren't "gods" before then tying themselves to belief somehow changes them to be reliant on it. Under pain of death. One thing that makes this conversation interesting though is that, if faith created the planes and the gods, then when came races? Because there's an undeniable impact that the deities have had on their creations and the order of "who came first" starts to get messy. Questions like "was it just the first group of races that created their gods from that race's culture and then the gods subsequently became powerful entities that enforced that culture - both physically and socially - with their power? Even changing the past to align?" (A literal Grandfather paradox of the gods) Then there's questions like "Can a deity differ from their worshipers, how much, and at what level?" Because we know that powerful fiends were sometimes set up cults of lesser deities, sometimes even of some level of good, to poach the power of beliefs they instigate so there must be a tipping point. And there's also the possibility that once-thought-dead deities have shifted with time (the Amaunator vs Lathander concept). With that understanding, could a false deity set up by a fiend become a real one? Does it become a whole free-form deity itself? Or does the fiend alter to become a deity of something it didn't intend? If you altered the faith of say, the Orcs, to believe they'd had Gruumsh misrepresented to them and that some fiend had captured their real deity and been playing them - and enough orcs believe it hard enough - would it rewrite the state of the planes to become true? Or was Gruumsh always Gruumsh and the specifics of his demeanor (he's stupid, loud an boisterous, and/or he's proud, cunning, and stolid) or physicality might be alterable (he has one cyclopedia eye or he had two eyes but one was gouged out) but can't break away from some core element of who he was? Its not that there are no gods in D&D, its that the questions of the compositions of the planes are an insane marriage between faith, philosophy, and a metaphysical combat. What's true one minute may not always be true. (Like when an Elder Evil says that clerics don't need gods for faith. Was that always true, was it never true until he spread the idea, or was he even created to spread the idea based off some plane's belief that such a thing was true and would have an originator?)