How did this one group I know IRL get the idea in their head that D&D (Pathfinder setting in particular) is antiethical to polytheistic clerics? They think the very nature of D&D itself says that all gods are monotheistic and clerics can only get one source at a time. They are also against the idea of clerics that don't choose a specific god to worship, which was an idea I proposed for a character (which would allow for the concept of a polytheistic priest).
Ugh.
Polytheism and D&D
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Polytheism and D&D
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How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
We-ell...As I understand it, DnD gods usually stand alone. There's a whole pantheon which includes absolutely every god, but there's only racial pantheons below that, and, even then, you don't get much in the way of benefits for believing in more than one god.
Just because you worship one god, though, does not mean that you refuse to acknowledge the existence of other deities. Gruumsh, in particular, is all about sticking it to Corellon.
So, they're wrong. DnD priests do acknowledge the existence of other deities. It's kind of hard not to, when there's priests who don't worship your god who can do the same damn things that you do.
Just because you worship one god, though, does not mean that you refuse to acknowledge the existence of other deities. Gruumsh, in particular, is all about sticking it to Corellon.
So, they're wrong. DnD priests do acknowledge the existence of other deities. It's kind of hard not to, when there's priests who don't worship your god who can do the same damn things that you do.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
Think of it more in terms of the Discworld, except not as coherent.
All of the gods exist, you know that. It's not even a matter of belief, as the gods themselves frequently wander around throwing rocks through atheist's windows. However, you worship one god. That god gets your attention, and in return, you get its attention. They give you cleric spells, you slap the piss out of their enemies.
But you still acknowledge the fact that other gods exist, you just don't particularly care.
All of the gods exist, you know that. It's not even a matter of belief, as the gods themselves frequently wander around throwing rocks through atheist's windows. However, you worship one god. That god gets your attention, and in return, you get its attention. They give you cleric spells, you slap the piss out of their enemies.
But you still acknowledge the fact that other gods exist, you just don't particularly care.
Well, the recent books have pointed out that people like worshipping gods who provide concrete benefits.
So Anoia, the Goddess of Things That Stick in Drawers, is getting to be popular because while people aren't sure about eternal life and salvation, they do appreciate having the kitchen drawers open in a perfectly smooth action, with no chance to have something hang up.
So Anoia, the Goddess of Things That Stick in Drawers, is getting to be popular because while people aren't sure about eternal life and salvation, they do appreciate having the kitchen drawers open in a perfectly smooth action, with no chance to have something hang up.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
When I said monotheistic, I meant it in a manner that acknowledges the others (but only that). It just seems illogical for a setting to so readily fall into that kind of monotheism, as opposed to a polytheistic or pantheistic view.
Come see Sprockets & Serials
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
I dunno. Being a priest of the pantheon might be interesting. If nothing else, that may expand your list of selectable domains.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
I guess in a setting like FR, the general populous might be paying lip service to several gods at once, depending which ones affect their daily life. Remember even many of the "evil" gods have legitimate temples in centers of goodness so people on the sea worship Talos, even though he's a dick, so he won't be a dick to them. Then they wander over to Tymora's temple and worship her to make sure if Talos wasn't listening, that their luck might hold.
Of course the priests have to support one god to get their powers. Priesthood is about obedience and dedication and it difficult to be obedient and dedicated to more than one master. It's not to say that a priest can even say a prayer to another god at an appropriate time, but that the devotion required to gain priestly powers is limited to only one
Of course the priests have to support one god to get their powers. Priesthood is about obedience and dedication and it difficult to be obedient and dedicated to more than one master. It's not to say that a priest can even say a prayer to another god at an appropriate time, but that the devotion required to gain priestly powers is limited to only one
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JonSetanta
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Heroes are granted powers by one deity at a time because That's The Way It Has Always Been So Sayeth The Wizards Of The Coast.
If you don't like it, change it, make a setting.
Friends and I have had pantheon-wide spellgranting options for a decade or more, it's no big deal.
Also, I found the source of your problem:
If you don't like it, change it, make a setting.
Friends and I have had pantheon-wide spellgranting options for a decade or more, it's no big deal.
Also, I found the source of your problem:
virgileso wrote:Pathfinder
Pathfinder isn't the source, it actually has a line in the book mentioning a sect of religion where people and clerics are polytheistic; the group I'm with just plain disagree with it on principle.
Come see Sprockets & Serials
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
How do you confuse a barbarian?
Put a greatsword a maul and a greataxe in a room and ask them to take their pick
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
Eh. It goes far beyond Pathfinder. Its been a problem with D&D religion since at least second edition. Religion has been represented as rigidly monotheist in poly- and pantheist cosplay outfits.
Sadly, Eberron is the only D&D setting that really has pantheistic clerics, and even those are arbitrarily cut into 'civilized' and 'savage' gods, and for no apparent reason the Eberronites don't ask favors of the civilized gods and make sacrifices to placate the 'savage' gods they way pantheists actually did. They somehow pretend that worship the good gods (or even a specific god) will keep the nasty bad gods away. And thats crap.
Now, you could reasonably have a priest of Zeus, but that doesn't mean that priest goes around telling people that Ares can kiss his ass. Thats not only going to get Ares wanting to kick that ass from Olympus to Hades, but its also going to piss off Zeus, because mortal priest is showing disrespect to the gods as a whole, as well as causing problems between their gods.
@ck- not necessarily. You could easily have a priest who bugs Ares for fightin' spells, Zeus for lightning spells, Aphrodite for the sexin' spells and so on. There isn't anything inherent in the cleric class thats says Thou Must Be a Closeminded Fuck to get cleric spells. Especially since it explicitly allows worshipping ideas and concepts. You could seriously be a priest of Zeus, Olympians, the Peace of the Gun or Flying Fucking Pigs as far as the RAW are concerned.
@virg- these people sound a little odd. Are they seriously objecting to the idea of actually being polytheistic? Because thats what it sounds like.
Sadly, Eberron is the only D&D setting that really has pantheistic clerics, and even those are arbitrarily cut into 'civilized' and 'savage' gods, and for no apparent reason the Eberronites don't ask favors of the civilized gods and make sacrifices to placate the 'savage' gods they way pantheists actually did. They somehow pretend that worship the good gods (or even a specific god) will keep the nasty bad gods away. And thats crap.
Now, you could reasonably have a priest of Zeus, but that doesn't mean that priest goes around telling people that Ares can kiss his ass. Thats not only going to get Ares wanting to kick that ass from Olympus to Hades, but its also going to piss off Zeus, because mortal priest is showing disrespect to the gods as a whole, as well as causing problems between their gods.
@ck- not necessarily. You could easily have a priest who bugs Ares for fightin' spells, Zeus for lightning spells, Aphrodite for the sexin' spells and so on. There isn't anything inherent in the cleric class thats says Thou Must Be a Closeminded Fuck to get cleric spells. Especially since it explicitly allows worshipping ideas and concepts. You could seriously be a priest of Zeus, Olympians, the Peace of the Gun or Flying Fucking Pigs as far as the RAW are concerned.
@virg- these people sound a little odd. Are they seriously objecting to the idea of actually being polytheistic? Because thats what it sounds like.
Last edited by Voss on Thu Jan 15, 2009 5:29 am, edited 1 time in total.
Just because you're pantheistic doesn't mean you accept all gods. Someone who holds the greek pantheon, for instance, won't really accept someone who's going on about yahweh or expect the egyptian pantheon to listen to their prayers.
But D&D has often been 'pantheistic' where what you really have are many monotheisms that are in competition.
-Crissa
But D&D has often been 'pantheistic' where what you really have are many monotheisms that are in competition.
-Crissa
It largely depends on your cosmology of the gods and how they work.Voss wrote: @ck- not necessarily. You could easily have a priest who bugs Ares for fightin' spells, Zeus for lightning spells, Aphrodite for the sexin' spells and so on. There isn't anything inherent in the cleric class thats says Thou Must Be a Closeminded Fuck to get cleric spells. Especially since it explicitly allows worshipping ideas and concepts. You could seriously be a priest of Zeus, Olympians, the Peace of the Gun or Flying Fucking Pigs as far as the RAW are concerned.
If a cleric works for both Ares and Aphrodite but what happens when Ares is backing Troy and Aphrodite is backing Greece?(I can't remember who backed who so I could very easily be wrong on these, the point stands regardless)
If the power of the gods is based on the respect/recognition being given to them by the peasant folks, than it hardly makes sense for gods to be feeding divine powers to a cleric who his batting for more than one team because you gets all the recognition from the deeds performed by the cleric.
Now having a Pantheon that do always work together and are worshiped as a united entity would be fine and good. It that sense they would act as a single god where each individual god would highlight certain aspects of a moral framework. The gods of the same family aren't competing with each other. But they would be competing with other pantheons and I would say no mixing between pantheons. But even in these cases I would imagine that most clerics dedicate themselves to one aspect of the pantheon even if they are free to acknowledge the rest (as many Hindu temples are dedicated to one aspect of Brahman despite them all being part of the same).
I mean seriously, religious service is about devotion to a divine presence and the moral code that divine presence represents. Priest are supposed to be the most devoted, for which they are being compensated with divine powers. You're not just a lapsed atheist (only goes to church on Christmas and Easter) but the dude who is there monday to Saturday as well, preaching the good word to a near empty hall of half deaf octogenarians and vagrants looking to scam some communion wine. It shouldn't be leaving you much time to be preaching the Koran as well.
The internet gave a voice to the world thus gave definitive proof that the world is mostly full of idiots.
Hm, I suppose you do know, but might be worth pointing out that this (polytheism actually) and pantheism are different.Crissa wrote:Just because you're pantheistic doesn't mean you accept all gods. Someone who holds the greek pantheon, for instance, won't really accept someone who's going on about yahweh or expect the egyptian pantheon to listen to their prayers.
But D&D has often been 'pantheistic' where what you really have are many monotheisms that are in competition.
Hans Freyer, s.b.u.h. wrote:A manly, a bold tone prevails in history. He who has the grip has the booty.
Huston Smith wrote:Life gives us no view of the whole. We see only snatches here and there, (...)
brotherfrancis75 wrote:Perhaps you imagine that Ayn Rand is our friend? And the Mont Pelerin Society? No, those are but the more subtle versions of the Bolshevik Communist Revolution you imagine you reject. (...) FOX NEWS IS ALSO COMMUNIST!
LDSChristian wrote:True. I do wonder which is worse: killing so many people like Hitler did or denying Christ 3 times like Peter did.
Yeah, it was late, shouldn't rely upon the spellchecker to know that stuff.
But then again, you have everything as defined by people who don't believe there can be more than one god, and tend to attach words to specific groups instead of letting us have words with general meanings.
If the person who wrote that definition had their way, they'd define atheism as a religion as well, and point to specific, organized adherents, and then no one would be able to use the word to mean anything but those specific adherents.
-Crissa
But then again, you have everything as defined by people who don't believe there can be more than one god, and tend to attach words to specific groups instead of letting us have words with general meanings.
If the person who wrote that definition had their way, they'd define atheism as a religion as well, and point to specific, organized adherents, and then no one would be able to use the word to mean anything but those specific adherents.
-Crissa
In RL "acknowledging other gods, but directing worship and sacrifices to your patron only" model was quite common. And if you was a priest, you usually (almost always in many cases) was a priest of a single particular deity, say, Poseidon or Apollo, not of a whole pantheon, under personal protection of this particular deity and this deity only. This made sense, because deities squabbled a whole lot in myths. Also, Golarion gods aren't very close to each other, even in case of compatible alignments, further reinforcing this model (they seem to be too damn passive to actively demand or forbid alliances).virgileso wrote:When I said monotheistic, I meant it in a manner that acknowledges the others (but only that). It just seems illogical for a setting to so readily fall into that kind of monotheism, as opposed to a polytheistic or pantheistic view.
Last edited by FatR on Thu Jan 15, 2009 10:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.
The cleric likely either stands back and lets the gods and armies duke it out, or supports the patron of where he lives.ckafrica wrote:It largely depends on your cosmology of the gods and how they work.Voss wrote: @ck- not necessarily. You could easily have a priest who bugs Ares for fightin' spells, Zeus for lightning spells, Aphrodite for the sexin' spells and so on. There isn't anything inherent in the cleric class thats says Thou Must Be a Closeminded Fuck to get cleric spells. Especially since it explicitly allows worshipping ideas and concepts. You could seriously be a priest of Zeus, Olympians, the Peace of the Gun or Flying Fucking Pigs as far as the RAW are concerned.
If a cleric works for both Ares and Aphrodite but what happens when Ares is backing Troy and Aphrodite is backing Greece?(I can't remember who backed who so I could very easily be wrong on these, the point stands regardless)
Well, I don't know about that. I could see a cleric being devoted to a given archetype and using the archetype's different faces in his preaching.It shouldn't be leaving you much time to be preaching the Koran as well.
Cuz apparently I gotta break this down for you dense motherfuckers- I'm trans feminine nonbinary. My pronouns are they/them.
Winnah wrote:No, No. 'Prak' is actually a Thri Kreen impersonating a human and roleplaying himself as a D&D character. All hail our hidden insect overlords.
FrankTrollman wrote:In Soviet Russia, cosmic horror is the default state.
You should gain sanity for finding out that the problems of a region are because there are fucking monsters there.
I'd just like to say that Flying Fucking Pigs would fit right in Zeus's portfolio.Voss wrote:You could seriously be a priest of Zeus, Olympians, the Peace of the Gun or Flying Fucking Pigs as far as the RAW are concerned.
MartinHarper wrote:Babies are difficult to acquire in comparison to other sources of nutrition.
See there's the greek model and then there's the Indian (hindu) polytheistic model.
Hinduism is a proponent of worship multiple gods at the same time. Yes, you do have the shaivites who worship SHiva and the Vaishnavites who worship Vishnu and they clash over who is more powerful and sometimes you have crazy fundies who believe only in one god but for the most part, worship and faith involves all the gods.
That model is definitely not supported in D&D.
Hinduism is a proponent of worship multiple gods at the same time. Yes, you do have the shaivites who worship SHiva and the Vaishnavites who worship Vishnu and they clash over who is more powerful and sometimes you have crazy fundies who believe only in one god but for the most part, worship and faith involves all the gods.
That model is definitely not supported in D&D.
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Absentminded_Wizard
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It's not particularly supported for priests in D&D core. IIRC, the general assumption of the "default setting" is that the common people often pray to different gods on different occasions, even if one god is their favorite. By RAW, core D&D doesn't support clerical worship of more than one god, though it supports worship of no gods. Then again, I believe the 3.0 supplement Deities and Demigods did introduce the concept of pantheon worship for clerics.
If you find a spellchecker who knows philosophy someday, please do tell; might solve a couple problems for me.Crissa wrote:Yeah, it was late, shouldn't rely upon the spellchecker to know that stuff.
Hm, Ancient European polytheism and Spinoza's pantheism, for example, seem to me to definitely merit different words. As for Atheism, while it seems to have indeed been born as an insult, it was aimed at people who didn't follow anything, so I guess it never ran the risk of being considered a religion - and nowadays the term's so general that there's even some people considered religious included. So, in either case - what general meaning do you miss?Crissa wrote:But then again, you have everything as defined by people who don't believe there can be more than one god, and tend to attach words to specific groups instead of letting us have words with general meanings.
If the person who wrote that definition had their way, they'd define atheism as a religion as well, and point to specific, organized adherents, and then no one would be able to use the word to mean anything but those specific adherents.
Fixed. Not as an attack, but because that didn't look like a typo.FatR wrote:And if you were a priest, you usually (almost always in many cases) were a priest of a single particular deity, say, Poseidon or Apollo, not of a whole pantheon, under personal protection of this particular deity and this deity only.
Hans Freyer, s.b.u.h. wrote:A manly, a bold tone prevails in history. He who has the grip has the booty.
Huston Smith wrote:Life gives us no view of the whole. We see only snatches here and there, (...)
brotherfrancis75 wrote:Perhaps you imagine that Ayn Rand is our friend? And the Mont Pelerin Society? No, those are but the more subtle versions of the Bolshevik Communist Revolution you imagine you reject. (...) FOX NEWS IS ALSO COMMUNIST!
LDSChristian wrote:True. I do wonder which is worse: killing so many people like Hitler did or denying Christ 3 times like Peter did.