Cleric guidelines and rules

[Waylander]

This is a Beta ruleset for clerics. its not official, but the nearest thing so far. there are a few glitches which need talking about and playtesting.

the one i need most feedback on is the Healer class. they are meant to be complete pacifists, but this obviously means they cant get xp.


As you all well know, Kydor is not set in the forgotton realms, therefore does not follow the forgotton realms gods of Faerun.

In Kydor, there may be many beliefs, but by far the most common is in the Source.
The source is beleived to be just that. The Source of all things. This can obvisouly be interpreted in a vast number of ways, and indeed it is, and so here are the ways you can create your character in relation to following the source.

(A quick note, this is obvsiouly much easier to do on paper than it is in practice, and the rules are by no means set in stone. If the rules are changed, and that means your character is now breaking the new rules, you will be duly accomodated so you can alter your character so they again conform.)

***This class is open for discussion in the 'suggestions room' ***

When someone is blessed with the power of the source, often those gifted are not sure how to use it. There are no schools for such priests, or at least no public ones. There are legends of such schools, but their authenticity is far from solid.
Usually the power begins to surface around puberty or sometimes slightly before. This can lead to very different views and perspectives on life, and the responsibility of power, as children are very influential, and no upbrining of two children is the same.
One of the favourite paths of the source, is the belief that all life comes from the source, and is therefore sacred. Pain, anger, and all violent feelings are abhorrent to those who follow this path, and their weapon againt evil is love, and healing, for how can evil and death be prevented by means of only more evil and death?
Another belief, though very similar, is also very different. Some again believe that life is sacred, and therefore it must be protected. While healers will stand before a warrior and let himself be cut down before raising a finger against another living being, a warrior of the source will protect himself, in order to protect others that would be done harm by the foe. It would be wise to note, that very nearly all priests who follow this way of life, were former Healer priests, who could not cope with the way of life, and took up arms. And as a result, they are usually dubbed weaker priests, by themselves and others in the faith.
There is another common, but slightly different view taken by many with the gift. It is easiest described with an analogy; In the the natural world, a wolfpack needs a leader. The leader will protect the other wolves from dangers, the females will breed with him, ensuring stronger young. This is neccessary for survival. If a weak wolf leads the pack, they will surely die. This is the usual beleif of source priests that follow this path. They are not protecting themselves, or even their friends and family, they look to serve a bigger, better purpose. They must strive to protect their brothers and sisters in humanity by eliminating the weak.
To many priests, and often people not involved in the beleifs of the faith, this path can appear shocking and cruel, but this is how the source has deemed things. Does the lion not kill the weakest, slowest deer? an ignorant man would slay the lion and save the deer, but not spare a thought for the lion cubs that are condemned to a slow death of starvation.

These are just examples of the more common paths followed by people gifted with the power of the source. These are not the only followers, as said earlier each priest is unique in the way they serve the source, but these are the most common.

Rules

There are three main cleric subclasses. You can choose any three of these and abide by the rules.
There is also an option to you to devise your own cleric. If you have a creative and well put together idea for a character and how he worships the source, by all means put it forward, and it will be considered.
But the concept must fit into the world, and the concept of religion. Feel free to ask a Dm if you feel you would like clarification.

Healer Priest.
A healer priest unquestionably has the most spell power, and is also the only priest with access to all healing spells.
A priest of this path will never cast a spell that causes damage to another living being, be it human, animal or insect. That said, he can cast any other spell, be it mind affecting (though he can only cast this on an enemy to avoid conflict) defensive, or spells that cause damage indirectly (such as darkfire). Depending on your characters beliefs, he may intensely dislike casting spells such as darkfire, as the chances are the power will be used to cause injury.
This causes a huge problem. to gain xp in nwn, you have to kill things. and this character class is a Pacifist. We reccomend travelling in partys, if and when you do go out to get experience, and healers will recieve slightly more xp for roleplaying, to counteract this flaw.
Summons are also allowed, but only natural creatures. no fire elementals and balors.



Warrior Priest
When a priest of the source picks up a sword, he immiadiatly loses the power to heal (the loss of all healing and curative spells, bar those less than level three). It is a trade, which no one can explain, but it is a fact. Also, his mental power suffers, because he has to devote more time to keeping himself fit, and well trained with weapons. A warrior priest must take one fighter level for every 2 clerical levels to represent this. Unless you have an ic reason, fighting will be a last resort.

Aggressive Warrior priest
This is not an evil class. These priests see themselves as gods gardeners, and weak people are the weeds. to other people their actions may seem (and sometimes be, by common average) cold and calous, but to them they are holding true to their faith.
These too must take one fighter level for every two levels of cleric, and suffer a complete loss of healing and curative spells.
These priests tend not to hold back their aggressive urges when involved in heated debates, and will not be punished ooc for starting fights (unless it contravenes the pvp rules set by Boomer).

[Emwiz]

i got an idea, wild one but ill toss it out. To make healer clerics abit more tempting how about custom spells/devices given to them as awards from their deity? But as healers i think that they should be allowed to use anti-undead spells.

[Bane]

I was thinking somethign like that myself... there will be many custom spells (rp and scripted).
I was thinking to strengthen the healing pacifist priests with other abilities. more powerfull healing spells at lower levels, other abilities, and so on and so forth.

[Emwiz]

what i had in mind when it comes too custom spells i was thinking something along the lines of perhaps one summoning spell and i also thought of abilities like giving them resistance to energy or physical damage, making it easier on the pascifistic part so it doesnt become like one hit dead. just some ideas on top of my head.

[Waylander]

with them having access to nealry all spells, they will be one of the best defensive classes. source warriors wont have the same level of spellpower as a healer of the same level, so healers will have the better defence.

Edit: summons are allowed too, but:

1, only natural creatures
and 2, they come a runnin from nearby, not summoned outta nowhere as per the spell graphic

[Bane]

the problem is the concept of these priests is a RL concept... no levelups etc.. they simply had the power to heal, spirits to leave their bodies and flyaround, read peoples thoughts etc...
But they didnt fight at all. period. they would sooner be cut down then harm another. to do otherwise would be mocking their faith. now if we take these priests and give them spells to stop them being hurt. thats not following their faith.
they teach to offer love in the face of hate. You cant kill evil without becoming evil yourself.
so if somone comes at you with a sword. you offer no resistence. you let them kill you and you forgive them. For life i just the begining. and when you die you will join the source.
but the men who live their lives selfishly, killing others and so on. dont join the source. the go to a Grey wastland of nothingness... Because of that. these pascifist priests pity these men.

Now how do we apply that to nwn... Clerics first of all are a melee -based class. second characters in nwn arent designed to be pascifists.
one would be fun to roleplay but not able to levelup by the normal means... its a pickle to be sure. thats why its here, to get feedback.

[Emwiz]

Well ill be making a healer, and ill of course be giving response on what flaws i find when in game or suggestions i come up with.

Spells that prevent the healers and others from harm, how is that against their faith?

[Waylander]

they werent so much against defence, but never seemed to put up a fight. i think they maybe lk#iked getting killed.

But changes must be made, and i cant really see a problem with allowing healers to be actively defensive. (though with no offensive capbilityies)

[Emwiz]

yea i was thinking something along the lines off stoneskin in when talking about defensive magic, i dont think darkfire is something a healer would use. i mean, my healer will be using stuff like hold person and to prevent harm to anyone, he would rather stun an opponent and walk away or trying to talk with the opponent rather than stand still and let him kill him, i mean just because theyre pascifists doesnt mean they have no selfpreservation.

[redunzgofasta]

There is another common, but slightly different view taken by many with the gift. It is easiest described with an analogy; In the the natural world, a wolfpack needs a leader. The leader will protect the other wolves from dangers, the females will breed with him, ensuring stronger young. This is neccessary for survival. If a weak wolf leads the pack, they will surely die. This is the usual beleif of source priests that follow this path. They are not protecting themselves, or even their friends and family, they look to serve a bigger, better purpose. They must strive to protect their brothers and sisters in humanity by eliminating the weak.
To many priests, and often people not involved in the beleifs of the faith, this path can appear shocking and cruel, but this is how the source has deemed things. Does the lion not kill the weakest, slowest deer? an ignorant man would slay the lion and save the deer, but not spare a thought for the lion cubs that are condemned to a slow death of starvation.

Now that sounds exactly like a "Green Reaper" druid.

IMO the "healer" isnt suited as a character class at all
I fail to see why a pacifist would align himself with a party that will do lots of killing. Wouldnt the healer be participating in that killing by suporting the killers (and by healing them make sure they can continue to do so) ?
Wouldnt those healers feel inclinede to heal those poor creatures being slaughtered by the party?

Unless DMs will run (regular) quests that would provide a solid reason for a healing priest to go out and participate ( one way or the other) in a "killing" mission without comprimising their faith, or even better, run quests that dont involve any killing at all I think the "healing priest" is a class best reserved for NPCs.

[Emwiz]

i would like to play the healer class because i really do hate going out into dungeons killing stuff anyway. and i agree to that healers in parties killing creatures would be against their faith, which can complicate things really. so if healers as a class would work i think you should perhaps consider not having encounters on main roads so that the healers can travell some with out having to run around to avoid combat all the time. The healer class would work for pc's but it would be hard and needs dm's monitoring them.

[Bane]

IMO the "healer" isnt suited as a character class at all
I fail to see why a pacifist would align himself with a party that will do lots of killing. Wouldnt the healer be participating in that killing by suporting the killers (and by healing them make sure they can continue to do so) ?
Wouldnt those healers feel inclinede to heal those poor creatures being slaughtered by the party?

Unless DMs will run (regular) quests that would provide a solid reason for a healing priest to go out and participate ( one way or the other) in a "killing" mission without comprimising their faith, or even better, run quests that dont involve any killing at all I think the "healing priest" is a class best reserved for NPCs.

Exactly, I dont really want to scrap 500 npc's so that a few players can play that role.
I wont say they 'cant' but i cant see a viable way to impliment the faith as a playable class.
By going out and healing the adventureres, they are in effect, allowing them to continue killing whatevrer they are killing. by their faith they should be healing whatever the adventurers are killing, and pitying the adventurers for slaughtering life all day.

An example, would be a priest in his monestary. an angry mob is coming to kill them all because the mob is convinced the priests in the monestary are the reason for all their troubles. Despite the fact that the priests have healed many of the mob when they where sick.

Somone tells the priests the mob is coming. and urges them to flee, and get away. The priests refuse. and say they will remain. The person is confused and asks, 'if there was a great fire and your monestary would you not flee?'
the priest replies, That the fire is not sentient. so of course he would try to get out. But the priest teaches to offer love in the face of hatred. So when the face of hatred, a huge mob comes to their door to butcher them all. to run would be a mockery to all he preaches. So he would remain, and ask the mob why they are doing this, try to speak sence into them, offer them his love. and if must. be cut down.
Not to say he wouldnt be terrified and wish to die. Many priests would flee, if their faith was weaker than their perseation. But the concept is the same.

A priest simply wouldnt go out helping people to butcher whatever they are butchering. 'only' a warrior priest would do this.
To actively help killing anything. or to simply 'shut his eyes' to the killing around him is against his faith.

If a player really wants to play one of these. they can. But they have to stick rigidly within the faith.
they will in all likelyhood be a level 1 priest with some custom spell-power of a healing and intelectual nature.
Which we could develop through RP.
I'm fine for this so long as the player understands what they are accepting unto themselves.

[Bane]

found the quote.

'If this building were ablaze, holy brother, would you sit within and wait for the flames to devour you?'

'No sir, I would take myself to a place of safety. That, However, does not equate to the situation we are facing. Fire is inanimate and non-discerning. We are ordered to offer love in the face of hate, and forgiveness in the face of pain. We cannot run away when danger threatens. That would be like saying we have no faith in our own philosophy. How can we obey our teachings if we run in the face of hate?'

Funnily enough, the other person whom was a warrior who became a priest, replies...

'It is not a philosophy i can share.'

Its not a philosophy many can share. Not myself for one. But do you see how running off to the bandit woods and killing other men who have feelings, who would go home that night and klaugh and joke with friends... And watching as other men cut them down, loot their bodies... is totaly blesphemous to their faith?
They just cant do it. they would try their upmost to convince the adventurers not to go. The most true to their faith would even allow the bandits to kill them.

However heh, like the wise priest said, these bandits are inanimate and non-discerning... since they are NPC's So i dont expect a player to let themselves be killed by one. Which is why the faith is practically un-playable. without serious limitations on the players-part.

[Emwiz]

yes, limitations. so IMO i think that healers should be allowed to run away if for excample spawning a bandit or whatever when out walking, since in that would be the most fair towards the player and it would also follow their faith (though not as hardcore as getting killed) and for partying i would think a healer would try and convince the party not to go out and kill other beings. But what i would like to get through is that a human would be really insane to go that far as those hardcore healers, i mean selfpreservation is something we're born with, we have an instinct to ensure our survival, thats where i was thinking protection spells come in, spells that prevents any part from getting harmed, for instance if the healer gets attacked by bandits, then he casts stoneskin on himself, he doesnt fight back but try and find a way to get away from there or somehow talk the bandit out of killing. And i was curious, wouldnt a priest who lets a bandit kill him still allow this evil to coninue? I mean, the harm wouldnt stop, the healers death was something against his faith and he allowed it.

[Waylander]

well your all familiar with the problem then. a healer class is completely incompatible with the nwn rule system.

but the question is, do we let people play them? i personally see no problem with letting people try them out for a little, perhaps we will see within a very short time that it doesnt fit with the setting, perhaps that wont be the case. as i siad, its much easier on paper than it is in reality. i think the proof will be in the pudding, so they say.