Narrative & Cleric Domains

[magistrasa]

I think clerics have some of the most fun and interesting roleplay potential out of any class, and was looking forward to what the domain update might be able to offer in developing new roleplay potential. While the update certainly opened up some exciting mechanical opportunities, I can't help but feel like we missed a great chance to really give domains some narrative weight.

A domain is meant to represent an aspect of divinity, a metaphysical profile occupied by a deity. A god of fire is a personification of fire, and this is reflected not just in physical power, but in personality and expression. Likewise, the Fire domain doesn't just stand for the literal chemical reaction that causes fire - it stands for fire's symbolic associations, like destruction, and creation, and passion. When I look at some of these domains, like Acid or Water, I don't see that consideration really reflected in the spell selection or abilities. I see someone who said, "Well, it's the water domain, so let's pick a bunch of spells that seem like they have to do with water." But, what does the concept of water represent on a spiritual level? What is the commonality between the various gods of water?

On the other hand, there are gods that have to do with very explicitly social or metaphysical concepts that I don't think have any representation at all. What domains should be chosen by a cleric worshipping a god of commerce, or love? This issue might be alleviated if the more "physical" domains were set up in such a way that they could extend to metaphysical ideas, but the current state of affairs with the literal interpretations of how their abilities manifest make it limiting.

I think the domains also neglect to acknowledge the inherent duality of the universe our roleplay is based in. Positive vs Negative, Good vs Evil, Law vs Chaos, Water vs Fire, Gnomes vs Kobolds, Elves vs Other Elves - everything has its equal opposite, and in those opposing forces the universe finds its balance. But when we look at the domains and try to split them up into direct opposites, it's sort of all over the place. The domains coded as "good" or "evil" are skewed in one direction over the other, domains like Travel and Animal don't really have any clear opposite at all, and honestly there's some domains that just sort of seem redundant. Take the Death and Undeath domains for instance. What's the conceptual difference between them supposed to be, exactly? Both of them are associated with necromancy and negative energy, but I suppose you could say Undeath is about reanimation whereas Death is more about raw destruction. Okay, but if Death is supposed to represent the concept of destruction, then what is the Destruction domain supposed to represent? Assuming it's supposed to be a more "natural" form of destruction, what is the Storm domain? This daisy chain of concepts and domains all stepping on each others' toes touches on another concern I have, which is that we should probably try to curb overlap and redundancy by keeping the number of domains limited, and their subjects focused.

So with all this in consideration, allow me to share how I imagine our domains would look in an ideal world. Bear in mind that I am not really going to go into mechanics, because the focus here is really on the narrative foundation to it all. Which is how I imagine it should be, considering how we are (allegedly) a roleplay server. Mechanics can be figured out to fit any concept, but I feel that at the core of any effort should be narrative integrity.

The War Domain, representing concepts of Conflict & Victory, contrasted to the Protection Domain, representing concepts of Peace & Vigilance
The Magic Domain, representing concepts of Metaphysical & Theoretical Information, contrasted to the Knowledge Domain, representing concepts of Physical & Practical Information
The Desire Domain, representing concepts of Indulgence, Nihilism, and Hedonism, contrasted to the Grave Domain, representing concepts of the Afterlife, Psychopomps, and Judgement
The Fire Domain, representing concepts of Innovation, Purification, and Refinement, contrasted to the Ice Domain, representing concepts of Water, Perseverance, and Raw Stubbornness
The Sun Domain, representing concepts of Light, Truth, and Justice, contrasted to the Darkness Domain, representing concepts of Shadow, Irreverence, and Duplicity
The Order Domain, representing concepts of Design, Civilization, and Hierarchy, contrasted to the Entropy Domain, representing concepts of Discord, Freedom, and Anarchy
The Serpent Domain, representing concepts of Renewal, Medicine, and Poison, contrasted to the Plague Domain, representing concepts of Ending, Devouring, Disease, and Pestilence
The Tyranny Domain, representing concepts of Aggression & Domination, contrasted to the Fate Domain, representing Passivity & Acceptance
The Earth Domain, representing concepts of Stability, Strength, and Tradition, contrasted to the Air Domain, representing concepts of Whimsy, Speed, and Travel
The Life Domain, representing concepts of Fertility, Healing, and Creation, contrasted to the Death Domain, representing concepts of Malice, Decay, and Destruction
The Storm Domain, representing concepts of Wrath & Hardship, contrasted to the Nature Domain, representing concepts of Responsibility & Coexistence
The Moon Domain, representing concepts of Guidance, Wisdom, and Illusions, contrasted to the Stars Domain, representing concepts of Luck, Beauty, and Charisma

This makes 24 domains, which is both a manageable number to balance around, and conveniently a number with some mystic and divine significance. It probably goes without saying, but the names I've chosen to represent some of these concepts may not fit as well as I think they do. I hope the premise behind them all is clear, regardless. It's about the conceptual profile behind them.

Under this hypothetical domain list, some existing domains would be absorbed into a new form - namely, I imagine the Strength Domain would join Earth, the Travel domain would join Air, the Healing domain would join Life, the Trickery domain would be split between Darkness & Moon, and the Nature Domain would be some fusion of the Plant & Animal Domain. The Good & Evil domains wouldn't exist, but I feel like they are represented well enough by the Life & Death domains, just without the moral baggage. There's enough versatility in the list that clerics of most deities would be able to feasibly choose from a wide range of domains and still fall within reason of their god's portfolio, which lends to a sense of diversity that I don't think is the case currently. I mean, most clerics wanting to pick an evil deity to follow currently are relegated to picking between Death, Evil, Undeath, and Trickery (and the choice invariably will always come out to Death & Trickery), which seems like a real shame.

All that said, I'm not entirely sure how to sign this off. What do you guys think? What are your hopes for how domains might be portrayed with a sense of narrative significance? What improvements would you make to the list I've made?

[LovelyLightningWitch]

On Death vs Undeath.


Deities who are aligned with Death are usually those whose duties are related to either the afterlife itself, or the ferrying of souls into said afterlife. Although the Faerunian pantheon claims that Myrkul (or now Kelemvor) is the ultimate authority over said process - interloper deities (and deities of other continents) have entirely different cosmology surrounding death.

As Faith is the strongest driving force of the outer planes, all these stewards of death are right in their education, provided people believe in them or their pantheon.

Sehanine for instance utterly resents any undead. She does not happily create Baelnorn, and only does so if there's no viable alternative. However, she is also very explicitly the goddess of Death. She governs elven reincarnation alongside Corellon, father of all elves. She governs giving elves the dreams and visions foretelling their death by old age (recognizable to others by sight of a moonbow in the affected's eyes). Her clergy are tasked with special rituals to ensure those elves who died unnatural deaths can pass to Arvandor without danger to their soul (recognizable by a moonbow appearing in their iris). Her very existence is centered around the concept of death - of being born, learning and experiencing life, becoming wiser and then passing to Arvandor to perhaps regale her with your experiences, or your family that stayed behind in Arvandor. And then - those dedicated to enlightenment, will seek her out to be reborn and learn new lessons.

This is heavily contrasted with Myrkul, the now late human god of death AND undeath. He would create undead to frighten humans, to make them fear him. He would send his clergy to desecrate graveyards that did not pay him tribute. He still is a god of death, and begrudgingly fulfilled his role sending souls to their appropriate realms - but often he tried violating this, trapping souls for himself forcing other deities to invade his plane to enforce contracts (Brandobaris is one such example). All he wanted was people to fear death, and thus him.

Bhaal is another god of Death. However, unlike Sehanine who focuses on the afterlife and what comes after, and the purpose of life. All Bhaal cared about is the moment of death itself. The more violent, the more powerful and happier he grew. Bhaal cared not for reanimation, for what came after death. Only that people experienced immense pain when it came to pass.

Contrasted with Bhaal is Kiransalee, who cared not a lick for either afterlife (unlike Sehanine) nor for the experience of death or its fear (unlike Myrkul and Bhaal). No, all she cared for was the continuation of what she did in life: reanimating the dead - and doing so specifically to spite and enact vengeance of those that opposed her (or her followers). To her clergy, what was most important in life was to humiliate those who wronged them by murdering them and reanimating them as mindless slaves.



As visible by these 4 deities examples - the concept of Death and Undeath are highly varied, and have little overlap amongst them. The only real overlap there was was through Myrkul who sought to intimidate people using Undeath.




As for Magic & Knowledge being contrasted: Sehanine Moonbow is the goddess of illusionists and diviners, and her sphere covers the very concept of knowledge and wisdom too, often using dreams and visions to guide elven villages. And even when she does not intervene personally, her clergy will act as sages and seers providing invaluable knowledge for governance or for daily life. She would be represented by the following domains best (limiting myself to only Arelith domains): Death (goddess of elven afterlife), Knowledge (Goddess of Seers and Sages), Magic (Goddess of Diviners and Illusionists), , Travel (Both metaphorically, in terms of journey of Life, and literally, in terms of the Retreat), Moon (Her power waxes and wanes with phases of the moon).

As such, this particular entry of the "Opposed alignments" is no longer applicable due to a strong counter evidence.

[magistrasa]

On Death vs Undeath.

I agree with you that there is a strong need for this distinction. That a god of death and the afterlife represents something different as compared to a god of Undeath and malevolent use of magic. I emphatically disagree that the domains we have presently represent this in the way you've described.

For the sake of reference as we continue discussion:



The domain abilities and spell selection of these two domains are nearly identical. Only two key differences are readily apparent: the Death Domain has more save-or-die spells while the Undeath Domain is better able to create minions to do their bidding, and the Death Domain has spells designed to counter undead creatures. The latter point speaks strongly towards the idea that the Death Domain can be spun as the "Anti-Undead, Pro-Natural-Death Domain," but you have to ignore every other ability of the domain to reach that conclusion. There's no sense of "natural death" in a Wail of the Banshee. It's not very Kelemvorite, and certainly not characteristic to Sehanine.

So, let's keep using Sehanine as an example. If a cleric of Sehanine took the Death Domain, as you suggest, they would almost certainly be considered a heretic. Sehanine doesn't just abhor the animation of undead, she is morally opposed to nearly the entire school of necromancy. The only spells on that list that she'd remotely approve of are Undeath to Death, Undeath's Eternal Foe, and maybe Death Armor. Even making use of your Empowered Inflict Wounds would put you on thin ice with the goddess. So to take that Domain and keep yourself in line with the deity you presume to worship, you have to ignore more than half of your domain's abilities.

Which... you can do, I guess. Plenty have before. But isn't that a shame, to take a domain that shares the name of a concept your deity represents, only to see that it doesn't match in practice? And that's sort of what I'm talking about here, when I say that the narrative concepts should be the core of design decisions. Nearly every domain seems to have a conceptual disconnect. The Death Domain's new description says that it is "one with the concept of the end of life and repose," but it seems far more concerned with ending life than what comes after. And I fully acknowledge the fact that in some cases, the mechanics that might more accurately represent certain concepts just don't exist yet. There's a reason why the "Special Domain Powers" collumn for so many of our domains say "TBD." But all the same, I can't help but feel like the mark was missed with the Death Domain's seemingly intended neutrality. Its signature abilities focus exclusively on inflicting death, which is hard to skew towards Neutral or Good, and will continue to be a mainstay for clerics worshipping Evil deities.

(A suggestion I'd make to better set up the Death Domain as a more neutral, natural, benign expression of the concept death, would be to move the empowered Inflict Wounds and at least some of the save-or-die spells over to the Undeath Domain, give it Raise Dead & Death Ward at an earlier level, and maybe give it an activated ability that gives it immunity to death spells and resistance to negative energy - maybe even tie some kind of special bonus to the spell Death Ward rather than Death Armor.)

Knowledge (Goddess of Seers and Sages), Magic (Goddess of Diviners and Illusionists)

Forgive me if I'm misinterpreting you here, I'm not sure I entirely understood you at certain points in your post, but it seems like you'd set up the difference between these two domains in this way: The Knowledge Domain represents the pursuit and accumulation of knowledge in all its forms, and the Magic Domain represents... really liking certain forms of magic? I feel like most deities would fit with the Magic Domain under that premise, because the nature of the universe we sometimes pretend to exist in is that everyone really likes magic, because everything is magic. I feel like it doesn't make sense to exist as a domain unless it means something more than the literal study of spellcasting methods. Because studying things is... pursuing and accumulating knowledge, which is what the Knowledge Domain represents, which means that they should just be fused into the same thing if that's all it is!

As such, this particular entry of the "Opposed alignments" is no longer applicable due to a strong counter evidence.

You seem to be under the impression that there's no consistency in the depictions of the various domains. I disagree. Your examples show a clear consistency among how the domains manifest, even if on surface level examination the deities are all "different" and "special" and "unique." Myrkul, Kiaransalee, Orcus, and all other gods of Undeath, are unified in one consistent theme: Malevolence. Malice and hatred are strongly associated with negative energy, which is intrinsically tied to undeath. Likewise, there is consistency in gods of the more benign concept of Death. Sehanine, Kelemvor, Osiris, and all other psychopomp deities are affiliated with guidance, reverence, and karmic judgement - with all these deities and concepts having only a tertiary relationship with negative energy. On face value, Bhaal would be the outlier as a death god associated with malevolence and not undeath, but it's worth mentioning that Bhaal isn't a god anymore. He's dead. And the god that stole his portfolio is not considered to be affiliated with the Death Domain. Because Bhaal's association with death was also only tertiary, as his primary aspects were violence and ritual murder. That's more akin to destruction and tyranny, as opposed to death.

At the end of the day, we're all sharing the same story, so that story needs consistency. Without that consistency to link us all together, our stories become incompatible and exclusionary. This is why it's important to develop the game with narrative in mind, rather than only looking at mechanics and numbers. Don't get me wrong, I think this domain update was a great step in the right direction, and gives me a lot of hope for the future! I just think it wouldn't be hard to go a little bit further. This could be as simple as changing the names and descriptions. Or, it could be rearranging the spells and mechanics. I just know we can do better!

[Hazard]

Death domain looks really fun to me and I'm very excited to try it out. I've always wished for ESF: Necro to be of more value to a cleric by sprinkling a few DC spells in there.

Undeath domain looks really great too, but ESF: Necro already grants a 1/day greater undead, clerics can simply take scribe scroll/buy a stack of scrolls for as many uses as they want because it makes no difference and you're going to end up using EMD anyway, and resting if the good summons die, so the extra create undead spells don't really do a lot for the necro-cleric.

What if the Finger of Death, Wail of Banshee and similar spells were moved to Undeath to replace the Create Undead spells, and Death was instead given more Anti-Undead stuff, like Sunburst, Sunbeam?

Also empowered harm could be moved Undeath and Death could get Bless Weapon with bonuses against undead and improved turning.

Death, as it is now, has a lot of death magic and negative energy involved .. which can create and raise undead, and that might go against the gods dogma of the character that's chosen the domain. Example a Kelemvorite probably wouldn't use death magic to kill someone or large amounts of negative energy, knowing it could result in undead.

[Irongron]

I'm really happy with the work being done by the developers here, and fine the new domains most welcome.

While a lot of thought has gone into the post above, and certainly demonstrates some creative thinking, please do keep in mind that the suggestion box is currently closed.

By all means offer feedback on what we have, I'm sure the team will be listening, but suggesting that they throw out all of their work, and make the above (and entirely different system) is not really a constructive use of this forum area.

[Hazard]

You're right, sorry.
I think what I was trying, and failing to communicate was ..

Death is a domain Kelemvor will be having, obviously..
But Death also mechanically focuses on death magic and negative energy spells.
Death by death magic or negative energy, and large amounts of negative energy in an area can result in undead.
Death magic can also harm souls.

So this stands out to me a bit as a situation where the Death domain's new identity isn't matching the mechanical benefits it's giving. A Kelemvorite might choose this domain, but would be very unlikely to make use of the spells it grants.

[Red Ropes]

Death domain and Repose domain in PnP are almost exactly the same. I'll show you their difference.

Death Domain
Granted Power
You may use a death touch once per day. Your death touch is a supernatural ability that produces a death effect. You must succeed on a melee touch attack against a living creature (using the rules for touch spells). When you touch, roll 1d6 per cleric level you possess. If the total at least equals the creature’s current hit points, it dies (no save).

Death Domain Spells
Cause Fear: One creature of 5 HD or less flees for 1d4 rounds.
Death Knell: Kill dying creature and gain 1d8 temporary hp, +2 to Str, and +1 caster level.
Animate Dead M: Creates undead skeletons and zombies.
Death Ward: Grants immunity to death spells and negative energy effects.
Slay Living: Touch attack kills subject.
Create Undead M: Create ghouls, ghasts, mummies, or mohrgs.
Destruction F: Kills subject and destroys remains.
Create Greater Undead M: Create shadows, wraiths, spectres, or devourers.
Wail of the Banshee: Kills one creature/level.

Repose Domain
Granted Powers: You may use a death touch once per day. Your death touch is a spell-like ability that is a death effect. You must succeed at a melee touch attack against a living creature (using the rules for touch spells). When you touch, roll 1d6 per you cleric level. If the total at least equals the creature's current hit points, it dies.

1 - Hide from Undead

2 - Gentle Repose

3 - Speak with Dead

4 - Death Ward

5 - Slay Living

6 - Undeath to Death

7 - Destruction

8 - Surelife

9 - Wail of the Banshee

Repose is just FR's Death domain meant for the more benevolent death gods like Kelemvor. Not all death gods however are kind.

On Arelith - Death is going to just not give you any bonuses to the undead - leaving it to its actual opposite - Undeath. Both will be great combinations of necromancy spells for a cleric.

As mentioned in the other thread this is another situation where we took something complicated/arbitrary and made it modular so more people can use it and so we don't have to make 69 different domains for the same thing or theme between deities.

[Hazard]

Death domain and Repose domain in PnP are almost exactly the same. I'll show you their difference.

Death Domain
Granted Power
You may use a death touch once per day. Your death touch is a supernatural ability that produces a death effect. You must succeed on a melee touch attack against a living creature (using the rules for touch spells). When you touch, roll 1d6 per cleric level you possess. If the total at least equals the creature’s current hit points, it dies (no save).

Death Domain Spells
Cause Fear: One creature of 5 HD or less flees for 1d4 rounds.
Death Knell: Kill dying creature and gain 1d8 temporary hp, +2 to Str, and +1 caster level.
Animate Dead M: Creates undead skeletons and zombies.
Death Ward: Grants immunity to death spells and negative energy effects.
Slay Living: Touch attack kills subject.
Create Undead M: Create ghouls, ghasts, mummies, or mohrgs.
Destruction F: Kills subject and destroys remains.
Create Greater Undead M: Create shadows, wraiths, spectres, or devourers.
Wail of the Banshee: Kills one creature/level.

Repose Domain
Granted Powers: You may use a death touch once per day. Your death touch is a spell-like ability that is a death effect. You must succeed at a melee touch attack against a living creature (using the rules for touch spells). When you touch, roll 1d6 per you cleric level. If the total at least equals the creature's current hit points, it dies.

1 - Hide from Undead

2 - Gentle Repose

3 - Speak with Dead

4 - Death Ward

5 - Slay Living

6 - Undeath to Death

7 - Destruction

8 - Surelife

9 - Wail of the Banshee

Repose is just FR's Death domain meant for the more benevolent death gods like Kelemvor. Not all death gods however are kind.

On Arelith - Death is going to just not give you any bonuses to the undead - leaving it to its actual opposite - Undeath. Both will be great combinations of necromancy spells for a cleric.

As mentioned in the other thread this is another situation where we took something complicated/arbitrary and made it modular so more people can use it and so we don't have to make 69 different domains for the same thing or theme between deities.

Oh, thanks. Gotcha. It will be up to the character a bit to use whatever powers they have responsibly in some situations then, and I sort of like that. Much like any cleric could animate the dead, but a lot don't want to.

Makes sense. Thanks for laying it out.

[Red Ropes]

Then you just sort of compare it to our Death Domain which focuses more on death spells.

http://wiki.nwnarelith.com/Category:Cleric_domains

As well as the countering of undead.

And again, the domains, are Phase One. These are just extra spells and domains for you to play with - give feedback on - as we add other thematic stuff to them.

[DM Butterfly]

Please keep all feedback for the cleric domain overhaul to Kenji's official thread for it here:

viewtopic.php?f=37&t=34182

Locking this thread.