Post/Author/DateTime	Post
fansy 07-25-06, 09:22 PM	Removed, as it seemed an unwelcome idea.
fansy 07-26-06, 12:13 AM	Bumpity bump. No ideas? Not even ideas for feats?
PhoenixInferno 07-26-06, 12:16 AM	Here's an idea - wait more than 3 hours between bumps. I challenge you to find a printed deity that has the Healing and Undeath domains.
Korwin 07-26-06, 04:21 AM	Hmm, not shure but would be Spell Focus Evil be better than Necromancy? Can you exchange the cleric with a ur-priest (Spell Focus Evil is a Pre-Req. for Ur-Priest...)? Maybe Duskblade 20 - Monk/Ur-Priest/Geomancer?
fansy 07-26-06, 08:06 PM	Here's an idea - wait more than 3 hours between bumps. I challenge you to find a printed deity that has the Healing and Undeath domains. Hey, just bumped it once at a time when usage was pretty high, no harm meant...nor done imo. I could see using such a derisive tone with someone who was abusing the boards, but a single bump seems to be a little short of warranting such a response...but mebbe that's just my personal sensibilities...and I don't want to come on these boards, as a new poster, and try to tell people how to act. So, my apologies. And on the subject of domains: "If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities," to quote the SRD. Despite my love for powergaming, the decision to pick these domains came early in the character's development, and were chosen for background reasons...the character coming from one of the gravewhisper cabals that had fallen prey to its own fascination with death and a rival cabal. I enjoy complex characters. As for the Ur-Priest, I never really got into the prc. I didn't see it as really synergizing well with this combo, but I'll give it another look. I quite enjoy having full cleric casting on this guy, to give him more flexibility than your usual duskblade.
PhoenixInferno 07-26-06, 08:24 PM	Hey, just bumped it once at a time when usage was pretty high, no harm meant...nor done imo. I could see using such a derisive tone with someone who was abusing the boards, but a single bump seems to be a little short of warranting such a response...but mebbe that's just my personal sensibilities...and I don't want to come on these boards, as a new poster, and try to tell people how to act. So, my apologies.I don't make the forum rules. You'd know 'em if you read 'em. I'm only trying to get across that your thread isn't any more important than any other thread - so why expect people to flock to your thread? Bumping just pisses people off - and if you worry about not being seen, you don't want to take advice from anyone who doesn't read past the 1st page anyway. And on the subject of domains: "If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities," to quote the SRD. Despite my love for powergaming, the decision to pick these domains came early in the character's development, and were chosen for background reasons...the character coming from one of the gravewhisper cabals that had fallen prey to its own fascination with death and a rival cabal. I enjoy complex characters.So there's no printed precedent for what you propose. As long as you can find a DM that'll buy it. Playable builds that rely on DM fiat like that don't mean a thing in my eyes. Undeath and Planning are the two cornerstone domains to Ultimate Power (TM) but if your DM doesn't buy it, you've got a piece of paper with some scratch marks.
fansy 07-26-06, 09:00 PM	So there's no printed precedent for what you propose. Maybe I'm misunderstanding, how is there no printed precedent for a non-deity-following cleric picking his domains to match his spiritual outlook? In the Player's Handbook I just dug up, on page 32, under Deity, Domains, and Domain Spells it says exactly what I quoted out of the SRD: "If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities. The restriction on alignment domains still applies." To me that is a clear rule.
PhoenixInferno 07-26-06, 09:03 PM	Maybe I'm misunderstanding, how is there no printed precedent for a non-deity-following cleric picking his domains to match his spiritual outlook? In the Player's Handbook I just dug up, on page 32, under Deity, Domains, and Domain Spells it says exactly what I quoted out of the SRD: "If a cleric is not devoted to a particular deity, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities. The restriction on alignment domains still applies." To me that is a clear rule.There is no printed precedent for a deity with Healing and Undeath. The two domains are philosophically inimical - one channels positive energy the other channels negative energy. For theoretical rules-lawyering, I wouldn't argue the point, but you want to play this guy.
fansy 07-26-06, 09:29 PM	First, according to the PHB, there need be no precedential deity. Call it rules-lawyering if you want, but it is printed there for a reason. This use of the RAW is no different, and perhaps less egregious than characters who betray deities and then enter prc's that are the ultimate embodiments of their deity (as if a second deity would so entrust a betrayer...) Oh, and on that topic, read the decription and requirements of Contemplative...it SPECIFICALLY references clerics who are devoted NOT to a deity, but to an alignment, or a spiritual outlook. How's that for precedent? Second, why do fantasy rpgs need to cling to one-dimensional views of good, evil, spirituality, healing, etc? Healing and Undeath need not be inimical. They are only at odds if you have overly simplistic views of what healing is, and what undeath means in a fantasy world. But, I guess this post was unwelcome, so I won't beat this to death anymore. I'd say that maybe you should re-evaluate how you look at the rules. Someone new to these forums might pick up on a perfectly valid rule that your veterans might not have used in their so-called "uber-builds"...but that is no reason to reject them out-of-hand, without consideration.
PhoenixInferno 07-26-06, 09:30 PM	I don't doubt the rule. I doubt you'll get a DM to accept your vision of a cleric that embraces Healing and Undeath. That is all I'm saying.
Mindolin 07-26-06, 09:51 PM	Actually, in my view of it, yes it can be done. The rules are clearly in support of not needing a deity to acess domains, and just because they seem to be at odds doesn't mean that they are. The only real problem for combining domains is the moral domains of Good and Evil, or Law and Chaos. As far as I, as a DM, would be concerned, is if they had a backstory to describe why they embrace teachings of such diverse philosophies. As an example, are Good and Death at odds as domains? What if they were both for a character that teaches that death is a release, granting the dead a place at the deitiy's side with such rewards as befit the virtue they showed in life?
PhoenixInferno 07-26-06, 09:53 PM	As an example, are Good and Death at odds as domains? What if they were both for a character that teaches that death is a release, granting the dead a place at the deitiy's side with such rewards as befit the virtue they showed in life?Enough so that they took away the Death domain from any deity in the Forgotten Realms that wasn't evil and replaced it with Repose.
Mindolin 07-26-06, 10:15 PM	Forgotten Realms, maybe, but then there is Eberron, Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Athas, Hollow World, Known World, and how many other settings, not to mention the countless home brew settings. Something that happens in Forgotten Realms does not mean things are wrong anywhere else, and I, personally, think that most of the Realms is the worst thing that has happened to D&D since the Pygmy Giant Space Hamster, even though the Realms came first.
JulesCARV 07-26-06, 11:23 PM	I missed the original post, but I for one find the idea of a sort of necromancer/healer appealing. Maybe not from a D&D perspective, with its alignment system and planar energy system, but from a generic high fantasy perspective, it passes the smell test to me. Don't old foggies who miss 2e talk about how Conjuration (healing) spells should really be Necromancy (healing) spells? Certainly not the only way to look at it, but seems like a valid perspective to me.
Mindolin 07-26-06, 11:31 PM	The really interesting thing is that yes, healing subschool spells should indeed be Necromancy. As written in the Player's Handbook Page 174, Paragraph I, Necromancy "manipulate(s) the power of death, unlife, and the life force". This seems to mean that they need to be Necromancy spells, as the fit in so poorly with Conjuration they made a subschool that contained only the curative spells.