Technically, it has to be a book.
Not mechanically. There's nothing in the actual rules for spellbooks that makes them only work with a connected series of pages. You can mask the mechanics (keeping the actual rules identical -- 100 spell levels of space per "book", all the time and material component costs the same, etc etc) while changing the flavor and you've suddenly got a character who is, mechanically, a wizard, but plays the role of a bard in game -- he plays the didgeridoo and has engraved his spells across its surface.
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That's not 'entirely' true Jal, regarding the spellbook piece. A class using the wizard mechanics would have to have some external source on which they store their power and refresh it daily, but that source doesn't have to be a spellbook.In my above example, the guy's flavor was martial artist, he used kung fu scrolls to refresh his technique daily.
In an example VV gave, the alchemist flavor with wizard mechanics brews 'potions' and such every morning for use later in the day, by imbibing them, or splashing targets with them, etc.
So while your right in one sense, it's not as solid as you imply.
All references to spellbooks in the core rules refer to "books" and "pages". Unless you interpret these words (ie. change the rules) you aren't playing the class as written. (By the way, I'm not saying that's a bad thing).
A spellbook has 100 pages of parchment, and each spell takes up one page per spell level (one page each for 0-level spells).
The point isn't the rule though, it's the comparison between classes that have this rule, and classes that don't.
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Technically, it has to be a book.Not mechanically. There's nothing in the actual rules for spellbooks that makes them only work with a connected series of pages. You can mask the mechanics (keeping the actual rules identical -- 100 spell levels of space per "book", all the time and material component costs the same, etc etc) while changing the flavor and you've suddenly got a character who is, mechanically, a wizard, but plays the role of a bard in game -- he plays the didgeridoo and has engraved his spells across its surface.
And you can pretend greatsword stats are actually the stats for mind-blasts. That doesn't change how they work mechanically compared to, say, Unarmed Strike or a dragon's breath weapon.
And you can pretend greatsword stats are actually the stats for mind-blasts. That doesn't change how they work mechanically compared to, say, Unarmed Strike or a dragon's breath weapon.
Thank you for telling us what we've been trying to tell you (plural) for the last 200 or so posts in this thread.
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And you can pretend greatsword stats are actually the stats for mind-blasts. That doesn't change how they work mechanically compared to, say, Unarmed Strike or a dragon's breath weapon.Thank you for telling us what we've been trying to tell you (plural) for the last 200 or so posts in this thread.
No, I got that. I just don't buy that the DM has to accept such changes.
If a player came to me with a sorcerer and said his spells were actually weapon damage (not sure why...), I would tell him there are already rules for weapon damage that everyone else in the world must follow. And the rules for his spells already have a certain flavour to them.
Then why can you not use another mechanic to represent your character instead of insisting on the one the DM objects to?Why does the DM object to the mechanic that perfectly represents the character?
The players are coming into the game with control of one, and only one thing. Their character. Unless the DM has a very good reason (and do note that there are very good reasons- many of them, in fact), she should not rob a player of her ability to make an appropriate character and represent them as they see fit. The DM has the entire world. The player has this one character. If the player decides that the most elegant representation of her sorcerer is through the Psion class, the DM had better think long and hard before turning to her and saying, "No you can't," because that statement is a big deal. Stripping them of the tools to portray their character in the most appropriate way because you don't like the metagame tag of "Psion" that doesn't even exist in-game is a Bad Thing.
The question the player should be asking themself is "why am I building a character concept around psionic mechanics when the DM has said no?"
I dont think anyone is advocating building before asking. The idea was that the player wants to build a sorcerer using psion mechanics.
Actually, there are Spellshards on p. 122 of Eberron. Wizards can use them with Arcane Mark to scribe spells within the depths of the crystal, and can bring the words to the surface of the crystal with a thought. Mechanically, they're half-price half-capacity blessed books.
You could fairly easily take a wizard, shave his head, take him to the body painting booth, hand him a spellshard and have him go as a psychic with his psychic crystal. Same class, different costuming and jargon.
The trouble is, if you put by-the-book Wizards in a game, and then over the next mountain you put "Psychic" which are Wizards in all but name, the moment the two subcultures meet, they're going to figure out they're the same damn class, and those chunks of rocks and those musty piles of dead leaves serve the same purpose, because the underlying metaphysics is exactly the same, even if their jargon and implementation varies.
Similarly, if you take the potion bottles marked DRINK ME and change them into cakes marked TASTE ME, they're still potions, and Brew Potion is the exact same feat even over the hill and through the woods its called Bake Cookie, and the Master Alchemist prestige class is now Master Keebler. Same mechanic, different skinning, but if the potion brewing witch met the cookie baking elf, after the initial shock they'd probably start trading recipes and form the Milk and Cookies guild. And if later on there's someone who does potions as magic apples? Same song, different day.
That's not 'entirely' true Jal, regarding the spellbook piece. A class using the wizard mechanics would have to have some external source on which they store their power and refresh it daily, but that source doesn't have to be a spellbook.In my above example, the guy's flavor was martial artist, he used kung fu scrolls to refresh his technique daily.
In an example VV gave, the alchemist flavor with wizard mechanics brews 'potions' and such every morning for use later in the day, by imbibing them, or splashing targets with them, etc.
So while your right in one sense, it's not as solid as you imply.
All references to spellbooks in the core rules refer to "books" and "pages". Unless you interpret these words (ie. change the rules) you aren't playing the class as written. (By the way, I'm not saying that's a bad thing).
A spellbook has 100 pages of parchment, and each spell takes up one page per spell level (one page each for 0-level spells).The point isn't the rule though, it's the comparison between classes that have this rule, and classes that don't.
Eberron has crystals aka spellshards. All they did was state that each spellshard could hold X many pages of spells.
Edit: ninja'd by Kevin
And you can pretend greatsword stats are actually the stats for mind-blasts. That doesn't change how they work mechanically compared to, say, Unarmed Strike or a dragon's breath weapon.Thank you for telling us what we've been trying to tell you (plural) for the last 200 or so posts in this thread.No, I got that. I just don't buy that the DM has to accept such changes.
If a player came to me with a sorcerer and said his spells were actually weapon damage (not sure why...), I would tell him there are already rules for weapon damage that everyone else in the world must follow. And the rules for his spells already have a certain flavour to them.
Nobody is telling you what you have to do. We are saying if the mechanics dont break the game, and the player takes care of the flavor part so it does not ruin your world then why not allow him to have the character? Once the flavor and mechanics are taken care of there is really no reason not to allow said class. Actually since flavor can be done in a myriad of ways, once the mechanical issues is taken care of it is hard to reasonably deny the class.
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See, there's always a caveat "if the mechanics don't break the game" and "if it doesn't ruin your world." Exactly, and what breaks the game or ruins the world (for me and my other players) is different than for you, or for any other of numerous groups.
It's not an argument any side can win.
Here's the opposite to your argument:
"If a DM has a reasonable justification to establish the mechanics and flavour of his campaign world, the players must work with those decisions to create characters that fit that particular story."
There's a lot of presumption in that statement. Just as there is to say "a DM cannot ban a book because of flavour if the players can rewrite the flavour."
Just because Eberron has different spellbooks doesn't change the fact that in the core rules wizards use actual books. Changing the nature of potions doesn't change the fact that you need a feat to make them, and if a player has a class that for some reason doesn't get feats, then they can't make potions by any name.
Changing the nature of potions doesn't change the fact that you need a feat to make them, and if a player has a class that for some reason doesn't get feats, then they can't make potions by any name.
You're talking apples and belugas here. NO ONE has proposed that re-flavoring the mechanics gets you a mechanical benefit, like being able to brew "potions" without the Brew Potion feat would.
Exactly.I think its more that he's referring to the eventual ability.If the expectations of the world are that a priestess of Lliira can do things a Bard can not, oh say raise the dead, no amount of bluster is going to make anyone think she is a priestess of Lliira.So it's absolutely impossible for a 1st-through-8th level character to be a priestess of Lliira?Staff of life + Use Magic Device.
Next?
Well, I take it your OK with other people doing someone elses work for them? Someone else write your essays in school and you just hand them in? Someone else taking care of your responsibilities at work for you? That's not her miracle then is it? I did not say that anyone would doubt the temples ability, just hers. And that would include her fellow priestesses, wouldn't it? The use magic device "X" to simulate ability "Y" bit is just a bit tired. So am I actually, sorry if this sounds a bit grouchy.
If you want to get into it, a bucket load of magic devices will let someone *simulate* about any class / ability set, won't it? Doesn't mean that said character is the right class / has the right abilities for the job or position.
It's no more inappropriate than basing the possibility of being the clergy of a deity of joy, dance, and revelry on their ability to cast raise dead. The two have no connection whatsoever. Would you base the clergy of the deity of murder, rape, and slaughter on their ability to cast raise dead? It makes just as little sense and is just as close-minded.
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You're talking apples and belugas here. NO ONE has proposed that re-flavoring the mechanics gets you a mechanical benefit, like being able to brew "potions" without the Brew Potion feat would.Changing the nature of potions doesn't change the fact that you need a feat to make them, and if a player has a class that for some reason doesn't get feats, then they can't make potions by any name.
I'm not the one who brought it up. The potion example shows that despite the change in flavour, the mechanics didn't change. And if you don't like the flavour of the mechanics, you can't change that. The mechanical flavour is "single-use item is destroyed for in-game effect".
Hypothetically, if potions were an optional rule, and as a DM I disliked the flavour of magic being destroyed or consumed because in my campaign world magic is too powerful, then disallowing potions for flavour is justified.
It's very convenient to overlook or dismiss the fact that certain mechanics in the core rules are tied to flavour.
The mechanical flavour is "single-use item is destroyed for in-game effect".
Incorrect. That's the raw, flavorless mechanic (actually, even that is wrong because it also describes scrolls, oils, and some wondrous items). The mechanical flavor of potions is "magical liquid is consumed to duplicate a spell effect on the consumer". You can re-flavor that to "magical cake is consumed to duplicate a spell effect on the consumer" without changing the base, flavorless mechanic of "single-use item is destroyed for in-game effect".
There is a difference between being dictatorial and saying "I'm the GM, I spent 6 months making a world. That concept doesn't fit into it, I'm sorry. Let's see what else we can work on that would work that you'd enjoy? How about...".
Again, this is about concepts and characters that do fit the world.
Further, just because the DM spent six months on the world doesn't mean that world isn't one big, neon middle finger to the players. A lot of DMs make a "game" when really, they should be writing a novel. In their world, if there are eleven classes, then there may as well eleven possible characters because of how much they've pinned them down in-world, and if you don't want to be one of those eleven characters and want to actually make something yourself, you're a horrible and selfish player who's trying to destroy all the DM's work, the entire world is populated by pet NPCs who are always better than you, always smarter than you, will automatically retroactively outwit you at every turn, whom you must obey at every turn, who you can never beat, never outshine, never defy, and never kill because that would make you an evil player trying to ruin the game for everyone, and you can never ever really do anything more influential than trundle around after the good guy pet NPCs (who are the only folks who stand a chance against the bad guy pet NPCs, of course), and slaughter mooks in their wake, assuming the NPCs don't just unmake them with a wave of their hand in case you might have been getting any kind of enjoyment at all out of the fight.
Yes, that DM did put in a lot of work, but she's still so very, very wrong.
The same is true for non-core rules. I spend a lot of time as GM working out my own campaign worlds so my players have a new world to explore and learn about. When it comes down to it, I have to get all that to fit into a framework inside the world I created for them to explore. If I can't, or I don't have time to do that and 12 other things, or if the crunch in the rules grate on my nerves like a violin bow on a bent sword, why is it somehow me being an ogre to say "I'm sorry Jim, I looked it over, and I just don't like the Moogryvator class. The mechanics make me want to yank my teeth out and shove them in my eyes. On top of that, they just don't fit in my world. Now, why did you like them? What was it about them that got you all excited? Let's see if we can get you some of what you liked without making me want to shove broken glass in my eyes. How about..."
"I'm not comfortable with the mechanics," or, "I don't have time to learn those rules," have already been acknowledged as valid reasons to ban a class, many many many times, and it is completely acceptable, so long as you're honest about it.
However, classes do not exist in the game world. They are a mechanical construct. It is impossible for a class to be inappropriate to a world. Only a character can be inappropriate. Or appropriate, as the case may be. The default fluff for Moogryvator may not be appropriate, but the default fluff counts for precisely jack. The character could well be perfectly appropriate, and use preexisting fluff that fits the world seamlessly.
A note on logic here. If you have three reasons for banning Moogryvator, let's say, "I'm not comfortable with the mechanics," "The mechanics are just too cumbersome," and, "It doesn't fit the fluff," and the third is not valid, you still have two perfectly good and acceptable reasons to ban the class.
If you have one reason for banning the Moogryvator, "The fluff doesn't fit the world," and the character utilizing the Moogryvator class isn't using the default Moogryvator fluff, but rather uses fluff appropriate to the world and the character, you actually have precisely zero reasons to ban the class, and it would be wrong to do so.
I've been noticing lately there is a group of people on the boards who, when they are not winning an argument they think they should, fall back to the 'Well you are just a bad GM then' argument. It's pretty annoying. These people have never sat in one of my games, have never explored a world I spent 6 months creating, have never talked to me about what they want to play, have never even met me, yet they seem to feel entitled to judge me and say I'm a bad GM because I don't agree with their pet philosophy or home rule or whatever other thing happens to be up for discussion.
Seriously, what hubris. And yes, this is the first post I've made on this thread (I think), but I still read people saying 'if you don't do it the way I say you are a bad GM' and since I don't do it their way, and don't agree with them, then that applies to me, yet they have no way nor right to judge until they have at the very least met me.
I haven't called anyone a bad DM. However, there is such a thing as bad DMing practices. And a good and enjoyable DM can have some very, very bad habits. Some DMs are enjoyable for their group simply because they're the only DM their group has ever had and they've always been the DM so nobody knows any better.
There are many cases that are possible, to the point where classifying them all would be impossible, but there's no such thing as a perfect DM, and a discussion of bad DMing habits does not mean everyone practicing those bad habits is necessarily a bad DM.
The mechanics can be viewed as part of the game world laws of physics. Notice I did not say must but can. As such, using a mechanic that is not considered part of the game world can be viewed as a violation of the game world. I'm not talking about names or descriptions, I'm talking about the actual stripped down mechanics.
Yes, you can treat the rules as the world's laws of physics, but I'm saying that's unnecessary conflation, and it's wrong. Yes, you can say that the only possible source of Barbarian Rage is the blessing of Hyurei, but it doesn't contribute anything to the game, and shackles the system in ways that impede its ability to serve.
What you call limiting character options, I call defining the world. You like the world painted in broad strokes, I like it defined in minute detail.
"All barbarians must be Barbarians," or putting a microscope on all the sorcerers to make sure they're using spell slots and not power points by the most minute and petty of evidence, is not a matter of defining the world.
I accept that you do not agree with or approve of this approach. I'm not saying your way of doing things is wrong. My issue is that you are presenting a case that your way is the only correct way and must be conformed to. It is one way, but it is not the only way. My problem is not with how you want the game to be run, but your insistence that running the game any other way is inherently wrong.
I'm willing to agree to disagree on preferred play style, but don't declare that a play style you don't agree with is inherently wrong.
I'm not saying my way is the only way. I understand and respect that there are many, many styles of game. However, there are about two things that I will decry as Doing It Wrong without hesitation. They are unnecessary conflation and usurping player control of their character without cause.
Unnecessary conflation in particular is an extremely poisonous idea that is far too widely accepted, has no basis in the rules, does not enrich the world, does not enhance gameplay, and is the real reason many are so jaded with class-based systems even though it has nothing to do with the system itself.
I am not saying that everyone who doesn't do things my way is wrong. I'm saying these two practices are inherently wrong, independent of style, that they are a plague, that they cheapen the system and poison the entire community; unnecessary conflation in particular is at the heart of many problems within the community at large.
I've been a player under a ham fisted railroading DM. Limiting class mechanic options for character creation is positively benign in my experience. If thats the worst you've had to endure, then consider yourself fortunate.
Oh, I've seen some doozies, I assure you. Doesn't make unnecessary conflation right.
You may want to study more history. It's amazing how much tyranny people will put up with if they consider it the lesser of two evils. In the case of tyrant DMs, the game you have, no matter how bad, may look better than no game at all.
And all it takes is one person standing up to start a revolution. All it takes is one person leaving the group to get others to start saying, "She's right, this isn't fun anymore, I'm gone."
No She's not -- at least of the Goddess of Song and Poetry in my world. If the expectations of the world are that a priestess of Lliira can do things a Bard can not, oh say raise the dead, no amount of bluster is going to make anyone think she is a priestess of Lliira. If "Priestesses of Lliira" are already established as capable of doing certain things that you're Bard can not, then your Bard is a counterfiet. A fraud. People notice these things :) Unless, of course the DM refits their world so that all priestesses of Lliira have the same limitations and abilities as your Bard. But you said you didn't require any changes in the DMs world. A priestess has ritual functions and abilities a Bard does not have (in my world). Your world may vary. Are some classes used in religious organizations in my world? Yes. The priests of the Horned God of the Hunt are all Rangers, not Clerics. Nobody expects them not to be Rangers. They fit the mold perfectly. A Cleric would not. The class abilities have to fit the expectations of the world (what you would call "fluff" and mechanics / crunch).
You're removing much of the purpose of using a priestess of Lliira in particular in the first place. Lliira is a very specific god, from a very specific setting, and invoking her specifically was a large part of the point, as a Bard priestess of Lliira is perfectly appropriate in regards to the goddess herself and the setting.
Also, when, as an established element of the setting, you start requiring a very specific class feature to attain a standard social position, particularly if it's a class feature that you're not even going to have until long after you acquire said station, you're getting into bad world design, and pretty much amounts to a flat refusal to work with the player. To say, "If you were a level 1 Cleric, you could be a priestess of Lliira, but because you're a level 1 Bard and you're not going to get Raise Dead in eight levels, you can't," is simply wrong.
When you get to the point where every member of an organization has to have a specific build path to be part, you're getting into bad design. It's a case of conflating the fluff and the mechanics in ways that cheapen the world and do not contribute to the game. That stifle the players, get in the way of valid characters that fit the world, and don't make for a richer experience.
Priests of the Horned God are not merely Rangers. That's unnecessary conflation. To disallow a Druid or a Spirit Shaman or a Savage Bard or one of the more mystical Barbarian variants, or any of many other possible builds that could meet the fluff as a priest of the Horned God simply because they're not Rangers is wrong, and a case of horrible design.
None of them however tried to redefine my world to suit their own wishes while insisting they knew it better than me. Good thing, because to be blunt -- they don't.
And I still ain't talking about redefining the world.
You have a monumental amount of arrogance and an inability to compromise that is unfortunate. If you were a potential player in my game I would have worked to find your Bard / preistess a role in the game world that fit it and your concepts and you would, apparently, say "no, that's not my conception". It's not just your game.
Yes, it is my game. And the DM's game. And the guy sitting next to me's game. It's the entire group's game, for everyone.
And this is all about working together. When the DM says, "No, you cannot be a cleric because you didn't take the Cleric class," the DM is obstructing the player without cause, without basis in the rules, and without contribution to the game. The DM is refusing to work with the player, and the DM is wrong.
As someone else said upthread, perhaps you like a world that is more open to interpretation than an established world is. Then you would be free, with the DM I imagine, to use whatever class fitted your conception of this priestess in this nascent world. Not all games are this open to interpretation. I've played in both kinds (although it's been 20+ years since I did anything but DM), and I've always adapted to the situation. It's always worked better that way.
Forgotten Realms is older than I am. It's extremely well-established and well-defined, and I'm willing to bet it's even more so than your own world. A Bard priestess of Lliira is still coherent with the setting and the world. A Psion sorcerer is still coherent with the setting and the world. A Warblade knight is still coherent with the setting and the world.
It's not a question of how defined or established the world might be. It's that the world is fluff, and the mechanics are not. That a character's metagame tags from class might not match their social status is not a snub of the setting or the world.
I think its more that he's referring to the eventual ability.
Except the game world doesn't ostensibly have the power of prophesy. To shoot down a concept over powers you won't get rather than powers you don't have is even worse.
Besides, Bards can raise the dead. And so can Beguilers and Wizards and any caster that gets at least sixth-level spells by level 18. The Extra Spell feat isn't constrained by class, so a Bard can pick that up at level 18, easy as pie.
One more point. If I have offended anyone in the heat of commenting, I apologize.
Oh, I'm quite enjoying myself, no worries.
If the party sold or used the scrolls, they could be replaced, but not as conveniently or easily as if they'd realized their significance in the first place. Which is as it should be for any benefit.
Or, you could acknowledge that there are multiple answers to any given problem. If you need to get past the sphere, summon an infernal black dragon to use its breath to melt through the wall and make a path around. If you need something inside the sphere, you could just brute force it. Buff someone's saves into godhood and have them just walk in the sphere. But any puzzle with only one solution is bad design.
For example, let's say I had a new campaign where I allowed spell-points. In such a campaign, it would be illogical for me to disallow psionics because it's a much easier analogue to fluff over. But at that point, there really isn't a reason to want psionics as the same thing can be achieved with minor tinkering to the spell-points system. But I would be more receptive to a request.
Except whether the mechanic is spell points or spell slots, the result is the same; people who throw fireballs and read minds. No one can see spell slots and power points and spell points in the world. Nitpicking over the accounting is petty.
Wizards MUST use a spellbook unless the DM changes the rules. That spellbook is part of the flavour and mechanics of the class. Any class that doesn't use a spellbook has a totally different flavour. That flavour cannot be rewritten without changing the rules. That's very different from saying a bard is a priest.
Sorcerers still don't need spellbooks.
The question the player should be asking themself is "why am I building a character concept around psionic mechanics when the DM has said no?"
This is not about building to the mechanics. It's just the opposite, in fact. The process is to create the character, and then represent them with the most appropriate mechanics. If those mechanics are psionics, then that's just what happens.
There are thousands of splatbooks published. None are conclusively "good" or "bad" so in the end those chosen to be a part of the game experience needs to either be a group or a DM decision, not solely the players.
It has to be a group decision. What's more, the decision to ban anything is always subject to the question, "Why?" If the answer is, "No X, because I don't want to deal with it," that's fine. However, if the reason is, "No X, because fluff," and your character can utilize X without contradicting the fluff, that means there is no reason to ban X. The only reason for banning it is fluff, and fluff is not an issue, therefore it is not banned, and to enforce the ban without reason is just plain wrong.
A psion can pretend to do the same thing, but destroy the spellbook and they are just as effective. Unless of course, the player is so attached to their concept that they actually roleplay the loss of the spellbook into character ineffectiveness.
Or, they can say beforehand, "Alright, all wizards rely on spellbooks in this world, my Psion is a wizard, therefore obviously she relies on her spellbook and isn't any use without it." It then carries the weight of rule.
No, I got that. I just don't buy that the DM has to accept such changes.
If the DM doesn't, she needs a reason first. And that reason must be valid.
The trouble is, if you put by-the-book Wizards in a game, and then over the next mountain you put "Psychic" which are Wizards in all but name, the moment the two subcultures meet, they're going to figure out they're the same damn class, and those chunks of rocks and those musty piles of dead leaves serve the same purpose, because the underlying metaphysics is exactly the same, even if their jargon and implementation varies.
That only happens if you're forcing the differences under a microscope and bestowing metagame knowledge of the class structure onto the NPCs. In which case, the trouble only exists because the DM has decided it exists. Otherwise, it's as simple as, "We learned in different places and honed different tricks through the same methods. Yay us."
There's a lot of presumption in that statement. Just as there is to say "a DM cannot ban a book because of flavour if the players can rewrite the flavour."
It is impossible to ban a book because of flavor, because flavor is not a part of the books, and the books do not bring the flavor. The players and the characters are what bring the flavor.
You know, my group started a campaign in my long-term homebrew setting not long ago. This is a setting I'm quite attached to, so naturally I'm careful about contradicting established "facts" about the game world.
When one of the players asked me, "What about character concepts/classes/deities/flavors that don't fit the setting?" I replied, "Then we'll simply assume that character is from off-world." Crisis averted. It occurred to me that any homebrew setting worth playing in has to be big enough to hold things other than just its creator's ego.
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Similarly, if you take the potion bottles marked DRINK ME and change them into cakes marked TASTE ME, they're still potions, and Brew Potion is the exact same feat even over the hill and through the woods its called Bake Cookie, and the Master Alchemist prestige class is now Master Keebler. Same mechanic, different skinning, but if the potion brewing witch met the cookie baking elf, after the initial shock they'd probably start trading recipes and form the Milk and Cookies guild. And if later on there's someone who does potions as magic apples? Same song, different day.
That's been my beef with the Item Crafting rules, since 3.0.
Abilities should be measured against each other by what they actually do in-game. Instead, the feats were divided by what shape the finished item was. Then, they trumped all those feats with a catch-all Craft Wondrous Item feat that could replicate the results of the other feats.
Because, really, what's the difference between a 'Wand of Spell X', and a 'Wondrous Stick of Spell X, with 50 charges'?
What's the difference betwen a masterwork sword, given a +1 bonus via Craft Magic Arms and Armour, and the same masterwork sword, given a permanent, use-activated Magic Weapon effect via Craft Wondrous Item?
Better to replace Scribe Scroll with 'Craft Caster-Only, Single-Use, Minor Magic Item', and add feats that increase the range and functionality of more mechanical effects.
Craft Universal-Use Item (to allow non-casters to use them),
Craft Charged Item, Craft Uses/day Item, Craft Permanent Item.
Craft Medium Magic Item and Craft Major Magic Item (for effects of level 4-6, and 7-9).
Then we can lose the ridiculous situation, where a caster had to be level 12 to make a Ring of Feather-Falling, when another caster has been making Propellor-Beany Hats of Feather-Falling since level 3, and Boots of Flying since level 5.
Again, this is about concepts and characters that do fit the world.
Further, just because the DM spent six months on the world doesn't mean that world isn't one big, neon middle finger to the players. A lot of DMs make a "game" when really, they should be writing a novel. In their world, if there are eleven classes, then there may as well eleven possible characters because of how much they've pinned them down in-world, and if you don't want to be one of those eleven characters and want to actually make something yourself, you're a horrible and selfish player who's trying to destroy all the DM's work, the entire world is populated by pet NPCs who are always better than you, always smarter than you, will automatically retroactively outwit you at every turn, whom you must obey at every turn, who you can never beat, never outshine, never defy, and never kill because that would make you an evil player trying to ruin the game for everyone, and you can never ever really do anything more influential than trundle around after the good guy pet NPCs (who are the only folks who stand a chance against the bad guy pet NPCs, of course), and slaughter mooks in their wake, assuming the NPCs don't just unmake them with a wave of their hand in case you might have been getting any kind of enjoyment at all out of the fight.
Yes, that DM did put in a lot of work, but she's still so very, very wrong.
Okay, Viletta, this is a straw man and you know it. There is a huge difference between a DM designing a world and a DM designing a world and populating it with Mary Sue NPCs, who are always better, stronger, prettier than all the PCs and have miraculous Santa Claus level foreknowledge of all the PCs secrets because there insane bleedover between NPC knowledge and DM knowledge.
Hell, there are DMs who could take a prepackaged fantasy world and allow in every book ever written and every home-brewed reskinned "engine" that any player damn well desired and the game would still suck if all the NPCs were unstoppable Mary Sues with Santa Claus level omniscience. And trust me, I've been in games exactly like this, so allowing whatever character classes the players desire is no proof against it.
For someone whose #1 sin is "conflation," conflating these two is....
Well, I'll leave it for you to finish the thought.
For someone whose #1 sin is "conflation," conflating these two is the height of hypocrisy.
There was not one whit of hypocrisy. The point was not, "Unnecessary conflation begets Mary Sues and Marty Stus," but that, "Just because the DM put a huge amount of work into the world doesn't mean they're not still wrong." Which is the point I was making with that example.
It's no more inappropriate than basing the possibility of being the clergy of a deity of joy, dance, and revelry on their ability to cast raise dead. The two have no connection whatsoever. Would you base the clergy of the deity of murder, rape, and slaughter on their ability to cast raise dead? It makes just as little sense and is just as close-minded.
If you caught it earlier, and I gather you didn't, the raise dead bit was just an obvious example of a power that Bard's don't have that priests (who are already hypothetically established in this game world as Clerics) do have. I wasn't trying to be specific, especially to someone elses conception of a deity. And besides, being able to restore the dance / song / poetry of life to a worshipper seems appropriate for a godess of joy / dance / revelry to me. Depends on the campaign / world / deity involved. In my world a Bard would be a lay preist of the Godess, with clergy carrying the ritual load. And the rituals would involve plenty of the right fluff. I'm not the one being close minded here.
Further, just because the DM spent six months on the world doesn't mean that world isn't one big, neon middle finger to the players. A lot of DMs make a "game" when really, they should be writing a novel. In their world, if there are eleven classes, then there may as well eleven possible characters because of how much they've pinned them down in-world, and if you don't want to be one of those eleven characters and want to actually make something yourself, you're a horrible and selfish player who's trying to destroy all the DM's work, the entire world is populated by pet NPCs who are always better than you, always smarter than you, will automatically retroactively outwit you at every turn, whom you must obey at every turn, who you can never beat, never outshine, never defy, and never kill because that would make you an evil player trying to ruin the game for everyone, and you can never ever really do anything more influential than trundle around after the good guy pet NPCs (who are the only folks who stand a chance against the bad guy pet NPCs, of course), and slaughter mooks in their wake, assuming the NPCs don't just unmake them with a wave of their hand in case you might have been getting any kind of enjoyment at all out of the fight.
Wow. That was awesome! (actually not being sarcastic - this is the best description of a neon middle finger I think I've ever read).
Needless to say though, I tend to agree with Kevin that this is a straw man.
I don't think anyone would disagree that this kind of game would suck for the players to play in (and I played very very briefly in one not even so bad as this). But I haven't interpreted anyone here to advocate such an unreasonable position. Just as I don't think I've seen anyone here seriously advocate a position that "Player desires for character creation are *always* right, and the DM is *always* wrong to deny what a player wants."
For someone whose #1 sin is "conflation," conflating these two is the height of hypocrisy.There was not one whit of hypocrisy. The point was not, "Unnecessary conflation begets Mary Sues and Marty Stus," but that, "Just because the DM put a huge amount of work into the world doesn't mean they're not still wrong." Which is the point I was making with that example.
It's still a straw man, because Mary Sues and Marty Stus can exist in worlds where the DM has done 0 worldbuilding, and there can likewise be properly done NPCs in worlds that have been hand built by the DM.
Your example is a straw man. It's the same as saying "Worldbuilding leads to cannibalism, and cannibalism is bad, and therefore worldbuilding is bad."
First off, it's a false assumption. Worldbuilding leads to neither cannibalism nor Mary Sues.
Second, worldbuilding is not an error. It's a beloved style of play for many groups and--it should come as no surprise--many published game worlds as well as published novels had their genesis in people's homebrewed worlds.
And the better novels do not have Mary Sues. Occasional cannibalism, but no Mary Sues.
+ a bunch to kyrt-ryder.
I think what alllll this boils down to is a difference in DMing philosophy. Some DMs see the world as their sandbox that they're letting the players play in, and some see it as a communal sandbox that everyone's playing in. Personally, I've always found that the DM and players telling a story together comes out infinitely better than the DM telling a story about the players.
Now as for the idea of a priestess of Llyra or whoever that goddess is being portrayed by a Bard, that makes reasonable sense for a character, or even an entire religion, though after a while people will start to notice that the priests of Llyra, while okay at minor healing, kind of suck at the big stuff, being unable to reattach severed limbs or raise the dead, and adventurers needing a Cleric will go to another temple.
There are a few problem with your argument against this, first off, characters aren't the norm. In fact they are specifically called out as to be the "special" ones, I've mentioned this before. They are the ones who are supposed to break the mold, do amazing things and stand out. Secondly just because the character is playing a bard and has a bard spell list doesn't mean all other priests of the faith follow the same path, the character may be the only "cleric" with bard abilities. This is so easily remedied in game as to be laughable. Either your character hasn't been granted the "expected" abilities by their god or it could be a simple matter of the PC character never wanting to use the ability. It is all FLUFF. The character's in game priest was granted such abilities as they had been and are out doing good (or bad) works in the name of their deity. That the mechanics say BARD, means absolutely nothing in game, the character is still a priest of god XYZ even though the expected abilities are not available, "Sister Sera is different" they proclaim.
That she can't use heavy armor - She chose to never studied the use of armor like that as she was busy working on the gifts granted to her by her deity. The requirements in game world being she prays to her god at a specific time and as long as she is in her gods good favour is granted abilities that are supernatural. The mechanics bear out with the character got rest and spent time on recouping the spells. The game world doesn't care or even know that the spells are spontaneously cast instead of chosen before use. You again are essentially falling into a meta game trap. You are giving npcs who should have absolutely no frikkin idea of what is happening some out of game knowledge. DM's get pissy when when players do that with their characters, it's okay that you do it though with every third npc though?Lastly, just because an ability is available does not mean it is common or has to be used. A "cleric" could go an entire career without casting a specific spell (and many often do so with more than one), the reasons being numerous. The world at large has no clue as to the abilities of the individual character and as such cannot judge them on those abilities, even though they have expectations. A simple "I don't want to cast that spell" covers the characters inability to do something, maybe they find the magic spell abhorrent, maybe the fell asleep that day in class, many many reasons justify that "in game." Just because it is available to most doesn't mean it has to be used as a measuring stick, nor should it. Toughness is available to all commoners from the point they are "born", does that mean because they don't have it they aren't commoners?
Mechanics represent how a character does something, his method. Defining how effects can be achieved is part of defining the game world. It can be established in a game world that the only method of spell casting is Vancian and that this is an element of the setting. Introducing a new method that was not currently in use is a retcon. It alters the setting.
By definition CORE or 3.X is not a vancian setting, it has bards and sorcerers. End of story. You cannot argue that a character using the psionic mechanics to represent a spontaneous spell caster should be excluded from a game world because of the "flavor of the world" when it has those concepts allowed with a previous mechanic. If you do you are flat out being arbitrary and or possibly lying about your reasoning.
If you were saying that the world only had "wizards" the psionic mechanics would still be an acceptable option as the character could spend an hour after rest going through a (mechanically unecessary) book, checking over all the spells they have access to so they can more easily bring them forth later in the day when they have need of them. Mechanically they are a psion and got their power points back after the rest period, fluff wise the world sees some person studying a spell book memorizing "stuff", the world keeps spinning on its axis and catastrophe averted - vancian criteria satisfied. Sure maybe some day someone goes through the book and can't figure heads from tails, but what did they expect? It was written in some sort of short hand that BoB the "wizard" made up because it made the rote learning easier to remember and allows him a tool to figure out new spells as time goes on. Heck, maybe BoB is actually so good with magic that he doesn't even need the book (but doesn't realize it) and keeps using it because that was what all the other wizards used. He might not ever even realize this unless someone steals the book, but he keeps the book locked up tight and safe just because it is supposed to have meaning and is important to him. Need I go further? Game world is divorced from mechanics, period.Just wanna point out that I completly agree with the idea of having the character concept done before the mechanics are taken into account. That way player and DM can work to make the character as close to the concept using the mechanics available. However that´s a very different thing from trying to make the character´s flavor (of the character and NPC around it) fit whatver mechanics the player feels like having.
The problem with that is, the mechanics that exist and may be in use are sometimes hardly sufficient. Lets go back to: I want to make the melee character who is master tactician who helps allies in combat and is no slouch in combat themselves. Okay what have we got in our CORE....
Oh look a fighter, lets see...
I can flank.
Well anyone can do that...
What else... 2 or 3 feats, huh...
Well I guess I could take levels of Fighter and Rogue and alternate them so I get damage when I'm flanking. Or I could take levels of Cleric and Fighter and get buff spells, but that really isn't what I had envisioned. Too much religion involved and I was envisioning more intelligence or combat savvy. Damn there is nothing there.
ToB - White Raven Tactics abilities. Hit the nail on the head.
The extra mechanics actually make the concept a possibility. Yeah you can shoe horn the stuff that exists but you would never ever actually get a viable character to fit the concept. Now you - the DM - are making the player take the square peg and jam it into the round hole for the sake of your world's "fluffy flavor" when the new mechanics wouldn't have had any impact on the world regardless anyways.
But once all that was done, if someone wanted to write up a character in it, I would not be allowing in a Vancian wizard or a psionic or any other magical system not established in the Potterverse, and I would strongly discourage anyone from trying to play a Muggle unless they had an extremely compelling reason and backstory.My point is that the mechanics need to reflect the world, and if they don't reflect the world, then they shouldn't be used.
There's also a certain amount of suspension of disbelief. A great deal of problems at Hogwart's could have been solved by Hermione bringing an AK47 back from the summer holidays, but Rowling didn't want to break that wall so I wouldn't either.
Read my post to you above, fluff is what fluff does, mechanics have no impact (I repeat - mechanics have no impact) on the game world at all. Sets of mechanics are completely and totally a meta game tool to deal with specific situations in this made up game world. You repeatedly ignore this fact.
You don't have a point because you have it backwards, the world is based on the mechanics. You wouldn't have spell casters with out the games mechanics for spell casters. You took the fluff and pasted it on the skeleton of the mechanics. This is what any campaign setting does when it is created for a certain rules system. All you did was strip away what fluff you didn't want in your world and replace it with the fluff you wanted. Now a player comes along and says I want to do the same thing, I want to use these mechanics which compare with these existing mechanics in the world that is published with this fluff. You are complaining about the fluff not matching and saying that the fluff has some sort of direct correlation, even after you just got done doing the exact same thing with your game world you are saying can't be done with the mechanics they want to use. Do you see what you are doing there? The mechanics aren't the problem, you are.
As for suspension of disbelief, we are talking about a game world where magic exists... What makes the fluff of a sorcerer spontaneous casting more or less believable than that of a re-fluffed psion? What makes one magical effect "right" and one magical effect "wrong" in a non-arbitrary manner? We are WAY past what nit picks anyone may have about the two systems mechanically as in game world, it is all "magic." By virtue of having magic in the game world anything is possible as magic has that oh so wonderful tendency to break all barriers and limits and make the unbelievable believable.
I'm perfectly willing to make accommodations in my world(s) if someone wants to play a certain type of character I hadn't considered before, but if the character absolutely does not fit and inclusion would wreck the world, then it doesn't go in.
No character could ever wreck the world, ever, magic is involved, anything is possible. You decided to open that door when you created the campaign, you willfully included it.
However if it is given as a fact that all casters in the game world use the Vancian mechanic, then that does logically result in all spell casters in that world are Vancian casters.I acknowledge the first, yet you are willfully ignoring that the DM has the ability to establish the second as a fact for the world they are running.
Vancian magic is fluff, it is based on fluff from a book, it was given a mechanic that has been used repeatedly over the last umpteen years. As such the mechanics for spell casting could be absolutely anything and still be seen as vancian in game because of the fluff the player decides to use with it, see my psion example earlier in the post. Also, again, there is no "vancian magic only world" possible when using 3.x and included classes as the rules include non-vancian casting. Apparently you are willfully ignoring that. By using the mechanics for 3.x and including certain classes the DM no longer has the right to restrict things in a manner such as "It's okay for these spontaneous casting classes but not these" logically.
Now as for the idea of a priestess of Llyra or whoever that goddess is being portrayed by a Bard, that makes reasonable sense for a character, or even an entire religion, though after a while people will start to notice that the priests of Llyra, while okay at minor healing, kind of suck at the big stuff, being unable to reattach severed limbs or raise the dead, and adventurers needing a Cleric will go to another temple.
There are a few problem with your argument against this, first off, characters aren't the norm. In fact they are specifically called out as to be the "special" ones, I've mentioned this before. They are the ones who are supposed to break the mold, do amazing things and stand out. Secondly just because the character is playing a bard and has a bard spell list doesn't mean all other priests of the faith follow the same path, the character may be the only "cleric" with bard abilities. This is so easily remedied in game as to be laughable. Either your character hasn't been granted the "expected" abilities by their god or it could be a simple matter of the PC character never wanting to use the ability. It is all FLUFF. The character's in game priest was granted such abilities as they had been and are out doing good (or bad) works in the name of their deity. That the mechanics say BARD, means absolutely nothing in game, the character is still a priest of god XYZ even though the expected abilities are not available, "Sister Sera is different" they proclaim.
That she can't use heavy armor - She chose to never studied the use of armor like that as she was busy working on the gifts granted to her by her deity. The requirements in game world being she prays to her god at a specific time and as long as she is in her gods good favour is granted abilities that are supernatural. The mechanics bear out with the character got rest and spent time on recouping the spells. The game world doesn't care or even know that the spells are spontaneously cast instead of chosen in before use. You again are essentially fallinging into a meta game trap. You are giving npcs who should have absolutely no frikkin idea of what is happening out of game knowledge. DM's get pissy when when players do that with their characters, it's okay that you do it though with every third npc though?Lastly, just because an ability is available does not mean it is common or has to be used. A "cleric" could go an entire career without casting a specific spell (and many often do so with more than one), the reasons being numerous. The world at large has no clue as to the abilities of the individual character and as such cannot judge them on those abilities, even though they have expectations. A simple "I don't want to cast that spell" covers the characters inability to do something, maybe they find the magic spell abhorrent, maybe the fell asleep that day in class, many many reasons justify that "in game." Just because it is available to most doesn't mean it has to be used as a measuring stick, nor should it. Toughness is available to all commoners from the point they are "born", does that mean because they don't have it they aren't commoners?
Mechanics represent how a character does something, his method. Defining how effects can be achieved is part of defining the game world. It can be established in a game world that the only method of spell casting is Vancian and that this is an element of the setting. Introducing a new method that was not currently in use is a retcon. It alters the setting.
By definition CORE or 3.X is not a vancian setting, it has bards and sorcerers. End of story. You cannot argue that a character using the psionic mechanics to represent a spontaneous spell caster should be excluded from a game world because of the "flavor of the world" when it has those concepts allowed with a previous mechanic. If you do you are flat out being arbitrary and or possibly lying about your reasoning.
If you were saying that the world only had "wizards" the psionic mechanics would still be an acceptable option as the character could spend an hour after rest going through a (mechanically unecessary) book, checking over all the spells they have access to so they can more easily bring them forth later in the day when they have need of them. Mechanically they are a psion and got their power points back after the rest period, fluff wise the world sees some person studying a spell book memorizing "stuff", the world keeps spinning on its axis and catastrophe averted - vancian criteria satisfied. Sure maybe some day someone goes through the book and can't figure heads from tails, but what did they expect? It was written in some sort of short hand that BoB the "wizard" made up because it made the rote learning easier to remember and allows him a tool to figure out new spells as time goes on. Heck, maybe BoB is actually so good with magic that he doesn't even need the book (but doesn't realize it) and keeps using it because that was what all the other wizards used. He might not ever even realize this unless someone steals the book, but he keeps the book locked up tight and safe just because it is supposed to have meaning and is important to him. Need I go further? Game world is divorced from mechanics, period.Just wanna point out that I completly agree with the idea of having the character concept done before the mechanics are taken into account. That way player and DM can work to make the character as close to the concept using the mechanics available. However that´s a very different thing from trying to make the character´s flavor (of the character and NPC around it) fit whatver mechanics the player feels like having.
The problem with that is, the mechanics that exist and may be in use are sometimes hardly sufficient. Lets go back to: I want to make the melee character who is master tactician who helps allies in combat and is no slouch in combat themselves. Okay what have we got in our CORE....
Oh look a fighter, lets see...
I can flank.
Well anyone can do that...
What else... 2 or 3 feats, huh...
Well I guess I could take levels of Fighter and Rogue and alternate them so I get damage when I'm flanking. Or I could take levels of Cleric and Fighter and get buff spells, but that really isn't what I had envisioned. Too much religion involved and I was envisioning more intelligence or combat savvy. Damn there is nothing there.
ToB - White Raven Tactics abilities. Hit the nail on the head.
The extra mechanics actually make the concept a possibility. Yeah you can shoe horn the stuff that exists but you would never ever actually get a viable character to fit the concept. Now you - the DM - are making the player take the square peg and jam it into the round hole for the sake of your world's "fluffy flavor" when the new mechanics wouldn't have had any impact on the world regardless anyways.
But once all that was done, if someone wanted to write up a character in it, I would not be allowing in a Vancian wizard or a psionic or any other magical system not established in the Potterverse, and I would strongly discourage anyone from trying to play a Muggle unless they had an extremely compelling reason and backstory.My point is that the mechanics need to reflect the world, and if they don't reflect the world, then they shouldn't be used.
There's also a certain amount of suspension of disbelief. A great deal of problems at Hogwart's could have been solved by Hermione bringing an AK47 back from the summer holidays, but Rowling didn't want to break that wall so I wouldn't either.
Read my post to you above, fluff is what fluff does, mechanics have no impact (I repeat - mechanics have no impact) on the game world at all. Sets of mechanics are completely and totally a meta game tool to deal with specific situations in this made up game world. You repeatedly ignore this fact.
You don't have a point because you have it backwards, the world is based on the mechanics. You wouldn't have spell casters with out the games mechanics for spell casters. You took the fluff and pasted it on the skeleton of the mechanics. This is what any campaign setting does when it is created for a certain rules system. All you did was strip away what fluff you didn't want in your world and replace it with the fluff you wanted. Now a player comes along and says I want to do the same thing, I want to use these mechanics which compare with these existing mechanics in the world that is published with this fluff. You are complaining about the fluff not matching and saying that the fluff has some sort of direct correlation, even after you just got done doing the exact same thing with your game world you are saying can't be done with the mechanics they want to use. Do you see what you are doing there? The mechanics aren't the problem, you are.
As for suspension of disbelief, we are talking about a game world where magic exists... What makes the fluff of a sorcerer spontaneous casting more or less believable than that of a re-fluffed psion? What makes one magical effect "right" and one magical effect "wrong" in a non-arbitrary manner? We are WAY past what nit picks anyone may have about the two systems mechanically as in game world, it is all "magic." By virtue of having magic in the game world anything is possible as magic has that oh so wonderful tendency to break all barriers and limits and make the unbelievable believable.
I'm perfectly willing to make accommodations in my world(s) if someone wants to play a certain type of character I hadn't considered before, but if the character absolutely does not fit and inclusion would wreck the world, then it doesn't go in.
No character could ever wreck the world, ever, magic is involved, anything is possible. You decided to open that door when you created the campaign, you willfully included it.
However if it is given as a fact that all casters in the game world use the Vancian mechanic, then that does logically result in all spell casters in that world are Vancian casters.I acknowledge the first, yet you are willfully ignoring that the DM has the ability to establish the second as a fact for the world they are running.
Vancian magic is fluff, it is based on fluff from a book, it was given a mechanic that has been used repeatedly over the last umpteen years. As such the mechanics for spell casting could be absolutely anything and still be seen as vancian in game because of the fluff the player decides to use with it, see my psion example earlier in the post. Also, again, there is no "vancian magic only world" possible when using 3.x as the rules include non-vancian casting. Apparently you are willfully ignoring that. By using the mechanics for 3.x and including certain classes the DM no longer has the right to restrict things in such a manner.
If the mechanics are not part of the game world, but they are part of the character, then the character is not part of the game world.IF B is not a part of A.
AND
IF B is a part of C.
THEN B is not a part of A.
Q.E.D.
This attempt at logic is so flawed as to be... I honestly can't believe you wrote it out actually.
Then why can you not use another mechanic to represent your character instead of insisting on the one the DM objects to?
Because the mechanics that exist are maybe too general or too limited to be able to create all concepts viably? It is why house rules exist is it not? No system is without its flaws, mechanics are constantly being created, recreated, scrapped or brought back from the circular bin. When a mechanic can do something better than another but is not unbalancing why would you not use the best tool for the project? Fluff? Fluff is easy, fluff can be rewritten, fluff can be retconned. Good mechanics are much harder to find.
You are so focused on "MY Character" that you aren't considering what the DM wants. DMs who are not happy stop running games. While most games/groups can survive losing a player, few can survive losing a DM.
Not even close, what the DM wants is conformity to the custom fluffed world they envisioned. Regardless of whether they actually grabbed those rules from someplace else and filed off the serial numbers, slapped a new coat of paint on it and added a few new frills to say "this is mine." These new mechanics can be give the exact same treatment to conform, saying they can't is just plain being ignorant. The core rules were refluffed, how are these other mechanics any different? "Because I said so" isn't good enough, I'd rather go play a MMORPG than deal with an arbitrary DM, at least then I know when I should bend over and kiss my behind good bye. At least the MMORPG is consistent and less frustrating.
The mechanics can be viewed as part of the game world laws of physics. Notice I did not say must but can. As such, using a mechanic that is not considered part of the game world can be viewed as a violation of the game world. I'm not talking about names or descriptions, I'm talking about the actual stripped down mechanics.
Mechanics exist outside the realm of the game, they are not a part of the game world. Case in point, the srd rules say you can use the spell point system instead of the core spellcasting system. That the srd states these mechanics are as good as the existing mechanics in core and that there is no mention of fluff change with such a change of mechanics clearly shows without a doubt that mechanics are in no way, shape or form, mystically linked to the fluffy flavor of the campaign setting.
I've spent 34 years developing my campaign world. I've used it since I first played D&D. .... You have a monumental amount of arrogance and an inability to compromise that is unfortunate. If you were a potential player in my game I would have worked to find your Bard / preistess a role in the game world that fit it and your concepts and you would, apparently, say "no, that's not my conception". It's not just your game. The DM, most of all for the effort, creativity and time put into it, and the other players as well, have a claim on it too. If I may be so quaint, I have a responsibility to be true to it and the players that have spent literally thousands of hours enjoying it. Above all, it's a joint effort, not a stage for a monologue. You seem to accuse "some DMs" of being inflexible and domineering even while expressing these same traits yourself. Maybe I'm wrong about this. I would hope so.
To be quite blunt, I really hope you don't take this personally as it isn't meant to be, just because you do something for a long time doesn't mean you are doing it well. Also for as much arrogance as you are claiming the person you are calling out might have, you are showing as much, if not more with the majority of your post.
*edit* In my opinion it would be easier to redefine the fluff of the Cleric to be more involved in song and poetry, retaining the ability of the Cleric to do what they are, previously, presumed to be able to do. Requiring them to take appropriate performance skills, perform publicly in rituals, using only spells with verbal components (maybe somantic / dance like moves too), etc.
Um, this actually sounds like much more work for both the DM and the player than saying "Sister Sera is a priestess (meta game bard) of the clergy, she has been touched by our goddess in a way unlike others of our faith have" and letting it be at that. Simple, yet elegant fix and the fluff goes from there.
Finally, as much as Viletta is dismissing it, some game mechanics do have in-game consequences.Wizards MUST use a spellbook unless the DM changes the rules. That spellbook is part of the flavour and mechanics of the class. Any class that doesn't use a spellbook has a totally different flavour. That flavour cannot be rewritten without changing the rules. That's very different from saying a bard is a priest.
He/She isn't saying they don't, what they are saying is in cases where the mechanics don't completely contradict the fluff they should be allowed to be implemented.
Using your example:
A psion being portrayed as a wizard CAN use the book as a prop in game. The fluff in game is being conformed to even though the mechanics don't require it. The in game people don't know the book is useless, the character doesn't think the book is useless. I covered this further up my post in more detail. The rules say the wizard class has to use the book, that is all. If the fluff of the world is "wizards are people who cast magic" and "all people who cast magic read a book" the psion can do so without regards to the mechanics contradicting it and therefore conforms to the fluff of the world. The flavor is intact, the mechanics are in use and the rules haven't been changed at all. Meta game says there is a difference between the warrior class and the fighter class, in game they are virtually interchangeable, the differences being so slight as to be indestiguishable from each other in game. The actual differences are things that could easily be differences between two people who chose different things, but yet there are two different meta game mechanics for the same intended result, someone who fights. The precedent is there, in CORE, for doing exactly what you disagree with doing by CORE.
For someone whose #1 sin is "conflation," conflating these two is the height of hypocrisy.
Kinda like complaining about how psions flavor is completely contradictory to your world due to vancian casting yet allowing sorcerers? Wait, that doesn't even compare.
The point of the post you had quoted is still that the npcs in your world would never ever get the kind of knowledge that would allow them to tell the difference between the two in game. Nor would the vast majority be inclined to look for those differences. "No spell book, glowies, huh just another sorcerer..." the old farmer says. And even if they did, lets say because some power had been used that didn't have a similar counterpart in the spell list (unlikely given the amount of spells produced), it would be trivial to make the spell up, the hard work was already done for you. Have them study/research it with the sorcerer(meta game psion) and viola! Magic spell for them spell slot users.
Yeah, the player's not always right, and the DM isn't always wrong, but, at least the way I see it, it's the DM's responsibility to try to bring the player's ideas to life in the best, most effective (without being game-breakingly effective) way possible.
For example, I typically tend to run a high fantasy game, without any major tech. When a player came to me and told me he wanted to run a 'fighter pilot' I did everything in my power to help him do just that, eventually building into the dragonlance dragon rider prestige class (As a halfling with a medium sized dragon, I think it was silver but I'm not 100% sure) with a mounted, Great-Crossbow that used a belt feed (and was eventually magically enhanced to fire multiple bolts at once)
Sure it was weird, and it didn't really mesh with the world or the party perfectly, but gosh those dogfights were fun. And the times when the party would get pinned down and he'd go on a strafing run.
good times.
That is absolutely reasonable.
It is also reasonably the player's responsibility to try to work within the DM's ideas.
The example you give seems like a reasonable compromise- if everyone was happy with it - and actually to me it sounds like fun!
But again, I don't see anyone advocating unreasonable positions - what works as a reasonable compromise for one group may not for another.
Straw men don't add much to help delineate the boundaries of reasonable compromises (though in this case, it was at least fun to read). Neither do comments like mine necessarily, that no one is really being unreasonable - this is also hopefully obvious.
Mechanics exist outside the realm of the game, they are not a part of the game world.
Some mechanics do indeed influence the game world overtly -- but these are underlying system mechanics, not character-building mechanics.
Falling damage being unable to cripple or kill comes immediately to mind. Direct hits from crossbow bolts fired point-blank being unable kill anyone who is awake, is another one. Inability to disrupt spells being cast, etc... These things create actual physical limitations on what people can do, and you can cover them with "fluff" all you like to try and hide them, but they keep peeking out from around the edges.
If game world "A" has instant-death rules all over the place, and mechanics that restrict everyone to 1 HD, and world "B" has standard D&D hp and damage mechanics, then world "A" is by its very nature more deadly than world "B," and no amount of fluff will conceal that fact for very long. And if you turn around and swap the mechanics used one day, then all of the sudden, both worlds have enormous internal consistency issues that no amount of fluff will successfully cover over.
I played a single campaign, with a relatively-consistent world, through Basic, 1e, 2e, proto-Hero, 3.5, and total homebrew rules. For the most part, the systems have analogous loopholes that allowed me to maintain an illusion of consistency despite the rules changes. Some things, like the ones mentioned above, could not be adequately covered up by fluff, however, and they remained glaring cracks in the edges of world verisimilitude.
No character could ever wreck the world, ever, magic is involved, anything is possible. You decided to open that door when you created the campaign, you willfully included it.
In short order:
No.
No.
No.
And NO!
In long form:
1. "No character could ever wreck the world"
Sure they could.
Stick The Terminator into the Harry Potter universe.
Put The Alien from the Alien movies into Pride & Prejudice.
Try to maintain an aura of darkening horror in a game based on Shadow over Innsmouth when Mary Poppins shows up, with all the magical powers, as well as a large-breasted anime cat girl and Ash from the Evil Dead series.
2. "magic is involved, anything is possible"
Only if there's an incompetent world designer who uses "magic" as an excuse for "handwavium" and doesn't set laws and limitations for his own magic system and follow them.
3. "You decided to open that door when you created the campaign"
My campaign has a sign that reads "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone."
That includes cat girls. Usually.
Sue me if you don't like it.
4. "you willfully included it"
False. I willfully disincluded it, along with a whole lot of other things. Magic working certain ways. For example, genie stating "No wishes to bring someone back from the dead or to fall in love with you." Why not, isn't he an omnipotent genie? No, not for that movie. Them's the rules for "Aladdin," and so long as they're internally consistent, they're good.
Wow. That was awesome! (actually not being sarcastic - this is the best description of a neon middle finger I think I've ever read).
I wasn't aware there was a whole lot of competition there. ^^U
I don't think anyone would disagree that this kind of game would suck for the players to play in (and I played very very briefly in one not even so bad as this). But I haven't interpreted anyone here to advocate such an unreasonable position. Just as I don't think I've seen anyone here seriously advocate a position that "Player desires for character creation are *always* right, and the DM is *always* wrong to deny what a player wants."
Second, worldbuilding is not an error. It's a beloved style of play for many groups and--it should come as no surprise--many published game worlds as well as published novels had their genesis in people's homebrewed worlds.
Y'all misunderstand. My point is not that anyone is advocating photocopying Elminster a hundred times and making that the entire population of the world, or that world building is bad and leads to tyrants.
The point that I was rebutting was that the DM put in all these months of work and is the ultimate authority the players have no right to defy her. My rebut is that just because the DM put in all that work does not mean the DM is right. The neon finger DM certainly put in a lot of work, but is very much wrong.
My point is that a DM is wrong... when the DM is wrong. Whether they put in huge amounts of work up front, or whether they do it completely improv. Likewise, the DM is right when the DM is right. The amount of work they put in doesn't make it any less wrong when the DM is unnecessarily conflating fluff and mechanics, or usurping the players' control of their characters without cause, or generally giving the players the finger.
Try to maintain an aura of darkening horror in a game based on Shadow over Innsmouth when Mary Poppins shows up, with all the magical powers, as well as a large-breasted anime cat girl and Ash from the Evil Dead series.
I fail to see the problem, except from the standpoint of a DM who wants to dictate who the main characters are. So Mary Poppins has a sense of humor and is cute? If her magic follows actual rules that are at all balanced against the Dagon cultists' magic rules, then mechanical incompaitibility isn't the issue. It's her personality -- which is the player's call, not the DM's. On the other hand, if her magic follows grossly different rules that don't play well with the magic cultists' rules, then you're banning a mechanic for mechanical reasons, rather than for fluff reasons, and all is well. Cat girl? If BESM cat-girl rules are reasonably balanced against fish-people rules, then pretend the cat-girl is human and just has annoying anime catgirl-like mannerisms. Ash? What's the problem? Chainsaws are consistent with an Innsmouth setting. Or is it because he refuses to just lie down and let the monsters eat him? Well, unless you have insanity rules that force him to do otherwise, his personality and reaction to stress is the player's purview, not yours.
The DM controls the setting. Any DM who also wants to dictate the PCs' personalities is grossly overstepping his bounds, in my opinion. If your Innsmouth setting requires characters exactly like Lovecraft's, and won't tolerate any other personalities, then you're better off writing fan fiction, rather than trying to run a supposedly interactive game.
How do you find the time? Well, I'll restrict myself to the more specific, to me, parts of your post.
You're removing much of the purpose of using a priestess of Lliira in particular in the first place. Lliira is a very specific god, from a very specific setting, and invoking her specifically was a large part of the point, as a Bard priestess of Lliira is perfectly appropriate in regards to the goddess herself and the setting.
Which I'm not familiar with. I've always run my own world (since 1974). The last commercial setting I played in was Greyhawk. I gather this is Forgotten Realms... never played in it. So I missed that part of your point. My objection was to shoe horning a Bard into just any role (that might already be expected to be a Cleric), not using it in an appropriate spot.
Also, when, as an established element of the setting, you start requiring a very specific class feature to attain a standard social position, particularly if it's a class feature that you're not even going to have until long after you acquire said station, you're getting into bad world design, and pretty much amounts to a flat refusal to work with the player. To say, "If you were a level 1 Cleric, you could be a priestess of Lliira, but because you're a level 1 Bard and you're not going to get Raise Dead in eight levels, you can't," is simply wrong.
No. If I want to be a civil engineer or a Roman Catholic Priest, they require specific educational / experiential backgrounds. I can't say, but look "I have a degree in chemistry, why can't I be a civil engineer?", or "Why won't you ordain me, I'm Catholic and seminary is too boring". Doesn't work. The player has to work with the DM to fit the role he wants. Again, it's a two way street. The DM shouldn't rule out what fits and the player shouldn't try to make a square peg fit a round hole either.
When you get to the point where every member of an organization has to have a specific build path to be part, you're getting into bad design. It's a case of conflating the fluff and the mechanics in ways that cheapen the world and do not contribute to the game. That stifle the players, get in the way of valid characters that fit the world, and don't make for a richer experience.Priests of the Horned God are not merely Rangers. That's unnecessary conflation. To disallow a Druid or a Spirit Shaman or a Savage Bard or one of the more mystical Barbarian variants, or any of many other possible builds that could meet the fluff as a priest of the Horned God simply because they're not Rangers is wrong, and a case of horrible design.
This time you're the one unfamiliar with the expectations of the class. My Horned God probably differs significantly from what you're thinking of. It's a lodge, a secret society deeply involved with the hunt. initiates are raised in the lodge with a specific skill set to do specific tasks in the world. There are other gods involved with other aspects of nature etc. who aren't so specific. Sorry, I should have provided more background on it. As for the "horrible design" -- no. It works fine for what it is and is supposed to be.
And I still ain't talking about redefining the world.
I think you are. Not just the game, but the style as well. Because after all. if someone doesn't agree with you they're a bad DM. Oh, sorry, not a bad DM, just making "bad decisions" or using "horrible design". You like to infer without directly attacking. Doesn't change the jist of it I guess. Doesn't bother me either btw, it's all part of the discussion. But I'm sure others are taking it more personally.
Yes, it is my game. And the DM's game. And the guy sitting next to me's game. It's the entire group's game, for everyone.And this is all about working together. When the DM says, "No, you cannot be a cleric because you didn't take the Cleric class," the DM is obstructing the player without cause, without basis in the rules, and without contribution to the game. The DM is refusing to work with the player, and the DM is wrong.
No the Dms not, really. You place the onus on the DM. I think it belongs to both the player and the DM. Incidentally, I hope your next surgeon is a surgeon, not somebody who thinks they can be one because the "DM is wrong". The roles and the expectations of those roles are part of the game world (or the real world). The skill sets for some (but not all) things can be very specific.
Forgotten Realms is older than I am. It's extremely well-established and well-defined, and I'm willing to bet it's even more so than your own world. A Bard priestess of Lliira is still coherent with the setting and the world. A Psion sorcerer is still coherent with the setting and the world. A Warblade knight is still coherent with the setting and the world.It's not a question of how defined or established the world might be. It's that the world is fluff, and the mechanics are not. That a character's metagame tags from class might not match their social status is not a snub of the setting or the world.
Mine is older, actually. At least based on the publication of the Forgotten Realms. Still, I'm sure it was a well established game before it was published, so we'll call it even :) My world started out as a setting for the Chainmail fantasy supplement in about 1973. We played an enhanced version of those rules and had a blast. I made it into a D&D world when those rules first came out. The Forgotten Realms have certainly had more people writing up material for it. I'm not familiar with the setting, except in the most casual way, but I have seen a ton of books / info out for it and given it's popularity and the quality of what little of it I'm familiar with, I'm sure it's a good setting.
I see "fluff" and "mechanics" as intertwined to deliver a world and an experience. You don't. No problem. It's a difference of philosophy and style.
Besides, Bards can raise the dead. And so can Beguilers and Wizards and any caster that gets at least sixth-level spells by level 18. The Extra Spell feat isn't constrained by class, so a Bard can pick that up at level 18, easy as pie.
You're missing the point. That was an example, chosen beacuse it was obvious and easily understood. There are numerous things that are different in the skill sets of a Bard and a Cleric. You can patch one, but fixing them all? More difficult (without multi-classing). A Bard can't mimic a Cleric perfectly -- or as close as a given specific role may require -- and vice versa. If the given role has requirements that can be met by multiple classes (or some combination of classes) fine, no harm, no foul. A bard, without multi-classing couldn't do that in my world. Different world -- maybe. Depends on the setting / world and the requirements for that role in that world.
Oh, I'm quite enjoying myself, no worries.
So I gathered :D Nothing like a good discussion to get ideas moving around. You have me lookng over parts of my world and that's good.
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I think the best way to understand this whole freaking thing is to look at that example presented earlier about the dragon riding halfling.
Followign the logic of those who advocate that fluff is ALWAYS maleable with EVERY MECHANIC AVAILABLE, the result would have been the player using some random d20 modern "refluffed' class because the mechanics fit whatever it is the player wanted to do.
On the other hand if the DM was some tyrannic unreasonable bastard he wuld ave just said NO, GO AWAY and be done with it.
However in this cas both player and DM agreed that a full blown mechanical hijack of the worl would be too much, and an outright ban of the concept would also be wrong. And for what i read the compromise reached was great.
As a personal example i ran a while ago a south american mythology themed game using an ability burn magic system (almost vancian). And so the player using a ranger wanted to be a cruzader, however the abilities the full blown crusader got were too exotic and flashy compared to the power every other non magic user had in the world. So what i did was allow him to take maneuvers through martial study by using is BAB as initiator level. Done and everyone happy.
Point being, not every mechanic fits every world's fluff, but banning something outrght because it might be a little different is also going too far.
Followign the logic of those who advocate that fluff is ALWAYS maleable with EVERY MECHANIC AVAILABLE, the result would have been the player using some random d20 modern "refluffed' class because the mechanics fit whatever it is the player wanted to do.
Incorrect. D20 modern is a different ruleset and not very compatible with D&D. It'd take a lot more than a refluff to make a d20 modern class work in D&D.
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psionics and magic also use a very different system (thou not as much so), but apparently that's not an obstacle to try to pass a psion as a sorcerer.
So I guess you'll have to get some kind of arbiter that decides whch mechanics are allowed and which aren't. I guess I'll call that person something like Surgen Master, or no better Dungeon Master. Yes that sounds good.
psionics and magic also use a very different system (thou not as much so), but apparently that's not an obstacle to try to pass a psion as a sorcerer.
Psion vs Sorcerer are both using rules from the same game.
Sorcerer vs d20 Modern Mage are using rules from two different games.
Stop the straw men. You're not convincing anyone of anything except you of your own cleverness.
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Ok it might have been an exageration. However I think the example presented by the mentioned post was a good one of player and DM going out of their way to make the game enjoyable for both. Which is the ideal situation to be honest.
But if you disagree that both DM and player relenting a little bit on their ideas and find a middle point is the best course of action then please say so.
Wow. That was awesome! (actually not being sarcastic - this is the best description of a neon middle finger I think I've ever read).I wasn't aware there was a whole lot of competition there. ^^U
Ok, "best", "only" - it'll be hard to top.
I don't think anyone would disagree that this kind of game would suck for the players to play in (and I played very very briefly in one not even so bad as this). But I haven't interpreted anyone here to advocate such an unreasonable position. Just as I don't think I've seen anyone here seriously advocate a position that "Player desires for character creation are *always* right, and the DM is *always* wrong to deny what a player wants."Second, worldbuilding is not an error. It's a beloved style of play for many groups and--it should come as no surprise--many published game worlds as well as published novels had their genesis in people's homebrewed worlds.Y'all misunderstand. My point is not that anyone is advocating photocopying Elminster a hundred times and making that the entire population of the world, or that world building is bad and leads to tyrants.
The point that I was rebutting was that the DM put in all these months of work and is the ultimate authority the players have no right to defy her. My rebut is that just because the DM put in all that work does not mean the DM is right. The neon finger DM certainly put in a lot of work, but is very much wrong.
My point is that a DM is wrong... when the DM is wrong. Whether they put in huge amounts of work up front, or whether they do it completely improv. Likewise, the DM is right when the DM is right. The amount of work they put in doesn't make it any less wrong when the DM is unnecessarily conflating fluff and mechanics, or usurping the players' control of their characters without cause, or generally giving the players the finger.
I got the point - I just don't see why you needed to make it. I don't think anyone actually advocated that the DM is the "...ultimate authority and the players have no right to defy..."
You've pushed an argument to an unreasonable extreme and then rebutted that extreme. I certainly wouldn't argue your rebuttal of that extreme, but as a rebuttal of a more nuanced point it doesn't work.
Your point that "work makes right" isn't true is well taken (though I'm not sure I've seen anyone make this extreme case either). Putting a lot of work into something does not mean that it must be right, but as it represents an investment of time and effort, it should at least be considered along with everything else.
Which I'm not familiar with. I've always run my own world (since 1974). The last commercial setting I played in was Greyhawk. I gather this is Forgotten Realms... never played in it. So I missed that part of your point. My objection was to shoe horning a Bard into just any role (that might already be expected to be a Cleric), not using it in an appropriate spot.
The entire point is that the Bard is the more appropriate class, and to use Cleric instead is what would be shoehorning. And just because there are OoC expectations, like all priests will be Clerics, does not mean that those expectations are reasonable. Tradition does not hold the weight of law, and forcing tradition on players with the weight of law is simply unreasonable.
When I ask myself what is appropriate for my priestess of Lliira (and not that "appropriate" includes considerations of her station), I see a woman who is clever and charming and graceful, who can sing, and dance, who of course can tend to wounds, which bard spells can do, and bestow blessings, which Bardic Music can represent very well. I don't see her in heavy armor, and wearing armor at all is iffy. Turning doesn't really advance the concept at all, as Lliira doesn't really care about the undead. The Cleric skill list doesn't really fit, the kinds of stats a Cleric requires don't cater to the need for decent intelligence to get those 2+ skill points to mean much. If she's a Bard, her casting won't be as advanced as a Cleric of the same level, but there is no in-game concept of level anyways, and the Bard list has a better representation for the kind of charm and mind effects (and music effects) that logically follows from a god of dance and joy, and what's more, I don't want my priestess of Lliira to have the high-end magic effects, and they're not necessary for clergy. After all, eight levels of Cleric already can't cast Raise Dead, so how is it a problem that the priestess of Lliira can't after twenty levels? How is she any less of a priestess than those level 8 and under Clerics?
In all ways, the Bard is the superior representation, the natural and logical fit, rather than Cleric. Bard does everything that the player wants out of the character, and everything that is reasonably appropriate to the position.
To then force the player to either remove their character from the clergy proper or take the Cleric class just because the expectation that all clerics are Clerics has been given the weight of law, and if you want to be clergy, you have to shoehorn your character into the Cleric class is quite simply wrong, and contributes nothing to the game. It's forcing the player to try and pound a square peg into a round hole.
No. If I want to be a civil engineer or a Roman Catholic Priest, they require specific educational / experiential backgrounds. I can't say, but look "I have a degree in chemistry, why can't I be a civil engineer?", or "Why won't you ordain me, I'm Catholic and seminary is too boring". Doesn't work. The player has to work with the DM to fit the role he wants. Again, it's a two way street. The DM shouldn't rule out what fits and the player shouldn't try to make a square peg fit a round hole either.
Except the priestess of Lliira was ordained as a priestess and holds the status as a priestess, just like I am pursuing my civil engineering degree because I seek to become a civil engineer.
Here's where your analogy falls apart. Seminary and the station of Catholic priest? Civil engineering degrees and the profession of civil engineer? These exist in our world. Likewise, ordained and status as priestess of Lliira exist in the game world. However, the Bard class does not. Character class has no place in the game world. It's an abstraction, a tool for representing the world, not anything the characters knowingly and actively pursue, or anything they're even aware of. My priestess of Lliira went through the process and became ordained as a priestess of Lliira, and the mechanics that were selected as the best representation for her were those of the Bard class, simply because they are most appropriate for who she is and what the player wants out of the character.
You're missing the point. That was an example, chosen beacuse it was obvious and easily understood. There are numerous things that are different in the skill sets of a Bard and a Cleric. You can patch one, but fixing them all? More difficult (without multi-classing). A Bard can't mimic a Cleric perfectly -- or as close as this role may require -- and vice versa. If the given role has requirements that can be met by multiple classes (or some combination of classes) fine, no harm, no foul. A bard, without multi-classing couldn't do that in my world. Different world -- maybe. Depends on the setting / world and the requirements for that role in that world.
Ah, but you're missing the point of using Bard in the first place. Bard was selected because it is the superior fit, representing the abilities desired from the specific character better than the Cleric. It's the Cleric that would have to be patched without end to be acceptable, ultimately without adequate end, rather than the Bard. The Bard isn't supposed to mimic the Cleric. The Bard is supposed to represent a character. The priestess of Lliira. For whom the abilities of the Cleric class are simply inappropriate.
And requiring the priestess of Lliira to multiclass as a Cleric/Bard only results in her being forced to stink at both for the sole purpose of picking up a metagame tag, which is completely unreasonable.
So here's a question for you: why are priests, people who stand in church and deliver sermons, provide spiritual advice and very occasionally heal the sick when mundane methods won't work, expected to be trained in the use of full plate armour, regardless of which god they are a priest of? A god of war, sure, but what about that other god over there who demands that all his priests be pacifists?
This is one of the many quirks of any class based game; not all concepts for a given archetype will fit the class supposed to represent it. Remember that in any given religion, promotion isn't based on how many monsters you've killed (i.e. your level, and therefore how many divine spells you get), but upon your ability to do the task at hand. Besides, the great thing about fluff is, one can create a bard and say that his God granted him these specific abilities, as opposed to the usual ones. Won't fit for a god of war, but the goddess of joy? Why not; especially when a level 20 bard can make a given character so happy that they literally die from it?
I'd agree. I've already had Clerics of certain deities (the lawful saint of peace in my game for example) swapping out heavy (and even medium in some cases) armor proficiency for things more related to their god's focus. That's why the Cleric doesn't automatically get heavy armor proficiency controversy didn't bother me. I had already made that choice. It just so happens that's not how the coresponding, but not exact, god of music and dance in my game works.
A Bard can't mimic a Cleric perfectly -- or as close as this role may require
Actually, a Bard can mimic a Cleric "close enough" as far as being a generic priest goes - leading services, performing healing, curing ailments - what other actions do you think a priest of an outlying church should be able to perform in order to be a priest of that church?
As long as they are able to care for their own community and perform religious services, then they have the necessary aptitude to be a leader of the faith. Given that the vast majority of clerics serving as priests of outlying churches are unable to raise the dead, saying that "well bards can't raise dead so can't be priests" is completely bunk.
And if you're going to argue based on what a character could presumably do later on in their career, then that's an entirely meta argument and thus not relevant to an in-world position.
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the problem with all this bard as cleric arguments is that it is the DM who chooses what kind of deities exist in his world and how it is that thwy grant powers and or blessings. A player can't alter the way the things in the world work just to fit him or her playing an specific class.
If the DM said that the goddes of music granted powers through giving joy by skillfull gifted artists and still not allowed a bard , then that DM would be doing his job wrong. However if he stablished that said goddes of music and joy gave er gifts through some kind of cleric variany (homebrewed variant closer to favored soul than cleric) and some player still wanted to lay a bard then guess who'd be at fault.
the problem with all this bard as cleric arguments is that it is the DM who chooses what kind of deities exist in his world and how it is that thwy grant powers and or blessings. A player can't alter the way the things in the world work just to fit him or her playing an specific class.
Would it really trouble you that much to read the actual arguments?
The argument was never "I can fit a bard into clergy of any deity in any campaign world". The example was a very, very specific one: a bard of the Forgotten Realms' goddess Lliira.