Good day.
This is meant for an NPC in a homebrew i'm working on.
Say we have a character that, via some strong magical means, has their soul split. Each half is its own physical form.
Over time, half A walks a good path, and becomes a LG cleric of [insert benevolent deity]
Half B, instead comes to walk a less righteous path, and becomes a CN/CE cleric with matching deity.
Now, after X amount of time, and equally powerful magical means, the two halves re-merge.
What would the effect be for their spell casting? Would they lose it, as the 'whole' is now a combination of different outlooks on life? Or would this push them more towards a separatist archetype?
Would LG + CN/CE put them on TN?
The two sides would fight for power, we generally call this a conscience, but this would be a literal headache between an angel on one shoulder with a demon on the other. One will stand, and one shall fall. It's that simple, there is ultimately a choice to be made, and may the best half win. One of the Clerics will not have to change a d@mn thing, and the other Cleric will cease to exist.
One of the Clerics will not have to change a d@mn thing, and the other Cleric will cease to exist.
They could end up as a strange blend… like the alignment and morals of one might win out, while the religious beliefs of the other win… resulting in the wonderful awkwardness that is a LG cleric of a CE deity… now initially they may have no issues accessing their spells and abilities from the CE cleric side of things… but soon they may find their LG tendencies will anger their deity…
Clerics have to remain within one step of their deity's alignment, so one half is doomed to become an ex-cleric.
OTOH, there's always the possibility that they may split the difference and convert to a god of balance. Especially if a servant of such a god is the one responsible for the rejoining of the two halves.
When did the split occur? Unless the split happened before the character developed an alignment it probably resulted in each half getting part of the characters personality, similar to the star trek episode mirror, mirror. If this is the case the character would probably revert back to something similar to his original alignment.
If the split happened before the character developed an alignment, then I don’t think they can be re-merged. The only way this would happen if the split happened before the character’s mind developed enough to tell the difference between good and evil. Now instead of two halves of a soul you end up with two complete souls. Each soul will have grown so they are no longer the same soul.
the new character would have alignment that's the average of the 2, so in this case, true Neutral. They would still be a cleric, but would not have any clerical powers until it redeemed itself to one of the previous gods (and changed it's alignment again) or, it found a new god willing to accept it as a follower.
When did the split occur?
The original whole person was NG/LG, though not yet a cleric at the time of the split. After the event both halves were flung somewhere different, that led them to their respective re-merge paths.
They would still be a cleric, but would not have any clerical powers until it redeemed itself to one of the previous gods (and changed it's alignment again) or, it found a new god willing to accept it as a follower.
That would make an interesting path for the character, finding a new patron. Thanks for the tip.
OTOH, there's always the possibility that they may split the difference and convert to a god of balance. Especially if a servant of such a god is the one responsible for the rejoining of the two halves.
That would go well with the above that TxSam88 suggested.
No rules handle this so it would depend on what you want to do as the GM.
Depending on what magic merges them back together, could provide a clue as to what happens to them.
What could be interesting is to let the new resulting character have the memories of both, and be a gestalt character, having the class abilities of both former creatures. But! Perhaps they have (parts of) both former creatures consciousness within their new mind which are fighting to direct the new entity. Perhaps some sort of opposed charisma check but also give the creature an opportunity to "choose" based on if they "remember" an event in the life of either creature closely related to their current choice, and that allows them to provide a bonus to one side or the other.
Maybe keep track of the number of significant choices and after one side reaches a set amount (10 or maybe even 100) the other side disappears.
However, the new creature may also choose their own path, ending the consciousness of both other.
If both characters have all the memories on the original character, I would say the character is likely to become NG. On the law vs chaos axis, the character are opposite so neither one seems to be likely to become dominant. That would probably end with the character being neutral in regard to law and chaos. On the good vs evil character A is listed as LG which puts him fully in the good camp. Character B is on the other hand listed as CN/CE which to me implies he has not gone totally over to evil. It seems like there is still part of the original character in him holding him back form going completely evil. If that is the case, it would seem that there is more good in the combined character than evil.
What it is really going to come down to is how strong character A dedication to good is. As long as character A was not bordering on neutral on the good vs evil axis, good will probably become the dominant alignment. The combined character will probably be close to the border of neutral on the good evil axis.
Ex-Clerics
A cleric who grossly violates the code of conduct required by her god loses all spells and class features, except for armor and shield proficiencies and proficiency with simple weapons. She cannot thereafter gain levels as a cleric of that god until she atones for her deeds (see the atonement spell description).
In any case the character will probably become an ex-cleric and need to atone. Changing alignment is not the only thing that causes a cleric to become an ex-cleric. Unless both deities have compatible codes of conduct more than likely the characters have violated the code of conduct of both deities. I don’t see how two deities of opposite alignment could have compatible codes of conduct. Usually serving an opposing deity would be considered a gross violation. If the character is still good, he could get an atonement from the deity of character A and regain his class abilities.
Since this is 100% fiction... whatever you want.
But... the only way I can make sense of this is that they return to the general alignment they had before the split.
If their original "soul" was a Reese's peanut butter cup, and you split it into a chocolate person and a peanut butter person, when you put them back together, you get a Reese's peanut butter cup.
Since this is 100% fiction... whatever you want.
But... the only way I can make sense of this is that they return to the general alignment they had before the split.
If their original "soul" was a Reese's peanut butter cup, and you split it into a chocolate person and a peanut butter person, when you put them back together, you get a Reese's peanut butter cup.
Returning to the alignment before the split does not make sense because both characters have changed. A better example than a Reese’s peanut butter cup would be a child. So, a healthy six-year-old child is split into to two identical people. One person grows up in healthy safe environment and grows up into a healthy adult. The other person grows up in a radioactive environment with dangerous creatures. The second character grows up mutated disease-ridden adult that was blinded by an attack as a teenager. When both people are thirty years old, they are recombined. According to your view the recombined person would be a healthy six-year-old child.
The OP said that they were in two different locations and that led to their different paths. This does not appear to be a case of splitting a soul into a good half and an evil half. It appears to be something similar to mitosis where creature reproduces by splitting into two identical creatures. After the split each creature is altered by their environment and then later merged into a single creature.
i like to think of souls and bodies as growing candles with flames.
with normal mortals the parents take a part of their candle and light it together to make a new one. which grow steadily if brought up right.
with ghosts they are flames with no candles that barely hang in there. (or hang in there with some magical\spiritual means without a body to sustain the flame).
with outsiders who's body is the soul. they are more like small suns which sustain themselves as long as they live. if they mate with mortals they share their flame with the mortal's to create a semi sun\semi candle offspring (tieflings\aasimars\genie keen etc). and when they die they go kinda nova and their mass\soul return to the world.
in your case without a very strong magic i wouldn't say the bodies and souls can combine back together anymore then a child can be absorbed back by it's parent. and any magic strong enough to do so would create a very miserable and mind splitting individual. kinda Dr Jackel and Mr Hide.
he might lose both classes spellcasting or have them both active each when the right kind of mind s dominant. when the evil mind is off it's Patron loose connection to it and can't keep track anymore then it can keep track on another's god's cleric. the good part is fully devoted to it's patron and as long as it doesn't stride off should get all it's abilities. same for when they switch.
if for some reason BOTH are in control (or fighting over it) at the same time BOTH would have their powers intact the same as a good cleric being passed by an evil spirit doesn't lose his abilities when he regain or fighting for control.
Hmm.... I have some mechanical advice for making the concept work within the current system (as it is a concept that I've toyed with before though the situation/story is quite different). As for the roleplaying aspect, I'd determine which personality is the more dominant and have that one be more 'in control' than the other until some kind of permanent meld can occur, similar to ego rules for intelligent items. Probably use a form of atonement and a quest line to resolve the differences between the two, or seek a way to clone the character and finally separate the two again.
As for building this character, I'd actually use the Summoner or Spiritualist to model the mechanics. Archteypes that I think could be useful for this are: Fractured Mind (Spiritualist), Spirit Summoner (Summoner), or Twinned Summoner (Summoner). Any of them are good, though you might want to tweak the spellcasting to divine if it is important that they remain divine casters. Otherwise, the Spirit Summoner would be a really good fit.