The other day, I was reading this post from Derik at Madinkbeard. Some of what he discusses are similar to things that I've been considering lately: the role of deities in fantasy RPGs and their relations to their clerics and to magic in general.
Derik's approach to deities for an ancient Greek D&D campaign makes a lot of sense. As in the ancient myths themselves, these deities should be active agents in creating the plots, mysteries, and complications at work in the campaign setting. This is similar to the depiction of the gods in films like Jason and the Argonauts or Clash of the Titans, beings with their own agendas and vendettas, with personal stakes in the affairs of mortals, and who can be appealed to in times of need.
I also think he's right when he characterizes deities in your typical D&D campaign as accessories rather than NPCs. You make a cleric, you pick a deity, you tack it on for purposes of spell selection. Typically, it's about as functionally relevant as your character background in 5th Edition. It becomes a name inserted into a blank spot in a prayer or a symbol painted on a shield as an iconic flourish, but it has little role-playing weight beyond that.
I like his "reaction check" approach to determining spell success. As he mentions, it fits well with a pantheon of deities that are humanistic and involved, prone to moods and fickle changes. It definitely raises the stakes of religion in the campaign and ensures that players will be paying heed to it more. And, as an added bonus, it conserves system mechanics by adapting existing reaction checks for a new purpose.
Since the time that I started writing this post, I see serendipity has brought other voices into the mix for consideration! James at 10' Polemic just posted on clerics and their role in D&D. I also like James' approach of trying to adjust clerics from the "front end" (how they operate in regards to spellcasting) -- particularly the faith mechanic, which introduces another nice form of uncertainty surrounding spell success. I especially like it because it distinguishes the cleric as different, makes them not just another being rolling through D&D's Vancian universe, projecting magic out of their hands on a whim. The source of a cleric's power should be entirely contingent on the current relationship with their deity -- which, if you adopt Derik's approach, can only be labeled as "it's complicated."
But here's the thing. Here's where my own concerns start to stray from all of that above. I've been thinking a bit over the past year about the nature of magic and religion in D&D settings, about how the two concepts relate to one another. In D&D-as-written, there's honestly not much a difference. It's all just magic that flows in from differing sources. Increasingly, I'm left with the feeling that magic has to be a lingering ontological issue for any setting.
The central question: what is the nature of magic? How does it operate? And I feel like each of the magic-wielding cohorts in the game would have their own interpretation of this. It would be a grand debate with the same level of entrenched beliefs and judgments that religion has in our own world. Here's roughly how I imagine it breaks down:
Clerics/Paladins: Magic is the domain of the gods. It is divine emanation rendered in the material plane. Don't believe them? Look, here, they'll heal you. See, it is the will of [insert deity's name]. If you're casting spells, it's really [insert deity's name] channeling their power through you. You should thank them!
Wizards: Magic is the underlying pattern of cosmic forces. If they study it, try to understand it, they can create predictable effects, which are called spells. Even though they don't completely understand this force, they're fortunate that it conforms to just enough of a pattern that it's usable as a tool.
Sorcerers, possibly Druids: Magic is. It's an intrinsic part of nature. It can support and move things, like a wave. It can impact things, like a stone. You don't question a wave or a stone; you just go with them. Respect them for what they are, whether or not you really understand them and their true nature.
One complication here would come from a pantheon that is more involved, like the model in Derik's post. If the gods can come down and make a case for the nature of magic as wielded by their followers, well...things become less complicated. Or more. I guess it depends.
I think, were I to run a D&D campaign, it would probably have to include more deist-style divinities. They're presumably out there, but they don't show up much in a direct and personal way. This would leave plenty of room for this broad debate and all of the various takes on the origin and nature of magic, each arguing with the others. In short, it's a possibility for low-lying conflict in any given scene.
Yet another development in such a campaign setting could be to empirically resolve the great debate. Declare a winner. How would that impact character classes going forward? Would clerics go extinct? Would mages become rabid converts to a magical theocracy? Interesting possibilities that might be worth considering in a future post...
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