In the novel “Greatheart” which deals w/ the elves of the Seilwode, the
issue of elven atheism in the face of direct proof of divinity is addressed.
The general idea is that the strength of the humans beliefs in one
particular god is strong enough to create the power to grant spells. In
other words, the gods exist because the humans believe they exist. (At
least, this is how I read it, if anyone else sees differently, I’d love to
hear an alternate explanation) Anyway, perhaps elves use some of the same
reasoning to explain how the rangers acquire spells. Maybe they believe
that as one becomes more in tune w/ nature, one can begin to influence it in
supernatural ways, and the strenth of that belief grants the spells.
Considering the sometimes egotistical nature of elves, they might believe
that the desire of all elven nations for the forest to be protected
manifests itself as the spell abilities of the rangers which are its eternal
guardians. Just a few ideas.. maybe they’ll be a springboard for a more
satisfactory solution.
Just a thought that occured to me (I don’t know whether anyone’s talked about it before) - Cerillian elves can’t get their heads around priestly magic, so they can’t be priests… but can they cast priest spells as rangers? surely not, but everyone loves an elven ranger right? to replace them with arcane spells seems a little over powerful. What do people think?
My answer would be to say that rangers don’t use priestly magic, but instead something that comes from nature.
Personally I like the division of magic into three distinct types as opposed to the trditional two. The additional one being Primordial magic, which comes from the reverence of nature, and is used by druids and rangers. Some people think this is the same as the magic force utilised by wizards and sorcerers, but I think of it more as coming from what is alive in the nature and can be accesed by tuning oneself to that.
On a domain level I would have druids use sources instead of temples. This gives the druids a incentive to preserve nature, and to put them in opposition to the regular priests of nature gods.
This might bring up the question on wheter to allow elves to be druids or not. Personally I think all races should be allowed to have druids as a remenant of their ancient beliefs that was much more common before the spread of civilization. I think goblin druids are a good source of intrigue a plot lines if one are looking for a non-human centred setting.
Originally posted by Mr.Froggatt@Dec 15 2003, 11:43 AM Just a thought that occured to me (I don’t know whether anyone’s talked about it before) - Cerillian elves can’t get their heads around priestly magic, so they can’t be priests… but can they cast priest spells as rangers? surely not, but everyone loves an elven ranger right? to replace them with arcane spells seems a little over powerful. What do people think?
Using the distinction made in 3/3.5 ed rangers cast divine spells. This doesn’t make them deity inspired/supplied but only a ‘type’ of magic, all magic is either arcane or divine per 3/3.5 - makes things simplier IMO.
If you really wanted to ‘avoid’ the spell issue then use one of the options out there for non-spell casting rangers. Monte Cook had one published a long time ago and WotC put an example of one in the Complete Warrior book, there is also an example of a non-spell casting paladin there for those whomight be interested in one for paladins of Cuirecean.
Originally posted by Don E@Dec 15 2003, 12:11 PM
[b] This might bring up the question on wheter to allow elves to be druids or not. Personally I think all races should be allowed to have druids as a remenant of their ancient beliefs that was much more common before the spread of civilization. I think goblin druids are a good source of intrigue a plot lines if one are looking for a non-human centred setting.
Cheers,
Don E [/b]
You could do that, but the 2nd ed Birthright made it very specific that there were no druids (per the class in the PHB) and that all druid-like priests were priest of Erik. This is something that is very significant and helps to explain why elves only had minor divine magic (that from being a ranger) instead of that of a druid (which is pretty substantial). If elves had access to all of that druidic magic then they would surely have defeated the humans a long time ago. I mean the elves already had access to greater magic (arcane) and humans didn’t until after Deismaar. So if elves had both greater arcane magic and drudic magic then they would surely have run the humans off the continent.
And why would goblins ever be druids? It doesn’t make sense to me. Even the ‘civilized’ Cerilian goblins have no greater affinity for nature than their non-Cerilian counterparts. Again we would be back to the all druids are priests of Erik which would pretty much eliminate the average goblin from ever becoming a druid. Although if a goblin left his ‘homeland’ and become more human-like (for example say in Mhorhied) then I would see no reason he couldn’t start to worship the human pantheon and potentially acquire the druid-like features of priests of Erik or be a priest of any of the other gods.
In relation with this question (do elves should have druidic/ranger magic) I completely agree with Don E and the Green Knight.
In fact, IMC I make the priests of Erik clerics with nature-related domains and I reserve druids for elves and some other races.
That is because the 3rd edition “druid” is very different from the 2nd edition. In the original Birthright, the druid was a priest of a specific deity (Erik in the case).
But in the 3rd edition, druids are no longer priests: druids cast divine spells in the same way clerics do, though they get their spells from the power of nature rather than from the deities… (or something like that)
So you can say that Cerilian elves have druids and they still don’t have gods, which is the original Birthright idea!
This has but a single problem, as irdggman pointed: if they had divine (this isnt’ the correct term…) magic, why the elves lost the war to the humans? Actually, I don’t think this is a problem, as one can justify that the elves lost because, while they had divine magic, they didn’t had a CHURCH, and this could make a big difference - elves would have half a dozen of diffused druids, while the humans would have LOTS of organized clerics, which would be much more effective in a battle.
Back to the rangers, I personally don’t like rangers with spells. To me a ranger is a stalker, hunter, scout, whatever. I really don’t like D&D idea that almost everyone should have spells. In short, my opinion to the ranger case is: use a variation without spells…
Originally posted by The Green Knight@Dec 15 2003, 02:43 PM
[b] I think you are missing the point or rather limiting yourself to 2E
canon.
[/b]
Actually I’m trying to stay within the setting definitions. There was a long list of posts concerning what was flavor and what was setting definition material.
In 2nd ed druids were a separate class just like paladins were. There were under the broad category of priest as paladins were under the broad category of warrior but they were still different classes. In Birthright the setting defined a difference between the core druid and the Birthright druid, the fact that Birthright druids were priests of Erik.
In 3rd ed all spells are categorized as either divine or arcane for mechanics purposes. For one divine spells don’t suffer arcane spell failure chances and other factors could come into play like some sort of special spell resistance (I haven’t seen any examples of this yet, but the possibility does exist) also prerequisites for prestige classes.
Birthright campaign setting definition material (that material which set it apart from the core rules) included (not an all-inclusive list):
Elves don’t worship gods and hence can’t be clerics (they could in the core rules)
There was greater and lesser magic (arcane) and in order to cast greater magic a character had to be of elven blood or be a scion. (There was no distinction in the core rules and humans could cast greater magic).
Originally posted by The Green Knight@Dec 15 2003, 07:15 PM
[b] This has but a single problem, as irdggman pointed: if they had divine
(this isnt` the correct term…) magic, why the elves lost the war to
the humans? Actually, I don`t think this is a problem, as one can
justify that the elves lost because, while they had divine magic, they
didn`t had a CHURCH, and this could make a big difference - elves would
have half a dozen of diffused druids, while the humans would have LOTS
of organized clerics, which would be much more effective in a battle.
[/b]
So elves were more organized as fighters than if theyhad any ‘druids’ amongst them. Doesn’t make any sense. The elven racial affinity for individuallity doesn’t quite make the transfer. One thing they have been known to come together for short times (short being a relative word for an immortal race) for the common good.
Before Deismaar there were no realm spells so the major effect of organized religion and temples doesn’t really factor in to the equation.
Using the distinction made in 3/3.5 ed rangers cast divine spells. This doesn’t make them deity inspired/supplied but only a ‘type’ of magic, all magic is either arcane or divine per 3/3.5 - makes things simplier IMO.
According to the 3ed definition divine spells are “Spells of religious origin powered by faith or by a deity.” Based on this I think Mr. Foggart raise a very relevant topic on wheter this is appropiate for elven rangers. What is then simple for ‘regular’ DnD is something that causes trouble for the Birhtirght setting. Like so many other things there are different solutions, and different people will inevitably choose a wide range of solutions.
Actually I’m trying to stay within the setting definitions. There was a long list of posts concerning what was flavor and what was setting definition material.
That is exactly Green Knight’s point. We all know what the original BR setting contained, but a lot of us prefer to change this around and add other bits to it. We are merely exchanging ideas and concepts that we know are outside the original BR setting, but which we think others might find useful.
Somebody has here pointed out a inconsistency arising from the setting definition material. Hence any solution to the problem will have to be outside the setting definition material.
The solution to the initial question I see as the one causing the least change/difficulty/confusion is saying that rangers (and similar classes/presitge classes) use primordial instead of divine magic. This wouldn’t conflict with elves being barred from using divine magic and still allow for elven rangers. Druids can still be priests of Aeric (or something else if you prefer) and only be the province of humans. Personally I also like non-magic rangers, but that I think is a greater change to the rules and setting.
Wow! I sparked a debate! Cool, now I feel like fully accepted memeber of the Birthright Fansite!
Seriously, it’s nice of you guys to gimmie feedback on that little question.
Originally posted by Don E@Dec 16 2003, 02:46 PM
[b]
According to the 3ed definition divine spells are “Spells of religious origin powered by faith or by a deity.” Based on this I think Mr. Foggart raise a very relevant topic on wheter this is appropiate for elven rangers. What is then simple for ‘regular’ DnD is something that causes trouble for the Birhtirght setting. Like so many other things there are different solutions, and different people will inevitably choose a wide range of solutions.
Cheers,
Don E [/b]
Same definition in 3.5. But let’s look at the classes (again using the 3.5 PHB - much better text overall than 3.0)
Druids: “She gains her magical powers from either the force of nature itself or from a nature deity.”
Rangers: “Though a ranger gains divine spells from the power of nature, he like anyone else may worship a chosen deity.”
Now using this amplifying text - there doesn’t seem to be a real problem with matching the Birthright setting to 3.5 for this issue.
Druids (in Birthright - gain their magical powers from a nature deity (i.e., Erik), no other option)
Rangers as in the core rules gain their spells from the power of nature.
Cerilian elves can revere (and have faith in) nature and have such a tight affinity for it that as a ranger they gain the divine spells (if using a spell casting ranger that is).
Since druidic magic is granted by the worship of a nature deity in Cerilian, elves can not be druids (at least not normally - I would never rule out the exception, but the social backlash would be immense for the elf).
By revering (or having faith in) nature an elf is not giving up his individuality and ‘serving’ a deity, he is serving all of nature which doesn’t really have the same worshipping feel to it.
The key here is the difference between ‘faith’ and ‘worship’. Cerilian elves don’t worship individual deities, they can have faith in nature.
Fair enough. We are basically agreeing, but I prefer to call the reverence of nature something different than divine magic as it is not based on a divine deity. It is all sematics,
Druids (in Birthright - gain their magical powers from a nature deity (i.e., Erik), no other option)
That is of course if you feel bound by the ‘setting definition’. For the rest of us there are a plethora of options. If somebody can have faith in nature enough to have spells granted for this, why wouldn’t there be any dedicated spiritual leaders aka priests? Or on the other hand, if the ranger’s spells aren’t from a deity, would a mere human be able to acheive that bond with nature?
Fair enough. We are basically agreeing, but I prefer to call the reverence of nature something different than divine magic as it is not based on a divine deity. It is all sematics,
Druids (in Birthright - gain their magical powers from a nature deity (i.e., Erik), no other option)
That is of course if you feel bound by the ‘setting definition’. For the rest of us there are a plethora of options. If somebody can have faith in nature enough to have spells granted for this, why wouldn’t there be any dedicated spiritual leaders aka priests? Or on the other hand, if the ranger’s spells aren’t from a deity, would a mere human be able to acheive that bond with nature?
I am of the group that believes that if the elves had access to divine healing the initial war between humans and elves would have been with the elves winning.
Rangers have some healing, but it is at higher levels and of much less frequency than druids can provide.
With no arcane magic on the human side, and both able to heal the wounded quickly due to divine magic, only the rapid reproduction of humans would have let them win.
The cost would have been astronomical, but with no place for the humans to go wave attacks might have been possible.
Under 2nd edition I assume it was the ability of the humans to return the next day to a battle with troops mostly healed. While the elves were only able to rememorize arcane spells and use salves (rangers were only plant/animal sphere in 2nd ed. Care for a goodberry?). The humans would concentrate on the spellcasters and then be able to overpower the still wounded elven warriors another day.
But if the elves could heal their warriors as quickly as humans they could better defend the wizard/sorcerers and the daily barrage of arcane spells would drastically change the course of the war.
Originally posted by The Green Knight@Dec 16 2003, 05:25 PM
[b] Point is:
By all means, do present your own views of the issue, but don`t:
A) Overly quote published BR material or Core Rulebooks - we know what
the books say.
B) In any way try to stop an interesting thread by claiming it is
contrary to either the rules or the setting.
Cheers
Bjørn
[/b]
As far as A) goes this has yet to have been demonstrated. There are quite a few people out there that don’t have the original 2nd ed material and are relying on what is being posted as their basis for the campaign. There are others that have resisted the draw to purchase 3rd ed at all and those that did but have resisted switching to 3.5. The source of reference is important and while the SRD is very useful the color and expanatory text is often missing, which is important to help in understanding the whys The reason I use quotes is to show the basis for my reasoning. I find that reasoning based on something sound (i.e., written somewhere) other that “I think it should be this way” is almost always of better quality and tends to stand up longer. Otherwise you end up with the knee-jerk type of reactions like the ones concerning the scion class/feat/templates a while ago. I assume you can recall the rapidly switching opinions of some of the posters and their equally strong instance on the fact that it should be the way they were inclined at that precise moment.
B) I was not trying to stop the thread, only pointing out where the existing rules could be used to quantify/explain the reasons why elven rangers can cast divine spells without a deity and why druids work the way they do in the core rules (in 3.5 terms) without there being any inconsistencies.
The bottom line comes down to this is someone trying to create a setting that is Birthright-like or are they trying to recreate the Birthright setting. There is a difference. It again comes down to what is considered core Birthright setting material and what is considered color - oops don’t want to start that thread up again. :lol:
