Designing: The Cleric Theme

The power of heaven and the outer planes lies in the will of the gods and the hands of the divine. Imagine such power at your beck and call. Picture your character working miracles and meting out justice through displays of devotion. This is the essence of the Cleric. A theme well known to the fantasy genre, the cleric is a defining character concept that influences the campaign more than any other theme. The inclusion of a cleric in a campaign demands that his chosen faith exists, driving world building and story. Despite such evident grandeur, the Cleric regularly is relegated to healer, acting routinely as support for a party. Even the potential roleplaying options of cleric get reduced to their mechanical capabilities, with the focus shifted to serving the needs of the party rather than the divine beings that granted a Cleric character his power in the first place. RISE seeks to challenge this conception by releasing the cleric from its support role and returning it to its roots in story and myth: a RISE cleric is a servant of the divine, the beings that create worlds.

With every theme having some flavorful method to contribute to healing and restoring allies, RISE frees the Cleric from its subservience to the party and reorients it back to the service of a faith. Consider three classic cleric examples from fantasy, such as Friar Tuck, Thoros of Myr, and even Darth Vader. Clerics have power due to a special relationship with a deity or belief that is beyond the workings of any mortal. Tuck’s common-sense wisdom, jovial nature, and stern defense of himself as a conduit of divine authority encourages the Merry Men, but more importantly focuses the band on keeping their faith in Jesus for their righteous cause, even in the face of tyranny and faithless laws. In Game of Thrones, Thoros the Red Priest’s power, like Friar Tuck’s, comes from the service of his master’s goals. At first, Thoros’s course was wayward. However, when his voice found the power to call back the dead, his flaming sword was no longer an alchemical trick, but an answered prayer, a tangible response from the Lord of Light. Thoros was never a healer, but a weapon against the darkness, letting lightning strike again and again. Turning to Star Wars, the tragedy of Lord Vader demonstrates how devotion to a particular divinity, namely the Dark Side of the Force, influences the abilities of a cleric. The Sith Lord could not use his “devotion to that ancient religion” to heal wounds or even find the missing data tapes.* The Dark Side cannot accomplish such goals. It destroys, it never makes; thus, Vader cannot regenerate himself fully, but becomes armor-bound, until his Jedi son heals the man in the machine. The abilities—and limitations— of a cleric must flow from his faith.

With worlds filled with ancient gods and tangible religions, the features available to the Cleric needed to be abundant and diverse, highlighting the myriad of faiths a Cleric could serve. A priest of winter should function and feel different than one devoted to the triad goddess of the night. For this reason, the Sacred Domain features available in RISE were created in abundance, allowing a variety of options for the priest character. By investing into a sole Sacred Domain feature, a character can be devoted to a particular concept, such as the Sun or Justice. Combining domains, a character’s faith could become more nuanced, such as the Sun’s Burning Power or Truth Shown by the Light of Day. Cleric features allow for the building of faiths and therefore the building of worlds.

Few character options are as campaign-defining as the creation of a cleric. Do the Merry Man justify their thievery without the Gospel? Can anything confront the Long Winter, save the Red Priest’s fire and its spark of light? Without the Dark Side, what solidifies the power of the Empire the fear it spreads? In a very real sense, a cleric controls a significant portion of his party’s fortune, not through simply restoring some hit points, but through the strength of his devotion and the choice of his cause.

*20th Century Fox ; Lucasfilm Limited production ; written and directed by George Lucas ; produced by Gary Kurtz. Star Wars. Episode IV, A New Hope. Beverly Hills, Calif. :20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, 2013 (1977)