Quote from: 1e AD&D DMG, p. 66, "Evil Areas"You may wish to establish areas where evil has made special power bases, i.e., an evil shrine, temple, or whatever. Such areas must be limited, of course - the shrine to perhaps a 10" by 10" area, the temple to twice that area. Such areas will automatically reduce the chance of any cleric affecting undead or other creatures within their precincts by a previously stipulated factor - perhaps 1 or 2 in the shrine area, 3 or 4 in the temple area. This power can be destroyed only by desecration of the evil, i.e. breaking of the evil altar service, pouring of holy water upon the altar, blessing and prayers, and whatever other actions you, as DM, deem sufficient.

If I included an area of supernatural darkness in a dungeon or such, the method for dispelling the darkness would be already determined in advance in similar fashion.

In any case, I would be unlikely to extend the cleric's turning undead ability on the fly to cover this, not because it's a bad idea - it's not - but because the cleric already has the means to deal with magical darkness and part of the game is planning for such contingencies.

Quote from: Rincewind1;674614I can understand you mate, I had some bad calls from GMs I played under myself lately. The crowning one was that flanking issue in WFRP.

Seems like everyone has a story about a gm freaking out when a rogue sneak attacks.

"What!? You can..Do Damage!? to my ...PRECIOUS... NPCS!?"

Quote from: Bill;674386Player of a cleric that worships a Sun god encounters an area of total supernatural darkness (An actual darkness spell, but the character may not know exactly what it is)

The character could try, but would fail in this case. However, if the supernatural darkness was not caused by a spell but by some type of "demonic"/evil supernatural power, I would allow a successful turn roll (against the "level" of the creator of the effect) to dispel, or at least lessen, the darkness.

Quote from: talysman;674607My answer is: Clerics Without Spells. I explicitly eliminate or reduce clerical spell casting that works like M-U spellcasting and use a test of faith instead, with Turn Undead (actually, the reaction roll, which is the same thing in OD&D) as the basic mechanic.

You need to roll a Good reaction or better when asking for a miracle. Roll 2d6 and add double the cleric's level, subtract double the spell level equivalent to the miracle asked for. On 9+, the miracle succeeds. On a 2, God is angry; no more miracles until you've atoned for your impiety. I might modify this for multiple miracle requests in a single turn or on the same day, but there's no "expend your turn undead ability in trade"; you just get to do that, period.

For dispelling the darkness, I might actually judge it a little differently. Light is a 1st level spell, Continual Light is 3rd level, and Dispel Evil is 5th level. I'd roll once, but check for all three results and give you the best one that succeeds: so, you might get a flickering little torchlight, a bright globe equivalent to sunlight, or the thick darkness will be permanently swept away, depending on how good the roll is.

I would greatly prefer Clerics to work your way. Their spell casting is way too 'wizard like' for my taste.

Quote from: Bill;674612It was obvious, but not stated.

The lament of whiny players everywhere.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;674621The lament of whiny players everywhere.

Just as much as an excuse of poor GMs. "It's not my fault, it's always those whining players."

As per the magic missile question, I would again bend that request back towards the rules.

"Sure, your Magic Missile can be a Fire Missile instead, so long as everything else about it stays the same."

Quote from: Rincewind1;674622Just as much as an excuse of poor GMs. "It's not my fault, it's always those whining players."

I don't think I know any whiny players. I have seen a few asshat players, but they did not whine.

Quote from: mcbobbo;674633As per the magic missile question, I would again bend that request back towards the rules.

"Sure, your Magic Missile can be a Fire Missile instead, so long as everything else about it stays the same."

That sort of change I like as part of the character creation process. A wizard with a fire theme would have magic missile as fire, not force, with reasonable trade offs.

Quote from: Piestrio;674524In previous games with very active God's I've often allowed characters to call for miracles in dire situations. Starting with a 1% chance and being modified by the worthiness of the cause, the worthiness of the character, and any promised sacrifices, oaths, etc.

So in this case we would start with the base 1% chance.

The situation does not seem especially dire so no modifier there.

The character is a cleric and more particularly a cleric of the sun God, So I might let him add half his level.

The character is offering a sacrifice of his turning abilities so I would probably add a few percentage points to the roll for that.

In addition the character could have sacrificed something on the spot, promised to build a shrine, promised to dedicate a temple, convert the heathens, etc. For more points.

Anyway, it's always a longshot because the gods are fickle and not amused by your petty requests.

And of course you can fumble.

Oh, crap, THIS is the proper call.  There's even a rules section on it in the DMG, totally forgot about it.

Good post.

Quote from: KenHR;674641Oh, crap, THIS is the proper call.  There's even a rules section on it in the DMG, totally forgot about it.

Good post.

It's a good call, and a reasonable call in my opinion.

I personally would use the sacrifice as the main limiting factor and have a higher chance to succeed, but its a great call.

Quote from: Bill;674573This appears to be mainly a split between "To RAW or not to RAW"

Hm no. I wouldn't quite put it like that. Some of us are thinking in specific terms and just adjudicating the action thinking it might make sense from the world's standpoint, starting from an attitude of "what's not specified by the rules may be possible, but you got to make it work with the rest of the framework", whereas others are thinking in terms of basically opening Pandora's door, and what that could do with players who keep spamming custom effects like this all the time in play.

Where do you stop? If you allow that thing with the darkness, why wouldn't another Cleric of the God of Persuasion be able to change people's minds with a "turning attempt"? How about Paladins of the God of Truth turning liars in this way? I suspect the people who say "no" on this thread are worried about the domino effect this might have, and opt to just refuse in an attempt to not open Pandora's door.

I don't think it's that simple, however, and that basically defaulting to "no" all the time changes the dynamic from "what the rules don't spell out may be attempted" to "what the rules don't spell out CAN'T be attempted", which is a major landmark in an evolution towards the Cult of RAW and "if the feat doesn't say you can then you can't" type game play.

Quote from: Benoist;674651Hm no. I wouldn't put it like that. Some of us are thinking in specific terms and just adjudicating the action thinking it makes sense and go from an attitude of "what's not specified by the rules may be possible, but you got to make it work with the rest of the framework", whereas others are thinking in terms of basically opening Pandora's door, and what that could do with players who keep spamming custom effects like this all the time in play.

Where do you stop? If you allow that thing with the darkness, why wouldn't another Cleric of the God of Persuasion be able to change people's minds with a "turning attempt"? How about Paladins of the God of Truth turning liars in this way? I suspect the people who say "no" on this thread are worried about the domino effect this might have, and opt to just refuse in an attempt to not open Pandora's door.

I don't think it's that simple, however, and that basically defaulting to "no" all the time changes the dynamic from "what the rules don't spell out may be attempted" to "what the rules don't spell out can't be attempted", and that's putting the finger into a vicious cycle that may end up with a fall for the Cult of RAW.

Sure looks like Raw Good, not Raw Bad.

But anyway,

Somehow, I have not had a Pandora's box problem in 30+years, so I am not concerned about that.

Quote from: Benoist;674651Hm no. I wouldn't put it like that. Some of us are thinking in specific terms and just adjudicating the action thinking it makes sense and go from an attitude of "what's not specified by the rules may be possible, but you got to make it work with the rest of the framework", whereas others are thinking in terms of basically opening Pandora's door, and what that could do with players who keep spamming custom effects like this all the time in play.

Where do you stop? If you allow that thing with the darkness, why wouldn't another Cleric of the God of Persuasion be able to change people's minds with a "turning attempt"? How about Paladins of the God of Truth turning liars in this way? I suspect the people who say "no" on this thread are worried about the domino effect this might have, and opt to just refuse in an attempt to not open Pandora's door.

I don't think it's that simple, however, and that basically defaulting to "no" all the time changes the dynamic from "what the rules don't spell out may be attempted" to "what the rules don't spell out CAN'T be attempted", which is a major landmark in an evolution towards the Cult of RAW and "if the feat doesn't say you can then you can't" type game play.

I'd say though that it isn't THAT far away from, for example, giving a Thief character knowledge of seedy taverns and merchants in a city where he was before - those (little) bonuses that allow a character to shine.

For me I'd just go with the flow to reward RP and "story coolness" for the lack of a better word - if this was a final confrontation and the cleric had a lot of build up regarding to really devoting his past deeds to defeating this guy, I'd allow a roll here as god granting special favour for special time. After all, the gods grant Clerics spells, so I'd wrap this up under "active gods" part of the world. I'd not actually be outside of granting such one time favour to, say, a very religious Fighter or Thief, who earned said Sun God's favour.

One advantage of bennies/Fate Points/Karma mechanics is that they kind of/sort of wrap around such ideas mechanically. And also disadvantage of them.

Quote from: Piestrio;674524In previous games with very active God's I've often allowed characters to call for miracles in dire situations. Starting with a 1% chance and being modified by the worthiness of the cause, the worthiness of the character, and any promised sacrifices, oaths, etc.

So in this case we would start with the base 1% chance.

The situation does not seem especially dire so no modifier there.

The character is a cleric and more particularly a cleric of the sun God, So I might let him add half his level.

The character is offering a sacrifice of his turning abilities so I would probably add a few percentage points to the roll for that.

In addition the character could have sacrificed something on the spot, promised to build a shrine, promised to dedicate a temple, convert the heathens, etc. For more points.

Anyway, it's always a longshot because the gods are fickle and not amused by your petty requests.

And of course you can fumble.

This is a cool post. I like divine intervention attempts like this too.