AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic - A question regarding the Trickery Domain.

Hi guys and gal's, I have no doubt that many of you already have the smell of cheese reeking from your screens as you highlighted this topic but I ask you persevere through the smell and attempt to hear me out. Basically, I have had the intention of making a Kelemvorite with a bit of zing to him for some time now, I was somehow guided to making a Duergar Cleric. I came to the point of having to choose clerical domains pretty quickly and decided to move on and work out the rest of the kinks of the character first and come back to them at a later point, so here I am wondering what to take. As a Kelemvorite, my domains are technically restricted (some clarification on whether or not a cleric has to take the domains of his deity would be welcome) to Sun/Protection/Travel, however I have been wondering if it would be possible to take Trickery and implement its bonus spells into my characters RP as an upgraded natural ability akin to him being able to cast Invisibilty simply for being a Duergar, by doing this it would bring home the fact that he excels in darkness and the improved methods of invisibility would help portray this.

The alternative to taking Trickery is Protection, which offers a passive 20% concealment + cleric levels (correct me if I am wrong), which to me seems less feasible for a duergar to have, especially in open areas with sunlight, whereas Trickery can be implemented on demand on to reflect the situation and environment he finds himself in.

I spoke to MrBennHundred ingame regarding this matter and gained his approval on it, of course, this is only his opinion and I thought it best to gain further thoughts on this matter, It is not my intent to take it for the pure reason of having a better build although I doubt anyone could deny that it would improve my characters role. Please consider this with a bit more thought than an instant hammering of the anti-cheese bat, I appreciate your time and I remain eager to get this character under way and bring the joys of his persona to the rest of you.

Please feel free to move this post to the Build Advice thread or any other appropriate forum if it needs doing so, sorry.

Thanks, Nauxia.

I have to say I heavily disapprove of Duergar being used as a race for this reason. Duergar are evil, and it is rare that they venture from the underdark for anything other then raiding, let alone to serve a human god. If you do make this cleric, and of which I have the greatest of urges to kick you in the head for, make sure he's neutral, as it's extremely rare and silly for a Duergar to be good, even more so then a drow. Possible, but rare to the point of silly.

Few more facts about Duergar. They are bald usually, have a tendency towards light armor due to the confined spaces of the underdark, and are a hard working race. They don't generally have silly personalities, and tend to be a rather dour sort who engage in mass slavery to work their mines. Their main god is Ladgeur, also known as the Lord of Toil.

Trickey makes the most sense as the favored class and tactics of Duergar are rogue based. Finally, Duergar are a psionic race. Obviously depending on how they develop this ability defines the strength of their psionics, but the invisability for example, is a psionic ability of their race. As is the immunites to death spells and such. This comes from the time when the entire Duergar race was enslaved by the illthaids and broke free. They have an intense hatred of mind flayers ever since and came out with psionic abilities. In a way, though I hate to say it, Duergar are the evil psionic rogues, full of trickery and spite, of the Dwarfs. They are the stealthy aspect the dwarven race seems to lack.

To reduce the cheese, and my wanting to slice you in two with a spoon, I suggest you read up heavily on Duergar lore, and write a very indepth backstory containing explanations and reasons for why your Duergar is who he is. It will stop people from screwing up their noses and shutting their eyes at the sight of the cheese.

I don't mean to appear un-appreciative, because I'm not and I thank you for going out of your way to enlighten me and perhaps others reading this, but I have spent a fair amount of time doing my homework preparing to play a Duergar, obviously there is probably a load I still dont know, but as far as things that I would normally get picked out for and a semi-solid back story that should avoid any raised eyebrows, I think I have covered. As far as the Trickery Domain goes, is it safe to assume you agree with the stance on using the Trickery Domain for the purpose of an improved psionic ability?

NAUX wrote:

I don't mean to appear un-appreciative, because I'm not and I thank you for going out of your way to enlighten me and perhaps others reading this, but I have spent a fair amount of time doing my homework preparing to play a Duergar, obviously there is probably a load I still dont know, but as far as things that I would normally get picked out for and a semi-solid back story that should avoid any raised eyebrows, I think I have covered. As far as the Trickery Domain goes, is it safe to assume you agree with the stance on using the Trickery Domain for the purpose of an improved psionic ability?

Not really. Clerical powers are just that, clerical powers. Your best bet is to PM Tormak and ask him directly, but I believe the only classes you use to emulate psionic classes are "WM, Bard, Sorc and Wizard" thats "Psion, Wilder, Psychic Warrior, and Soulknife", though don't quote me on that. Tormaks Amia's DM on all things Psionic I believe.

I don't intend to categorise or play my character as an alternative duergar class, all I am trying to do without much complication is implement a clerical domain that is not favoured (or supported by the deity rules?) by Kelemvor into my characters roleplay, my character does not pay much attention to his natural psionic abilities beyond taking advantage of them, but it does not mean that they are particularly weak or strong nor does he care. To simplify what I am asking for would be to just say that I am trying to create an IC reason to use a domain OOC'ly, which is where most people would cry cheese, if its going to be too controversial for people to give me some artistic license, then I am perfectly happy to admit defeat and take Protection as my domain despite my opinions on it, I just thought Trickery would be more fitting and honestly my domains have very little impact on my characters back story (Forgive me if this is a bad thing, but I wouldn't even know where to begin RP'ing domains beyond mentioning the time that I asked my god to grace me in the act of doing [insert domain here]). Again, thanks for the advice Selvec.

Laduguer=yes
Deep Duerra=yes
Anyone else noooo. :oops:

Besides that duergar in general aren't the clerical type.

One of those exceptions I suppose.

I'm pretty sure DM's don't enforce specific domains for specific deities here on Amia, so you're fine. Although the whole "using it OOCly" part would require you to request permission from the DM team, I imagine.

...A Duergar Kelemvorite? That's absolutely ridiculous.

And no Duergar PC is psinic unless you have an approved request before the character is made.

TormakSaber wrote:

...A Duergar Kelemvorite? That's absolutely ridiculous.

And no Duergar PC is psinic unless you have an approved request before the character is made.

There you have it. Though I believe that the invisability spell like racial ability is of psionic origin, otherwise I don't really see how Duergar can have it otherwise. No real explanation.

Monster Manual errata states that if you do not use the Psionics alternative magic system or otherwse restrict psionics in your campaign, to treat it as a standard spell like ability like any creature might have. If using Psionics, alternative and equivalent abilities that are psionic are listed.

Hrrrrm... This is why i think every race beside normal elves/humans/Halflings should be request only.

That's silly. Monster Manual provides the errata. There's no problem with Duergar innately.

Nono, there's no problem at all...

Besides that 90% Of monster pc's are like ...::Ahems:: Just not lorewise

You think elves are easy to play lore-wise? What do several centuries of personal growth and acquired wisdom get you? Decades perfecting a trade, just to go on and do another because you've mastered one?
If you want to get down to detail, it's hard enough to play a lore-correct human.

Good point. I stand corrected!

New idea - Have every character get requested.

Well to be honest, I wanted to try something wild and exciting, and yes, I admit, I came up with a duergar cleric fully aware of the controversy that it might cause. However, unlike many recently, I thought it wise to atleast ask for the opinion of some of the veteran players on the idea of it before simply going headstrong into game with it and adding to the already intense population of strange races and creatures wielding the powers of deities and classes the probably should be no where near. I created this post to simply ask if it were possible to make use of the additional bonus spells a domain provided without acknowledging the domain IC and using it to benefit "creature/subrace" powers and roleplay, I'm not entirely sure if I got a definitive answer on that, but I get the gist, its a "no".

I will rework my character to fit a generic shield dwarf, however I am still partially left confused as to the view on using non favoured domains, judging from Gunz+Roses earlier post, "I'm pretty sure DM's don't enforce specific domains for specific deities here on Amia, so you're fine." I'm assuming I wont be kicked in the nad's for walking around with a domain not associated with my god?

Thanks for the feedback guys and gals.

NAUX wrote:

however I am still partially left confused as to the view on using non favoured domains, judging from Gunz+Roses earlier post, "I'm pretty sure DM's don't enforce specific domains for specific deities here on Amia, so you're fine." I'm assuming I wont be kicked in the nad's for walking around with a domain not associated with my god?

The ruling as I understand it is, you have to choose at least one of their domains but its much better if you choose both.

Well if you don't use the domains of your Diety, you're not getting any kickback when you use the Prayer System. So that is a huge motivation right there because the prayers can be quite helpful.

I have a cleric of Salandra who's domains are Healing/Good/Protection.
My cleric used to be Healing/Sun; sun domain was not part of the portfolio but it still fit RPly as Salandra has creedances about the destruction of undead, and sun domain helps with that.
Now my cleric has Healing/Animal; animal domain is not at all part of the portfolio, and RPly it is harder to justify. But I still made a case and requested it to the DM's which I got permission and the change done. Although animals are not quite so the domain, my cleric is focused in conjuration and has learned to work with summons on a regular basis out of neccessity.

Picking domains of the Deity: Awsomeness.
1 Domain of Diety: A smart thing to do, or they is likely a better god to follow.
No Domains of Diety: RP justification is hopefully applied more than 'it is useful'.

DM rules on this stuff? I don't know. This is just a personal opinion.

Thanks, I wouldnt be in a huff about making sure I got everything right if this wasn't my first cleric on Amia, I think I'm going to take one for the team and avoid the powergamer inside of me urging to take Trickery for the awesomeness that is Improved Invis and have faith in the prayer system. I'll see you on the other side.

A DM won't come down on you for not having the domain, no, but there bcould be pleasant results in roleplay for taking it.

You have two choices for domains...pick one correct domain and the other is practically free for you to choose....you need not both...but at least one correct domain helps.

Duergar cleric of Kelemvor?....

*laughs hysterically at the many ironies besides the Duergar's usual lack of religion, hating the surface, and hatred of human gods*

Cant good old Kelly the god of death, have LG, LN and LE clerics?

Yeah, as long as one domain is in your god's portfolio, you're technically within the boundaries to play a cleric of that god. Something like Travel and Trickery would be fine for a Kelemvorite. However, I think you should steer well away from a Duergar. It's just a bit too much of a stretch to see happening. I'd scratch the race, go back and see if another fits.

I'd be talking to the Eternal Order members first and foremost. When Phearnun was in charge, the EO was very single minded on how they operated... I'd see if your toon is compatible with them. Playing a Kelemvorite will be very boring otherwise.

ainjyll wrote:

Yeah, as long as one domain is in your god's portfolio, you're technically within the boundaries to play a cleric of that god. Something like Travel and Trickery would be fine for a Kelemvorite. However, I think you should steer well away from a Duergar. It's just a bit too much of a stretch to see happening. I'd scratch the race, go back and see if another fits.

You don't "need" any of their domains. But the DMs encourage it. And there may be roleplay consequences for having no domains, one domain, or both domains. Odder things have happened.

Galenson wrote:

I'd be talking to the Eternal Order members first and foremost. When Phearnun was in charge, the EO was very single minded on how they operated... I'd see if your toon is compatible with them. Playing a Kelemvorite will be very boring otherwise.

Totally disagree. You can have plenty of fun without being in the EO. I have a Kelemvorite who isn't in the EO and I have tons of fun playing the PC.

Technically you're in the EO. You have faction access, etc, regardless of your PC's Ic standing in the general kelemvorite faith. For categorizing purposes, you're EO.

TormakSaber wrote:

You don't "need" any of their domains. But the DMs encourage it. And there may be roleplay consequences for having no domains, one domain, or both domains. Odder things have happened.

This is Tormy's version of a "polite" warning....heh.

I went for Protection and Travel as a shield dwarf. Sadly, he's going to be a lot less volatile than originally planned but I hope he works out ok, If anyones interested, keep an eye out for a certain Muurth Greyshield. Thanks to everyone who posted, hopefully your posts have been helpful to more than just myself.

TormakSaber wrote:

Technically you're in the EO. You have faction access, etc, regardless of your PC's Ic standing in the general kelemvorite faith. For categorizing purposes, you're EO.

Maybe for DM's to make it easy on themselves. But my point is, I have fun without having to be around the EO all the time. They're rarely around when I'm on because most of them are Euro's and I'm a Californian. I would spend my time alone or with the Triads on occasion. Things have changed lately though. A lot more of the old US EO are back and new people are being recruited so they're around more when I usually play. Unfortunately, I haven't been playing as much lately due to college... so... hasn't really effect me.

Geld Yaztran wrote:

TormakSaber wrote:

You don't "need" any of their domains. But the DMs encourage it. And there may be roleplay consequences for having no domains, one domain, or both domains. Odder things have happened.

This is Tormy's version of a "polite" warning....heh.

It's not really a warning. But if it comes crunch time and you're relying on a miracle and you are beseeching the Powers That Be, and you have not opened a full channel to your deity by embracing their god-given powers, and have instead, spurned them for your own selfish material gain by "Choosing another domain"... then you might be a clutch choker.

Sort of like how there's never an Exorcist when you really need one.

A question regarding the Trickery Domain.

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