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Can Amaunator have Druids?

LG God with civilization and Law as domains? I'd say no.

Last edited by LetumLux on Thu, Aug 09 2012, 0:22 AM, edited 1 time in total.

There's also: is he listed in the gods that Druids can worship and gain their powers of Divine Nature from? (Complete Nature Deity List, Faiths and Pantheons pg 90). Neither Lathander nor Amaunator is on that list, so it would be no, unless there was a house rule about it.

This list is floating around the forums somewhere, too. I'm currently looking for it!

Here's one topical thread: Nature deities

Agreed with the last two. There's nothing about Amaunator that suggests that he has any special regard for balance, nature, animals, plants, etc. He's kind of a non-druidy as it's possible to be. I'm curious what it is about him that inspired you to ask?

And, LetumLux, that list you were mentioning is here.

NinjaClarinet wrote:

LG God with civilization and Law as domains? I'd say no.

LG didn't seem right to me and I did some digging around, prior to 4e it seems that he was LN. This is more consistent with his behaviour as a deity (near-obsession with law and contracts even at the expense of life). I can't confirm this though.

Yeup. Was LN as Amaunator, shifted to NG as Lathander and then over to LG as Amaunator again. We need to stop approving alignment shifts for that guy... srsly.

Even if he was LG, I don't see why he couldn't have druids. I.E. Nobanion.

Also, having the Law domain doesn't have any bearing on druidism I feel, Lawful Neutral is acceptable for a druid alignment. Even without being lawful, a druid can have respect for Law, as in the laws of nature and the natural order.

Perhaps it's not in the guides or whatever for druids so it may be moot all the same, but in my opinion, a druid of Amaunator is reasonable. The Sun is a very key element of the natural world, as well as Law in some respects.

... that's crazy.

Amaunator is a god of law and bureaucracy, and in some interpretations, human supremacy over other races. He has no regard for anything nature-related, really, much less the Balance of nature that's the defining aspect of druidism.

He is also (a) god of the Sun, which was my point. Yes, it's merely one of his domains, but I don't see how a god of something so integral to nature could be completely aloof of what that entails. Especially given that his other face, Lathander, is practically banging Chauntea.

Yeah, but he's into the Sun not as an aspect of nature, but as a symbol of constancy, authority, and civilizing influence, the creative spark. Not all sun gods are created equal: it's not just about whether he's a sun god, but *how* he's a sun god.

(This is all IMHO, of course.)

He cannot have druids. That's a ruling.

Bobo_Underhill wrote:

He cannot have druids. That's a ruling.

This.

Lizzie wrote:

He has no regard for anything nature-related, really, much less the Balance of nature that's the defining aspect of druidism.

I wouldn't go so far. Keep in mind that Amaunator (at least in 4th edition) IS Lathander. And Lathander's dogma explicitely mentions sowing and helping life prosper. However, I think the difference is similar to a cleric of Chauntea vs a druid of Chauntea. A cleric is concerned with the spiritual meaning of the act, and spreading knowledge of this meaning. A druid is concerned with the practical side of things, IMO.

As such, you could have a nature-focused cleric of Amaunator who focuses highly on the symbolism of growth and Amaunator/Lathander's influence in this. Perhaps also the purpose of each season, and the need to keep each season in balance eg. equal in time (as Amaunator is also a god of timekeeping). And of course, as a god of bureaucracy it's perfectly feasable to create a cleric of Amaunator who acts as a keeper of records for a druidic circle, IMO. It could be the sort of character who literally goes around counting the trees and animals, measuring the size of the forest, etc. every year. If you want to play a cleric of Amaunator who's involved with the druids, that might be an interesting way to go - provided the druids accept him/her.
On the whole though, I think there's just too little that supports a true druidic tradition of Amaunator/Lathander.

ICly, Marcus' stance is that druids are inherently a sylvan (fey) tradition. Sylvans are creatures of magic who were created to tend to the forest. Humans are not sylvans. Amaunator is the father of humankind. To Marcus, the notion of a druid of Amaunator makes no sense; just like a human cleric of Corellon would make no sense (to him). Marcus believes it's juist not humankind's part to be druids. Throw in the fact that he believes humans have souls born from fire and combine that with the druidic aversion to fire...

I think Elor put it very well. Also remember, that Amaunator (and any sun god, really) very much represents a type of cosmological religion, the sanctity of cyclical time and the year as a re-enactment of timeless creation. I imagine rituals of Amaunator recreate cosmogony in illo tempore, and as such reflect very ancient and "primitive" forms of natural religion (despite his later status as the principle of order in a structured patriarchy). That is very close to druidism.

I think the question is rather theoretical, though: could Amaunator sponsor druids if he so wished, people believed it to be possible, and somebody tried to become one? No doubt, since the divine is by its nature malleable potential. Given enough time and enough faith, even Bane could do it. Does he actually do so, at the moment? No, and I think it's understandable why: he's a dead god forgotten to most, and those scholars (or nutjobs like Marcus) who still remember him, remember him as the head of the Netheril pantheon, as a figure of order, law, patriarchy, social power, a transcendent father figure of stability and civilization. That may be a distorted, one-sided view of the original cult, but it would be highly unlikely for an aspiring treehugger to just come up with the idea to start worshiping this forgotten god of one of history's most decadent and unnatural dead civilizations. It seems like a completely arbitrary and baseless decision.

I still do think Lathander has a druid following, "nature diety lists" be damned. It is simply inconceivable that one of the most central elements of primitive, natural religion (the sun) would not be represented in druidism. The dualism between male and female, heaven and earth, the fertile potential and the impregnating principle, is core to the whole concept of the class. D&D designers didn't seem to realize they created a completely implausible construct.

IronAngel wrote:

I still do think Lathander has a druid following, "nature diety lists" be damned. It is simply inconceivable that one of the most central elements of primitive, natural religion (the sun) would not be represented in druidism. The dualism between male and female, heaven and earth, the fertile potential and the impregnating principle, is core to the whole concept of the class. D&D designers didn't seem to realize they created a completely implausible construct.

Interesting point. In this light, it seems just as likely to have druids of "mother Chauntea" as druids of "father Lathander/Amaunator". It makes sense, but there's much about FR that doesn't make sense, when it comes to gods.

Elorathall wrote:

Interesting point. In this light, it seems just as likely to have druids of "mother Chauntea" as druids of "father Lathander/Amaunator". It makes sense, but there's much about FR that doesn't make sense, when it comes to gods.

Yeah. It's quite possible that the mother is more central in actual ritual practices and daily life, because she's the one that can be interacted with and affected (through prayer and work). The sun is, in a way, eternal and not subject to human influence under normal conditions. It's only once a year that he would require human help to resurrect at the start of a new year, if we take that global motif from our world and (I think reasonably) apply it to FR.

Lathander is less of a stretch than Amaunator, since he doesn't represent law and order. If we draw another real-world parallel, Lathander is clearly Apollon, the brother of Artemis (Mielikki). And, as is known, there were shamanic and extatic characteristics to his worship. Healing, sowing, rebirth, poetry (probably originally in connection with prophecy) are also aspects of our Lathander. You could say his rebirth aspect is connected to Chauntea, whom he impregnates every spring and, on a smaller scale, every morning. To be honest, I can't see a more fitting pair to be at the core of druidic mythology, even if lesser gods of wildlife and woodlands are the more popular subjects of daily devotion.

There are things that don't make sense, that's for sure, but there's no reason we shouldn't fill in the gaps and make them make sense in our game. I'm sure we have a lot more collective expertise on history, anthropology and religion in the Amian player- and DM-base than on the WotC design team, after all. It isn't a big breach of canon to suggest Lathander might be a viable nature deity, anyway. The two nature deity lists in 3e sources (FRCS and F&P) are incomplete and inconsistent with eachother, so the fact they omit Lathander isn't very condemning.

I agree with all that, Iron. If the discussion is about whther Lathander should have a few druids under his wing, then I'd argue alongside you that there should be some room for interpretation there.

But we're talking about Amaunator, and Lathander is not Amaunator. (Or at least not yet, or not completely.) Lathander is focused on rebirth and renewal, which are classically druidical tropes, rooted in the world of nature. Everything Amaunator advocates is artificial, sterile, constructed, rooted in the world of civilization. Amaunator's entire dogma could be adhered to scrupulously by automatons who had never seen a tree or animal in their lives.

I agree with you that Amaunator "could" sponsor druids if he wanted to, but that's not the salient question. The more important consideration is whether it would make sense for him to do so. And I think, clearly not.

Lathander was worshipped by the Netherese as Amaunator according to the 3.X Races of Faerun.

Races of Faerun wrote:

Both groups venerated the same pantheon, which included gods
such as Amaunator (Lathander), Jannath (Chauntea), Jergal,
Kozah (Talos), Moander, Mystryl (Mystra), Selune, Shar, and
Targus (Garagos).

Lathander is one of those weird gods that seems like it'd be druid compatible, but the church doesn't really act in a way that is druid compatible. If there are druidic followers, they probably form a cult outside the mainstream Lathanderian church. (Look at who is listed as Lathander's followers: Aristocrats, Artists, Athletes, Merchants, Monks (Sun Soul), and The Young.) Lathander's past as Amaunator is even more urban than Lathander currently is, so if it were up to me, I'd say "no" to Amaunator and a skeptical "maybe" to Lathander.

Bobo_Underhill wrote:

He cannot have druids. That's a ruling.

Yeah. We kinda moved onto another, related subject of Lathanderite druids and why they are necessary. The topic is, after all, "varying questions." It needs to be noted that Amaunator is not Lathander, in any timeline. That's just sloppy language and poor thinking from the writers. It may be that Amaunator became Lathander and that Lathander will become Amaunator in the future, but that doesn't mean they aren't different individuals. Gods absord eachother, split, change over time as beliefs mold them, die and get reborn again, and you can't apply rules that concern human individuals to gods. Yes, Lathander may have risen from Amaunator's ashes, but he's also a seperate god whose body is floating in the astral plane or wherever it was that divine bodies float, and you can draw power from him with the Servant of the Fallen feat independent of Lathander. So drawing conclusions about one and generalizing to the other isn't very convincing.

Amaunator is just Lathander in super saiyan mode.

Also, while it is conceivable that A would have druids, they are too rare for Amia and NWN doesn't have the ideal spell/domain combos for it. (Druids in PF get a domain and I like that so fuck you!)

I don't think anyone but the DMs are in the business of saying what god is what, Iron...

As the DM most concerned with Lathander and Amaunator let me clarify this for you:

Nivo wrote:

Bobo_Underhill wrote:

He cannot have druids. That's a ruling.

Nor can Lathander simply because it doesn't fit with my Cosmic interpretation which is important to the over-all story that I'm regaling players who actually have a vested interest in the diety from the character perspective.

There is a deific status quo involved and thats all I'm saying on the matter.

I've always thought the idea of Druids of Lathander would be cool. Adding Lathander to the list of Druidic gods isn't really a big concern though. Chauntea is the logical answer to a Druid who works in a Lathandrian sort of way.

You want an actual Lathandrian Druid? Write something and submit it for approval.

Yo.
Does all pc's worshipping amaunator require a request?

I would think only those who draw divine spells (ie Clerics and Paladins) from him would.

Any ol' nutter can worship a "dead" god

drawing power from him is another story.

Well historically, worshiping the established dead gods who do in fact grant power with the Servant of the Fallen feat has been unproblematic and required no request. It's not controversial or difficult. Those gods are listed in Lost Empires of Faerûn with some details about their history and current status. Leira, Auppenser, Amaunator, Bhaal etc. are all the kind of dead gods that probably should be OK to worship without request. It doesn't take any great deeds, it's an option freely available to anyone in PnP.

Granted, I'm personally rather unhappy with the constantly tightened standards on what requires a request. It seems you're sliding towards more and more restrictions every time someone asks. They're not written in stone, but the usual answer is "it's probably best to request" and slowly it becomes standard practice. I've even heard of someone requesting a bladesinger? That was passable without question earlier.

This is not really a lore question or answer I guess, but I thought it important to bring up that Amia's standards keep getting tighter and tighter. And it's probably without many people noticing, because it's not a conscious decision. It's just something that happens when people are rather safe than sorry.

Just ask elorathall if he requested his Amaunator-an. I forget.

Yeah but do the DMs want to make that an exemplary precedent? That's the real issue. To be honest, I'd always discourage people from requesting something the rules don't clearly demand they request, because if they do it "just in case" it creates an unintended precedent for others. It's a mechanism that creates more and tighter control completely "facelessly", without anyone ever really making the conscious decision to start policing a new area. In my personal view, gradual normalization has always been Amia's greatest threat on the lore/control department. We long since reached the level of canon accuracy and believable setting that was consciously desired. Going further will continue to create new "tiers" of characters created under different standards, like my bladesinger and those what have since been requested.

Besides, it would be rather strange to have a character in game preaching Amaunator, but then prohibiting people from converting without DM approval. Wouldn't it?

I'm not getting into an argument..... just saying to ask Elor. I refrained from giving my end of the opinion on purpose.

(what does tormak think woooooooo~~~~)

I can't find anything in the rules section sooo... I'm making a follower of amaunator tomorrow.

Kapow

I did make a request.

And I'm all in favor of limiting special characters or concepts to case-by-case basis. But I'll rant on that some other time.

Well, the alternative is investing a lot of time and energy into the character only to find out you are a failure at the concept and having the character boxed up. So if the risk is worth it to you, sure.

Svensk, mind that Servants of the Fallen cannot communicate with their deity, receive visions or anything like that. They just leech spell energy off the dead body of the god floating in the Astral.

You'll just have to pick some deity which supports the correct alignment and domains, I suppose. Hasn't the deity system been connected to your ability to cast spells? Lathander seems like a good match, but that obviously doesn't mean you're getting your spells from him if you're using the Servant of the Fallen option. You're getting your spells from the dead corpse of Amaunator who have just about enough divine spark left to passively grant spells.

Another option would be the Heretic of the Faith route. That means getting spells from a deity despite misinterpreting his dogma and/or falling outside the accepted alignment. You could argue that the Risen Sun is a Lathanderan heresy, but one Lathander approves for some reason and thus grants spells.

There's a major difference between Servant of the Fallen and Heretic of the Faith, though, in relation to DM approval: the one is just a straightforward way to draw power from a passive corpse, but the other requires DM decision to control the god's reaction. You can't be a Heretic of the Faith and gain spells without some, perhaps counter-intuitive and mysterious, approval from the living god that actually grants your spells.

I get the need to monitor special concepts. But both Servant of the Fallen and Heretic of the Faith are feats that receive extensive coverage in exceptionally high-quality books on Realmslore (Lost Empires of Faerûn and Power of Faerûn, respectively - both some of the best lore in 3e, compared to garbage like Champions of Valor or Player's Guide to Faerûn), and both come with a list of dead gods and heresies which actually exist and are available to PCs. They aren't "special characters." It ought to become a matter of request and negotiation when you want to deviate from that list and make up your own heresies.

For those who haven't read those book, these deities and heresies are:
Amaunator
Auppenser
Bhaal
Gilgeam
Ibrandul
Leira
Moander
Myrkul
Ramman
Tchazzar

Cult of Shared Suffering
Dark Moon Heresy
Risen Sun Heresy (and indeed PoF adds the Heretic feat as an alternative to Servant in the Sunmaster PrC prereqs)
Three-Faced Sun Heresy

If you've all already read both these books and considered all these points, my apologies. But reading back on that request, it doesn't look like every DM is aware of these feats and the gods and cults explicitly associated with them. It requires some believable motivation to worship a dead god (but when wouldn't you need good motivation for everything?), but it doesn't require jumping through hoops or performing great deeds of cosmic significance.

As much as I appreciate the responsibility and freedom Yossarin's comment grants, I do think you should return to clear policies on what's allowed and what isn't. Emulating prestige classes and other character concepts has always been fine within very specific parameters. Ambiguity in practice leads to more control, because people are rather safe than sorry. Elor's request is a prime example of something that was unquestionably OK earlier, but suddenly has a precedent for requesting. This will keep happening with more and more cases until you put a stop to it. People are already complaining we've become too strict. If something is acceptable, it's acceptable without grudge and there can't be a potential for "boxing" a perfectly legal character. If it's not acceptable, it needs to be clearly stated and preferrably added to R&L in the character creation guidelines. There's not that many Prestige Classes and story-changing feats like this in FR, it's not hard to make a definite yes/no decision on each of them and write it down for reference.

The whole Servant of the Fallen feat is a bit off for Amaunator, IMO. Even in 3.5 it made little sense, as the Amaunatorans have always been a small but dedicated sect WITHIN the church of Lathander; they may hold to theological differences but they still serve Lathander as the other and more mainstream sects in the church of Lathander do. They fight evil, bring light, spread hope, and all that. If you look at Sunmaster, which is a prestige class specific to Amaunatorans, it even states that they are elite clergy dedicated to fighting darkness and chaos (eg. suffering). This isn't that different from what more orthodox Lathanderans do. In light of what we know as canon in 4E, that Lathander has always been Amaunator, the Servant of the Fallen feat becomes even more of an oddity for Amaunator. How would a dead god overtake one of the most powerful gods of the realm with only a small following, when a god's power is directly linked to the number of followers they have.

This is why I've never thought of Marcus as having Servant of the Fallen. He's a priest of a particular sect within the Lathanderan faith, but technically he's still a Lathanderan; hence why he preaches a combination of the Lathanderan and Amaunatoran doctrine.

Well, there we come to the complexities of faith and divine existence, I suppose. There's nothing contradictory about Amaunator being a corpse but also existing reborn within Lathander who absorbed part of his essence, and Lathander ultimately transforming into Amaunator again - perhaps by absorbing the dead body in the Astral plane quite literally, or just reshaping himself in the image of Amaunator. He obviously does not become the original Amaunator in either case, but a new Amaunator changed by the passing of time and the faith of his followers.

Lathander wouldn't become Amaunator on his own, whether they were one and the same (like the human mind is accustomed to thinking) or if they're amalgamations of divine principles and worship that intertwine at several points (as I believe the gods really exist in the Realms). It requires faith. The faith of thousands, if not millions, to shape the god's self-image and actual portfolios. It doesn't really matter whether Amaunator also exists as a corpse somewhere, does it? If enough people believed Shar and Selûne were two faces of the same goddess, even if that were not "true" currently, they would eventually be shaped by the faith of mortals and merge closer together. That's how gods work. They're not people, they don't have stable identities and they don't respect the logical law of identity. It's very possible one divine name can occupy two seperate spaces at once, or that there are actually two gods occupying one point in space. So to speak. Don't forget that part of Amaunator also seems to exist in the cruel Bedine deity. Perhaps it's a splinter of divine essence that became independent and heavily twisted by the faith of those people.

It's pretty explicit in LEoF that Servant of the Fallen is the primary feat to worship Amaunator and it's the original prerequisite for Sunmaster. Heretic of the Faith was a later addition in PoF. But it might make sense to speculate that as the Risen Sun Heresy has recently grown in influence and established itself as a clear alternative, the importance of Servant of the Fallen has decreased and Heretic of the Faith has gradually taken its place as the "feat of choice." This would represent the fact that most Amaunatorans are no longer scholars of obscure history, Netheril buffs or those in the church of Lathander who respect this lost (possibly transformed) god, but rather followers of a new cult that preaches Amaunator's return. From what I gather, though the belief that Amaunator was partially reborn in the character of Lathander is an old belief and though Amaunator has been worshiped by some for centuries, the heresy that Lathander is about to become Amaunator again and that he should be worshiped as the dawn maturing into noon, is a recent developement. If the more restrained belief about Lathander's past has long been accepted in the church, it's not exactly a "heresy of the faith" now, is it? That could explain the difference between the two feats: one is for traditional, conservative Amaunator worship, other specifically for this new Risen Sun Heresy. What would you say?

I don't think I have anything to add to that. The idea that Lathander took up Amaunator's name and portfolio is a very interesting idea, though irellevant for most PC's I suppose at this point. Heretic of the Faith also strikes me as more appropriate than Servant of the Fallen, especially for the Brotherhood of the Glorious Sun.

I agree in principle. Gods are heavily mutable and are virtually the playthings of the the consensus their worshipers have of them. While it would likely take not only large numbers of worshipers, but time to change what has been ingrained into the gods, they're mostly slaves to the beliefs people worship them for. They're the metaphysical expression of a set of ideals, aesthetics, or principles, outsiders like how elemental are manifestations of their elements. While over time they may switch to represent one aspect of their particular "element" over time or even be broken down into distilled forms of that element, that's about the extent of their uniqueness.

Whether Lathander is truly a part of Amaunator, derived from him, or going to change into him, it really is more up to the beliefs at this point. That's not to say if everyone suddenly believed he was Amaunator that he would instantly change, but given time, by virtue of being a deity he would begin to change to look like him, if the majority believed it so.

In others news, I think the best prank Good characters could pull would be to subversively indoctrinate places like Zhentil Keep with the belief that Bane wears a frilly pink tutu. Because inevitably, his big spiky avatars would be forced to wear them by the consensus of belief.

I think the rule on what needs a request is already pretty clear, isn't it? You need to put in a request if your character concept requires you to represent some mechanical aspect of your character as something else. If your character sheet says Lathander but you want it to be not-really-but-sort-of-Lathander, then write up a request for it. If you want your magic spells to be psionics, or your shield dwarf to be a derro, or whatever, then that's accomplished by getting a request approved.

Or at least that's how I've understood it. I suppose I could be wrong.

Lizzie wrote:

I think the rule on what needs a request is already pretty clear, isn't it? You need to put in a request if your character concept requires you to represent some mechanical aspect of your character as something else. If your character sheet says Lathander but you want it to be not-really-but-sort-of-Lathander, then write up a request for it. If you want your magic spells to be psionics, or your shield dwarf to be a derro, or whatever, then that's accomplished by getting a request approved.

Or at least that's how I've understood it. I suppose I could be wrong.

That's not the rule at all, though. It's something like "You can emulate PnP things like prestige classes with what's available in NWN, provided it doesn't grant you claims to any additional power or freedom from rules you'd otherwise be subject to." In addition to that vague rule of thumb, there are things that specifically need to be requested. Your cleric or druid can be a shaman, but if you wish to claim you're free from divine retribution or the rules of druidism, you need a request. You can be a bladesinger, breachgnome, stuff like that as you please, but new forms of magic or special powers beyond NWN's limits need a request.

I'll get you to quote on that in a bit.

Edit: Here it is.

PaladinOfSune wrote:

IronAngel wrote:

You typically don't need to request special base or prestige classes, with some qualifications: you cannot claim any powers you can't actually simulate with the mechanics, and those powers are subject to the same limitations as any vanilla class with those abilities. That is to say, you're not excempt from deity restrictions, somatic spell components or whatever by virtue of pretending to be something other than an NWN class. So your special spell you simulate with a wizard level is not a free action even if it would be in PnP, for example. And secondly, there are some extraordinary things that will require a request. These include High Magic and Psionics and some other things listed in R&L, and anything else the DM deem to be extraordinary. Use caution and common sense here, I guess. If it's a new type of magic entirely, it may need a request. Mundane classes and those who just combine traditional arcane or divine magic with something else should always be fair game.

Arcane Trickster, Breach Gnome, Bladesinger, Eldritch Knight, Shaman, Urban Ranger, Runescarred Berserker or whatever? That's always been fine. Don't claim you're a divine caster who doesn't need a deity or try use Paladin to simulate something with no code of conduct, though. I think it's pretty clear when you ask yourself, "Would this character as a vanilla class face some restrictions, and if so, will I adhere to them in my new interpretation?"

It's funny that anyone should even ask this, because it has always been an Amia staple. Not just an Amian thing, but almost the Amia thing. When I joined, the freedom of creativity was an important selling point of the server and everybody knew that. You wanted to play a primitive shaman of Mielikki and use cleric levels? Sure. You wanted to be a brawler with a monk levels? No problem. Times and points of interest change, I guess.

Bingo.

The normativity of Sune's statement is that of one DM, but this is an accurate description of hat has been de facto practiced and preached on Amia, always.

Amaunator. Varying Questions

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