Ah, priests! What to do about priests?

So here’s the problem as I see it: the original Cleric class in D&D is very Christian in nature. There’s nothing wrong with that per se, except it isn’t very inspiring for a fantasy game, and even less inspiring for a sword-and-sorcery, land-before-modern-history type game.

First, The McHack assumes a world run by a pantheon of gods, not just one god. In a pantheon situation it makes no sense that individual clerics, or anyone else for that matter, would worship just one of them! No, you would go to the fertility god if you wanted children, the war god if you are being invaded, and the harvest god if your grain is dying on the stalk. It stands to reason then that most priests would stand in the gap between humanoids and all the gods, not just one. In a world of antagonistic gods all vying for power, it makes sense to me that most priests would tend towards neutrality, not lawfulness.

If we lose the Christian influence for priests then does it still make sense for them to have power over undead? I think it does! Undead are an abomination to the world order created by those gods, so it stands to reason that the gods would empower their priests to stand against this anathema! I decided to swap out the 2d6 table and replace it with 1D12 table to bring the mechanic in line with the Task mechanic: Wisdom modifiers affect both the holding and the number of undead held. I also wanted to build in some interest by allowing more or less expensive/powerful holy symbols which also bring a modifier to holding and the number of HD held. I think this is a nice touch and gives priests a piece of expensive equipment to aspire to.

In an effort to continue to simplify the game I stripped down the spells available to fit in better with my world, and removed the priests ability to have access to catalogues of spells. Instead the gods bestow certain spells on a priest just as mages gain only specific spells.

While is wanted priests to have access to some heavy weaponry, I did not want them encroaching on the fighter and dwarf’s purview to heavy armor. So priests are proficient in up to heavy weaponry but only medium armor. I think the overall balance of the priest is pretty good!

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