Favored weapons

[Yemin]

Its been a while since i played it, but I believe that generally, a cleric is supposed to gain the weapon proficiency of their favored god when they join the clergy in older DND.

Could we add double-edged blades to priests of Kelemvor class since bastard sword is Kelem's fav:
http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Fatal_Touch

And due to the rule of in for a penny, it'd be nice to get taught exotic bastard sword like how fighters get taught their armor prof.

Other clerics get double-edged prof when they join their church and a longsword / bastard sword isn't the god's favored weapon in those cases so I'm not quite sure how this came to be about but eh.

Correct me if mistaken of course.

peace.

[Areia]

Agreed here on the main point. I always assumed Kel's clerics got double-edged and great blades because of his favored weapon, and how many Kelemvorite clerics I've known to wield the greatsword as their main weapon. Turns out they all just baught the feat.

I'm not sure about training exotic weapon prof for bastard swords specifically. While I'd like to see it and think it appropriate, I don't believe there's any precedent in FK for teaching extra feats to clerics etc. Loviatan clerics need to train exotic prof for whips and so on.

So I'd definitely be in favor of adding double-edged and great blades to their weapons list. Great blades because bastard sword falls also under that and, in practice, Kelemvor rarely actually uses his weapon one-handed in combat, so it's the style his priests would probably prefer.

[Yemin]

Give Loviatan's exotic weapon proff whips too? I mean c'mon....,
its a whip. I'm not aware that suddenly being able to use whips is going to break the game.

Or mystrans throwing weapons with the shuriken etc.

In general I don't have a very high opinion of exotic weapon proficiencies. They're a mechanical cost for roleplay that shouldn't really exist and only serve to penalize people who want to roleplay something different, or something more appropriate to their class, race or background in some cases.

A little off topic but yeah.

[Vaemar]

Remove exotic weapon proficiencies entirely and reimburse the feat points spent!

It is true that barring a select number of weapons, namely three, katana, bastard sword and dwarven waraxe, exotic weapon proficiencies are a tax on roleplay. Who roleplays their character with consistency should certainly not be penalized mechanically in such a manner, especially considering that some exotic weapons are already inferior to non-exotic counterparts, see for example sai versus dagger, or naginata versus halberd.

In this case anyway, the proficiency for great blades and double-edged is probably the best thing, since a bastard sword can be used two-handed without the exotic weapon proficiency.

[Yemin]

What advantages does the katana and the bastard sword offer? I've had chars with both and haven't experienced anything amazing with them.

You can see on your sheet it says D10 damage, but I never felt like I was doing anything special. I had a char that used to two hand a longsword and had the same experience as when I was two handing the hand and a half / katana.

I'd argue that the experience of the weapons vs technically what they offer isn't enough to require a feat to use them.

On the other hand, you could argue that the feat makes it so that they dont' become the norm since Katanas aren't native to the mostly medieval european setting of large portions of the Faerun continent. But I feel like with Aasimar's, since adventurers make up a small population anyway. Its not going to ruin anything for a few more players to run around with them.

[Vaemar]

What advantages does the katana and the bastard sword offer?

How many one-handed (since the exotic prof gives that ability) weapons with d10 damage die are there? Three: katana, bastard sword and dwarven waraxe. The rest is either 1d8 or lower.

Granted, it is a small advantage over a longsword or battleaxe, barely 1 point on average, but there is still an advantage.

On the other hand, you could argue that the feat makes it so that they dont' become the norm since Katanas aren't native to the mostly medieval european setting of large portions of the Faerun continent.

If you use katana as it was used by most samurai and Japanese warriors, that is two-handed, you do not need any exotic weapon proficiency. The proficiency is needed only for the one-handed usage, that, albeit present, was rare even in Japan.

[Yemin]

Fair doos.

[Talos]

Can someone quote a source that gives clerics the favored weapon of their deity? This would not include specialty priest stats, which are not standard.

[Yemin]

Never did play too much of 3.5 but I used this site for reference when I did. Its never proven to be innacurate as far as I know from people who have to book would tell me

https://dndtools.net/classes/cleric/

Looks like its taken from a War cleric varient in the book.

[Skylar]

Ya. I think it's basically a "war domain" bonus.

[Talos]

Every deity has a favored weapon (see Deities, page 106), and his or her clerics consider it a point of pride to wield that weapon. A cleric who chooses the War domain receives the Weapon Focus feat related to that weapon as a bonus feat. He also receives the appropriate Martial Weapon Proficiency feat as a bonus feat, if the weapon falls into that category. See Chapter 5: Feats for details.

That does appear accurate, corresponding to page 31 of the PHB 3.5.

Ya. I think it's basically a "war domain" bonus.

Maybe one of the Faerunian source books gives it to all clerics? FR has diverged from general setting rules before.

[Yemin]

Though, all path finder clerics are thusly proficient

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/cleric/

Granted we're not on Golarean, but the MUD front page does say we use some pf mechanics.

so.... yeah.

[Kaenas]

On a related note, do priests get different weapon proficiencies based on deity? If so is there a list somewhere? Might be helpful to avoid people spending feats to get access to weapons for RP reasons that it then turns out they would have gained normally once faithed.

[Areia]

On a related note, do priests get different weapon proficiencies based on deity? If so is there a list somewhere? Might be helpful to avoid people spending feats to get access to weapons for RP reasons that it then turns out they would have gained normally once faithed.

They do get different profs based on deity. As for which, best I could suggest myself is to try to seek out another cleric or high-ranking member of that faith IC to ask. There aren't any lists available that I know of.

..Or, even safer bet is just to refrain from weapon prof feats until you're faithed, if you can't get hold of another cleric.

[Kaenas]

On a related note, do priests get different weapon proficiencies based on deity? If so is there a list somewhere? Might be helpful to avoid people spending feats to get access to weapons for RP reasons that it then turns out they would have gained normally once faithed.

They do get different profs based on deity. As for which, best I could suggest myself is to try to seek out another cleric or high-ranking member of that faith IC to ask. There aren't any lists available that I know of.

..Or, even safer bet is just to refrain from weapon prof feats until you're faithed, if you can't get hold of another cleric.

Fair enough, though in the event that it's not a faith weapon it's potentially quite a bit of time lost that could have been spent improving the weapon skill given that it can't be trained normally.

[Hrosskell]

I believe it may be a hold-over from 2E.

[Benorf]

As someone who lives and breathes the rules of 3.5, I am sad to say Clerics do not automatically get a martial weapon proficiency if they need it, according to the core 3.5 rulebook. That being said, I've never played in a game in which it wasn't just freely given. It makes very little sense that there would not be training given to any cleric that intends to go out and travel the world to spread the word of their god.

This being said, the rules specifically say that taking the war domain would give martial weapon proficiency if it falls into the category. That implies that if it's an exotic weapon, it does not grant the ability to use it (though somehow you'd still have weapon focus for the weapon?)

Anyway, I did a bit of digging, including looking into errata and sifting through forums, and the general consensus is that the rules do *not* give weapon proficiency, but everyone and their duck's house rule is to give it to them anyway, regardless of what the rules say.

Personally, I think it should be granted. Especially since we don't get to choose which domains we focus on, and we don't get the little boosts from picking certain domains.

TL;DR, The rules do not give clerics martial weapon proficiencies, but everyone just acts like they do anyway.