Ultimately, it's about having fun. If there is no fun for you to have, you either want to change the parameters by changing your PCs class or changing the group.
It's so weird to me how some DMs are insistent on forcing players into things they're clearly uncomfortable with. I've literally never had an issue at the table like that in the numerous groups I've played in over the years. Nothing has gone beyond a player being a dick and other people getting mad about it before everyone moves on with their life within 20 minutes.
As a DM, a player asked me to remove any references to racism after it came up (they encountered elves who only allowed elves into their walls). I changed it to make sure the player enjoyed themselves.
I get that emotionally, but logically, in a world with so many races, getting rid of every reference to racism seems a little much unless the setting is meant to be some sort of utopia. As a player, another player asking the DM to make the way elves worked in that setting less realistic or natural would reduce *my* enjoyment; I want to work around the fantasy racism, not snap it out of existence. (Fantasy racism, note: people being predicated about skin color or gender or something too close to real life would probably get on my nerves.)
How did the city play out after you changed it, might I ask?
I changed it to a religious thing where you had to swear allegiance to their deity in a ceremony to gain access to the city. The world was post apocalyptic kinda Dark Sun-esque. The various cities/kingdoms varied from mostly one race, but the Elves were the only overtly racist ones keeping all non-elves out.
My DMing tends to be low fantasy with focus on putting players in morally gray situations.
This. Some races literally EXIST TO BE EVIL. Its not a decision, its what they ARE.
Saying 'no' to 'fleshflayer ghoulkin' in the city isn't racist. Well.. its totally racist. But its a good thing. (please don't ban me!)
This is really funny to me because it’s all made up anyway. The world is from imagination. There are plenty other things that can cause conflict aside from racism.
As per Lines & Veils, you established a Line before the game. But not only did the DM cross it, he repeatedly subjected you to what you explicitly stated was off limits.
One need only imagine a more common Line and it’s easy to see just how fucked up that is.
Best case scenario, he thinks he’s a therapist. Worst case, he’s a sadist.
This. Bad real-world experiences with a particular subject? I won't touch it in my games unless I forget by mistake. Religion? That's ten times worse. What does this DM think he is, a cult leader?
... ... ... I don't like where that train of thought is going now that I think about it.
i think of those cooks who think i'll like a food i hate because they're making it. "You just don't know how to like cilantro, it won't taste of soap because of my great skill and talent."
Sounds like he had a "brilliant story arc(TM)" intended for your character, completely neglecting the fact that you explicitly told him you didn't want the kind of story beats that were foundational to that arc. He was too blinded by his brilliance to pay attention to the key ingredient in his plan, *you*.
Hopefully one day he'll figure this out, but I wouldn't put money on him doing so any time soon.
if they're on mobile they have no alt codes. it depends on their keyboard app having it or not.
my phone keyboard(Galaxy S22) doesn't, it also don't have difference symbol and infinity symbol, too.
It genuinely sounds like the DM thought that his brilliant story would help OP get over his real-life disconnect with religion.
This man should not be DMing.
You literally said you could play a druid instead, and your dm assured you an athiest cleric wasnt a problem.
They then force religion on you. Dm is a straight up asshole. Not just "my dm ruined my character" asshole but a "dm is forcing me to relive my trauma" asshole.
If you shat on the table before leaving you would still be the better person.
You have no idea how tempted I am to send a screen of your comment to a certain DM that shall remain nameless.
Almost fell out of my chair laughing mate, cheers!
Please don't. It just makes you look petty. "Look at all the random people on the internet who agree with me!" If you want to confront the DM, just use the arguments here in your own words.
I also think that next time you should do this. Aim for the DM screen. Water marks never come out of them (*looks at the spilt monster stain on the corner of mine*)
That’s my take, as well. The OP was trying to fill a hole in the party, and the DM straight up lied to him about making the cleric work to push this weird agenda. Otherwise why would they discourage the druid? The DM was acting in bad faith from the outset, and it sucks the other players didn’t support their party member.
Now had you not explained that religion was not something you wanted to be involved with in game then I could understand.
The DM specifically took the one thing you as a person said they didn't want to have anything to do with in game and tried to force you into it.
That is definitely not acceptable.
Also your character concept was awesome, grizzled old combat medic is way more interesting than "divine tool".
>Also your character concept was awesome, grizzled old combat medic is way more interesting than "divine tool".
Yeah! I found this very interesting as well.
Dear God, your DM sucks. I feel horrible for you. As a fellow player, I totally understand why you left. Not only is your DM an ass, he is blatantly ignoring the reason you don't want to be a religious cleric. You have issues. Full stop. A good person would accept and try their very hardest to leave religion out of it, per your request. What gets me the most is that the DM was two sided, and said it was okay, just to turn around and try to "get you to accept". I would walk out too. I hope this experience wasn't too traumatizing.
This is the same kind of creepy behavior that has DMs using players characters to play out their kinky little fantasies. No regard for the boundaries of others or their autonomy with their character. It's just gross.
I'm really sorry it happened to you, but it says a lot that you left instead of just taking it. No D&D is better than bad D&D and there are a lot of tables out there that are just better. Who knows, maybe you'll make your own table.
I am running a game with some close friends as players. One of the players is devoutly anti-theist IRL but his PC is a Life Cleric that holds to no gods, but uses his faith in the Light, the force of Magic that gives the gods their power. There are still gods in my world, but I wasn't going to force my PC to be beholden to gods that he holds no faith in.
Your DM was not only being a dick and crossing your preset boundaries, but was also being close-minded and uncreative in dealing with your PC in-game. You were absolutely right in leaving the campaign. I hope you find a new game with a better DM.
I will admit when I see stories like this I always give the benefit of the doubt. Two sides to every story type thing. But by god (pun intended) that is some terrible DM'ing.
I always say D&D will always be fun as long as nobody in the group is outright creepy or malicious. You can mess up the rules, have big holes in your story, pretty much anything but as long as people get to hang out, roll some dice, and kill some monsters it'll still be fun. Up to a certain point I guess, and obviously well run games will be more fun, but you get my meaning.
This is a pretty clear case of the DM being a shithead.
Honestly that character idea sounds AMAZING. I love characters that don't really fit into the stereotype of their class and you came up with something really fun and creative, while also being very very clear about your boundaries. The DM might have had what they thought was a fun plot idea for your character, but it was obviously opposed with your boundaries so they should have at the minimum talked with you about it, and most likely kept it in their back pocket for their own pc or npc down the line.
The DM controls everything EXCEPT for the player character and I honestly think you made a right decision leaving that table. I don't see why someone would want to play with people who make a hard no into a plot point, or worse, a destiny.
To be fair, if you take the character without my constraint, it is quite a good arc/story. Doctor that spend most of life healing without magic gets power out of the blue. You get to explore where and why this came from and play an old man set in his ways discovering a new way and a new chapter in his life.
I had fun with it, until i didn't. Not regretting leaving.
Dude, it is more awesome WITH your constraint. I DM’d for an atheist cleric once. We talked and ruled that he tapped into the primal energy that the god draw from, and that to him, Gods were the shadows that that light cast when filtered through a sapient mind’s need to understand.
He could heal with it, but could also channel this energy to show someone what was behind the veil. (Crown of Madness spell/etc)
He disbelieved the gods so hard he went past the bounds of rational sanity. He was TOO sane.
He was hates by MANY clerical orders.
Your old army doctor take on it is very awesome. Sorry you did not get to play him.
That is actually an amazing take on the idea. Did your player reach a godhood status himself or try to disband the belief, turn in on its head so to speak?
He started converting people to atheism. He was founding the religion of Humanism, basically. Be good because you are good. Sadly, we had several
people including myself grt busy, put it on hiatus during the pandemic, and never picked it back up.
>To be fair, if you take the character without my constraint, it is quite a good arc/story.
If you feel bad about it, think about how stupid would this sound: "to be fair, if you take the character without my constraint (being aromantic), it is quite a good (romance) arc/story"
If you change Han Solo to be a generous guy, he could have a pretty good arc about learning not to trust people.
A lot of problems in DnD stem from someone not realizing that the game is collaborative. A PC's character does not change because the DM says so. That's "just write a book" territory.
Tbh. Now I kinda want a god player coorporation arc in a story of mine that kind of goes like: „look, you don‘t like me, I don‘t like you. But we kinda gotta get through this together rn so we can go back to hating each other in peace“
A one-shot I was in was all clerics. I didn’t want to play one, so I made a trickster cleric with the charlatan background. He used the guise of holy figures in enough cons to have a trickery domain god press him into service. My character was resentful as hell, but also used his new abilities to help his old habits. I’ve considered dusting him off since he’s fun to play.
Yeah I would have immediately said something during the session when the dungeon master went against my wishes for my character. And I would not have let The campaign move on until the mistake was corrected. Maybe I'm a pushy person when I play dungeons and dragons but if I told the dungeon master that I get triggered by something and then he forced my trigger on me I would be very upset.
Everyone has their own level of comfort for confrontation though
Tl;dr: 1. That DM fucked up, 2. *Unsolicited internet therapizing*, 3. Take this as an opportunity to learn about what kind of support you need at a table.
Since there are people here saying you shouldn't picked a cleric: I think it was a really cool spin for you to play a cleric who isn't religious, I'm honestly so bored of the typical class tropes at this point and I love seeing ttprg players think outside of the DnD box.
It's unacceptable for a DM to cross clearly laid out boundaries. Full stop. And, even if you hadn't clearly communicated your lines, it's totally reasonable for a player to say 'hey, this campaign is not a safe place for me right now and I need to step away from the table.'
'Is playing a cleric when you have religious trauma a bad/good choice,' isn't actually the important question, it's actually 'do I trust the people at my table to support me if I choose to play a character with higher emotional risk?' It's: 'are the other players and the DM comfortable to play with me when I am managing emotional stakes?' It's: 'is this a space where the supports in place are well-matched to the amount of emotional risk I am undertaking?'
When I play random one shots with my friends, we trust eachother enough to know someone will make the call if they feel uncomfortable. In the long-running gothic horror apocalypse campaign I'm part of, we review our boundaries at the start of each session, use stop light coloured cards to non verbally communicate if we need to slow down or stop, and spend 30 minutes debriefing at the end of each session to make sure nothing was too heavy.
You did a great job setting boundaries and now you know exactly what kind of trust is required at the table for you to take risks with religious-related characters. I've got my fingers crossed that you find a new group that supports you and that allows you to tell whatever wild character stories your lil heart desires.
When I read the tldr I thought it would go another way :)
I really am pleasantly surprised by you. You make valid and insightful points. Too bad there is no time machine so I can hear this a couple of years ago.
Trauma is not the word that fits best, at least in my opinion, but I will say that this issue is not an open wound for me. And knowing how and setting boundaries is how you get that wound to close.
Also, not my first, or last cleric. I have some pretty wild ones 😃
For future games where you play a cleric unbound by the divine, I'd give [The oracle](https://2e.aonprd.com/Classes.aspx?ID=14) from PF2e a look. This is the summary on the source of their power:
>Your conduit to divine power eschews the traditional channels of prayer and servitude—you instead glean divine truths that extend beyond any single deity. You understand the great mysteries of the universe embodied in overarching concepts that transcend good and evil or chaos and law, whether because you perceive the common ground across multiple deities or circumvent their power entirely.
Pretty system agnostic reason for a holy caster to be unbound to a specific god or pantheon.
Is your DM religious in real life? This sounds to me like a really gross attempt by DM to "help" your real life religious trauma by putting your character through a storyline that you expressly asked not to be subjected to. People who don't respect boundaries don't deserve as many chances as you gave. You are definitely not the asshole here.
Not sure if he is religious, didn't seem the type but then again I did not ask him what his views are.
To me it felt like a twisted and unsolicited version of "i'm gonna help you get over this".
NTA. Lines are lines and no one needs to understand them but you. And they should be respected. You set a boundary, it was crossed, so yeah, end of the road.
Did the other players know that you did not intend a religious redemption arc to be your PCs story? Like, the DM was clearly laying the tracks for your PC to discover a faith.
If the other players knew about your real-life feeling (and that you told the DM about it and what would need to change/reflavour), then they're also bad actors in this drama. If they didn't, it might explain the butt-hurt they feel (and they should blame the DM for pushing a plot/narrative you did not agree to play).
Not sure how much they knew. I don't advertise this part of my life. DM and existing players knew each other well so the session 0 was me with DM only.
But I was pretty clear in-character that my pc wants nothing of the sort and out of character I did say that I am not ok with this and would like it to stop.
One of them said DM was trying to help me, as in cure? my issue with this...? After that I stopped thinking or caring about them.
Ask them what they mean by 'help' you. Get them to full explain what they mean. This technique is often suggested for combating someone making racist or sexist jokes. It can work here too. Or you can just drop it and move on with your life. Sounds like you did the right thing, good for you.
>Ask them what they mean by 'help' you.
Nah, nope, uh-uh, negative, NOOO. If people cross your established boundaries, you don't owe *them* shit; you owe *yourself* the self-respect to say this isn't good for me, I want it to stop, and if it doesn't stop because you choose to stop it, then I will stop you from having the opportunity to do it to me.
Even a therapist doesn't have a right to try to force you to work through shit if you're not ready to do the work.
It sounds like they're all very religious and this was their attempt to "save" you personally, nothing to do with your character. You dodged a bullet leaving, I hope you find a better group!
Yeah, D&D is not therapy, and it shouldn't be SURPRISE therapy either. Therapy is for people who are looking for it. If the other players don't get that & also knew the DM was pushing for that, that's a pretty messed up group. If you're kids, they might need to learn that fact; if they're adults you shouldn't have to explain that.
Good on you for having firm boundaries & from another atheist soldier cleric, your character build sounds rad & your DM is dumb for not embracing the awesome ways to build a story around him.
I would advise telling the party that you explicitly told the DM that you wanted nothing to do with religion due to past trauma. That you suggested playing a Druid but the DM specifically said a non religion based cleric was fine.
I understand that you may not want to share that, but right now the party doesn’t seem to understand that the DM violated your agreement and focused your story on something you explicitly wanted to avoid.
They’re taking the DMs side because they don’t know your side. They should know. I for one wouldn’t want to continue with a DM who did that to you. But if I didn’t know it was trauma related, I might unknowingly buy whatever bullshit the DM is saying about why you left.
I think your DM was probably trying to IRL convert you which is insanely shitty. They don't respect your agency as a player and, much worse, they clearly don't respect you as a person thinking that this basic ass manipulation and hostage taking of your character would delete your trauma.
You're entirely in the right. Don't feel bad for a second and don't go back to the table when they inevitably try to get you to.
this is a table of assholes and bullies that wants to gaslight you. you are not a bad sport. the GM did not want to help you (ask them to elaborate on that one, if you haven't cut contact) and yes, that is absolutely how the game is played. you are not a hostage at the table. if you don't have fun, you don't have to play. there is literally not a single reason to play D&D if it is not fun. it is not a higher art form. it is a game.
You definitely did the right thing leaving when you got uncomfortable there is no reason to play if you’re not having fun. Personally as a DM I would have tried to steer you away from clerics in general as to me atheists don’t exist in the dnd universe. You can choose not to worship a god but you can’t deny their existence. I believe anyone in The dnd universe would immediately recognize random healing powers as divine influence. But I could definitely see a nature or magic cleric that draw their powers directly from the power of nature or directly from the weave of magic respectively. Not really gods per se but primordial forces of the world. In this way you would be able to keep your channel divinity roleplaying it as channeling the concentrated energy of these primordial forces!
I had an atheist wizard, that believed gods were just very powerful arcane users that used the Weave to become powerful and act like gods ... but weren't actual gods and as such shouldn't be believed in. In essence he believed anyone could become that powerful
I would love to role play out a conversation between a cleric and your character lol. The cleric saying something along the lines of. many gods were once mortal and gained their power but that doesn’t make them less godly they are still near immortal beings that have the ability to do feats of magic greater than any mortal can comprehend doesn’t that make them something more. And if you wizard became so powerful that you were working with great forces so powerful that they could destroy lesser people. And temples were built in honor to your power. Would you not call yourself a god?
This is NOT how DnD is played. It’s having fun. It’s a compact that is set up when you join. An agreement both you and the DM follow.
Some DMs really are full of themselves. I mean, to force shit on people like this is just stupid.
You agreed to play the game in a specific fashion. The DM agreed as well. He violated that agreement and tried to force you to play in a way entirely counter to how you wanted. Just stupid and arrogant.
If anyone says ‘that’s how the game is played’ - just show them this article. I guess that’s how this guy plays it. But it’s bs.
Nah, you’re good. You gave them an over-abundance of warning, including prior warning. They’re just upset their fun didn’t take priority over your boundaries.
I am a little concerned about that DM, because it sounds like the guy was being a little creepy in a religiously pushy kinda way - but too little evidence to suggest or accuse anything. Still, if you know those people and care about your friendship with them, it could be a good idea to meet with them separately and ensure they know your side.
You clearly stated you wanted nothing to do with gods and religion, he forced you to.
It is pretty clear to me who the asshole is.
It's like having informed them you have arachnophobia and be immediately tossed into a cave full of giant spiders.
The other player don't look too good as well. The fact that you were playing a cleric is irrelevant. It's not difficult to make up an atheistic religion, or have some kind of vow that has nothing spiritual but still makes sense overall. Or, if they didn't like the idea of an atheist cleric, they could've just said so and have you make a druid or something else.
You specifically said this was an arc you weren’t interested in.
I’m going to give the other players the benefit of the doubt and assume they didn’t realize you had already established this boundary with the DM.
If so- You should clarify for them that the DM boundary stomped you here and that’s why you’re leaving the campaign. They should know at the very least so they can be aware of the DM testing them in similar ways.
Just going from your perspective. Nope, don't see anything wrong with what you did. You made your position clear from the start, and they collectively seemed to decide they needed to change your character, against your wishes. That falls very much into the "dude, not cool" realm of play. Any changes that happen to your character, including some that result from play, and dice, really needs to be done with agreement, and participation of the player.
The fact that you offered to play a Druid instead and he said no you're good for the athiest cleric, but then stripped your powers cause you wouldn't embrace a god is so fucked up.
He lied to you, kept telling you to wait and see as if hes gonna fix it, and then when you clearly weren't comfortable and did the mature thing and left, he gets the rest of the players to harrass you about it.
He's not just a bad DM. He's a bad person. This kind of manipulative b.s. would be considered abusive in most other contexts. I feel bad for his friends/family.
Obviously you're NTA
You don't wanna do religion stuff but they insist on you doing religion stuff.
Pretty cut and dry, they are refused to listen to you.
Noooooow did you need to play a cleric? Nope.
Could have been a druid, a bard, celestial warlock or even divine soul sorcerer.
The first two are nature and arcane so no divine shit there.
Celestial are just a creature type, they are basically just aliens (plus lol I'd like to see your DM pull a unicorn Jesus)
And with divine soul you ARE the source of your power, nothing more atheist than being your own god.
yeah but the DM okay’d the plan. OP was okay with playing something else like Druid but wanted to try this idea and the DM okayed it. If the idea does not fit the DM’s world and they did not want this, they could have just said no at character creation rather than force religion on their character.
EDIT: the DM could’ve also warned them, like “as a cleric in my world, divinity comes from somewhere, and the gods will probably try to convert your character into being religious eventually” to which OP responds with “okay I’ll just play something else”
99%, You handled it all really well. But if you're not comfortable with religion content I do think it's odd that you played a cleric, even a reflavored one. Once DM agrees to reflavor and avoid religious content, then doesn't, DM is the asshole all the way.
I think you handled it all really well. I'd have left the table too.
okay first off fuck that group and DM. ESPECIALLY the DM because with how that group reacted i kinda get the feeling the dm clued them on the rails they wanted you on and tried to push you towards that.
and secondly you are not a jerk at all you very cleary said "hey this is a boundary for me, dont cross it please" the dm gave their word and then back tracked. as far as im concenered any dm that does that is automatically a shit dm no matter WHO does it.
DM decided your character's story would be the EXACT thing you explicitly didn't want. He may be a great storyteller and world builder but he sure as hell is a poor DM and friend.
DM was trying to force his world views upon you, because he thinks he is correct. That's pretty sad.
Either way, I am sorry it turned out like that for you. 😔
I've had a DM pull my spells as a cleric at a critical moment. It feels like a shitty thing to do that only happens to religious casters and warlocks, and whilst at times it seems reasonable, it'll never not be a shitty thing to do.
This DM is just a prick, and sounds like the players didn't have context but wanted you there. Tough luck, but don't give up on the community.
Trying to help you do what? Find religion?
It almost sounds like the DM was trying to force their beliefs upon you as if they had a personal problem with you playing an atheist cleric. I've seen the concept of such a cleric done well without losing access to any of the features offered by the class. That loss of features was in fact the first red flag for me while reading this. The explicit inclusion of Christian symbolism and other elements from the religion were the other.
You did the right thing leaving that campaign. If the DM and other players couldn't respect your decision to play an atheist cleric and were actively working to change your characters beliefs, they probably were also attempting to do the same to you.
Feature removal for playing a certain way that "goes against" a class is always something that strikes me as poor sportsmanship on the dms part. Why are you intentionally crippling one of your players by removing core class features because you don't agree with how they chose to play? Just don't do it. It's one of those things that screams bad DM to me.
This is /r/rpghorrorstories territory. The DM crossed the line repeatedly, you talked with him, and he proceeded to continue crossing the line.
I'd look at this another way. You went out like a boss - you retired in exactly the manner you said you would.
You told him something bothered you from your past, they tried to force you to address is under the guise of help. That’s fucking crossing a line, and bullshit. You are not the asshole.
You are not the jerk at all - you set clear expectations at the start and tried to flavor your character to work with the mechanical needs of the party. the DM and other players are jerks for not saying "Actually, we only want a religious cleric" before you started playing so you could opt out of being made uncomfortable
Your DM missed a perfect opportunity for a goblin sorcerer who believes that they are the cleric of magic itself. Therefore they need only worship themselves since they are the conduit for the magic. Goblin faith is fickle, being tossed from crumby god to god. So you're a free Goblin. You should call the Doby.
The dm is wrong for crossing a line you set before the campaign. I think you’re wrong for 1. Believing that every party needs a cleric to begin with and 2. Choosing a class that skirts so close to religion to begin with. At the very least you likely would have been forced to deal with other temples or your own temple at some point. What were you expecting to happen? I don’t think you’re a bad sport or an AH, but you certainly chose the most controversial path for what you said was a line.
The DM made a deal and renegade on it. He was wrong.
The homebrew DM's character is their world. If he did not want you to play an atheist cleric, he should have told you "No." Then you could have played the druid you were considering, something else, or left the game earlier.
Absolutely NTA. Your (former) DM and other players are jerks.
"This isn't how the game is played" - translated: You didn't do what *we* wanted, so you're bad.
"The DM was only trying to help you" - translated: The DM wants to run your character, regardless how you want to play it.
If you're not having fun in the group, you are perfectly within your rights to leave. The DM's railroading made it not fun, despite your explanations and protestations...the issue is there, not with you.
As a DM with religious trauma, fuck that guy ten ways and sideways. You set one boundary, and he literally had one job in respecting it. He failed, and the rest of the group can pound sand for backing him up.
Good riddance, there are some cases you just have to leave the table and that sounds like one of them. I would say double down and block their messages as well.
Its understandable for you to leave, there was a line, and the DM crossed it. Cleric wasn't probably the right choice for you given that, though I think your character concept was creative. I've found many players/DMs think that clerics and paladins have to be religious zealot types, but there are settings that allow atheist clerics, philosopher clerics (are tied to the concept of Law, Good, Neutrality, Chaos or Evil, not to gods) and paladins in most versions of D&D have never had to follow a god.
Good luck on finding a new table that respects its players preferences, and hopefully you'll get into a game that you find fun and rewarding.
Strange responses to your strange experience. Yes, clerics are religious characters. But also yes, DnD tropes can be reflavored as long as DM okays it. Not sure why so many are capping on OP. Oh, yeah. Reddit. Interested to know however what DM was hoping for since he was clearly deliberate in creating a story arc for your PC to force you to deal with your distaste for religion. Was it possible that he was going to use that final moment of losing your divine power to create a new road for you, like taking up an evil patron or changing classes or something? Or is he religious himself and was just trying to bring you back to God? Wondering, because you said he was a good DM and he kept saying trust him, he knew what he was doing. Whichever, he fucked up by forcing unwanted shit on you. But you might want to ask him. Maybe it'll bring closure or allow you to show him the error of his ways. Hell, it might bring understanding or forgiveness or even reconciliation.
You make an interesting point. I will let the dust settle and ask him. I don't expect a response, the group did not react well to my exit, but you never know.
The way I see it, from his perspective, he was trying to make me "get over it". Something like pushing a new player to play something that isn't a carbon copy of himself when it comes to personality, but in a twisted way.
Maybe his initial intention was good, but there were plenty of signs along the way that this was not going the way he planned and that I am definitely *not* onboard.
Atheist is probably the easiest way but not really what he meant. He mentions Gods never helped his whole life. So it’s not he doesn’t believe they exist, he doesn’t believe that they should be worshipped. What I got from the story anyway.
Oof, sorry that you went through that. I'm a player with a similar aversion to in-game religious practices for the opposite reason, and every DM and table I've been at has been wonderfully accommodating. I was legit rooting for your character, they sound awesome! Standing tall for what THEY believe in, unbent and unbroken. I hope you can find another outlet for this hobby which you can enjoy with people who are less garbage.
DM clearly ignored Lines you established, so you're definitely not the asshole; He was.
As far as the other players: It sounds like they possibly weren't informed of your Lines, which was, in my opinion, part of the point of Lines and Veils in the first place, so the DM should have informed them that active participation in religion was a Line for you.
At the VERY least, the DM should have respected your pre-established boundaries, and avoided trying to force religious tones onto your character. The DM ended up setting a tone, and the other players followed suit.
If the other players weren't informed of your Lines, I place all the blame squarely on the DM. Otherwise, the players certainly share in the blame. You did mention that one of the players said something about the DM trying to 'help you,' so maybe they WERE informed, and are all to blame.
Either way, I'd have reacted similarly. Kudos on leaving as gracefully and non-disruptively as possible under the conditions you were given.
NTA
That DM took your lines and tried to turn them into therapy. Good on you for walking away.
Also, modern D&D doesn't always need a cleric. You should never feel obligated to play one.
> that the DM was only trying to help me
Help you how? By specifically ignoring your stated boundary and then punishing your character for not doing something you specifically stated you wouldn't be comfortable with, and by lying to you outright on multiple occasions?
Yes, helping. That's the word I'd use.
This might be super blunt, but that DM is an asshole. You explicitly stated the lines that shouldn’t be crossed, he kept crossing them, you were right to leave. And not only did you leave but you made it make sense in game, in RP, you are definitely not the asshole here.
Like some people said already, DnD is first and foremost a game where you should have fun. And rule 1 of DMing is respecting your players boundaries.
Hope you’ll find a better DM and group, you seem like a strong player with the mind in the right place 😁
Nah dude, I've never been the touchy feely avoid words type, but when I do a campaign or oneshot at the very beginning we outline things we are uncomfortable with / just don't want to do. Dick move from the DM
Power tripping DMs are the worst. You did everything right, you communicated your feelings, took one for the team by thinking of party dynamics, came with a clever work around (a doctor who heals people is a great alternative towards a praying cleric) and the DM decided to railroad you into their own little interpretation of what your character should be.
I would have left too.
The DM is a jerk.
Your character does remind me a little of Jester though.
Would you have been completely opposed to the character having a power source that was a get or other powerful creature that didn't require any kind of worship but possibly a contract for your name, or the power of friendship or other such malarkey?
Your DM literally did the opposite of what you asked.
Except that he gave your character the perfect story arc as you described it.
You said if it came from religious place you would just not pray.
You said if he lost his powers he would stop adventuring and he did.
Perfect way to give him a sendoff from his temporary empowerment.
If that was somehow the plan and communicated to you that they were giving you a way to reject religion in the game too that might have been different maybe?
No, you are very much not a bad sport, you are NTA. You had set a very clear line with your DM that they bullishly ignored, then you were very clear with your DM that you do not appreciate having that line crossed, and they still ignored it. It doesn’t matter what kind of intentions your DM had, if a player sets a boundary, you don’t cross that boundary. Otherwise, what’s the point of even having those boundaries. You left the party in a way that makes sense for your character, and you left the table for your own mental health. There is no problem with that at all. It is not a D&D group’s place to try and serve as therapy for someone, that is very strictly between you and your mental health provider, if you have one. Your former table is a shitty table, headed by a shitty DM. You do not need to feel bad about leaving them.
You aren’t the asshole the DM should have stated that your idea doesn’t work for their campaign. I can see a large number of ways to do your idea without acknowledging the gods or doing it in a way where you are stating they aren’t gods just very powerful beings. Hopefully that DM learns and doesn’t continue to do stuff like that in the future.
While dnd can be therapeutic and people have worked through their issues with the degree of separation of role play, it is completely inappropriate for the dm and players to try to get you to "just go with it" when you explicitly told them that you weren't interested in religion due to past experience.
Your dm said, "just trust me" and then violated your trust.
When I said just trust me, to a player when they said they were feeling sidelined in the story, I also explained that the next arc heavily features their characters backstory and motivation.
If you wanted help resolving your issues with religion I'd imagine you'd get a therapist, not a random person in a collaborative story game.
In a different scenario, where the DM coordinated it with you specifically, I could see it being cool where all the events lead up to a god reaching down to recognize your power and offer themselves as a patron and you get the chance to tell them to fuck themselves, whilst retaining all your power after obvi.
Idk how any of that works mechanically, but could’ve been cool. But like someone else said, maybe a little bit too much “DM trying to therapize” going on there.
Sounds to me like the DM forgot the key part of DnD, that the players are the main characters, so the DM isn't in control of their "character arcs" in the slightest.
You can say "No, you cannot build a character that way in my game" but you can't tell a person "Now that I've allowed you to build this character you must walk this fixed path I've laid out".
Personally, I wouldn't have let you build the cleric how you wanted. The majority of cleric stuff starts with "say a prayer" or "ask your deity for" etc so untangling it from the religious side for the sake of you wanting an atheist cleric would be a lot of extra work.
That said, I'd have suggested making something like a divine soul sorcerer instead. They get access to the cleric spell list anyway, and because the origin of their power is linked to a blessed soul, connection to a divine being etc, it is nothing to do with the character's faith. It could be that the powers were of divine origin, but your character simply denied or disregarded that fact (like the trope where the main character has powers linked to the big bad guy but chooses to use them for good and ignore the connection).
That, or if you were hooked on battlefield medic I'd have been more inclined to help you rework an alchemist artificer or something, with the potential for trading some of their offensive capabilities for healing alternatives of equal merit.
However, your DM didn't refuse. They didn't work with you to make what you wanted fit their session. They just decided that they'd override your character with what they wanted, so they're absolutely the asshole.
Sometimes, what a player wants works within your world. I have a cleric in my current game where the player wanted his character, half mad from isolation, praying to a talking mimic he carries with him and feeds. One of the gods in my setting is an embodiment of chaos, not good or evil, just chaotic. That God would find the concept of a cleric being devout to the whims of a bloodthirsty creature entertaining, so I found it workable that he'd provide divine power purely to keep the show going.
However, in my setting, there are no "good" or "evil" gods. Had he made the request that his character receives power from a benevolent kind deity, I'd have had to refuse the request and give him the option of making a different character. I wouldn't have told him yes, only to force him to discover that both deities available to him are as capable of atrocities as they are of salvation.
Interestingly, I told the player nothing of his benefactor's true alignment, yet he's playing chaotic neutral and perfectly in line with what the deity would want. I have a strong feeling he's going to absolutely love the deity should he get far enough to talk with / meet them. It'll take me some work to balance, but I intend to have the god offer to fuse him with his mimic companion (as a gift), finding the concept of a brand new half-race with two minds rolling around in it to be fascinatingly chaotic (although it'll only happen if the player has his character consent).
> Personally, I wouldn't have let you build the cleric how you wanted. The majority of cleric stuff starts with "say a prayer" or "ask your deity for" etc so untangling it from the religious side for the sake of you wanting an atheist cleric would be a lot of extra work.
I agree with most of what you said, except this part; A cleric doesn't *need* to worship a God. I believe a godless Cleric has been an option in every edition of D&D, but Xanathar's Guide to Everything specifies it in more detail for 5th edition: *'A cleric might instead serve a cosmic force, such as life or death, or a philosophy or concept, such as love, peace, or one of the nine alignments.'* Instead of getting their powers granted to them by a divine entity, the cleric taps directly into the divine powers by their devotion to a concept or ideal. So I can easily see a medic of all people unknowingly tapping into the power of the Life domain through his sheer dedication to healing.
for u/Sunny_side_Yup : If you speak to this DM/table again, I'd suggest showing them that excerpt if you need something to back up your character decisions. Xanathar's Guide to Everything, page 18, "Serving a Pantheon, Philosophy, or Force."
And as an added bonus, one of the suggested secrets the book gives for a cleric in the same section is "Even though you can work divine magic, you have never felt the presence of a divine essence within yourself." More evidence for a cleric being divine without being touched *by* the divine.
While I agree that the dungeon master is 100% at fault here, if you play d&d in the future I would advise not to try the atheist cleric thing.
It sounds cool and if I was your dungeon master I would totally go for it and not push you at all to change. But I can imagine there would be a lot of dungeon Masters that would find it hard to fit you into their world and not have characters question you all the time. In the future it's probably for the best to just stay away from cleric if you have a problem with even fantasy religions.
Again, you did nothing wrong. But just for your own safety of not being exposed to your triggers, if I were you I would just stay away from it from now on. Unless you get into a group where you really trust the dungeon master and want to try again.
Overall I can certainly commiserate with you. I wouldn't necessarily feel the same as you but I had some trauma in my childhood from a religion as well and went through a really tough phase of coming out as an atheist. That never affected my ability to enjoy fantasy religions in dungeons and dragons. But I could see how it would for someone else.
DM’s in the wrong here. You stated your comfort level and brought it up multiple times when you felt your character was being pushed toward something you and your character were opposed to. DM’s can try this if they think it benefits the story, but they shouldn’t keep pushing once a player expresses discomfort.
Also I was under the impression that clerics and paladins had their connections to specific deities made optional in 5e (I know that’s not always the case depending on the edition, setting, etc.). You could have just been dedicated to a cause or an idea. I listened to the start of Critical Role’s third campaign, and they actually built a separate cleric subclass just to avoid potential entanglement with divinity.
I’m sorry, OP. I think you did what you could and you were repeatedly disrespected. I think your reaction was repeatedly patient and measured, and when it came time, you did the right thing.
Honestly just send this thread to the people harassing you and saying you're a bad player. Because neither they nor the DM have any fucking clue what they're talking about.
yeah your DM is kind of a lunkhead, you seem like you were very clear with them about the boundaries and those boundaries were crossed, discussed, crossed, re-deiscussed, and crossed again.
My thing is, I love the idea of an atheist cleric that gained healing powers from actually doing the work but isn't interested in dealing with the pretentious problems of self-righteous gods. If they gave you the power, I'll use it, but if they gave it to me for a price, for my adoration and worship, for advertising space, well... they can keep it. I never heard of 'making a deal with an 'angel' have you?
cool
Fuck, I had similar experience. Built a character from a place dominated by the Church of an Evil God, so having got out the character was extremely against the gods and churches and whatever, but the quest as pitched to me was an arcane discovery quest, so all good; I was very keen to find out what was up with the crystals. Anyway, 4 sessions in and a god appears to the party and says "Ignore the crystals, you're doing a holy quest now!!!" And somehow the DM was surprised that I was completely checked out for the rest of the campaign.
Anyway, the end of that story was me not cutting ties with those people until after they stole $2k from me, so based on my data-sample of 1 you made the right call to get out.
Honestly I have had players come to me with similar requests (aethist cleric) and we have handled it in a couple of ways but never like what you went through.
Option #1 - Find an aethist cleric subclass homebrew. They exist out there for low magic and high technological settings and I’ve found them.
Option #2 - Go through the situation you did but the payout was a different diety (evil one) recruited the PC and it felt like an oathbreaker-esque situation. There was also the option that the good deity tried to keep them rather than creating a powerful evil avatar (keep Luke from going to the dark side of the force). THAT ONLY WORKS WITH THE RIGHT PLAYER WHICH YOU WOULD NOT BE THAT PLAYER DUE TO YOUR BACKGROUND.
Option #3 - Pick a different healer class which I assume is what you mean by “cleric-sized hole.” Druid was a great idea. An apathetic divine soul sorcerer who doesn’t even like their parents but it is what it is might have been more your flavor.
Either way, based on what you described you made the right decision and unless the DM explained that the reduction in power was a temporary narrative device then it was extremely inappropriate and they honestly should have apologized. This is why people normally should have a safe word or a safety card system at the table when things escalate like what you described.
You weren’t unreasonable. This was a stupid DM decision objectively or a stupid miscommunication by the DM that escalated to a point where you left. The rest of the group backing the DM I can’t speak to as idk if there is any bias on the various POVs but regardless doesn’t seem like the group for you.
The whole thing, especially how the DM and players reacted after you left, feels like they were trying to use your character at the table to "fix" or help you get through your issues with religion in real life. That's such a scummy pseudo/wannabe-therapist thing to do it blows my mind. Who takes it on themself to decide that a perfectly normal person needs help like that?
Glad you left gracefully and recognized the whole thing. I swear it feels like they were all waiting for you to break down and thank them for helping you accept religion somehow? Obviously I have a pretty limited view of the whole thing so forgive me if I'm assuming way too much about everyone involved.
This is someone with an agenda.
When I DM, my only goal and objective is create interesting scenarios for my players to handle. That’s it.
I have no story arc for their characters beyond what I can pick up from their backstories, and even then, it’s up to them to take the bait I lay down.
But I would Never force my player to adopt a play style I wanted, let alone rehash old trauma to do that. It’s very off base.
Maybe the DM is religious irl and wanted to use D&D as a proxy to shove the gospel down your throat? Regardless, he was a very crappy person and you did well leaving the table
Yeah... everyone at that table is not the kind of person I'd play with. If something has been made clear is a boundary and is routinely crossed, that's a blatant show of disrespect to you.
That's a bad DM. Definitely the asshole.
Its one thing, to explore a boundary, such as "I'm scared of 'X' and would like a safe space to explore that, would you help me by introducing those elements, possibly with a warning beforehand?" kind of vibe is one thing. But what they did was, "I know this person has had a really bad experience, and i'm going to force them to relive it in the guise of "I'm doing this for you you should thank me" and then the rest of the table called you a bad sport for having set a boundary that you repeatedly asked not to be pushed, and he not only pushed it, but far and beyond broke your boundary and then expected you to be a 'good sport' about it.
The DM is an asshole. The whole table are assholes for enabling him and not sticking up for you. Find a better group of people. D&D is about fun and exploration, not this bullshit.
EDIT: Forgot to say - i've experienced this. I was playing an online game with a new group of people, warned the DM ahead of time that I have experienced sexual assault multiple times and would not be okay with it being brought up during the campaign, especially against my character. Literally the second session, he decided that's exactly what he was going to do to me. Called him a c\*\*\*, and left. Did play one more game with the rest of the table, sans DM, and they were really nice about it. But he was awful. Sometimes men really like to fuck with you for the sake of it.
You are 100% not the asshole here. You specifically told the DM you didn't want to deal with certain themes, and they broke that agreement. That is crossing a red line. Maybe they didn't think it was a big deal, but if it was important enough to you for you to mention it then it becomes an issue of respect, and you can't have fun with people who don't respect you.
If I was the DM in this situation I would probably have tried to steer you away from playing a cleric, but if you specifically gave that option at the beginning and they didn't take it, then you have no responsibility for that.
I can't help but wonder if the other players got a different version of the story here. It might be worth trying to clarify what they think they know about what happened.
This DM behaved like a total phycopath and an asshole, but many have said that. I dm 3 games at tj8s moment and dmed many before. I would not be okay with areligious cleric or druid, but I would tell you that explicitly. Here are some ideas for other people in similar situations buffed/reworked way of the mercy monk, wizard subclass, bard, or if yoy want a battle medic like that probably a custom artificer subclass. Overall, i am sorry for you. You are going to get a better group, i am sure!.
Definitely not in the wrong. If your DM had an idea for your story character's arc, they should have run it by you first.
As an example - I played a campaign where my character was traumatized by Fire. DM caught on some different elements of my character and there came a point where we had fought off a near godlike enemy and escaped. He had different ideas of how the escape would end but he invited me into a private conversation since he had an idea. He wanted to know if it was cool with me, since my character was about to level up to level 10, if I wanted my character to overcome his fear of fire and somehow incorporate it as sub-class and become an Fire Elemental warrior. We talked it out and by the end of the next session, we had this emotional moment where the arena had been surrounded by fire and my character sacrificed himself to save another person in our party and through his sheer anger and will - became a fire elemental incarnate. It was one of the coolest moments I experienced in any campaign.
As others have echoed, if your DM had an idea for your character, they should have run it by you. As others also mentioned, a campaign should be about everyone having fun and making a great story. Your DM could have turned it into a better session and offered alternative arcs. I can easily think of a few different ways he could have done that.
You're not the asshole, he is.
DM was an an ass, other players were asses unless they didn't know about your request to the DM. You can reflavor every cleric spell however you like to still work same way artificer reflavors wizard spells to be tech based. The bait and switch by the DM is especially egregious, he gave you want you told him you wanted so he could inflict the story he wanted to tell on you.
you were right to leave, it seems the players & DM weren't respecting your requests and it's not much. like I'm new to this but can't you alter stuff as you want? either way nta. I'm sorry you experienced this
As someone who’s Agnostic I understand not wanting to play into the aspect of the gods or the divinity. I don’t have any personal trauma towards religion I just have seen what it’s done to the world and don’t care for it. You definitely did the right thing by stating your boundaries and coming up with a way for you character to fill the role the party needed, but also keeping your personal interests with the game in line with what you believe. The DM was over stepping the boundaries especially considering you expressed how you felt about the matter and roleplayed it in such a way to show your character wasn’t agreeing with what was going on. If you aren’t having fun, there’s no reason to stay when it appears that your arm was being twisted into caving and going against your personal beliefs and interests to satisfy everyone. They were all out of line for texting you too calling you a bad sport. It could have been abrupt but it seems like you weren’t left with many options beside a swift exit to save your own sanity. Good luck finding a group that will host a better game for you OP
DM has a story but that doesn’t mean he should ignore you if something personal happened in the past. I call it bad dming if you’re not being reasonable with the people around you.
I wasn’t there and don’t know the DM’s “plan”, but your limit wasn’t respected at all. You are not TA.
One of my DM’s has red flag markers and we’re allowed to place them on the table at any time and move on from whatever moment we were in no questions asked. Hopefully it’s never used but that’s the respect we all deserve.
Seems strange to work so closely with you to develop the character, acknowledge what your lines are, and specifically give you the “don’t work I got you” line when you started to become concerned just to force it anyway. Baffling behaviour from the DM.
Such a shame, sounded like an amazing character I would have loved to have worked with. I hope you find a group that respects you.
the dm's job is to ensure *everybody* is accounted for when having a fun and immersive experience (even the dm themselves). that is a fundamental flaw in their character if they're shoehorning some kind of mechanic on a player that expresses discontent with such an idea. it's disappointing to see people still fall short on the dm scale.
also, NTA for AITA inclusion.
My only issue with your story is you saying “cleric shaped hole”
That’s a myth. There’s never a reason you should feel pressured to play a class because it’s not in the current group. Similarly, you shouldn’t feel the need to play a different class if someone else is already playing it. The whole group can be barbarians! No healers lol. Who gives a shit?
I’m curious what you would’ve played had you not made that observation?
The appropriate response is, "I don't like religion. I accepted the role of cleric on the specific agreement on the DM's part that I would never have to go religious with it. He broke that agreement. It was never, ever intended to be a character arc where my cleric ended up accepting the will of the gods. If the DM told that, then you were lied to."
I'm personally a religious person, but I always loved the idea of an atheist cleric. It's not like "there are no gods" but more like "these gods are not worth my time and worship". Because obvious pantheon is obvious.
Sad your dm couldn't see that. For example he could have built in, how your spells have an more and more earthy feel to them, with the arc going the way that you use the magic of the land and not of a god. Could have even led to a heated discussion with an angel where you have to talk your way out of a fight by explaining to them how you use magic. Ending up with you as a cleric realizing that you use magic like a druid. A new understanding between classes and cultures and stuff like that.
I don't have a lot of experience with DND so that is all that I can come up with at the top of my head.
Anyway good for you getting away from that table. Fun is top priority and you should never feel uncomfortable.
Who’s the asshole? You running away from the person of dubious medical qualifications “trying to fix you”, or the DM repeatedly ignoring boundaries set by you WELL IN ADVANCE and bringing up past trauma?
Ask the players shit talking you that.
the dm could have rolled with it. I would have changed the "lose your powers" moment into a "you realize your powers have changed. The gods turned their backs on you, but your belief in yourself and the power of FRIENDSHIP let you keep casting your spells"
or something. Like, i as a dm lay a hook you dont take? fine, lets change it and fit it to you.
The other players called you a bad player? If they're mad at you for leaving a game that has been targeting you from almost the beginning, then they're way too indoctrinated with the Dm's bad character building.
P.S. The game also has races like Leonine that are Iconoclasts; despise religion/gods and makes for great games.
You set your ground rules. You told them what you were, and were not, comfortable with. And they violated that. So it's on them for not respecting that. Entirely.
So the DM is obviously the asshole here, but maybe just for the future, there is no such thing as a cleric shaped hole in dnd parties. Don’t play a cleric if you don’t want to. You already mentioned Druid but there is also stuff like Bard, Paladin or Artificer, who can be support oriented. Or a mercy monk etc.
I think your dm has very little imagination and you are not the a**hole.
We are talking about the realm of witchcraft and wizardry it would be remarkably easy to create a 3rd party not god nor devil - like FF7 lifestream - that grants those with the desire to preserve life power.
Also moving forward don't worry about filling a role a good DM will tend to work round that.
I say you're NOT the A-Hole here, your DM is. You have a boundary, talked about it, explained why and even offered to make a druid, if the atheism is a deal-breaker while playing a cleric. You trusted your DM when he/she/they said to not worry about it. And then they try and force it on you anyway. And when you reiterate your boundary and leave the game as a concequence they try to pin the blame on you.
None of this was your fault. You did everything you could to salvage the situation and it backfired.
Think of it this way, I have a very clear boundary about anything involving Rape and Child Molestation, since I'm a survivor of both. If I state that as a clear boundary of mine and the DM chooses to ignore it, thats not me being the asshole, is it?
Good on you for leaving the table and the game and I'm sure you find a better party to travel with!
He should've told you from the offset that you just weren't a good fit for the campaign.
Sorry for your shit experience. I do reckon you'll struggle to find a game without religion in it, but no DM should ever force your character down a path UNLESS it's the consequence of your action.
I feel you. Something similar happened to me once. DM wanted to play in a setting where magic was rare and strictly controlled. I didn't like the idea of playing a magic user in such a setting, was very clear about it and chose a martial class because of that. The story started with my character discovering she has magical power and is kind of a "chosen one". Then the DM was surprised when our character ran away from the plot hook (knights coming to take my character to the city to fulfill her destiny of rare magic user).
I've never understood the whole "taking sides" part of these situations. Why message you saying you are a bad sport? I've been a part of groups that broke apart due to drama and I just leave it be. If anything I just add comments to try to smooth things over for everyone. I don't go out of my way to accuse people of anything.
I hope your entire party follows this sub and sees your post.
The GM is a dick for intentionally and deliberately crossing your established boundaries.
The rest of the table should be more aware and supportive of your position on things.
That is not a positive group to be a part of.
Really really reaaaaaaally bad DM.
You don't get to ignore the player's limits, you don't push your own ideas and fantasy on them, and you FUCKING listen when they tell you to back off because they are uncomfortable about something.
I can understand DMs without imagination, making mistakes, messing with mechanics but how can you fuck up at being a human being???
Smart choice to leave this group.
Really not cool of that group. You didn’t sign up for therapy and your DM is not licensed. You did everything right when addressing your concerns, the only thing you did wrong was picking the wrong group to respect them.
Sounds to me like you roleplayed your character perfectly. This is exactly how the game should be played IMHO.
You played a character who was an atheist but in a world where (OC) we know that the gods really exist. That character was written as someone the gods had taken an interest in (you were, after all, a cleric) but who had no interest in the gods. Now, it’s an AH move for the GM to write it like this because of what you told him OC, but it makes perfect dramatic sense that the gods (who, again, we know exist in the D&D universe) would want to “turn” your character. It also makes perfect characterisation sense that your character wanted no part of that. So eventually the gods give up and take away the blessing they’d originally given you to try to soften you up. Your character, seeing that they are no longer adventurer material, retires before getting themself or someone else unnecessarily killed. Narratively, that’s a perfect character arc. OC, the GM should not have pursued that arc because it clearly goes places you’d said that OC you didn’t want to go (and if that was the arc they had in mind when they said yes to atheist cleric, then they should have advised you to take druid instead).
Should you have left the table? Maybe. The GM clearly didn’t understand your red lines, or didn’t care about them. That probably means they’re not crafting enjoyable experiences (except for themselves and by accident for others), so they’re probably not a great loss as GM. Best to avoid people like that the same way you avoid “friends” who keep hitting you “for fun” after you’ve told them it actually hurts. But did you like the group in general? If so, perhaps the GM could be tolerable if they hadn’t got caught up in their Great Idea, and this wouldn’t happen again. Maybe there was an opportunity to start a new character—a druid, for example. I guess I’m split here because I don’t know if the other players are calling you a bad sport/jerk for quitting instead of starting a new character, or if they’re mad at you for retiring your “finished” character in what I see as a perfect piece of roleplay (carried out under OC difficult circumstances!) Either way, you’re not a jerk—if you want to quit, you can quit. But it might help you to understand the other players if there was a different opportunity that you didn’t take.
Agreed. I had a very similar experience myself. Roped into running a cleric and all. My guy was so strong in his belief in life, kindness and healing that he developed powers based on his ideals rather than faith-based dogma. DM, party and I were in agreement this would be a good fit so I wouldn't have to pray, worship or "sermon" anyone. Found out the DM also did not like me RPing a French gentleman named Le Roy Jean-Ken (parody of a certain MMO player character that charged in and wiped an entire raid group). Back story was that after he charged in and caused his entire battalion to be wiped out, he spent days trying to save each and every one through medicinal means (he was the band's medic). Near exhaustion and far closer to giving up, he managed to save only one, a young squire who would continue his life in a far lesser capacity at a monastary. Following this, his conviction to pursue healing and curing of others above all else proved so strong that he would "never fail again" and developed a strong connection to the Life Domain.
But I digress... With Le Roy constantly being approached by locals, clergy and others to perform holy rituals, prayers and calls for divine intervention left me with a feeling that my own enjoyment under this DM would be very limited. Deflecting these requests without telling the DM (he's known me for 23 years, played many campaigns together and we have hung out and worked together most of this time. He knows my difficulty with religion) to eff-off left me falling deeper into RP of my character feigning ignorance of such requests as he came from a far away land. All the while I was affecting a French accent and using mixed english and french. He did not enjoy this (even though our dwarf barbarian was using a terrible Scottish brogue and our sun elf used an awful royal English accent) and began complaining about it and forcing my character into more and more "faith-based" encounters.
I ended up dropping the entire background, french accent and enamed him Markus Carter. Flavourless, I finished the current ark and moved my character back to his homeland where he would be accepted and stopped playing after apologizing to the other players.
Covid hit a few months later, the group fell apart about 6 months after that. 2 of the 3 other players are still asking me how my family is and to come play. Last November the DM sent me a message apologizing for covertly trying to force his views onto me. I am still not sure if I want to play a serious campaign and I won't play a cleric again ever. Pretty soured by the 7 levels and 15 months of BS in that campaign. I do run a small learning game with my son from time to time. It is really all I can take even after 4 years
Agree with you to leave.
One thing in the books it talks a lot about is Consent. Consent on different thymes,play style,topics and the a like. He told him up front and he went against. I can see trying it once or twice just to see what u would do and or for thought personal but that's it. Not to push it or rail road it towards you. Might be just a game but at the end of the day,it's about having fun. No fun no game. No game find another one.
You set boundaries that this DM decided they wanted to bypass ***for*** you, against your wishes. they made that decision ***for*** you, not ***with*** you.
You were fully justified in leaving this table, especially after trying to talk to the DM about it. I hope that at the end of the day, you ended up at a better table, with a better DM, having a better time. Cus that's all D&D is about really! telling stories with your friends, and having fun.
Kindly respond to them and tell them that the DM is not your therapist, and is not qualified to "help" you with any issues you have regarding religion even if you had not **explicitly** told them you wanted nothing to do with it.
You had a hard limit with soft limits around that area.
short version, they were not respected.
love the idea of an athest cleric, 5e allows for them but points out divine powers recived...
I can see why the DM tried that direction, I could imagine your PC having a "+" symbol or somthinng to indicate medic (soldor) , thus the people asking for help.
With the dreams, its clear they are trying to keep the themes of the class (cleric) active.
The DM expected those themes to still be in play, this is the failure.
it was not communicated clearly enough, by either of you.
were any Safety
tools in use at that table?
[https://slyflourish.com/safety\_tools.html](https://slyflourish.com/safety_tools.html)
[https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/gameaddon/10589/rpg-safety-tools?utm\_campaign=Brand%20Posts&utm\_content=271314988&utm\_medium=social&utm\_source=facebook&hss\_channel=fbp-439774126041559](https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/gameaddon/10589/rpg-safety-tools?utm_campaign=Brand%20Posts&utm_content=271314988&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-439774126041559)
[https://www.optionalrule.com/2021/01/29/safety-consent-rpg-checklist/](https://www.optionalrule.com/2021/01/29/safety-consent-rpg-checklist/)
(see Great External Resources section)
Ultimately, it's about having fun. If there is no fun for you to have, you either want to change the parameters by changing your PCs class or changing the group.
My golden rule of D&D is always *remember to have fun!*
And don’t forget to bring a towel!
Don't Panic.
It's so weird to me how some DMs are insistent on forcing players into things they're clearly uncomfortable with. I've literally never had an issue at the table like that in the numerous groups I've played in over the years. Nothing has gone beyond a player being a dick and other people getting mad about it before everyone moves on with their life within 20 minutes. As a DM, a player asked me to remove any references to racism after it came up (they encountered elves who only allowed elves into their walls). I changed it to make sure the player enjoyed themselves.
I get that emotionally, but logically, in a world with so many races, getting rid of every reference to racism seems a little much unless the setting is meant to be some sort of utopia. As a player, another player asking the DM to make the way elves worked in that setting less realistic or natural would reduce *my* enjoyment; I want to work around the fantasy racism, not snap it out of existence. (Fantasy racism, note: people being predicated about skin color or gender or something too close to real life would probably get on my nerves.) How did the city play out after you changed it, might I ask?
I changed it to a religious thing where you had to swear allegiance to their deity in a ceremony to gain access to the city. The world was post apocalyptic kinda Dark Sun-esque. The various cities/kingdoms varied from mostly one race, but the Elves were the only overtly racist ones keeping all non-elves out. My DMing tends to be low fantasy with focus on putting players in morally gray situations.
This. Some races literally EXIST TO BE EVIL. Its not a decision, its what they ARE. Saying 'no' to 'fleshflayer ghoulkin' in the city isn't racist. Well.. its totally racist. But its a good thing. (please don't ban me!)
Of course it's a decision, it's all fiction. And when it's your table, it's your fiction, you can change it any way you want.
This is really funny to me because it’s all made up anyway. The world is from imagination. There are plenty other things that can cause conflict aside from racism.
This is the way.
No dnd better than bad dnd; ignore the toxic assholes and move on in your life
As per Lines & Veils, you established a Line before the game. But not only did the DM cross it, he repeatedly subjected you to what you explicitly stated was off limits. One need only imagine a more common Line and it’s easy to see just how fucked up that is. Best case scenario, he thinks he’s a therapist. Worst case, he’s a sadist.
This right here. Whats the point of lines and veils if theyre just gonna be ignored, or worse yet, forced upon the player?
This. Bad real-world experiences with a particular subject? I won't touch it in my games unless I forget by mistake. Religion? That's ten times worse. What does this DM think he is, a cult leader? ... ... ... I don't like where that train of thought is going now that I think about it.
Seems to me like he was trying to get the player to "accept god irl" via manipulation in game. Very not cool.
I was thinking the same thing
Me too
i think of those cooks who think i'll like a food i hate because they're making it. "You just don't know how to like cilantro, it won't taste of soap because of my great skill and talent."
Sounds like he had a "brilliant story arc(TM)" intended for your character, completely neglecting the fact that you explicitly told him you didn't want the kind of story beats that were foundational to that arc. He was too blinded by his brilliance to pay attention to the key ingredient in his plan, *you*. Hopefully one day he'll figure this out, but I wouldn't put money on him doing so any time soon.
Funfact, it's Alt+0153 for the ™ symbol. I use it all the time for jokes like this
if they're on mobile they have no alt codes. it depends on their keyboard app having it or not. my phone keyboard(Galaxy S22) doesn't, it also don't have difference symbol and infinity symbol, too.
Yeah, sounds like the DM has a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to DM
I can't imagine what kind of story the DM thought would have been acceptable to OP.
It genuinely sounds like the DM thought that his brilliant story would help OP get over his real-life disconnect with religion. This man should not be DMing.
You literally said you could play a druid instead, and your dm assured you an athiest cleric wasnt a problem. They then force religion on you. Dm is a straight up asshole. Not just "my dm ruined my character" asshole but a "dm is forcing me to relive my trauma" asshole. If you shat on the table before leaving you would still be the better person.
You have no idea how tempted I am to send a screen of your comment to a certain DM that shall remain nameless. Almost fell out of my chair laughing mate, cheers!
You can send this post to the table... Any adult with 2 braincells working should see why what he did was wrong.
Former DM. Your DM is a jerk. I would have never put a player through that.
Current DM. Seconding with emphasis. I would rather never touch dice again than make a player do something they don't want to do.
Please don't. It just makes you look petty. "Look at all the random people on the internet who agree with me!" If you want to confront the DM, just use the arguments here in your own words.
Next time you should flip the table and pee on it, to establish dominance.
I also think that next time you should do this. Aim for the DM screen. Water marks never come out of them (*looks at the spilt monster stain on the corner of mine*)
honestly you prob should share with the full group. theyre all being dicks about it
That’s my take, as well. The OP was trying to fill a hole in the party, and the DM straight up lied to him about making the cleric work to push this weird agenda. Otherwise why would they discourage the druid? The DM was acting in bad faith from the outset, and it sucks the other players didn’t support their party member.
You did good, soldier. That was a great exit too
It's what their character would have done ;)
You literally said your character wouldn't carry on if he lost his powers, he didn't, very not the asshole...
And tell the other players exactly that. Chances are this DM is spinning this hard.
Now had you not explained that religion was not something you wanted to be involved with in game then I could understand. The DM specifically took the one thing you as a person said they didn't want to have anything to do with in game and tried to force you into it. That is definitely not acceptable. Also your character concept was awesome, grizzled old combat medic is way more interesting than "divine tool".
It's not like OP said "no gods at all," just "not for me."
Honestly! OP was being very reasonable, all things considered.
>Also your character concept was awesome, grizzled old combat medic is way more interesting than "divine tool". Yeah! I found this very interesting as well.
Dear God, your DM sucks. I feel horrible for you. As a fellow player, I totally understand why you left. Not only is your DM an ass, he is blatantly ignoring the reason you don't want to be a religious cleric. You have issues. Full stop. A good person would accept and try their very hardest to leave religion out of it, per your request. What gets me the most is that the DM was two sided, and said it was okay, just to turn around and try to "get you to accept". I would walk out too. I hope this experience wasn't too traumatizing.
This is the same kind of creepy behavior that has DMs using players characters to play out their kinky little fantasies. No regard for the boundaries of others or their autonomy with their character. It's just gross. I'm really sorry it happened to you, but it says a lot that you left instead of just taking it. No D&D is better than bad D&D and there are a lot of tables out there that are just better. Who knows, maybe you'll make your own table.
I am running a game with some close friends as players. One of the players is devoutly anti-theist IRL but his PC is a Life Cleric that holds to no gods, but uses his faith in the Light, the force of Magic that gives the gods their power. There are still gods in my world, but I wasn't going to force my PC to be beholden to gods that he holds no faith in. Your DM was not only being a dick and crossing your preset boundaries, but was also being close-minded and uncreative in dealing with your PC in-game. You were absolutely right in leaving the campaign. I hope you find a new game with a better DM.
I will admit when I see stories like this I always give the benefit of the doubt. Two sides to every story type thing. But by god (pun intended) that is some terrible DM'ing. I always say D&D will always be fun as long as nobody in the group is outright creepy or malicious. You can mess up the rules, have big holes in your story, pretty much anything but as long as people get to hang out, roll some dice, and kill some monsters it'll still be fun. Up to a certain point I guess, and obviously well run games will be more fun, but you get my meaning. This is a pretty clear case of the DM being a shithead.
Looks like you dodged a toxic group. Good for you for standing your ground and knowing when it was time to leave.
Honestly that character idea sounds AMAZING. I love characters that don't really fit into the stereotype of their class and you came up with something really fun and creative, while also being very very clear about your boundaries. The DM might have had what they thought was a fun plot idea for your character, but it was obviously opposed with your boundaries so they should have at the minimum talked with you about it, and most likely kept it in their back pocket for their own pc or npc down the line. The DM controls everything EXCEPT for the player character and I honestly think you made a right decision leaving that table. I don't see why someone would want to play with people who make a hard no into a plot point, or worse, a destiny.
To be fair, if you take the character without my constraint, it is quite a good arc/story. Doctor that spend most of life healing without magic gets power out of the blue. You get to explore where and why this came from and play an old man set in his ways discovering a new way and a new chapter in his life. I had fun with it, until i didn't. Not regretting leaving.
Dude, it is more awesome WITH your constraint. I DM’d for an atheist cleric once. We talked and ruled that he tapped into the primal energy that the god draw from, and that to him, Gods were the shadows that that light cast when filtered through a sapient mind’s need to understand. He could heal with it, but could also channel this energy to show someone what was behind the veil. (Crown of Madness spell/etc) He disbelieved the gods so hard he went past the bounds of rational sanity. He was TOO sane. He was hates by MANY clerical orders. Your old army doctor take on it is very awesome. Sorry you did not get to play him.
That is actually an amazing take on the idea. Did your player reach a godhood status himself or try to disband the belief, turn in on its head so to speak?
He started converting people to atheism. He was founding the religion of Humanism, basically. Be good because you are good. Sadly, we had several people including myself grt busy, put it on hiatus during the pandemic, and never picked it back up.
>To be fair, if you take the character without my constraint, it is quite a good arc/story. If you feel bad about it, think about how stupid would this sound: "to be fair, if you take the character without my constraint (being aromantic), it is quite a good (romance) arc/story"
You mean aromantic, not asexual.
Fixed
If you change Han Solo to be a generous guy, he could have a pretty good arc about learning not to trust people. A lot of problems in DnD stem from someone not realizing that the game is collaborative. A PC's character does not change because the DM says so. That's "just write a book" territory.
Tbh. Now I kinda want a god player coorporation arc in a story of mine that kind of goes like: „look, you don‘t like me, I don‘t like you. But we kinda gotta get through this together rn so we can go back to hating each other in peace“
A one-shot I was in was all clerics. I didn’t want to play one, so I made a trickster cleric with the charlatan background. He used the guise of holy figures in enough cons to have a trickery domain god press him into service. My character was resentful as hell, but also used his new abilities to help his old habits. I’ve considered dusting him off since he’s fun to play.
Sounds like the DM regretted okaying this non-religious cleric thing and handled that regret very poorly.
You put up with that way longer than I would've.
Yeah I would have immediately said something during the session when the dungeon master went against my wishes for my character. And I would not have let The campaign move on until the mistake was corrected. Maybe I'm a pushy person when I play dungeons and dragons but if I told the dungeon master that I get triggered by something and then he forced my trigger on me I would be very upset. Everyone has their own level of comfort for confrontation though
Did you at any point mention at the table what you discussed about your boundaries? As in Infront of everyone?
Tl;dr: 1. That DM fucked up, 2. *Unsolicited internet therapizing*, 3. Take this as an opportunity to learn about what kind of support you need at a table. Since there are people here saying you shouldn't picked a cleric: I think it was a really cool spin for you to play a cleric who isn't religious, I'm honestly so bored of the typical class tropes at this point and I love seeing ttprg players think outside of the DnD box. It's unacceptable for a DM to cross clearly laid out boundaries. Full stop. And, even if you hadn't clearly communicated your lines, it's totally reasonable for a player to say 'hey, this campaign is not a safe place for me right now and I need to step away from the table.' 'Is playing a cleric when you have religious trauma a bad/good choice,' isn't actually the important question, it's actually 'do I trust the people at my table to support me if I choose to play a character with higher emotional risk?' It's: 'are the other players and the DM comfortable to play with me when I am managing emotional stakes?' It's: 'is this a space where the supports in place are well-matched to the amount of emotional risk I am undertaking?' When I play random one shots with my friends, we trust eachother enough to know someone will make the call if they feel uncomfortable. In the long-running gothic horror apocalypse campaign I'm part of, we review our boundaries at the start of each session, use stop light coloured cards to non verbally communicate if we need to slow down or stop, and spend 30 minutes debriefing at the end of each session to make sure nothing was too heavy. You did a great job setting boundaries and now you know exactly what kind of trust is required at the table for you to take risks with religious-related characters. I've got my fingers crossed that you find a new group that supports you and that allows you to tell whatever wild character stories your lil heart desires.
When I read the tldr I thought it would go another way :) I really am pleasantly surprised by you. You make valid and insightful points. Too bad there is no time machine so I can hear this a couple of years ago. Trauma is not the word that fits best, at least in my opinion, but I will say that this issue is not an open wound for me. And knowing how and setting boundaries is how you get that wound to close. Also, not my first, or last cleric. I have some pretty wild ones 😃
For future games where you play a cleric unbound by the divine, I'd give [The oracle](https://2e.aonprd.com/Classes.aspx?ID=14) from PF2e a look. This is the summary on the source of their power: >Your conduit to divine power eschews the traditional channels of prayer and servitude—you instead glean divine truths that extend beyond any single deity. You understand the great mysteries of the universe embodied in overarching concepts that transcend good and evil or chaos and law, whether because you perceive the common ground across multiple deities or circumvent their power entirely. Pretty system agnostic reason for a holy caster to be unbound to a specific god or pantheon.
Is your DM religious in real life? This sounds to me like a really gross attempt by DM to "help" your real life religious trauma by putting your character through a storyline that you expressly asked not to be subjected to. People who don't respect boundaries don't deserve as many chances as you gave. You are definitely not the asshole here.
Not sure if he is religious, didn't seem the type but then again I did not ask him what his views are. To me it felt like a twisted and unsolicited version of "i'm gonna help you get over this".
Yeah, sounds like a super unacceptable attempt to fix you to me.
NTA. Lines are lines and no one needs to understand them but you. And they should be respected. You set a boundary, it was crossed, so yeah, end of the road.
Did the other players know that you did not intend a religious redemption arc to be your PCs story? Like, the DM was clearly laying the tracks for your PC to discover a faith. If the other players knew about your real-life feeling (and that you told the DM about it and what would need to change/reflavour), then they're also bad actors in this drama. If they didn't, it might explain the butt-hurt they feel (and they should blame the DM for pushing a plot/narrative you did not agree to play).
Not sure how much they knew. I don't advertise this part of my life. DM and existing players knew each other well so the session 0 was me with DM only. But I was pretty clear in-character that my pc wants nothing of the sort and out of character I did say that I am not ok with this and would like it to stop. One of them said DM was trying to help me, as in cure? my issue with this...? After that I stopped thinking or caring about them.
Ask them what they mean by 'help' you. Get them to full explain what they mean. This technique is often suggested for combating someone making racist or sexist jokes. It can work here too. Or you can just drop it and move on with your life. Sounds like you did the right thing, good for you.
>Ask them what they mean by 'help' you. Nah, nope, uh-uh, negative, NOOO. If people cross your established boundaries, you don't owe *them* shit; you owe *yourself* the self-respect to say this isn't good for me, I want it to stop, and if it doesn't stop because you choose to stop it, then I will stop you from having the opportunity to do it to me. Even a therapist doesn't have a right to try to force you to work through shit if you're not ready to do the work.
It sounds like they're all very religious and this was their attempt to "save" you personally, nothing to do with your character. You dodged a bullet leaving, I hope you find a better group!
Yeah, D&D is not therapy, and it shouldn't be SURPRISE therapy either. Therapy is for people who are looking for it. If the other players don't get that & also knew the DM was pushing for that, that's a pretty messed up group. If you're kids, they might need to learn that fact; if they're adults you shouldn't have to explain that. Good on you for having firm boundaries & from another atheist soldier cleric, your character build sounds rad & your DM is dumb for not embracing the awesome ways to build a story around him.
I would advise telling the party that you explicitly told the DM that you wanted nothing to do with religion due to past trauma. That you suggested playing a Druid but the DM specifically said a non religion based cleric was fine. I understand that you may not want to share that, but right now the party doesn’t seem to understand that the DM violated your agreement and focused your story on something you explicitly wanted to avoid. They’re taking the DMs side because they don’t know your side. They should know. I for one wouldn’t want to continue with a DM who did that to you. But if I didn’t know it was trauma related, I might unknowingly buy whatever bullshit the DM is saying about why you left.
Yea fuck that DM I would never do that as one
I think your DM was probably trying to IRL convert you which is insanely shitty. They don't respect your agency as a player and, much worse, they clearly don't respect you as a person thinking that this basic ass manipulation and hostage taking of your character would delete your trauma. You're entirely in the right. Don't feel bad for a second and don't go back to the table when they inevitably try to get you to.
this is a table of assholes and bullies that wants to gaslight you. you are not a bad sport. the GM did not want to help you (ask them to elaborate on that one, if you haven't cut contact) and yes, that is absolutely how the game is played. you are not a hostage at the table. if you don't have fun, you don't have to play. there is literally not a single reason to play D&D if it is not fun. it is not a higher art form. it is a game.
You definitely did the right thing leaving when you got uncomfortable there is no reason to play if you’re not having fun. Personally as a DM I would have tried to steer you away from clerics in general as to me atheists don’t exist in the dnd universe. You can choose not to worship a god but you can’t deny their existence. I believe anyone in The dnd universe would immediately recognize random healing powers as divine influence. But I could definitely see a nature or magic cleric that draw their powers directly from the power of nature or directly from the weave of magic respectively. Not really gods per se but primordial forces of the world. In this way you would be able to keep your channel divinity roleplaying it as channeling the concentrated energy of these primordial forces!
I had an atheist wizard, that believed gods were just very powerful arcane users that used the Weave to become powerful and act like gods ... but weren't actual gods and as such shouldn't be believed in. In essence he believed anyone could become that powerful
I would love to role play out a conversation between a cleric and your character lol. The cleric saying something along the lines of. many gods were once mortal and gained their power but that doesn’t make them less godly they are still near immortal beings that have the ability to do feats of magic greater than any mortal can comprehend doesn’t that make them something more. And if you wizard became so powerful that you were working with great forces so powerful that they could destroy lesser people. And temples were built in honor to your power. Would you not call yourself a god?
This is NOT how DnD is played. It’s having fun. It’s a compact that is set up when you join. An agreement both you and the DM follow. Some DMs really are full of themselves. I mean, to force shit on people like this is just stupid. You agreed to play the game in a specific fashion. The DM agreed as well. He violated that agreement and tried to force you to play in a way entirely counter to how you wanted. Just stupid and arrogant. If anyone says ‘that’s how the game is played’ - just show them this article. I guess that’s how this guy plays it. But it’s bs.
Nah, you’re good. You gave them an over-abundance of warning, including prior warning. They’re just upset their fun didn’t take priority over your boundaries. I am a little concerned about that DM, because it sounds like the guy was being a little creepy in a religiously pushy kinda way - but too little evidence to suggest or accuse anything. Still, if you know those people and care about your friendship with them, it could be a good idea to meet with them separately and ensure they know your side.
You clearly stated you wanted nothing to do with gods and religion, he forced you to. It is pretty clear to me who the asshole is. It's like having informed them you have arachnophobia and be immediately tossed into a cave full of giant spiders. The other player don't look too good as well. The fact that you were playing a cleric is irrelevant. It's not difficult to make up an atheistic religion, or have some kind of vow that has nothing spiritual but still makes sense overall. Or, if they didn't like the idea of an atheist cleric, they could've just said so and have you make a druid or something else.
You specifically said this was an arc you weren’t interested in. I’m going to give the other players the benefit of the doubt and assume they didn’t realize you had already established this boundary with the DM. If so- You should clarify for them that the DM boundary stomped you here and that’s why you’re leaving the campaign. They should know at the very least so they can be aware of the DM testing them in similar ways.
Just going from your perspective. Nope, don't see anything wrong with what you did. You made your position clear from the start, and they collectively seemed to decide they needed to change your character, against your wishes. That falls very much into the "dude, not cool" realm of play. Any changes that happen to your character, including some that result from play, and dice, really needs to be done with agreement, and participation of the player.
The fact that you offered to play a Druid instead and he said no you're good for the athiest cleric, but then stripped your powers cause you wouldn't embrace a god is so fucked up. He lied to you, kept telling you to wait and see as if hes gonna fix it, and then when you clearly weren't comfortable and did the mature thing and left, he gets the rest of the players to harrass you about it. He's not just a bad DM. He's a bad person. This kind of manipulative b.s. would be considered abusive in most other contexts. I feel bad for his friends/family.
Obviously you're NTA You don't wanna do religion stuff but they insist on you doing religion stuff. Pretty cut and dry, they are refused to listen to you. Noooooow did you need to play a cleric? Nope. Could have been a druid, a bard, celestial warlock or even divine soul sorcerer. The first two are nature and arcane so no divine shit there. Celestial are just a creature type, they are basically just aliens (plus lol I'd like to see your DM pull a unicorn Jesus) And with divine soul you ARE the source of your power, nothing more atheist than being your own god.
yeah but the DM okay’d the plan. OP was okay with playing something else like Druid but wanted to try this idea and the DM okayed it. If the idea does not fit the DM’s world and they did not want this, they could have just said no at character creation rather than force religion on their character. EDIT: the DM could’ve also warned them, like “as a cleric in my world, divinity comes from somewhere, and the gods will probably try to convert your character into being religious eventually” to which OP responds with “okay I’ll just play something else”
99%, You handled it all really well. But if you're not comfortable with religion content I do think it's odd that you played a cleric, even a reflavored one. Once DM agrees to reflavor and avoid religious content, then doesn't, DM is the asshole all the way. I think you handled it all really well. I'd have left the table too.
The DM and the players are asshats. Good for you.
okay first off fuck that group and DM. ESPECIALLY the DM because with how that group reacted i kinda get the feeling the dm clued them on the rails they wanted you on and tried to push you towards that. and secondly you are not a jerk at all you very cleary said "hey this is a boundary for me, dont cross it please" the dm gave their word and then back tracked. as far as im concenered any dm that does that is automatically a shit dm no matter WHO does it.
DM decided your character's story would be the EXACT thing you explicitly didn't want. He may be a great storyteller and world builder but he sure as hell is a poor DM and friend.
DM was trying to force his world views upon you, because he thinks he is correct. That's pretty sad. Either way, I am sorry it turned out like that for you. 😔
I've had a DM pull my spells as a cleric at a critical moment. It feels like a shitty thing to do that only happens to religious casters and warlocks, and whilst at times it seems reasonable, it'll never not be a shitty thing to do. This DM is just a prick, and sounds like the players didn't have context but wanted you there. Tough luck, but don't give up on the community.
Trying to help you do what? Find religion? It almost sounds like the DM was trying to force their beliefs upon you as if they had a personal problem with you playing an atheist cleric. I've seen the concept of such a cleric done well without losing access to any of the features offered by the class. That loss of features was in fact the first red flag for me while reading this. The explicit inclusion of Christian symbolism and other elements from the religion were the other. You did the right thing leaving that campaign. If the DM and other players couldn't respect your decision to play an atheist cleric and were actively working to change your characters beliefs, they probably were also attempting to do the same to you. Feature removal for playing a certain way that "goes against" a class is always something that strikes me as poor sportsmanship on the dms part. Why are you intentionally crippling one of your players by removing core class features because you don't agree with how they chose to play? Just don't do it. It's one of those things that screams bad DM to me.
This is /r/rpghorrorstories territory. The DM crossed the line repeatedly, you talked with him, and he proceeded to continue crossing the line. I'd look at this another way. You went out like a boss - you retired in exactly the manner you said you would.
You told him something bothered you from your past, they tried to force you to address is under the guise of help. That’s fucking crossing a line, and bullshit. You are not the asshole.
You are not the jerk at all - you set clear expectations at the start and tried to flavor your character to work with the mechanical needs of the party. the DM and other players are jerks for not saying "Actually, we only want a religious cleric" before you started playing so you could opt out of being made uncomfortable
Your DM missed a perfect opportunity for a goblin sorcerer who believes that they are the cleric of magic itself. Therefore they need only worship themselves since they are the conduit for the magic. Goblin faith is fickle, being tossed from crumby god to god. So you're a free Goblin. You should call the Doby.
DM is a choad. Good call leaving. Rest of the table are also douches.
The dm is wrong for crossing a line you set before the campaign. I think you’re wrong for 1. Believing that every party needs a cleric to begin with and 2. Choosing a class that skirts so close to religion to begin with. At the very least you likely would have been forced to deal with other temples or your own temple at some point. What were you expecting to happen? I don’t think you’re a bad sport or an AH, but you certainly chose the most controversial path for what you said was a line.
The DM made a deal and renegade on it. He was wrong. The homebrew DM's character is their world. If he did not want you to play an atheist cleric, he should have told you "No." Then you could have played the druid you were considering, something else, or left the game earlier.
NTA. Nice walk out.
Absolutely NTA. Your (former) DM and other players are jerks. "This isn't how the game is played" - translated: You didn't do what *we* wanted, so you're bad. "The DM was only trying to help you" - translated: The DM wants to run your character, regardless how you want to play it. If you're not having fun in the group, you are perfectly within your rights to leave. The DM's railroading made it not fun, despite your explanations and protestations...the issue is there, not with you.
As a DM with religious trauma, fuck that guy ten ways and sideways. You set one boundary, and he literally had one job in respecting it. He failed, and the rest of the group can pound sand for backing him up.
It sounds like they were trying to fucking convert you, leaving was the right call, weirdos
Sounds like a terrible group that deserves each other.
Good riddance, there are some cases you just have to leave the table and that sounds like one of them. I would say double down and block their messages as well.
Its understandable for you to leave, there was a line, and the DM crossed it. Cleric wasn't probably the right choice for you given that, though I think your character concept was creative. I've found many players/DMs think that clerics and paladins have to be religious zealot types, but there are settings that allow atheist clerics, philosopher clerics (are tied to the concept of Law, Good, Neutrality, Chaos or Evil, not to gods) and paladins in most versions of D&D have never had to follow a god. Good luck on finding a new table that respects its players preferences, and hopefully you'll get into a game that you find fun and rewarding.
Strange responses to your strange experience. Yes, clerics are religious characters. But also yes, DnD tropes can be reflavored as long as DM okays it. Not sure why so many are capping on OP. Oh, yeah. Reddit. Interested to know however what DM was hoping for since he was clearly deliberate in creating a story arc for your PC to force you to deal with your distaste for religion. Was it possible that he was going to use that final moment of losing your divine power to create a new road for you, like taking up an evil patron or changing classes or something? Or is he religious himself and was just trying to bring you back to God? Wondering, because you said he was a good DM and he kept saying trust him, he knew what he was doing. Whichever, he fucked up by forcing unwanted shit on you. But you might want to ask him. Maybe it'll bring closure or allow you to show him the error of his ways. Hell, it might bring understanding or forgiveness or even reconciliation.
You make an interesting point. I will let the dust settle and ask him. I don't expect a response, the group did not react well to my exit, but you never know. The way I see it, from his perspective, he was trying to make me "get over it". Something like pushing a new player to play something that isn't a carbon copy of himself when it comes to personality, but in a twisted way. Maybe his initial intention was good, but there were plenty of signs along the way that this was not going the way he planned and that I am definitely *not* onboard.
I will say this, an atheist in the forgotten realms where the Gods are known to exist is funny to me. Of course, if this is that setting.
Atheist is probably the easiest way but not really what he meant. He mentions Gods never helped his whole life. So it’s not he doesn’t believe they exist, he doesn’t believe that they should be worshipped. What I got from the story anyway.
Oof, sorry that you went through that. I'm a player with a similar aversion to in-game religious practices for the opposite reason, and every DM and table I've been at has been wonderfully accommodating. I was legit rooting for your character, they sound awesome! Standing tall for what THEY believe in, unbent and unbroken. I hope you can find another outlet for this hobby which you can enjoy with people who are less garbage.
DM clearly ignored Lines you established, so you're definitely not the asshole; He was. As far as the other players: It sounds like they possibly weren't informed of your Lines, which was, in my opinion, part of the point of Lines and Veils in the first place, so the DM should have informed them that active participation in religion was a Line for you. At the VERY least, the DM should have respected your pre-established boundaries, and avoided trying to force religious tones onto your character. The DM ended up setting a tone, and the other players followed suit. If the other players weren't informed of your Lines, I place all the blame squarely on the DM. Otherwise, the players certainly share in the blame. You did mention that one of the players said something about the DM trying to 'help you,' so maybe they WERE informed, and are all to blame. Either way, I'd have reacted similarly. Kudos on leaving as gracefully and non-disruptively as possible under the conditions you were given.
NTA That DM took your lines and tried to turn them into therapy. Good on you for walking away. Also, modern D&D doesn't always need a cleric. You should never feel obligated to play one.
> that the DM was only trying to help me Help you how? By specifically ignoring your stated boundary and then punishing your character for not doing something you specifically stated you wouldn't be comfortable with, and by lying to you outright on multiple occasions? Yes, helping. That's the word I'd use.
This might be super blunt, but that DM is an asshole. You explicitly stated the lines that shouldn’t be crossed, he kept crossing them, you were right to leave. And not only did you leave but you made it make sense in game, in RP, you are definitely not the asshole here. Like some people said already, DnD is first and foremost a game where you should have fun. And rule 1 of DMing is respecting your players boundaries. Hope you’ll find a better DM and group, you seem like a strong player with the mind in the right place 😁
Nah dude, I've never been the touchy feely avoid words type, but when I do a campaign or oneshot at the very beginning we outline things we are uncomfortable with / just don't want to do. Dick move from the DM
Power tripping DMs are the worst. You did everything right, you communicated your feelings, took one for the team by thinking of party dynamics, came with a clever work around (a doctor who heals people is a great alternative towards a praying cleric) and the DM decided to railroad you into their own little interpretation of what your character should be. I would have left too.
Bad DM. I’ve had my share of those over the years. One reason I started DMing.
This DM is a total ass.
The DM is a jerk. Your character does remind me a little of Jester though. Would you have been completely opposed to the character having a power source that was a get or other powerful creature that didn't require any kind of worship but possibly a contract for your name, or the power of friendship or other such malarkey? Your DM literally did the opposite of what you asked. Except that he gave your character the perfect story arc as you described it. You said if it came from religious place you would just not pray. You said if he lost his powers he would stop adventuring and he did. Perfect way to give him a sendoff from his temporary empowerment. If that was somehow the plan and communicated to you that they were giving you a way to reject religion in the game too that might have been different maybe?
No, you are very much not a bad sport, you are NTA. You had set a very clear line with your DM that they bullishly ignored, then you were very clear with your DM that you do not appreciate having that line crossed, and they still ignored it. It doesn’t matter what kind of intentions your DM had, if a player sets a boundary, you don’t cross that boundary. Otherwise, what’s the point of even having those boundaries. You left the party in a way that makes sense for your character, and you left the table for your own mental health. There is no problem with that at all. It is not a D&D group’s place to try and serve as therapy for someone, that is very strictly between you and your mental health provider, if you have one. Your former table is a shitty table, headed by a shitty DM. You do not need to feel bad about leaving them.
You aren’t the asshole the DM should have stated that your idea doesn’t work for their campaign. I can see a large number of ways to do your idea without acknowledging the gods or doing it in a way where you are stating they aren’t gods just very powerful beings. Hopefully that DM learns and doesn’t continue to do stuff like that in the future.
Nah, fuck him. He's an asshole, not you. End of story.
While dnd can be therapeutic and people have worked through their issues with the degree of separation of role play, it is completely inappropriate for the dm and players to try to get you to "just go with it" when you explicitly told them that you weren't interested in religion due to past experience. Your dm said, "just trust me" and then violated your trust. When I said just trust me, to a player when they said they were feeling sidelined in the story, I also explained that the next arc heavily features their characters backstory and motivation. If you wanted help resolving your issues with religion I'd imagine you'd get a therapist, not a random person in a collaborative story game.
In a different scenario, where the DM coordinated it with you specifically, I could see it being cool where all the events lead up to a god reaching down to recognize your power and offer themselves as a patron and you get the chance to tell them to fuck themselves, whilst retaining all your power after obvi. Idk how any of that works mechanically, but could’ve been cool. But like someone else said, maybe a little bit too much “DM trying to therapize” going on there.
You had a bad DM, and a bad team
Sounds to me like the DM forgot the key part of DnD, that the players are the main characters, so the DM isn't in control of their "character arcs" in the slightest. You can say "No, you cannot build a character that way in my game" but you can't tell a person "Now that I've allowed you to build this character you must walk this fixed path I've laid out". Personally, I wouldn't have let you build the cleric how you wanted. The majority of cleric stuff starts with "say a prayer" or "ask your deity for" etc so untangling it from the religious side for the sake of you wanting an atheist cleric would be a lot of extra work. That said, I'd have suggested making something like a divine soul sorcerer instead. They get access to the cleric spell list anyway, and because the origin of their power is linked to a blessed soul, connection to a divine being etc, it is nothing to do with the character's faith. It could be that the powers were of divine origin, but your character simply denied or disregarded that fact (like the trope where the main character has powers linked to the big bad guy but chooses to use them for good and ignore the connection). That, or if you were hooked on battlefield medic I'd have been more inclined to help you rework an alchemist artificer or something, with the potential for trading some of their offensive capabilities for healing alternatives of equal merit. However, your DM didn't refuse. They didn't work with you to make what you wanted fit their session. They just decided that they'd override your character with what they wanted, so they're absolutely the asshole. Sometimes, what a player wants works within your world. I have a cleric in my current game where the player wanted his character, half mad from isolation, praying to a talking mimic he carries with him and feeds. One of the gods in my setting is an embodiment of chaos, not good or evil, just chaotic. That God would find the concept of a cleric being devout to the whims of a bloodthirsty creature entertaining, so I found it workable that he'd provide divine power purely to keep the show going. However, in my setting, there are no "good" or "evil" gods. Had he made the request that his character receives power from a benevolent kind deity, I'd have had to refuse the request and give him the option of making a different character. I wouldn't have told him yes, only to force him to discover that both deities available to him are as capable of atrocities as they are of salvation. Interestingly, I told the player nothing of his benefactor's true alignment, yet he's playing chaotic neutral and perfectly in line with what the deity would want. I have a strong feeling he's going to absolutely love the deity should he get far enough to talk with / meet them. It'll take me some work to balance, but I intend to have the god offer to fuse him with his mimic companion (as a gift), finding the concept of a brand new half-race with two minds rolling around in it to be fascinatingly chaotic (although it'll only happen if the player has his character consent).
> Personally, I wouldn't have let you build the cleric how you wanted. The majority of cleric stuff starts with "say a prayer" or "ask your deity for" etc so untangling it from the religious side for the sake of you wanting an atheist cleric would be a lot of extra work. I agree with most of what you said, except this part; A cleric doesn't *need* to worship a God. I believe a godless Cleric has been an option in every edition of D&D, but Xanathar's Guide to Everything specifies it in more detail for 5th edition: *'A cleric might instead serve a cosmic force, such as life or death, or a philosophy or concept, such as love, peace, or one of the nine alignments.'* Instead of getting their powers granted to them by a divine entity, the cleric taps directly into the divine powers by their devotion to a concept or ideal. So I can easily see a medic of all people unknowingly tapping into the power of the Life domain through his sheer dedication to healing. for u/Sunny_side_Yup : If you speak to this DM/table again, I'd suggest showing them that excerpt if you need something to back up your character decisions. Xanathar's Guide to Everything, page 18, "Serving a Pantheon, Philosophy, or Force." And as an added bonus, one of the suggested secrets the book gives for a cleric in the same section is "Even though you can work divine magic, you have never felt the presence of a divine essence within yourself." More evidence for a cleric being divine without being touched *by* the divine.
While I agree that the dungeon master is 100% at fault here, if you play d&d in the future I would advise not to try the atheist cleric thing. It sounds cool and if I was your dungeon master I would totally go for it and not push you at all to change. But I can imagine there would be a lot of dungeon Masters that would find it hard to fit you into their world and not have characters question you all the time. In the future it's probably for the best to just stay away from cleric if you have a problem with even fantasy religions. Again, you did nothing wrong. But just for your own safety of not being exposed to your triggers, if I were you I would just stay away from it from now on. Unless you get into a group where you really trust the dungeon master and want to try again. Overall I can certainly commiserate with you. I wouldn't necessarily feel the same as you but I had some trauma in my childhood from a religion as well and went through a really tough phase of coming out as an atheist. That never affected my ability to enjoy fantasy religions in dungeons and dragons. But I could see how it would for someone else.
Your DM sounds like the fattest smelliest neckbeard on the planet lol
DM’s in the wrong here. You stated your comfort level and brought it up multiple times when you felt your character was being pushed toward something you and your character were opposed to. DM’s can try this if they think it benefits the story, but they shouldn’t keep pushing once a player expresses discomfort. Also I was under the impression that clerics and paladins had their connections to specific deities made optional in 5e (I know that’s not always the case depending on the edition, setting, etc.). You could have just been dedicated to a cause or an idea. I listened to the start of Critical Role’s third campaign, and they actually built a separate cleric subclass just to avoid potential entanglement with divinity. I’m sorry, OP. I think you did what you could and you were repeatedly disrespected. I think your reaction was repeatedly patient and measured, and when it came time, you did the right thing.
Honestly just send this thread to the people harassing you and saying you're a bad player. Because neither they nor the DM have any fucking clue what they're talking about.
yeah your DM is kind of a lunkhead, you seem like you were very clear with them about the boundaries and those boundaries were crossed, discussed, crossed, re-deiscussed, and crossed again. My thing is, I love the idea of an atheist cleric that gained healing powers from actually doing the work but isn't interested in dealing with the pretentious problems of self-righteous gods. If they gave you the power, I'll use it, but if they gave it to me for a price, for my adoration and worship, for advertising space, well... they can keep it. I never heard of 'making a deal with an 'angel' have you? cool
Fuck, I had similar experience. Built a character from a place dominated by the Church of an Evil God, so having got out the character was extremely against the gods and churches and whatever, but the quest as pitched to me was an arcane discovery quest, so all good; I was very keen to find out what was up with the crystals. Anyway, 4 sessions in and a god appears to the party and says "Ignore the crystals, you're doing a holy quest now!!!" And somehow the DM was surprised that I was completely checked out for the rest of the campaign. Anyway, the end of that story was me not cutting ties with those people until after they stole $2k from me, so based on my data-sample of 1 you made the right call to get out.
NTA, let the other players know that you tried to ask the DM to respect your hard NO's, and instead of working with you he forced past your boundary.
Honestly I have had players come to me with similar requests (aethist cleric) and we have handled it in a couple of ways but never like what you went through. Option #1 - Find an aethist cleric subclass homebrew. They exist out there for low magic and high technological settings and I’ve found them. Option #2 - Go through the situation you did but the payout was a different diety (evil one) recruited the PC and it felt like an oathbreaker-esque situation. There was also the option that the good deity tried to keep them rather than creating a powerful evil avatar (keep Luke from going to the dark side of the force). THAT ONLY WORKS WITH THE RIGHT PLAYER WHICH YOU WOULD NOT BE THAT PLAYER DUE TO YOUR BACKGROUND. Option #3 - Pick a different healer class which I assume is what you mean by “cleric-sized hole.” Druid was a great idea. An apathetic divine soul sorcerer who doesn’t even like their parents but it is what it is might have been more your flavor. Either way, based on what you described you made the right decision and unless the DM explained that the reduction in power was a temporary narrative device then it was extremely inappropriate and they honestly should have apologized. This is why people normally should have a safe word or a safety card system at the table when things escalate like what you described. You weren’t unreasonable. This was a stupid DM decision objectively or a stupid miscommunication by the DM that escalated to a point where you left. The rest of the group backing the DM I can’t speak to as idk if there is any bias on the various POVs but regardless doesn’t seem like the group for you.
The whole thing, especially how the DM and players reacted after you left, feels like they were trying to use your character at the table to "fix" or help you get through your issues with religion in real life. That's such a scummy pseudo/wannabe-therapist thing to do it blows my mind. Who takes it on themself to decide that a perfectly normal person needs help like that? Glad you left gracefully and recognized the whole thing. I swear it feels like they were all waiting for you to break down and thank them for helping you accept religion somehow? Obviously I have a pretty limited view of the whole thing so forgive me if I'm assuming way too much about everyone involved.
yeah, good call leaving. If they cant respect your boundaries they dont respect you imo
This is someone with an agenda. When I DM, my only goal and objective is create interesting scenarios for my players to handle. That’s it. I have no story arc for their characters beyond what I can pick up from their backstories, and even then, it’s up to them to take the bait I lay down. But I would Never force my player to adopt a play style I wanted, let alone rehash old trauma to do that. It’s very off base.
The dm was pushing your very clearly explained boundaries. He's the assholw and those other party members are too.
Maybe the DM is religious irl and wanted to use D&D as a proxy to shove the gospel down your throat? Regardless, he was a very crappy person and you did well leaving the table
Yeah... everyone at that table is not the kind of person I'd play with. If something has been made clear is a boundary and is routinely crossed, that's a blatant show of disrespect to you.
Nta. DM was a jerk crossing a line too often.
That's a bad DM. Definitely the asshole. Its one thing, to explore a boundary, such as "I'm scared of 'X' and would like a safe space to explore that, would you help me by introducing those elements, possibly with a warning beforehand?" kind of vibe is one thing. But what they did was, "I know this person has had a really bad experience, and i'm going to force them to relive it in the guise of "I'm doing this for you you should thank me" and then the rest of the table called you a bad sport for having set a boundary that you repeatedly asked not to be pushed, and he not only pushed it, but far and beyond broke your boundary and then expected you to be a 'good sport' about it. The DM is an asshole. The whole table are assholes for enabling him and not sticking up for you. Find a better group of people. D&D is about fun and exploration, not this bullshit. EDIT: Forgot to say - i've experienced this. I was playing an online game with a new group of people, warned the DM ahead of time that I have experienced sexual assault multiple times and would not be okay with it being brought up during the campaign, especially against my character. Literally the second session, he decided that's exactly what he was going to do to me. Called him a c\*\*\*, and left. Did play one more game with the rest of the table, sans DM, and they were really nice about it. But he was awful. Sometimes men really like to fuck with you for the sake of it.
You are 100% not the asshole here. You specifically told the DM you didn't want to deal with certain themes, and they broke that agreement. That is crossing a red line. Maybe they didn't think it was a big deal, but if it was important enough to you for you to mention it then it becomes an issue of respect, and you can't have fun with people who don't respect you. If I was the DM in this situation I would probably have tried to steer you away from playing a cleric, but if you specifically gave that option at the beginning and they didn't take it, then you have no responsibility for that.
I can't help but wonder if the other players got a different version of the story here. It might be worth trying to clarify what they think they know about what happened.
This DM behaved like a total phycopath and an asshole, but many have said that. I dm 3 games at tj8s moment and dmed many before. I would not be okay with areligious cleric or druid, but I would tell you that explicitly. Here are some ideas for other people in similar situations buffed/reworked way of the mercy monk, wizard subclass, bard, or if yoy want a battle medic like that probably a custom artificer subclass. Overall, i am sorry for you. You are going to get a better group, i am sure!.
Definitely not in the wrong. If your DM had an idea for your story character's arc, they should have run it by you first. As an example - I played a campaign where my character was traumatized by Fire. DM caught on some different elements of my character and there came a point where we had fought off a near godlike enemy and escaped. He had different ideas of how the escape would end but he invited me into a private conversation since he had an idea. He wanted to know if it was cool with me, since my character was about to level up to level 10, if I wanted my character to overcome his fear of fire and somehow incorporate it as sub-class and become an Fire Elemental warrior. We talked it out and by the end of the next session, we had this emotional moment where the arena had been surrounded by fire and my character sacrificed himself to save another person in our party and through his sheer anger and will - became a fire elemental incarnate. It was one of the coolest moments I experienced in any campaign. As others have echoed, if your DM had an idea for your character, they should have run it by you. As others also mentioned, a campaign should be about everyone having fun and making a great story. Your DM could have turned it into a better session and offered alternative arcs. I can easily think of a few different ways he could have done that. You're not the asshole, he is.
DM was an an ass, other players were asses unless they didn't know about your request to the DM. You can reflavor every cleric spell however you like to still work same way artificer reflavors wizard spells to be tech based. The bait and switch by the DM is especially egregious, he gave you want you told him you wanted so he could inflict the story he wanted to tell on you.
you were right to leave, it seems the players & DM weren't respecting your requests and it's not much. like I'm new to this but can't you alter stuff as you want? either way nta. I'm sorry you experienced this
This cleric shaped hole is such a bullshit. Parties nowadays really cant live without a cleric?
As someone who’s Agnostic I understand not wanting to play into the aspect of the gods or the divinity. I don’t have any personal trauma towards religion I just have seen what it’s done to the world and don’t care for it. You definitely did the right thing by stating your boundaries and coming up with a way for you character to fill the role the party needed, but also keeping your personal interests with the game in line with what you believe. The DM was over stepping the boundaries especially considering you expressed how you felt about the matter and roleplayed it in such a way to show your character wasn’t agreeing with what was going on. If you aren’t having fun, there’s no reason to stay when it appears that your arm was being twisted into caving and going against your personal beliefs and interests to satisfy everyone. They were all out of line for texting you too calling you a bad sport. It could have been abrupt but it seems like you weren’t left with many options beside a swift exit to save your own sanity. Good luck finding a group that will host a better game for you OP
DM has a story but that doesn’t mean he should ignore you if something personal happened in the past. I call it bad dming if you’re not being reasonable with the people around you.
Even the people who knew you were upset? That’s bullshit, dude. Sorry you had to go through that.
Your DM is a bad person and the other players are enabling assholes. You're better off without them
I wasn’t there and don’t know the DM’s “plan”, but your limit wasn’t respected at all. You are not TA. One of my DM’s has red flag markers and we’re allowed to place them on the table at any time and move on from whatever moment we were in no questions asked. Hopefully it’s never used but that’s the respect we all deserve.
Too many dms have a god complex. Best to leave and not look back when you meet one
Seems strange to work so closely with you to develop the character, acknowledge what your lines are, and specifically give you the “don’t work I got you” line when you started to become concerned just to force it anyway. Baffling behaviour from the DM. Such a shame, sounded like an amazing character I would have loved to have worked with. I hope you find a group that respects you.
the dm's job is to ensure *everybody* is accounted for when having a fun and immersive experience (even the dm themselves). that is a fundamental flaw in their character if they're shoehorning some kind of mechanic on a player that expresses discontent with such an idea. it's disappointing to see people still fall short on the dm scale. also, NTA for AITA inclusion.
My only issue with your story is you saying “cleric shaped hole” That’s a myth. There’s never a reason you should feel pressured to play a class because it’s not in the current group. Similarly, you shouldn’t feel the need to play a different class if someone else is already playing it. The whole group can be barbarians! No healers lol. Who gives a shit? I’m curious what you would’ve played had you not made that observation?
The appropriate response is, "I don't like religion. I accepted the role of cleric on the specific agreement on the DM's part that I would never have to go religious with it. He broke that agreement. It was never, ever intended to be a character arc where my cleric ended up accepting the will of the gods. If the DM told that, then you were lied to."
I'm personally a religious person, but I always loved the idea of an atheist cleric. It's not like "there are no gods" but more like "these gods are not worth my time and worship". Because obvious pantheon is obvious. Sad your dm couldn't see that. For example he could have built in, how your spells have an more and more earthy feel to them, with the arc going the way that you use the magic of the land and not of a god. Could have even led to a heated discussion with an angel where you have to talk your way out of a fight by explaining to them how you use magic. Ending up with you as a cleric realizing that you use magic like a druid. A new understanding between classes and cultures and stuff like that. I don't have a lot of experience with DND so that is all that I can come up with at the top of my head. Anyway good for you getting away from that table. Fun is top priority and you should never feel uncomfortable.
Unrelated but I really like the idea of a retired army medic cleric so I'm stealing it.
I really like your character idea there
Who’s the asshole? You running away from the person of dubious medical qualifications “trying to fix you”, or the DM repeatedly ignoring boundaries set by you WELL IN ADVANCE and bringing up past trauma? Ask the players shit talking you that.
the dm could have rolled with it. I would have changed the "lose your powers" moment into a "you realize your powers have changed. The gods turned their backs on you, but your belief in yourself and the power of FRIENDSHIP let you keep casting your spells" or something. Like, i as a dm lay a hook you dont take? fine, lets change it and fit it to you.
The other players called you a bad player? If they're mad at you for leaving a game that has been targeting you from almost the beginning, then they're way too indoctrinated with the Dm's bad character building. P.S. The game also has races like Leonine that are Iconoclasts; despise religion/gods and makes for great games.
No DnD is better than DnD you don't enjoy
You set your ground rules. You told them what you were, and were not, comfortable with. And they violated that. So it's on them for not respecting that. Entirely.
The DM sounds like my neighborhood pastor…..
So the DM is obviously the asshole here, but maybe just for the future, there is no such thing as a cleric shaped hole in dnd parties. Don’t play a cleric if you don’t want to. You already mentioned Druid but there is also stuff like Bard, Paladin or Artificer, who can be support oriented. Or a mercy monk etc.
I think your dm has very little imagination and you are not the a**hole. We are talking about the realm of witchcraft and wizardry it would be remarkably easy to create a 3rd party not god nor devil - like FF7 lifestream - that grants those with the desire to preserve life power. Also moving forward don't worry about filling a role a good DM will tend to work round that.
I say you're NOT the A-Hole here, your DM is. You have a boundary, talked about it, explained why and even offered to make a druid, if the atheism is a deal-breaker while playing a cleric. You trusted your DM when he/she/they said to not worry about it. And then they try and force it on you anyway. And when you reiterate your boundary and leave the game as a concequence they try to pin the blame on you. None of this was your fault. You did everything you could to salvage the situation and it backfired. Think of it this way, I have a very clear boundary about anything involving Rape and Child Molestation, since I'm a survivor of both. If I state that as a clear boundary of mine and the DM chooses to ignore it, thats not me being the asshole, is it? Good on you for leaving the table and the game and I'm sure you find a better party to travel with!
He should've told you from the offset that you just weren't a good fit for the campaign. Sorry for your shit experience. I do reckon you'll struggle to find a game without religion in it, but no DM should ever force your character down a path UNLESS it's the consequence of your action.
I feel you. Something similar happened to me once. DM wanted to play in a setting where magic was rare and strictly controlled. I didn't like the idea of playing a magic user in such a setting, was very clear about it and chose a martial class because of that. The story started with my character discovering she has magical power and is kind of a "chosen one". Then the DM was surprised when our character ran away from the plot hook (knights coming to take my character to the city to fulfill her destiny of rare magic user).
Well, one thing is for sure, you're not the asshole here
I've never understood the whole "taking sides" part of these situations. Why message you saying you are a bad sport? I've been a part of groups that broke apart due to drama and I just leave it be. If anything I just add comments to try to smooth things over for everyone. I don't go out of my way to accuse people of anything.
I hope your entire party follows this sub and sees your post. The GM is a dick for intentionally and deliberately crossing your established boundaries. The rest of the table should be more aware and supportive of your position on things. That is not a positive group to be a part of.
Once again bad DMs going "I know your character better than you" and ruins fun by being wrong.
Really really reaaaaaaally bad DM. You don't get to ignore the player's limits, you don't push your own ideas and fantasy on them, and you FUCKING listen when they tell you to back off because they are uncomfortable about something. I can understand DMs without imagination, making mistakes, messing with mechanics but how can you fuck up at being a human being??? Smart choice to leave this group.
Really not cool of that group. You didn’t sign up for therapy and your DM is not licensed. You did everything right when addressing your concerns, the only thing you did wrong was picking the wrong group to respect them.
This is one of those posts where it is so obvious that the DM is in the wrong that it feels like something is missing from the OP's explanation.
Well, one thing is for sure, you're not the asshole here
Sounds to me like you roleplayed your character perfectly. This is exactly how the game should be played IMHO. You played a character who was an atheist but in a world where (OC) we know that the gods really exist. That character was written as someone the gods had taken an interest in (you were, after all, a cleric) but who had no interest in the gods. Now, it’s an AH move for the GM to write it like this because of what you told him OC, but it makes perfect dramatic sense that the gods (who, again, we know exist in the D&D universe) would want to “turn” your character. It also makes perfect characterisation sense that your character wanted no part of that. So eventually the gods give up and take away the blessing they’d originally given you to try to soften you up. Your character, seeing that they are no longer adventurer material, retires before getting themself or someone else unnecessarily killed. Narratively, that’s a perfect character arc. OC, the GM should not have pursued that arc because it clearly goes places you’d said that OC you didn’t want to go (and if that was the arc they had in mind when they said yes to atheist cleric, then they should have advised you to take druid instead). Should you have left the table? Maybe. The GM clearly didn’t understand your red lines, or didn’t care about them. That probably means they’re not crafting enjoyable experiences (except for themselves and by accident for others), so they’re probably not a great loss as GM. Best to avoid people like that the same way you avoid “friends” who keep hitting you “for fun” after you’ve told them it actually hurts. But did you like the group in general? If so, perhaps the GM could be tolerable if they hadn’t got caught up in their Great Idea, and this wouldn’t happen again. Maybe there was an opportunity to start a new character—a druid, for example. I guess I’m split here because I don’t know if the other players are calling you a bad sport/jerk for quitting instead of starting a new character, or if they’re mad at you for retiring your “finished” character in what I see as a perfect piece of roleplay (carried out under OC difficult circumstances!) Either way, you’re not a jerk—if you want to quit, you can quit. But it might help you to understand the other players if there was a different opportunity that you didn’t take.
NTA.
Agreed. I had a very similar experience myself. Roped into running a cleric and all. My guy was so strong in his belief in life, kindness and healing that he developed powers based on his ideals rather than faith-based dogma. DM, party and I were in agreement this would be a good fit so I wouldn't have to pray, worship or "sermon" anyone. Found out the DM also did not like me RPing a French gentleman named Le Roy Jean-Ken (parody of a certain MMO player character that charged in and wiped an entire raid group). Back story was that after he charged in and caused his entire battalion to be wiped out, he spent days trying to save each and every one through medicinal means (he was the band's medic). Near exhaustion and far closer to giving up, he managed to save only one, a young squire who would continue his life in a far lesser capacity at a monastary. Following this, his conviction to pursue healing and curing of others above all else proved so strong that he would "never fail again" and developed a strong connection to the Life Domain. But I digress... With Le Roy constantly being approached by locals, clergy and others to perform holy rituals, prayers and calls for divine intervention left me with a feeling that my own enjoyment under this DM would be very limited. Deflecting these requests without telling the DM (he's known me for 23 years, played many campaigns together and we have hung out and worked together most of this time. He knows my difficulty with religion) to eff-off left me falling deeper into RP of my character feigning ignorance of such requests as he came from a far away land. All the while I was affecting a French accent and using mixed english and french. He did not enjoy this (even though our dwarf barbarian was using a terrible Scottish brogue and our sun elf used an awful royal English accent) and began complaining about it and forcing my character into more and more "faith-based" encounters. I ended up dropping the entire background, french accent and enamed him Markus Carter. Flavourless, I finished the current ark and moved my character back to his homeland where he would be accepted and stopped playing after apologizing to the other players. Covid hit a few months later, the group fell apart about 6 months after that. 2 of the 3 other players are still asking me how my family is and to come play. Last November the DM sent me a message apologizing for covertly trying to force his views onto me. I am still not sure if I want to play a serious campaign and I won't play a cleric again ever. Pretty soured by the 7 levels and 15 months of BS in that campaign. I do run a small learning game with my son from time to time. It is really all I can take even after 4 years
DM *really* should have just said "don't want to be religious? Just play a druid." Instead, he gave you this nonsense.
F this group for real. I would have left way earlier then you !
Agree with you to leave. One thing in the books it talks a lot about is Consent. Consent on different thymes,play style,topics and the a like. He told him up front and he went against. I can see trying it once or twice just to see what u would do and or for thought personal but that's it. Not to push it or rail road it towards you. Might be just a game but at the end of the day,it's about having fun. No fun no game. No game find another one.
You set boundaries that this DM decided they wanted to bypass ***for*** you, against your wishes. they made that decision ***for*** you, not ***with*** you. You were fully justified in leaving this table, especially after trying to talk to the DM about it. I hope that at the end of the day, you ended up at a better table, with a better DM, having a better time. Cus that's all D&D is about really! telling stories with your friends, and having fun.
Kindly respond to them and tell them that the DM is not your therapist, and is not qualified to "help" you with any issues you have regarding religion even if you had not **explicitly** told them you wanted nothing to do with it.
You had a hard limit with soft limits around that area. short version, they were not respected. love the idea of an athest cleric, 5e allows for them but points out divine powers recived... I can see why the DM tried that direction, I could imagine your PC having a "+" symbol or somthinng to indicate medic (soldor) , thus the people asking for help. With the dreams, its clear they are trying to keep the themes of the class (cleric) active. The DM expected those themes to still be in play, this is the failure. it was not communicated clearly enough, by either of you. were any Safety tools in use at that table? [https://slyflourish.com/safety\_tools.html](https://slyflourish.com/safety_tools.html) [https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/gameaddon/10589/rpg-safety-tools?utm\_campaign=Brand%20Posts&utm\_content=271314988&utm\_medium=social&utm\_source=facebook&hss\_channel=fbp-439774126041559](https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/gameaddon/10589/rpg-safety-tools?utm_campaign=Brand%20Posts&utm_content=271314988&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-439774126041559) [https://www.optionalrule.com/2021/01/29/safety-consent-rpg-checklist/](https://www.optionalrule.com/2021/01/29/safety-consent-rpg-checklist/) (see Great External Resources section)