Elemental deities represent the fundamental principals of nature. Wind, Fire, Earth, Water, Cold, etc... Why would Grumbar (earth) be the only elemental deity who cannot grant druid spells?

I havent been able to rationalize that since his dogma could easily work for any druid. Considering our setting, in my opinion he should be one of the Major druid gods. So I'm suggesting Grumbar be added to the druid lists.

Other people who care should feel free to chime in. I could be wrong about this, but if not- It would be cool to see him added.

I'm not an expect on grumbar, but he's resistance to change and stoicity probably makes him a bad choice for a druid, who's more open to change and variety. Having the setting set under the ground means that a lot more of what grumbar does is more in tune with what's around, hence the reason why the major temple in town is to grumbar.

There is a spell substitution on efu that converts druid's call lightning into call boulders which if anything SHOULD be something an earth domain cleric of grumbar should be able to do.

But then you're looking at reworking the bonus spells the various domains get, and although that isnt a bad idea it's another can of worms. :)

As a side question what spell do AIR domain clerics gets when they try to cast CALL LIGHTNING (their level 3 domain spell)?, ideally for them it would be substituted to LIGHTNING BOLT.

Agree with Chaosprism.

Druids as advocates of nature are in effect advocates of change and balance. Grumbar represents an extreme limit of an ideal, that of almost stagnant opposition to any change at all--atleast that is what I have taken from his dogma. He represents the earth, stone, and rock. Period, and on an elemental level, not a level that interacts with man so much-- and his dogma reflects that.

All of the actual "nature" dieties are balanced in their views and not averse to changes in the natural world they look over.

Let's remember folks, the Dogma of a deity isn't strictly applicable to it's Druids. It's nice guidelines and all, but the Druids do have a significant amount of flexroom there. And, as for change, I can definitely see Druids resistant to change. A druid might be resistant to creating a mine that would destroy the earth, or leveling a forest for timber. I can definitely see Grumbar as a druid deity. Mayhaps something akin to Silvanus?

Ebok Elemental deities represent the fundamental principals of nature. Wind, Fire, Earth, Water, Cold, etc... Why would Grumbar (earth) be the only elemental deity who cannot grant druid spells?

Actually of the four major elemental powers (Air, Earth, Fire, Water... Cold is a quasi-element), only Kossuth is currently listed as granting druid spells. Grumbar, Akadi and Istishia (as far as I know) aren't on the Druid deity list.

The canon deities for Druids and Rangers is on page 90 of Faiths and Pantheons. As a quick difference between the EfU listing and that listing:

Ones on EfU that aren't in FnP: Kossuth, Cyrrollalee Ones in FnP that aren't on EfU: Stronmaus (giant deity), Osiris

So there you go. According to canon, none of the four Elemental deities give spells to Druids/Rangers.

EDIT: This is not to say of course that the DMs can't make their own decision about which deities they feel should support Druids/Rangers.

Didn't MithrilDragon and MrCheezIt discuss this ages ago and reach some sort of conclusion?

I dont know what was decided months ago. I wanted some kind of feedback and so far I'm happy with the both sides. What ever comes, comes. I'd like to see it happen, but as with everything- its up the to Dm team. And if you've already decided it way back when, then I'd be happy knowing that.

Just as a bit of interesting additional info:

After a quick glance through Faiths and Pantheons, I found one good reason why Kossuth has been added to the list of applicable deities here on EfU... once again the sourcebooks contradict themselves, as Druids are included under "Worshippers" of Kossuth, despite him being left off the official nature deity list.

Purely for interests sake, there is a heap of deities that list Rangers under worshippers but they don't appear on the Nature deities list. They are: Shaundakul, Tempus, Garagos, Grumbar, Marthammor Duin, Corellon Larethian and Shevarash.

So you could quite easily make a ranger with one of these deities - just don't expect to get spells (whenever it is that Rangers develop a spellcasting ability).

Plus this from the list of official nature deities which I think is something to be included on the description of the Druid class:

"Druids of a deity whose favoured weapon is not on the druid weapon list in the Player's Handbook are able to wield that kind of weapon without violating their spiritual oaths, but they are not automatically proficient in that weapon's use."

but I'm now wandering off topic... so will stop. :D

I think there are definitely errors in the source books, to me kossuth is about as far from what a druid would support, since fire ends up destroying much of nature, even though it is often a part of the cycle.

The elemental lords to me represent extremes, all of them. Druid spells even though with elemental effects strongly in there are not focused on one aspect.

I can see casting fire spells as a druid annoying akadi (air) if you happened to be a worshipper of her for example. Grumbarites are actually supposed to not like crossing water for example. The animal and plant (and sun) powers druids have are not anywhere near as confrontational to other powers as the elemental ones could be. For that reason I dont see any elemental deities being reasonable for druids. Druids are connected to the elements yes but , thats all of them, in a balanced way not to one aspect.

As far as i see a druid they serve nature and the balance NOT the god that grants there spells they may respect malar for his skill as a hunter but they won't go around slaughtering elves as that would upset the balance.

So druids serve nature...that should mean every god that has narture as part of there portfolio could have druids supporting that aspect.They wouldn't be praying to the god as such but to an apsect of that god or goddess that is involved with nature,IMO.

Peace

chaosprism I think there are definitely errors in the source books, to me kossuth is about as far from what a druid would support, since fire ends up destroying much of nature, even though it is often a part of the cycle.

Actually, not true. Nature USES fire in a lot of cases

http://www.fire-ecology.org/education/doc1.htm

Read this for a little background, i'm only going off the top of my head, but some plants actually encourage forest fires in order to spread - I recall reading something about a certain type of vegetation thriving after massive destruction of forestry (I think it had something to do with Australia, but can't quite recall.)

Yeah I live in australia, and yes fire germinates certain seed pods, burning off the husk letting the seed out, I'm pretty sure canada has a few plants the same way.

Thats why as I said it's part of the cycle.

But the extreme of it isnt, thats the unnatural thing. I'm not saying that bushfires (or wildfires as you might call them) arent extreme conditions because they are, the temperatures can get pretty hot. And if you take into account volcanoes which are natural, magma is pretty darned hot too and turns other things to ash pretty quick.

What I'm saying is that the elemental gods to me anyway care ONLY for their element and wouldnt supply the druid with their full range of powers at all.

And if you had a druid like that you'd likely be looking at a prestige class of a druid or something, where all their spells work only in one element. Then they really become some sort of elementalist.

I don't understand what you're trying to say, chaosprism. Why should a Kossuth worshipper advocate "extreme fire"? Fire is an aspect of the natural order of things, why wouldn't you be allowed to worship that aspect? Not every Kossuthian has to be a pyromancer that wants everything to BURN BURN BURN. It's your own thinking that's extreme here, not Kossuthians themselves.

Extreme hunting also messes up the balance, yet I don't see you questioning Malar's status as a nature deity.

"extreme" hunting is a natural aspect also, there are some animals that hunt for sport, play with their "food" and generally things that can be called sadistic. However abhorrent malar is it's still a nature aspect. Nature kills the weak as part of its 'natural' order.

The point you ignored that I made is that Kossuth WOULD not supply the druid with any other powers except for fire. If there were natural fire dwelling beasts than you'd probably be able to summon those, but likely little else. As I said you're talking about a sub-set of a druid at most.

I see the elemental deity aspects as different to the "nature" based gods. Elemental aspect is a subset of nature, but nature is not a subset of elemental aspect.

So NO I would NEVER EVER call any of the elemental gods a nature deity. And hence would never allow druids of them.

chaosprism I see the elemental deity aspects as different to the "nature" based gods. Elemental aspect is a subset of nature, but nature is not a subset of elemental aspect.

I've sympathy for your position, though. Despite the above, I also feel that the elemental deities aren't particularly concerned with the natural world. I don't really feel very strongly either way in this debate, but I'm pointing out that the notion of for instance Kossuth as a nature deity is at least conceivable, if not particularly plausible.