Oh crap.I killed the gods.

[sekaiichibannobaka]

remember my little adventure in trying to convert Final Fantasy into D&D format?

Well,I managed to do it,and then I realized with utter satisfaction one thing.I removed entire pantheon of gods.Then I realized the bad thing.I removed the ENTIRE PANTHEON of GODS.

That led to a few problems,especially involving the W.Mage,who was to be a Clerical characther,such as:

-What would make them different,such as the normal D&D clerics who worsihpped different gods?

-Why the heck would there be evil aligned W.Mages?Their better off being warriors or something else.

So basically,all the W.Mages would be good or neutral!They would do the same thing,running around,healing people,and as a fellow member said run-around-trying-not-to-get-stuff-blown-up[not the exact words,but what the heck.]!

The class lacked any allure,and all the W.Mages made were goody-two-shoes!I don't know what to do!If I re-insert the deities,the W.Mage would no longer actually be a mage,drawing foth the power of the gods instead of the power of Mana!

I need your help and guidance on this one guys.I just can't figure out a solution.

[Toric]

If you wanted to have dieties of some form, the simplest thing to do that I can think of would be to convert the various summoned monsters (or at least the more powerful ones) into dieties. Perhaps the summoned creature they worship could grant them a unique spell (similar the powers granted by domains), so Ifrit White Mages would get some sort of haste spell, Carbuncle WM's would get a full-party-targeting Reflect (or maybe Globe of Invulnerability in this case), and Odin followers would get a once-per-day Greater Magic Weapon, or something like that. And if you really DON'T want any dieties, sorry, I'm stumped for now.

And I agree, I can't imagine any evil White Mages. They've all primarily got spells that heal and half their offensive spells work best against the undead. If you want to be an evil White Mage, just be a Black Mage.

[I_Got_This_Name]

An evil white mage would just have to be one who turns their powers to evil. Admittedly, if you make all of the undead-creation spells Black Magic (as they should be), an evil white mage would be the one who stands behind the dark knight and heals them. They'd do the same thing as their good counterparts, but serve an evil cause.

[sekaiichibannobaka]

I agree with the 'greater summons are deities' concept,and yeah,I guess evil W.Mages would be on the evil side.But then why the heck would patron deities accept evil doers when their good or neutral aligned?I can only think of 2 evil deities,namely Tiamat and Griever[both from Final Fantasy 8.],and I don't think thats enough.

Furthermore,what would their portfolios be?

Suggestions?

[Toric]

Actually I think a large majority of the Summons would be neutrally-aligned, and thus wouldn't mind if their followers used their abilities for evil work so long as it increased that Summon/god's influence. Whether you're good or evil, if you go around healing people enough and telling them who they should really thank for not having to amputate an arm, you're bound to convert a few.

As for portfolios, I really don't know. The recurring summons really haven't had much personality in the FF games, so it'd be tough to figure out what traits they would be associated with aside from their basic elemental relations.

[Cybren]

In Final Fantasy magic is either unrelated to the religion, or both types of magic are, and both have the capacity for good and evil.
(in tactics, the effectiveness of spells required a high faith score, but that also made spells cast ON you more effective, healing or harming alike)

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

Here's the way I do it:

White Magic can be used for good or evil (all the bosses in FFTA use it). Healing evil people is an evil act, yes? Blowing up evil people is a good act, yes? There's also a great deal of white magic that has offensive capabilities, including abjurations and some time magic.

Being a white mage does NOT mean you have to be a good person. A cool character concept would be the mercenary healer. "Cure light wounds? Sure, that'll be 50 gil!"

There is a bit of a balance issue, though. It's not hard to fix, just make healing spells as effective as offensive spells. The Wite Mage and Black Mage should both have good Will saves, 1/2 BAB, and simple weapon proficiencies. None of this CoDzilla stuff.

Anyways, dieties. Yeah, the way I figured out the cosmology put a few superior universal forces behind the scenes pulling strings, while the summons are the spirits that interact directly with mortals. If a character wants a patron summon, that's fine, but I don't think it's necessary. Also, summoning magic is both White and Black (depending on the summon).

The biggest problem I see is that clerics in D&D are set up so that they appeal to players in more ways than one, in order to compete with the versatility of wizards and the general lack of imagination in divine magic. That's wrong. Offensive and defensive magic should have equal amounts of cool things going for them. If black magic can do it, white magic should both be able to negate it and invert it to boot.

[Draco_Ignifer]

Use all the summons, or a lot of them, if you want a full Pantheon.

Alexander, LG Intermediate God of Guardians.
Bahamut, NG Greater God of the Heavens
Ashura, NG Lesser God of Healing
Phoenix, CG, Intermediate God of Rebirth (It upsets the natural order)
Odin, LN Greater God of War
Ifrit, Shiva, Ramuh, Titan - TN Intermediate Gods of the four elements.
Eden - TN Greater God of the Earth
Siren - TN Lesser God of Music
Leviathan - CN Greater God of the Sea
Crusader - CN Intermediate God of Battle (He's the chaotic side of war)
Stray - CN Lesser God of Trickery
Diablos - LE Intermediate God of Despair
Tiamat - LE Greater God of the Hells
Lich - NE Intermediate God of Death
Griever - NE Intermediate God of Destruction
Hades - CE Intermediate God of Plagues

And so forth. I'm sure you can make others with this as a starter.

[Sophistemon]

What about Kary, CE Lesser God of Fire and Kraken, LE Lesser God of Water?

I mean, you have the Lich and Tiamat, so why not include the other two?

(Uhg, didn't notice that you had elemental gods all ready. Forgive me.)

[sekaiichibannobaka]

Interesting ideas guys.I thought about a couple of deities since,sure W.Mages[I cant get used to the Mage DOES NOT USE MANA FOR SPELLS concept.Its just...not magey anymore...] may not get the spells from them,but they DO get bonuses...

What I managed to think about Griever was:

Griever

Title(s):The One of Chaos
Homeplane : The Black Bastion
Power Level : Greater Deity
Alignment : Chaotic Evil
Portfolio : Murder,Death,Strife,Hatred,Fear,Tyranny
Domains : Death, Destruction, Evil, Retribution, Hatred, Chaos,Tyranny
Superiors : N/A
Servants : Diablos the Dream Weaver,Hades the Keeper of Souls.

HISTORY:

Griever is a part of the Six,the first group of deities who were born of the Over-God Promethius.They are:Alexander the Ever Watchful[Holy element],Bahamut the Lord of the Skies[Wind element],Griever the One of Chaos[Dark element],Ifrit the One Born of Flames[Fire element],and Leviathan the Master of the Waters[water element].

Promethius,at the Creation of the Worlds,ordered the deities to imbue their powers into 6 crystals,which He put into Vana'diel as its Core,naming it the Hearts of Vanadiel.This weakened the powers of the deities,but they agreed to it nonetheless.Griever merely agreed to do so as he was a servant of Promethius and that the idea was interesting.He merely wanted to see how it would go.

Griver hates Alexander,and thus wages constant war against him,and their followers do the same[like Hextor and Heironeous.]

Griever usually appears in the form of a Demi-Human Lion sporting Demonic Wings.

FOLLOWERS

Griever lays in shadows,preferring to let his servants wreak havoc wherever they go.He puts no leash upon them and willingly bestows them power if they could cause greater chaos and mayhem.

ENEMIES

Griever's arch enemy is Alexander.He cares not about other deities,so he makes no enemies there.

BONUS FOR FOLLOWERS:

Griever's Word : Once per day,worshippers[W.Mages] of Griever may cast Mass Confusion/Mass Fear with an effective caster level of 15+their level.

What do you guys think about em?[W.Mages casting Mass Confusion/Fear?its strange...cant get used to it...]

[Gyrfalcon]

Er... once they reach an appropriate level to have such a spell? Otherwise, low level boss encounters and such are wrecked. What sort of 3rd level boss encounter is going to make a save against an effective CL17-18 spell?

[Dicemaster]

There is no need to make White Mages "different", unless you are differentiating Black Mages too. If that's the case, how are you doing it? D&D specialists seem hardly appropriate (come on... Black Abjurer?).
WMs should mirror BMs, so domains seem inappropriate too.

On the other hand, having summons take the role of deities sounds fine to me. They would have less impact on mechanics an more on the plot than Core deities. They are more like Japanese Kami.
Unless you make a Summoner PrC :D ...

A few thoughts:
- Aero is a White Magic spell. So are Dia and Holy. And remember, "holy" isn't the same as "good" in FF. White isn't only defense.
(to Draco_Ignifer and Sophistemon)
- Kraken is most definitely CE. So is Kary/Marilith.
- Hades could be LE, but his domains tend to overlap with Lich.
- Stray is actually Cait Sith in Japanese.
- Add Carbuncle, Catoblepas, Atomos, Madein and Cyclops.