Alternate Divine Magic System

Here is the divine magic system I used in my 3e campaign in .PDF format.  I have never been happy with divine magic (actually, all magic) as written in D&D.  For this campaign I made up a system based on the trance possession religion of the Yoruba of west Africa (probably more familiar to my readers as Santeria and Candomble in the New World).

This was one of the player handouts, so the whole thing is written in the second person. I should mention that this was an EXTREMELY high powered campaign.  These rules make the divine magic user quite powerful, but in the context of the campaign they worked well.  I think the general concept could be easily adapted to a lower power campaign by scaling back the static benefits of each possession.

Here are the allowed weapons and armor for a Yoruba Cleric:

Traditional Yoruba Armor:  frame shield, bone breast plate, (bone breastplate give +1 to AC, shield gives +3 AC if not flanked)

Weapons:

 long spear (oko):6’ haft, 2’ steel blade does 1d8 dmg piercing/critical on 19-20x2, or 1d6 dmg slashing, critical on 20x2, with a spike on the butt end (1d6 piercing or bludgeoning, critical on 20x2): can be used to make two attacks a round, a slashing attack with the front and a stab or bash with the rear: -4/-2 or no penalty if two skill points spent on oko skill (2 attacks at 1d6 dmg).

 long spear with barbs (oko eleti) 1d8 dmg piercing/critical on 19-20x3 (this spear is a little heavier, with barbs protruding angularly from the base of the blade, but in all other respects is identical to the oko.

throwing spear/javelin (esin): 4’ haft, 1 ½’ steel point:1d6 dmg piercing, critical on 20x2, 30’ range increment

sword with single edge and backwards curve (agedengbe): 2-2 ½’ steel blade, hilt of wood bound with leather:2d4 dmg slashing, critical on 18-20x2, x3 if used two-handed, 6 lbs

longsword (ida):3’ steel blade, expanding from the hilt towards the broadest section close to the tip, iron or wood and leather hilt with crossguard: 1d8 dmg slashing, critical on 19-20x2, 3 lbs

curved sword/scimitar (ogbo):3’ curved steel blade, iron hilt with cross guard and pommel: 1d6 dmg slashing, critical on 18-20x2, 3 lbs

dagger (obe): 12” blade, 5 1/2” wood hilt with no guard, hangs in a leather scabbard from the left hip: dmg 1d4 piercing or slashing, critical on 19-20x2, range increment 10’, 1 lb

short bow (orun):4-5’ wood shaft, with a leather grip in the center bound with magical herbs, and a twisted leather string fed through a hole in the top of the shaft and bound frontally to the bottom of the shaft:1d6 dmg piercing, critical on 20x3, range increment 60’, 2 lbs

arrow (ofa): 24-30” canes tipped with steel points and fletched with thin pieces of leather towards the rear of the arrow

quiver (apo): tubular leather holder fitting twenty arrows

Here are examples of the ritual objects used by the Yoruba Cleric:

God Statue/Tapper:

Agogo Bell:

Ashere Dance Rattles:

Clay Bust of Elegua (for Dream Messaging):