Ildavir, Goddess of Nature

Ildavir, Goddess of Nature

Goddess of the primeval woods, of the Silver Stag, of the holly branch and moonlit grove. Her forests as dark and limitless as oceans, there are no roads in her green realm, only unseen paths. In every raindrop, in every moss covered rock, in every wayward leaf, she is found. It was she who gave the fox the colour of its fur, it was she who gave the raven the lustre of its feathers. All that roams the woods keep her well and whisper her name when they come across one of watching eyes carved by her priesthood.

Her followers know well how to read her moods; they see her fury in the storm, hear her laughter in sunlight, and feel her majesty in the greenery that cloaks the land. She watches her followers struggle and survive, watches them live and nurtures their soul with the strength to find their freedom.

Title:

1. Hermit

2. Walker

3. Guardian

4. Druid

5. Archdruid

Creed:

To live is to be wild, and to be wild is to be free.

Alignment:

Neutral.

Holy Symbol:

Their holy symbol is an oak leaf.

Restricted Weapons:

Clerics of Ildavir can use any weapon as long as it’s made from wood or resembles a common tool. Otherwise they roll at one dice lower. In general they tend to wield bows, slings, staffs, wooden clubs, and scythes or falxs.

Favoured Spells:

First Level: Food of the gods, paralysis.

Second Level: curse, neutralize poison or disease, wood wyrding.

Third Level: remove curse.

Fourth Level: affliction of the gods.

Fifth Level: weather control.

Unholy Creatures:

Un-dead, abhorrent or alien extra-planer creatures, demons, devils, lycanthropes, perversions of nature, oozes, slimes, moulds.

Communing with Ildavir

Clerics of Ildavir commune with her by meditating in nature. They gain insight into what she wants or her pleasure and displeasure through the actions of animals that serve as omens. Such as the flights or calls of birds, the appearance of a stag or bear on a nearby hill, the path of a mouse that crawls beneath a tree, a squirrel carrying an acorn across a tree branch, etc.

Clergy and Worship

Clerics of Ildavir tend to live as recluses or hermits living within, protecting, and caring for vast swaths of forest and those that live nearby. They view all life as equal and are equally inclined to save or help a wounded fox as they are to for a human child. They generally live in small huts in the forest near human settlements and build no other buildings and prefer to sleep under the stars if weather permits.

They protect the wilderness and are at times at odds with human civilization. They abhor deforestation caused by farming and the spread and squalor of civilization. Most clerics of Ildavir care not for the petty politics of the world and don't get involved to much in the affairs of the civilized world. Each cleric of Ildavir loosely belongs to a group of other clerics who live in nearby forests. Together they form a Circle and this tends to be the extent of the clergy’s hierarchy.

They tend to be indifferent to humanity or the other races but will stay on good terms with nearby settlements often tending to and caring for the sick or injured livestock of the common folk and finding them when they get lost in the woods. They are often sought out for their medical advice and contain a great knowledge about the healing properties of certain plants.

However the bulk of their time is spent simply existing in nature as they wish all would exist. They tend to their lands and the natural creatures within it, and blaze trails to erect thin totem poles with a myriad of strange shaped eyes carved into them. These totems called eyes of Ildavir by the common folk and rumour holds it that the Druids erect them so Ildavir herself can look through them and watch all that walk within the forest. The Druids say they simply serve to mark boundaries or function trail markers. Like many things about the practices and rituals of Ildavir their true purpose is unknown.

They have no temples or churches and only gather on certain nights in sacred places found in nature; groves full of ancient trees, at the edges of moonlight lakes, within circles of ancient standing stones, anywhere that the beauty and majesty of the wild strikes deep within the soul.

These meeting involve many sacred songs and rituals and are part council where the Druids of Ildavir discuss much about what has been going on in their forests and how they want to further their goals of building more Eyes of Ildavir and maintaining the forests.

Healing Description:

When healed by druids of Ildavir the individual watches as their flesh begins to move and grow as if it has a life of its own; bone sprouts like a tree at a prodigious rate and muscle worms its way around it like a snake followed by skin which flowing forth like water. Wounds snapping shut with scars appearing to seal them and spilled blood moves with a pulse of its own.

Deity Disapproval:

Roll
1	Walk barefoot for one day.
2	Take a vow of silence for one day.
3	Harm no animal, no matter how hostile, for one day.
4	Cut your palm and let the blood flow freely mixing with the earth. Take 1d4 damage.
5	Heal at 1 reduced die for a day as your connection with nature and life is lessened.
6	Seek out a hurt animal within 24 hours and nurse it back to health or suffer a -1 penalty to spell rolls for one day.
7	Carve a new totem, an eye of Illdavia’s eyes, deep within the forest within 1d3 days or loose 1d3 randomly determined spells for 1d3 days.
8	Lose the ability to cast one random spell until you plant a tree in Ildavirs name.
9	Suffer -2 to spell checks until you spend one night naked and alone meditating in nature.
10	You must subsist on nothing but the forgings of the forest, mainly roots and berries, for 1d12 days. Due to the fasting that results from this you only gain 1 hp when resting at night and recover no lost ability points.
11	Test of the Wild: you must venture into the woods and face a silver wolf summoned by Illdavia and fashion it’s pelt into a cloak.
12	Help 1d20 hitdice worth of sick or injured livestock of nearby farmers with your lay on hands ability. If you incur disapproval while doing so you take 1 str, sta, or agility point damage as you empathetically take their injuries into your body.
13	Kill no living natural things, no matter how hostile, for one day.
14	Seek out and destroy a greater corruption of nature. Be unable to turn unholy creatures until done.
15	Restore 1d20 hectares of farmland to forest. This generally involves hiring people at your own cost to help plant trees. Take a -3 penalty to spell checks until complete.
16	The cleric must give away all his gold to the poor, nature alone shall provide for him.
17	Clear a ruin or lair deep in the wilderness and take nothing from within. Ildavir will destroy it afterwards with an earthquake so that nature can reclaim it.
18	Blight the crops of a village to stop them from encroaching on the forest. This will cause the cleric to be branded an outlaw with a sizeable bounty placed upon their head in civilized lands.
19	Suffer from the sickness of civilization as the pain of the earth itself is felt. Suffer from Affliction of the Gods at a spellcheck of 1d20+17. This lasts a number of days equal to 1d4s rolled on this chart.
20	You suffer the curse of Illdavia and are cursed with lycanthropy and are one of her forsaken. You must go on a quest to find redemption and to have the curse be lifted.

Call of the Wild Ritual

To perform this ritual the Druid needs part of an animal or plant to act as a magical focus of the same type that they wish to call or interact with. Generally this is a bit of hair, tooth, root, flower petal, or leaf. The ritual involves the druid cutting their palm with a special ceremonial knife and letting their blood fall from their palm and mix with earth in a specially crafted oaken bowl worth no less than 50gp. The earth must be from a forest and be fresh, no older than 1 day. They must hold the focus in one hand while they mix the earth and blood with the other and smear traces of it on their forehead and face in Druidic letterings. 

Call of the Wild
Level 1	Range: Self     Duration: Varies    Casting Time: 1 hour  Save: N/A
1-11	Failure.
12-13	They can speak to and understand any natural animal or plant of the same type as the focus for CL hours and of equal to or lower Hit Dice of the caster. The animal or plant will act in a non-hostile, or (depending on species)  friendly manner towards the Druid but does not have to obey it's commands.
14-17	As above but if an animal of the focus type is present within CL miles of the caster they are called forth to the caster. If it is a stationary plant they are not called forth but the caster knows where it lies.
18-19	As above but the animal or plant will obey the caster’s commands within normal bounds; suicidal commands or those contrary to its nature have a 50% chance of releasing a monster from service. Due to the nature of the summoning, the caster cannot directly harm a creature he summons.
20-23	As above and they can see through a single sense of the called forth animal or plant and can communicate with it telepathically at a range of CL x 100 feet.
24-27	As above but instead of calling forth the animal can choose to take its form of the animal or plant. He assumes the creature’s form and manner of locomotion, as well as the ability to survive in the creature’s normal habitat but gains no other powers.
30-31	As above but the caster can change himself completely into a new animal or plant of Hit Dice equal to twice his caster level.
32+	As above but the caster can change himself completely into a new animal or plant, gaining all of that creature’s powers and abilities. The creature cannot have more Hit Dice than twice the caster’s level. The transformation lasts until the caster chooses to return to his normal form or 24 hours have passed

Divine Aid

There are a couple considerations about invoking Ildavir. The first is that being the goddess of nature herself it is near impossible for her to manifest aid in place where there is a lack of animals or vegetation, such as deserts, wastelands, barren mountain ranges, etc. However to make up for this, in areas with abundant life and vegetative matter the cleric rolls with a d24 instead of a d20 when seeking divine aid.

Furthermore Ildavir is somewhat of an amorphous goddess. She has no concrete form and instead is part of life and nature itself. When she manifests it tends to be in a profusion of growth and life itself. Examples are provided as follows:

DC 10 - Simple effects limited to affecting only the caster and manifest in almost natural ways.

• Plants and trees sprout from the land around the cleric rising from the earth, restoring it and hiding him.
• Life flows into the cleric from earth and they are healed of all damage.
• Storm clouds begin to billow and rain begins to pour obscuring sight.

DC 15 - Miraculous effects that aid the cleric and his party and are distinctly supernatural in nature.

• Vines grow from the ground wrapping around the enemies of the cleric ensnaring them.
• A wall of thorns sprouts up and blocks off creatures pursuing the cleric.
• The cleric and his party step into a tree and appears from a tree several miles distant.

DC 20 - Extraordinary effects that directly harm the enemies of the cleric and are blatantly supernatural.

• A dozen dire wolves are called to aid the cleric against his enemies.
•  The sky clouds over supernaturally fast and lighting beings to strike down the clerics enemies one by one.
•  The skin of the cleric and his party turn to bark greatly shielding them from damage.

DC 30 - Direct manifestations of the God; any creature (including the cleric's party) who cares for their wellbeing should immediately run.

• Wild growth bursts forth from the earth ensnaring and tearing apart any who aren't quick enough to get away.
• Hail the size of apples begins to fall as lighting strikes any moving target.
• The trees themselves come alive as Treants and walk forth led by the Greene man.