How do you handle Magic Circle in your game?

[Caudoviral]

Or hey if you ever find a sleeping tarrasque you may as well just spend 250g and a few hours and create a circle nobody could ever break it out of.

Theres that pesky tarrasque taken care of.... forever..... no chance of it ever harming anyone again...

The ridiculously powerful sealed evil in a can has to get sealed in there somehow. And if you are capable of killing the thing, it never needs to be sealed in the first place. Just look at how common of a trope this is in fantasy literature and that right there should be enough of a motivation to let a group of incredibly lucky low level characters seal away something they can't face in combat.

 

[Flipguarder]

The ridiculously powerful sealed evil in a can has to get sealed in there somehow. And if you are capable of killing the thing, it never needs to be sealed in the first place. Just look at how common of a trope this is in fantasy literature and that right there should be enough of a motivation to let a group of incredibly lucky low level characters seal away something they can't face in combat.

Im sorry, I suppose I just have this thing called logic that seems to think that if the Tarrasque was this easy to trap forever, he wouldn't even be a threat.

But yeah whatever lets have some heroic level guys remove the threat of the Tarrasque forever, sure whatever.

 

[Mirtek]

Im sorry, I suppose I just have this thing called logic that seems to think that if the Tarrasque was this easy to trap forever, he wouldn't even be a threat.

It's only easy if you get her to hold still for ~1.5 hours you need to cast the circle around her.

And then the threat will be the earthquake or other disaster breaking the circle and release the sealed evil. As has been said, that's a pretty common fantasy scenario.

 

[Flipguarder]

From what I've heard the Tarrasque only wakes up about once every 12 months. So getting a sleeping one to wake up while you were completing the ritual would be extremely unlucky.

Also Im not trying to say the ritual is unfixable, but Raw its just too powerful. And by raw it does not state that environmental effects would ruin the circle.

 

[Ryujin]

Or hey if you ever find a sleeping tarrasque you may as well just spend 250g and a few hours and create a circle nobody could ever break it out of.

Theres that pesky tarrasque taken care of.... forever..... no chance of it ever harming anyone again...

Perfect excuse for a little "mouse in the fuse box" deus ex machina.

 

[ki11erDM]

From what I've heard the Tarrasque only wakes up about once every 12 months. So getting a sleeping one to wake up while you were completing the ritual would be extremely unlucky.

Also Im not trying to say the ritual is unfixable, but Raw its just too powerful. And by raw it does not state that environmental effects would ruin the circle.

Mr. T just wakes up and burrows under them. Why all the bother? Nothing in the spell says it extends down, or even up past 5'.

 

[Kordeth]

And by raw it does not state that environmental effects would ruin the circle.

It says it lasts until the circle is broken, then goes on to say that affected creatures cannot break the circle. It says nothing about the circle being immune to any other sort of disruption, so logically it isn't.

Also, you're overlooking the fact that the Tarrasque sleeps in the world's core. If your party of 5th-level adventurers have the resources to:

1) Dig a hole about 4,000 miles deep.
2) Survive the monstrous heat and toxic gasses they discover down there.
3) Find the Tarrasque's resting spot, assuming it isn't simply mystically diffused throughout the iron and nickel of the inner core.
4) Devise a means to permanently inscribe runes on molten freaking rock.
5) Cast the magic circle ritual.

Then yeah, I think they deserve to bind the Tarrasque away until the next earthquake.

 

[FrozenChrono]

Or hey if you ever find a sleeping tarrasque you may as well just spend 250g and a few hours and create a circle nobody could ever break it out of.

Theres that pesky tarrasque taken care of.... forever..... no chance of it ever harming anyone again...

This is awesome. It's a great story opener. Maybe there's an item sealed with the Tarrasque that the adventurers need, maybe someone stumbles upon it and lets it out not knowing what it is? Magic circle has it's flaws, this is not one of them. The possibility of stumbling upon a sleeping Tarrasque at level 5 is completely at the DM's digression, as is any other situation that could create an overpowered use of this ritual.

It's a lot like push and pulls. They become drastically more powerful when there is a 1000 ft cliff 2 squares away, but that kind of terrain is completely up to the DM.


Most situations where magic circle could be used to "break the game" are preventable by logic.

Towns don't have circles around them because a block everything circle would isolate them and prevent trade/contact with the outside world. If they have a circle that targets one type of creature it becomes much easier to get around.

Adventurers could use it to protect themselves overnight in a dangerous area, but they can never leave the place they've made the circle.

The only plot I really see this ritual preventing is someone performing another ritual to end the world/summon big bad/turn into giant snake inside the magic circle. This is also easily preventable. One of the stipulations on this new ritual is that it can't be cast inside a magic circle. Problem solved. You can also use the ritual to force your party to watch the big bad being summoned/created and being unable to do anything about it. If done right it could be an epic build up.

All of this is doable within RAW by the way.

 

[Flipguarder]

Mr. T just wakes up and burrows under them. Why all the bother? Nothing in the spell says it extends down, or even up past 5'.

Magic Circle = useless against flying creatures?
and things with burrow
and teleport
and anything that can jump 5'

Wow that makes most things just slightly annoyed by this spell.

 

[Jack99]

Any 12th lvl group with a ritual caster = most likely not a tpk (considering its colossal and makes a lot of noise you could probably make a magic circle before it notices you)
Any 12th lvl group without a ritual caster = most likely tpk

Except when you have a Ritual caster.

And Im sorry but this is not a personal problem. The idea of a 12th level party meeting an awake tarrasque on thier own has always, since the introduction of the monster meant tpk. Now a simple ritual can remove the threat entirely?

I honestly don't see how this is ok.

Actually, it rarely meant a TPK. In prior editions, they would simply teleport/airwalk/fly away at that level.

Its motivation is irrelevant. This spell takes away from the fear that mid paragon pcs should have over meeting a tarrasque.

If the tarrasque is within sight (at which point the fear should probably kick in), it's doubtful that they will have the time to cast the ritual.