Mastered Rituals when starting higher than 1st

[fba827]

So when starting PCs higher than 1st level, I was thinking about rituals, specifically, mastered rituals.

Now a PC could use his starting funds to purchase mastered rituals at their market price. But the thing that strikes me about that is, rituals tend to end up being used as a group resource, and so it ends up forcing the PC to decide between spending on self vs. spending on a group resource (whereas non-ritual casters do not have to make such a dramatic decision beyond maybe a scroll or potion or two).

Therefore, when starting above 1st level, is it off base to give a "ritual fund" (as an abstract fund, not actual money) to purchase rituals to master. Rituals mastered this way would represent rituals that the character would have naturally picked up from research or from enemies over the course of actual adventuring. Thus separating starting gold to spend on own resources vs. spending starting funds

The details on it would be something like:
If you have ritual casting, you have an abstract “ritual budget” to purchase rituals equal to your level or lower (at market price) to represent rituals that you would have learned during heroic tier of adventuring.
* If you gained ritual casting as a class feature, the budget is equal to 350gp * 1/2 level. But if you gained ritual casting as a feat, the budget is half of that as you have been less focused on it than one who learned it as a core part of class training.
* Any money not used from the abstract budget is lost and cannot be used to purchase other things. You can, however, spend some of your starting gold on rituals as a way of increasing your ritual budget if you want more than your ritual budget allows.
* Any rituals you purchase are in addition to normal ritual progression that your class features may provide (i.e. in addition to the wizards gained rituals every 4 levels).

That budget figure was determined by taking the average of almost all heroic tier rituals' market price (357-ish), rounding to 350 for ease, and then assuming you get a new ritual every other level... which is where the 1/2 level comes in. That number does not hold true at all once you get into paragon rituals as the market prices are dramatically higher for some of them, so i just stuck with heroic tier rituals for this since i wasn't looking higher than that for now.

Does that all that seem reasonable? Something in there I'm not considering? Or am I just over thinking this and shouldn't give a separate ritual budget in the first place?

Anyway, just playing with the idea and thought I'd see how off base i was/wasn't before talking to my group about it.

 

[hipnotode]

id be tempted just to change the level 1 rituals you get from a class skill so that instead of saying level 1, they say of your level or lower. i would also say that any riturals you gain higher than level 1 are not affected.

so a wizard starting at level 8 has access to 3 level 1-8 riturals and one 1-5 ritural.

either way its not gamebreaking stuff, they are still going to have to cough up component costs for there rituals.

 

[pauljathome]

So when starting PCs higher than 1st level, I was thinking about rituals, specifically, mastered rituals.

Now a PC could use his starting funds to purchase mastered rituals at their market price. But the thing that strikes me about that is, rituals tend to end up being used as a group resource, and so it ends up forcing the PC to decide between spending on self vs. spending on a group resource (whereas non-ritual casters do not have to make such a dramatic decision beyond maybe a scroll or potion or two).

Therefore, when starting above 1st level, is it off base to give a "ritual fund" (as an abstract fund, not actual money) to purchase rituals to master. Rituals mastered this way would represent rituals that the character would have naturally picked up from research or from enemies over the course of actual adventuring. Thus separating starting gold to spend on own resources vs. spending starting funds
.

You can do something like this but I'm not sure that its really worth the hassle.

Although you can definitely look at rituals as a group resource you can also look at them as a place where the character gets to shine and feel all important.

And, at one level, EVERY magic item is a group resource. Bills magic sword helps kill the monsters faster and so helps keep Bob from taking damage.

In my experience, the cost for buying the rituals is generally quite affordable with the starting cash a higher level character gets. While one can't buy EVERYTHING that one wants one can generally get the things that you REALLY want. Pretty much the worst possible case (and this is quite unlikely) is that your AC or NADs are one lower than they should be as one of your big 3 items becomes 5 levels lower. That worst possible case really isn't all that big a deal.

The above assumes that you could take one of your 3 items and turn it into rituals. Not quite legal by the book but I think that just about any GM would allow that.

 

[cpendlet]

I would just give them the important ones: Raise dead, remove disease, etc and let them buy the others with their own money if they really want it. Also the players can get together and each contribute to cost of buying rituals (my players did this when we all created new characters when we hit paragon level).

 

[S'mon]

If it's important to the other players that the ritual caster has certain rituals, they can chip in. But more plausibly the high level caster can buy low level rituals for trivial cost.

 

[malraux]

IME it isn't a big deal for the caster to buy the ritual himself. The cost of the rituals is usually not a big cost relative to everything else at higher levels. Also, the caster buying the rituals means that he'll be familiar with all the info in them. If the fighter wants a ritual available then he can buy it himself.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yeah, I would just deal with it after the new PC joins the group. He can pick rituals if he wants, but he doesn't have to, instead he can keep that money. Once the game starts he can hit up the other party members for funds to buy them and cast them.

And as S'mon says, the lower level rituals are going to be trivial in cost anyway. I think I calculated that a 5th level PC could buy basically every ritual he could theoretically cast for his starting cash, and still have some left over. By 8th or 9th level the cost of all the 5th and under rituals, which are your basic utility ones mostly, is so trivial it is hardly worth adding up.