D&D 5E ritual casting overpowered?

[Psikerlord#]

Leomund's Tiny Hut is a very good spell but not perfect protection. It is visible and an enemy with the ability to track can determine the party is hiding under the dome. If the hunters are serious about catching the people hiding in the hut they just need to wait, preferably with an arsenal of area of effect attack spells waiting for the hut to disappear. Depending on the terrain, the hunters can even find or build cover to avoid missile attacks from inside the hut. If the hunters include a wizard or someone else familiar with the spell, they will certainly be able to devise tactics to take advantage of its limited duration and the conveniently clustered quarry hiding inside.

For a small party, Meld Into Stone is a more effective way to take a long rest in safety. It is also a ritual and the party can be spread around an area (assuming the terrain is stone).

My group includes one guy who is always looking for an angle with his spells and he is a fan of rituals. After two years of playing 5e we have still not seen any sign of rituals being overpowered.

We banned rope trick and leomund's tiny hut. Too much easy mode.

 

[Andor]

The biggest danger would be pirates and unscrupulous business competitors. All they need to do is to wait until the water walkers are more than 30 minutes away from shore and then show up with a ship and a few archers. As soon as the ritual casting starts (because Water Walking and Tensor's Floating Disk only last an hour, so it needs to be cast regularly) and they start firing arrows at that point. Once the wizard is dead (or has his ritual disrupted enough to fail and he sinks under the water, they have their own wizard cast waterbreathing on some of their crew who dives in and retrieves the cargo.

Also Sahuagin, Merfolk, Locanth, Kraken, various waterbreathing dragons, fatigue, water damage to the pages of the spell book, navigation, weather, and the humiliation of dying because you tripped on a squid. Honestly if I were in a campaign and someone suggested this my response to be to put a knife to his throat and ask which of our enemies hired him, and why they hired an obvious moron.

 

[Ovinomancer]

We banned rope trick and leomund's tiny hut. Too much easy mode.

Rope trick lasts an hour, how is it easy mode?

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Rope trick lasts an hour, how is it easy mode?

Judging from Psikerlord's overall statements as read in prior posts, it is "easy mode" because the party with that spell can use it to guarantee themselves an uninterrupted short rest, with the costs of the spell and possible complications when casting it being viewed as non-existent or irrelevant, so it is getting something for "free" by refusing to actually acknowledge the cost.

 

[S'mon]

I think it is working as intended. But it may be a campaign level power jump for certain campaign styles. If you are in that boat and the ritual system doesn't work for you, I would just get rid of rituals in full or only allow it on a limited case by case basis.

Deleting the 'ritual' line from spells like Leomund's Tiny Hut seems like a good idea, yes.

 

[crashtestdummy]

Deleting the 'ritual' line from spells like Leomund's Tiny Hut seems like a good idea, yes.

As I said earlier, the difference between this being a ritual or not is simply one spell slot. This is not a spell that your would spam -- it's generally cast once per day at most. That is, being a ritual will save one spell slot in all bar exceptional circumstances. It's not that big a deal.

Now, if Rope Trick were a ritual, I've be more concerned, but it's not. Yes, it's a 'safe short-rest' spell, but it uses up a spell slot and if you want lots of short rests (especially for all the classes that regain benefits after a short rest) then you'd want to cast it a lot...but that's using up resources that you might want for other purposes.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

how so? Ritual casting (1 feat) grants the equivalent of water breathing for the whole party for the whole day at the cost of a 10 min cast. By moving 15% slower through an area, the whole party gets continuous telepathic link, and if they move 10% slower they get continuous knowledge of the area for miles around them at all times. At the cost of 10 mins, they get an invisible force shielded shelter every night. By moving 15% slower they get someone to spring traps for them. Move 50% slower and you have continuous magic detection.

How does this change the world of d and d? Any kingdom with even limited resources could completely eliminate banditry for instance. Water walking trading groups w/tensers disc become as common as ships. Would there be ordinances against massive overuse of magic mouths? Every castle would have its troops telepathically linked - how does that change combat? Animal messengers running to and fro continously become as common as trees. Magically hiding anything becomes virtually useless. And think about common outdoor encounters (the surprise night ambush, the ambush in the mountain pass, the hidden magical door in the tree) and how unlimited ritual spells trivializes them.

Wow...like I've said in multiple threads over the last few weeks, my experience differs vastly from yours.

First..and again I have to point this out... FEATS ARE OPTIONAL. That' said, if you are using feats, you WILL have to adjust some 'power gaming shenanigans'. You have no choice. The game is NOT designed around the inclusion of Feats or Multiclassing, or any other rule listed as "optional". Yes, I'm sure the designers did try and take them into consideration when they could, but I'd also bet that if it came down to "which one do we choose, core or Feat, as the base ruling?"...that they chose core every single time. As soon as the DM starts adding in these optional things...he/she will have to make adjustments to fit his or her game. A DM that cart blanche just says "Yeah, use them as is", and then does nothing to adjust all the things in the core rules that may end up being too much/little for his campaign..., well, he needs to work on the "balancing house rules" aspect of being a DM.

Anyway...so you're using Feats or not. The Ritual thing is pretty cool. It is useful. In my campaign it never became a problem.

I also don't understand how or why your DM is just ignoring everything that could be bad with regards to all that stuff you said. I mean, yeah, you can breath water. Great! You all jump into the ocean to search for that sunken pirate ship...and now the Barbarian with his two handed sword can't swing it. The paladin in full plate sinks to the bottom...could be really bad if he falls off a ledge/cliff and sinks 500' down! Oh, and they're exploring and suddenly are attacked by a half-dozen bull-sharks? Looks like the sharks are going to have a feast! If your DM just says "Oh, you have water breathing, so depth, temperature, casting spells, talking, walking, swimming, dodging, etc are all ignored"...then all I have to say is...I'm glad they aren't my DM.

Telepathic link? Awesome...except that the spell says "psychically linked". As DM, I'd rule that that pretty much means they are treated as "one mind". So, if ONE of them fails a charm save...ALL of them are charmed. If one of them takes 19 psychic damage, they ALL take 19 psychic damage. Hell, if I was feeling particularly nasty, if one of them 'dies' (drops to 0hp), they ALL have to make a death save. But that's me. And I'm kind of a hard ass about that...but it makes sense to me that if everyone is sharing one mind, that they kind of form a "symbiotic" type relationship.

What's this about "someone to spring traps for them"? I'm not sure what spell you're referring to. If you're thinking about Unseen Servant, you have to know the trap is there to begin with, and it won't spring traps that "go off" when you cross it (ex: a magic glyph on the floor, or a pit trap). If it's opening a door that you think may be trapped, sure. If it's trapped. If it's not, it just opens a door for you. So what? Mage hand or an actual party member can do that. If your DM just has "traps" do nothing other than single, specific, targeted effects with no effect on their surroundings...well, again, "i'm glad they aren't my DM". In my games, a trapped chest can be many things. From the simple poison needle trap (were Unseen Servant is really useful!...if the chest isn't locked, of course), up to things like rocks falling from the ceiling, fireball traps, stone slabs moving to block the door/entrance to the room, etc. In short, if the PC's don't mind the risk of not having treasure...sure, use Unseen Servant all you want. No skin off my teeth.

The bottom line is this: Ritual castings are nice. With the reduction in the number of 'spells' a caster can bring to bare each day in 5e, the addition of being able to cast certain spells as a "ritual" helps balance that out a bit. We were testing out Feats in our last campaign, where PC's hit level 6 at the highest, iirc (after about 8 months or so of play). The Valor Bard took it. He used it to cast Leomunds Tiny Hut. It was nice and comfortable for them. Until that one night at the base of the Granite Mountains, when that stone giant decided it made a great place to sit down on to wait out the night. The giant didn't look like he was going to leave by the time it ran out, and anything and anybody underneath it was going to get smooshed into a fine PC-paste like substance! It was fun watching the players try and figure out how to move far enough away from the giant to not get squished, and then plan on running away as fast as possible once the hut blinked out of existence. The ensuing giant chase was nail-biting (the PC's were about 2nd to 4th level at the time), and one PC was dropped to below 0 by a single critical rock throw! They regrouped, then came back for revenge. They succeeded, barely, but that only did one thing: make the stone giant clan that lived in the area instantly hostile to the PC's. Many close calls later, the PC's are now a bit paranoid about venturing into those rocky areas...which just so happens to be the area they need to go into, of course! :evil: ...so, one "overpowered use of a ritual spell" has pretty much replaced a potentially very valuable ally with a potentially very deadly enemy. Yay overuse of Ritual spells!

This post is getting long. So I'll end it here. Rituals are not unbalanced at all, if your DM runs any sort of decently adjudicated campaign. If he/she just uses the world as a "MMO-Style Stomping Ground" for PC's do use their cool powers to kill stuff with no consequences other than resource depletion....well, it's not a problem with the Ritual ability (of Feat)...

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Staffan]

Water walking trading groups w/tensers disc become as common as ships.

The great thing about ships isn't that they let you move across water. It's that they do so with relatively little effort. As an example from the real world: the Suez canal is about 100 miles long. Before it was built, there was pretty much nothing stopping ships from landing at Port Said, then transporting cargo the 100 miles across the isthmus to Port Tefwik, and then loading the cargo onto different ships to continue its voyage. You'd think that'd be convenient. But instead people thought it was way better to travel around Africa, which was 4,300 miles longer than sailing through the Mediterranean and walking across the isthmus.

Every castle would have its troops telepathically linked - how does that change combat?

Rary's telepathic bond is a 5th level spell, needing a 9th level caster. 9th level casters don't grow on trees. In addition, it affects 8 people for one hour - so it creates a single 8-member "cell" that are telepathically connected and need to get the spell renewed every hour for ten minutes. That's not super-useful unless those 8 are on a scouting mission somewhere, and the mage accompanies them.

I do know that a necromancer I DM'd for trivialized a lot of overland travel and danger when he realized that he could ritual phantom steed every few hours and let the party essentially travel 3 times faster than would otherwise be possible, turning a week long excursion into a 2 day trip.

Phantom steed creates a single steed that lasts for an hour. It's great for the wizard who travels alone and needs to get somewhere fast. But if the wizard has a mere three traveling companions, he's spending half his time recasting the spell, and then it's not much faster than walking.

True, which is why Wizards make the best ritual casters (leaving aside the Ritual Caster feat) because their rules for ritual casting does not require them to have the spells prepared -- they only need to be in their spellbook. The other classes all require the caster to have the spell prepared, which cuts into what else they can do.

Both wizards and clerics/druids have a limitation on their ritual casting. Wizards need to have spent effort learning the ritual spell in the first place, in order to have it in their spell book. Clerics/druids automatically know their whole spell list, but instead need to expend daily resources in order to prepare​ the spell.

 

[S'mon]

As I said earlier, the difference between this being a ritual or not is simply one spell slot. This is not a spell that your would spam -- it's generally cast once per day at most. That is, being a ritual will save one spell slot in all bar exceptional circumstances. It's not that big a deal.

It means a choice between LTH or an extra fireball, so I think it's potentially significant.
Personally I don't think I'll be allowing the spell at all.

 

[crashtestdummy]

S'mon, that could be said regarding any spell. Spell slots are a limited resource and there will be times when you want to use all of them (or all at a particular level or higher). Leomund's Tiny Hut is a spell that's probably the last one the Wizard casts in a day. If it wasn't a ritual, would they try to save one 3+ level slot to cast it? That's one of the many decisions a wizard would need to make: use that last slot now and risk having no resources in case of an ambush during the night, or try to save it to almost guarantee all spell slots ready the next day. Having the spell as a ritual removes that problem, but I'm sure there will be other decisions the wizard has to make: cast that Fireball, or hold off so he/she can cast Dispel Magic on the Fighter that just failed a wisdom saving throw?

Yes, having Leomund's Tiny Hut as a ritual makes life a little easier for the wizard and the rest of the party, but I don't see it as a major problem for game balance. It means that a party that's reached 5th level can breath easier at night...but as has been pointed out above, it doesn't make the party completely safe.