Ritual to convert a ritual scroll to a book?

[msherman]

Forked from: Converting ritual scrolls to books?

Nope, can't do it by the rules. A scroll is a partially cast ritual and can't be 'converted.'

The PCs in my game currently have a bunch of scrolls above their level that they found in treasure. If they don't use the scrolls by the time they get to that level, they're probably going to want to turn those scrolls into books. Since this isn't currently allowed by the base rules, a new ritual seems like a good way to do it.

Is allowing this a bad idea for balance in any way? It seems to me that since the scroll and book have the same market price, allowing PCs to do this doesn't break balance at all.

If it's a good idea, what's a good level/market price/component cost for this? My initial gut feel is that this is similar to Transfer Enchantment, in that it changes the chrome on a magic item without changing the raw balance at all, so a new ritual (Unscribe Scroll) with the same level and costs as Transfer Enchantment seems reasonable. Any suggestions?

 

[eriktheguy]

It is probably not imbalanced (I'm no expert on rituals, but I doubt they will get their hands on anything game breaking). They may need to create this ritual themselves to do so however, if it does not already exist in your game-world. If it is worth their time then the spell components and research they may need to do is an excellent adventure hook really. If the ritual is seen as useful by other spell casters and lore masters the PCs may even earn a reputation for themselves.

The only requirements are obviously that the ritual being converted be one castable by the character (his level or lower). With this limitation in place you could probably make Scribe Ritual a level 1 ritual without worrying about abuse.

 

[CapnZapp]

Is allowing this a bad idea for balance in any way? It seems to me that since the scroll and book have the same market price, allowing PCs to do this doesn't break balance at all.

For the benefit of any new readers, let me reiterate what I said in the other thread:

It isn't an issue of balance, it's an issue of control.

Scrolls have the beneficial benefit of you the DM being in control of how many times you can cast a particular ritual. Some rituals might feel generally balanced, but turn out to wreck specific adventures.

On the other hand; for rituals you don't care if the party casts the ritual over and over again, feel free to give them (or allow them to buy) the ritual as a book.

A ritual to turn one into the other negates this benefit of the scroll/book divide.

So I'd think long and hard before introducing one into my campaign. Especially as you could solve your particular problem by simply have an NPC buy the scrolls back at full price. Or even simpler, just accept your PCs have "lost" a small amount of cash. There are plenty of solutions that does not compromise your ability to restrict scrolls in the future.

At the very least, add a restriction for the ritual you're giving the PCs that it only works on, say, rituals of level 15 or lower (or "only Heroic-level" rituals or whatever).

At least this way you don't give them something now which you'll regret a dozen sessions from now!

But to answer your question - no, the market price for the scroll and the book is the same, and all gold expenditures are supposed to be equal in the game, so I wouldn't say there is any balance problem.