Shouldn't most Rituals be free?

[DracoSuave]

One reason is that rituals can be controlled.

If you require the players to have the appropriate components, you can reduce the reliance on rituals to solve all their problems simply by making ritual components have a limited supply. You can even break it up by skill.

So... the components for Heal rituals are fairly common, but the ones for Arcane rituals are rarer. They might only be able to procure 500 gold at a time in their current area. Later, as they travel through the wilderness away from the city, access to Arcana ritual components grow scarcer, but Nature components are in abundance (making travel easier).

As well, players have to make decisions about what to take with them into the dungeon. Components not named residuum are not interchangable, and residuum is only available through the use of the Disenchant ritual, which itself requires Arcana components. That means if you want to be able to Disenchant on the fly, you have to make sure you have the components necessary to do so.

As well, it creates a tension: A character tends to specialize in a skill's rituals, do to the flexibility of carrying one spell component. Many people complain about how Ritual Caster carries no flavor, however the system when used properly has something in place. The caster who desires flexibility in what they can cast will be more likely to focus on rituals in one skill... and keep components within that skill that can be used in a broad selection of rituals, rather than rituals from many skills, but only having enough rituals to cover one casting each that they may never need.

 

[phloog]

Any DM that has zero fear at the idea of unlimited rituals has either excessively kind players, or players with no imagination. Unlimited use of even something as seemingly weak as Tenser's Floating Disk scares the heck out of me, coming from a history of players who have used seemingly innocent items that hold things or have extra-dimensional spaces to create such wonders as the Holy Watercannon. I have no idea what my players will do with unlimited rituals...I only know that A) it will likely be amusing but B ) it is likely to completely spoil something I spent hours creating

 

[bganon]

The problem is this isn't a case of people wanting Wizards to be able to do everything. This is wanting everything Wizards do to be useful.

Why do I HAVE a Knock ritual, if there is never a reason to use it? If it exists, it should ALWAYS be useful somehow.

Sometimes you need to open something delicate (i.e. smashing is not an option), and there's nobody with Thievery around. Knock also pretty specifically mentions that it can used to unlatch bars you can't actually reach! That's not something just any Rogue can do.

 

[bganon]

And Observe Portal doesn't have the severe time limitation to frustrate random scrying attempts. It's there because WOTC assumes that the players are smart, e.g. they've done some scouting and know the BBEG's lieutenant reports at dinnertime, thus they time the ritual so they can hear about the deployment of the BBEG's army. With that kind of preparation, even 30 seconds of scyring could be very informative (and worth the cost which is rather small given the level)... one hour of scrying would get them the BBEG's entire plan.

It's also a specific limitation intended to break the scry-buff-teleport cycle. True Portal just needs a specific description of the destination and then it works basically without fail; Forbiddance just shunts True Portals 60 feet off at the most. Having the response to an epic threat be: Observe Creature (to determine location), True Portal, kill threat is maybe nice once or twice, but every time? Sure, a creative DM can think of other ways to throw things off, but why force DMs into an escalating arms race of rituals just to maintain a plot?

 

[Mapache]

Any DM that has zero fear at the idea of unlimited rituals has either excessively kind players, or players with no imagination. Unlimited use of even something as seemingly weak as Tenser's Floating Disk scares the heck out of me, coming from a history of players who have used seemingly innocent items that hold things or have extra-dimensional spaces to create such wonders as the Holy Watercannon. I have no idea what my players will do with unlimited rituals...I only know that A) it will likely be amusing but B ) it is likely to completely spoil something I spent hours creating

Fear? Try excitement! My players are insane, so I give them a set of random incredibly powerful niche effects, then sit back and see what they concoct. I barely prepare anyway, because I'm good at improvising and no plan survives five minutes of contact with PCs no matter what. Fortunately, with the new MM3 formulas, it's even easy to come up with monsters on the fly. My standard GMing approach can really be summed up as coming up with a completely impossible problem and throwing it at the PCs, then usually shooting down their first two solutions and letting the third one work. You can't expect to stay more than a few minutes ahead of the PCs, but that's all you need.

As far as rituals, I give out Ritual Caster for free to everyone (because there's basically no difference between on character having it and everyone having it, and I don't want anyone to have to pay a feat tax to make the game more fun for everyone, myself included) and ignore gold costs entirely. Anything less, and they never get used for anything.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Any DM that has zero fear at the idea of unlimited rituals has either excessively kind players, or players with no imagination. Unlimited use of even something as seemingly weak as Tenser's Floating Disk scares the heck out of me, coming from a history of players who have used seemingly innocent items that hold things or have extra-dimensional spaces to create such wonders as the Holy Watercannon. I have no idea what my players will do with unlimited rituals...I only know that A) it will likely be amusing but B ) it is likely to completely spoil something I spent hours creating

Pfft.

What's the worst that could happen? Everyone has fun, and you get to do less work!

I've made rituals only use healing surges and the time required is a short or extended rest, and I still don't see anyone using them.

Rituals need a cost, and the cost should not be insignificant, but they should be useful. A rogue might be better at opening the doors with a simple Thievery check, but the proper ritual (which should be available to any character, including the rogue) should be able to do it, even if it requires 5 minutes and a minor skill challenge between several characters.

Rituals also can occupy a space of doing things that physical effort cannot do. Open a portal, divine the future, create a golem. These are big effects, however, and can be suitably complicated, expensive (but NOT in GP terms) and time-consuming.

 

[phloog]

I think I left the impression that I don't like players to surprise me. The point was just that I don't want UNLIMITED rituals, because even with limited items my players are always shocking me. I like the surprises, but I want to be able to provide challenge that can't just be removed via multiple free rituals.

But I don't fear surprise, and I want my players to be creative...which is why I tend to give out lots of things like immovable rods, invisible bowling pins, jars of dehydrated boulders, Dust of Clown Suiting, The Book of Salted Seeds, The Book of Phial Darkness, and the legendary Wand of Vowel Change. All but the last were designed to be seemingly useless, and all were used to great impact by the groups.

I want to give my players toys to amaze me - I don't want them to have all the rituals from the PH and any other supplements available at zero cost.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

The problem is this isn't a case of people wanting Wizards to be able to do everything. This is wanting everything Wizards do to be useful.

Why do I HAVE a Knock ritual, if there is never a reason to use it? If it exists, it should ALWAYS be useful somehow.

Because magic is what you turn to when the ordinary fails. If its your default answer to a problem, its not, well... magical. Magic becomes routine.

If each ritual cost a feat, then I could see making them free. But wide reaching utility should cost a premium. People in earlier editions were WAY too spoiled with "cast spell X to solve problem Y" (and thinking themselves clever in the process), while the non-magical characters were the ones who actually had to use creativity.

As far as free rituals go, you have them, They are called skill and ability checks. Reflavor those appropriately, and there's your free utility magic. When you use your diplomacy skill, you drop arcane words of persuasion in the conversation. When you succeed on a spot check, its because a spirit whispered something to you. Use your role playing skills for a change, rather than simply relying on rote mechanics to do everything for you.

 

[ppaladin123]

Pfft.

What's the worst that could happen? Everyone has fun, and you get to do less work!

I've made rituals only use healing surges and the time required is a short or extended rest, and I still don't see anyone using them.

Rituals need a cost, and the cost should not be insignificant, but they should be useful. A rogue might be better at opening the doors with a simple Thievery check, but the proper ritual (which should be available to any character, including the rogue) should be able to do it, even if it requires 5 minutes and a minor skill challenge between several characters.

Rituals also can occupy a space of doing things that physical effort cannot do. Open a portal, divine the future, create a golem. These are big effects, however, and can be suitably complicated, expensive (but NOT in GP terms) and time-consuming.

I'd be interested hearing more about your house rules for rituals, [MENTION=2067]Kamikaze Midget[/MENTION]. Have you posted them anywhere?

I was also wondering what you thought of the duration of many of the scrying rituals. The 3-6 rounds(~ 30 seconds) they typically give you isn't particularly useful.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Well, here's the notes I've got:

[sblock=Ritual Rules]

• Cost: Rituals do not usually have a GP cost. They may have a price in healing surges (for things that we want to happen several times a day) or action points (for things that we want to happen roughly once a day). Other party members may help pay the cost for the ritual. Rituals with a GP cost will give permanent bonuses, such as when enchanting a magic suit of armor.
• Casting Time: Rituals do not take "hours" or "minutes." They have a casting time of a Short Rest (for simple rituals) or an Extended Rest (for complex rituals). Time spent casting the ritual does not allow the character to regain hit points or recharge powers.
• Skills: Rituals are broadened to include any skill, sometimes several skills. Use some logic when determining which ritual uses which skills. For instance, Arcane Lock might use Arcana, Thievery, and Dungeoneering
• Using a Ritual: Performing a ritual is a short Complexity 1 Skill Challenge with the relevant skills. Other party members (aside from the caster) can help in this. Each party member that helps supplies some of the ritual's cost, in healing surges or action points. Each success brings the ritual closer to completion, each failure weakens the ritual a bit. If the party fails outright, the ritual is ruined, and some catastrophic effect happens relevant to the ritual (for instance, Arcane Lock might destroy the item you were trying to seal). You can acquire and use a ritual above your level, if you think your party can pull it off, and risk the failure...

It should be noted that I use Stalker 0's Obsidian skill challenge system. Here's my specific fix for View Location:
[sblock]
View Location [Scrying]
Level: 14 (DC 27)
Skills: Perception, Arcana, Stealth
Casting Time: Extended Rest
Duration: 5 minutes per success [see below]
Cost: 1 Action Point per success [see below]
About:
When you perform this ritual, choose a location you have previously visited. The location must be fixed in place (for example, you can’t use this to scry into the cabin of an oceangoing vessel), and it must still be at the same place (and in more or less the same shape) as when you visited. Redecorating a room won’t fool View Location scrying, but destroying a tower and rebuilding it with a different layout would cause the ritual to fail (until you visit the new location). You know if the ritual has failed before you expend any components. This ritual can show you a location anywhere in the world, but it can’t show you a location on another plane.

This ritual creates a scrying sensor—a shimmer in the air -- through which those casting the ritual view the location as if they were there, including any special senses (such as darkvision). The casters view the location through some reflective surface, such as a mirror, a pool of water, or a crystal ball. Each successful skill check sustains the sensor for 5 minutes, assuming a caster pays the cost (1 action point). During the 5 minute duration, the sensor moves freely to any location it can see once per round.

If you fail a skill check, the sensor goes dark and immobile for 5 minutes (and no one needs to spend an action point), and the one who failed cannot make any further skill checks to continue the ritual. If no one spends an action point, the ritual ends quietly.

If all casters fail a skill check, no casters remain, and the ritual fails. The ritual's energy surges, and sensor flashes and emits a low magical hum just before it winks out of existence, causing it to be detected by creatures that can see or hear it, and causing the ritual to end.

Sufficiently powerful warding magic, such as the Forbiddance ritual, can block View Location. If the location is warded in such a manner, you learn that as soon as you begin the ritual, so you can interrupt the ritual and not expend any components.
[/sblock]

So, in that version, any party of characters can see a location. If the party is the "D&D Typical" of 5, this means that they'll spend at most about half an hour (25 minutes) viewing the location, assuming that they're all willing to cast, and that they're all willing to spend their action points. A conservative party after a milestone might be able to pump it a little longer. It'll probably usually go for a shorter term (about 10-15 minutes), depending on how lucky the party is, since if they roll badly, the ritual will end early, AND they'll be given away. A party needs to decide if it's worth spending those AP's on for the info they might get, but a solo wizard could do it all by himself if he wanted to.

A quirk of the system that I like is that a non-magical character could easily use the ritual. Say you have a thief trained in Stealth, they could pick up View Location in a scroll and use it just as easily as a wizard. Magic-casting classes have the ability to *store* rituals for use later. A thief using this ritual is essentially using a magic item in the form of a scroll. A wizard using this ritual might use it from a scroll, or they might be using it from a book, so that they can reliably use the ritual over and over again if they need to. I like this because it makes the ritual versatile -- a party entirely made of meathead martial characters has no problem using most of these rituals. I also like it because it makes sense for the ritual. If I'm a high-Cha character with Diplomacy and Bluff and Insight out my wazoo, I should be able to help in the case of a Charm Person ritual, maybe even outperform our bookish wizard.
[/sblock]

Any others?