What are your rules for classic swords and sorcery?

[Tony Vargas]

is slow sorcery just plain incompatible with fun in a RPG when you tie player characters into it? I see a risk of "You guys go adventure. We'll be sprinking powders and chanting for the next few days." that I think everyone would want to avoid.

For any clearly un-fun thing that an RPG might offer, there's somebody who thinks it'd be fun.

Something that's slow is a question of logistics. Is there time to do the ritual? OK, we do the ritual, if there's no problems, after that we continue on.

Sure, if there's a ritual that needs to be done while something more exciting is going on, or a ritual that needs to be stopped by doing something exciting, the hero (and thus, generally, the PCs) should be doing the exciting bits. OTOH, if the ritual culminates in some excitement, like the quasi-resurrection in Conan the Barbarian, or if the everyone participates in the ritual and you just move to the next thing, that's fine.

I also think it's fine to have background magical powers that are established, but don't much impact play. It's fine for a PC to be able to, IDK, bless crops or something, just like it's fine for him to be a blacksmith or whatever.

I think that issue is tied to the fact that in classic S&S magic is used mostly by the bad guys, or for non-combat healing. I seem to recall the Grey Mouser casting some spells, but only using charms and scrolls, am I right?

The one scene that stuck with me were Grey Mouser used magic was when a sorcerer was tossing blue lightning bolts at him, he grounded them out with a wire attached to his sword. Hm... I could be getting that slightly wrong, but I think that was the gist of it.

 

[Piratecat]

It is a sad fact that my first inclination for the Mouser's magical ability goes back to the 1e Deities & Demigods stat block. That's not weird, right?

Early on, he's great at sleight of hand and legerdemain. Re-reading my way through the stories, so I'll confirm if he gets more knowledgeable thanks to Sheelba and Ningauble.

And it's tricky; when it's mostly bad guys who use slower ritual magic, you ask why. I'm considering a few different options to reflect this.