Why all the ritual hate?

[I'm A Banana]

Uh, point taken Kamikaze Midget? It'd be nice if you contributed something though, since calling out my specific examples doesn't really touch on the point of the discussion...

Well, it does, since the reason you don't hate rituals is because you have made them better than they are written to be.

Which is great, but that's a solution for you, at your table, with your specific group.

It doesn't mean that rituals don't deserve the hate. Perhaps if the other millions of people playing D&D hadn't thought of or implemented your specific fixes, they hate the rituals, because they are still expensive, bland, and overly specific. Because they're not at your table, haven't thought of your solutions, and so, they still have the problems that your group has fixed.

And in all seriousness, that was just a good example of a DM saying yes. Perhaps my examples were all colored by that, but what can I say? I have had extraordinary luck with super DMs!

Totally right, and great for you, but if you want an answer to the question, perhaps this is it: people have ritual hate because not everyone has a super DM who bends the rules to make rituals useful for people who like rituals.

Which is a problem. Having fun shouldn't require an excellent DM. If you can't get a good result without good DM improvisation, then the thing itself is borked.

Including ritual components in treasures was part of the design not a fix...

I don't see "ritual components" anywhere in the list of treasure parcels, but maybe I'm not squinting hard enough.

I very much like them as they are. They reduce the super-high-magic feel of 3e (and to a large extent prior editions) down to something that finally fits my world. Players only use them when necessary, eg to Raise a dead PC, and NPCs only use them when necessary, ie when plot-useful. They solve a huge problem with prior editions in that I can now have an NPC "high priestess" or "great wizard" with great magical ability but no combat power.

I totally agree with all these high points, but like I've said before, I think Rituals are a stupendous idea that fails a bit in execution.

We need a different way to "pay" for rituals, one that is assumed in the system.

We need rituals divided more strongly into flavorful effects, and spread out amongst more classes. The upcoming "Martial Practices" is probably a really good use of this idea, judging from the bit in the character builder. Segregating rituals by power source (which is almost done with rituals depending on trained skills right now) is another good element. They need to take this farther, and make the rituals stronger. This might not even be a problem in the next few years. Rituals need to be more strongly tied to character archetype.

Rituals need to have an affect on the game. This is a philosophical change more than anything. 4e's main way of doing anything is via encounters (mostly combat encounters) and rituals are inherently isolated from encounters, so you don't ever need to use a ritual for anything, so anything you invest in a ritual is pointless unless your DM makes a special exception just for you. This is a deep divide that affects the structure of the game, the number of assumed combats, the nature of XP, even the powers system itself.

I like rituals. I just never get to use them in my games as a player, because the DM doesn't make a special exception for them, or often as a DM, because by RAW, they're not worth the effort it takes to get them.

I banished all GP costs to use a ritual in my game, and instantly saw an uptick in use. Not a big uptick, but still. I personally want to encourage their use, because I do like the way they make you feel like an actual well-rounded character who can do things other than blow up goblins, who can help, in a uniquely archetypal way, in situations other than combat. I love that you don't have to allocate combat resources to them anymore, but I still want them to be important to characters accomplishing their goals.

By RAW, they're not.

I think in my mind, Rituals and Skill Challenges might be combined into one big system that is then divided into types of conflicts the PC's might overcome that don't involve combat, but I'm still early in my thinking on that. I think the strengths of the Ritual system will help offset the problems with the Skill Challenge system, and vice-versa.

 

[Turtlejay]

Was that a nice presentation of an already defined ritual?

Object Reading (I think).

The DM described the events, and then the Ranger asked the Wizard how he did it. His reply was the awesome time/space answer I posted.

I wasn't really looking to start an argument, or segue this into a "Rituals suck because 4e sucks" thing. I do think that some groups have had bad experiences, or no experience, and I am curious about those.

As an aside, I was not the DM during any of those examples, and I have played 4e with 4 great DM's who all had different approaches to the game. I take no credit for any of it.

Jay

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Just look at the knock ritual.

10 minute casting time, costs 35 gold and a healing surge, for something that can be done for free in about 6 seconds by a skill.

That's the point. The best person to do a task is someone trained to actually do it. Mages take second fiddle for once. as it should be. I loathed the old days of the best everything is a wizard.

 

[Nightson]

I don't see "ritual components" anywhere in the list of treasure parcels, but maybe I'm not squinting hard enough.

Maybe you should read through the PHB Rituals chapter which mention ritual books, ritual scrolls and ritual components are all things which you might find as treasure.

 

[Pseudopsyche]

Rituals seem an afterthought in the overall design of 4E. In the first three core books, they received one chapter of attention, the very last in the PHB. They almost never appear in published adventures, and we've only a couple of DDI articles that mention them. Sure a good DM can make rituals engaging and fun, but he or she does so in spite of the design and without much support from WotC.

Once upon a time, much the same could be said of skill challenges. That design element has received more attention, to the tune at least of Mike Mearls dedicating an entire column to them every month. I really hope rituals receive some love, too. Like skill challenges, rituals rely on flavor, narrative, and creativity. Perhaps the designers concentrated their efforts on crunchier bits of the system, expected DMs to want to provide their own flavor, narrative, and creativity to rituals. That said, I think we could use more examples and guidance of how to incorporate them effectively into campaigns. Maybe they could be incorporated into the culture of the campaign world, like ceremonies in Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed (still one of my favorite settings). Maybe they could be incorporated mechanically into other subsystems. A plausible use of a ritual could explicitly grant a success or even remove a failure in a skill challenge. If martial practices (from Martial Power 2) had been in the game from the beginning, the short rest could have been a martial practice (use the ritual mechanics). Heck, just give ritual casting to every class and say you gain one every even level. That might at least encourage players to crack that section of the book.

I think it says something that plenty of 4E campaigns don't seem to use rituals (and others, skill challenges) at all. You can't really say that about powers or feats or classes or skills. Perhaps some campaigns omit magic items, but not to the degree of rituals.

 

[Cyronax]

Object Reading (I think).

The DM described the events, and then the Ranger asked the Wizard how he did it. His reply was the awesome time/space answer I posted.

I wasn't really looking to start an argument, or segue this into a "Rituals suck because 4e sucks" thing. I do think that some groups have had bad experiences, or no experience, and I am curious about those.

As an aside, I was not the DM during any of those examples, and I have played 4e with 4 great DM's who all had different approaches to the game. I take no credit for any of it.

Jay

We've used Object Reading in one of our campaigns. Its definitely one of the most evocative rituals.

I like your entire description and analysis of rituals Turtlejay. I generally think the rituals are done 'okay', but deserve some renewed attention from the 4e designers.

As a DM and a player, I don't think rituals cost too much or have too much time for casting. Its the assumption that rituals take a long time.

Its sort of take it or leave it in 4e sense, by RAW. That said, I like reading about weem's ritual house rules, but I sort of like it the way it is for my games.

Anyway .. my ramble does come to a point: rituals are probably the easiest part of 4e to start house ruling. Its the sub-system that least affects the rest of the game.

C.I.D.

 

[Derulbaskul]

My players are pretty lazy when it comes to exploring options for their characters so I am not seeing ritual use yet. To try and entice them to consider it I have included a couple of sites in my current adventure that allow the casting of a ritual without components by using the inherent magic of the site (a la earth nodes from FR3.5E's Underdark).

The adventure is a conversion/homage of the legendary Caverns of Thracia so one of the sites is a version of the Pool of Watery Wonders for those who are familiar with this 30-odd year old adventure.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Maybe you should read through the PHB Rituals chapter which mention ritual books, ritual scrolls and ritual components are all things which you might find as treasure.

When I am looking to assign my players treasure, I look at the part of the DMG that tells me what treasure to give out, and it says "here are some treasure parcels," and I give those out.

I could add books, scrolls, and components to the list. That is me going above and beyond the RAW, where I am told, as a DM, to assign treasure based on the parcels.

At the very least, the casual suggestion in the PHB doesn't match the actual text of the DMG -- the actual rules of the game.

 

[deadsmurf]

An alternate to reducing the costs to encourage player use is add an extra power that is gained with the ritual caster feat (and I'd say the martial practices also)

Hasten Ritual
Standard Action
Prerequiste: You must have your Ritual Book and ritual components on hand to use this power.
Effect: Make a skill check for one of the primary skills of the ritual you intend to cast with a Hard DC for your level, if you suceed You spend 1/10th of the time to complete a ritual begining in your next round, if the casting time of that ritual was measured in minutes, you must spend that number of standard actions to complete the ritual.
If you are damaged, move away from your ritual components, or do a different type standard action, you must spend an additional standard action to complete the ritual.

basically, make a skill check, do the ritual much faster, and in theory be able to take a couple rounds and even do them in combat (though this wouldn't be useful most of the time) - it gives a lot more options.

 

[Garthanos]

At the very least, the casual suggestion in the PHB doesn't match the actual text of the DMG -- the actual rules of the game.

So you consider it a house rule for a dm to do things mentioned in the phb? hmmm ... fascinating. I read the players handbook first it has some good bits in there for the DM too. (The party might not have a ritualist... and I am pretty sure the DM is advised to make the treasures suit the player characters.)