Why all the ritual hate?

[avin]

Chapter 2 of the DMG seems to think something called exploration is pretty important as well.

DMG 1 and 2 seems to think in a lot of cool and interesting things that don't work very well in 4E's very combat centric system.

I gotta say I kinda like Rituals... but they'll need some revision for 5E... their implementation was completely taken out of the combat system, leading to impression that there's two different worlds in fourth edition: combat and outside combat.

It kills a lot of my DMing mood... in this specific aspect former editions fit my DMing style better.

While I keep DMing and having fun with 4E, when I aim to suspension disbelief in a game I'm calling GURPS fourth edition

 

[MrGrenadine]

First off, yes they do. Its why wizard fans are griping they cant do everything, and better than everyone else. For 30 years, the wizard player tricked themselves into thinking that "cast spell X" to overcome problem X was creative play. "Hey look at me! I used affect normal fires to put out a camp fire! I used dominate person/ read thoughts on the guard! I used speak with dead to learn the identity of the murderer! I flew over the raging river! I'm brilliant!"

Those days are thankfully over. 4th edition gets it almost right, and IMO, rituals should be more difficult to pull off due to requiring specific components, not generic "magic cash". For comprehend languages, it should be a tongue of someone who could speak the language. The gist is, utility magic should be a slight edge, not the easy street to plot busting and problem solving players were used to.

A previous poster was complaining he couldn't cast water walk to stop creatures from dragging a party member off. Don't you have ranged control power options? Didn't you anticipate there might be trouble and you might need to reach the scout quickly? Utility magic takes a little more planning than spending the minor action to retrieve your cheap scroll.

Given that the alternative is NOTHING, and most ritual casters didn't even have blow a feat to bogart someone else's skill, I think this illustrates just how entitled caster players grew over the course of D&D. Magic still lets you do stuff no one can do, but its somehow still not good enough.

I'd like to apologize on behalf of all the players who used casters to steal your thunder and made the game unfun for you and claimed they were brilliant for doing the obvious. I've never played that way, and I don't play in groups that play that way, so, you know, YMMV. But I see by how worked up you are that its been a problem, so I'm happy 4e fixed that for you.

On the other hand, the issue isn't that people who play casters want to do everything better than everyone else--selfish, immature players might, but not good players. The fact is that for 30 years casters using spell X to overcome problems facing the party has absolutely led to some very creative, out of the box play--I'm sure any one of us could think of a few dozen examples from our own campaigns where that happened. Examples, I'm sure, where the casters quick thinking or fortuitous spell selection saved the party's bacon. So blanket statements knocking casters for having it too easy is just hogwash.

And on the subject of creativity, I'd love to hear your examples of the tremendously creative ways your fighter characters hit stuff with sharpened pieces of metal over and over. Or bashed through locked doors. Etc.

Anyway, if your experience has been that casters memorized just the correct spells to bust plots, then I'm sorry the DM created plots for you that were so easily bustable.

You see, the point is that magic should NOT always just give a slight edge--that would be boring. It should sometimes be exactly the right thing to do to solve the problem--OR it should be the right thing to do that allows the rest of the party to do their thing to solve the problem. Teamwork and roles and all that.

And yes, in terms of my water-filled room example, ranged options, and scrolls would have worked, and of course we used those. But to me an interesting campaign is one that surprises--not one where I have just the utility spell prepped and we think of every contingency and merely react as a matter of course.

Adventures should be chaotic, hazardous, confusing, surprising and fast paced--and casters should have moments to use their powers to push the party towards its goals, the same as fighters, rogues and whoever else.



On another note, I think your idea of having to use the tongue of someone who speaks the language to cast Comprehend is pretty cool.

 

[Votan]

I, personally, don't have any skin in this game- I find rituals rather bland, but haven't thought about them enough to have an informed opinion.

I do have to point out, however, that your exact argument, twisted backwards, was used dozens (if not hundreds) of times to argue that magic was far too easy and powerful in 3.x. To wit:

Just look at the Knock spell.

1 round casting time and no component cost for something that completely invalidates one of the rogue's main skills.

It's a delicate and fragile line. In 2E, knock was balanced by it replacing one of a limited number of spells. In 3E, easy scroll creation make the cost to have knock available trivial. In 4E, knock is both lengthy to cast, expensive and only gives a bonus. Likely any of the 3 would have sufficed to baalnce this spell (i.e. long to cast and costly but auto success has applicaitons, as does expensive and fast).

But I think knock is a good example of poorly designed ritual; which deos not mean ALL rituals are poorly designed. If we acknowledge this and move on that could be a good thing.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Well, in my view, for a magical class like the Wizard or the Cleric, it SHOULD be easy street. Since it is their schtick.

What ISNT their schtick? Anything they want to do is covered under once skill. Magic. Since they get everything handed to them, there needs to be a trade off. That's time and gold. Wizards were used to having their cake and eating it too. Not to mention the fighter's cake, rogue's and the social guy's...

What does the caster NOT get to do? If the answer is nothing, to me, it suggests that casters need to not be PC classes, or you need to take a look at Ars Magica, where everyone gets a badass wizard and a bunch of peon grogs to order around. Because the old system sucked IMO.

I don't think it should overlap what other classes do, either, though.

So utility magic can no longer let players do something conceivably covered by a skill or ability check? Awesome! I may be on board. However, something tells me this is just lip service to fairness, the same crap that justified being a sleep spell on legs for a level or two as a trade off for being able to solve everything with a few spells later.

Which is roles, again. If the Wizard does one thing with magic well (and the Cleric does another) and the Fighter does something with skills well, and the Rogue does a fourth thing with skills well, there's no one stealing anyone's thunder. Wizards get to cast magic and do cool stuff all the livelong day, and so do fighters and rogues, without magic treading on their toes.

What's the athletics DC to fly? What's the diplomacy DC to speak with dead?

Oh right... magic gets to do all the special stuff, and all the mundane stuff. Because its magic.

If you want it fast, easy, reliable and free, take it as a daily utility power.

Right now, the cry baby spell casters get skills, powers AND rituals... but its somehow not enough.

 

[Puggins]

It's a delicate and fragile line. In 2E, knock was balanced by it replacing one of a limited number of spells. In 3E, easy scroll creation make the cost to have knock available trivial. In 4E, knock is both lengthy to cast, expensive and only gives a bonus. Likely any of the 3 would have sufficed to baalnce this spell (i.e. long to cast and costly but auto success has applicaitons, as does expensive and fast).

But I think knock is a good example of poorly designed ritual; which deos not mean ALL rituals are poorly designed. If we acknowledge this and move on that could be a good thing.

I'm not trying to be flippant here- honest. I don't see why, exactly, it is poorly designed. A character with thievery paid a cost for having thievery- essentially one feat (yes, you can argue less than one feat, since he can take the multiclass feat, but that comes with the opportunity cost of not taking another multiclass option, so let's call it one feat).

What is one feat worth in gold and/or time? Certainly more than 25g or 50g per level, given that the amount paid for knock becomes absolutely trivial by paragon tier (at the latest), while that feat could easily have been retrained into a very good paragon or epic feat later on.

Now add on the advantage that its a bonus that stacks with thievery, giving the arcane trickster character quite the perk. How much is that worth in time and money?

I understand your argument, but I see no easy way to quantify how much the knock ritual is really worth in game terms, especially since its value varies by the campaign. One locked cell or chest per 2-3 levels makes the knock spell an absolute bargain for a party that doesn't want to be bothered with thievery. One locked cell per encounter makes thievery quite the value.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

This is the attitude I am talking about. It's full of nothing but hate for the way things used to be, which isn't relevant because things aren't that way anymore.

So why do you want to make them that way AGAIN? Which is essentially what these threads are. An older edition pity party saying "magic isnt as good as it used to be". I thought that was the obvious intent of 4th edition.

The alternative is bashing the door down. Rogues are now properly strikers and have a meaningful role to fill in a party beyond just being a skill-monkey.

Casters have a role too, and there's actually an arcane/divine class for every one... So I'm not seeing why they need more than the non casters.

Thievery is no longer the niche protection of rogues, and 4e is supposed to let you have whatever classes you want in a party.

Its the niche protection of the thievery skill. Which costs a feat to get if you aren't trained. If the ritual caster feat gives you a bunch of skills... why blow a feat to train a skill? Ritual Caster also lets you do stuff you cant even TRY to do with skills. So no, the catch all skill doesnt get to be as good as the specific tool.

Additionally, warlocks can train thievery as one of their choices. If you want to use magic to pick locks, take the skill and fluff your skill roll as a spell. Fluff your diplomacy check as slipping words of power into a conversation. The 1/2 level bonus to all rolls should essentially represent your non combat magical knowledge being put into play.

It's OK, no wait, it's essential that the other classes can handle those kinds of challenges. We need to give up this outdated "thieves pick locks and nobody else can" mentality, and replace it with a "how does X class handle a lock?" paradigm.

That's cool. What's the heal DC for a warlord to raise the dead? What's the knowledge nature DC for the ranger to open a dimensional portal?

When the non casters start doing stuff magic characters cant hope to accomplish, then perhaps casters can start getting back what they lost. Until then. I've got no pity.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

On the other hand, the issue isn't that people who play casters want to do everything better than everyone else--selfish, immature players might, but not good players.

What do they do WORSE? You have arcane classes of every combat role (leader, defender, controller, striker), so its not a combat issue. What do they do worse out of combat to justify getting access to every skill and problem solving spell "because its magic"?

If it was hard to learn rituals, or if each ritual took a feat, or required a power swap, I might feel sorry for the casters. If martial characters could all utilize the skill powers freely, instead of having to blow both a feat AND a power choice on them... I might agree with buffing them.

The fact is that for 30 years casters using spell X to overcome problems facing the party has absolutely led to some very creative, out of the box play--I'm sure any one of us could think of a few dozen examples from our own campaigns where that happened. Examples, I'm sure, where the casters quick thinking or fortuitous spell selection saved the party's bacon. So blanket statements knocking casters for having it too easy is just hogwash.

Cant combat powers be used out of combat? Utility powers? Skills? Why does the mage need yet another option on top of what everyone else gets to overcome problems?

And on the subject of creativity, I'd love to hear your examples of the tremendously creative ways your fighter characters hit stuff with sharpened pieces of metal over and over. Or bashed through locked doors. Etc.

Thank you for illustrating the point. Because they cant just throw a cheap scroll at the problem, they actually DID have to think. They have to utilize equipment and the environment more because they have less tools. Necessity is the motherhood of invention.

You see, the point is that magic should NOT always just give a slight edge--that would be boring. It should sometimes be exactly the right thing to do to solve the problem--OR it should be the right thing to do that allows the rest of the party to do their thing to solve the problem. Teamwork and roles and all that.

If magic does everything, like the ritual caster feat essentially does, then yes, it should be a slight perk. Its the trade off of being general vs. specific. Otherwise ritual caster is the jack of all trades, master of all trades ability.

Rituals are pretty cheap when spread over 5 people. The ritual caster shouldn't be shouldering the cost on his own. Its like making the face pay for all the bribes or whatever out of his pocket when the entire party benefits.

 

[Negflar2099]

Or about 1 minute and a great-axe.

I'm pretty sure an axe can't unlock a portal which the Knock ritual can do.

My point is that knock (like several other rituals) is not meant to replace a character with thievery or a big axe. Instead it's meant, I think, to supplement those characters when axes and thievery skill fails. It allows a wizard to essentially substitute Arcana for Thievery all without using a feat.

I agree that the rituals lack flavor and that some of the rituals are less than useful in most situations, but while those are valid criticisms for some rituals I don't think you can dismiss the entire idea of rituals because a few aren't up to snuff. That's like saying man weapons are useless in this game because the dagger only does 1d4 damage. You have to look at rituals as a whole and I think in general the idea is sound. A few rituals just need a little tweaking is all.

 

[Nightson]

What's more, breaking a door down might be a lot less of an option with a heavy stone or iron door. Once you spend the 175gp to buy the ritual, you get to keep around without it taking up space or slots or anything. As long as you have 35gp worth of components on hand and a healing surge you can make use of it on the rare occasions it would be worthwhile.

 

[Votan]

I'm not trying to be flippant here- honest. I don't see why, exactly, it is poorly designed. A character with thievery paid a cost for having thievery- essentially one feat (yes, you can argue less than one feat, since he can take the multiclass feat, but that comes with the opportunity cost of not taking another multiclass option, so let's call it one feat).

What is one feat worth in gold and/or time? Certainly more than 25g or 50g per level, given that the amount paid for knock becomes absolutely trivial by paragon tier (at the latest), while that feat could easily have been retrained into a very good paragon or epic feat later on.

Now add on the advantage that its a bonus that stacks with thievery, giving the arcane trickster character quite the perk. How much is that worth in time and money?

I understand your argument, but I see no easy way to quantify how much the knock ritual is really worth in game terms, especially since its value varies by the campaign. One locked cell or chest per 2-3 levels makes the knock spell an absolute bargain for a party that doesn't want to be bothered with thievery. One locked cell per encounter makes thievery quite the value.

It's complicated to quantify and it might be different in some campaign worlds, depending on local circumstance. All players have skills and the Thievery skill is way better (given the low bonus from the ritual). A full ten minutes makes breaking the lock with a hammer a viable alternative (it's loud but so is a magic incantation). It makes repeated tries to lockpick competive and the odds of success are low (if the rogue failed to pick the lock, a +10 on the wizard's bonus may not be enough either). If you can see through the door then the Eldarin can teleport past. It just seems to rate below the normal (creative) solutions that I'd try if the initial lockpick failed.

I agree that it's in the range where it could be okay but I dislike how easily it is competed with by the sledgehammer approach. Sure, if nobody is trained at Thievery and the doors are often thick and steel it will start seeming appealing. But locks that the rogue fails to pick (barring a terrible die roll) aren't likely to be picked by the wizard, either.

I guess what Iw as trying to say is that there is a reason knock is so often mocked compared to other options. It's low hanging fruit for the "anti-ritual side of the debate".

Raise Dead is a much better example of a ritual that you can't easily get around using in special circumstances. Or long distance teleport. These seem to be the cases where rituals provide effective alternatives but don;t overshadow character roles. perhaps the discussion should be how to make more rituals like these ones.

But at first glance it looks like a lot of