Comments on: Getting The Most Out Of Rituals

By: DerekDyer

DerekDyer — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 05:20:36 +0000

Maybe… X rounds where X is how many minutes it normally takes. It requires double the normal cost to expedite. The first round it requires a Standard to start, and each following round a minor to Sustain.

That’s at least an initial evaluation. I like the concept.

By: PinkRose

PinkRose — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:16:17 +0000

True, but after looking at a few other rituals, I felt a rule rather then a DM ruling each time was a much simpler solution.
Now my players and I know before hand how long a ritual takes to cast.
Here’s my complete list.
* 1 minute = 1 Standard Action
* 5 minutes = 30 sec / 5 Standard Actions
* 10 minutes = 1 minute
* 20 minutes = 2 minutes
* 30 minutes = 3 minutes
* 1 hour = 10 minutes
* 2 hours = 15 minutes
* 4 hours = 30 minutes
* 8 hours = 1 hour

By: Wimwick

Wimwick — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 15:58:34 +0000

@ PinkRose
Welcome to Dungeon’s Master, glad you found the site and I hope you continue to enjoy the content we provide.

I really like your idea of reduced casting time. For me casting time has always been the deal breaker on whether I’ve felt rituals are an appropriate action to take. Another alternative to consider, especially in a case like water walk, might be rule that one casting could cover the party as long as the appropriate material components are expended.

By: PinkRose

PinkRose — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:25:18 +0000

I’m late to the discussion (just found your blog from the DDi article. Favorite new blog this year) but I wanted to chime in.
In my group, I’ve reduced the casting time of rituals by 1 notch.
So 1 minute rituals take 1 standard action. 1 hour ritual takes 10 minutes. 8 hour rituals take 1 hour. And everything else falls in-between. The big catalyst for me to make the changes was water walk. It takes 10 minutes to cast and lasts an hour. So by the time I’ve cast it 5 times, I the first guy only has 10 minutes left to walk. 1 minute cast time seemed much better. Now you have 55 minutes to walk as a group. So my game hasn’t broke and the D&D police haven’t shown up.
Thanks again for the great blog.

By: Rook

Rook — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 23:21:36 +0000

I would think that if you are going to allow rituals to be cast during combat, then a Concentration-like roll should be needed. Maybe something like an attack roll, your Int vs. 10 + ritual level or a similar mechanic. Perhaps you could impose a penalty to your roll if you are hit before your turn in that same round. Failure simply means the ritual was disrupted, but you don’t lose any material components.
Mind you this is just off the top of my head and haven’t tried it out, but maybe it might lead you in the right direction.
Rook´s last blog ..And me without a Girdle of Masculinity/Femininity: A tale of a modest mini.

By: Swordgleam

Swordgleam — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 03:44:01 +0000

I once played a one-shot where three out of the four characters had rituals – the party was a wizard, a warlock (me), a paladin and a cleric. None of us had ever played characters with rituals before, and we used them a LOT.

Needed to cross a rickety bridge? Our wizard had the highest dex. He cast Tenser’s Floating Disk and ferried the rest of us across. The same for sneaking – also dex-based. The rest of us sat on the disk quietly while the wizard rolled all the Stealth checks.

By: Wimwick

Wimwick — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 23:59:00 +0000

@ Starvosk
I agree that having rituals outside of combat was a deliberate design choice. However, saying that rituals would override skills if allowed in combat doesn’t work either. Afterall, if a skill check alone would suffice, why do we need rituals? Also, most rituals require a skill check to see if they will work.

@ Wyatt
I noted you were writing on rituals recently. I haven’t had a time to fully read what you’ve put up, but I am interested in reading the framework you’ve created.

@ Mike Katz
I like your idea about the casting time and requiring a concentrated effort over multiple rounds. I suppose my intent as a PC is to think of ways rituals could be used differently and then present them to my DM (either inside the game or out) and see what happens.

@ Neuroglyph
It will be interesting to see if Ameron will let me use select rituals inside combat and how that might effect the game. The trade off is if I’m casting a ritual, I’m not attacking. While it’s true that non-ritual casters would not be able to particpate, what we need to remember is that anyone can train in the ritual casting feat. I’ll let you know how things go in a future post.

By: Neuroglyph

Neuroglyph — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:11:02 +0000

I really think it’s a balance mistake to cast rituals in combat. I don’t think that casting them in combat is necessary to make them popular with your players – rituals are just fun to use in the right context.

My players are very excited to use Rituals, and use them often, despite having to plan ahead a bit and cast them outside of combat. Almost every level so far, as soon as they hit a new level, they swarm to the local temple or mages guild, clamoring to buy new rituals.

I have to Starvosk – rituals were specifically taken out of combat in order to make sure that spell casters are not artificially overpowered – making them combat abilities is essentially granting ritual casters a whole set of encounter powers that non-ritual casters can’t enjoy.
Neuroglyph´s last blog ..Review: Nevermore by Expeditious Retreat Press

By: Mike Katz

Mike Katz — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:21:15 +0000

I feel that way about rituals too, although in earlier editions, I found plenty of uses for utility spells in combat. After all… it’s magic!

For something like Seal Portal, it might make sense to reduce the casting time from 10 minutes to 10 rounds worth of standard actions. As long as one person in the party with the ritual uses a standard action to cast it, another party member could use one to cast it (like an aid another skill check), reducing its remaining time by 1. That way you get the drama of the whole party involved, and having to balance dealing demons flying through the portal with closing it. This is where the 3/3.5 skill Concentration shined.

Or maybe something level based, where a spell costs its level in standard actions to cast. This might also make a good magic item, one that lets you store a ritual to use as a combat action.
Mike Katz´s last blog ..On sneaking

By: Wyatt

Wyatt — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 16:08:54 +0000

What I decided was that I didn’t like the rituals guidelines to begin with, so I made my own. I tried toning down the casting times, reducing costs and so on, but for players they still felt clumsy and were often forgotten. So I made the Endeavor rules (linkbacked here) to try to give my players something more relevant.
Wyatt´s last blog ..Skill Rituals: Comprehensive Rules