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Jan 18, 2013 -- 10:19AM, pauln6 wrote:

I understand that the gp cost of rituals in 4e was not felt to be a balancing issue but in our campaigns we never felt that rituals overshadowed anything.  That might be because we did not purchase them tactically, we just dished them out based on the pre-4e versions of our PCs.

I don't think the design of rituals is very good in 5e yet.  Some of the rituals seem to equate to auto-sucess at tasks and I thought the enhanced skill rolls of 4e seemed far more sensible (although only have a point if there is a cost beyond spending time to cast rituals).  Using up a spell slot seems counter-intuitive and won't leave any room for ritual casters from other classes to overcome the point of rituals in the first place.  There is nothing wrong with requiring clerics to have ritual versions of spells in a ritual book and limiting the number of rituals they can learn by reference to their level and wisdom.  Or have core rituals that all clerics can use and allow them limited access to a deity-specific list of other rituals.

I also don't have an issue with class-specific rituals but I think that access to batches of related rituals should be purchasable with feats so that we can go back to having Agravaan, our intelligent knight who pores over ancient texts trying to decipher prophecies without him having to take high levels in wizard or cleric to use his knowledge.

So my 2gp worth is to say keep some kind of cost, whether gold, hit points, or humanoid sacrifice, keep ritual books, limit the number of rituals any PC can know, and possibly allow access to a core of rituals but make all the others knowable only through feats.

Which rituals equate to auto success?  IE banishment still requires a saving throw, others still have gp costs ect.

Additionally, the idea of cost with a ritual is taken with time, imho.  You're trading off the ability to cast an additional spell that you otherwise wouldn't have access to with the downside that it takes 10 minutes. 

I dont understand why an additional 'cost' would need to be added.  Or let me say it anotherway... in what way could rituals be manipulated to damage the player experiance or break a game?

got it... I think you're reading it too literally.

What is the benefit of casting a spell as a ritual if you both have to prepair it and it takes up a spell slot.  Why not just cast it normally and save yourself 10 min?

Thank you, all, for your thoughts on this obscurely written class feature. I'm thinking that, for now, until this has been clarified by the designers, I will change the wording to something like: "You can cast as a ritual any spell to which you have access".  Thoughts?  I think that taking out the "prepared" word is key to clearing up the issue.

Cheers,
Afet

Knock as a ritual is actually less powerfull.

" When you use knock as a ritual, you can open an object that requires DC 15 or lower check to open rather than DC 20."

Regenerate is the same as normal but also requires a troll heart and the bile of a purple worm.  I'm not sure how often you'd have access to those components.

Teleport... well there's no contest, that's very cool. But it takes a year of casting the spell every day.  There's definately some sacrifice going into these rituals.