Ritualist (PFRPG)

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Ritualist (PFRPG)
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Meet the ritualist!

This base class surmounts divine order, compelling the gods rather than beseeching them. Featuring a new approach to spell-like abilities based on deities and player-defined areas, the ritualist demands Intelligence both in and out of character. If a bard, cleric and wizard had a baby, dropped it in the Fountain of Awesome and ordered a host of imps to drag it out, they would emerge with the ritualist.

This class hybridizes the support role with authority and has been thoroughly playtested.

Design Goals:

  • Design a support class with an active role in combat.
  • Encourage cooperation but enable independence.
  • Devise a primary class feature reliant on dynamic player Intelligence to the extreme.
  • Incorporate an engaging "deal with a devil" type dynamic to many aspects of play.

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Subscribe at dreadfox.com for $3.99 during the month of January, 2012 and get the ritualist for free.

Ritualist Tips are also free. If you can't decide whether or not you want the class, or if you have already purchased the class, we encourage you to check them out.


Picked up this yesterday and quite enjoyed it. Some questions:

At one point it refers to the area of a ritual being the max space the ritualist and thrall can traverse in 2 rounds, but its only mentioned that once. What happens after two rounds? Why can't I keep sowing for more?

In playtest, how did the rituals work when unusual environments were presented ( ie. underwater, during rain or high wind, standing in muck in the city sewers, when the ritualist is flying)? There seem to be a lot of spots where this character's main schtick could be rendered unusable.


I'm glad you enjoyed this, IronDesk.

IronDesk wrote:
What happens after two rounds? Why can't I keep sowing for more?

Ritualist PDF (page 5): If a ritual is not completed within 2 rounds, that ritual fails and the ritualist loses a daily use of his rituals.

The sowing of salts is limited to 2 rounds in order to prevent abusively-sized rituals. We wanted rituals to encompass entire battlefields, but not entire continents. 2 rounds puts a practical limit of roughly 45 sq. ft. on a ritual's area. That might not sound like a lot, but because the shape of every ritual is player-defined, it ended up stretching a lot further than it sounds like it would.

IronDesk wrote:
In playtest, how did the rituals work when unusual environments were presented...?

This is ultimately a DM's judgement call. Many environments do make sowing salts unfeasible, but there are several ways to deal with these environments. A few off the top of my head:

-Try shielding a small ritual's area with you or your allies' bodies.
-Summoning Circle: If you're on good terms with one of your canon deities, you can trade a day's worth of rituals for a powerful pet. There are outsiders suited to almost any environment.
-Conquest of the Ages: This ritual grants considerable buffs for a very long time (long enough to perform before facing hostile environments).
-Blessings Enjoined: As above, but not quite as long.
-Standard Action Domains: If you expect to face watery or windy environments on a semi-regular basis, these are a great Plan B.

I'm happy to answer these and any more questions you might have.


Thanks for the response. A couple more questions then...

A lot of the ritualist's abilities seem to break the mold for power levels available to low level characters. For example, acces to a teleport effect potentially at lvl 1 (granted with signifigant limitations.), and a flying familiar with opposable thumbs right out of the gate. How disruptive did you find these factors when the character is used with published materials?

On the opposite spectrum, many of the rituals with the 1 +1/3 rnds/lvl duration seem underwhelmingly short lived for the effort it takes to cast them. Am I missing the point of these?

I have to go back and review domain powers now, but I got the impression that the Class didn't have much to do outside of casting rituals. Can you share some examples from playtests of how it stayed relevent and enjoyable for the player through a whole game?

As I said, I did quite enjoy the class and and am just trying to get a better feel for a class that departs so much from established norms.

Oh and finally, is there anywhere else I can download the Ritualist Primer? I don't really want to open a Drivthru account.


IronDesk wrote:
A lot of the ritualist's abilities seem to break the mold for power levels available to low level characters... How disruptive did you find these factors when the character is used with published materials?

The final iteration of rituals and thralls didn't seem disruptive at all during our playtests. Our low level tests consisted of several groups running through Paizo and non-Paizo modules, and these features didn't appear to "break" them. Of course we could never explore as many possibilities as I wish we could with only a few groups at our disposal, but here is what I observed...

The ritualist has a slightly different "economy" than any of the core classes. He has 3 things going for him: rituals, domains and a really cool pet.

Rituals: Individually, rituals are stronger than most spells. That's because 3 + Int rituals per day are intended to be almost equal to the bard's spell progression + performances, the cleric's spell progression + channeled energy and the wizard's spell progression. At level 4, 8 rituals = 7 bard spells + 8 bardic performances; 8 rituals = 10 cleric spells + 7 channel energies; 8 rituals = 8 wizard spells. On top of their low number of uses per day, the ritualist only learns 1 ritual per 2 levels, which means that a ritualist's ability selection is far more narrow than that of any other class. Choosing a "super utility" ritual like planar portal (teleport between 2 places you've traveled within a few days) at low levels takes a lot of wind out of a ritualist's sails in combat in exchange for the ability to carry the party though a roleplaying scenario or two. We tried to control rituals in such a way that no matter what the player chose to emphasize (buffs, direct damage + direct healing, control + summons or out of combat utility) his total party contribution fell somewhere between the bard's and cleric's. Even though rituals seem powerful, they provide a "burst" of contribution that can't be sustained, and ultimately their total party contribution seemed roughly equal to the other support classes' combined main features.

Truthfully, at low levels, I saw the ritualist being slightly out-contributed by the likes of color spray and channel energy, but because the ritualist's contributions were always flashy (kills heal the whole party, teleport the party to a place you've already been, etc.) players seemed to get more excited about them.

Domains: Rituals are supposed to be "almost equal" to other classes' combined features because we used domains to tip the scales in the ritualist's favor a little bit. The ritualist starts off slowly with 1 domain, but finishes with 4; this progression was designed to help him match the pace of spellcasting support classes as they gained more spells per day.

Thralls: We modified the creatures' special abilities to scale with player level after watching a pixie trivialize an encounter at level 1 (/facepalm), but ultimately thralls were hitting all the notes we wanted them to hit. A thrall's superiority to an ordinary familiar is supposed to be the ritualist's answer to cantrips during combat (makeshift ammunition when you're otherwise out). Their roleplaying advantage is deliberate - our #1 priority will always be rich flavor, which means that we are constantly starving to encourage player ingenuity. Incorporating intelligent underlings with agendas of their own seemed like a great way ignite players' imaginations.

IronDesk wrote:
On the opposite spectrum, many of the rituals with the 1 +1/3 rnds/lvl duration seem underwhelmingly short lived for the effort it takes to cast them. Am I missing the point of these?

The duration of a ritual is indirectly proportionate to its power. 1 + 1/3 rounds/level rituals are extremely powerful, and even 2 rounds of their effects can be sufficient to turn the tides of a battle. For instance, compulsory sanction grants the Simple Template for a Fiendish or Celestial Creature, which can provide the entire party with DR 10/alignment, darkvision, energy resistances, spell resistance and smite alignment. 2-6 rounds of that boon can be superior to hours of a level 6-9 spell. On the contrary, conquest of the ages lasts a long time because it is generally a less powerful buff (+1 to the enhancement bonus of the party's weapons, armor and shields (though it can be huge for all-day attack roll bonuses and the ability to overcome DR when the party has +2 to +4 weapons)).

IronDesk wrote:
...I got the impression that the Class didn't have much to do outside of casting rituals. Can you share some examples from playtests of how it stayed relevent and enjoyable for the player through a whole game?

Players typically performed 1-3 rituals per combat. The most effective player performed rituals until he had combat under control (usually 1) before switching to less precious resources. At low levels, the most effective non-ritual action I saw was Bit of Luck (Luck domain). The synergy of that with an ally's power attack was pretty brutal, and I would expect it to scale well at higher levels, too (reroll saves = valuable). It takes 2 rounds (1 round of double moving) to realize the full potential of some rituals, which can stretch 8 rituals into 16 rounds of combat. Domain abilities add 7+ useful standard actions to a players' repertoire, so taking at least 1 domain with a standard action ability seemed like the best strategy. By level 5 thralls regain most of their spell-like abilities, and players spent several turns playing with those. At level 8 players seemed to have so many spells and domain abilities that their limiting reagent was standard actions, not useful abilities.

IronDesk wrote:
Oh and finally, is there anywhere else I can download the Ritualist Primer? I don't really want to open a Drivthru account.

Dreadfox.com should be able to process $0.00 transactions in a few days, but in the meantime please contact me via our Feedback Tab and I will be happy to send you a copy via email.


Huge thanks for taking the time to provide such detailed feedback. I'm looking forward to trying out the class.

Grand Lodge

Just picked this up today, and I've only got one question. Considering what abilities its got, why is not a 3/4 BAB for the d8? It doesn't have many spells, nor does it have much for skill points. At first glance it looks like it'd barely keep up with the Inquisitor, let alone other classes. The extra domains and spells are nice, but it's still only 6th level spells.


kevin_video wrote:
Considering what abilities its got, why is not a 3/4 BAB for the d8?

Thanks for asking this. I love to hear what's on players' minds, especially players interested in our products.

Rituals are generally stronger than spells. The ritualist is a ritual caster, not a spell caster. Spells are just icing on his cake. He got a low BAB because the net power of his abilities is roughly equal to the net power of the wizard's abilities - it's just that the ritualist relies primarily on rituals and the wizard relies primarily on spells.

To give a few examples of how 3 + Int rituals per day can be equal to spells...

Glorious sacrifice: 437 vs. 72. Every time a creature is slain, this ritual cures 1d6 hit points per 2 HD the creature had. It lasts a number of rounds equal to the ritualist's level. At character level 10, that means 5d6 to 8d6 hit points for the entire party every time they kill something for 10 rounds. If a level 10 ritualist lays this down, and his party of 5 is fighting 5 creatures, this ritual will cure 437 (5*87.5(25d6)) hit points. Compare that to 72 (5*14.5(1d8+10)) hit points from the level 10 cleric's maximum spell level spell mass cure light wounds. It's not a perfect comparison as glorious sacrifice happens over time (which can be good or bad), requires the ritualist's party to stay within the salts and requires them to kill things, but the comparison does convey the point that one ritual can be much stronger than a comparably leveled spell.

Summoning circle: This can potentially put an outsider of the ritualist's HD into their service all day every day, minus the extravagant cost and risks normally associated with binding outsiders. Also, this ability can have a casting time as short as 1 move action + 1 standard action (as compared to planar binding's 10 minutes). It's much more powerful and versatile than a comparably leveled spell.

Compulsory sanction: DR 10/alignment, SR 5+level, Resist 15 cold and fire or cold, acid and electricity plus Smite alignment for the entire party at level 11. Compare this to the wizard's greater heroism which is a maximum level spell at level 11 that grants a single creature a +4 morale bonus to attack rolls, saves, skill checks, immunity to fear effects and 11 temporary hit points. 9 times out of 10, I think most players would strongly prefer sanction's bonuses (the rare exceptions being when up against save or die spells or fear effects).

I have heard comments similar to this one in the past; apparently it is quite natural to overlook rituals and expect the class's power to stem from spells. I should have known that rituals' precedence was not apparent and addressed this earlier. I will update the Tips and FAQs to reflect this information as soon as I get a chance.


Reviewed here and sent to GMS magazine. I really hope this gets an update with clarifications and tools of the trade soon.

Contributor

Free Preview PDF now available!


We have updated the ritualist.

HERE is a detailed list of the changes and a discussion of how and why these changes improve the design.


Updated my review to a whopping 4 stars to reflect the changes made and the added content. Two thumbs up, my player will thank you that the hiatus of his ritualist is over. Now we'll just need those additional options announced for October! :) Also sent my updated review to GMS magazine.

Cheers!


We are currently putting the finishing touches on the gypsy-ritualist expansion.

Though we schedule releases on the 1st of every month as a courtesy to our subscribers, the gypsy-ritualist expansion may be delayed by a day or two. This is the good kind of delay - we are not repairing critically flawed features, we are polishing exciting new features that were inspired by the final open playtest.

We will have a preview build available on our website by the end of the day so that subscribers (and anyone else that buys the expansion) can catch a glimpse of what to expect once the final balancing and editing passes are complete.


The ritualist's expansion is now avaiable.

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