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Latest from the 4th Ed. Player's Handbook
For those with no care to link:
Welcome wizards, clerics, and other initiates to Rituals 101, where you will learn what rituals are and what they are not.
Rituals take time to cast. Unlike a wizard’s spells or a cleric’s prayers, which can be cast under pressure and at a moment’s notice, rituals require preparation, costly components, and time—these are effects that must wait for a quiet moment before you call on their power.
Rituals are used for effects you cannot accomplish in other ways. Looking upon a creature from afar, traveling halfway across the world with a few steps, speaking with distant friends, leaving behind a mouth to speak your message: these are all capabilities that rituals offer. Some rituals supply the abilities of absent comrades, such as magically opening locks or sensing secret doors. Using them in such a way, however, is rarely your first choice; letting the rogue pick the lock is the cheaper and faster option.
Some powers that will be familiar from past editions of the game now reside in rituals. Enduring illusions, for example—from false walls to goblins made from nothing but trickery—are rituals. You can also summon a prepared treasure chest full of gear (or empty, to fill it with treasure), or create a floating disk to carry your loot. Rituals help you understand languages you’ve never studied, conjure mounts, and lift curses and diseases from your friends.
Rituals fall into one of nine categories:
Binding (Arcana or Religion): These rituals seek to lure, ensnare, control, or protect you from other beings, sometimes from other planes.
Creation (Arcana or Religion): These rituals are used to craft magic items and other special objects.
Deception (Arcana): Deception rituals cloak reality behind various facades.
Divination (Arcana, Nature, or Religion): These rituals provide advice, information, or guidance.
Exploration (Arcana, Nature, or Religion): A catch-all category, exploration rituals include a variety of effects useful in everyday adventuring.
Restoration (Heal): These rituals remove ill effects from the living or bring back the dead.
Scrying (Arcana): Scrying rituals let the caster spy on locations, objects, or creatures.
Travel (Arcana): Travel rituals transport characters from one place, or plane, to another.
Warding (Arcana): These rituals provide various forms of protection.
That’s a look at what rituals are. Here’s what they are not. Rituals are not buffs for combat. There are no rituals that give you temporary hit points, make your attacks do more damage, let you fly above the battlefield, or wrap you in coronas of flame that scorch your enemies.
That said, rituals can tactically inform combat: If you cast Arcane Lock on the door to the barracks before the alarm went off, if you cast Water Breathing before fighting in the city of canals, if you used an illusion to increase your apparent numbers, then you may well have gained an advantage in a fight. Rituals are primarily utility, and can only be used for tactical advantage by the clever.
--Peter Schaefer
Rituals are complex ceremonies that create magic effects. You don’t memorize or prepare a ritual; a ritual is so long and complex that no one could ever commit the whole thing to memory. To perform a ritual, you need to read from a book or a scroll containing it.
A ritual book contains one or more rituals that you can use as often and as many times as you like, as long as you can spare the time and the components to perform the ritual.
A ritual scroll contains a single ritual, and you can perform the ritual from that scroll only once. After that, the magic contained in the scroll is expended, and the scroll turns to dust. Anyone can use a ritual scroll to perform the ritual it contains, as long as the appropriate components are expended.
Performing a Ritual
To perform a ritual that you have mastered, you spend a certain amount of time (specified in the ritual description) performing various actions appropriate to the ritual. The actions might include reading long passages out of the ritual book, scribing complex diagrams on the ground, burning special incense or sprinkling mystic reagents at appropriate times, or performing a long set of meticulous gestures. The specific activities required aren’t described in most ritual descriptions; they’re left to your imagination.
A ritual requires certain esoteric components, which you purchase before you perform the ritual and which are expended when the ritual is complete. Each ritual specifies the cost of the components you need.
If a ritual requires a skill check, the check usually determines the ritual’s effectiveness. Even if the check result is low, a ritual usually succeeds, but if the result is high, you can usually achieve better effects.
How to Read a Ritual
Rituals are described in a consistent format, the elements of which are outlined below.
Name and Flavor Text
Beneath a ritual’s name is a short passage of flavor text that tells what a ritual accomplishes, sometimes expressing that information in terms of what the ritual looks like or sounds like as it’s being performed.
Level
Each ritual has a level. You have to be that level or higher to perform the ritual from a book or to copy it.
Time
Performing a ritual takes the specified amount of time. Using a scroll cuts that time in half.
Duration
This entry shows how long a ritual’s effects last after the completion of the ritual. The effects of a ritual usually last longer than those of a power.
Component Cost
This is the value of the components that must be expended to perform a ritual. A ritual’s key skill determines the kind of components required.
Alchemical Reagents (Arcana): Typically these are small vials full of powdered metals, rare earths, acids, salts, or extracts from creatures such as dragons or basilisks.
Mystic Salves (Heal): Restoration rituals use mystic salves, dabbed or painted on the creatures to be healed. These salves come in small jars and include blessed oils and unguents made from rare spices.
Rare Herbs (Nature): Rare herbs are usually collected and preserved during certain times of year, such as when the moon is full.
Sanctified Incense (Religion): Sanctified incense is prepared during certain religious rites and is burned as a powder or a stick.
Residuum (Any): The concentrated magical substance that results from performing the Disenchant Magic Item ritual, residuum can be used as a component for any ritual. You can’t usually buy it on the open market; you acquire it by draining it out of magic items.
You can use the components associated with a key skill for any ritual that uses that skill. For example, if you stock up on alchemical reagents, you can use them when you perform any Arcana-based ritual. Ritual components are not interchangeable; you can’t use alchemical reagents to perform a ritual requiring sanctified incense, for example. But you can use residuum for any ritual.
You can buy ritual components at some shops, your allies can provide them (sharing the cost of a ritual with you), or you might find them as treasure. However you acquire components, record their value on your character sheet. When you perform a ritual, mark off the ritual’s cost from the appropriate components.
Some rituals’ descriptions note other costs, including healing surges or a focus item (such as a mirror or a crystal ball for a scrying ritual). A focus item is not expended when you perform a ritual.
Market Price
This entry is the cost to purchase a ritual book containing the ritual or to copy a ritual into an existing ritual book. A scroll containing a ritual costs the same amount.
Key Skill
A ritual’s key skill determines the type of components required to perform the ritual, and if a ritual requires a skill check, the key skill is used for the check. If this entry ends with “(no check),” then the ritual does not require a skill check.
If a ritual has more than one key skill, you choose which skill to use. Your choice determines both the components you use and the skill you use for any checks required by the ritual.
Unless a ritual’s description says otherwise, you make your skill check when you finish performing a ritual. You can’t take 10 on one of these skill checks.
Effects
The text that follows the foregoing information describes what happens when you finish performing a ritual.
Rituals by Level (first 10 levels)
Level Ritual Key Skill
1 Animal Messenger Nature
1 Comprehend Language Arcana
1 Gentle Repose Heal
1 Magic Mouth Arcana
1 Make Whole Arcana
1 Secret Page Arcana
1 Silence Arcana
1 Tenser’s Floating Disk Arcana
2 Endure Elements Arcana or Nature
2 Eye of Alarm Arcana
2 Water Walk Nature
3 Detect Secret Doors Arcana
4 Arcane Lock Arcana
4 Enchant Magic Item Arcana
4 Hand of Fate Religion
4 Knock Arcana
4 Travelers’ Feast Nature
5 Brew Potion Arcana or Religion
5 Hallucinatory Item Arcana
5 Magic Circle Arcana
6 Commune with Nature Nature
6 Cure Disease Heal
6 Discern Lies Religion
6 Disenchant Magic Item Arcana
6 Leomund’s Secret Chest Arcana
6 Phantom Steed Arcana
6 Sending Arcana
6 Speak with Dead Religion
8 Linked Portal Arcana
8 Raise Dead Heal
8 Remove Affliction Heal
8 Water Breathing Arcana or Nature
8 Wizard’s Sight Arcana
10 Consult Mystic Sages Religion
10 Detect Object Arcana
Detect Secret Doors
With a smile and a wink, you show Soveliss the outline of the trapdoor he missed.
Level: 3
Category: Exploration
Time: 10 minutes
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 25 gp
Market Price: 125 gp
Key Skill: Arcana
Make an Arcana check. Use the result as a bonus to a Perception check you immediately make to find any secret or hidden doors in your line of sight. If anyone aided you while performing this ritual, they can’t help you make the resulting Perception check.
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Cure Disease
Even the most horrid affliction disappears in response to your healing touch.
Level: 6
Category: Restoration
Time: 10 minutes
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 150 gp
Market Price: 360 gp
Key Skill: Heal
The Cure Disease ritual wipes away a single disease afflicting the subject, whether the disease is active or still incubating. The subject is completely cured and loses any negative side effects and symptoms of the disease.
This ritual is physically taxing to the recipient; if used on an injured character, it can even kill him or her. Upon completing this ritual, make a Heal check, using the level of the disease as a penalty to this check. The result indicates the amount of damage the character takes. Assuming the character survives, this damage can be healed normally.
Heal Check Result Effect on Target
0 or lower Death
1–9 Damage equal to the target’s maximum hit points
10–19 Damage equal to one-half of the target’s maximum hit points
20–29 Damage equal to one-quarter of the target’s maximum hit points
30 or higher No damage
If you know that your subject is suffering from multiple diseases, you must choose which one this ritual will cure. Otherwise, the ritual affects whichever single disease you knew about. You learn the disease level when you begin the ritual, and at that point you can choose not to continue, without expending any components.
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Raise Dead
You bend over the body of your slain comrade, applying sacramental unguents. Finally his eyes flutter open as he is restored to life.
Level: 8
Category: Restoration
Time: 8 hours
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 500 gp
Market Price: 680 gp
Key Skill: Heal (no check)
To perform the Raise Dead ritual, you must have a part of the corpse of a creature that died no more than 30 days ago. You apply mystic salves, then pray to the gods to restore the dead creature’s life. The subject returns to life as if he or she had taken an extended rest. The subject is freed of any temporary conditions suffered at death, but permanent conditions remain.
The subject returns with a death penalty: –1 to all attack rolls, skill checks, saving throws, and ability checks. This death penalty fades after the subject reaches three milestones.
You can’t restore life to a creature that has been petrified or to a creature that died of old age.
The subject’s soul must be free and willing to return to life. Some magical effects trap the soul and thus prevent Raise Dead from working, and the gods can intervene to prevent a soul from journeying back to the realm of the living. In all cases, death is less inclined to return paragon and epic heroes; the component cost is 5,000 gp for paragon tier characters and 50,000 gp for epic tier characters.
I wasn't quite sure what to expect of rituals (I'm not sure anyone really was) but I am very pleased with what they've given us. It seems the spells that were always relegated to scrolls (since no one wanted to risk having a valuable spell slot "wasted" on a spell that wasn't needed during the day) are now rituals. Very nice!
I'm assuming you need to have a level equal to or higher than the ritual to cast it. That would explain why Raise Dead is so rare in Heroic Tier ... you have to nearly be done with the tier to even use it!
Of course, NPCs probably get to ignore that rule. Anyway, I like!
Cheers! :)
The ritual rules seem to be based off of what we originally got in D20 Modern in that anyone can use them, its just that now you need a feat (Ritual Caster), money to buy the ritual book, and money to buy the consumables to pull it off. Otherwise, its just a matter of time.
A ritual book lets you master one and use it anytime you have the cash and time, a scroll lets you do it even if you dont have the feat, but otherwise still need the money and time. Scrolls also go poof when used, and you cant use a scroll to master it. Basically, scrolls in 4E are scrolls in 3E.
There are 49 rituals that I counted, it might be 50 though. They are all basically 3rd Edition spells that didnt really have combat applications. Drawmji's Instant Summons lets you attune a single implement, weapon, or shield that you can summon to yourself anywhere as a minor action (I would houserule to really allow any one object).
Enchant Magic Item lets you not only turn stuff into magic items, but resize them as well (so if you find a longsword, you can make it a shortsword for the halfling).
Tenser's Floating Disk takes 10 minutes to cast and lasts all day.
To me, this is great and takes care of any concerns or gripes about some of the utility spells out there, such as unseen servant. Basically, make it a ritual. There are already some utility spells like prestidigitation, light, and mage hand, but for the others you can simply make a ritual.
Of course, I fully expect to see a crapton of new and fan-made rituals pretty quickly. I already made one: Unseen Servant. :-P
Now a particularly relevant comment, but the girl from the illustration is really pretty.
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I like it because things the wizard could just "fix on the fly" now have to be figured out via skills or role played. I think this will make the game more fun for everyone (the DM most especially).
Examples: Comprehend Language: Right now if I want to have the characters talk to them I just have them speak common anyway, since I know the wizard's always got a scroll of comprehend lang handy!! What's the point?
It now takes 10 minutes (5 on a scroll). As a DM, now I can actually put in mysterious creatures that the characters have to interact with non-verbally and with charisma in order to attempt to influence. And the mysterious symbols on the wall of the rapidly sinking room? Better have some points in history and arcana! Better get the other characters involved to assist. There's more potential drama here.
Silence: WOO-HOO! One of the most broken, overused combat spells ever. Good ridance!
Arcane Lock/Knock: Should never have been used in combat anyway. too easy of a getaway. Again, more potential drama.
Other examples: Invisibility is now a combat power. With a range of 5. At first I was annoyed, but as a DM I think it's great. So no more of the thief sneaking in and around everywhere to open the gate. You have to use Stealth buddy!
A lot of this stuff seems to avoid allowing easy solutions to numerous problems, which is something I like. I dont have to worry about creating a puzzle that they can auto-succeed on by using a spell, nor do I make sure I apply antimagic zones everywhere to explain how people couldnt just teleport in and out of someplace.
I love most of this, and absolutely despise the last part. Can I tell you how much more color and flavor is added to the setting when things like laying illusions and opening portals can be made into fun elaborate rituals. Love it. The reagent types are evokative and real feeling.
Rituals have always existed as kind of a McGuffin in D&D. So and so is doing a ritual to end the world, or to make an artifact. The fact that it's become a tangible part of the world now that characters can interact with is really cool. I love that magic items have a process to their creation now--beyond the kind of lame 3.0 way where you put a masterwork item on a table, pour some gold and XP on it, and whammy. Wow this is so much better.
That said, once you start breaking rituals down by level the wheels fall off. All of a sudden, a lot of cool options for stories shut down. If you want to pit the characters against a devil binding warlock, they have to be huge level--or else the guy casting the ritual would be so high level they'd wipe the party. Ditto with any ritual on the list. The level where those kinds of encounters can be used all of a sudden hits a hard level requirement of about two levels lower than the PC group. Not a fan of that.
Plus the flavor text for the rituals was a huge disappointment. These are rituals right? But the flavor for both the raise dead and detect secret doors rituals certainly don't feel like it. You wink and trace the outline of the door? How long does that take? That feels like a somatic component--and not even an elaborate one. Do you really need to write that down on a scroll because it's so hard to remember? Or the raise dead ritual where you put oil on the guy. Umm...you mean like a potion? I was really hoping (and plan to play them as) a TON more elaborate than that!
Plus then there's that part about how death has a harder time letting go of important folks (paragon and epic). Ghaah. I thought the whole point of making raise dead not a spell was to get rid of the drama-killing ressurrection of anybody who dies in game or...y'know peasants or murdered lords. The promise was that it's expected that at heroic levels death means making a new character. I hate the idea that any kind of rezzing exists in the first few levels. Argh. Of all the troubles I have with this article--this one is major. Hate hate hate. How much danger can you have in a setting where anybody can get oil blorped on them and pop back to life.
Given the way that 4e is designed, there is definitely a split between how rituals work for PCs and NPCs. I agree with the 4e design of rituals for PCs, but the "guidelines," such as they for NPC rituals, don't have to follow those kind of strict rules that are necessary to maintain balance and become much more about plot-hooks, McGuffins, etc. Just look at Keep on the Shadowfell:
I guess why do the double standard? I mean, why level them at all? Just have more potent effects be more expensive and take longer--and maybe in the case of unsavory effects, that they require certain sacrifices be made that non-evil people just aren't willing to do. I think that would probably take care of a lot of the problems.
That and totally scrub low level dead raising. That's just so dumb. I've always hated bringing folks back to life--since it takes all the danger out of everything and makes stuff like murder investigations fall apart ("okay we raise the victim and ask him who killed him!") I was able to barely tolerate it for epic games, but the fact that it's on the heroic list at all just gives me fits.
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That and totally scrub low level dead raising. That's just so dumb. I've always hated bringing folks back to life--since it takes all the danger out of everything and makes stuff like murder investigations fall apart ("okay we raise the victim and ask him who killed him!") I was able to barely tolerate it for epic games, but the fact that it's on the heroic list at all just gives me fits.
And some folks like to be able to keep playing the same character instead of having to create something new or have his "twin brother" show up. If you don't like it, don't allow that ritual in your game until later levels. See, I fixed your problem. :-)
I guess why do the double standard? I mean, why level them at all? Just have more potent effects be more expensive and take longer--and maybe in the case of unsavory effects, that they require certain sacrifices be made that non-evil people just aren't willing to do. I think that would probably take care of a lot of the problems.
That and totally scrub low level dead raising. That's just so dumb. I've always hated bringing folks back to life--since it takes all the danger out of everything and makes stuff like murder investigations fall apart ("okay we raise the victim and ask him who killed him!") I was able to barely tolerate it for epic games, but the fact that it's on the heroic list at all just gives me fits.
Why the double standard? Because things that PCs are going to use regularly need rules to keep them from getting out of control, while rituals like the ones I mentioned from Keep on the Shadowfell are more or less plot points/justifications. Strictly speaking, robust mechanics are not really necessary in these instances. As for levels, almost everything in 4e has a level as an organizing and balancing principle; I mean, why are 3.5e spells assigned levels? Its easy to parcel them out and easier to balance similarly leveled spells (in theory at least).
Regarding raise dead, at level 8, it really doesn't become readily available for PCs usage until the upper end of the heroic tier. Plus, there's enough caveats built into the ritual to provide lots of freedom for DMs to decide who or what can be raised.
Yeah. I know the drill--it's my game so do whatever I want. Yeah. I know. The problem is I want my games to be as authentic as possible. I don't want to use the +5 Heavy Hands of Destroying Stuff I Don't Like just to make my life easier. I was just looking forward to a new kind of D&D where every problem a PC had couldn't just be cured with a few waves of a hand--where it was a little more hardcore and the losses were a little more permanent. I just wish they would have kept with what they'd promised in the intro books.
I'll still use the rezzing stuff. Whatever. Just cause I hate it, doesn't mean I'm not going to allow it.
That and totally scrub low level dead raising. That's just so dumb. I've always hated bringing folks back to life--since it takes all the danger out of everything and makes stuff like murder investigations fall apart ("okay we raise the victim and ask him who killed him!") I was able to barely tolerate it for epic games, but the fact that it's on the heroic list at all just gives me fits.
Sigh...we'll just have to do what we did with every other edition. House rule it out of friggen existance.
I'm certianly with you here - though I kind of find it odd that your so opposed. You play a very heavy story based game. If the characters are dropping like flies how do you keep the story going?
I kill, on average, roughly one player per four sessions. Or, put another way, "one of you sitting here won't live to see next level." However my game is gamist. Its about flights of Dragons and Dungeons built into the walls of a pit that spirals downward forever. If a character dies they just bring in a new one.
Character death IS a story for us. If somebody dies, the hope is that it's a big dramatic moment. Maybe there's even a funeral in game to remember them. Getting rid of death gets rid of a lot of the opportunity for drama in the game.
That said, I was rereading the idea of the Shadowfell and they really have come up with an amazing justification there for moderating the use of raising the dead through fluff only. Spirits dissolve slowly on the Shadowfell, or are whisked away by the gods. Unlike previous editions, if a god wants you bad enough to whisk you to the afterlife--then you're done. Likewise people without much strength of will tend to discorporate alarmingly quickly, whereas those that are strong enough to endure may inadvertantly be lost to their lives anyhow, returning to haunt the living as undead.
I really dig that. There was always the idea that dead folks don't come back if they don't want to--but it was always a chore trying to convince people that so-and-so would really much rather stay dead. I like it much better that the lands of the dead consume the souls of the folks who go there pretty quickly and once they're gone you can't get them back. That way the decision is in the DM's hands and the amount of dead raising in the game is entirely up to him (or her) to decide.