So I had a bit of a thought and ran with it. I love permanency as a player option, and wish it worked in more ways and on more spells. I also see a strong connection/overlap with magic item creation, for things like "should I permanency a heat resist on to myself or make a magic item that grants me heat resistance?".
I know that permanency as a spell has a lot of problems with wealth by level and applying layers of magic to something to make it well above normal effectiveness. Investing in tons of wondrous items can have a similar theme, with a million buffs and ten (3x per day you may) you often have far more power and versatility than someone who didn't raid the equipment guides and splatbooks for every option.
I'd like to see permanency made into a ritual instead of a spell, which allows you to imbue your spell in one of three ways.
* The spell is made permanent, possibly at a lower value, such as permanent speak with dead or permanent mage armor granting +3 AC instead of +4.
* The spell is recurring under circumstances with a recharge time, such as a trap or contingency spell. This includes things like a permanent dazing rune on the inside cover of a spell book which once per day can stop a creature for several rounds, or a healing spell which activates once per week to protect a target which would otherwise have been rendered unconscious.
* The spell is imbued into an item and may be used at a cost of resonance or spell points based on the effect.
These options, which all or most spells can easily have written into them, permanently occupy the appropriate spell slot of the caster. This reduces spells available in exchange for leaving a part of your power behind to react autonomously under your predirected orders. It is a direct cost of power to make power. With this in mind, character WBL is less affected. Some classes then would have fun archetypes which grant them additional spell slots specifically to produce permanent spells without using their normal slots or which grant bonuses such as allowing a single slot to grant two spells with one permanency ritual, or making the permanent magic function as if at your highest spell slot and caster level while using your normal slot.
Beyond that, you may also choose to retract the ritual (provided you are alive and such) to regain your spell slot and permanently dispel the item. You do not need to be in the presence of the item to do so, though some things such as anti-magic fields or the item being presently in use may hinder you. If the item is held or attuned, the weilder should probably get a will save to resist and hold the magic. This means low level permanent magic can be regained later when you no longer need or want that item or have moved your base of operations somewhere else and the alarm spell isn't worth maintaining.
I think this adds a lot of fluff, a needed balance against crafters which also makes the process surprisingly simple while offering options for archetypes and class features to improve it, and fits well with the new concepts of resonance and spell points that make magic an intuitive and universal feature in the world.
One thing it does remove is crafting magic items for sale, as it becomes rare to see a wizard make something and sacrifice a part of their power for meager gold. Most existing magical items are something which was made at one point for the wizard or his allies while alive, and now that the caster is dead they have no need of the item or the spell slot it contains.
