[sblock][b]In today’s Forgotten Realms Player's Guide preview, we introduce a new suite of rituals as well as present an in-depth look at three.
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The lands of Faerûn abound with arcane secrets, clandestine ceremonies, unbridled magic, and spellscarred lands and creatures. From the human farmer who wants better ground for his crops to the eladrin ranger who conspires to walk the crossroads to the Feywild, the people of Faerûn use rituals to make reality out of possibility.
One need not be a practitioner of spells and wizardry to perform rituals. Rituals, whether of an arcane, divine, curative, or natural aspect, are accessible to any individual who has the conviction to learn, the devotion to practice, and the resources to perform them.
The rituals in this chapter are listed on the table below. Some of them expand upon the key skills connected with certain ritual categories as described in Chapter 10 of the Player’s Handbook.
Level Ritual Key Skill
1 Amanuensis Arcana
1 Arcane Mark Arcana
1 Simbul’s Conversion Arcana or Heal
2 Seek Rumor Arcana
4 Dark Light Arcana
4 Feat of Strength Nature
6 Clear the Path Nature
6 Deathly Shroud Arcana or Religion
6 Duplicate Arcana
6 Tiny Lanterns Arcana
8 Analyze Portal Arcana
8 Shadow Bridge Arcana
8 Share Husk Nature
8 Status Arcana
10 Trailblaze Nature
14 Walk Crossroads Nature
14 Waterborn Arcana or Nature
14 Time Ravager Arcana
18 Purify Spellscarred Heal
20 Soulguard Heal
22 Divine Sight Religion
24 Purge Spellplague Arcana
26 Shift Mote Arcana
30 Raise Land Arcana
Simbul’s Conversion
Taking a moment to breathe and concentrate intently on your powers, you convert arcane energy into curing.
Level: 1
Category: Restoration
Time: 1 minute
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 25 gp
Market Price: 125 gp
Key Skill: Arcana (no check)
Favored by ritual casters accustomed to long battles and constant warfare, Simbul’s Conversion allows an individual to convert powerful spells into healing reserves. The Simbul taught this ritual to many of her apprentices, and it has since become widely employed as an emergency resource.
After performing this ritual, you sacrifice any number of unused daily arcane powers and regain an equal number of healing surges. You cannot exceed your normal maximum number of healing surges per day.
Walk Crossroads
You raise your hand, holly and mistletoe wrapped around your fingers. Singing a song you hope the guardian finds pleasing, you notice a strange dark hole in the side of a nearby hill. You could swear that the hole wasn’t there a moment before.
Level: 14
Category: Travel
Time: 30 minutes
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 850 gp
Market Price: 4,250 gp
Key Skill: Nature
Speckled across Toril are countless portals called fey crossroads. Each such portal forms at a place where the barrier between the Feywild and the world is especially thin.
This ritual allows you and your allies access to a fey crossroads of your choice, enabling you to use the Feywild as a conduit between two locations in the world. Completing the ritual conveys you and your allies a certain distance through the world. These crossroads are undependable means of travel, however, and walkers on these paths never end up exactly where they intend to go. You and your friends exit the crossroads a certain distance away from your intended destination, and the crossroads often deposit their travelers in precarious or interesting locations.
Your Nature check result determines the greatest distance you can travel. You can always choose for your maximum travel to correspond to a lower check result if you desire, and by doing so you can reduce the distance to your intended destination. For example, if you want to travel only 10 miles but your check result is 40, you can apply the outcome for a check result of 21–30. As a result, you end up 1d4 miles away from your intended destination instead of 1d10 miles.
Check Result Maximum Travel (Distance from Target)
20 or lower 1 mile (1d10
Bel
18DELTA
-I'm sad they changed the name of The Simbul's Synestrodweomer (Sp?). It's unspellable, but awesome!
-I'm sad they changed the name of The Simbul's Synestrodweomer (Sp?). It's unspellable, but awesome!
The current generation wizards probably had trouble pronouncing it. Maybe the spellplague made wizards dumber. I can imagine them calling it "Dah Simbul SynestoDOH"...
Gomez
Dunno, but while it surely opens up tons of character options, it also creates a major headache for DMs wanting to create self-created NPCs or use NPCs of lorebooks who have umpteen rituals from a great variety of D&D material. Given that extra classes, PrC and racial abilities plus feats et al will come our way too, well, the writing is on the wall. Everything will become easier to manage.
*cynical mode off*
Dunno, but while it surely opens up tons of character options, it also creates a major headache for DMs wanting to create self-created NPCs or use NPCs of lorebooks who have umpteen rituals from a great variety of D&D material.
Not really... keeping track of what rituals a character knows is only relevant to PCs, and even then it's an independent system from normal level progression. Since rituals mainly have a cost for using them rather than learning, you can simply add rituals to a character's repertoire (or just assume they've always had it) whenever you feel like it and there's no harm done.
Given that extra classes, PrC and racial abilities plus feats et al will come our way too, well, the writing is on the wall.
That again is mostly an issue for PCs; 4E NPCs are not meant to be complete character builds, but modular compilations of various abilities to throw at the PCs should they decide to fight them. If you don't like power X for your drow priestess, you can always replace it with power Y without touching anything else, and you're good to go.
Mind you, I don't like this sort of methodology, but I can't rightly argue against it being pretty damn cost-efficient... :whatsthis
That again is mostly an issue for PCs; 4E NPCs are not meant to be complete character builds, but modular compilations of various abilities to throw at the PCs should they decide to fight them. If you don't like power X for your drow priestess, you can always replace it with power Y without touching anything else, and you're good to go.
Mind you, I don't like this sort of methodology, but I can't rightly argue against it being pretty damn cost-efficient... :whatsthis
This is my bone of contention. If I create NPCs, they are not just there to be munched up by PCs. I also doubt that you can simply exchange rituals or powers or abilities just like that and nothing changes with XP or CR and the like. But maybe that's just me.
I have the distinct feeling that about 9 million rituals will be coming our way with 4E, FR or not. WIth all that in mind, it was only logical that there had to be some space cleared in the sourcebooks ... and it started - most conveniently - with the deities.
Nah, I doubt it has any effect, as all that stuff will be found in the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide. The cut down deity entries are in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide, which apparently has some monster stats and nothing more, when it comes to game mechanics.
If I create NPCs, they are not just there to be munched up by PCs.
What are they for?
It usually goes something like this:
Is it friendly, does it have the slightest chance of betraying me later, has it done anything for me lately, do I like it, or will I gain more power if I let it live than if I just kill it for XP? If the answer to any of these is "No", then kill it. This applies to all NPCs regardless of their alignments or occupations, and regardless of the PC's alignment or class.
Speak with Dead was invented with players like this in mind.
Input would be appreciated thanks
Should be named "Proctiv's Move Mountain". I imagine FR Spellcasters are sort of like modern scholars in that they want to accurately attribute their sources.
Maybe the spellplague made wizards dumber. I can imagine them calling it "Dah Simbul SynestoDOH"...
-And, of course, they are talking like Bizarro to begin with. "Me are not cast Dah Simbul SynestoD'oh!"
Yeah, I've created TONS of plot NPCs in all editions, and if they're the slightest bit antagonistic, sooner or later (most of the time sooner, even before their first lines) they get munched by PCs. Heck even friendly NPCs get munched.
-I have a PC who wants to kill a NPC who happens to be a "mafia don". I can't want until he tries and gets his ass kicked. I came to the conclusion that killing the character is not the best idea. Instead, taking all of his stuff and leaving him naked in the fountain at Town Square is a better idea.
Hey I just want to mention that Raise Land is more like what I'd like to see in epic tier rituals than what I saw in the PHB. I'm still in the 3e power curve mindset, though.
What are they for?
Story, flair, background, info sources and the like. If you only want XP, you can erase about 80% of all NPC entries in the lorebooks.
The 4E MM quasi - NPC entries are, IMHO, a step backward. They present not a base character, but a set of creatures (MM 3,5 IV and V - style) which can be taken and used straight away. Nigh no info* on how to build your own creatures of that race at a lower or higher "CR". Which is fine, for one-off meetings with such creatures or ... beginners. But maybe we will see more of creature creation and updating in books to come.
*I know there are some tidbits in the back of that book and the DMG, but really, that's about a fifth of the basics you get in the 3,5E alone.
Story, flair, background, info sources and the like. If you only want XP, you can erase about 80% of all NPC entries in the lorebooks.
The 4E MM quasi - NPC entries are, IMHO, a step backward. They present not a base character, but a set of creatures (MM 3,5 IV and V - style) which can be taken and used straight away. Nigh no info* on how to build your own creatures of that race at a lower or higher "CR". Which is fine, for one-off meetings with such creatures or ... beginners. But maybe we will see more of creature creation and updating in books to come.
*I know there are some tidbits in the back of that book and the DMG, but really, that's about a fifth of the basics you get in the 3,5E alone.
well, that thing is, the monster manual is a book of "mosters" of rather creature with the intent on killing the PC's. as you said, you make a lot on NPC to not be combat targets. so why should they be in the MM?
next the DMG is the book on how to run a game, including tips on how to design/improve a story. so shouldn't story based NPC be in that book?
and they are in the DMG.
now, if you say "but it doen't have full character sheets for NPC's in the DMG!" the thing is, what does it matter what there HP are, if they are never to go into combat? infact 90% of the full character sheet only matter in combat. story based NPC's only really need a description, stats, skills, known rituals, resources, modivation, a history, and anything else needed to further the story. and even then, the stats and skills isn't that important *most* of the time, as if them doing something is inportant to the story, it should just happen, you shouldn't have to roll well to advance your story. really, what else matters if you don't want them to be in a fight? and most it is better done by a GM setting it to what they want it to be, that way they get to have all the things you need/want them to have for the story.
Plus all of that has no affect on combat and thus no affect on a creatures CR (onless thier "resources" includes a magical weapon or something that far out levels them.) this means if you want an NPC that has both combat and non-combat applications you aren't forced to decide between them, split combat ability for skills or vice versa.
a lot of ppl keep complaining that they don't give rules on how to tell their storys, but the problem is, you can't make rules for that. any you make will help just as many as they hurt. but not giving rules you are open to make what ever you need to tell your story.
Or knocking him out with a few rays of stupidity and putting a fanatic's collar on him for when he wakes up. :D
-I don't know what a Fanatic's Collar is, but that sounds...interesting...
Story, flair, background, info sources and the like. If you only want XP, you can erase about 80% of all NPC entries in the lorebooks.
The 4E MM quasi - NPC entries are, IMHO, a step backward. They present not a base character, but a set of creatures (MM 3,5 IV and V - style) which can be taken and used straight away. Nigh no info* on how to build your own creatures of that race at a lower or higher "CR". Which is fine, for one-off meetings with such creatures or ... beginners. But maybe we will see more of creature creation and updating in books to come.
*I know there are some tidbits in the back of that book and the DMG, but really, that's about a fifth of the basics you get in the 3,5E alone.
Your in luck. If NPCs are most likely not going to go toe to toe with the PCs that often you really do not need to stat them out too much. You can just follow the DMGs suggestion when creating classed NPCs. Adding rituals to them should be pretty simple IMO, and i am horrible with numbers. :D
It has held that name for over 20 years, and across multiple editions of D&D, when it first appeared in 1988 in FR4 The Magister. Even when the Simbul's name was removed from its title in the pointless spell renaming in the Spell Compendium, they still kept the obscure latter half of its title in tact.
"Synostodweomer" is not an english word, nor is it particularly easy to spell. That however is hardly a justifiable reason to change the name, specifically when the same can be said for a great number of the locations and personages in the Forgotten Realms, and virtually all of the greetings/phrases used in the realms to this day (see the FRCG).
More relevant however, is the fact that we still have rituals/spells called Amanuensis...which appears just one line up on the same table in the same book, and is equally as obscure of a word and difficult to spell without a second glance.
Finally, I cannot imagine the issue of correct spelling being an overtly difficult issue for any item of 4E rules content when you can just cut & paste the name and description of something right out of the D&D Compendium, or plug it directly into your character sheet with the forthcoming character builder.
I get upset over dark spots on my x-rays, not things that happen in PG products.
More relevant however, is the fact that we still have rituals/spells called Amanuensis...which appears just one line up on the same table in the same book, and is equally as obscure of a word and difficult to spell without a second glance.
Good point, there. Either go all the way or not at all. Don't half-ass it. Synostodweomer would've been nice, just like Amanuensis is.
While I greatly appreciate that they have converted the spell into 4E, the Simbul's healing ritual should have retained its original name of "Simbul's Synstodweomer".
It has held that name for over 20 years, and across multiple editions of D&D, when it first appeared in 1988 in FR4 The Magister. Even when the Simbul's name was removed from its title in the pointless spell renaming in the Spell Compendium, they still kept the obscure latter half of its title in tact.
"Synostodweomer" is not an english word, nor is it particularly easy to spell. That however is hardly a justifiable reason to change the name, specifically when the same can be said for a great number of the locations and personages in the Forgotten Realms, and virtually all of the greetings/phrases used in the realms to this day (see the FRCG).
More relevant however, is the fact that we still have rituals/spells called Amanuensis...which appears just one line up on the same table in the same book, and is equally as obscure of a word and difficult to spell without a second glance.
Finally, I cannot imagine the issue of correct spelling being an overtly difficult issue for any item of 4E rules content when you can just cut & paste the name and description of something right out of the D&D Compendium, or plug it directly into your character sheet with the forthcoming character builder.
They should have changed Amanuensis (see I had to look at your post to spell that) as well.
This isn't Scrabble.
They should have changed Amanuensis (see I had to look at your post to spell that) as well.
This isn't Scrabble.
Then I vote prestidigitation goes as well. :P
Really any word with more than two syllab... word part thingies.
Did anyone who has the FRCG happen to read the information on Circle Magic? I read it and it seems to have no real battle application. The example uses fireball and 6 participants. The circle needs 6 minutes to produce a more powerful fireball. Now, in the heat of battle who is going to stand still for 6 minutes while they cast?
Input would be appreciated thanks
I don't think you typically get six wizards in your average party so perhaps it's more a fluff piece.
Or
When they say battle their referring more to warfare than your usual PC encounter. In this case six minutes is not to bad for a nice battle changing spell. That's how I read it anyway.
Side thought: I'd like to see some large(ish) scale battle rules that fit seamlessly for a change.