Rituals (3.5e Variant Rule)

Author:	Ghostwheel (talk)
Date Created:	February 18, 2011
Status:	WIP
Editing:	Clarity edits only please

Ratings for this homebrew:
Average: NA / 4	0 users favored it (4/4). 1 users liked it (3/4). 1 were neutral on it (2/4). 0 users disliked it (1/4). 0 users opposed it (0/4).

Rate this article
Discuss this article

Rituals

<Flavor text here? Expand on flavor of rituals in the world, give a few accounts of different characters with different power sources who access rituals?>

What are Rituals?

Rituals are a way of bringing player agency and world-shaping abilities to games that lack spellcasters such as the wizard or cleric. They give such powers to all characters--after all, why should only the spellcasters have the ability to change the world around them? Rather than giving only traditional spellcasters such abilities, this variant grants them to all characters.

Mechanics

Rituals require an amount of time to enact, and duplicate some sort of effect. While many rituals appear in the world, most can only be cast by a character of a certain character level (CL from now on), and that character must have at least 9 Intelligence and Charisma. The following table defines at what CL characters can cast a ritual of what level:

Rituals by Character Level
Character level	Ritual Level
1	1
3	2
5	3
7	4
9	5
11	6
13	7
15	8
17	9

Casting a Ritual

There are a number of components to casting a ritual. Depending on the ritual's nature, it has either a short casting time (one minute), medium casting time (ten minutes), or long casting time (one hour).

Rituals require special materials, incense, or other components to cast; this cost is equal to the ritual's level squared x 50. If the ritual duplicates a spell with expensive material components or an experience cost, the cost of the material compontents must be added into the original ritual cost, as well as 50 gold per experience point that would be spent were the spell cast normally. These components are consumed regardless of whether the ritual succeeds or fails.

Finally, characters require a Charisma check to successfully cast a ritual, made at the end of the ritual's casting time. The DC for this check is equal to 10 + ritual level. If the ritual duplicates a spell, the effect caster level is equal to the caster's character level, and any DC is equal to 10 + 1/2 character level + Charisma modifier.

Rituals may be interrupted at any time, as per the Concentration skill (replace all instances of "spell" with ritual. All rituals are considered to have a somatic and verbal component).

Collecting Rituals

Rituals can be found or researched; either way, recording them requires a ritual book (identical to a spellbook). Alternative materials can be used to record a ritual as per Alternative Spellbooks (Complete Arcane 186). Each ritual requires 100 gp per ritual level in special inks, adhesive dust, or similar material to record, and takes a single page of the ritual book.

While many rituals are found, they can also be researched. Characters can research rituals that are at least one level lower than the highest-level ritual they can cast, and researching a ritual requires 1,000 gp per ritual level to research as well as three days per level of the ritual.

Sample Rituals

Here are a number of sample rituals to get you started. Remember that specific rituals may be missing from a campaign altogether at the DM's discretion. Use the following rituals as guidelines for your own.

First Level Rituals

Animate Rope

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Animate Rope

Astral Traveler

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Astral Traveler

Destroy Warp Anchor

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Destroy a Anchor Point you can touch.

Detect Magic

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Detect Magic.

Detect Poison

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Detect Poison.

Detect Secret Doors

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Detect Secret Doors

Feather Fall

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Feather Fall, except it applies to the next time one falls at least 10' in the next 10 minutes.
Special: If one hangs this ritual, it may be unhung as an immediate action.

Ghost Sound

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Ghost Sound

Hold Portal

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Hold Portal

Light

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Light

Mending

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Mending

Purify Food and Drink

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Purify Food and Drink

Unseen Servant

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Unseen Servant.

Ventriloquism

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Ghost Sound

Whispering Wind

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Whispering Wind

Second Level Rituals

Alarm

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Alarm.

Align Weapon

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Align Weapon.

Animal Messenger

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Animal Messenger.

Animal Trance

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Animal Trance.
Special: One cannot hang this ritual.

Establish Warp Anchor

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Creates a Anchor Point at your location.

Create Food and Water

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Create Food and Water.

Detect Thoughts

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Detect Thoughts.

Disguise Self

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Disguise Self.

Dispel Magic

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Greater Dispel Magic.

Endure Elements

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Endure Elements.

Find Traps

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Find Traps, except that the bonus to Search is +5 and doesn't change with CL.
Special: The ritual may be cast with a medium casting time to increase the bonus to +10, or a long casting time to increase the bonus to +20.

Ghost Touch Weapon

Casting Time: Short
Effect: A single weapon (or up to 50 pieces of ammunition) gain the Ghost Touch property for one minute per CL.

Hypnotism

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Hypnotism.
Special: One cannot hang this ritual.

Knock

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Knock, except that instead of automatically unlocking the portal it instead reduces the open lock DC by 10.
Special: This ritual may be cast with a long casting time to instead reduce the DC by 20. One cannot hang this ritual when used this way.

Misdirection

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Misdirection.

See Invisibility

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates See Invisibility. Range is changed to Touch.

Third Level Rituals

Daylight

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Daylight.

Hypnotic Pattern

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Hypnotic Pattern.
Special: One cannot hang this ritual.

Invisibility

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Invisibility.

Levitate

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Levitate. Range is changed to Touch.

Silence

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Silence. Range is changed to Touch.

Fourth Level Rituals

Air Walk

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Air Walk.

Analyze Dweomer

Casting Time: Medium
Effect: Duplicates Analyze Dweomer.

Fly

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Fly.

Warp

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Warp.

Fifth Level Rituals

Animate Dead

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Animate Dead. One cannot hang this ritual.
Special: You cannot control more than 2 HD of undead per CL with this ritual.

Animate Objects

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Animate Objects. One cannot hang this ritual.

Animate Plants

Casting Time: Short
Effect: Duplicates Animate Plants. One cannot hang this ritual.

Astral Caravan

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Astral Caravan.

Awaken

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Awaken. One cannot hang this ritual.

Contact Other Plane

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Contact Other Plane.

Sixth Level Rituals

Commune

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Commune.

Plane Shift

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Plane Shift.

Seventh Level Rituals

Teleport

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Teleport.

Volcanic Eruption

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Volcano. The volcano does not continue erupting or growing after the initial effect.
Special: One cannot hang this ritual.

Eighth Level Rituals

Ninth Level Rituals

Genesis

Casting Time: Long
Effect: Duplicates Genesis except that if this ritual is cast again the original demiplane is destroyed and creatures within it are expelled where the original Genesis spell was originally cast.

Supplemental Rules

Hang Ritual [General] Benefit: Upon successfully casting a ritual you may stop right before the last word. The ritual then "hangs", ready to be used at a later time. A ritual may be activated as a standard action if its activation time is short, a full-round action if its activation time is medium, and a one-round action if its activation is long. Unhanging a ritual provokes an attack of opportunity and may be interrupted as normal. Special: This feat may be taken any number of times. Each time this feat is taken, you may hang another ritual. For example, someone who took this feat three times would be able to hang up to three rituals at a time.

Professional Ritualist [General] Benefit: You gain a +5 bonus to the Charisma check to successfully cast a ritual. Special: This feat may be taken multiple times. Each time the bonus increases by another two. Thus, someone who took this feat three times would gain a +9 bonus to their check.

Quicken Ritual [General] Benefit: Once per day you may cast a ritual with a lowered casting time. Rituals with a short casting time require one round to cast, rituals with a medium casting time require two rounds to cast, and rituals with a long casting time require three rounds to cast. Special: This feat may not be used with rituals that one could not hang. This feat may be taken multiple times. Each time, you may activate a ritual with a lowered casting time an additional time per day.

Back to Main Page → 3.5e Homebrew → Variant Rules

Ghostwheel's Homebrew (311 Articles)
Ghostwheel^v
3.5 Classes	Berserker, Cosplayer, Daywalker Paragon, Iaijutsu Master, Magus Portalus, Marshal, Rage Mage, Reaper, Sharpshooter, Spellthief, Pathfinder Variant, Thaumaturge, Toxinblade, Trapsmith, Variant, Xenophile
3.5 Feats	Access Divine Power, Access Divine Spells, Accomplished, Accurate Opportunist, Acolyte of the Skin, Adaptable Technique, Adjusted Accuracy, Aegis of Health, Tome, Arcane Champion, Assassinate, Augmented Thaumaturge, Barreling Charge, Bladeblast, Blood of Stone, Bolster Technique, Careful Movement, Charismatic Prodigy, Cleave, Grimoire, Close Miss, Combat Reflexes, Greater, Combat Reflexes, Grimoire, Combat Reflexes, Improved, Compensate for Size, Copy Technique, Cross-Style Training, Dabbler, Danger Intuition, Dash, Death From Afar, Defensive Roll, Defensive Strike, Deft Opportunist, Diehard, Grimoire, Distracting Barrage, Divine Stalker, Dragoon Charge, Endurance, Grimoire, Euphoric Blade, Expose Weakness, Extended Psychic Strike, Focused Energy, Fortune's Friend, Furious Blow, Gatecrasher, Gatling Spell, Goad, Greater Spellthief, Greater Spring Attack, Gripping Vise, Heavy Build, Heedful Charge, Hidden Manifestation, Hostile Mind, Improved Charge, Improved Mage Knight, Improved On Your Knees, Improved Wild Talent, Incredible Focus, Intervene, Intimidating Brute, Iron Tide, Know-It-All, Last to Fall, Living Weapon, Mage Knight, Magekiller, Tome, Mana Engine, Master Blaster, Master Creature Killer, Master of Concoctions, Metamana Fuel, Mobile Wall, Mystic Arts Synthesis, Mystic Theurge, On Your Knees, Overwhelming Blow, Penetrating Strike, Phantom Health, Pounce, Power Attack, Grimoire, Power Charge, Precise Marksman, Primal Enchanter, Psyblade, Purple Dragon Knight, Quick Reconnoiter, Ranged Feint, Ranged Flanking, Ranged Threat, Renewed Zealousness, Shadow Pounce, Sharpshooter, Shielded in Life, Short Haft, Skill Trick Mastery, Spell Cascade, Spell Parry, Spell Reflection, Spellcutting Strike, Spellthief... further results
3.5 Traits	Ambidextrous, Avenger, Exceptional Luck, Hulking Brute, Mixed Blood, Opportunist, Preacher, Psychic Potential, Radical Upbringing, Raised by Wolves, Sight Without Sight, Skilled, Trapspringer, Unnatural Aura, Unorthodox Tutelage, Versatile, Void Born
3.5 ACFs	Barrage Sharpshooter, Grimoire Fighter, Grimoire Paladin, Grimoire Ranger, Grimoire Rogue, Grimoire Soulknife, Grimoire Tenken, Grimoire Totemist, Psychic Soulknife, Trapspringer Bard, Trapspringer Sharpshooter, Wildmagic Thaumaturge
3.5 Variant Rules	Alignments by Color, Alternative Iterative Attacks, Background-Based Skills, Balanced Skills, Balanced Wealth, Broken Shields, Capped Modifiers and DCs, Condensed Skills, Custom Weapon Creation, Dual Preparation Casting, E20, Expanded Movement Options, Failure is not the End, Grace Points, Healing Surges, Lengthened Spellcasting, Limited Spell Levels, Magical Focus Implements, Masterwork Variant, Monstrous Player Characters, New Level-Dependent Benefits, Original Race Rebuilding, Prepared Spontaneous Casting, Recharging Magic, Recharging Power Points, Refillable Potions, Rituals, Scaling Item DCs, Simplified Experience, Simplified Races, Simplified Skills, Simplified Social Interaction, Simplified Special Attacks, Stacking Ability Modifiers, Standardized Bonus Types, Taking Stock, The Edge, Turn Undead, Variant Reach, Vow of Poverty, Wounds
3.5 Optimized Builds	Arcane Warrior, Basic Blaster Wilder, Basic Combat Rogue Guide, Bladesinger, Clever Critfighter, Dragoon, Eternal Blade of the Revenant, Feral Shifter, Glaive of the Dungeon Crasher, Glaive of the Hellfire Warlock, Grapplemancer, Healing Personified, Hero of Time, Knightly Charger, Low Level Nova, Machine Gun Assassin, Mindspider Infiltrator, Mobile Blender, Mobile Glaive, Nightcrawling Shadowpouncer, Psionic Monk, Righteous Rager, Sacred Fist of the Silver Flame, Shower of Arrows, Sublime Singer, Ubermount, Whirling Eater of Souls
Guide to Roles in the Party (3.5), Talk

Author	Ghostwheel +
Identifier	3.5e Variant Rule +
Prerequisite	None +
Rated By	MisterSinister + and Foxwarrior +
Rating	Rating Pending +
Summary	You can "hang" a ritual for later use. +, You succeed at casting rituals far more often than your peers. + and You can cast rituals on the fly a small number of times per day. +
Title	Rituals +
Type	General +