“Everything is possible to him who wills only what is true! Rest in Nature, study, know, then dare; dare to will, dare to act and be silent!”

The world of ritual is one of risk taken and reward received. To those who know what they are doing and have the will to achieve it and the knowledge and wisdom to know their limits the sky is really the limit.

A ritual is a piece of improved theatre of around 10 minutes in duration conducted by a small team in a place of power within the game system (ritual circle). These places of power are linked through conduits of magic termed ley-lines and act to store magical power into which the ritualist can tap to achieve their goals.

In order to be a ritualist you will require at least one level of magic in any sphere of magic. It is important to then take ritual magic at a realistic level corresponding with the speed and and level of effect you want to achieve. In order to be truly efficient and effective it is often cited that 14 points of ritual lead is a good starting point. That isn’t to say if you are prepared to limit the power of effects you try and create and/or the speed you create things (number of rituals) you can’t be a ritualist as you definitely can. Given that each ritual performed has a financial cost then clearly with less power available the financial cost of achieving the same effect will be greater.

The other skill required in order to perform a ritual is contribute. Roughly speaking a lead ritualist can draw upon the power of their team through accessing their contribute to ritual skill. A good rule of thumb is that a ritual lead can be access upto double their own ritual lead skill as contribution. That isn’t to say that more people cannot participate in their rituals but once this limit is exceeded than any additional power will be superfluous.

So for example if Jules as a 14pt ritual leader were to have a ritual team consisting of Riculf who has 8 points of contribute, Brambles who had 6 and Markus and Sven who each had 7 points of contribute they would have a contributing team with a total of 28 points and have reached the cap mentioned above.

When considering the team in order to achieve an effect it is worth further considering the magical nature of what is being attempted. So for example if the goal is to make a corporeal sword then access to corporeal magic within the team might be a sensible consideration.

There are certain things that all ritual teams can achieve regardless of power levels. It is possible to enact certain religious rites within a ritual circle (devotionals) it is also possible for wards to be raised and lowered protecting those within from harm that might be present outside the circle.

As with a lot of magical activity within the game the process of producing something in the ritual circle is a structured act of will. It typically involves forcing out and cleansing existing magical energies before then imparting the item/person with the specific magics required in order to produce the effect desired.

A number of factors come into play when considering what can achieved and how many rituals will be required in order to do so. The first of these is the difficulty of what is being attempted. This will be decided by the ritual marking team taking into account both the power level being requested and the alignment of what is being requested with the metaphysics of the game world.

The power of the ritual circle being used is also an important consideration. The ritual circles available at the second and third events each year tend to be of lesser power than those at the first and the last. Correspondingly however these greater circles cost more to hire than the lesser circles at the middle events. On the subject of cost it is also much more cost effective to plan ahead and pre-book a ritual circle than just turn upto an event and ask to use one. A mundane circle avail at events 2&3 typically cost 4 gold if pre-booked and 8 gold if not. A greater circle typically available at events 1 and 4 cost 8 gold if pre-booked and 16 gold if not.

A number of other factors will impact the overall score given to a ritual and hence whether it succeeds either wholly or partially. These include the overall quality of the roleplay performance, the appropriate use of props and costume, the use of meaningful and appropriate sacrifices and so forth. Broadly speaking a ritual effect will be assigned an overall score for success which can be achieved across one or more rituals.

Whilst the sky is really the limit when it comes to ritual magic both in terms of positive effects when successful and problems should it go catastrophically wrong it is worth mentioning some common requests and likely structure and associated costs.

There is a commonly used pattern to making magic items. The starting point is a master-crafted item. This is then often “cleansed” in the ritual circle as a preparatory step prior to the actual effect being imbued. Then one or more rituals are often conducted depending on what is being attempted.

It is also common to enhance a persons “pattern” to extend their spellcasting abilities giving them access to two level 2 spell picks and hence access to conjunctional magics such as necromancy, thaumaturgy and demonology. The classical “upgrade” ritual supposes the recipient has 2 picks of a level one magical sphere which they wish to upgrade to level 2. This is normally undertaken as a series of two rituals which is normally sufficient in order to achieve this with a reasonable probability of success.