Common Rituals

[UmbraLux]

To perform Thaumaturgy safely takes a modified discipline of 5, be that from raw talent or having done enough preparation, above and beyond that needed for complexity, that you have tags and aspects to handle the low rolls. To do it quickly without melting your brain, you also need reasonably conviction. To do it really quickly takes high conviction and a willingness to eat consequences just to control it.

Not really.  It just takes dedicating a couple declarations to each given roll.

That's the RAW at least.  Not my preferred method of dealing with thaumaturgy.

[Sanctaphrax]

Declarations require GM approval, moreso than most things. The GM has to actually allow them rather than simply not ban them.

Speaking personally, I use scaling difficulties and I generally don't let tags last into the casting part. So skill is still needed.

The issue with Thaumaturgy isn't that the RAW forces people to take a particular approach...quite the opposite actually, the main issue is a lack of guidance.

[Addicted2aa]

Declarations require GM approval, moreso than most things. The GM has to actually allow them rather than simply not ban them.

Speaking personally, I use scaling difficulties and I generally don't let tags last into the casting part. So skill is still needed.

The issue with Thaumaturgy isn't that the RAW forces people to take a particular approach...quite the opposite actually, the main issue is a lack of guidance.

Isn't RAW on Declarations a default of 0 and add 2 for each of the three questions they don't answer, provided the declaration isn't stupid?

[Sanctaphrax]

I think you're thinking of the Spirit Of The Century rules.

[GryMor]

I think you're thinking of the Spirit Of The Century rules.

Nope

The difficulties for declarations should,
honestly, be based on how interesting the
proposed fact or aspect is. Ideas that would
disrupt the game or are just unreasonable should
simply be vetoed. These are the questions to ask
yourself when determining difficulty:
1. Is the declaration interesting (or funny)?
2. Will the declaration have interesting
consequences if it’s acted upon, whether
it’s right or wrong?
3. Does the declaration propose a specific
and interesting course of action?
Each “no” adds 2 to the base difficulty of
Mediocre. If the proposed fact is very amusing,
proposes an interesting course of action, and
has interesting consequences (three “yes”-es), a
Mediocre difficulty is appropriate—you want
to provide a good chance that the detail is true.

[Sanctaphrax]

Huh, go figure.

[GryMor]

Huh, go figure.

It's the basis of my assumption that declarations are going to be scarce if they aren't funded by fate points. As a player, I generally assume a difficulty of 4 for the first deceleration on a ritual for a particular skill and character, if the GM thinks otherwise, he'll tell me. Generally, about half of my ritual aspects end up coming from maneuvers rather than declarations.

[Addicted2aa]

Huh, go figure.

Yeah.
Personally I'm against it, but my group has yet to abuse it so I haven't had to clamp down on it yet.

[atavistic]

The end result of using a common ritual regardless of your skill or the ritual complexity is that you end up with sponsor dept.  Most likely you don't "need" skill or power but if you don't you are probably going to fail or end up eating a great deal of mental and physical stress as you take backlash after backlash.  That's a lot of consequences and aspects and dept to get compelled at a later date.  That's how you put the "crazed" in Crazed Cultist, and how 'bizarre suicide' ends up in the obituaries.

[Addicted2aa]

Since Declarations got brought up, and I didn't want to make a new thread...
If I have NPC "crazed Cultists" practicing their crazy zany rituals, and doing magic via some entity, can I make declarations as the GM? I know I can just say, it happens, cause it's off screen, but in case something is happening on screen or I don't particularly care whether they succeed or not, I just want to see how the dice fall, do I have the declaration option or is that purely the realm of the PC's?

[UmbraLux]

You can and, technically, you need to for thaumaturgy.  I tend to treat them as maneuvers - helps keep things simple.

[Addicted2aa]

You can and, technically, you need to for thaumaturgy.  I tend to treat them as maneuvers - helps keep things simple.

Well, my question stems from what happens if i want the cultists to be trying to get a ritual off, as the PC's are trying to stop it. If they make a maneuver each exchange, they won't be able to Chanel any energy into the ritual will they?

[Tedronai]

The use of the term 'declaration' in the Thaumaturgy preparation rules actually seems to be different than that used elsewhere such that it includes maneuvers.  Or rather, it includes things that are otherwise most similar to maneuvers (since they're described as the results of 'mini-scenes' and maneuvered aspects do not normally extend beyond the scene in which they are created).

[UmbraLux]

Well, my question stems from what happens if i want the cultists to be trying to get a ritual off, as the PC's are trying to stop it. If they make a maneuver each exchange, they won't be able to Chanel any energy into the ritual will they?

While I do sometimes choose to spend an action, that wasn't what I meant by 'treat as maneuvers'.  There I was referring to how target numbers are selected.

The declaration target method is entirely subjective.  I tend to use more objective methods for NPCs when possible - unless it introduces other problems.

[Sanctaphrax]

I really don't want to go over the maneuver argument again, but I'm pretty sure you can't maneuver to get complexity for a ritual. If you try, you'll end up declaring instead.

Honestly, though, by that difficulty set literally the entire game is about talking your GM into not shutting down your Declarations. The only thing standing between you and infinite power is your GM saying "don't be a prick".

Given the sketchy definition of prickishness and how unpleasant playing policeman is, that's a bad thing.