Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramidel
(Post 2535966)
Not to be confused with Ritual Magic (the skill).
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…which was first introduced in the 3e book
GURPS Voodoo, where it served as the core of a new magic system
also introduced in that book that was called Ritual Magic.
There's always been a dual use of "Ritual Magic", with one of those uses being the skill of that name. What changed in 4e was what the
other use was: in 3e, it referred to an entire magic system which included as
one of its features a learning system where you picked up entire Paths as skills while learning individual rituals (the system's equivalent of spells) as Maneuvers — the 3e term for what 4e calls Techniques. The
other part of 3e Ritual Magic was rules about how to
perform magic, referred to as Effect-Shaping. To add to the confusion, GURPS Castle Falkenstein introduced a different magic system called Ritual Magick, which featured a minor variation on Paths (called Books) as the learning model, and an entirely new "working magic" system patterned loosely after the origins game's "accumulate cards until you achieve the effect" system. What both systems had in common was that they felt like "performing rituals" rather than "casting spells".
In the 4e Basic Set, Ritual Magic was used to refer specifically to the Paths-as-Skills/spells-as-Techniques learning system, in anticipation of the Effect-Shaping model eventually being introduced in a later supplement. It was, in effect, a placeholder for the full Ritual Magic system, grafting the learning model into the Basic Set magic system.
But when that supplement (Thaumatology) finally came out, the Effect-Shaping and Energy-Accumulating models for working magic appeared under the "Path/Book Magic" chapter. Which I find to be weird, as Paths and Books have to do with the "learning magic" side of things, but Effect-Shaping and Energy-Accumulation have to do with the "working magic" side of things. There's nothing inherently ritualistic about Paths and Books, as can be seen by how easily Paths can be applied to the classical magic system instead of its traditional Skill Tree learning model; but Effect-Shaping and Energy-Accumulating
are inherently ritualistic, to the extent that you need to introduce the Ritual Adept Advantage in order to approximate the instant gratification nature of the default spellcasting system. And, while I've never seen anyone actually do this, there's nothing fundamental about using Paths and Books in conjunction with the Effect-Shaping or Energy-Accumulating models: they
could be paired with a Skill Tree model, perhaps using the guidelines in
Magic Styles to turn the default penalties given for use with Effect-Shaping into prerequisite trees.
But the thing that's all about Paths gets called "Ritual Magic", and the thing that's all about ritualistic casting gets called "Path/Book Magic". That's backwards.
Finally, there's "Ceremonial Magic Made Easy" from Pyramid #3/28, which is a bit of a misnomer: rather than being about making it
easy, what that article does is to make Ceremonial Magic
more like Effect-Shaping magic, bringing ritual spaces, symbols, magical materials, and Sympathy, Contagion, and Naming into the mix. If this was a GURPS 5e thread, I'd look into merging the Effect-Shaping and Energy-Accumulating models into the standard magic system as variations on or alternatives to the Ceremonial Magic rules; and then say that he's Ritual Magic is Ceremonial-Only Magic using the Effect-Shaping variant (for the Voodoo-derived version) or the Energy-Accumulating alternative (for the Castle Falkenstein version), and replacing the College Magic system of skill trees with either Path Magic (for Voodoo) or its Book Magic variant (for Castle Falkenstein). For 4eR, though, I'd be happy with just getting the name-switch between Path Magic vs. Ritual Magic implemented.