320 - Reworking Rituals

Optional Rules: Reworking Rituals

Ritual magick occupies a liminal space in Unknown Armies. It’s a more serious undertaking than splashing around in the kiddie pool of gutter magick but doesn’t require the life-shattering investment of adept mind-rending. It’s capable of breaking the laws of nature but it’s also limited, specific and difficult to obtain. It’s often the last stop on the train away from normalcy.

Rituals without Identities
By default ritual magick requires the ‘Casts Rituals’ identity feature. Gutter Magick can be cast with a single hardened notch in unnatural and a secrecy roll but the hard stuff is off limits unless you’ve made a serious character investment. Within the context of ritual magick having the reputation of being rife with frauds, traps and uncertainty this makes some sense - an uncultivated arcane mindset is a good explanation why it might work for some but not for others. It also means that clueless nobodies who stumble across occult knowledge usually get off scot free, if disappointed.

For GMs who wish to grant their PCs and GMCs access to rituals without this restriction: casting rituals without an appropriate identity feature is done with the secrecy ability and the result is automatically flip-flopped to the worst outcome. Bonuses from blowing enough charges or priming your attempt with a gutter magick blessing still apply but it will always be fraught with danger.

It’s not all bad, even a botched ritual should count as a significant milestone towards an objective for learning an identity with the ‘Casts Rituals’ feature.

Ritual Components & Modification
Rituals are like secret holes in the universe, places where a little extra give was left to keep things running smoothly or handwaved out of laziness and forgotten about. Places where the laws of previous incarnations of the universe bleed through and play havoc with our ideas of physics and nature. Owing to the nature of the invisible clergy these holes were placed by consensus, with the right know-how you can widen or even move them to grasp more power.

One way is doing this is to substitute especially resonant components, things defined almost as much by their rarity as their relevance. Symbolic connection isn’t enough, what we think of as important is only half of the puzzle. Divining the hidden identity of such an object is a local objective for minor rituals and a global objective for significant ones. The pay off is increased potency, the effects of the ritual might last longer, have greater power or be less taxing to cast (even free) so long as you incorporate the component. Rare instances can even be used more than once.

The other way is to meddle with their connection to this universe. This is a far graver undertaking which not only risks destroying the ritual in a storm of unnatural phenomenon but changes things for everyone. Pulling off something like this is a global objective for a minor ritual and a cosmic objective for a significant one. This could make a particular target off limits to the ritual or widen or shrink the acceptable ingredients. It's a good way to make enemies out of anyone who was relying on the old formula, but if you're able to pull off a stunt that shifts the cosmic fabric this much then you can probably afford to not care.