What class is the most effective/cost efficient for casting rituals in D&D 4e?
Best Answer
Wizards gain rituals more easily than any other class; they start with three rituals for free, and learn two more for free at 5th, 11th, 15th, 21st, and 25th level.
Bards only gain two rituals for free at first level, but they can cast one bardic ritual at no cost every day. At higher levels, they can cast two or three free bardic rituals per day. So they pay more up front than wizards, but they can cast for free, which wizards cannot do.
Other classes with free ritual casting are all more limited in one way or the other (up front costs or casting costs) than wizards or bards. For completeness:
Artificers gain Brew Potion, Disenchant Magic Item, Enchant Magic Item, and Make Whole for free at first level. They can use Disenchant Magic Item for free as often as they like.
Psions gain two rituals at level 1; one must be either Sending or Tenser's Floating Disk. Once per day, they can cast whichever of those two they chose. This is less choice than the bard has, and they can never cast their ritual more than once per day.
Invokers are exactly like psions as far as rituals go, except that their second free ritual is Hand of Fate. They can cast Hand of Fate once per day, and never more than once per day. Druids are like invokers, but have Animal Messenger instead of Hand of Fate.
There are also various feats which reduce costs of ritual casting, but since any class can take them, I don't think they represent a difference between classes. I will note that there are a few feats which allow PCs to make magic items with levels higher than themselves, but again, these are not class specific. They are often background specific, though.
That is a very hard question to answer, because it depends on tier and what you mean by the numbers. However, here are my leading candidates.
Cleric. The cleric has more utility heals than any other class, and its heals are bigger. You can't overestimate the power of adding the Wisdom modifier to most of your heals, plus the cleric has an at-will that heals, which is unique to that class. When you want to bring someone from bloodied to full hit points in one go, you want the cleric.
Warlord. The warlord's heals aren't as big, but if you take the Fight On paragon tier feat you can pump out four Inspiring Words an encounter by level 16; this is good flexibility.
Bard. The bard's heals aren't particularly big either, but a valorous bard produces a ridiculous amount of temps -- particularly if she's a tiefling with the Stirring Song of Baator feat and a flaming weapon. And the great thing about temps is that they're not wasted if someone at full health receives them.
Shaman. You want to go Protector Spirit for best effect; your heals are, again, not huge but you can heal multiple people at once with flexibility no other class can match.
To summarize: clerics win for huge single-target healing. Warlords probably have the most stamina. Bards are right up there with warlords, albeit via temps rather than pure heals; and shamans are unmatched for party healing.
(And of course, there's nothing wrong with the ardent or the runepriest. Runepriests give really good buffs to their party, which is the other half of the leader's role; ardents have a superb range of at-wills and also grant temps rather easily. A well-played leader speeds up combat by buffing allies along with healing.)
The hand can conceivable answer most any question that can be answered with a gesture and whose time-frame does not extend beyond the current hour.
"Should I purchase this item" is a little vague. "Direct me to the best weapon to use in my upcoming duel" would be better.
For your second question, perhaps something like
"What is the safest path to the meeting?"
"Should I go to the meeting or directly to the bar?"
I think the DM has the onus to keep the power useful and interesting. The hand explicitly favors reward over risk, so the DM is free to use it to get y'all into interesting encounters of just the sort an adventurer should be ready for.
Best Answer
Wizards gain rituals more easily than any other class; they start with three rituals for free, and learn two more for free at 5th, 11th, 15th, 21st, and 25th level.
Bards only gain two rituals for free at first level, but they can cast one bardic ritual at no cost every day. At higher levels, they can cast two or three free bardic rituals per day. So they pay more up front than wizards, but they can cast for free, which wizards cannot do.
Other classes with free ritual casting are all more limited in one way or the other (up front costs or casting costs) than wizards or bards. For completeness:
Artificers gain Brew Potion, Disenchant Magic Item, Enchant Magic Item, and Make Whole for free at first level. They can use Disenchant Magic Item for free as often as they like.
Psions gain two rituals at level 1; one must be either Sending or Tenser's Floating Disk. Once per day, they can cast whichever of those two they chose. This is less choice than the bard has, and they can never cast their ritual more than once per day.
Invokers are exactly like psions as far as rituals go, except that their second free ritual is Hand of Fate. They can cast Hand of Fate once per day, and never more than once per day. Druids are like invokers, but have Animal Messenger instead of Hand of Fate.
There are also various feats which reduce costs of ritual casting, but since any class can take them, I don't think they represent a difference between classes. I will note that there are a few feats which allow PCs to make magic items with levels higher than themselves, but again, these are not class specific. They are often background specific, though.