Ring of Theurgy

[Chilxius]

So, one of my players found this item (CA 145) and wants to use it. Problem is, whoever wrote the rules for this item did not follow the usual D&D practice of 'use no fewer than 10,000 words to describe everything'. So, the item's powers are a bit foggy.

Basically, a caster that prepares spells can cast them into the ring. It can hold three spells. Later, it can be used two ways:
For casters that prepare, they can leave a slot open and expend one of the spells in the ring to cast that spell with the empty slot, provided it's a high enough level. This provides them with a level of spontaneity.
For casters that don't prepare, they can treat a spell in the ring as a 'spell known' and cast it as one of their own, which wipes that spell from the ring. This provides them with a level of variety.

Note that the spontaneous caster needs to have someone else cast the spell into his ring...normally. But my player is an Ultimate Magus (CM 77). He could fill the ring from his wizard list and use the ring to cast spontaneously.

Now, here's the problem: does the ring allow a spontaneous caster to add the ring spells to their SPELLS KNOWN or to their SPELL LIST? The item's entry seems to use both terms interchangeably. The example they give is a bard using Invisibility Sphere, which is still on his spell list.

My player is a Wizard/Warmage who became an ultimate magus. If the ring allows his wizard spells to be spontaneously cast, then his warmage spell slots can be used to cast any wizard spell he knows. That's nice. But if it only allows spontaneous casters to cast spells on their class list, then it's worthless to his warmage since warmages know all their spells automatically.

Also, could a divine caster fill the ring for him?

[Cerefel]

I don't think prepared casters need to cast spells into the ring. It describes its function as being similar to a spellbook which makes me think that a prepared caster scribes them into the ring.

[Chilxius]

Yeah, the rules aren't clear about how spells get into the ring. I assumed it worked like a ring of spell storing. Describing the ring as a spellbook just made the description more confusing. If you found someone else's ring of Theurgy, could you cast the spells in it, even if you did not know the spells? Could you scribe them into your book, and would that purge them from the ring if you did?

[MisterKaws]

Yeah, the rules aren't clear about how spells get into the ring. I assumed it worked like a ring of spell storing. Describing the ring as a spellbook just made the description more confusing. If you found someone else's ring of Theurgy, could you cast the spells in it, even if you did not know the spells? Could you scribe them into your book, and would that purge them from the ring if you did?

To use active items, you either identify them, or activate it blindly, in which case, it would simply suck out the caster's slot by force to activate one of the item's spells in case of a spontaneous, or intrude into a left-out slot for a prepared caster, in the case a caster doesn't have a qualifying slot, nothing happens, and you treat it as if the UMD for using blindly had failed.

Anyway, once the spell is activated for any of the two, it's treated as gone. Also, it only adds a spell to the known list of a spontaneous caster, not even ultimate magus can bypass that, he only gets the spell on his spontaneous casting list, not on his prepared list.

In short, the ring provides little benefit without a second caster from which to drain spells, especially class-unique self-only spells, wu-jen being the best example of potential abuse for a gish caster

[Fizban]

Ignore all fluffy descriptions. When an item says it stores a spell the usual comparison is the Ring of Spell storing, you cast the spell targeting the ring regardless of it's normal use and the ring stores it. While it's pretty crap for spontaneous casters, it is pretty clear. Regardless of the writer's obvious confusion between spell list and spells known, you can use any spells in the ring as if they were on your known list. If they're not on your class list that doesn't matter because the ring has put them straight on your known list. You can only spontaneously cast the spell once, and the use of "transfer" makes it clear that prepared casters empty the ring as well.

You have a warmage/ultimate magus. He can put wizard spells not on the warmage list into the ring, and then may use the ring to cast those spells from his warmage slots, but each spell will disappear from the ring after a single casting. He could also use the ring to store a warmage spell and then later use a move action to fill an empty wizard slot with that spell, at which point the spell has moved from the ring into his mind and will need to be refilled. In either direction you're wasting slots if you use them on the same day: the Ring of Theurgy is a batman preparation item, you set it with your backup spells during downtime, burning the slots on a day you don't need them for more options in the future. Unless he's storing spells from his wizard side that are a higher level than the warmage side can cast, there's no reason to leave wizard slots open when he can just use warmage slots to fire the ring (aside from transferring warmage spells into his mind so he can scribe them into his spellbook rather than going through warmage->scroll->book).

[Chilxius]

That makes sense.

Now, would spells from the ring activate his Warmage Edge? I assume so.

[KillianHawkeye]

Now, would spells from the ring activate his Warmage Edge? I assume so.

If he casts them from his Warmage spell slots, and it's a spell that deals hp damage, yes.