Dustchapel · Downs · Town · Crier

One of the things that has particularly irked me about D&D/AD&D and their ilk is the higher level of spells (particularly resurrection, gate, wish, limited wish, and alter reality).  For me, it always seemed as if it would be a little too easy to misuse those spells (and in my experience, they often were).  I was reading the Swords and Wizardry forum earlier today and stumbled on a thread that discussed this topic and caught my interest.  It was suggested that these higher level spells utilize ritual magic instead of D&D/AD&D's traditional Vancian magic system.  I know this in not by any means a new concept, but it does seem to make the higher levels of gameplay more in line with my tastes in fantasy.  I am thinking of utilizing such a system in my games to see it it goes over.  Has anyone done this and if so how well did it work and how did you implement it?