I think the Ritualist is almost dead.....

I'm slowing changing the attitudes towards Ritualists one PuG at a time...

Last night, I just got done soloing (without henchmen) the Dunes of Despair bonus with my Rt/E, and noticed a group was looking for a necrotic transversal necro to do the bonus. Unfortunately, this poor group had heard of the trick, but had absolutely no idea how to pull it off (i.e. no vampiric weapons at all).

So, I joined their group and soloed the bonus for them. They were quite impressed with the power of a ritualist... That's the spirit. Keep up the good work . I myself am very surprised at the utter lack of rit knowledge the player base has. In the past, some groups have invited me purely because they didn't know what a rit could do...

I wouldn't call em 'tanks' ^_^. That's my main problem with using one at the mo. I really don't like light-armour melee... They're really not that frail. With stats at 12 Weapon/13 Spawning/9 Tactics, using a full Ghostforge armor (+15AL in weapon spell) and a shield (+45/-2 while enchanted is best imo cause if you're not enchanted you shouldn't be in melee in the first place), you have 91 base AL. If you use Watch Yourself!, it raises to 108AL.

We used Rt/Ws in GvG and they don't go down any easier than a warrior

Like I said before, you have no basis to say that elementalists can overpower ritualists when you are basing that on... well... nothing really. Fortunately for me, I only need to be a ritualist to know they can outdamage an ele, because ive done so... many many... wonderful times.... ahhh great times. And no, I'm not just talking about 1 on 1 scrimmages. Though I do feel insulted that you think im a nobody, I care about scrimmages.

Of course, I use Lyssa's Balance in my build, so har har to your silly regen.



That's true. Anyone who plays a rit will try to make comparisons towards other classes, and then base their abilities on that. Its a really stupid thing to do - and it's exactly what happened with the Mesmer, right up until Nightfall came out and the Mesmers' increased attire of offensive, high damaging skills. They're capable of pulling off a 400 untyped damage spike in 4 seconds - every 30 seconds. But nobody looks at that.

For those who know how to play a ritualist properly, they are entirely capable of... you know what? They're like females, capable of doing many things at once.... there you go - how about them apples^^.

But if there is one thing I would love for the negatives to take away with them, it's this:

Ritualists are the masters of skill SYNERGY. Every skill works well and works even better with other attribute lines. Ritualists work much, much more effectively when there are two of them. They have a high DPS and the longest term DPS on a single target in the game (I don't care how many times you think they don't. They do.)
When it comes to synergy with 2, the elementalist has similar co-op ability. Still, no one cares (it's so annoying). Also, 1 v 1 is rubbish. A build can be constructed to take out any opposing class, as long as you know what that class is. It holds no value.

What it all boils down to is this; The Ritualist has potential. They can do a lot of good but they are highly precarious creatures. Highly situational. Obviously too much so for most people (high-end or low) to deal with.
They are a class who's variety and flexibility is their key attribute. They exist however in an environment(meta-game) that requires efficiency and strength in a particular area. That strength (in this environment) unfortunately can't be flexibility. The only thing that they can do differently is Spirits, but we all know how well they work in pvp...

Maybe it's just the way people want to play the game (en-mass). Until flexibility becomes a key component in mid-high end pvp, Ritualists will be rare and the hate will be common.


EDIT: I did see quite a few in HA though. Spirit-spamming (using Recovery to remove Conditions faster etc) to power Necro's. HA however is now the gutter as far as I'm concerned.
Especially when all I see is "5/6 lf 1 more SF ele to complete team!". Can Anet please either nerf this skill or improve it's counters? Do something? It's not over-powered but it's over-used...

Oh yeah. I'm sure I'm not the first to notice this combo, but it's my first time trying it! Is cool. LOl at that. A 10 second combo of non imbaness?

that had all the dps of a badly played whammo.... The teleport was cool if there was any items spells that wer actually devistating.

Oh yeah. I'm sure I'm not the first to notice this combo, but it's my first time trying it! Is cool. Lol, i posted something similar to that on gwo today without seeing you post it here. I don't think it's something good in PvP or anything, but i've been running that in PvE for a change. You can do like 500 AOE damage in a 3s window in a pretty big AOE, and like 400 damage of this hits in a single blast. It will often wipe a big pack of mobs that were soften before in a really funny way. What i add is Destructive was Glaive for elite.

What i do is cast Destruction, let it build while i spam basic Channeling nukes (Spirit Burn, Essence Strike...), after like 15s i use Glaive, after like 20-25s i run in biggest group of mob, swap with Destruction (the shadowstep makes you drop Glaive for damage), throw a new Glaive on Destruction (ya... you can throw Glaive even on SPIRITS!) and Rupture it. Destruction goes off for 120-150 damage, Glaive falls for 106 damage and Rupture hits for 128. Add to that the Glaive you dropped swapping and it's a LOT of damage in a HUGE AOE. But ofc it takes time to build your destruction, etc. and i don't think that'd work in PvP hehe. What could work though is using a hidden Glaive bomb on spirits with Rupture. For example you see a warrior near a spirit in Frenzy, throw a Glaive on the spirit and Rupture it for 250 damage. On a Frenzy war that can hurt a lot =p

It would be a funny thing to do actually along with a Communing Rt spammer. If a war goes to take down spirit, you throw Glaives and Rupture. Gotta try that sometimes =p

And i really agree with the group builds part. Especially for Ritualists, group builds are essential because they are MUCH better with other Rts around. That's something i do a lot personally cause i love making uncommon GvG builds (our 3 Rt builds was even referred to in the GotWeek article on DeeR hehe), and they include Rts more often than not lately. And the thing is really what you say : team synergy. For example we have a build with a D/N spamming Order of Pain + Dark Fury to provide constant cover enchant and adrenal buff to Rt/Ws using Spirit Strength and Sight beyond Sight (+40 damage in Flurry and can't be blind ftw. Those BSurge Me/E sure bite the dust fast) while fueling the energy of a D/Mo healer with Healer's Boon (with infinite energy from the orders ending on him all the time for +4E and Healer's Boon giving him +50% to heal, he can spam things like Heal Other and even use Heal Party for 100 without running into energy problem. It's more efficient than a heal monk by far in these conditions). But it's all about a team build, none of those characters are reliable on their own in GvG because of enchant strip, etc. But the synergy between them covers for a lot and it's very reliable overall since the D/N is actually remote from fight so no matter what the other team is running it will hardly affect his job. It's just an example (and one of the most wild ones hehe) but it shows some kind of build synergy that can turn some apparently bad builds into a force to reckon with.

Of course, I use Lyssa's Balance in my build, so har har to your silly regen. lol, you're thinking as if it's a 1v1 game again. I could daze you, and har har to your entire skill bar. Everything has a counter, silly scrimmage matches only prove who happens to have the counter to the other player's build. Or maybe if they're even matches, it proves who gets the first hit.

I like the ritualist, it's fun to play sometimes, I play it for variety when bored. But for most situations, another character would be better.

and in Nightfall we have 2 melee classes 1 melee 1 ranged