Ritualist does... what?

This is like the time I first played GuildWars, and I didn't want Mesmers or Necro's in my Whammo's team because I thought they were useless... What do Rits do exactly?

My mesmer is my main character, personally I think they are quite useful. Right now, my ritualist is a channeler, though he has summoned many helpful spirits in the past.

And most importantly, I think your avatar is hilarious.

To put them all :

Classic Spirit spam : summon spirit either to defend (union, shelter, Displacement) or to attack ( pain, bloodsong, anguish). Personnally my favorite build, you can dish out around 100 dmg/s without doing anything and they offer ally-wide protection (that wane quickly unfortunately). Only problems are they are incontrollable ( a spike is possible for the first mob coming to the party) and spirits are long recharge/casting (and the defensive ones die quickly).

Restoration (heal) : some pretty good spike heal, generally 100+ hp. Problems are most of them are conditional, they require spirits, which is not too hard for a rit. My personnal second favorite build.

Channel : Spike air dmg. Personnaly teh last build i'll use. Conditional spike damage, generally spike but has some AoE. It'S the one I know the least so I can't really explain it.

Minions : Spawning power (4% more hp/lvl for minions) Make them honnest MM but they are at their best as minions bombers. Basically create and send minions in the fight to get killed and make them explode on death (forgot the skill's name), plus they have enchantments triggering on creature creation, mostly Explosive Creation (not sure about the name) : 5 mobs are damaged for every creature spawned.

That'S basically it.

P.S : totally agree about the avatar!

Ritualists can do a lot of stuff, basically.

They can heal using Restoration Magic, deal direct damage with Channeling or defend the party/attack the enemy through spirits created from Communing.

Also, it's completely retarded to exclude mesmers and necros because you think they are 'useless' and really only shows you to be an idiot -.-
There's a reason why people want Necromancers

I said when I first started I thought that, not that I still do. I <3 Mesmers. Thanks for clearing it up, guys.

Rits are a very versalite profession, and it's worth to unlock them to play them, because not many people have good rit builds. Here are the types of magic from Rits. Just a very short general description.

Channeling-Straight up damage, this is what people refer to as a 'rit spike'. 2-3 spirits in this attribute, mainly to do with damage.

Communing-Half Offensive/Half defensive, about 85% spirits. Offensive spirits like Pain and Anguish that do dmg with their attacks, and defensive spirits like Union or Displacement, that basically protect your team.

Restoration-Basically all defensive; a few weapon spells, a few item spells, a few spirits. All tied to the healing of your party.

Spawning Power-Primary attribute, has spells to do with the creation of spirit, and has an inherent effect that your summoned creatures (spirits or minions) have 4% more health, so a Rt/N as a mm is a common sight.

mesmers your basically right. they look pretty, but as far as PvE goes they dont have a primary attribute.

necros on they other hand your just being ignorant.

Ritualists are incredibly versatile. A well planned restoration rit is capable of beating a monk when it comes to raw healing power. Channeling rits are capable of dealing damage almost as well as an elementalist. Communing rits work with spirits that can add attack pressure, cause knockdown, strip enchantments, and reduce/prevent damage to your party (among other things).

Rite also have sole access to weapon spells - similar to enchantments, except they can't be stacked like enchantments and also cannot be stripped like enchantments can be. Not only do weapon spells have some pretty powerful buffs among them, they also give you a great visual effect when one gets cast on you.

I like to think of rts as sorta a wierd "backwards" version of the monk. They aren't quite as good as a monk with healing (restoration magic) or protection (spirits + weapon spells) but they are far better smiters (channelling). Not to say a restoration or spirit spam rt isn't useful in the right situation...

a rit is a pretty unique class when you compare them to classes in other RPGs. if anything it's similar to the classic Druid but it greatly differs from it... basically you got spirits to do whatever you need, knockdown, interrupt, blind, strip enchantments, you name it, you got the whole channeling line for damage and the whole restoration line for health. spawning power combines well with them, especially communing(the spirit line)