Artillery Ritualist

The goal of this post is to provide a pratical build for a ritualist who is
stuck /w henchies. The idea is to setup a line of defense (ritualists
are great at holding ground) that is... nasty. It takes a bit of time,
but, you're virtually garuenteed to handle any situation where you have
plenty of preparation time.

Ritualist (no secondary required)
Communing 11+4
Channeling 10+1
Spawning

* Pain (lvl 8, deals 20dmg per attack, dies after 150s)
* Bloodsong (lvl 8, steals 20dmg, dies after 150s)
* Shadowsong (lvl 6, blindness for 6s, dies after 30s)
* Painful Bond (for 17s, aoe hexed foes take 17 extra dmg)

* Union (dmg is reduced by 15, lvl 8, 60s) or
Shelter (spike protection, lvl 8, dies after 60s)
* Doom (stike for 32 dmg for every recharging binding ritual) or
Brutal Weapon (for 20s, your warrior does +15 extra dmg per swing)

* Boon of Creation (48s, create creature get 7en)
* Flesh of My Flesh (you are primary rezzer)

You open with Boon, then setup your back wall /w shelter or union
(or both). Then create your middle-wall with bloodsong and then
shadow song, then you drop pain (as your first most spirit, as
it will get killed first). Finally, you open with painful bond when the
PvE group forms a clump. Since the damage from the spirits is armour
ignoring and blinds, make sure to target incoming warriors and assassin's
first. For the first 17s, you have 17*3+20+20+blindness on your target
every 2s or so; this is 81 dmg every 2s; so you drop a warrior or assassin
every 6-8 seconds (not so bad actually). The rest of the PvE encounter
is simply cleanup. Doing either Doom, or, better yet, keeping brutal weapon
on your warrior(s).

For double-fun, bring along another ritualist to spam different attack
spirits. The damage with two artillery ritualists is just quite amazing to
watch (add in Disenchantment, Dissonance) and an extra copy of
Shadow Song for when the other one dies. I did a few missions /w a second
artillery ritualist and it was a blast watching them drop quickly.

i like the way u wrote ur post. it was easy to read and follow.

u are right, it does take time to set the spirits up and stuff.

Good advice for the Henchy impaired Ritualists (i.e. ME!!). Only drawback is preptime is semi-counter-productive. The more time you spend casting additional Spirits, the closer you get to previously casted Spirit's deaths.

I find it best to create 3, 4 spirits at most before aggro. Then as aggro charges, focus fire on melee, while casting defensive spirit backline AS the damage builds. It takes the best advantage of spirit life periods. Oh and btw, try dropping one spirit in order to put in some in some support spells. Either damage or weapon spells like Weapon of Warding...

I've found Anguished was Lingwah to be very helpful in the problem you mention of taking too much time to setup. You can regen the energy before doing anything and there is no time casting the pet afterward. You simply drop the ashes and the Pain pet pops up there.

Quote:

I find Dissonance is really good to have as it makes taking monks out pretty easy.

My addition would be add Ritual Lord, mainly because it owns >_> and drop one spirit. I know it cuts into the initial firepower, but it lets you cast spirits more often if the enemies decide to kill them.