Where Does The Ritualist Fit In?

[DIEnamic]

You guys all know the usual chain of priority targets. I'm not talking anything sophisticated like kill the boon prot mo/me before the normal heal mo/e etc, just in general...

Monks -- priority one
Mesmers -- two
Necros -- three
Eles -- four
Rangers -- five
Wars -- six

Where do you think Ritualist would fit in? Would it be like,

Monk
Ritualist
Mesmer
?

While we are at it, i'd like opinions on where you would place the assassin in the list.

Personally, from what ive seen it's like;

Monk
Ritualist
Mesmer
Necro
Elementalist
Assassin
Ranger
Warrior

[Spoil of War]

Depends on the build the Rt is running. During the FPE I was running the default Rt/Mo template in an alliance battle, and someone obviously decided I was such a threat that I had my own pet Mesmer devoted to blacking me out every few seconds. I didn't even think the build was that good.

I think that Rits using "backup" spirits (Shelter, Recuperation, Union etc) might even be on level pegging with healer Monks. If they get those spirits up, then it makes the whole opposing team harder to kill.

[StickyPanda]

Ritualist could very well be at the top? Why? Spirit Lord + Spirit Spamming.

A monk can heal damage. A ritualist can prevent damage on whole new levels.

Imagine this, Union+Shelter, Shadowsong and the other spirit that causes attacks to be evaded. With this all the players (The ones being defended by the spirits) have to do is stand by these spirits. Because of spirit lord the spirits are endless. People could go ahead and try to kill them but their attacks will miss and do so little damage.

A monk can heal health but a ritualist can prevent its loss.

[Artemis Shadowhawk]

Ritualist could very well be at the top? Why? Spirit Lord + Spirit Spamming.

A monk can heal damage. A ritualist can prevent damage on whole new levels.

Imagine this, Union+Shelter, Shadowsong and the other spirit that causes attacks to be evaded. With this all the players (The ones being defended by the spirits) have to do is stand by these spirits. Because of spirit lord the spirits are endless. People could go ahead and try to kill them but their attacks will miss and do so little damage.

A monk can heal health but a ritualist can prevent its loss.I've never heard of Spirit Lord and Spirit's don't affect other Spirits.

[Nekretaal]

Since the OP seems to be talking about Pvp, I would hope that killing the spirits themselves might take precedence over killing the ritualist, or else the spawning attribute would seem to be completely useless and we just wolnt see many ritualists in pvp.

This to me makes some sense, as I saw a ritualist take down a warrior who ignored the spirits (Damage limitation and health every three seconds will allow anybody to defeat a warrior)

Otherwise, if the spirits are no so powerful as to make their deaths a priority over even player characters, then ritualists will replace warding elementalists and be seen or not seen only as far as the current metagame.

[StickyPanda]

I've never heard of Spirit Lord and Spirit's don't affect other Spirits.


Spirit Lord makes spirit skills recharge fast (eventually 12 seconds).

When I was referring to missing spirits I was referring to shadow song which causes blindness.

[Artemis Shadowhawk]

Spirit Lord makes spirit skills recharge fast (eventually 12 seconds).

When I was referring to missing spirits I was referring to shadow song which causes blindness.So you are thinking of Ritual Lord, right?

[DIEnamic]

Ritualist could very well be at the top? Why? Spirit Lord + Spirit Spamming.

A monk can heal damage. A ritualist can prevent damage on whole new levels.

Imagine this, Union+Shelter, Shadowsong and the other spirit that causes attacks to be evaded. With this all the players (The ones being defended by the spirits) have to do is stand by these spirits. Because of spirit lord the spirits are endless. People could go ahead and try to kill them but their attacks will miss and do so little damage.

A monk can heal health but a ritualist can prevent its loss.

You make a strong point, but with the monks power to heal tremondous amounts on a single target, and a prot monk that can reduce damage taken, targetting the ritualist first would be tough to do. It seems like it would be much easier to spike down a monk than a ritualist.

Ritual Lord might be good, but if spirits don't end up being targeted that often in pvp I would much rather make use of a different elite. I didn't really test this, but im pretty sure serpents quickness and QZ will have an effect on binding rituals.

We just might see MUCH MUCH longer battles now that spirits have been added to the game and there is pretty much one less offensive slot. Of course thats your guilds choice, maybe we will completely dump ritualist and see one in pvp as often as we see the Houston Texans win a football game.


I would hope that killing the spirits themselves might take precedence over killing the ritualist, or else the spawning attribute would seem to be completely useless and we just wolnt see many ritualists in pvp.

Wouldnt it be great if it worked like that? I seriously doubt that would happen but you never know :grin:. As far as spawning attribute, I think it is great for skills that use your spirits health to heal others/prevent damage. It is a very indirect proffession imo.

[Falrow]

Shelter and Union will die FAR before they recharge, thus Ritual Lord is good even when no one is attacking spirits. Signet of creation will give your spirits a bit more time alive too.

Also, because you only really want Shelter and Union to effect your casters, you can be far behind the monks on the team, making it really hard for anyone to get to you, and if they do, you just move back and watch as their monks walk out into a death trap trying to heal.

As for trying to kill the spirits before the Rt, that will be common, because it's rather hard to kill a Rt with Shelter and Union on the ground, with only a couple of your teams targeting him, with all monks in range of him.

Starting to get the picture of how Shelter+Union+Ritual Lord will completely change the strategy of GvG?

-Fal

[Zaxares]

Ritualists I'd place around priority 2, about the same as mesmers. This is due partly to their spirits, but also partly because like mesmers, it's very difficult to guess what role a ritualist is playing in a group until he starts to bring out his spirits or ashes. You know that a monk is going to be healing, an ele is almost always going to be damage, and a warrior is CERTAINLY going to be damage, but ritualists are a wild card.

Me personally, I'm going to gank spirits before anything else; even monks. :laugh:

[Rayne Frostbite]

Depends on what the Ritualist is... If he's some sort of prot I imagine he would be targeted fairly quickly. If he was damage dealing, possibly not.

And your list isn't completely true. Sometimes (GvG/Hero's) you have to target a particularly nasty mesmer first before he completely wastes your monks or does any further damage.

Or for example, the new IWAY - my guild ALWAYS targets the rangers first as their traps are a royal pain in the *** and they are best disposed of quickly. (necros are less of a problem)

During the old ranger spike groups we would also pick off the necromancer first, rather than monks. Every time the order went off, damage boost they received was insane - so once again, he had to be silenced! :tongue:

[DIEnamic]

Depends on what the Ritualist is... If he's some sort of prot I imagine he would be targeted fairly quickly. If he was damage dealing, possibly not.

And your list isn't completely true. Sometimes (GvG/Hero's) you have to target a particularly nasty mesmer first before he completely wastes your monks or does any further damage.

Or for example, the new IWAY - my guild ALWAYS targets the rangers first as their traps are a royal pain in the *** and they are best disposed of quickly. (necros are less of a problem)

During the old ranger spike groups we would also pick off the necromancer first, rather than monks. Every time the order went off, damage boost they received was insane - so once again, he had to be silenced! :tongue:

The list is just a general order of targetting. I definitely agree on targetting those "particularly nasty mesmer" builds, but most of the time the list refers to the basic order of targets. Almost like playing RA where thats the usual order. Not like anyone follows targets in RA anyway *cough wammos*.

You are probably right in thinking a Ri/Mo would definitely be a priority target, maybe even higher than monk if it is indeed shelter+union+prot (which looks like its gonna be pretty popular).

PvE wise, the Ritualist looks really fun. PvP wise, I don't know about you guys but I can't stand getting ganked on by an entire group. :undecided:

All-In-All, it might just tend to be a guild preference, we will have to wait and see just what kind of Ritualist build top guilds are running.

btw, what do you guys think of Ritual Lord for tombs/gvg?

[Kjentei]

This is a great question. I think it depends on the type of Ritualist. This is probably going to be the priorities:

Monk
Communing Ritualist
Assassin
Elementalist/Mesmer/Necromancer/Non-Communing Ritualist
Ranger
Warrior

My reasons for this are: Assassins are pretty vulnerable, and there's so much an Assassin can do to an unprotected caster, I found myself dealing 400 damage in 5 seconds with my personal lead>off-hand>dual combo, I think they're going to have to be taken out pretty quickly in a battle. Communing Ritualists' spirits CONTROL a whole battlefield, and only in advantage for one side, so I think these Ritualists and their spirits are going to also have to be taken out A.S.A.P.

[Lady Lozza]

IMHO ritualist will quickly find their way to the top of the list because they control the field of play. It doesn't matter whether they are healers or damage dealers, if a ritualist is using spirits they will place them in places that are going ot advantage the team, and it will be the teams job to make sure that they use what the ritualist give them.

The enemy will want to take them down pretty quickly because well placed spirits will make their job VERY difficult, and kiting won't always fix the situation.