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Author: everdream
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30 Comments
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Restoration Ritualist (Spirit Light Weapon Elite)
More powerful party support and heals than any monk!
Hey again, now that i've seered your eyes with the blue font and got your attention by slandering Monks a bit, here's another Ritualist Guide for the novice or advanced Ritualist! This is another incredibly easy to play and quite effective build. To keep things simple and straight forward I’m keeping Title Track Skills out of it, though there are several from all Title Tracks that can add support to this. Also, you can combine Necromancer skills such as Well of Blood and Blood Ritual to add extra support if needed. It’s really open and free to tweaks and personal touches, skill swaps, etc. The point is, a Ritualist can heal very well and in some situations are better than having a Monk.
Here are some examples of where I feel builds like this excel more than what a Monk can do (remembering, 99% of my GW time is spent on a Necromancer, Monk, or Ritualist and I split that evenly between the three professions):
Where this is Key:
1. Teams with Minion Masters: Recuperation and Life are the two dominant skills that aid in a team with 1 or 2 Minion Masters. Pumped up with 16 Restoration, Recuperation lasts longer than its maximum recast time, pending it’s not destroyed first. A Mo/Rt with 12 Restoration will still have the +3 regeneration, but the spirit will die in 39 seconds and won’t have the added life from Spawning Power.
Life is a big heal at maximum duration, which it almost always reaches. At +140 health to All Allies, it does a great job in healing minions. Again, it’s -20 less effective at 12 restoration for a Ritualist Secondary.
2. Team Battles greatly benefit from Ritualists healing or protecting using Spirits, as much as I love playing a Monk, I realize that on Unwaking Waters a Ritualist Healer is a much better choice in comparison to a Monk Healer. That’s just one example. These also heal all Allies, say, Canthan Guards, Sunspears, or our friend “Blobby.”
3. Alliance Battles benefit greatly from these Spirits. It’s funny, 90% of the time I’ve done Alliance Battles with a build like this (with some Mesmer skills to prevent interrupts) I’ve found that I never seemed to primary of a target because no one ever seems know what the heck an Ritualist is packing and I don’t want to suggest that they’re scared, they just ignore me. The spirits also go vastly ignored, then I sit back and watch a massive +140 health go to pretty much every single ally on screen, including our shrines and it just boosts and helps, that simple. Recuperation also boosts big time in this as well. When I see opposing Ritualists like this, I make sure to wreck their spirits as soon as possible.
These are just three examples where I feel this strongly aids your team’s overall cause.
All of this pre-explanation is nice, but time to get down and into it!
Skill Bar and Attributes:
Equipment:
I use all Radiant and Attunement Runes where I can because I’m sure to stay in the back and away from the thick of it. If I am doing PvP I’ll run Ghost Forge on main pieces of armor and then constantly keep up Resilient Weapon for the +10 armor boost.
I use Oola’s Wand or a Kaolin Wand (10/10) and a Restoration Focus from Vasburg Armory.
I use a Superior Restoration Rune on my Tea-Kettle of Restoration Magic Head Piece, a Minor Spawning Rune, and a Rune of Superior Vigor.
The Skills Explained:
1. Spirit Light Weapon, Elite (5e, 1c, 5rc) 10 seconds of healing +16 per second, this doubles if the targeted ally (or you) is within earshot of a Spirit. This has a pretty decent range, and with +32 Health per second and 1/5th the recast time of Healing Hands, I’d say it’s more useful, considering most of Healing Hands only heals when damage is being taken, Spirit Light Weapon will continue to heal even on nasty Degeneration or when someone isn’t taking damage, it just heals. Plain and simple.
This skill is available from Chkkr Brightclaw - Melandru's Hope - Mantis. With 13 in Spawning this skills duration will last 13 seconds.
2. Spirit Light (5e, 1c, 4rc) This is the big direct heal at +188 health and you can target yourself with it! Unlike Heal Other. The only problem with this is if you’re not close to a spirit, you’ll sacrifice 17% health, this shouldn’t happen all that often and even if it does you’re still +111 health after sacrifice.
3. Mend Body and Soul (5e, ¾c, 3rc) Fast way to heal and remove two conditions. It casts really quick, hard to interrupt, and recharges fast.
4. Resilient Weapon (10e, 1c, 4rc) Again, this is a quick recharging spell that lasts for 26 seconds with this build. Hexes and Conditions against your team are always around and +Armor is always helpful. Comparable Monk skill is Healing Breeze, this spell can be stripped, lasts for half the time, and doesn’t give an armor boost of +24, which reduces damage which means less healing. Pending for Resilient Weapon to work, you need to have a Hex or Condition on that particular target, but like I said before, especially in hard areas, it’s almost all the time. Though Healing Breeze on a typical Healing Monk is good for 10-12 seconds with +8-9 Regeneration, it still in my mind doesn’t compare to the overall abilities of Resilient Weapon for preventing death.
5. Spirit To Flesh (10e, ¾c, 15rc) this is really optional, I put it in this build to show how massive some of the healing power really is. If you flag your team well or if they’re actually people and group well than this can create an insane amount of allied healing abilities in the nick of time. I’ve used Spirit to Flesh in AB’s at shrines and it just boosts them when they’re near death and really delays the opposing team at times from taking over a shrine.
6. Recuperation (25e, 3c 45rc) as explained before, heals every ally pretty much on the radar! Very critical aid in keeping minions alive longer and allies that Monk’s would have a hard time healing individually. Only problem with this is recasting it as it will tap up to 3 seconds away from casting other heals which could mean a dead teammate, usually not though, just mentioning to potential problems. Getting interrupted also can happen, bring Mantra of Resolve from the Mesmer side of things if interrupts may be a problem and drop a different skill.
7. Life (10e, 3c, 20rc) same purpose as Recuperation, this is the spirit I’ll target with Spirit to Flesh if there’s no Ranger spirit around to sack, or if the Ranger spirit is more important than Life, then I’ll sack life, either way some spirit will be sacked, the Spirit responsible for the sacking will be sacked.
8. Flesh of Flesh… Resurrect. If the worst occurs, lightning strikes, you get ganged, you have quad-aggroed groups of Aatxes, Destroyers, Margonites, or some other nasty mob, then bring this!
Playing the Build:
Same thing as a monk pretty much, watch the health bars, watch for hexes and conditions, removes conditions with Mend Body and Soul, heal really weak players with Spirit Light, continue casting Spirit Light Weapon whenever it’s available, particularly on tanks and those in the ‘thick of it’. Keep your spirits up and know where they are in relation to your party for using Spirit Light Weapon or Spirit to Flesh. Timing is key in placing spirits as well, if you can silent count 19 seconds then wreck life with a spell it will be good. Use Resilient Weapon on those either waiting for Spirit Light Weapon or those under heavy degeneration.
Here's a shot of the Spirit Life expiring, you'll notice a big party heal going throughout, this can be timed after you play this a while. I find it kicks in just when you need it to with the proper timing! Also, note Olias is getting the +32 Health per second from Spirit Light Weapon, this totals out to being +416 Health over its duration.
Stay back! You’re a caster and a healer; you’re there to help, not to kill, so there’s no need to be standing beside your Warrior, Dervish, or Assassin. Chill with the Ranger’s, they are cooler anyway with their break dancing.
This is a shot of Life getting sacked by Spirit to Flesh a bit pre-maturely. I need to heal the minions up after the fray. There's a lot off screen as well. This just shows the close support potential, it's like timing Divine Intervention to every ally that's close to you!
Best Combination: Protection Monk + this = very safe and secure party, I particularly use Lina when I have no other real monk and very rarely run into trouble.
Energy Management should not be an issue in this build as the spells do not have a huge energy cost and Recuperation is only cast once every 45 seconds.
Yet another sacking of Life, this was timed out a bit better. It really heals the rear of your party in a pinch.
Ritualist vs. Monk Argument:
Well, both do what they need to do and do it well. Monk’s are definitely stronger direct healers, meaning if you’re at 15/530 health, a Monk can get you up to full health faster than a Ritualist can under normal circumstances and at any time (a Ritualist would need to wait for Life to build some time up and then use Spirit to Flesh), Ritualist’s and Monks both can shield teams from attacks and absorb damage. Monk’s again do it directly with spells and enchantments and Ritualist’s do it with spirits and weapon spells. Monk spells tend to carry a bigger heal, even in protection mode. Ritualist’s have the ability for their heals to steal health from enemies while healing (ie: Vengeful Weapon, Nightmare Weapon, etc.) the tad bit of offensive healing is much like a Necromancer’s Blood Magic.
In this shot, you can see the effective range of Spirit Light Weapon as it heals Devona up pretty much as she takes damage. Like Healing Hands, just better in most situations.
The nice thing about Ritualist Weapon Spells is they cannot be shattered or stripped like enchantments. With high spawning, Weapon Spells last a long time just naturally, whereas a Monk would need to bring along a Enchanting 20% of be running Blessed Aura, which well… takes up space on your skill bar.
They both essentially do the same thing, just in different ways, slightly different spells. Monk’s have Guardian, Ritualist’s have Weapon of Warding, both are good and you could argue which one’s better. The downside to Weapon Spells is that you can only have one on at a time cast on you, whereas you can have a boat load of enchantments on you. Again, the downside to enchantments is they can hurt you as fast as they help you, depends on what you’re fighting, whereas, Weapon Spells can’t be stripped, shattered, revealed, or removed.
I could likely do a guide solely on the topic of Monk and Ritualist with both sides being put on the balance, but I don’t believe there would be a definite winner overall. I’d almost guarantee they’d balance out at being the same in usefulness and abilities.
Ritualist Slogan “Heal Different”
I hope you enjoyed reading my guide on Restoration Ritualist (Spirit Light Weapon) I had done a similar Rt/N Guide before called “Support Ritualist,” but I find this to be more heal strong rather than Caster Support with Blood is Power.
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RAWR! lol.
