Curse

teh bestest is here · Aug 22, 2011, 03:49 PM // 15:49

Just curious if anyone else out there has tried a Mercenary hero build with three ritualist.

My first Rit uses the standard ST bar with only Shelter(to insure it is almost always up). The rest of his bar consists of Resilient Weapon - Protective was Kaolai - Boon of Creation - Signet of Creation - Spirit Light - Power Drain
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My second rit uses a communing build made up of Signet of Ghostly Might - Pain - Anguish - Disenchantment - Shadowsong - Signet of Creation - Boon of Creation - Flesh of my flesh.
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My third rit uses a Standard SoS hero build consisting of SoS - Bloodsong - Painful Bond - Spirit Siphon - Spiritleech Aura - Mend Body and Soul - Spirit Light - and Protective was Kaolai.
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So far it can do FoWHM fairly Easily and Frostmaw HM with usually no wipes unless it is a triple aggro. The build is based around these three heroes, but my other heroes are as follows.

I use a monk/mesmer as my primary healer. He is set up as a UA mainly for the quick rez. Since the build revolves around having as many spirits up at once if a rit get spiked out it is important to have them up and running quite quickly.
The monks bar consists of UA - Dwanya's Kiss - Signet of Rejuvenation - Cure Hex - Divine Healing - Heaven's Delight - Power Drain and Waste Not Want Not.
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I also run an MM bomber for added damage and free tanks. The elite skill on this hero is Blood is Power, just to keep my monk, rits, and mesmers at full energy during longer fights. The Bomber consists of BiP - Animate Minions - Animate Shambling Horrors - Death Nova - Putrid Bile - Masochism - Spirit Light - and Flesh of my Flesh
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Then I run two mesmers to shutdown casters and interupt monks.

The first mesmer is a domination/inspiration hybrid with E-surge for an aoe spike and E denial. The bar consists of E-surge - Mistrust - Unnatural Signet - Cry of Frustration - Shatter Hex - Overload - Power Drain - and Waste not Want Not.
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The Second mesmer is basically an Illusion mesmer with a Fast casting elite. The bar consists of Psychic Instability - Clumsiness - Wandering Eye - Signet of Clumsiness - Accumulated Pain - Arcane Conundrum - Power Drain - and Flesh of my Flesh.
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Psych Instability provides an aoe 3 second knockdown which is quite nice. Stops a good amount of damage and gives the rits time to spawn their spirits and the minions time to swarm the group.

Ill post template codes in a bit. Would love to hear what everyone thinks. And i am VERY open to suggestions. These builds were mostly home made with some help from pvx, but i am well aware that they still have room to improve, especially in terms of synergy.

My ST Rit has a few wasted skill spots (boon of creation and signet of creation) because he only spawns one spirit so these skills are marginal. But I have not found any alternatives to fit his build

Thanks for reading

Venganza · Aug 22, 2011, 06:45 PM // 18:45

I almost never use Rt heroes, the AI is terrible, especially with weapon/item spells and other things, besides they have zero idea about being tactical.

ST works fine, with a tiny bit of micro at times.

Thanks for your ideas

Denar · Aug 22, 2011, 09:04 PM // 21:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venganza

I almost never use Rt heroes, the AI is terrible, especially with weapon/item spells and other things, besides they have zero idea about being tactical.

You never use rit heroes? Despite SoS being pretty much standard on any respectable 7H build (as well as a SoGM or ST sometimes)? Your comment about them not being tactical made me lol as well; the AI of heroes largely depends on what weapon type(s) they are holding, what setting they are on, and the skills on their bar. Most people agree that mesmers and rits are the best hero professions now, if you have problems with them, you've gone wrong somewhere with one of those points.

I like the idea, though it would need serious (by which I mean, tedious) micro-ing in order to be more effective in engagements than say, 7H player support (setting up the spirit wall beforehand would take forever), and at this stage, that would be overkill anyway.

Having resto skills on the ST rit seems too much considering the SoS and UA have your healing skills, I would recommend taking displacement, dissonance and union instead, but shift-click them so the hero can't use them on it's own (set them up before a big pull, also useful if the minion wall falls).

I would recommend the PI mesmer take ineptitude and the E-Surge take Panic. The UA should become an N/Rt resto (with the amount of defense you have, sacrificing a hero slot for UA is unnecessary).

What role are you in this team?

teh bestest is here · Aug 22, 2011, 10:22 PM // 22:22

Currently I have been playing a warrior with an empty bar. Most of my dungeoning or Elite areas is done while I semi-afk do my homework, so even if I had skills i wouldnt be using them. Ill try taking Panic instead of e-surge but I feel like the 3 second knock down twice per fight outdoes ineptitude in terms of negating damage.

I will see what I can do without the UA, but my worry is that in the isntance that one of my rits goes down(mainly the ST with shelter) then my other heroes will start dropping from the unprotected damage in HM. With UA i can gurantee the ST rit is rezzed long before the shelter spirit goes down.

The Guildless · Aug 22, 2011, 11:28 PM // 23:28

I often find myself using 2 or 3 rits with my Dagger Spammer sin, but I've grown a little tired of the old SoS/SoGM combo, so I usually run two ST rits to deal with all the damage mitigation and heal that I need. This is how I set them up:

Rit 1
Rit 2
(note that I just took that from my Templates folder so the runes don't show up - add them to your taste!)

The second rit feels a little sub-par, but I've been having great results with those two so I just stick with it. Granted, I am not well versed in the arts of FoW-HM or elite areas in general, but I've gone through all the rest of the HM content with great ease with those two. I sometimes use a third rit as my 7th hero, with some melee love and party wide heal. It is very useful to map the first 4-6 skills of the rits on your keyboard so you can quickly set up spirits before engaging a risky mob. I use "tyuiop" and "ghjkl;" for that so I can just go TG-YH-UJ-IK et voilà, you've got all your spirits up. The rest of the team is then pure damage / shutdown and I sometimes enjoy a Motigon on the side to support all those casters.

As for criticism, I'd say two things: first, there are way too many heals for me. Now that you said you usually afk during that, it makes a little more sense, but still, I'd drop a few heals in favor of more damage and see if it still works well. I don't see Boon of Creation and Signet of Creation being too cost effective on your ST rit, so maybe drop them in favor of Mend Body and Soul and Leech Signet or something similar so you can free up a skill slot on another char?

The second thing is that, in my book, defensive spirits + minions = big no no. Those minions no doubt eat through Shelter in no time which might be why you feel like having to make sure it is up 110% of the time. When I use the aforementioned rits, I want them to keep my party alive, not expendable cannon fodder. Then again, you going afk means the minions are pretty useful to keep the mobs at bay, but still, I'd strongly suggest to choose either minions or defensive spirits. If you decide to stick with minions, you could use something like Dwayna's Sorrow on your necro to keep them alive longer in battle and set your former ST rit to pack more of a punch. If you drop the minions, then PI becomes that more important to keep the melees away for as long as possible. You could also consider some AoE snares.

Props for getting a little creative though, keep it up! Don't give up no matter what kind of criticism you get; too often I see posts suggesting changes and in the end it means "load up a meta bar and go play". Don't do that! Keep on trying new stuff!

teh bestest is here · Aug 23, 2011, 12:54 AM // 00:54

Okay. Thanks for that Guildless

I am going to attempt to drop the ST rit and keep the minions. I may try to turn the ST rit into a channeling aoe damage build or switch it up with a different profession.

EDIT: I was just going over my skills, and seeing that im usually afk when i use these heroes i think Shelter may be better than minions actually. Id like to keep a necro in the build with BiP to fuel everyone else, but what other professions could take the necros place? Maybe there would be something more affective, like an Invoke Ele

Daesu · Aug 23, 2011, 04:23 AM // 04:23

For tougher elite areas, I bring 4 rits. 1 SoS, 1 SoGM offensive, 1 ST defensive, and 1 Wanderlust/Earthbind. I don't need to bring minions.

4 rits, 2 mesmers, 1 BiP necro. If I have spare slots, I usually fill them up with mesmers for armor ignoring damage.

paK0 · Aug 25, 2011, 08:32 PM // 20:32

1 is ok (and should almost always be used @ 16 channeling if you are playing as a melee) but aside from that Mesmers just outclass them. They deal way more damage offensively, don't need a BiP if you build them smart (frees up one elite slot) and keeping the whole screen down with permanent interrupts is basically a better defense than shelter could ever give.

The only instance where Ritualists are better is in a long, stationary battle against spread out foes.

I use 5 Mesmers right now and have yet to find a thing they can't handle.

Daesu · Aug 26, 2011, 03:25 AM // 03:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by paK0

1 is ok (and should almost always be used @ 16 channeling if you are playing as a melee) but aside from that Mesmers just outclass them. They deal way more damage offensively, don't need a BiP if you build them smart (frees up one elite slot) and keeping the whole screen down with permanent interrupts is basically a better defense than shelter could ever give.

The only instance where Ritualists are better is in a long, stationary battle against spread out foes.

I use 5 Mesmers right now and have yet to find a thing they can't handle.

Mesmers are still limited by energy while spirits are less energy demanding. If you are defending an area, rits tend to be better. If you need to move often, mesmers, since heroes do not have summon spirits.