Solo Ritualist guide

Description
A Solo Ritualist, "solo rit," or "vengeful rit," is a type of ritualist that takes advantage of the powerful life-stealing capabilities of the Restoration Magic line of skills, and the ability to maintain weapon spells and held items without fear of Mesmer or Necromancer stripping skills, as a means destroying mobs of enemies.

There are many kinds of Solo Ritualists, but most builds use either the Rt/Me or Rt/R combination of professions, and all make use of the elite skill, Vengeful Was Khanhei. Additional skills usually consist of a means of regaining energy (as holding Khanhei's ashes unequips wands/foci and staves as well as their benefits), a means self-healing (Restoration Magic can give health just as well as it steals), a means of reducing the damage you take, or a means of increasing the damage you inflict.

Because of the build's reliance on Vengeful Was Khanhei, players will usually wear the Oracle's Armor type for the armor bonus while holding an item. The player's weapon, however, is unimportant, as any weapon the player is carrying becomes useless while holding an item.

This build is primarily meant for farming and the occasional tanking, but related builds that use the elite have proven useful for deterring warrior and assassin enemies in both PvP and PvE, as double strikes and increased attack speed only quickens their death and heals the ritualist.

Benefits
Health

Unlike the popular Invincible Monk or other 55 builds for farming, the only superior rune that a Solo Ritualist needs is a rune of Superior Restoration Magic, and a player will often equip a Vigor rune to cancel out some of the health loss from the superior run, as more health can usually be better. Using Vengeful Was Khanhei, a player needs to take damage in order to deal damage, and they will want a lot of health if they want to take a lot of damage. And if something goes wrong, the extra health gives the player a much greater chance of surviving to make a retreat.

Enchantments

One problem with the 55 build that this build eliminates is the reliance on enchantments to keep the player alive. Rather than use enchantments to reduce damage, which can be easily stripped via Mesmer or Necromancer skills, the Solo Ritualist uses an Item Spell and Weapon Spell in the place of an enchantment to instead steal health from attackers. Item Spells and Weapon Spells, while similar to enchantments, cannot be stripped. Once activated, a Weapon Spell remains on the player until it meets the conditions for it to end, and an Item Spell can only be disabled if the player is knocked down, or if the player chooses to drop the item (and in some cases, it is actually beneficial to drop the item).

Bigger is Better

Further distinguishing this build from a 55 is the fact that a larger group of enemies is better than a smaller one, even though the player will usually come equipped with skills to be able to take on both. While farming, it is more efficient to take out a large group of enemies in one battle than to have to take on numerous small groups. Because of the ability to steal health from all incoming sources of physical damage, a Solo Ritualist can take on a large group of enemies and destroy them in relatively the same time as a small one.

The 55 build relies on the ability to heal faster than the enemy can damage the player, so once the number of enemies exceeds about 12, it becomes impossible to stay alive. With a Solo Ritualist, if there are multiple enemies on the player at once, but they are all doing about the same amount of damage, and Vengeful Was Khanhei is able to cancel out most or all of the damage, then the Solo Ritualist can take on as many enemies as they please.

Drawbacks
Spell Casters

One major problem is that spell casters often have the ability to do more damage than than Vengeful Was Khanhei can steal back, and they do not even have to attack to do it. If the enemies typically avoid doing much physical damage, the player becomes a sitting duck to their spells. There are, of course, secondary profession skills that can reduce the damage from non-physical attacks, and the skill Vengeful Weapon affects all kinds of damage done to the player, but usually it is just best to avoid caster enemies.

Torn Between Campaigns

Another disadvantage is that in order for some Solo Ritualist builds to be used, a player might have to capture skills for their secondary profession that are only available in the Prophecies campaign. One example of this is a Rt/Me that uses Ancestor's Visage to cause nearby enemies to lose energy by attacking, reducing them to using only melee attacks, and thus preventing them from being able to do more damage than Vengeful Was Khanhei can steal back.

Ancestor's Visage does not last until its next recharge, and any echo skills the player may have brought were probably used on Vengeful Was Khanhei, because that spell does not last until its next recharge either. A sensible solution would be to bring along its Prophecies counterpart, Sympathetic Visage, but that requires the player to own both campaigns.

Vulnerability

The biggest disadvantage to a Solo Ritualist is that they are less effective than 55 Monks at reducing the damage they take. Most experienced players bring along a means of reducing damage or increasing health stolen in case of an emergency, or simply because Vengeful Was Khanhei cannot normally keep up. But because of the raw power of enemies such as the Bladed Aatxe, a Solo Ritualist is not able to farm in places such as The Underworld without a backup player to help reduce the damage they take. Similarly, a 55 Monk is hugely vulnerable to enemies in the Underworld such as the Dying Nightmare, so a SS Necro comes along to help prevent the monk from losing their enchantments.

Farming
The Farmland

Solo Ritualists have been proven to farm best in areas where enemies lack the ability to do immense amounts of damage in single spells, and often resort to physical attacks. However, with skills like Ancestor's Visage that bring enemies' energy down to where they have to resort to physical attacks anyway, a player can farm in all kinds of areas.

Green Farming

Because of the high demand for unique items dropped off of Ranger, Warrior, and Assassin bosses, and because of the general advantages Solo Ritualists have when fighting Rangers, Warriors, and Assassins, unique item farming is a common use for this build. Other unique items, like Kepkhet's Refuge are also reasonably simple to farm with a Solo Ritualist because surrounding enemies rely so much on physical attacks.

But like all solo farming, high-demand items can present high-risk situations, and even the most skilled players can be overwhelmed.

Examples
Profession: Rt/Me

Attributes:
 * Restoration Magic - 16
 * Illusion Magic - 10
 * Inspiration Magic - 8

Skill Set:
 * Arcane Echo
 * Vengeful Was Khanhei
 * Vengeful Weapon
 * Soothing Memories
 * Channeling
 * Ancestor's Visage
 * Sympathetic Visage
 * Physical Resistance/Elemental Resistance/Mantra of Resolve

Summary:

A basic solo build where focus is put on maintaining a decent amount of energy, and making the enemies lose all of their energy so that they are reduced to physical attacks.

The last skill slot will vary depending on the type of enemies the player plans on facing, or whether or not the enemies will often use interrupt skills.

On a side note, using Arcane Echo on Vengeful Was Khanhei will allow the player to use the skill three times in a row before having to wait for it to recharge.

Profession: Rt/R

Attributes:
 * Restoration Magic - 16
 * Beast Mastery - 10
 * Wilderness Survival - 8

Skill Set:
 * Vengeful Was Khanhei
 * Vengeful Weapon
 * Soothing Memories
 * Troll Unguent
 * Serpent's Quickness
 * Primal Echoes
 * Edge of Extinction
 * Quickening Zephyr

Summary:

A slightly more advanced build, intended to target enemies that often use signets, and groups of enemies that are all the same type of creature. It is particularly useful against large groups of warriors.

Related Articles

 * Solo
 * Invincible Monk
 * N/Mo 55hp Solo Necromancer
 * Farming