Ritualist Pet Summoner - Shaman/Necro

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
1

Hello,

This is my first build post on GD forums, but figured I’d give my thoughts on a good Ritualist build for those struggling or interested in an alternative to the Necro/Occultist build most people are running.

Build link:
(Gear is my current gear, self-found, one green ring is a placeholder, not sure how to input the actual stats on grimtools. Didn’t put in augments/components, posting this from work, don’t have the time lol. You can view my “actual” stats in the attached photos at bottom of post.)
(Forgot to take a picture of my resists… but all are at 80% except Aether at 60%, Chaos at 54%, Pierce at 50%… which I feel is decent enough on Ultimate for my gear level. Happy enough I have Poison/Acid maxed out with all the Malmouth crap)

http://www.grimtools.com/calc/4VxArQpZ

I’m not a massive veteran of GD, but I am considerably experienced in similar games like PoE/D3 and picked up GD mechanics pretty quickly… This build seems strong so far, I’m currently lvl92, crushing through Ultimate without too much difficulty.

Note all my gear is SELF FOUND – obviously if you have twink gear or can craft better gear, you’ll do better. Better relics/gear would definitely make things easier; I’m still using a Savage relic despite having the blueprint for stuff like Bysmiel / Primal Instinct… but have yet to find the Scourge/Ancestor/Citadel etc. pre-req relics.

I initially went with 50 points in Necromancer, but upon reading some forum posts, some people mentioned investing heavier in Shaman is actually better. I understand many may want to focus on the “new class” – but from what I’ve seen, the Necro class is pretty weak overall unless you want to go a vitality/nuke build or run Occultist instead of Shaman.

All we really need in Necro tree is Skeletons – Max out the skeleton tree, and pick up Call of the Grave. The Blight Fiend is mediocre and 1 point is really all I need as an extra “meat shield”. Spectral Binding/Wrath is also optional, you can put these points elsewhere if you want (like more into blight fiend or briarthorn).

I tried out Reap Spirit but it felt extremely underwhelming. Putting 25 extra points into Necromancer just to get Master of Death is a big waste, when you can pick up so many more “useful” abilities in Shaman (Wendigo Totem/Blood Pact, Emboldening Presence, Primal Spirit, Primal Bond, etc.) Master of Death is likely a bit better than Primal Bond… but definitely not enough to warrant giving up any of the above.

Since we’re running as a Ritualist, I found going 50 into Shaman much stronger.
Primal Bond is comparable to Master of Death, and also provides you with some defensive stats (physical reduction, less dmg from beasts, etc.)
The Primal Spirit is actually very strong – it only lasts 20 seconds, on a 40 second cooldown (which is more like 32-33 seconds with a bit of CDR) but I basically find it up every other pull, and it lasts long enough to clear any champions I come across.

Strongest benefits of shaman are the AURAS
Investing in Necro doesn’t really provide much in terms of auras… when you are running LOTS of pets, Auras are very strong (as any PoE player would know.)

AURAS:
The Briarthorn aura, Emboldening Presence, is quite strong. Pierce/Bleed resist are hard to get on pets, but also comes with +offense and +%damage, with some added retaliation dmg.

Mogdrogen Pact / Heart (Both Max) – Self explanatory… Big +flat physical, +++health, and bleed/poison duration reduction… all nice for pets. Oak skin at 1 for some added pierce resist.

Wendigo Totem – Blood Pact – This one is BIG. I found my pets dying CONSTANTLY as 50 Necro without Wendigo totem. The %health restoration is nothing to laugh at when your “tank pets” (briarthorn, blight fiend etc.) have 40-60k health and are sitting in it. Blood Pact gives all your pets +flat vitality damage, +% vitality dmg, +% bleed damage, etc. Don’t neglect the %attack dmg converted to health aspect… this totem really helps keep your pets alive to facetank anything on a boss.

I also run Aether-Ward (Component) and the Fire Aura (Enchanted Flint), both are optional, but I imagine they help a bit. You could run Aether Ward and Void Ward if you need the resists, and both these auras provide your pets resists, which is a big plus.

PETS:
8-10 skeletons (depends on how much +army of the dead or +necro stuff you have)
1 Briarthorn (Although I believe you can get 2 if you have a specific shaman set?)
1 Blight Fiend
1 Primal Spirit (20s duration, pop it on big packs/heroes/bosses)
Bysmiel’s Command Hound (procs off casting the Vines, has a cooldown but almost always procs instantly from 1 vine cast)

OTHER OPTIONALS:
I have a Yeti from my necklace, and a thunder hound thing from my Savage relic.
Both are negligible fodder and optional, good to just have “more stuff” on the screen. Ideally I would like to craft a Primal Instinct for the beetles.

I would say like 60% of my damage comes from skeletons anyway, 30% from the primal spirit and 10% from the briarthorn. Keeping your skeletons up/alive is a priority, your other pets are just tank/fodder/meatshields.

PLAYSTYLE:
Pet-Attack button is VERY important. You want to bind it to an easily reachable key/mouse button. It’s important that you “group up” your pets by targeting a spot on the ground, ideally right next to the big boss/hero you are fighting. This does two things:

  1. Puts them all in your Wendigo Totem, basically making them all unkillable, providing them a big damage boost (vitality)
  2. Puts all your skeletons with the Fiend “Flame Aura” next to your target. All 8-10 of your skeletons have a flame aura which basically procs instantly when they attack, but since half or more of your skeletons are ranged, they won’t be next to your target unless you force them to “move” next to your target. Having 10 fire auras all burning 1 target is a ridiculous amount of extra damage.

Once I have all my pets grouped up next to my target, with wendigo totem down (which I make sure I am also standing in range of, since it keeps me alive and healthy) I throw down a Vine cast (just 1, since it seems to always proc the Bysmiel’s Command Hound.) Then spam Devouring Swarm on targets (which does two things – Lowers their vitality resist, and procs the Shepherds Crook for a massive %210+ pet dmg and +%crit dmg.) This proc has a very high uptime, I’d say something like 75%+ uptime.

My leveling experience so far… And suggestions.

Max skeletons, undead legion, 1 point in Will of the Crypt, 1 Blight Fiend, then rush Shaman up to Wendigo Totem. Get briarthorn, 1 point is plenty. Aim is to get 12/12 Wendigo Totem as fast as you can. This makes your life much, much better.

If you are struggling, especially with skeletons dying, I initially had the WENDIGO DEVOTION – Linked to Skeletons, it provides them a considerable vitality DoT which heals themselves… helps their survivability a ton. Swap it out for The Fiend when you get some better pet gear.

Emboldening Presence is a great pickup. I would max that next, followed by getting 50 in Shaman for Primal Spirit / Primal Bond (max both eventually.)

I would personally recommend SKIPPING the Malmouth area for Normal… I cleared it all myself, but it was a HUGE struggle, particularly due to all the poison/ground effects everywhere. Your pets do NOT do well in ground/damage effects (especially poison, as they have virtually zero poison resistances.) You can go back and do Malmouth stuff later… but that’s up to you.

Elite from Start -> Log was like 4x easier for me than normal Malmouth.

You’ll start building up better pet gear by early/mid Elite, and by the time I hit Malmouth on elite, I had a MUCH better time clearing it.

Ultimate has been a breeze so far, I just started Malmouth stuff (level 92, I spent a lot of time backtracking to help friends catch up etc.) but I don’t see it doing poorly – I feel much stronger than the friends I’m playing with (one is a necro/nightblade “reaper” and other is an inquisitor/solder.)

Hopefully this helps some people out there or at least provides some insights to build off of.

I’m welcome to any suggestions on optimizing my build/devotion tree if anybody has suggestions. Thanks!

(I attached 2 pictures with my current stats ingame - as mentioned, my gear is mediocre/self found, but still good resists/pet stats in Ultimate.)

IMPORTANT NOTE:
Pet resists are very important.
It’s stupidly easy to get their elemental resists all to 80%+.
However, I found the most difficult one to cap is POISON. (Which is super important for Malmouth since every single monster seems to poop it all over the screen.)

You literally cannot cap this unless you get your Coven rep to max - They have a whopping Pet 30% Poison Resist augment for rings, so 2 of those (alongside a devotion that gives 15%) brings them from 0% up to 75%. Super important.

Rest comes with gear, you’ll see in the attached stats below that their Bleed/Pierce/Chaos/Aether is not yet capped… but at least aim for 40%+. I would likely max Aether and Bleed next if possible. I’m also running an Enchanted Flint, which I will probably drop for the Chaos Ward aura soon (which would bring both my pets and my own chaos resist up another 20%.)

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1 Like
2

There’s no way this works well…

I have 90% better status than u, very close devotions and skills, better equip and my pets get destroyed in late ultimate as a Ritualist… I’ve abandoned it

3

Ok, well, I’ll have to see how it works in what you call “late ultimate.”
I personally think your pet resistances just weren’t good enough. Having 60% resist for example, instead of 80%, means your pets are taking DOUBLE damage from that damage type. (They take 40% instead of 20%)

If you neglect resistances and focus all on damage, sure, they’ll get wrecked. But my Briarthorn has like 70,000HP and Wendigo totem heals it for a large % each pulse… If anything, I generally die before my pets do. Even my squishy skeletons have more HP than I do, sitting at something like 16,000. My gear isn’t even that good… I only have 12,000HP myself.

It’s why stuff in Malmouth destroys them initially, because pet Poison resist is typically much lower - I imagine having 75-80% will make things much better.

I’ve already had no issues farming some easier content (cronley runs, Steps of Torment, etc.) Did a few bosses in Valsbury but got oneshot by one guy since my Aether isn’t capped yet. I guess this build may struggle with some Nemesis bosses but… from what I understand, pet builds typically aren’t great for most of them anyway. What do people consider “endgame ultimate” anyway? You can still do a lot in the game (farm-wise) besides just Nemesis farming.

This is just a good solid build for those looking to not play the cookiecutter Necro/Occultist but want to still clear and farm Ultimate reasonably well.

4

How to make a good pet build (quick guide with some of easy steps):

  1. Found this build

  2. Read chapter III and IV. Very carefully.

  3. Then you look at this. Also read and also very carefully.

  4. Only then you could make a worthy pet build

5

I did read all of the links you shared and it was a good read but maybe you can explain why his build won’t work in your view

6

for me it looks like a cool summoner with good survivability options that are not blood of the dreeg - the swarm, the wendigo and all of the auras and way more interesting then the regular cabalist build that all are playing but it seems you have more experience in the game and we would be happy if you share it.

thanks

7

Quick update -

Currently lvl 98, halfway through to 99, clearing this “late Ultimate” without difficulty.

Cabalist is probably stronger (I wouldn’t know, but everyone seems to be playing that over Ritualist, so I guess it is?) but this is a perfectly functional build for those who don’t want to be Occultist, or enjoy Shaman/Auras etc.

Made a few adjustments, still testing out which works better - 50 in shaman or 50 in necro.

Also picked up a Primal Instinct. Huge upgrade - rush to farm the mats for one of these ASAP. I self-found my recipe and all the components needed, so it’s not impossible - worst case do some trading.

Currently running this setup:
http://www.grimtools.com/calc/d2jBaQE2

Dropped 50 in shaman down to 40 in shaman, pumped Necro up to 50.
Switched our Primal Spirit / Primal Bond for Master of Death / 1 in Reap Spirit.

This still allows you to keep all the juicy Shaman utility - primarily, Wendigo Totem, Blood Pact, Emboldening Presence, Devouring Swarm, Mogdrogen Aura, etc.

Picking up the Master of Death provides reasonably similar dmg as Primal Bond, but you do unfortunately lose some defensiveness (due to lost dmg absorb). I did this because I am focusing heavier on vitality dmg - the extra % conversion of physical to vitality dmg, coupled with picking up Dying God devotion (HUGE vitality % multiplier) and Rattosh, Veilwarden (-% vitality resist) all adds up to big damage.

Downside is points are spread thin - I would ideally like to max out Soul Harvest for some added +flat vitality, but won’t be able to.

My gear isn’t even endgame/top end yet, but I am already seeing crits in the range of 17-19k

Blood Pact (from Wendigo totem) is MUCH more huge than people may realize, mine is just 13/12 and it adds +468 FLAT vitality damage to everything standing in it.

If you have 1000% pet damage, that’s 4680 more damage EACH of your pets is doing EVERY swing (even those little primal instinct beatles.) When they crit, that easily turns into 10-13k more damage with the crit multipliers. Vitality reductions are big too from devouring swarm, rattosh, etc.
This isn’t even counting the obvious defensive aspect of the totem… mine has a 3.8s cooldown, so it can be dropped every pack. My Briarthorn has 61,000 health - that means this totem restores 8340 every second to him. Pretty sure this out-heals Blood of Dreeg.

Even my squishy skeletons have about 15,000 life - that’s 1310 health each second restored to them.

Maybe im missing something regarding Blood of Dreeg - but a 15s cooldown (or 10s after some CDR gear) for a 25% heal and 164 health regen seems negligible compared to a 100% uptime pulsing AoE heal. Sure, the 100% poison/acid resist and 12% physical resist from Dreeg is nice… but you can get 80% poison resist on them pretty easily with Coven augments, and not everything does poison/acid.

I may do a respec over the weekend and try out Mogdrogen devotion (instead of dying god), and go back into 50 Shaman to compare. My understanding/research on pet builds seems to indicate you almost always want one or the other (dying god vs mogdrogen), depending on your damage focus/spec. Both are quite comparable, and you can build your pets as needed.

8

Killed Rashalga, Mad Queen in about 18 seconds.

I know there are strong builds out/plenty of videos that kill her in 4s or 10s or whatever, sure, but to whoever said this build can’t handle “endgame ultimate” likely had no idea how to play Ritualist properly.

9

Cool build, won’t be trying it anytime soon though since I am playing a summoner Cabalist at the moment and I am planning to play my future Ritualist as a vitality caster with Drain Essence.

10

I heard drain essence was underwhelming, even with all the specific DE gear and vitality dmg.

I want to try out Vitality Ritualist also, but probably as Ravenous Earth / Devouring Swarm. Ravenous is pretty ridiculous, tried it out a bit leveling and the AoE aspect alone makes it more worthwhile than DE. But I imagine a proper DE build could probably just facetank train everything.

11

would like to see those 4 sec kills of Mad Queen if you have links tho.

thx in advance.

12

I’m sure there’s a few out there, none off the top of my head.
Here’s one in 6 seconds though -

It’s back in April too so I imagine people have come up with stronger builds since then, possibly even as Cabalist.

13

Even Dracarris can’t do that anymore, sadly. They nerfed one of it’s age old and untouched abilities shortly after it’s 6 second vid went up.

14

Nice

I still haven’t chosen a second class for my Necro, and didn’t want to go Occultist.
I did think about Shaman, and so it’s good to see it doing well.

I thought of going Inquistor as well, for reasons :slight_smile:

15

Apostate is fun. That’s all I’m going to say.

16

This build which started the dominance of pets a long time ago

http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47232

17

I think that build has been nerfed to at least 50% less DPS

18

Thank you, your guides and ideas have helped me greatily specially my survivability. I recommend you to any new ritualist players to give it a try.

One question why dont you use Hungering Void ability from Dying God devotion? Is because the health penalty? What about using it with just one point spent into Ravenous Earth?

In general im happy with my dmg, the range is between 10k and 30k. Right now i am stuck with an average Relic (Deathchill) but everything else is getting slowly better although i play alone so im getting to the point where i am thinking in trying a shaman/necro 2h mele or reroll.

19

Actually, if you look at my build link on the “quick update” post on page 1, you’ll see I actually redid all my devotions to pick up Dying God. It’s definitely very strong. I believe EVERY pet build should have 1 or the other between Dying God or Mogdrogen (haven’t tested Mogdrogen yet, but I imagine it is equally as strong, just a difference of “burst” vs “sustained” damage.)

I personally think 2H Necro should go Reaper - Ritualist doesn’t have too much 2H synergy in damage types, however, it is very good for Vitality damage caster (Devouring swarm/Ravenous build perhaps).

20

Really like your build and trying it so far has felt very satisfying. I have the same question as before; why did you not bind the Dying God proc to sth? Is it because of the health penalty? I do agrre with having Dying God im just confused about why not havign the proc.

Otherwise great guide so far really enjoy playing it!