Bleed & Poison Ritualist Endgame Build

Build Introduction

In this build we utilize bleed, poison, and physical hit damage. Through high bleeding and poison magnitude scaling, we can make our Herald of Blood infinitely chain and create massive explosions. This build offers a very active playstyle by dashing in and out of combat with Rake and Cull the Weak.

We are using a Companion which is going to provide us with lots of % increased damage through nodes in the skill tree while also providing Haste Aura for additional movement speed and attack speed.

---

Strengths and Weaknesses

---

Build Mechanics

Herald of Blood, with its explosions and poisons, will take care of pretty much all clearing. However, we need something to start the explosion chain with. That’s mostly going to be Spearfield, Rake, Wind Dancer, or Cull the Weak.

Herald of Blood can self-chain with a specific combination of support gems; Bursting Plague, Poison III, and Bleed III.

Herald of Blood can’t inflict bleeding because it’s a payoff skill associated with bleeding. However, it can inflict poison, so by giving it Poison III, there’s a chance it will inflict poison and trigger Bursting Plague, which will inflict bleeding thanks to Bleed III and trigger the Herald of Blood again. This cycle repeats infinitely as long as there are enemies.

Herald of Plague is going to proliferate the strongest inflicted poison to other enemies in an area around the monster that was inflicted with poison. If the poison was caused by a skill that was supported by Bursting Plague, the proliferation will carry on that effect to other enemies, resulting in physical explosions that are able to inflict bleeding thus trigger Herald of Blood.

Keep in mind that if a skill does too much damage and kills the monster with a hit, and not bleeding or poison, it’s not going to trigger Herald of Blood!

Single Target

We use Rake from a distance to dash to the enemy and inflict heavy bleeding. By using Saitha’s Spear alongside Rapid Assault on our weapon swap, we will aggravate that bleeding on the enemy so it counts as moving to make it deal 100% extra damage. Rake has a built-in more damage multiplier based on distance traveled, and we are also using Momentum. That’s the reason why we always want to use Rake from a distance and dash to the enemy.

Defenses and Recovery

Evasion is giving us a chance to completely avoid hit damage, which is paired with Deflection to give us a chance to reduce hits that land through the Evasion Rating we have.

Wildwood Persistance ascendancy notable increases the life recovery rate from sources such as leech, life flasks, and regeneration based on our missing life. The lower the life, the higher the recovery.

Mana

To solve mana, you are going to need some maximum mana on gear, because of the ascendancy downside giving us 30% reduced maximum mana. Also, at least one modifier that gives you mana leech is required. Sometimes you might have to press mana flask because the mana costs of skills get higher with skill levels, and skill levels are one of your main damage scalers.

---

Skill Rotation

Map Clearing

It’s very simple. Initiate the Herald of Blood chain with a skill of your choosing, such as Spearfield or Cull the Weak, and then just watch the explosion chain happen.

Bossing

1. Cast Bloodhound’s Mark.
2. Use Rake from a distance.
3. Use Rapid Assault bound to your weapon swap spear (Saitha’s Spear) to aggravate the bleeding.
4. Use Spear Stab while the enemy is bleeding for some extra damage.
5. Finish off enemies with Blood Hunt once they have accumulated enough blood loss.

Repeat steps 2, 3, and 4 until the enemy has enough blood loss to make Blood Hunt worth pressing.

---

General Tips

• Blood Hunt can sometimes bug and not deal any damage, but still consume all the blood loss. This starts to occur only on really high-health enemies. Luckily there is a way around it. Using Blood Hunt once your bleeding has done 3 million damage or less will avoid the bug and cause the skill to work normally.
• Make sure to always use Rake and Blood Hunt from a distance.
• Reapply Bloodhound’s Mark if needed. It gets consumed when the enemy is heavy stunned, and it can expire.
• Do not underestimate the power of skill level scaling and don’t forget to get quality on your skills.
• If you find yourself having extra spirit, we would highly recommend using Cannibalism I or Vitality I.
• Attributes – Get enough Dexterity and Intelligence just to be able to equip your gear and use your gems. Extra points should go to Strength since it scales maximum life.
• Make sure you get, ideally, a 100% chance to poison on skills supported by Poison III, since those are the skills where poison matters the most.

---

Gem Setup

You will find all the gem setups listed below. The support gems are sorted in order of importance.

Skill five socket (6-link) priority:

• 1. Rake
• 2. Spearfield
• 3. Herald of Blood
• 4. Wind Dancer
• 5. Blood Hunt

Cull the Weak is entirely optional. If you want to use it instead of Spearfield you can. We would recommend playing with Spearfield and maybe consider Cull the Weak once you have good damage since this skill does very low amounts of damage.

Spear Throw is optional. You don’t have to use it, but if you want to be extra safe, you can use it and initiate your chain from a distance.

If you want to armour break with a Spear Stab against enemies that are not affected by Bloodhound’s Mark or you just want to armour break faster, you can switch Heft support to Armour Break III. Also, if you want more attack speed with the Spear Stab, you can use Rapid Attacks II instead of Heft.

Make sure that the skills you use for damage are bound to weapon set 2, as that weapon set is your main one with your damage weapon. Weapon set 1 is only for Rapid Assault with Saitha’s Spear.

Your beast Companion should be melee because those are going to be in your presence pretty much all the time.

Useful companion modifiers are:

• Haste Aura
• Extra Physical Damage Aura
• Trail of Lightning
• Prevents Recovery Above 50%
• Temporal Bubble
• Energy Shield Aura/Elemental Resistance Aura

---

Ascendancy

Ritualist

Ritualist provides an additional ring slot and increased effect for equipped rings and amulets, as well as great life recovery thanks to the Wildwood Persistence notable.

1. Unfurled Finger – Provides a third ring slot. Great power boost at a cost of 1 of 3 downsides. The downside we’re taking is Reduced Mana. Of course, if you have lots of Spirit or Rresistances you can take Reduced Spirit or Reduced Resistance; It is not recommended to do that, since extra Spirit or Resistance may still be useful.
2. Mystic Attunement– Provides a 25% increased effect of equipped rings and amulet. Great addition to the previous Unfurled Finger.
3. Wildwood Persistence – Gives increased life recovery from all sources. The lower our life is, the higher the recovery. This means that if we take a big hit, we can quickly recover back to full life through life flask, leech, life on kill, etc.
4. The last two ascendancy points are optional.
   • As the Whispers Demand is a fun node that gives you rare monsters’ modifiers for a duration if you’ve used the Ritual Sacrifice on the corpse.
   • Intricate Sigils will give you +1 charm slot. This can be useful when your belt has only one charm slot.
   • Lastly, you can just take two small nodes: Movement Speed and Physical Damage.

---

Skill Tree

Weapon set 1 points serve as attack speed increases for our Rapid Assault that we use to aggravate bleeding with Saitha’s Spear. Weapon set 2 points are meant for damage for our main spear.

---

Gearing and Affixes

In this video guide you will be able to see me craft a really good endgame spear.

Listed item bases are the ideal ones you should aim for. However, they are not required for the build to work.

Keep in mind that your resistances need to be capped!

Slot and Base	Affixes	Notes
Main Weapon – Grand Spear	1. % Physical Damage 2. +X Physical Damage 3. +X to Level of All Attack Skills 4. % of damage as Extra Physical 5. % Attack Speed 6. % chance to gain Onslaught on Killing Hits	Check the video above to see how to craft a spear. Your spear is the main priority for your single-target damage, so I would recommend getting a decent one as soon as possible.
Swap Weapon – Saitha’s Spear (Unique)	Saitha’s Spear (Unique)	The chance to aggravate bleeding modifier should be as high as possible. This spear is used only on weapon set 1, and only 1 skill should be bound to this weapon – Rapid Assault.
Shield – Golden Targe	1. Increased Block chance 2. Maximum life 3. Hits against you have #% reduced Critical Damage Bonus 4. Gain Deflection Rating 5. Resistances/Attributes	Increased Block chance should be 28%+, because it will result in a 32% ”flat” chance to block from our shield.
Helmet – Freebooter Cap	1. % Evasion 2. +X Evasion 3. Maximum life 4. Gain Deflection Rating 5. Resistances/Attributes/Rarity	The rarity affix should be only on a suffix.
Body Armour – Wyrmscale Coat	1. % Evasion 2. +X Evasion 3. Maximum life 4. Gain Deflection Rating 5. Resistances/Attributes 6. Life Regen/+X to Stun Threshold	Wyrmscale Coat for the implicit 30 – 40% increased Elemental Ailment Threshold
Gloves – Polished Bracers	1. Maximum life 2. Level of all Melee Skills 3. +# Physical Damage to Attacks 4. % Attack Speed 5. % Evasion/+X Evasion 6. Gain Deflection Rating 7. Resistances/Attributes/Rarity	Ideally get +2 Level of all Melee Skills.
Boots – Drakeskin Boots	1. % Movement Speed 2. Maximum life 3. % Evasion 4. Gain Deflection Rating 5. Resistances/Attributes 6. Rarity/Life Regen	Get as much movement speed on your boots as possible; that’s the priority!
Amulet – Solar/Gold Amulet	1. +X to Spirit 2. Level of all Melee Skills 3. % Maximum life 4. Maximum life 5. Rarity 6. Resistances/Attributes/Life Regen	Get enough spirit so you can use all your auras and companion. Ideally get +3 Level of all Melee Skills. The anointment you should aim for is Lasting Trauma. Use Flesh Catalyst to increase life modifiers.
Rings – Breach Ring	1. +# Physical Damage to Attacks 2. Maximum Mana 3. Life/Mana Leech 4. Maximum life 5. Rarity 6. Resistances/Attributes/Life Regen	Breach ring for the 40% maximum quality. As much +# Physical Damage to Attacks as possible! Get enough mana so you can comfortably use your skills. Get at least 1 mana leech and 1 life leech modifier on your rings, and if you feel like you need more mana/life recovery, get the modifier more than once. Use Uul-Netol’s or Reaver Catalyst. Whichever one is cheaper.
Belt – Darkness Enthroned (Unique)	Darkness Enthroned (Unique)	The line on the belt must say, “This item gains bonuses from Socketed Items as though it was Gloves”. Socket in the Courtesan Mannan’s Rune of Cruelty. The % increased effect of Socketed Items should be as high as possible. However, keep in mind that the difference between a 100% and 120% inc. effect is only 3% magnitude per rune, meanwhile the price difference is huge.

---

Socketables

Slot	Socketable
Main Weapon	Greater Iron Rune
Shield	Soul Core of Ticaba (Resist/Attribute Rune if needed)
Helm	Greater Iron Rune/Saqawal’s Rune of Memory
Body Armour	Greater Iron Rune
Gloves	Courtesan Mannan’s Rune of Cruelty/Boar Talisman
Boots	Uromoti’s Soul Core of Dampening/Soul Core of Topotante/Farrul’s Rune of the Chase/Greater Iron Rune
Belt	Courtesan Mannan’s Rune of Cruelty

---

Jewels

The priority unique jewel is Prism of Belief with +X levels to Rake. Get this one only when it’s +2 levels minimum, ideally +3.

The other unique jewel is Megalomaniac. Get one with any nodes that give you increased damage, attack damage, magnitude of ailments, etc.

Keep in mind that usually for a Megalomaniac to be worth it, you need to get at least 2 good notables. For example, if you have a node on a Megalomaniac that only gives you 20% increased attack damage, you can easily get the same or better on a rare jewel.

Example nodes:

• Lasting Trauma (if you get this on a Megalomaniac, change your anointment)
• Crushing Verdict
• Goring
• Fast Metabolism
• Serrated Edges
• Prolonged Assault
• Coated Arms
• Blinding Strike
• Disorientation
• Tempered Mind
• Swift Claw
• Lord of Horrors or Easy Going (only if you need Reservation Efficiency for your Companion)

Rare Jewels

We recommend getting both recover % maximum life/mana on kill on your jewels, at least one of each modifier.

Other useful modifiers:

Prefix

Suffix

% Increased Magnitude of Ailments % Increased Attack Damage % Increased Damage with Spears Companions deal % Increased Damage % Increased Global Physical Damage % Increased Magnitude of Bleeding % Increased Magnitude of Poison % Increased Presence Area of Effect % Increased Melee Damage % Increased Evasion Rating % Increased Damage With Hits Against Rare and Unique Enemy

Recover % of maximum life on kill Recover % of maximum mana on kill Gain +X Rage on Melee Hit % Increased chance to inflict Ailments (if not at 100% poison chance) % chance to Poison on Hit (if not at 100% poison chance) % Increased Attack Speed % Increased Attack Speed with Spears % Increased Duration of Damaging Ailments on Enemies % Increased Stun Threshold % Increased Ailment Threshold Damaging Ailments deal damage % faster % Increased Movement Speed

---

Flasks and Charms

Life and Mana Flasks

• Prefix – Increased Amount Recovered
• Suffix – % increased charges or % reduced charges per use

Charms

• Stone Charm
• Thawing Charm
• Silver Charm or charm of your choice

Campaign Buffs

If you have already chosen different permanent buffs than those listed here, do not worry too much. It’s not going to make or break the build.

• Valley of the Titans (Act 2) – 30% increased charm charges gained (changeable)
• Venom Draught (Act 3) 30% increased Elemental Ailment Threshold (permanent)
• Halls of the Dead (Act 4) – 5% increased resistance for every element (permanent)
• Abandoned Prison (Act 4) – 30% increased life recovery from flasks (changeable)
• Quimah (Interlude 2) – 5% to all Elemental Resistances (changeable)

---

Changelog

November 20th, 2025 – Created for Path of Exile 2 Patch 0.3