Pick Up Ritualist: Completionist Chronicles, Book 1 Written By By Dakota Krout Offered In Interactive EBook

it, read it, love it, Read it all in one day it would have been in a single setting but I had to take a short break for my weekly DD game.
Finally a MC you can support wholeheartedly, I won't give you spoilers here as that would truly spoil your enjoyment of this book, If at all squeamish about buying the book, just read the free sample and you will be hooked! Tablet drop or whatever is the written review equivalent for "Mic drop".
It's such a delight to find a complex, thoughtful, fun, and solidly written piece of LitRPG fiction, It really awakes the child in me and brings up this desire for true Virtual Reality MMORPGs that I've harboured since I first read Sword Art Online about eight years ago.
Ritualist follows Joe, a guy that has chosen to die in the real world and be fully alive inside a game he makes this bizarre choice after being blown up whilst serving as a medic in the army.


Inside the game, Joe is a bit special as are all LitRPG protagonists ha as he is the only person to complete several days worth of tests to determine his best character class.
He is offered an obscure class the Ritualist which he accepts the Ritualist is like a cleric, able to cast healing spells, but with huge reserves of mana required to cast rituals, which are exactly like they sound with big chalk circles and blood and guts and whatnot.
He has terrible combat skills but is very prized by a local guild in a world where magic is severely restricted and true magical healing is incredibly rare.


Joe joins a ragtag band of adventurers, completes a lot of quests hidden or otherwise, and starts to really discover the secrets of the world of Eternia.
What I loved most about the book was the indepth but not boring look into how all the skills function, how all of his abilities levelled up, and how Joe chose to develop as a Scholar and use his limited magical abilities in really unique ways.
There's a lot of thought behind this novel and I loved it, Okay, the trope of an everyday guy or girl caught up in a virtual reality game has become almost common place, The biggest problem with the trope is that game logic isn't like real world logic, So any story is driven almost as much by the game mechanics as by the plot, In this take on LiTRPG Mr, Krout gives us Joe, his everyman, who is placed into a virtual reality game as a result of real world accident he's literally a casualty of war.
Joe isn't an experienced gamer, he's played video games but doesn't have the sort of in depth background of someone who is a true 'gamer', He suffers some other drawbacks as well, In this particular game your initial physical stats are driven both by how you place in testing and what your real life body is like, Since Joe is a paraplegic, his physical stats suck big time, But he does well enough in the testing to achieve a very rare class, one that is essentially unique, This is his biggest advantage, and he exploits it pretty thoroughly,

One caveat, the game framework is interesting, but at times confusing to the reader, at least to me, For example player characteristics like Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, etc, rank up with practice. The odd thing for me was that where a Strength less thanis a percentile i, e. Strength ofis., or a mere, which is incredibly weak once it is at, the modifier changes to,or. Thus you never actually have a modifier of, it's either much less or than, And this continues at higher levels as well, A Strength ofis basically, but a Strength ofisor, Skills, Characteristics, Hit Points, Mana, and Stamina are independent of level, So a high level character doesn't necessarily possess high level skills, and low level characters could conceivably possess lots of Health/Hit Points or Mana, etc

All in all, it was a fun read.
Something to devour on a slow day, Entertaining without being too complicated, I recommend it to anyone that enjoys the genre of LitRPG, and to anyone else that's looking for a light, fun read about games and gamers.
This easily ranks up in the toplitrpg books/authors with the likes of Akella, Nest, Osadchuk etc, If u r asking why onlythen u should realise that i only consider a few authors worthy of aRobert Jordan, Tolkien etc, I hope there will be many many in this series it doesn't stop to soon like the Emerilia series of onlybooks, They could have been twice as big book size or had than, this series shouldn't feel rushed to a conclusion like Em's was, Can't wait till the next in the series, This book is great if you can get past the first two or three chapters, When you start the book the author comes off as a teenage Musk Fan boy with something dribbling down his chin, It's pathetic and really turned me off from the whole thing, I gave it a day break and stopped reading that part and jumped to where the story actually begins, From there on the book is awesome and I really enjoyed it, A bit different from the typical book from this genre and an engaging read, Excited to read the second one, A great new step for one of my favorite authors, A standard VRMMO beginning plot plunges you into a world full of interestimg characters, intrigue, and good old fashioned gaming fun, Light hearted enough to smile at some of the ridiculous moments in the book, you still feel the drama as the plot unfolds because of the charming world that is built.
All in all another solid piece of writing from an author I am very excited to see of This is one of the few series in this genre I have enjoyed in fact I've re read it several times and I find myself remembering certain scenes and having to re read it all over again! Seriously, I only brought

these books in November and I've read them at least three times and I'm about to do it again.
The main character chooses a very unusual path and god to follow and plays a very clever game of advancing his own interests while still being heroic in his own way.
He's here to stay and he's going to play himself while he's building himself a good life, I've found most books in this genre to be lacking in characterisation or general interest, but this book throws in strong characterisation, humour and unexpected twists and problem solving into the familiar but flawlessly seamless requirements of online gaming, such as the trials of choosing a path, advancing in levels, joining guilds, creating reputation and dealing with both the game's and the player's politics.
This is a strong, fun, engrossing series and I'm pleased to have found it! Another great story from the author who helped define the dungeon core subgenre.


Tldr: Good story, well thought out mechanics, decent characters,

Spoilers may follow after this line,

We follow a mans journey through personal disaster into a brand new world of rules and adventure, The opening is reasonably standard fare, giving us motivation and justification,
The initial character interactions are a bit strange, and feels forced, Some of the npcs feel needlessly antagonistic, There seems to be only one other guild in the game, and they are essentially a nuisance,
The npcs are better developed, and their power structures are believable,

All in all it scratches the litrpg/gamelit itch, doesn't contain a lot of typos or grammar issues and gave good bang for buck.


stars. A good start, for both book and series, The MC appeared to become "dumbed down" a bit near the middle of the book, forgetting or never researching things he should have been aware of.
This did lead to a few colorful scenes, but felt "off" the MC was generally much thoughtful and observant,

For the most part, a smooth flow and a relatively simple read with minimal foreshadowing, The book takes the MC through much of his beginning stage, getting him settled in the game and use to his initial abilities, He quickly becomes a useful member of his guild, and by Ritualist's end, very important,
The stage is set for the next book, though the MC has a very long road to travel before the series ends Cons:
The author does a poor job of showing the main characters life time of combat army medical training.
In game, he is too distracted to heal which is not somethig his real life profession would allow to go unchecked,
The author gives the main character an extravagant trump card, which is used like any common tool should be, for a task it was created for.
Afterwards nothing outside of the box or anything unexpected happened which seems to me to be a waste of something so special,
Main character calls himself a completionist yet denies the first grave quest that comes his way,
The game mechanics are lacking turning this novel into of a fantasy than a litRPG genre for me,

Pros:
The pace of the story is good, it managed to hold my attention well into the wee hours of the morning,
The class is rather untraditional so reading about something different put a good spin on the plot, Such a fun book. Its crazy that after you read so many mediocre books you start to lower your standards and think these arent so bad, Until you become lucky enough to stumble across a gem like this one, I loved the authors dungeon series and this one is just as awesome,
Loved the tomato analogy to explain character stats, Loved that while the MC has epic powers he also has epic handicaps that he must overcome, So many little details that came together to make it an awesome book, So, I've been fighting a battle with literature for the last few years, I have developed specific tastes, and like a craving a specific type of book, I have been told I can be overly critical, I prefer mature characters that make sound decisions based on their characters and experience, I also have a preference for the characters specific archetype, Ritualistic, Witchcraft, and or Healers in my fantasy,

This book gave me all of these things and, I had my eye on it for a few weeks and purchased it at:and read it straight through, I can not wait for the next one and look forward to a well written, well paced, and well told story as good if not better than the first.


TLDR: If you like casters, tactical magic, support classes, interesting stories, and fast paced adventure you should give this book a try, The decision to start a new life is never an easy one, but for Joe the transition was far from figurative, Becoming a permanent addition to a game world, it doesn't take long to learn that people with his abilities are actively hunted, In fact, if the wrong people gained knowledge of what he was capable of, assassins would appear in droves,   In his pursuit of power, Joe fights alongside his team, completes quests, and delves into the mysteries of his class, which he quickly discovers can be practiced only in secret.
Ultimately, his goal is to complete every mission, master every ability, and learn all of the world's secrets, All he has to do is survive long enough to make that happen, .