These rings can be of great assistance to many-a-caster. They can provide you with extremely useful boons, such as increased life, stamina, or even damage! “But there’s just too many rings to choose from!” I hear you say. Well fear not my dear mage, as we’re ranking all the best rings for your build, to ease your troubled mind from the stress of choice.
10. Ring of Knowledge
Just like our ranking on melee rings, our first few entries here are generally going to be less useful for most builds, and dropping in value later on in the game. Casters in DS2 (sorcerers, hexers, etc) have a harder time than melee with their stat distribution, being required to heavily invest in order for their builds to start shining. The Ring of Knowledge (and the other +5 stat rings) helps by slightly alleviating that pain, giving you some extra wiggle room with your soul-spending if you want to cast/try a new spell or weapon. How to get: Sold by Straid of Olaphis.
9. Abyss Seal
This one should rank quite a lot higher if you’re solely a hexer build. The Abyss Seal increases the power of all your hexes by 7%, at the loss of 30 life per cast. Very useful later on when you want to burst down your enemies as quickly as possible… but not too early, when 30 is a sizable amount of your total life. How to get: Gift given to you for joining the Pilgrims of Dark covenant.
8. Royal Soldier’s Ring
This ring, at its max level, increases your total equipment load by 20%. Which lets you equip heavier gear without having to invest too much in vitality. While melee builds can make a pretty good use of this, the equipment that you’ll want to be wearing as a caster is generally very lightweight –making this slightly less useful. Still, don’t be discouraged from using it. A higher max equipment load makes your stamina regenerate faster, which you might need! How to get: Dropped by Velstadt in New Game+.
7. Life Ring
Unless you’re starting off as a tanky cleric or paladin, you’re going to have a lot less life than your melee counterparts in the early and mid-game. In addition, even in the later parts of DS2, your flimsy robes don’t exactly provide the best protection against physical attacks. So does that mean you’ll just flop over and die if something hits you? Well, technically yes. But you should at least make it 15% harder for your opponents to kill you. The Life Ring saves lives! How to get (+3 version): Treasure in Brume Tower, up the Foyer bonfire elevator and across the gap left by another elevator.
6. Sorcery Clutch Ring
The clutch rings are a bit of a double-edged sword. They all provide extra damage to their corresponding element (magic, lightning, fire, dark), while decreasing your physical defenses by 80. The amount of damage you get depends on the “magical properties” of your weapon, which means a weapon infused with the same element it had as innate, will receive the most out of it They work really well if you’re going for a glass-cannon build. Just be careful to not get hit! How to get: Treasure in Brume Tower, in the room with the elevator leading to the Fume Knight.
5. Chloranthy Ring
Everyone’s favorite ring from Dark Souls is back in DS2, ready to once again fill our stamina bars with joy! If you think that health is your most valuable resource, then I’m sorry to inform you, but you’re wrong. Stamina dictates the amount of actions you can take before having to pause. Without it, you can’t even run or attack. And the Chloranthy Ring makes your stamina recover 25% faster, giving you room for so many more activities. How to get: Dropped by Executioner’s Chariot in New Game+.
4. Northern Ritual Band
Do you know what a caster with no spells is called? A training dummy! Seriously, unless you’re playing a hybrid spellsword build that has no problem with close combat, the vast majority of your damage is going to come from your magic. And running out of casts will mean certain death. So, how do we prevent that? By getting even more casts, of course! The Northern Ritual Band increases the amount of times you can cast all your spells, while reducing your own hitpoints by a flat percentage. Different tiers of the Band have different percentages, so you’ll have to look up and test which one suits you the most. How to get: Treasure in Sinner’s Rise, behind an illusory wall in the flooded area.
3. Third Dragon Ring
Unlike melee builds, casters are very “ring-slot” hungry, due to the abundance of great rings. And the Third Dragon Ring is an amazing 3-in-1 package, giving you extra health, stamina, and equipment load, which opens up the rest of your ring slots for more specialized options. There’s really not much else to be said. This is just a great ring that helps in many ways! Definitely give it a try in your next build. How to get: Treasure in Dragon Shrine, behind a Mimic and a Drakekeeper.
2. Southern Ritual Band
Okay okay, hear me out. Extra attunement slots might not sound like the most exciting bonus out there, but let’s talk this through. Let’s imagine that we’re an average sorcerer with 16 points in attunement, which gives us 3 spell slots. Due to how attunement works, to get 3 more slots it would either require 14 more stat points, or just wearing the Southern Ritual Band +2. The heavier you invest in your own attunement stat, the bigger the benefit of the Ritual Band. After 30, it always saves you another 30 stat points! Not to mention that if you no longer need those extra 3 slots, you can just swap it out for another ring with no cost at all. How to get: Defeat Scorpioness Najka in New Game+.
1. Clear Bluestone Ring
No matter what kind of magic you use to obliterate your foes, every caster wants one thing above everything else (no, it’s not power…) Speed! The Clear Bluestone Ring increases your casting speed by a whopping 55%. That means for roughly every 2 spells you cast, you get the third one “for free”. In hectic situations such as PvP or boss battles, a few extra seconds can really make the difference. I’d say it’s pretty clear why this ring is the best. How to get: Dropped by the Skeleton Lords in New Game+.
