Lunar items in Risk of Rain 2 offer both upsides and downsides. This is especially true with Visions of Heresy, which replaces the Survivor’s primary attack with a different one called Hungering Gaze. It’s very weak with certain characters, but it can be very strong with others. Here’s when to use Visions of Heresy and who you should be using it with.
Risk of Rain 2 Visions of Heresy | Best Uses and Characters
The most important thing to know about Visions of Heresy in Risk of Rain 2 is when to use it. This Lunar item replaces your Survivor’s primary attack with Hungering Gaze, which can ruin your run with certain characters. However, Visions of Heresy is very useful with Survivors like the Artificer or Loader.
Hungering Gaze fires off a set of tracking-enabled shards which detonate a short time after attaching to an enemy. These shards deal 120% base damage, and you can fire up to 12 of them (+12 per stack) total. However, there’s a mandatory recharge time of two seconds (+2 per stack) after all projectiles have been fired.
Because of how Hungering Gaze works, it winds up being a poor replacement attack for Survivors with strong primaries. As such, you probably won’t want to use Visions of Heresy with Commando, Huntress, or even the Engineer, as it will also replace the turrets’ primary attack.
However, Visions of Heresy can be a great choice for characters like Artificer, Acrid, Loader, or Mercenary. It’s especially good for Artificer, as her primary bolt attacks have a long cooldown, and they’re limited to four shots before you run out. Hungering Gaze will allow Artie to fire more shots, deal more damage, and take out more enemies than she would otherwise. As for Loader and Mercenary, Hungering Gaze serves as the only way to transition from melee to ranged attacks.
Regardless of who you use it with, you should also know how to use Visions of Heresy to full effect. Each stack count doubles the amount of projectiles and the recharge time. As such, it’s best not to pick up more than two, since the recharge time will leave you unable to use your primary attack for six seconds or more.