A Dryad may use Combat Arts and Buffs to increase the chance that some slain opponents will drop a shrunken head that can be equipped by the Dryad (only one at a time). When a player has found a shrunken head, he may drag it into his inventory screen (After pressing "F" key) and set it within the shrunken head slot. The head is comparable to a piece of armor that benefits the dryad with bonuses to magic, combat and protection. All shrunken heads possess an Armor value which gives the dryad a higher resistance against mostly physical damage when worn.

The following Combat Arts will increase the chance to drop a shrunken head from the Dryad's Cabalistic Voodoo Aspect:

Twisted Torment - Bronze Headhunter modification, Silver Sadist modification - duration (for recasting)
Viperish Disease - Silver Headhunter modification
Black Curse - Bronze Headhunter modification
Moribund Animus - Both Silver and Gold Headhunter modifications

The following Combat Arts will increase the chance to drop a shrunken head from the Dryad's Capricious Hunter Aspect:

Sinister Predator - No modification needed

She may also use the Combat Art (Buff) Moribund Animus to raise a Hireling to fight in battle with her. A Hireling's damage is only increased by the level of the hireling summoned. The level of Hireling summoned is directly related to the Combat Art level at which Moribund Animus is cast at. A weapon slot with pluses to all Combat Arts, Moribund Animus, or to the relevant skills can be used to increase the level at which this Combat Art is cast, which will result in a more powerful Hireling.

Note: Combat art level factors into chance for a head drop. Moribund Animus level 1 with a level 1 character results in a 10% chance to drop. (Even if the Animus is not involved in the combat) At Moribund Animus level 1 with a level 200 character you have a 0.4% chance to drop a shrunken head. So, drop chance scales with character level and combat art level, at least for Moribund Animus.

Types of Shrunken Heads

The different types of shrunken heads can be classed according to these three characteristics:

Combat Modifier - The general type of modifier that benefits particular traits of a character.
Color - Color of the head which, in conjunction with the enemy type of the head, indicates the unique hireling it summons.
Enemy Type - The type of enemy that will drop the head

3 Build Types for Headhunting

In decreasing order of effectiveness for headhunting:

Version 1 - Voodun

take both Voodoo Focus and Voodoo Lore
Keep your regeneration time of Twisted Torment to under 0.5 seconds
Gives huge chance of head drop

Version 2 - voodun

take Voodoo Focus only, but not the Voodoo Lore
Keep your regeneration time of Twisted Torment at 1.0 second
Good chance of a head drop

Version 3 - non-voodun

Concentration, stamina boosts from potions (and alchemy trophies) and equipment, Regen per Hit (RpH)
lowest drop chance, still can somewhat layer Twisted Torment

Combat Modifier

Rare (2 star) (yellow) shrunken heads can have up to 3 modifiers. These include such beauties as:

Deathblow
Regen Time -X%
+X General Skills (bargaining, alchemy, blacksmithing...etc...)
+X to all skills
+X to all combat arts
+range visibility
+retail price
+% EXP bonus / kill...
and lots more

Uncommon (1 star) (blue) shrunken heads can have 1 modifier.
Common (0 star) (white) shrunken heads have 1 modifier.

Combat Modifiers for shrunken heads come in three general types:

The three different types of base combat modifiers found upon heads give the following different benefits each per head to characters.

Defense - This affects a monster's Chance to Hit versus the character.

Spell Resistance - This affects a monster's chance to successfully cast a spell at full strength upon the character.

Cabalistic Voodoo Aspect - This can increase either the Cabalistic Voodoo Lore or Cabalistic Voodoo Focus levels.

Color

The color of the Shrunken head dropped is indicated by the color of the writing. This also indicates the strength and kind of hireling summoned. White heads are the easiest to have dropped from enemies but create the weakest hirelings. Blue is next in rarity, with Yellow only being found from unique bosses (or young dragons). In this way, a shrunken head of the same enemy type can come in three colors. Each color summons it's own unique hireling with the yellow head hirelings of that particular monster type being the strongest. Yellow heads generally also produce summons that have life leech of their own, making them much more durable. The scorpion summon is particularly robust due to it's high attack rate and double attacks. In the example shown here of the three types of colored heads of the same monster enemy type, the yellow enemy summoned would be the minotaur, one of the strongest hirelings possible. Blue Heads may have an extra modifier on the head as bonus, with yellow heads having the largest number of modifiers with greatest values.

Enemy Type

Each enemy in the game is grouped within an Enemy Type for the use of shrunken heads. Orcs and ogres, for example, belong to the goblinoid enemy type. A Dryad who wears the correct Enemy Type head while in battle against a matching enemy within that same enemy type gains significant bonuses via damage. Dryad Combat Arts that benefit from wearing the correct Enemy Type head are: