Mysticism...Um...

One key difference between Blood Spiking, and what a Dervish heavy party would have is that melee-weapon based damage requires far more investment.

You HAVE to run a decent amount of hex and condition removal to keep your offensive line clean, or else all the buffs in the world won't matter in the end.


To that end, Contemplation of Purity is a great start on the D/Mo Scythe Masters. Lose 3+ enchantments to remove a sizable chunk of conditions and hexes, while gaining a bit of extra health and energy in the process.


I personally think that if it did become a build, you'd see a 4-5 sized melee offensive line, probably packing Contemplation of Purity, possibly Aegis, and I'd be surprised if they didn't run Infuse Health or some other spell for spike support heals, 1-2 dedicated party buffers and cleaners, and 1-2 size monk backline.

I'd actually prefer Order of the Vampire for the added resilience, but the lack of synergy with the other party-wide necro enchantments is unfortunate.
I see a D/Mo taking the current place of the party E/Mo, providing buffs and support without the need for Ether Prodigy, and although the loss of Blinding Flash is unfortunate, the ability to use spells like Shield of Deflection would be nice.

In any case, this is all speculation based on how I interpret the primary as working.

I'm still waiting for the touch dervish to happen

how will you get a touch dervish? 15 energy a touch is hefty

@Mercury Angel

Dervishes have earth prayers and wind prayers - that might be good enough spike damage to go halfway between "dervish-way" and "dervish spike". 2 Dervish enchant spammers, 4 dervish/monk prot spammers with spell spiking and condition removal, 2 dervish/warrior AoE guys with Fear Me.

Of course, it all depends on how badly a Scythe Dervish can abuse having 10 extra pips of energy regen, as opposed to their ability to spike people with wind or earth prayers. If it leans towards the former, expect to see a dervish version of IWAY. If it leans towards the latter, expect to see a dervish version of necrospike. With the ease of supporting OoP, Dark Fury, and OoA, I'd expect to see meelee - possibly De/Mo with CoP, possilby De/W fear me abuse, who knows.

I'm thinking of going D/A and putting points into shadow arts. Shadow Refuge seems more useful of a self heal now if you combine it with mysticism. You get the short health regen, and in 4 seconds you get the small conditional heal and the mysticism health and energy. Having 10 points in mysticism makes the shadow refuge free. Thats just the first combo that poped into my head, I'm sure there are better ones though.

Doesnt it seem strange to anyone else to have a cold damage specialist native to a desert environment? Although the "movement" based skills sound like windborn speed derivitatves, whirlwind clones, and some sort of parrallel to ice based snares. Although it would be amusing to have a party wide windborn speed enchant being thrown around, but not for anyone who used a elementalist to cast it prior to the release.

Well the first time i saw the posting Leadership was was primary but thanks anyway

a touch dervish, interesting.

order of the vampire and the two vamp touches make for a solid, constant supply of energy. especially since order hits everyone in the party so often, and expires every 5 seconds.

edit: "order of the vampire" and "order of the campire" are not to be confused! one has a letter rotated 90 degrees...

that be really cool, self heal and free to boot, just think even if you aren't in combat when it ends you still get healed!!! Wow that be great if in combat you could get like 80+ health as an extra boost... hmm weird how a self heal seems better when used with a different profession lol

if you had like 10 mystisim and like 8 or something shadow arts just imagine if you had a scythe of enchanting

6 seconds of +x not sure how much health regen when it ends it's payed off AND you, since you should be in combat as it sounds like will get the awesome boost of it ending with free energy the 30 free health and the extra ~50 health

that just like rocks... almost too much still it would be so freaken awesome, and i know i would do that if it worked out like that.

That was brilliant of you to post, i would give you a high five, but eh i can't. Be a cool way to combine my favorite two professions, hope it works

The Dervish simply must have drawbacks we are not taking into consideration, because the mechanic as presented is absurd.

5 energy and 30 health per enchantment ending? Perhaps this is only when they end on your foes, or only enchants you cast, but still..?

Also this PBAOE attack stuff seems like it has the potential to be a good idea gone bad. It feels like ANet trying to work in whatever fevered dream convinced them to create the (pre-release, pre-nerf) skill "Triple Chop". Which, btw, used to be the same as it is now except it rapidly (near instantly) hit all adjacent foes 3 times. Yeah...

Ill hold my tongue till I see it in action, but I anticipate I will have quite a lot to say.

I bet it is only considered on you, otherwise he will be immortal in some builds, getting +5 energy per sec and geting healed for 30 non stop.

I am sure it will be pretty much balanced , let us see on friday

Speculation at this point seems like an exercise in futility. If you take the description of mysticism at face value the line is remarkably broken, so broken that I can't imagine that this is something that they missed in testing. There is something that we're missing, maybe it only works on dervish enchantments, maybe only on enchantments that you cast yourself. Even then it seems pretty bloody powerful. One thing that stands out to me ; I think that we're going to see the end of the e/mo flag runner. A dervish sounds perfect in this role. They have the speed buffs, they have an incredible energy engine, and through a monk secondary they will have excellent support skills.

Remember that we're also getting 300 new skills. I don't know how they intend to divide this, likely 75 for the new classes, and maybe 30 for assassin and rit, with 15 for each of the originals? However it works out it's quite possible that there is a reason that dervishes have to have this kind of absurd attribute line. Though I don't really see how that's possible without destabilising every other profession. No matter what happens I'm looking forward to giving these guys a try.

Deserts get bloody cold at night, especially the arctic desert of northern Canada. I've seen it get to -70C there, and I've heard of worse. Even the Sahara gets cold enough at night for water (and people) to freeze.

In my post about the D/Mo smiter, I was under the influence that enchantments ending meant ones you cast and ones that end on you. If this has changed since I have been asleep is a different matter, but picture this:

Typical monk AoE smiter, however every time you cast guardian, it removes the last guardian and you get health and energy back. A more damage approach for smiting?

methinks the only sane explanation is its just enchantments you cast on yourself. blah... 2 more days and we'll find out

I can see how everyone would think this is overpowered, I see it however as the Dervishes saving grace.

Remember, these guys have cloth armor, so they aint suited to being a wammo tank with 100+ armor

I suspect they have 60 *maybe 70 to match with sin* AL as a base and Mysticism is a small bit of help to keep their health going even though they have low armor for a melee class

My suspicion is that it's for each enchantment on you that expires, not ends.

If that's the case, since few enchantments last less than 5 seconds, it'd be a strong balancing factor, while still being good.

I can't imagine it's for each enchant nearby, or each enchantment you've cast.

If it's simply each enchantment on you that ends (not expires), then you'd still need a large investment in Mysticism (12 attribute points + 4 from hat & rune), and that leaves you with a 12-12-3 or 12-11-8 (I think) line. Not great for actual capability. I'm sure it works, to an extent, but the time investment in battle to regain energy, and the general investment of resources you're dedicating to yourself... well... I think other monks would be more consistent, than a D/Mo using a quarter of his time to buff his energy. (Imagine if he has only a energy cap of 20, add maybe 12 for a protection staff, that's 32, maybe 37 with an insightful mod. Not ~terrific~.).

As for the character classes, I don't think they're adding any skills for assassin & rit. That'd leave us with 25 skills per base class and 75 for the new ones. Then, most likely as a 'bonus' (as in Factions), I'd expect to see 5-ish duplicate skills per class.

Leadership seems more stable and wont hit a wording/nerf fan.

With leadership, and the right ranges, you could Spam Chants/Shouts that cost 5 energy all day. Even at 12 in Leadership, you are getting 4 energy back for the shouts/chants.

As being said, probably balanced by:

1.) End of self enchantments (decent self enchant fuel) or

2.) Expiry of the enchantments rather than premature end (hence not getting any additional benefits from end of RoF upon hit)

i don't know... still seems somewhat balance.. i mean a caster hate mesmet would destroy you... badly, and gaze of contempt would bascially kill you as well, there are plenty of balances, maybe this class will just make those more appealing?

Thanks. I've been looking at other shadow arts skills, and if you use shadow form, when it ends, you will end up with about 60 health instead of around 30, which is considerably better. Also, if you use heart of shadow, the next time you take damage you will gain around 90 health opposed to around 60. This is all taking into account you have 10 mysticism and 9 shadow arts. 10 mysticism would make these skills free too. This weekend I think I'm going to try out a D/A build with 10 mysticism, 16 scythe mastery, and 9 shadow arts.

I very seriously doubt that enchantments which end prematurely fail to give you the health and energy, because it looks like the intended purpose of this is to make it so that Dervishes (who are supposed to be front-line fighters in robes) don't drop like flies as soon as they run into mobs that can strip their self-enchantments. This looks like an attribute designed to allow a fighting style where you need to be enchanted most of the time by providing a counter to disenchantment.

But even if you need to wait for the enchantment to expire, I don' t see how a spell like Gaze of Contempt would "destroy" the build. The enemy uses up a skill slot, 15 energy, 2 second cast time to deprive you of your energy recovery from one cycle of your enchantments. So? You just cast them again; that's rather less devastating than using the same skills on a character (like, say, Dervishes as they are apparently intended to be played) who is actually depending on the effects of the enchantments, rather than using them primarily for energy management. Seems to me he'd be rather lucky to catch you with more than 15 energy worth of enchantments on you at a time, since you'd only use 5-cost ones for energy management anyway.

And I see no reason that a "caster hate mesmer" (of any flavor) would be more effective against Dervish energy management casters than any other casters. Sure, Mesmers have plenty of abilities that can be absolutely devastating to casters, if you don't have a proper counter to the Mesmers, but that's hardly specific to this strategy.

Bets on how many times Dervishes get nerfed this weekend?


..I'd have a laugh if the Dervish skill list contained no enchantments

Yeah, I was thinking that a Dervish/Assassin sounds pretty effective as well. It'll be fun experimenting this weekend. Hopefully they will have a D/A prebuilt, since I don't have any Balth faction stored up at the moment (nor will I have access to my GW-playing computer until the weekend), so I can't just unlock Dervish skills for a custom-pvp char.

I'm guessing that Mysticism will be limited to targeted enchantments, cast by you, and on you. So Aegis will not trigger it. RoF cast by your monk, will not trigger it. RoF cast by you, but put on another team member also will not trigger it. This makes the attribute much less effecitve.

It is most likely exactly what it says: Any enchantment on you ending for any reason.

Situation: A smiter casts RoF on you. 8 seconds pass and nothing else relevant happens. RoF expires. Mysticism triggers.
Situation: A smiter casts RoF on you. A warrior tries to smack you in the face. RoF triggers, prevents the damage and heals you. Mysticism triggers.
Situation: A smiter casts RoF on you. 2 seconds pass and nothing else relevant happens. The smiter recasts RoF on you. Mysticism does not trigger.


The wording is exactly the same as the wording on MoR, thus implying that it will work exactly the same as MoR: it triggers when an enchantment ends whether from natural expiration or from skills like CoP or Shatter Enchantment. It will not trigger when an enchantment is renewed before it's duration is up, as the original enchantment never gets a chance to end, it simply has it's duration rewritten.

Call me stupid, but I fail to see how this is going to be broken.

Sounds like it is going to play like 55 monk or a tank warrior, especially as a D/Mo. As a PvP player, that is completely unimpressive. The battery possibilities are no more promising than soul reaping. Even with a battery function, the most you are going to get out of Dervishers is annoying pressure. Warriors will remain damage king and your dervisher will be left with niche roles.

We'll have to wait to see individual utility and "god skills" before making a final analysis here. Playing strong dervish skills without mystiscism could end up like playing monk skills withoug DF or ranger skills without expertise. The skills will likely be designed taking into account the energy and heal bonuses. Dervishes will undoubtably be energy hungry and constantly in melee range, so health and energy will be a matter of survival.

what if its a new type of enchantment where it cannot be taken off? and that it applies to only dervish skills? like one of its attribute says cold damage/offensive....what if they are similar to a rits weapon spell...could be "godly enchantment" designed only to use by a dervish?

No, Takonic, mysticism will apply to all skills. Whether or not it is triggered on certain enchantments, is another matter.

+8 energy when your monk's aegis ends, IMHO, is broken.
+8 energy when your monk's RoF ends, IMHO, is broken.

My thoughs are that it will apply only to targeted enchantments, cast by the caster, on the caster.

Thats what i thought.


COuld be "only Dervish enchantments"

No, they don't make primary attributes to be THAT restrictive, period.

Expertise, Energy storage, Soul reaping, Fast casting, Spawning, Critical Hits, Strength, all cross-compatible. Hence mysticism will NOT apply to ONLY dervish enchantments.

Sounds pretty darn overpowered, we'll just see about it in the weekend, too bad i won't be around, though i'd appreciate it if anyone could mail me some pics & stuff about how it's been

Erm.. i dont know what youre reading, but on the official gw site, leadership is the primary for paragons. Spear mastery aint. sorry if anyone has posted this, i just looked at 2 pages..

You wont be able to have a dervish assassin. Well, you might be able to, as technically it isnt nightfall. But whats the point, you couldnt use it after.

Lol, I was just about to start this topic. Search does work
I see a whole new future for my monk here. I am 100% sure that this one will be nerved big time, or they will change this before Nightfall comes out. Either that, or soon there will run a whole lot of D/Mo bots around.

hmm sudden urge to pur well of the profane in pvp necro builds during preview.
but if it´s true that mystisicm triggers upon enchantments ending on allies then it then it would simply be to overpowerd.
most likely enchantments ending on you.

I see no reason you couldn't have a D/A. For the PvP event, Anet has stated that there will be a secondary profession changer available for PvP characters, to make trying out different builds more convenient, so you could even take a D/- template and change it into a D/A. If you want a RP char that's a D/A after release, you buy both Factions and Nightfall, create a Dervish in chapter 3, journey back to chapter 2, and use the profession changer in Senji's Corner. And it would be quite bizarre if they didn't let you select any class combinations you want for custom PvP characters. I see no problem here.

Divine Favor applies only to Monk spells that target allies; making Mysticism apply only to Dervish Enchantments would be somewhat more restrictive, but might not be much more restrictive.

But, as with every other hypothesized restriction, we're left with the worrisome fact that the description didn't say that. It doesn't say dervish enchantments; it doesn't say cast by you, it doesn't say on you, it doesn't say on allies. Considering that Guild Wars is usually pretty rigorous in the wording on all its tooltips, this really has me wondering.

Of all the proposed "implicit" limitations, the "enchantments on you" one sounds most plausible to me, simply because I can imagine someone being in a frame of mind where they're only thinking about the character and not the surroundings, and so might not think it natural to consider enchantments on other creatures. But even that seems like a stretch.

The other explanations seem to be that they have given us a deliberately vague description (which seems odd, considering that they gave us numerical values for the amount of health and energy returned) or that it really has the broad, obviously-broken function.

Several implausible possibilities, no clear reasonable one.

But I think it is likely to be somewhat abusable even if it's limited to enchantments cast by you and on you--for keeping yourself alive with enchantments while you do whatever else a Dervish does, if nothing else. With only one of either of those limitations, it leaves open a lot of scary possibilities. If it's limited to Dervish enchantments, then we'll need to see what those enchantments are to draw any conclusions.

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