[MERGED] Balancing Dervish Profession

Yes the avatars are, a bit much...

oh yeah... I agree with the damage reduction thing.

Also the enchantments removal of the dervish prof is just way to powerful. I think ANet needs to make the recharge slightly longer.
AND--- the avatars seems to be too powerful at times; like Avatar of Melandru (immune to conditions); that's a bit ridiculous.

You actually think the Auras are that overpowered? I found mine pretty close to useless, and even removed Melandru from my skill bar unless I knew I was going up against Trappers/Degen. Swapping in Reap Impurities was better for me personally.

Perhaps you saw some of the others in use.

umm i think the simplest thing to do about the AoE whoring issue is just nerf Balthazars Rage and Holy Heart of Flame to make the dmg Fire dmg instead of Holy damage.. that way armor can actually reduce this insane dps.. anyways it seems to make sense to me cuz things like Zealots fire are fire dmg.. why does Balthz have to be holy dmg -.-

Another thing is it seems that the Dervish's unique attribute Mysticism is just too overpowered the fact that you gain Health AND energy when enchantments end seems a little overdone, especially cuz the rest of the unique attributes in other classes are really subtle. it seems like the Dervish's Mysticism is the only one that really gives the most benefits to the character.

The AoE damage needs to be reduced. I was playing a Paragon with a +5 Armor Spear, a 16 Armor shield, and constantly had Watch Yourself up and was getting hit for 100+.

Or the range has to be brought in tighter. It was often quite hard to keep everyone in Shout range and yet be far enough away from people to not get nailed by AoE dmg.

Here are a few things I think would work (some have already been mentioned on this thread).

CoP: Adjust the skill so that it removes 1..5 or maybe 2..5 enchantments instead of all. This won't affect monks significantly and would remove the Dervish exploit.

Dervish aoe like Balthazar's rage and Grenth's Finger's: Reduce damage a little (32..80 instead of 40..88 or so), reduce range to adjacent (maybe), increase recharge by about 5 seconds per skill - more for some.

I don't think that Dervish enchantments should be changed to a different skill type. It would be far easier to rework CoP, and Dervishes should remain vulnerable to the various enchant removals, to be fair.

Alternatively, reducing damage according to the number of foes affected might also be an effective solution. For example, Balthazar's Rage could do 96 damage to a single foe at 14 Mysticism, but deal 80 each to 2 foes, 68 each to three foes, 59 to four foes, and 52 to five or more. Something like that.

I have faith that Anet will at least bring it closer to balance by release. This was a beta weekend after all.

I love Dervish and I LOOOOOOOVE where the name comes from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dervish


<---persian

TNX a lot Anet I hope you guys use Dervish for the CE box so That I can buy it and put it next my other CE boxes
weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
/kneel
/bow

Now I really like that idea. I called for a nerf to CoP back in December and it looks like that will never happen. So I completely agree with you. A Derv spamming CoP just isn't right.

Otherwise I say nerf CoP and make it 5e at 1sec cast with a 20sec recharge.
That may help a bit.

Hi there, this will be my first post on this forum ( which I have been following for quite some time) but ahem back to the point about the dervishes.

I think that the dervishes need to have their aoe effect enchantments' effects reduced and maybe buffed in terms of defense to counteract that change. The whole class on the prewiev event was just a "smiter+warrior combined in one", which is ridicilous. Some things that I thought might help are;

* Increase recharge time drastically, say 30sec of recharge for a 20 sec enchantment. If the dervish uses cop for 5 enchantments, he can still spike an area really good, but the extra time for recharge gives the opposing team enough time to recover. Now 30 sec recharge might seem long but if a dervish doesn't stack his enchantments and uses them one after other it should be fine (at least in PvE, in PvP a smiter support on dervish while his skills are recharging for 10 secs would be nice). Dervish can also use speed buffs and etc. or other non-aoe enchantments buffing him during the fight.

Besides, disenchanting a dervish might have benefits if the recharge is long enough.

* Dervish enchantments ending give the dervish some boost other than an aoe damage. For example, when balthasar's rage ends it can give the dervish +33% attack speed for 10 seconds. Or an armor boost for several seconds can be very good for a dervish in PvE. I think the problem is caused by the fact that all of these enchaments are all damage or condition heavy. Armor, speed, attack speed boosts, cancelling hexes or conditions etc. can be beneficial to dervish and will see some good use. Sure, there should be 3-4 smiting skills but the class lacks in variation right now.

That way, the dervish can't just pump these skills.

* Make CoP monks-skills only or non-dervish enchants or make it so that you lose 1...8 enchantments based on divine favor (pretty much what other people said on several topics can't remember names right now sorry)

* Make mysticism energy only

* Doing all or some combination of the above (especially myst) might make dervishes somewhat of a squishy in PvE, thus if it becomes a necessity arenanet can give them 2-3 defensive skills to help with armor or chance to block skills (stances or enchants like guardian etc.).

While dervishes suit smiter builds in PvP and I believe they'll do just fine with that, I am worried about PvE. After all, these guys need to be able to defend effectively (at least for some time unlike the assasin) so that their scythe attacks and aoe enchants can be used effectively on a mob around the dervish. I fear that by nerfing the enchantments, they'll just become too vulnerable in pve with 70 armor and no shield.

Anyway, these are my two cents feel free to flame

I'm not sure if it'll help to lenghten the time Balthz's Rage is on before it activates... It gets stronger the more times you hit so longer time will just add more damage, and doesn't it unleash it's damage when it ends? I mean, a Dervish could just remove it from himself before it times out whenever he feels like it.

I support the idea of calling their enchantments something else; I was thinking of Battle Charms so enchant removal won't help them.
However, calling them something else usually means something special; Weapon spells means you can have only one at a time, like a stance, except they are completely unstrippable.
Perhaps Battle Charms could be unstrippable (by enemies aswell as by the user) and would cost Adrenaline (just a brainfart, but you know what I mean), as to prevent Dervishes from using Battle Charms untill they are ACTUALLY in battle.

Not too keen on having them cost extra energy though. Might make them useless as secondaries for other physical proffesions.

Good ideas though.

Sometimes Im glad players aren't the final word as far as skill balancing goes...Really, I don't see CoP as the problem here..I'm sure Anet will come up with a reasonable change to the Dervish class.

How can anyone say that nerfing a skill outside of a classes own skillset can fix the problem?

let Mysticism only trigger if the ending enchantment is a dervish enchant.
20+ bip through order spamming, Rof etc is too much.


Maybe increase the energy gain only each 3 ranks.

Dervishes *might* be slightly overpowered, or some of the skills. Minor tweaks to numbers would certainly fix everything.

The most broken skill in the common, obvious D/Mo build used this weekend is clearly Contemplation of Purity (as people have been saying all weekend). There's a lot of counters for the PBAoE D/Mo, but most of the ones that would otherwise be effective are hexes. CoP is too good for taking them out (especially with zero points in Divine favor). I'd argue CoP is the biggest problem here (and most likely to continue to cause problems with future skills and builds).

Vermillion, when a build depends on a skill from another class without even using any points in that attribute, that's EXACTLY when you should be worried about that skill being broken instead of the class itself.

I'm sure ANet *can* come up with a way to fix D/Mo PBAoE without nerfing CoP. But then they'll just have to do the same thing for every future build that abuses CoP. It's just an abusable skill.

Personally, I don't care that much which approach they take, but they potentially waste time fixing all the Dervish skills instead of CoP (and time in the future when something else breaks because of CoP).

I think a great deal of the healing aspect of a base Dervish needs to be dropped somewhat. It appears as though they've tried to mix the typical RPG Paladin and Dark Knight character, which ideologically speaking would be some sort of "supremely" great character and in this PVP event we have seen such. But now that we have finally seen a game combine these two common jobs we realise how unrealistic it is in a multiplayer game, specifically one thats oriented around PVP play.

The class sounds great as advertised, a soloer, but then so does a Warrior Tank. I'm not going to argue a Tank's usefullness in PVP but you certainly see less than in PVE. In a PVP environment a Melee class SHOULD always RELY on a healing class to keep it alive. Otherwise what's the point? To prove my point I ask anyone who has fought one of the lovely 4 man D/Mo fights this weekend.

As a Monk I hated fighting Dervish, but on the flip side of this I loved fighting them as my Warrior. The advent of the Dervish has really forced a warrior to step up and protect a healer and because Dervs are AOE they literally can do so. So when a Dervish runs after my monk I will simply stand by them and use Ripost/DeadlyRpisot, and sometimes Glads def, and in a few swings the Derv's are either gone or have to retreat for awhile, which then makes them easy to pick off for me. Thus far this is the only sort of BALANCE for this class I can think off. So if they do not actually nerf the job, it will in actuality be a good thing for Tactics Warriors.

Even so, Anet could simply up the other classes. If anything the Dervish really have pointed out the flaws in the other character designs. The quickest way to balance this whole mess out is to give a Warrior some sort of direct control over PVP hate, (yes like Provoke!) where your selected target would only be allowed to attack you for a given time. Not only does this actually give the Warrior something to do, but it theoretically divides the Warrior from the W/Mo (paladin) classes. I personally feel it would balance it out more because then melee classes would be able to strategically function around that warrior to get to the end mage battle.

Theres several classification into what makes a balance skill, based on: cost, casting time, recharge time, duration of effect, effectiveness of effect, overall usability, counters (based only on Core Skills), synergy, negative effects

Lets take a look at a the VIM D/W Tank build (The D/mo build is almost the same) and try to balance it shall we?

This is a tanking build, so basically cast Vital boon, then turn on Pious Concentration and start spamming the AOE enchants: Dust Cloak, Balthazar's Rage, Aura of Thorns, Grenth's Fingers, using Signet of Piety after each enchantment. ViM is used after the target has picked up some nasty conditions. This build KILLS melee characters very quickly. The cripple, bleeding and blindess makes them useless, while taking armor ignoring damage. It has such powerful synergy, and spammability makes it an incredible build that doesnt even really require any weapons. Its way overpowered, and resilient vs interrupts (Pious Concentration) or enchantment removal (Thanks to the fact that removing enchantments will heal the dervish and give him energy and activate the various conditions from the AOE enchants) as well as E-denial in general.

Dust Cloak: 10 Energy. ¾ Sec Activation. 12 Sec Recharge.
Enchantment Spell. All nearby foes are struck for 40...88 earth damage. For 30 seconds, your attacks deal earth damage. When this Enchantment ends, all nearby foes are Blinded for 1...4 seconds.

cost: Average
casting time: Excellent
recharge time: Average:
duration of effect: Average
effectiveness of effect: Excellent
overall usability: Good
counters: Backfire, Arcane Conundrum, Kiting, Maelstrom, Well of Profane
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: None

Pious Concentration : 5 Energy. 5 Recharge.
Stance. For 20 seconds, you cannot be interrupted, but each time you would have been interrupted, you lose 1 Enchantment or Pious Concentration ends.

cost: Excellent
casting time: Excellent
recharge time: Excellent:
duration of effect: Average
effectiveness of effect: Good
overall usability: Excellent
counters: Wild Blow
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: Loss of enchantment

Signet of Piety : 1 Sec Activation. 20 Recharge.
Signet. Lose one Enchantment. Target ally is healed for 30...114 Health. If an Enchantment was removed in this way, this Signet recharges immediately.

cost: Excellent
casting time: Good
recharge time: Good
duration of effect:
effectiveness of effect: Good
overall usability: Excellent
counters: Rust, Ignorance, Diversion
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: Loss of enchantment

Vital Boon: 5 Energy. 1 Sec Activation. 8 Recharge.
Enchantment Spell. For 20 seconds, you have +40...88 maximum Health. When this Enchantment ends, you are healed for 75...135 Health.

cost: Excellent
casting time: Good
recharge time: Excellent
duration of effect: Good
effectiveness of effect: Excellent
overall usability: Excellent
counters: Backfire, Diversion, Maelstrom, Well of Profane
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: None

Balthazar's Rage: 10 Energy. ¾ Sec Activation. 5 Sec Recharge.
Enchantment Spell. All nearby foes take 40...88 holy damage. For 20 seconds, this Enchantment does nothing. When this Enchantment ends, you gain 4...9 Health for each successful hit while under the effects of this Enchantment.

cost: Good
casting time: Excellent
recharge time: Excellent
duration of effect: Excellent
effectiveness of effect: Holy Shit Excellent
overall usability: Excellent
counters: Backfire, Diversion, Maelstrom, Well of Profane, Kiting
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: None

[b]Aura of Thorns:[b] 5 Energy. ¼ Sec Activation. 12 Sec Recharge.
Enchantment Spell. All nearby foes are Crippled for 4...9 seconds. For 30 seconds, this Enchantment does nothing. When this Enchantment ends, all nearby foes begin Bleeding for 5...13 seconds.

cost: Excellent
casting time: Excellent
recharge time: Good
duration of effect: Average
effectiveness of effect: Good
overall usability: Good
counters: Backfire, Diversion, Maelstrom, Well of Profane, Kiting
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: None

Grenth's Fingers: 10 Energy. ¾ Sec Activation. 8 Recharge.
Enchantment Spell. All nearby foes are struck for 40...88 cold damage. For 30 seconds, your attacks deal cold damage. When this Enchantment ends, all nearby foes are Crippled for 4...9 seconds.

cost: Good
casting time: Excellent
recharge time: Good
duration of effect: Good
effectiveness of effect: Good
overall usability: Excellent
counters: Backfire, Diversion, Maelstrom, Well of Profane, Kiting
synergy: Excellent
negative effects: None

"Victory is Mine!": 5 Energy. 15 Sec Recharge.
You gain 10...56 Health and 5 Energy for each Condition suffered by foes in the area.


You can see how ridiculously overpowered it is? This is intentional. It's much much easier to tone down the power of a skill, than to buff it up.

Ways to nerf:

Increase Cost
Increase Recharge
Increase Casting time
Decrease duration (not very likely)
Decrease effectiveness
Decrease overall usability
Buff the counters
Decrease synergy
Increase Negative effects.

Lets look at an existing Core skill that kinda acts like those skills:

Balthazar's Aura: 25 Energy. 2 second cast. 25 second recharge.
For 8 seconds, foes adjacent to target ally take 10...22 holy damage each second.

8 seconds x 22 damage (at 12 smiting) = 176 damage

In about the same time as the casting of Balthazar's Aura, you can cast Balthazar's Rage and Grenth's Fingers doing 176 damage for a mere 20 energy and less than 10 second recharge.

:P Now thats what i call imbalanced!

Addressing the D/Mo issue: The synergy of CoP mixed with these AOE skills, allows the dervish to heal, remove conditions and hexes instantly at very little cost.

I dont know how i would address the CoP issue.

I also think the Dervishes aren't to Overpowered, but i seem to be just about alone on that. But with all the complaints i see i'm worried anet will RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO them up. Plus i wanted a area where people would post there idea, Instead of being scattered. I think most of the ideas are great, and if any of them do get implemented, they Dervishes will still be a nice new addition to GW. Ok thank you all for your post and not flaming >< Sorry for any of my spelling mistakes, we can let this die i guess now.

Kay, you guys are really trying to nerf the dervish into uselessness by increasing recharge time. Here's a few examples that would reduce the dervish's massive damage output, while still keeping it useful in pve and pvp.

1.) Make the energy regen from +4 to +3, like a ranger's. They would still be able to cast thier spells, just not at a faster pace for very long.

2.) Make Mysticism gain energy only. I really only used the mysticism for energy anyway when playing them, the health was just a small bonus.

3.) Make damage range of AoE spells to adjacent. It would reduce that wide range of damage, although then they would be useless in PvP with all of the kiting going on, even when they are crippled. NOT APPROVED REALLY

Now here are some other ideas that people stated that would nerf them to be much like how MOST assassins are( I know some assassins actually know how to play them. I for one am one of those few)

1.) Nerf CoP. No, that skill is mainly for monks only. Although it can be used to spike, its not really useful for Dervish Primarys in the first place. Better to use offensive attacks to strip your enchants. Nerfing CoP will only make the monk far less to survive, It's one of their main self removers.

2.)Increase costs of spells. Not really needed. When I played as one, my main combo depleted my energy quite quickly. Increasing even by 5 energy for each spell will make the dervish useless. They only have a bank of 25 people.

3.)Increase recharge times. Way to reduce their output of AoE damage, but then they would take forever to pull out thier combos. Remember how ANet stated how their suppost to play. "Dervish's are ment to be in the heart of battle." That means they shouldn't have to pull out of the battle to wait for skills to recharge.

4.)Increase casting time. [sarcasm] Yup, lets make the dervish's spells completely open to interrupts![end of sarcasm] Point stated.

5.)Decrease duration of enchants. Why? The dervish's get rid of them as fast as they cast them. Not needed really.

So all in all there are some ways to nerf and not nerf to extinction here. Think about it peeps.

I'd say the CoP idea is interesting with Divine Favor but I'd almost rather it not go that far as other classes can't nearly use, let alone abuse this like the Derv can, it just happens it works SO well within its framework its nutty - none of the Derv's own choices are nearly as good either.

I think ANet is hitting a wall - 3/4 classes get built in energy return in the primary? Huh. Think about the Dervs primary and Ether Renewals nerf (an elite skill with 7 seconds (!) to run) and reflect. And a Derv has 4 pips yet wades into the thick of it and has more hps than any class with chest armor.

Why consider w/e when you have an all in one Derv? AoE melee and chain-casting and energy return and health return? Laugh at the pbaoe ele and the w/e trying to be somebody as you down them. And that doesn't even touch on some eye-opening monk-like options with a MUCH better infuse and some very power target and touch heals.

I find it odd the Paragon seemed to be much more reasonably tempered than the Dervish. 1 energy every 3 max - relying on how effective you're using it in a group in pve or pvp, and arguably quite disappointing in solo affairs. Also their use would suggest coordination with other Paragon(s), doubtlessly.

The Derv? Up to 8 energy back an enchant, and often with effects when put on and taken off, with several at 5 energy and some at 10 energy quick cast and reasonable recharge any ele would give their off-hand focus for... not including the up to 48 health per enchant as it goes off... and everything seemed to be nearby - adjacent would have been a LOT more reasonable or you really should re-address a lot of other skills.

It is interesting as well that in a game of paper/rock/scissors there's not a lot you can do vs them effectively, and I'd have to check but its hard for me to think of any class that has a untouchable elite for a minute without a fair number of other supporting skills.

Honestly as it stands it dumbs down the game. Conditions and hexes were for the most part a joke against them (some, if few exceptions) - yeah at least the CoP synergy has to be toned way down. Personally I didnt get the 4 pip assassin initially, but I do now. But with the warrior nerf and this kind of [imo over the top as it stands] primary who wouldn't rather have a higher hp more truly aoe warrior with a heck of a lot better system of return?

Maybe it starts with CoP but I'm not sure that's the whole solution, there seems to be a lot of options even without it. It would have been nice to have this weekend without it, but it is what it is. I'll admit late last night I made the move to CoP with its AoE and Balt Form as I didnt have a lot of time this weekend with the classes - got a few glad points and most of my 10 flames that way.

There was a pattern - the team with more D/Mos usually won. Heck look at the spearman right? lol. PvP and PvE they're imbalanced monsters as it stands. I think their AoE is over the top and certainly with CoP they are an offensive and defensive nightmare. It would have been nice to see more of the Paragon talents at play but quite frankly this weekend was all about the Dervish.

LOL

Your joking right?

you all realize that this build can be done with other things besides cop, although it isnt as effective.

I said a while ago that CoP should be monk enchants only, but that wont completely solve the issue. i think it should be reworked to something like 2-5 enchants removed based on divine favor or something. that would balance that skill as it was used before on another build in the past and this subject was brought up.