What needs to be done to fix dervishes?

No , dont compare it to a caster , D's are not casters even thou they have spells , same applies to Sins.
Energy is all Eles need to nuke and EStorage ALWAYS gives you energy per rank , not when an ench ends or when you use X spells or something.
Soul Reaping suits necromancer name perfectly , they are not Damage Dealers but gain benefit of foe's death , now is X every some seconds but used to be ALWAYS ( and even now , is op at pve ).
You keep talking of D's as a melee casters , soz but thats your opinion and the true is that they are melee damage dealers that rely (or not )on enchants , as well sins are melee damage dealers that rely ( or not ) on hexes and/or enchants.

Rangers are not damage dealers , neither paragons are , you cant compare them to D's either. They are supporters , they have to do a lot of things and their MAIN att DIRECTLY affects that. Take out Leadership and hello , Paragons = 0 energy. Take out expertise and 10 secs later Ranger can only autoattack. But now , take out mysticism of a Scythe D ..... something happens ? erm yeah , but isnt as bad as the other profs. Why ? because its MAIN att is not as good as the other profs , thats why.

Im not arguing about Mysticism being not as good as e-management as some profs main att ( lol , its pretty clear , doesnt need to be discussed ), and im not saying that it MUST be reworked ENTIRELY ( i thought at this point you did realize it ) im saying that Mysticism should do something that DIRECTLY affects D's damage done with scythes. Not help "in some way" to e-management that "in some way" helps to use more enchants/spells that "in some way" boosts D's damage.

Making Mysticism increase scythe damage might work.

Yes, because Mesmers, Monks, Ritualists, Necromancers, and Paragons know that the only way to be useful is to get big numbers showing up every skill click.

As I said, you won't fix the Dervish by making its E-peen comparable to a Warriors.

See, I think Dervishes actually come at it from the other side of assassins, instead of from the same side.

Assassins are melee attackers that have some spells to support their role.

Dervishes, on the other hand, are melee spellcasters who have a melee weapon and some attack skills to support their role.

Now, if they were to be doing the same thing... well, you'd expect to find that one ends up doing it better and is favoured as a result, wouldn't you? This is why the Dervish needs to do its own thing, otherwise it'll either muscle out or be muscled out by whatever it's trying to compete with.

As for Rangers - they're as much damage dealers as Dervishes are. Barrage says hi. Trappers also. Oldschool Pious Assault dervish says "Look at all these lovely conditions I'm spreading around!"

Are you blind or something ? think before write and read the sentences you are quoting. Heres a hint ; keyword : melee .


Well thats the way YOU see it pal , but you got to understand that there are many other ppl that dont think so , check A and D :
- Both melee , both have spells to support dmg and debuff foes , both have same armor level , both have 2 handed weapons .... too much coincidence but if you think they cant be compared , go ahead , not my prob.

Pretty stupid to give a melee spellcaster a Scythe mastery , i dont see any other caster having a staff mastery ( and if you say "they are fighting at melee range , you are back on my side ^^ ).


Again , thats what you think and at this point i dont think it would imply "something to be done to FIX dervishes" , that would imply an almost complete rework of the entire char and skills ..... not gonna happen.


Skills description says hi ! my damage is conditional unlike any other damage dealer around !. Please dont be mistaken , a mesmer can cop the hell out of a bunch 12 foes on Urgoz like a Ranger can Splinter Barrage them but still they are not DD's . I know you see a melee using enchants and think they are casters ( like you say D are ) but they are not.
Nuker ( DD ) = Ele or a Me/E illusion sig whatever
Phys Hitter ( DD ) = W, A , D
Phys supporters = Paragon , Ranger
You wanna rework D entirely to be a supporter or a FULL melee caster ? great , good for me but as i said before , at this point , it wont be a "fix" it would be an almost complete rework.

Here's another keyword for you hybrid. Just because you are swayed by the initial marketing of dervish as a martial character through its gimmick skills does not bog down the fact it remains the only profession to be able to remove her own enchantments as an offensive means to spread AOE effects and further pressure them with scythe's damage. Having a scythe mastery does not equates dervish being a true martial profession. The same rule applies to ritualist; restoration does not mean they are in the same supportive role as monks do.

The amount of work takes to add in a few additional clauses to some dervish skills to promote premature removal of enchantments is much lesser as compared to revamping mysticism and reworking the whole enchantments. Tying dervish skills to mysticism attribute ranks is not going to help the profession either; all it does is make the profession secular as a secondary profession.

Like I said, the only feasible way is to take advantage the dervish's niche ability of self removal of enchantments, give bonuses for enchantments removed prematurely (e.g. shorter recharge of skills), tweak the end effects of short recharge enchantments (e.g. AOE knockdown).

There's just one teensy little problem with the idea of the Dervish being a PBAoE class.

Warriors do it better.

No, really. There is no synergy between mysticism and enchantments other than the fact that you get energy out of them. Guess what? Warriors with WE don't have to worry about energy. They can spam Aura of Thorns or Mirage Cloak or any other enchantment you give them more than a dervish could ever hope to. The dervish will get maybe 2 more sec of blindness out of dust cloak via runes, while the Warrior will still have his +30 or so dps. So, even under this interpretation of the dervish, there still need to be huge changes.

No matter how you slice it, dervishes suck, and until I start hearing monks saying that they want all their skills nerfed until rits can outheal them (and eles wanting their nukes nerfed so that everyone else can outnuke them and whatnot) then there's really no way to argue that changes don't need to be made regarding dervs. Like it or not, the profession exists. It should be good at something.

Otherwise, we should start talking about nerfing whatever your favorite class is, just because class balance apparently doesn't matter. Heck, while we're at it let's leave SF and ER as-is. It doesn't matter if sins are invulnerable and eles can outheal monks, since it doesn't matter if classes are balanced, right? Until dervishes have something they can do better than other professions, there will never be any such thing as class balance in GW.

By reading your post i can give you a perfect keyword ,misunderstanding .
Have a melee weap ? that weap mastery ? most skills related to a close range combat ? thats all. White liquid ? comes from a cow ? yeah , pretty obvious soz.

Dont be mistaken , you cant use the word "hybrid" here because GW is about versatile skill bars and almost every prof can go 2 or more roles :
- Omg earth ele with wards ! protection from damage , slowing foes , preventing KD , giving extra AL against some kind of damage ... hybrid class !
- Smitters ?! a monk dealing damage and killing mobs ! hybrid class !
- Ritualists can heal very well too but deal lots of damage ? damage dealers ? supporters ? healers ? nooooooo hybrid class !.
I guess i dont have to continue right ?

That is what you think , some other ppl like me dont. If you add something o rework a little mysticism you dont have to rework all D enchants , i dunno where did you get that.

True , but AoHM should be .

It wont make a great change , you are seeing it as the current way of playing of the D's , but try to make a change thinking about its lack of damage with scythe compared to others melee . Others melee main att helps them dealing damage with ANY weapon and Myst should do something like that , not help with energy to help using more ench to help boosting dmg.

No matter how many times you say it , it wont make it true , Dervish are a melee class , scythe wielders that use enchs to deal damage and weak foes ( not "weak" condition ). If you boost something related to enchants , you are going the wrong way.

Its about efficiency. It is only about efficiency. There is no reason to use a dervish over (other damage dealer). Buff dervishes and it could very well become 'There is no reason to use (other damage dealer) over a dervish.'

With 10 professions and over 1,300 skills there is always going to be a "There is no reason to use X over Y." If there are ideas that will give the dervish a niche without forcing something else out, then I'm listening, but a change that will just swap up the X and Y will ultimately end the class struggle in the exact same situation and with a degree of upset among the community.

Again, efficiency. But then again you wanted to balance everything by :

You have a terrible philosophy behind what and how to balance. You have a terrible attitude. You are very hostile and overexaggerate. You have an obvious personal agenda. You do not properly address anyone, preferring to give a passing comment followed by a rant. You are the worst kind of person to have around for any type of actual discussion. I would personally be grateful if you did not return to this thread.

Then fix them right. Anet has proved they CAN fix a class right (Ritualits)

I don't thing anyone is asking for a "Buff" in a sense of the word. One idea I can fully get behind is tieing AoHM to mysticism. this effectively knocks Warriors and Sins down a peg, without ruining the build.

I think Mysticism itself is fine, and that most people don't know what they are doing when they can just take a good hero with Patient Spirit and micro a quick spam to gain 4/5 energy. However I would not mind if they took out the health gain aspect (it is WEAK), and replaced it with something more worthwhile, but not broken.

Avatar of Balthazar has been asking for a buff for a LONG time, and I think it's about time they did it. I don't think it's too much to ask for Dervishes forms be maintainable at high ranks of Mysticism without Eternal Aura either.

Enchantment juggling was/is not a broken concept as it was poorly implemented, but if they reverted Pious Assault, shredded recharge off of skills that function like Heart of Holy Flame (you know the ones), and nerf the damage a bit, I think it would work well.

IMO, and follow me here... The damage done by a dervish with the enchantment itself should not surpass the average damage the dervish could have done in that time by just attacking. Arguably it should be lower, considering the end effects of the enchantments and the larger AoE nature of the enchantment.

I'm a huge fan of Dervishes, but I don't want them buffed with broken concepts that will make them the king of melee AoE or something, Just like Ritualist fans only wanted to be more viable at their own skills (spirits, weapon spells)

That particular example is bad, yes, but I stated it because it's preferable to the current system.

My personal agenda is that I want my dervish to not suck. That is all. If that makes me come off as hostile, I'm sorry. It's just frustrating to learn that your profession sucks and that no amount of clever building will fix that and (worse yet) that almost no one cares or is willing to change it (in fact, many such as yourself are telling me that my class should suck, which I find unacceptable; every class is supposed to be useful).

There is a very easy way to make dervishes good without making anyone else suck by comparison. Link AoHM to mysticism. Dervs would be the best melee AoE, and Warriors would still be better tanks, and assassins would still be better dagger-users. So, no, there does not always have to be a "there is no reason to use X because Y does it better".

I'm not going to comment on your opinion about my usefulness in a discussion. It's yours, and we'll just have to disagree on it.

The reason Dervishes dont do the close range enchantment spamming is because of the 1 second casting times of most of the enchantments, and their high energy costs. My fix would be to reduce these casting times to 1/4 or 1/2, and also buff Mysticism (as stated earlier in the thread) to allow for better energy management

The whole dervish design shows just how little the development team really understands their own game. The dervish was set up to be a melee/caster hybrid, from the lore and skills I really cannot see how it the original design could be anything else. Unfortunatley in Guild Wars casting and melee are fairly exclusive, you cannot effectively do both; or perhaps I should say, speccing to do only one will end up more powerful than any versatility from being lackluster at both.

The most powerful primary attributes have always dealt with energy management: Soul Reaping, Expertise, Critical Strikes. Why they would try to design another (mysticism, but this would also apply to leadership) is really beyond me. Also the clusterRED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO that was open beta should have been a huge wakeup that the conceptual design of the dervish is a poor design for the Guild Wars landscape.

On a balance standpoint, the enchantment stack/removing is terrible for the dervish. With the huge scythe criticals the dervish is already a spiky character. Adding in extra damage or effects triggered on attack skills further supports the dervish as a spike-only character. The only time this ever really saw any play was back during that avatar balth, grenth's aura spike meta, but it was quickly nerfed out. Even at other times the dervish has played a role only as a spike character, never has it been successfully used in pressure.

While a change to AoHM certainly seems acceptable, there are a couple of confounds. First there are many skills that need to be toned down, or somehow have their current form removed. Second, the general community behaves like kids and will pitch a tantrum whenever any of their toys are removed.

This is the threat. They ARE too easily compared, and if you have both trying to do the same thing, naturally one is going to be better than the other.

They are fighting in melee range - but with PBAOEs being the primary weapon and the scythe being the secondary weapon, just like a PBAOE-specialised elementalist might fight in melee range without a melee weapon at all. Nothing wrong with giving a caster a melee weapon if they're fighting in melee, and since every other physical damage dealer has a weapon mastery line, why not give them one too? Doesn't mean it's their primary role...

...just like, to use one of your own examples, the fact that Paragons have a spear mastery line doesn't mean dishing out damage with a spear is their primary function. The Paragon certainly can dish out a reasonable amount of damage with a spear, just like the Dervish can dish out a decent amount of damage with a scythe - but is it necessarily a bad thing if they can't compete with those professions whose primary role is dishing out damage with a physical weapon if that's not actually their purpose?

Either way, the Dervish needs something to be buffed - on that, I completely agree. However, I think buffing it so that it works well in its niche will be better both for the game in general and for the Dervish in the long run than buffing it in a way where it might kick something else out of their niche.

I guess you are the one who has a misunderstanding here. Dervish is a hybrid by its mechanics and functions, not skill builds. My monk can go ROJ for damage but does that define monks as a hybrid profession? No, because its underlying mechanics still proves that it is a support profession. The only profession comparable to dervish in terms of similar mechanics is ranger.

If you think reworking a primary attribute is a lighter workload then you obviously have a huge oversight that people are not going to play as a 'stacker' and abuse it till its broken. Mysticism is fine as it is, the skills are just too mediocre for any synergy with mysticism to be seen.

The only reason why 'casting and attacking' play style seemingly impossible because given the current skills, the only enchantments used are the supplementary ones (e.g. HoF, Attacker's Insight). People just successively cast their enchantments before attacking in order to fully utilise the enchantments' duration. If there are specific bonuses for removing certain enchantments prematurely, a definite change of playing style will be seen as they will start using a mix of both complimentary (e.g. Dust Cloak) and supplementary enchantments; intervals between each cast will be spread out.

Basically, in the current Dervish meta you can either use buffs that you want to keep up for as long as possible (AoHM, Heart of Fury) or play the PBAOE enchant-strip-enchant game. The... adjustment of Pious Assault nerfed the second form pretty thoroughly. (I say "adjustment" because ANet honestly thought it was a buff - they thought they were improving the Dervish by providing another option for non-elite Deep Wound and apparently missed the effect it had on other builds.) You could try running a hybrid between the two strategies, but that requires a degree of care and skill (especially when there's the possibility of receiving enchantments from an external source as well) that just isn't sufficiently rewarded in the end result.

If some of those enchantments that you'd otherwise want lasting their full duration had at least granted better benefits (or less harsh drawbacks) for stripping them off, maybe mixing the strategies would be more viable.

spellcasting mechanics is much clunkier than physical mechanics. this is why a character based on casting enchantments, and then forcing them to end with attack skills, will be inefficient. too much time would be lost in the casting, recasting, and aftercast times, that they'll always lose their targets due to simple kiting.

it would be nice for mysticism to actually do something useful. the energy/health gain is quite pathetic atm. Also the main gimmick :spamming enchants is not very useful when there are many enchant stripping mobs (like some high end pve areas) and can even make you die faster...

Wrong , you still lack perspective , did i ever say roj ? man monks have a WHOLE att line ded to damage ( and do damage while doing other things like prevent them ) wich is smitting prayers. Dont make same mistakes again no one said BUILDS , i said WHOLE ATTS .
For gods sake read yourself , compare Dervishes to Rangers ? in what world pal ? same armor and ..... nothing else ! . A hybrid here would be 50/50 and D's are nowhere near that , if D's are hybrid , Paragons , Assassins , Ritualists , Monks , Elementalists and Mesmers are too . Read meaning of Hybrid , a Support can be also a Hybrid Support , it has nothing to do with the functions you see on the paper , it has to do with the things they do ( whole attrib lines ) ingame and the WAY they do it ( builds and skills ) because THAT is reality.

Mysticism would be fine FOR YOU as it is but many other ppl dont think that , can YOU understand that ? . The fact is that no matter what you say , D's now need a boost and is NOT because their enchants dont do damage , is NOT because they dont have e-management .... is because COMPARED to the profs you have to compare them with ( the other 2 melees , yes wake up ) they LACK DPS . Whatever the damage it comes from , it doesnt matter and another fact , if YOU say that Mysticism is right then enchs dmg now are right ( because boosting PbaoE damage would be stupid ) the ONLY way to buff them ( and not the other scythe wielders too ) is BOOSTING in some way their main att by affecting damage done with Scythe at melee.

Yeah , we know how dervish work , now READ moriz and stormx . The thing is that no one is saying here D's should die , instead they are bringing up their flaws and trying to make them less bad or a little better , but DENIAL ....... that doesnt help pal , not at all.

Not in my (PvE) experience... when you could use Pious Assault. If you're forced to use something like Signet Of Pious Light, however... yeah, your target is probably gone by the time the signet is done unless they want to melee you.

This is probably where effect-on-end enchantments would come into play as cover enchantments - make it so that stripping enchantments from the Dervish is actually dangerous. An improvement to Mysticism - that is, improving it in its current form rather than reworking it - could further serve to keep a Dervish laughing in the face of enchantment-strippers.

Interesting..."50/50" seems to be missing. From what it says here, all you need to do is be "composed of elements of different or incongruous kinds". Casting spells and dealing melee damage? Seems to fit the definition quite well.

What part of "DAMAGE ISN'T EVERYTHING" is so hard to understand?

The reason this thread exists in the first place is because Dervishes are crap at dealing damage. That's clearly why you're complaining so much. If they suck at damage dealing, why are you so certain that they're damage dealers?

If Dervishes could PBoAE spam deep wound, bleeding, burning, and blind and do it effectively and quickly, while still dealing moderate damage, how is that not useful?

Dervishes are comparable to Rangers because they are not built as primary damage dealers, but at mass utility. Dervishes should be better at mass utility because they're doing it at melee range.
No, you're the only one that's in denial here.

Dervishes being crap at damage != Dervishes being dead. There are 6 other classes that are proof of that fact.

Just because you want your dervish to spam huge numbers doesn't mean that's the only solution.

Don't forget weakness, cripple, stripping enchantments from enemies, and healing allies. Now, some of those may not be powerful enough in their current form to be worth making a build around, but with such a variety of skill effects it seems obvious the Dervish was intended to be more than just a damage dealer. Consider the way some Dervish mobs behave - Margonite Reapers, for instance, present at least as much of a problem from the support they provide than from the damage they do themselves, and the well-known orders dervish is just taking this principle to the extreme.

Like i already told you before ( i dont know if you even bother to read ) then Assassins are Hybrids too ( fits the definition YOU just gave ) and for YOUR general definition , E , R and M are Hybrids too . it has no sense to go on this way because the way YOU call them isnt gonna change anything and you cant use that definition to argue anything.

I never said so dude , ( again , read and understand ) , the FACT is that if you BOOST its scythe damage tied to mysticism you will fix something ( direct damage ) that will help to rise D's a little bit because YOU ( yes, once again ) said that melee spells and so on are fine as they are NOW. So whats the prob ? you are agreeing with me dude.

Im not complaining lol , you are getting it wrong. I already told you that they dont HAVE TO be damage dealers , they have to deal decent damage with its weapon compared to the other ones that use it ( again , read and understand ).

Good for you , did i ever said that it wasnt USEFUL ? please remind me. The fact is that THIS thread is about ppl that DONT think its enough
, and if you disagree , feel free to leave mate.

Thats the way they are NOW , and doesnt mean thats the way they should be ( gosh , please read carefully before quoting ). If you like them now , dont waste your time on a thread that is proposing things to "fix" something that you dont think that needs to be "fixed" . Easy.

Dont make up things i never said and answer them , its pointless. My Dervish to spam huge numbers ? oh pal , you are totally wrong .
Now i ask you , what part in the thread title says that this "fix" should go on the melee spells of the D' ? . People here is saying multiple things , if you dont like it , but dont try to throw things down because you dont like them. Dont like my fixes or anyone else ? good for you , bye .

This is quite ridiculous. If we're talking damage, dervishes need a buff just as much as any other attacking profession (I'd vote ranger needs a damage buff more than anyone else). Sure, dervishes arent exactly unique, but its hard to be after warrior and assassin.

Most of you sit here and compare melee professions. But most of you fail to realize all armor-affected damage becomes cut by alot in HM (I dont know how a dervish's damage could suck with AoHM &/or asuran scan). Doesnt matter if you use a scythe or axe or whatever.

Speaking of scythes, another point most of you fail to see is that any/D scythes dont have the option of runes. Because of this, a sin or a warrior's scythe dps is never significantly larger than a dervish's, given AoHM+scan is up.

Most of you are also confused as to what a dervish is supposed to do in a party. But the thing is, when it comes down to simple frontlining, there isnt one melee profession that does things significantly different than others. A warrior may have armor, but in large mobs, the sheer amount of hits can drain a healer just as fast as a sin or dervish (keyword:healer). Prots come in handy here. With prots, you can forget the tank mentality when bar building (especially if it cuts your damage down), and the frontline can actually kill something. Case in point, do as much damage as you can, and make sure someone can prot you all the while.

Im not going to even mention PBAoE for dervishes.

Assassins are not designed to cast spells and do melee at the same time. They are either spellcasters, or melee characters.

Dervishes are geared to do both at the same time.

Uh...no, I never said melee spells are fine. They take too long to cast, the change in Pious Assault stopped the spamming of their effects, and right now too many of them are just "deal damage when cast" instead of giving decent utility.

So how are you not saying that you want dervish to be better damage dealers?

You want their scythe DAMAGE to comparable to classes that exist solely for DAMAGE.

Dervishes deal plenty of damage, when compared to Paragons and Rangers. Why do they need more?

How can it "not be enough" when they don't do it at all?

Dervishes suck at utility now because of casting speeds, energy management and lack of enabling skills.

Right now, all they can do is damage - damage that is crap compared to other characters.

Dervishes could be doing things that other classes cannot, so why not let them do it well?

As I said...they aren't that way now.

I don't even know what you're trying to say here.

This thread is about "fixing dervishes". Not "fixing melee damage".

Increasing melee damage does absolutely nothing to fix anything. Either dervishes become stronger than assassins and warriors, or remain weaker. That's it. Either way you still have something being broken.

lol fixed...

The way I see it, dervishes are designed to do three things.

1) Scythe stuff. Hit things with a blade on a stick.

2) Be a walking bomb. Enchantment damage, AoE effects, all of that.

3) Give a scratch on the back. Heal the party and themselves.

Currently, though, the scythe is failing, the walking bomb is awkward, and the backscratcher is using other professions instead of its own.


My bundle of potentially imbalanced suggestions?


Improving the Stick


Buff Mysticism skills.

Heart of Fury and AoHM have been mentioned a lot. Make them maintainable.

Change Eremite's Zeal to an offensive skill. Give a damage bonus to your next attack based on the number of adjacent opponents.

Pious Fury- Change function to avoid being incompatible with HoF. For example, "for 2...5...6 seconds, you strike twice with non-skill attacks." Still a short duration buff, allows you to spike when your attack skills are still recharging.

Remove the skill disabled function on the avatars. Let's face it, with Eternal Aura, we can keep them up forever as it is. Let's just simplify it. Buff a few avatars in different ways, reverting Grenth, for example.

Meanwhile, play with a different function for Eternal Aura, perhaps? Maybe something that reduces the cost of enchantments targeting you? Or an enchantment extension skill?


Building a Bomb

Change some skills to be more in line with Sand Shards to make bombing more fun. Ideally, we should be able to do what Varesh did. Make areas explode.

Possibilities?

Functional changes:
Aura of Thorns- "For 30 seconds, Aura of Thorns ends early if you use an attack skill. When Aura of Thorns ends, it creates a zone at your location for 10 seconds that deals X damage each second and cripples nearby foes."
Staggering Force- "For 30 seconds, Staggering Force ends early if you use an attack skill. When Staggering Force ends, it creates a sand storm at your location that deals X damage each second for 10 seconds to nearby foes."
Grenth's Aura- "For 30 seconds, Grenth's Aura ends early if you use an attack skill. When Grenth's Aura ends, it creates a zone at your location that deals X cold damage each second for 10 seconds and inflicts Cracked Armor on nearby foes." Death comes more swiftly, helps break down the front line troops.
Rending Aura- "For 30 seconds, Rending Aura ends early if you use an attack skill. When Rending Aura ends, it creates a zone at your location that removes all enchantments and prevents nearby enemies from being the target of enchantments." Mini Well of the Profane, anyone?
(E) Grenth's Grasp- "For 30 seconds, Grenth's Grasp ends early if you use an attack skill. When Grenth's Grasp ends, it creates a zone at your location that deals X cold damage each second for 10 seconds and inflicts Deep Wound on nearby foes."

Taken together, these should let the dervish erupt into a point blank area nuke, or to augment his scything with a quick cripple or bomb here and there. Of course, scattering applies, so he'll have to be careful.


Playing Nice With Friends

And finally, healing.

Perhaps to distance himself from the monk and rit, the derv should focus on healing from a different perspective. And given that he already tries to be the area effect attack and area effect bomber, why not an AoE healbot?

Faithful Intervention- All allies in the area cannot loose more that 10% of their maximum health in a single spell/attack. Ends after X number of attacks. Dervs have the whammo vibe through and through, so give them the lovechild of Watch Yourselves and Protective Spirit.
Imbue Health- Same effect, but applies itself to all allies in the area, centered on you. Stay alive, and help your close friends do the same.
Watchful Intervention- Same effect, but applies itself to all allies in the area, centered on you.
Dwayna's Touch- Spell. Heal yourself and all allies nearby/in the area for X health.
Mystic Healing- All nearby/in the area allies are healed X for each enchantment on you, maximum Y.
(E) Pious Renewal- Turn it into a short range heal + hex/condition removal effect to bolster the entire frontline.

Make it so having a dervish in the front of the party actually helps the healers, taking the pressure off of them as the holy zealot keeps the warriors or assassins on their feet.


Balance, as usual, might be a bit off, so tweak as desired.

Interesting suggestions, Shrike.

Any buff to AoHM should be tied to Mysticism, and possibly even nerf its use for professions without Mysticism (although it should still be usable). A possible alteration could be to make it 15 seconds plus one for every rank in Mysticism, or 20 seconds plus one for every two ranks.

Regarding your Building a Bomb suggestions - I think you may be overestimating the value of PBAoEDoTs. The Dervish could probably use a few more, but some improvements to the instantaneous nukes might be better than going overboard on them. Making them synergise better with Mysticism may also be a big help.

False , while you are casting you are NOT attacking and sins spells affect directly to combos , hell , there are some combos that CANT be achieved without Hexes. D dont get NOTHING by using a scythe under X enchants that any other prof wouldnt get and you know it.

No no no no noooooooo no , skillful misunderstander noooooooooo. For the 20th time NOOOOO. I dont want them to be damage dealers , i just say that they should be better or get some benefit the other scythe swingers dont have and the only way is MYSTICISM for god sake this is like talking to a wall.

That is YOUR opinion , many ppl dont think so and thats it . YOu dont like that ? fine , but it doesnt mean we are wrong. Period.

You are talking like I was a D QQing for not being a damage dealer and you couldnt be more WRONG . God dammit you are talking like melee damage wasnt part of D's Task and IT IS , and one of the 2 main tasks no matter what you say.
And yes , it wont fix anything because NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT FIXING MELEE DAMAGE. What im trying to say is that its melee damage has to be better or different or have SOMETHING that DIRECTLY affects it that rest of scythe swingers dont have. I dont know how many times do i have to say this , i thought it was easy to understand but im tired of throwing words to a wall . Theres a big diff between underpowered , weak , decent , not bad and totally overpowered. You dont seem to get it so GG dude , you win .

The benefits of 16 scythe mastery versus 12 is that your damage rating is 100 instead of 92. The bonus is miniscule, especially when compared to the benefits of Strength and Critical Strikes. W/Ds have something like 30 dps on the dervish.

Also, the problem isn't that people are imagining the dervish wrong. They can't be for the purposes of this, because no matter how you imagine them, the warrior and assassin beat them. Scything? A/Ds and W/Ds win. Tanking? Once again, dervishes lose. Enchantment spamming? The vastly superior energy management of the W/Ds and A/Ds far outweighs the slight bonuses a dervish gets via runes. No matter how you look at it, the dervish is inferior.

Dervishes are fine, have been fine, and (should) continue to be fine. Stop making these threads.

Room for improvement is there, in mysticism skills (alot of them are very weak and not worth slot on a skill bar), and wind prayers (far too many cripple/increase movement speed skills).

Also..the mysticism effect..the energy gain is VERY good, if you dont play derv for energy gain on enchant ending, you shouldnt play it at all. However the health gain upon enchants ending is very weak and unnoticeable. It may as well not be there at all..maybe fix the 'health gain' effect to be something more useful.

You think dervishes should be able to do more damage with scythes? lol? In pvp i can already kill casters and low armor professions in 3-4 hits (if my spike doesnt do critically LOW damage-big damage range on scythe). Any buff to dervishes scythe damage would be extremely overpowered in the hands of any player who isnt a total newb.

^ btw this is not as much of a noob-friendly profession like warrior or assassin, you cant press 123 to get past every obstacle. There is a steeper learning curve to playing this profession (effectively).

What are dervishes the best at? Mine is quite good at everything (besides things like spirit summoning and minion raising..)

p.s. pbaoe knockdown on short recharge enchants ending would be ridiculous - are you serious? imagine using it twice in a row (casting it and waiting until recharge time is up...removing, recasting, removing) it would be like grasping was kuurong in enchant form..way overpowered

First off, i do not play a Dervish, so it is hard for me to understand if there is actually something broken or not; mainly because die-hard dervishes say there is nothing wrong with them, where others claim they are not even worth a character slot...

Problem?
But, if it is indeed the case that R/D, W/D and A/D using a scyth are better at Dervishing then a D/* is with a similar build, then clearly something is 'wrongish',

Analysis 1
as i would emagine the primairy profession to be the better at using its skills, then using these same skills as a 2e profession
(this is mainly how i understand the Prophecies professions to work) ...

Analysis 2
Then it is also the case that, as a */D, you can't get the attribute beyond 12-ish, where a D/* would be able to get said attribute to 16+, if anything, this should make the difference between damage/effect output of the skills used.

Analysis 3
Given the Scyth is the weapon for the Dervish, i would conclude that the primairy attribute 'mysticism' (not available for */D) should give a buff to the Dervish that makes it better at Dervishing; From what i read in threads sofar, this should be Scyth using and Enchantment Jugling (casting/stripping) *correct me if i misunderstood*

Solution Scythbuff?
Sofar i understand weapons to be mainly the same in set-up, meaning, all melee weapons have similar buff upgrades, as do casting weapons; so i see no real need to make a Scyth a different weapon in relation to its use... Each melee weapon comes with a set of skills and the upgrades used are largely depending on the players preferences, and in some cases the preference for the build this player runs (be it vamp/ zeal/ penetrating/ damagetype) ... From this i would say giving the Dervish a buff to Scyth damage output on say mysticism, would make it viable to also add this buff to say Tactics for using a melee weapon as a worrior ... or a buff to the damage of Axe/Sword/Hammer's, depending on the lvl of the attribute (which to me sounds silly, as this relation is currently allready there, through the skills in the attribute catagory) ... so, /not signed for buffing the Dervish in this way..

Sollution Enchantment buff?
The Enchantment Jugling then becomes a way to buff the Dervish, if indeed the current jugling is 'broken'; unfortunatly i lack experience in dervish use to know if a buff here would fix things. But since the Mysticism attribute is currently related to this jugling and the bonus to this is related with HP/E management (which indeed makes it a harder profession to play, and perhaps not the best choise for a newer player, but it could be the next challenge for a long time Warrior). A Buff here might be viable ... But, as this is HP/E management this will not solve the Damage Output 'problem' as is currently put forth as the main problem, in relation with 2e prof. */D Dervishes.
** So perhaps the Dervish needs some more Enchantments and or strips to further its speciality in this damage/buff niche?

Solution Attribute Points
So from this i must conclude that if there is truely something wrong, the sollution must be found in the scaling of effect/output of the skills related to the attribute lvl. As apparently raising your scythmastery to 12 makes it to powerfull when being used as a 2e prof. To me this would mean scaling down the effects/output for <12 attributed, and keep the 12+ as it is now ... Mainly meaning a Nerf to the 2e prof. /D builds;
Kindoff disappointing to me to draw this conclusion, as a Buff sounds way more positive then a Nerf; but from this analysis i can't find an other simple way to give 'Dervishing' back to the Dervish, in relation to the */D builds that are said to outdervish them...

thank you for your input Arghore. I too have been thinking there should be a more significant difference in damage between attribute levels...a 12 attribute should not have comparable damage to a 15 or 16 attrib..or so it seems to me.

Those two would be plenty for me. The former because I'd like to not have to have Attacker's Insight stapled to my bar rather than having anything resembling Energy Management from a primary that's supposed to be all about it...

The second is variable. Any IAS that doesn't suck would be just fine, honestly.


I'm confused by your objection here... Tactics is a bad example, since it's not the warrior primary. Strength is, and it DOES buff sword/axe/hammer (as well as everything else, including scythes... that's part of the issue...) damage...

W/D isn't strong because of it alone. It's strong because of the suberb energy management of Warrior's Endurance and skills like Power attack which deal twice the damage of normal scythe skills. Strength has very little damage boosts, albiet, it helps a lot on high end areas.

Sorry, i tried to make a funny with some sarcasm, the should have been the givaway

Hmm, well the Warrior is the melee weapon specialist so it having a buff on using melee weapons sounds sensible; but there i would have to say im not much of a warrior either ... I have tried for a N/W in RA to many times to say it's pretty hard, and for some reason ppl start leaving the team when they see im trying for such a build ( ); in the correct group there should be posibilities for the N/W though; but asto not getting tomuch off topic... this means im not very familiar with the Strength attribute...

I would guess with Warriors endurance and a zealous one could get some decent energy going that would make for some medium casting abilities, but with the attribute nerf <12, damage from scyth related attacks/skills should be less then the Dervish, whom would be able to run these attacks on 16+

Then again using warrior skills with a Scyth should still be viable way to do alot of damage... the warrior is not a dervish, but a dervish isnt a warrior either ... from their background they sound somewhat like a jack of all trades, whom can never realy be a specialist in anything ... Enchantment jugling, with decent scyth mastery and melee bombing on the side, does seem like somewhat of a speciality niche though...

A warrior with a scyth should do warrior damage with a melee weapon, i guess if a dervish isnt a warrior, damage the dervish does with a melee weapon could well be less then a warrior; but then a warrior isnt realy suited for bombing and jugling enchantment, or are these skills also available to W/D ?!? (sigh hard to comment on these things if one isnt to sure what one is talking about, and can only relate to the main concepts and not all the in's and out's of every skill out there )

**I would guess modifying the scyth's attribute for the <12 could be a good first, to see if this would sort things out and keep things balanced, after that perhaps some skills need to be tweaked to get the odd combo back in line ... so the dervishish can atleast be dervish again, without turning into Superhero's

According to the nameless reaper, yes - the W/D has "more energy than (s)he knows what to do with thanks to Warrior's Endurance." I'm skeptical, myself (even WE with a scythe has a limit, time spent enchantment bombing is time not spent swinging the scythe to get energy out of WE, and the Dervish has Zealous Vow to be able to do the same thing and Mysticism on top of it) but it's probably true that the W/D can at least cherrypick the best of the bombs.

Lately I decided to pick up my old Dervish. Running Vow Of Strength and Aura of Holy Might feels the same as running w/d (d/w complete with SY). Same damage ranges with just those two as the warrior with aura of holy might + Asuran scan.

The W/D won't find themselves effectively having no elite as soon as Cracked Armour or Bleeding gets thrown, however - a lot of builds rely on various conditions to keep the enemy honest.

Give me a PvE Dervish build that doesn't involve one of the following skills:

WS, AoM, AoD, GftE

And I will give you a build for another profession that beats it in every possible way.

Mysticism is pathetically weak when it comes to energy management. You'll only be able to break even on a 5 energy enchantment with 15 Mysticism. Granted, there's also enchantments from other characters, but consider this: in real play, the more you spam the good enchantments (10 or 15 energy), the more energy you lose, because you'll still be losing 5 or 10 energy per casting. 4 pips of energy regen simply does not combat that. But you know what does? WE. Critical Strikes. Sure, you can keep up if you use zealous vow, but then you have to wonder where all the attribute points for your enchantment spamming will come from. No matter what a dervish does, they're screwed. The competition beats them. Scything, enchantment spamming, tanking, you name it.

Dervishes would be ok if it weren't for the fact that other professions can use their own skills better than they can.