Create your dervish

[Imperial.8471]

Hi,

 

Like probably many veterans from gw1, I miss the dervish that was my main character back then. And like many, when I saw Warden Amala and other dervishs in Istan, I hoped the dervish could come back. Some on the forum already asked for that. And most of the time the answer was "the mechanics are already in other classes" or "it's too related to human lore" or "an elite specialization at best". No one among those wishing for a come back actually imagined what the new class could be, or barely. So I made this topic so that we could try to design a dervish for gw2, in hope that if we have a good and new concept and develop it, make Anet could use that to make a new class.

 

I'll start with my ideas (long post incoming, I've been thinking about this for days)

 

# **LORE**

The main reason the dervish hasn't come back like other classes in the original game was due to the lore. The gods they draw their powers from were absent, no one knew where they were. And they are human gods, in a world were humans are struggling to keep their rank among other races.

 

But as we've seen with warden Amala, dervishs don't need the gods to actually draw their power. Dwayna, Lyssa, Melandru, Grenth have left Tyria, yet she could still become their avatar. Balthazar is dead (we made sure of that) yet she could become his avatar. Maybe more than the gods there's a link with the magic spectrum mentioned by Taimi ? Like death spectrum associated with Zhaitan could also be related to Grenth and this is were dervish's powers would actually come from ? I don't know, but we know for sure that dervish don't really need the gods.

 

As for the fact that others races don't care about human gods, is this really true ?

Asura consider the human gods are just a part of the eternal alchemy. But still a big one. Asura always look to deepen their knowledge of magic, studying dragons, old magic, etc. That some asura would try to study the gods to draw their magic seems actually obvious. No need to worship them to want to learn from them, or to want to use them.

Charr have no gods. They fought to get rid of religions. But they also look for new weapons, for ways to be stronger, to crush their enemies. And what was the secret weapon of their former human enemies ? The weapon that allowed those squishy humans to carve themselves a realm in charr territory and hold it a thousand years long ? Their gods. Who gave them magic. Who granted them their powers. The charr have no gods. But taking their enemies strength to make it theirs ? Taking the human gods powers to make the charr stronger than ever ? That they can do.

Norn worship nature spirits. They draw part of their strength from those spirits, like with their elite racial skills. And for the norn, the Six are just more powerful spirits. We already know the norn are ready to worship other "spirits", like Jormag from which the sons of Svanir draw their strength. So why some norn couldn't try to worship and draw powers from some other spirit, like, say, the gods of their human allies ?

And now for the Sylvari. They are the newborns of Tyria, curious to discover the world. They don't know much about human gods, but it seems natural for them to try to know more. Especially with Melandru being one of these gods (and the main god of dervish I think), the goddess of nature that for all they know (or knew before HoT) could have created the sylvari.

 

Humans may be the only ones actually worshiping the Six, but they can't be the only ones to care about them or their powers. And this is even more true since the end of LS3 and PoF. Well, PoF is supposed to happen long after the creation of our characters, but that didn't seem to bother Anet for the Revenant. After all Rytlock is supposed to be the first, with the black citadel very curious of these powers while a revenant MC can have these powers long before him...

 

That's all I've thought of for the lore. But I think that's far enough to introduce a new class.

 

# **Gameplay**

 

This is the hard part. Dervishs' mechanics used to be cleaving attacks and enchantments. Now all classes have cleaving attacks and enchantments are gone. Well, it can still be an inspiration.

 

**Avatars**

The special mechanic would be the avatars, and how to become them. Each avatar could be charged differently. Balthazar's would depend on the direct damage DPS, Dwayna's on the healing and defensive buffs, Grenth's on the damage taken and nearby deaths, Melandru's of alteration damage DPS, Lyssa I don't know. Once the avatar is charged, you can activate it and become the avatar of a god for a few seconds, with altered weapon skills and various passive effects. I'll expand on it later.

 

**Weapon skills modified by utility skills**

This alone wouldn't be enough to make a class. So the second part of the mechanics is the changing weapon skills. Every weapon would start with it's core skills. The scythe for instance would have auto-attack with direct damage, a blow to cripple enemies, a charge (like the cool jump of warden amala), a powerful blow, and somthing else. Then you would have utility skills altering those weapon skills. Not something as basic as thief's venoms. For instance a stance related to Balthazar that would make the weapon something hitting hard, like increased damage, the auto attack rending the armor (vulnerability), the charge knocking down, the powerful blow giving fury. A stance related to Melandru would decrease the direct damage and add alterations (bleeding for auto attack, immobilization and cripple for crippling blow,...), Grenth would be about frost and life stealing, etc. These stances would last until canceled. They would not make the dervish OP, it's more like the dervish would be weaker without them. But this is just a matter of balance. Last thing : these stances would make the related avatar charge faster

 

**AOE focused**

My last idea is to make the dervish's attacks revolve around self centered aoe. Now other classes can hit several enemies in front of them ? Then make the dervish's scythe able to hit eveything around him, at 360°, with a radius of 180 maybe (against 130 for other melee weapons). Cheated you say ? It depends on how you balance it. After all, almost all other classes have aoe oriented weapons. Necro's staff is all about that, and let's not talk about that OP thing that is the scourge, covering huge areas with aoe. Even the thief has aoe with the shortbow if I recall correctly. All long range aoe. While our dervish's would be centered on him only. Aoes would come from weapon skills as mentioned before and from auras. These are a type of skill currently underused. Only elementalists (and combos) have rather bad auras. Dervish's auras would apply to allies and enemies at weapon's range. Balthazar's aura would give you and affected allies power and give the enemy vulnerability with every hit. Dwayna's would heal, Grenth's would steal life... These auras would last a few seconds.

 

To come back to the avatars. These would last a few seconds (depending on game balance) and would kind of give the effect of the aura and the stance of the god and . Balthazar could give increased attack speed, give power and vulnerability with every hit, attack skills would be further modified.

 

The old wind and earth prayers would be renamed to remove the religious aspect (wind and earth strength, something like that). They would be traits and would give other categories of skills related to wind and earth.

 

The available weapons would be the scythe, as mentioned earlier and the staff, a more magic oriented weapon whose skills would allow to attack one target at long range with side effects around the dervish with a greater radius than the scythe. For instance a skill gathering earth around the dervish to throw it at the target, blinding enemies within a radius of 300 and damaging and blinding the target of the move. I'm not sure wether the dervish should be able to swap weapons or not since weapons skills would be regularly modified, but it needs at least one other weapon option. Dual swords maybe ? That could suit the whirling fighting style of the dervish.

 

The trait lines would be based on the old ones. Mysticism for avatars and auras, weapon mastery for weapons and stances, earth and wind prayers and one other (to get 5 lines like other classes)

 

I was about to list the skills I've thought about but then I saw the length of my post so I'll stop for now. What do you think of these ideas ? Do you have other ideas that could suit a dervish ?

[Dropdown.7460]

I'm replying just for fun and theory-crafting.

 

In my eyes, Dervish would be a Revenant Elite Spec that uses a Greatsword (with a new "scythe" skin for specialization collection). The Spec would draw on power from the elder dragons -- similar to how Herald draws from Glint -- or from powerful avatars in the mists. I would make the new utilities Meditations. They can be like the prayers from the previous game, but I would make them focused on enemy debilitation. For instance, an earth meditation that summons a sandstorm for 6s that blinds enemies every second (plus nominal damage). An air meditation that grants swiftness or superspeed to the group and slow or cripple to enemies.

 

Now that I'm thinking about it, I might go back and make the build centered around power-based damage (as we have enough condi builds as it is). Make the utilities and skills about the ability to survive and endure. A meditation that heals when health pool drops below 50% (heal skill). One that blinds like I mentioned above (utility 1). "Thorns" or retaliation aura (utility 2). Since Glint already has a swiftness, I'd say a superspeed buff / chilled condi for the "wind prayer" air meditation (utility 3). Haven't yet decided what I would make the 4th. The 5th could be a meditation that gives a burst of power for a short period of time. That or it drains resource every second, making it a risk/reward scenario.

 

I don't think we need any new classes. There is so much we can do with what we have in game already. If we're bringing back GW1 professions, Thief would have the Assassin elite spec (stances) that alters dagger main and off hand skills, Necromancer would have the Ritualist would have Spirit utilities. I suspect, as Tyria went through an industrial revolution, Paragon would have adapted to new circumstances as well. They might take up the bow or more likely the Rifle. That one might be a little harder since most classes already have shouts and/or gun options. Maybe give Guard a Rifle and give them Sigils (to be their "anthems" or "signets"?). Another option might be Manipulation to give them "command" skills.

 

I expect we won't see old classes return though. Still, it's fun to play around with what-ifs!

 

Edit: Just realized that there are new special skill types like Scourge's Punishment skills. It would be fairly simple to add Anthems or Chants as Shout-like abilities. Or even Command to the Guardian to emphasize their presence on the battlefield.

[Ohoni.6057]

Ok, my version, **every** move animation, including their Utilities and Dodge Roll, would be Whirling Axes.

[Erasculio.2914]

Very nice ideas in the OP.

 

I **really** like the lore explanation (I agree completely, the other races could use avatars as well - they do not require worship of the six gods), the focus on AoE skills, and having the weapon skills modified by utility skills. Those have been very well thought, and it's clear you spend a considerable time thinking about them. Well done!

 

I would just change how the avatars work. I think they could be combined with your other ideas, so...

 

* At the **right side** of the skill bar, but above the utility skills (so like the engineer's tool belt or the elementalist's attunement, but at the right side), the dervish would have access to the avatars of the gods. The five of them - Balthazar, Melandru, Grenth, Lyssa and Melandru - plus Kormir as one elite specialization and Abbadon as the other elite specialization. Each avatar would have no duration, like the engineer's kits.

 

* Why at the right side? Because using an avatar would modify the weapon skills to the left, and grant the dervish the primary mechanic of the profession linked to each god. So, for example, a dervish with a scythe using the Avatar of Balthazar would have martial weapon skills and have access to a Burst skill. The same dervish with the same scythe using Avatar of Lyssa would have access to caster weapon skills summoning clones and phantasms, as well as access to the mesmer's Shatter skills. Avatar of Grenth would give access to something similar to Death's Shroud, and so on.

 

* Thus the dervish would have only two possible weapons, with no weapon swap - the scythe and the staff. With two weapons and seven gods, that's 14 possible sets of weapon skills.

 

* Traits would be: Scythe Mastery, Staff Mastery, Earth Prayers, Wind Prayers, Mysticism. The two elite specializations would be the Avatar of Kormir and the Avatar of Abbadon, each adding one more god to the basic five possibilities.

[Orpheal.8263]

Why did i knew, that the very moment Anet adds any form of derv/para enemies into the game, that peopel in the forums get immediatly all their hopes up agian ,that we will eve see that stuff again in the gamem and playable LOL

 

This crap will never return in any form or way as playable class... way too much effort... even as Elite Specs thy make not much sense.

 

We have already except of spears as on land weapon paragons - they are called Guadians now.. so sooner people will finalyl accept that fact, so better.

Make yourself a Guardian, buy the GW1 paragon style outfit, turn it into a dragonhunter, there you go, your winged paragon, play with it a music insturment, then you can be with it also again a wannabe bard like the GW1 version, or just put shouts into your build..

But as it looks will Anet also implement soon some spear and scythe looking new STAFF RESKINS

 

Another sign for it, that these classes will never return (as also sadly eventually a sign for it, that the game iwll never see the implementation of proper real polearm Weapons as an own unique weapon type, what they should be like , cause classes like especially the warrior are running out of weapon options soon for Elite Specs, not really much left for them soon, that makes sense, except the Staff - however, if Anet makes naturally now out of the Staff also Pseudo-Spears, then this would naturally work for the next E-Spec, but the holdign animations would suck so much..no spear gets holded/wieldede like a staff, how our characters hold them with two hands ingame, dont want to think about these upcoming spear looking staff-reskins, beild in the hands wielded like an ordinary staff - too ridiculous to just think about that this becomes soon a fact as it looks like, when you look at what is upcoming in the future for skins from the latest patch at dulfy.net

 

Same goes for more scythe related staff-reskins that are coming