Curse

Bristlebane · Feb 11, 2011, 01:44 AM // 01:44

Quote:

Reap Impurities: Scythe Attack. Deals bonus damage. Removes a condition from each foe you hit. If a condition is removed, all other foes adjacent to that foe take holy damage.

This might cause some angry party members if they don't run synergized builds. "wtf, did you just remove my aoe daze/blindness?" On other hand it will bring new light to Fragility as you can quickly apply conditions and then remove them for more damage.

Quote:

Use Aura Slicer to inflict Cracked Armor and Bleeding to your target and follow up the damage with an initial hit from Heart of Holy Flame. Get a few hits in on your foe with holy damage on their lowered armor, then strip it off with Pious Fury. When you strip off Heart of Holy Flame, your foes will be set on fire. For even more damage, wait until it almost runs out before using Reap Impurities.

Theorycraft as it's best (or worst), chances are Dervish remove other conditions while the burning fades underneath

MithranArkanere · Feb 11, 2011, 01:46 AM // 01:46

Wow. Look at that.
This must be the most positive GWGuru thread I've ever seen, the ratio of positive comments is so high that it borders creepy.

I'm not very used to Dervishes, for me they have a few skills and few of them 'usable', so I never got the knack of them.
So I won't really have to learn how to use them again, but now that I got that cool Primeval fishbone armor to show off around, I suppose I'll try to use her more.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Essence Snow

Is it just me or are they missing the fact that holy dmg ignores armor, thus getting hits in while foe has cracked armor is irrelavent.

Holy damage does not ignore armor. Most skills that deal holy damage do, it's a bit different.
Lightbringer's Gaze is an example of a skill that deals holy damage that does not ignore armor.

But since holy damage isn't physical nor elemental damage, if you have +x physical (like a stalwart insignia or armor of frost) or elemental armor(like a dreadnought insignia or Dryder's Defenses), it will ignore those, so only pure +X armor increases like those in "Watch Yourself!" or "Armor of Earth" would work against it. That the reason why holy damage is still useful and powerful even when it doesn't ignore armor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rb.widow

I would love to see this idea used for other classes aswell.

Yeah.
The first thing that came to my mind after reading about those Flash Enchantments was Flame Djinn's Haste.

Konig Des Todes · Feb 11, 2011, 01:50 AM // 01:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by rb.widow

I would love to see this idea used for other classes aswell.

Not gonna happen. Every class has at least one uniqueness to them. The Flash Enchantment is the Dervish's.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MithranArkanere

Wow. Look at that.
This must be the most positive GWGuru thread I've ever seen, the ratio of positive comments is so high that it borders creepy.

I was thinking that too. xD

I wonder how many of these comments will turn into "omg you suckz!" by the end of the week.

Lady Kaguya · Feb 11, 2011, 01:50 AM // 01:50

I can't believe they did this! And so far, I'm pleased with the results...I can't wait to try it out on my Dervish <3

Bristlebane · Feb 11, 2011, 01:53 AM // 01:53

It will be interesting to see how long time it takes for non-dervish to find means of exploiting the new skills better than primary dervishes lol ;D Maybe some adrenaline-spamming warriors will find new use in some of the skills?

Imagine skill-reducing skills like QZ, SQ, or ward, can turn new Dervish into berserker on steroids.

Ahhh, I'm not raining on your parade lol, I'm happy for seeing the new Dervish changes and would love to give it a try

Steps_Descending · Feb 11, 2011, 01:55 AM // 01:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Martin Alvito

How did this thread get to thirty-two posts without someone pointing out that the game now has an interrupt with a casting time of zero?

Enjoy getting your Infuse interrupted.

2 reasons :

1. Interupts are more important in PvP. ANd that's a PvE important update.

2. PvE already has one. ;p

EDIT : Hold on, so many thread since I started to type this!

Arieon Ito · Feb 11, 2011, 01:57 AM // 01:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bristlebane

It will be interesting to see how long time it takes for non-dervish to find means of exploiting the new skills better than primary dervishes lol ;D Maybe some adrenaline-spamming warriors will find new use in some of the skills?

Imagine skill-reducing skills like QZ, SQ, or ward, can turn new Dervish into berserker on steroids.

Depends on what else they changed with the skills, I'm staring at the Wind Prayers line and there could be some interesting new builds coming out of that. Lyssa's Haste + Mystic Twister spam with some sort of tank enchant would be quite painful for a balled up mob. And if Lyssa's Haste reduces it's own recharge time + QZ, perma-interrupt?

ajaxfetish · Feb 11, 2011, 02:01 AM // 02:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Martin Alvito

How did this thread get to thirty-two posts without someone pointing out that the game now has an interrupt with a casting time of zero?

Enjoy getting your Infuse interrupted.

It does have the limitation of adjacent range. The dervish will have to be locked onto the infuser to have a chance at this, not helping spike down the infusee. There may also be a pve/pvp split for this one, as well.

Ajax

Chthon · Feb 11, 2011, 02:01 AM // 02:01

Looks... promising. Now let's see how well it pans out in practice. SOme thoughts:

1. Just having avatars that don't include a damage-type conversion that ruins all intrateam synergy is a very good start. Now, please, please, please remember to remove the damage type conversion from Aura of Holy Might as well.

2. If the adr gain on Balth is decent, D/W may become the new top-dog SY! spammer.

3. Adr skills. Good idea.

4. Aura Slicer. Non-elite, non-PvE source for cracked armor. A lot of my warrior builds might run this at low spec with a scythe on swap. W/D following this up with Body Blow is going to be brutal.

5. Flash enchants. Good idea.

5.5. I hearby pronounce the abbreviation for "flash enchantment" to be "fenchant." Ex: "Melonni has a penchant for fenchants."

6. Tear down combos. This is the part that I both anticipate the most, and most fear a-net will mess up. To get it right, they're going to have to strike a very fine balance with recharges. Too fast and you invite broken spam combos. Too slow and the mechanic will be every bit as worthless as it is now. Too heterogeneous and people will gravitate towards a few flash enchants with the best recharge and the rest will be junk.

7. Mysticism change. Very underwhelming. It forces you into an enchant-based build, because anything else will be essentially like playing with no primary, in which case you might as well be a sin or war or even ranger and bring that primary's benefits to a derv build. Moreover, it sounds a hell of a lot like Expertise, and -- newsflash -- Expertise is not very good. It's hard to support a bar on Expertise without added e-management, and even worse if you try to step outside it for a spell like EBSoH. I foresee the new mysticism having exactly the same problems. If there's one thing that gets fixed before this goes live, FIX THIS.

8. Pious change. Brilliant.

9. Pious Assault & Reap Impurities. Armor-ignoring AoE. Good. Very good.

10.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Martin Alvito

How did this thread get to thirty-two posts without someone pointing out that the game now has an interrupt with a casting time of zero?

Enjoy getting your Infuse interrupted.

Who casts Infuse while in adjacent range to an enemy dervish? Well, this will teach you not to. The adjacent range makes me not too worried about it causing problems.

*Darcy* · Feb 11, 2011, 02:12 AM // 02:12

I will need to take my dervish out for more than Zaishen dailies and try out the new focus and skills. She was so boring to play that I stopped using her. You've made this profession sound interesting.

MithranArkanere · Feb 11, 2011, 02:18 AM // 02:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Konig Des Todes

Not gonna happen. Every class has at least one uniqueness to them. The Flash Enchantment is the Dervish's.

Other than the primary attribute and armor properties and upgrades, there's only one more thing that makes professions different: skill selection.

Warriors had adrenaline and stance removal... paragons and dervishes got adrenaline, and assassins, paragons and finally dervishes got that too. Now they have nothing unique to them.
Rangers have nature rituals, traps and pet attacks. Assassins ALMOST got traps.
Monks had maintained enchantments. Assassins got them. Now they have nothing unique.
Necromancers had sacrifices, corpse exploitations and wells... ritualists got sacrifices. Only wells and corpses are left.
Mesmers... mantras got turned into stances, so they have nothing.
Elementalists have exhaustion, glyphs and wards.
Assassins have the chain attacks.
Ritualists have binding rituals, weapon spells and item spells. They tried to put exhaustion here, but... no one likes exhaustion (well, mesmer and assassins do, when they apply it to you).
Paragons have chants.
And dervishes? They have Avatars. Yeah, the Norn blessings got turned into Forms, but I won't count skills not linked to a profession.

Well, there's also the different weapon masteries, but, you know... it's not the same.

As you can see, things can change. Things that were once unique to a profession could be in others.

If they work, I don't see why shouldn't a enchantment or two be changed to Flash, if they fit the same style the other Flash enchantments are used.

We'll have to see them working first, and then we'll see how they work and if any other Enchantment could be turned into a Flash one.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

[...]
5. Flash enchants. Good idea.

5.5. I hearby pronounce the abbreviation for "flash enchantment" to be "fenchant." Ex: "Melonni has a penchant for fenchants."
[...]

Ew...

I prefer just 'Flash', thank you.
It sounds WAAAAY better.
Look:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfmrHTdXgK4
Don't tell me it doesn't sound good, eh?

And it has a nice bonus: While you can say that paragons go around without pants yelling at people, you'll be able to say that Dervishes go around with skirts Flashing at people, which gives us a very nice GW joke that Thorn could tell.

NerfHerder · Feb 11, 2011, 02:31 AM // 02:31

We didnt get many raw numbers from the update. That's really what I was after. My initial thoughts/questions are...

Irresistable Sweep looks like the PvP monks new worst enemy. Will the new Derv replace Wars in PvP? I smell a skill split.

The new Avatar of Balthazar looks like it will have a nice synergy with "SY!". And mixed with the right skills can be extremely powerful. But, can any combination of new skills out DPS a ZV Derv? Thats the real question.

If nothing is done to Aura of Holy Might, the Assassin will still be superior with a Scythe. There was no mention in the preview, so it still concerns me.

Overall, I like the maintainable avatars, adrenaline, flash enchants, and mysticism changes. It sounds like ANet is either very clever or they are listening to the player base more than we think. I cant wait to see it in action.

Steps_Descending · Feb 11, 2011, 02:37 AM // 02:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

7. Mysticism change. Very underwhelming. It forces you into an enchant-based build, because anything else will be essentially like playing with no primary, in which case you might as well be a sin or war or even ranger and bring that primary's benefits to a derv build. Moreover, it sounds a hell of a lot like Expertise, and -- newsflash -- Expertise is not very good. It's hard to support a bar on Expertise without added e-management, and even worse if you try to step outside it for a spell like EBSoH. I foresee the new mysticism having exactly the same problems. If there's one thing that gets fixed before this goes live, FIX THIS.

I agree on the most part, but if enchants are central enough to Dervish-like gameplay and said enchants are costed high enough, the only ones who will be able to afford it are casters... maybe sin too, but with a bigger skillbar (and critical hits needed)... And last time I heard (and tryed), expertise made the difference between a ranger who lasted teh fight and one who was out of breath (or energy) half-way throught.
But I agree they better make mysticysm enchants (and enchant play in general) worth it...

Dzjudz · Feb 11, 2011, 02:53 AM // 02:53

I might actually have to buy a character slot to create my first Dervish!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

4. Aura Slicer. Non-elite, non-PvE source for cracked armor. A lot of my warrior builds might run this at low spec with a scythe on swap. W/D following this up with Body Blow is going to be brutal.

Aura Slicer linked to Mysticism, possibly with a scale that starts at 0 seconds Cracked Armor?

Konig Des Todes · Feb 11, 2011, 02:55 AM // 02:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steps_Descending

ANd that's a PvE important update.

It's a PvE/PvP update, actually.

That skill may be split though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MithranArkanere

Other than the primary attribute and armor properties and upgrades, there's only one more thing that makes professions different: skill selection.

Warriors had adrenaline and stance removal... paragons and dervishes got adrenaline, and assassins, paragons and finally dervishes got that too. Now they have nothing unique to them.
Rangers have nature rituals, traps and pet attacks. Assassins ALMOST got traps.
Monks had maintained enchantments. Assassins got them. Now they have nothing unique.
Necromancers had sacrifices, corpse exploitations and wells... ritualists got sacrifices. Only wells and corpses are left.
Mesmers... mantras got turned into stances, so they have nothing.
Elementalists have exhaustion, glyphs and wards.
Assassins have the chain attacks.
Ritualists have binding rituals, weapon spells and item spells. They tried to put exhaustion here, but... no one likes exhaustion (well, mesmer and assassins do, when they apply it to you).
Paragons have chants.
And dervishes? They have Avatars. Yeah, the Norn blessings got turned into Forms, but I won't count skills not linked to a profession.

Well, there's also the different weapon masteries, but, you know... it's not the same.

You forgot a few things. Necros got life steal, monks had holy damage and have a stronghold on healing/protection (even if others get access to it, they'll never take the monk's uniqueness in that), assassins have dual attacks (may be tied to daggers but it's as unique to assassins as anything not under the primary for every profession) and shadowstepping, mesmers got energy steal, ritualists got situational sacrifices (so necro got some uniqueness to that, plus necro sacs are mostly 1e now), Paragons also have echos, and dervishes had(have?) multi-target scythes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MithranArkanere

As you can see, things can change. Things that were once unique to a profession could be in others.

True, things can always change. But some things don't. The mechanics which got shared are very generic.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MithranArkanere

If they work, I don't see why shouldn't a enchantment or two be changed to Flash, if they fit the same style the other Flash enchantments are used.

I can only see assassins needing flash enchantments. Rangers and warriors don't use enchantments, and the others are balanced by not only being ranged but also being casters - plus mesmers and elementalists have ways to hasten their casting time.

And ele's skills are balanced with their casting time. Ritualists don't focus on enchantments.

Which leave monks.

Kunder · Feb 11, 2011, 02:57 AM // 02:57

I have very big doubts about Anet's ability to balance flash enchants on dervs. Either going to be horrible overpowered, horribly underpowered, or all dervs will use exactly the same 1 or 2 while the rest are relegated to being noob detectors.

If they just make Heart of Fury a fully maintainable 33% IAS flash enchantment I'll be happy Derv's strength.

Steps_Descending · Feb 11, 2011, 03:08 AM // 03:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Konig Des Todes

It's a PvE/PvP update, actually.

That skill may be split though.

But I think there are a lot less crying about PvP-Derv than there is on PvE side. Thats why I considered it a PvE important update with effect on PvP. But with the probably important effect on PvP meta, that might get interesting for everyone. I'll agree that was abusive nomenclature.

And I can see the 2 ele "djinns haste" spells being changed for flashes in PvE for lore value only. I guess an instant nuke+kiting stance for ele would be a bit too much for PvP.

RedDog91 · Feb 11, 2011, 03:09 AM // 03:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

I have very big doubts about Anet's ability to balance flash enchants on dervs. Either going to be horrible overpowered, horribly underpowered, or all dervs will use exactly the same 1 or 2 while the rest are relegated to being noob detectors.

and this is new to the game, how?
Every profession has a very, VERY small handful of skills that if they aren't on the build, no one wants to team with them.

Shayne Hawke · Feb 11, 2011, 03:11 AM // 03:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

I have very big doubts about Anet's ability to balance flash enchants on dervs. Either going to be horrible overpowered, horribly underpowered, or all dervs will use exactly the same 1 or 2 while the rest are relegated to being noob detectors.

Balancing and tweaking this one mechanic to fit the Live team's objectives for the dervish has taken up a fairly good chuck of of the development process. Even if we think we've got it pretty good when this update goes out, you can count on the community to find something that exceeds expectations.

But, this is usually the case with any kind of new mechanic.

UnChosen · Feb 11, 2011, 03:22 AM // 03:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Konig Des Todes

I can only see assassins needing flash enchantments. Rangers and warriors don't use enchantments, and the others are balanced by not only being ranged but also being casters - plus mesmers and elementalists have ways to hasten their casting time.

And ele's skills are balanced with their casting time. Ritualists don't focus on enchantments.

Which leave monks.

What? Eles barely have anything that improves their casting time. The only two that they have are Glyph of Sacrifice and Glyph of Essence, and both of those have severe penalties attached to them.

And most of their skills are anything but balanced for their long cast time.

Back on topic, I hope that Anet balance the Dervs carefully so that we don't once again get a scenario where they buff something then immediately nerf it to a point where its less useful than before.