Curse

Str0b0 · Apr 18, 2007, 11:09 PM // 23:09

I disagree. I think Dervishes can tank just as effectively as a warrior. Their enchantments more than make up for the lack of armor. Conviction, Mystic Regen, Armor of Sanctity, Mirage Cloak. All these can transform a Dervish into just as effective a tank as a warrior. Of course the AI changes don't allow for tanking in the traditional sense anymore. It is almost impossible for a single character to hold the aggro of an entire mob. You might be able to hold one or two but if there are say four warriors in a mob then they will target the squishies first. I can't count the number of times I've been able to "out tank" the warrior tank by virtue of enchantments and conditions where their high armor just failed to offer adequate protection. I was left standing after they fell, an example of this was Tanhakai temple recently. The warrior tank was very good at his job and did well until elemental damage just overwhelmed his armor and tactics buffs. The same damage was almost inconsequential to me due to my enchantments. It wasn't a shortcoming on the warrior's part. His problem was simply that he did not have an adequate energy pool to continuously reapply his buffs. Mysticism and the relatively low cast time of dervish enchants allows a Dervish to maintain the buffs to health and armor almost indefinately provided they watch their status bar and allow mysticism to give them it's benefit.

ghostkai · Apr 19, 2007, 02:19 AM // 02:19

mmmmm decescrate enchantments on a derv.... *drools*

temple strike ftw?

Isil`Zha · Apr 19, 2007, 07:26 AM // 07:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by P A L P H R A M O N D

A screenie of this would be cool . . . does the 1000 have a comma after the 1 or not? Sand Shards is great against those stupid Kournan Bowmen that block everything under the sun, btw.

1) Yeah, but I didn't catch it cause I was literally playing one-handed at the time...

But it wasn't literally 1,000 on screen - my screen was quite literally filled with "-20's" It was 4 targets, I got blinded, so this is what happened:

Heart of Holy Flame = 52 damage x 4 targets = 204 damage.
Twin Moon Sweep = Missing each target twice, triggering Sand Shards 8 times - each trigger hits each target, so 8 x 4 x 20 = 640 (!!) for a total of 844.
Twin Moon Sweep rended off Heart of Holy flame, which set them all on fire for 3 seconds, for an additional 42 damage per target (7 degen = 14 health/sec x 3 sec) x 4 targets = another 168 for a grand total of 1,012 damage, just in the time it takes to hit Heart of Holy Flame, and Twin Moon Sweep.

Each additional normal scythe swing after that delt out 320 damage (4 triggers x 20 damage x 4 targets.)

It should also be noted I had Heart of Fury up at the time as well.

2) You mean these Kournan Bowmen?

I actually caught this on my first time through the mission, this was the second hit - my jaw dropped after the first one....

So I hit the screen-cap:

Note that in this screenshot I'm only level 15, Sand Shards is only doing -17 damage, and I that was from a single attack, dishing out 391 damage. (Had it been at 20, it would've been 460 damage.)

Note that this is also devastating on the kurzick ritualists in aspenwood... and I have a video of that.

Kuma_Pageworks · Apr 19, 2007, 09:29 PM // 21:29

I changed my secondary to Rt to cap a few skills in Nightfall for my heroes, then came here to see if there were any Rt builds - and it seems there's no such thing as a D/Rt.

What about having some spirits in the backfield, the same way that Rangers use nature spirits to improve performance?

Also, with item spells like Cruel Was Daoshen or Grasping Was Kuurong, it seems like you could find a way to add AoE with the dervish. Or is there just not enough comparable damage for the loss in, say, Mysticism, or the fact that you can't use runes?

LightningHell · Apr 20, 2007, 03:03 AM // 03:03

Because you can't hold a scythe while holding ashes.

Kuma_Pageworks · Apr 20, 2007, 11:27 AM // 11:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by LightningHell

Because you can't hold a scythe while holding ashes.

Well, no. But I did some practice runs with it today and if you drop and use an attack skill, there's no delay. So target, run into the mob, drop at the last second, then go Chilling Victory as an opener. Plus, Weapon of Remedy has proven a good condition remover for only 5e.

LightningHell · Apr 20, 2007, 12:21 PM // 12:21

IMO why they don't use item spells, or /Rt in general?

Because Dervishes don't need it. If you want condition removal, which you shouldn't in an organized group, you can go /Mo for Mending Touch, and save your elite slot. Item spells are kinda contradictory to your role of trying to kill stuff with your scythe, since they hamper movement speed, and the energy invested in them doesn't give a good enough effect - the only time where it's actually usable is before battle, and then you're just dragging the group down in terms of time.

Str0b0 · Apr 20, 2007, 03:01 PM // 15:01

The only real use I can see for a Rt secondary on a dervish is for the weapon enchant spells and even then those are sort of hit and miss. Other than that spirits just take too much time to set up and held items? I thought that was one of the crappiest mechanics ever introduced into the game. "I hold an item then I drop it and something happens." Dervishes just won't gain as much from a Rt secondary as t hey will from the other professions.

Whitezetsu · Apr 21, 2007, 06:48 PM // 18:48

Dervishs and Assassins are awesome characters (hence why i have a D/A) but comparing them is way off line. Assassins are stupid PvE characters and of course no one wants them in there group i dont care if your Assassin can pwn everyone in PvP, PvE is different Assassins are garenteed 200% of the time that there gonna die a dervish on the other hand is not. But you need to know how to control them. When i first started playing a Dervish all i did was die which made it very hard to complete missions. Then i went on Guildwiki to find builds cept im a particullary picky Dervish i only want to use sythe master and misticism which none of the builds consisted of. So i went on Guildwiki and made my own build. Now she is vertaully indeafetable in PvE and only dies once in PvP every attack heals here and with the combination of either Balthazar of Dwayna makes her even stronger. Also the fact that she has Assassin skills work 2. i added 2 healing Assassin skills along with vipers defense and for all you out there that don't know what that is it's an attack that when my dervish get hit she teleports to a random location and the person that attacked her become poisoned for 8 seconds. So even though their armor is 10 less armor than a warrior Dervishes are still the unltimate tanks. They are overused in nf so not alot of people want them but in Proph or factions there almost never seen so more people want them in there groups plus its more fun showing off your nf characters to people who almost never see them and then are amazed by what they can do.

h2oski · Apr 22, 2007, 10:40 PM // 22:40

Let me get 1 thing strait

When you start out in the beggining wth a derv you do fairly good dmg and until torment creature ur able to do sum pretty decent dmg (if u have a max dmg scythe). Then in the realm of torment you rely more on AoE enchantments (ie. heart of holy flame and balth rage) which can dmg the foe and heal ur self a bit at the same time (when the enchanment ends). My first char on GW was a derv and until Mallyx people wanted me in their groups. Im not saying this thread starter is wrong but you just have to explain ur build when applying for groups (ie. tank derv lfg for mission or self healing derv lfg for mission). On my derv i used AoE and Avatars for the whole nf campaign and i completed it easily (with exceptions for grand court and gate of madness). The AL isnt a problem if u have armor buffs like conviction or avatar of balth. The reason u think nobody want u in ur group is bcuz those people dont understand the type of derv u r (i always say "self healing tank dervish lfg for mission"). If they assume u can heal urself they add u and if u have troubles healing urself im sure the monks will step in.

Alucard Duskmoon · May 05, 2007, 07:18 AM // 07:18

My opinion: I think they are both underestimated and overestimated. Newbies often go, "Oh! My friend has a Dervish and he says it can kill almost anything!!! I'm gonna make one!" *I thought that at first.* When I started using my Dervish more I began to realize that they weren't the "all powerful, scythe wielding, killing machines" that I thought. They aren't necessarily "killing machines"...unless you really know what your doing. Theres a lot of people who probably thought that way when deciding to go with the Dervish but they found that they were a lot harder and more complicated to use. They have gave themselves this idea that Dervish blow after their experiences and thats how they are underestimated. Actually, Dervish can be quite adaptable. Dervish are a completely separate profession similar to melee types but in the same way different. They have a melee weapon like warriors, AOE spells similliar to an elementalist, weaker armor, deals conditions similliar to a necromancer, and has a slightly larger attack radius, does slightly more damage, and relies a lot on enchantments. Depending on how you set your Dervish it can do numerous things. D/A's can incorporate the assassians' critical hit moves with the dervish's high attack power and skills, D/Mo can increase the dervish's healing abilities, D/E can use the elementalist's earth spells with the dervish's mysticism to make defensive stats higher. These are just some things you can do with a dervish. They are a great profession if you know what your doing and have a little imagination.

Mekkakat · May 07, 2007, 03:53 PM // 15:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alucard Duskmoon

My opinion: I think they are both underestimated and overestimated. Newbies often go, "Oh! My friend has a Dervish and he says it can kill almost anything!!! I'm gonna make one!" *I thought that at first.* When I started using my Dervish more I began to realize that they weren't the "all powerful, scythe wielding, killing machines" that I thought. They aren't necessarily "killing machines"...unless you really know what your doing. Theres a lot of people who probably thought that way when deciding to go with the Dervish but they found that they were a lot harder and more complicated to use. They have gave themselves this idea that Dervish blow after their experiences and thats how they are underestimated. Actually, Dervish can be quite adaptable. Dervish are a completely separate profession similar to melee types but in the same way different. They have a melee weapon like warriors, AOE spells similliar to an elementalist, weaker armor, deals conditions similliar to a necromancer, and has a slightly larger attack radius, does slightly more damage, and relies a lot on enchantments. Depending on how you set your Dervish it can do numerous things. D/A's can incorporate the assassians' critical hit moves with the dervish's high attack power and skills, D/Mo can increase the dervish's healing abilities, D/E can use the elementalist's earth spells with the dervish's mysticism to make defensive stats higher. These are just some things you can do with a dervish. They are a great profession if you know what your doing and have a little imagination.

you can do the same thing with any other class... thats why there are secondaries.. warriors have been using all of those for years lol.

i agree, dervs got a lot packed into one little skirt, but when i play, or should i say, in order to play, i need to deal damage. in GvG/HA, no one wants some healing freak, they want damage/pressure... actual killers. i play reapers sweep, and usually some for of D/A for speed buffs/disrupting, and i go to town. sure Mys Regen is cool, and so are a lot of other moves, but i like melee for melee. not saying that to limit them, just on my own personal level. yeah, i've Sandstormed, and i've also Imbued in high GvG/HA, but its not as efficient nor (in my opinion) useful. all i can say is play what fits you best, but try not to focus on all that healing.

street peddler · May 07, 2007, 07:38 PM // 19:38

the problem with dervs that i see is that there are many "noobie" dervishes (mainly because everybody wants to try them, seeing as theyre new, which is understandable) but people dont realize that the dervish is a tough profession to play, and even harder to play well. My main problem is the names people playing a dervish come up with (3 words to sum up 80% of names, scythe, reaper, and...dervish) this isnt really a big deal, its just annoying to me.