Long story short, I’m of the belief that Engineers should be in heavy armor, and that if there was any carryover class from GW1 for expansions, it’ll be the Dervish. I know it’s a bit difficult to retroactively change the armor of a class, but bear with me.
Of the classes planned and existing in GW1, most have been converted over to GW2 just fine with minor changes. All the core classes are here except for monk. The assassin is essentially the Thief. When/if we visit Cantha, the ritualist could work flavorfully as a necromancer, and mechanically the Engineer has many old rit skills. The paragon is very much the Guardian. The planned Utopia class chronomancer has influenced GW2’s mesmer and the summoner can be emulated by elementalist skills and many racial summons.
That leaves the Dervish. In GW2, it was essentially a very high-health caster in medium armor. It had the highest health in the entire game. Its class gimmick was also the application and removal of enchantments (boons) for extra effects while using a scythe.
As it stands in GW2 currently, both Engineers and Rangers have medium armor and medium health. Thus, the new hierarchy retrofitting Engineer and fitting the Dervish would be:
Heavy Armor: Warrior (high hp), Engineer (medium hp), Guardian (low hp)
Medium Armor: Dervish (high hp), Ranger (medium hp), Thief (low hp)
Light Armor: Necromancer (high hp), Mesmer (medium hp), Elementalist (low hp)
This makes every class nicely fit into a unique ‘slot’. In addition:
The Heavy Armors have Guardian at melee, the Engineer at range, and the Warrior at either.
The Medium Armors have Thief at melee, Ranger at ranged, and Dervish at either.
Considering specific skills aren’t the main point of this thread, I’m not really going to post them. What’s more important is the flavorful theme and mechanical niche the Engineer and Dervish can fill.
How does the Dervish fit flavorfully and mechanically into all this?
Essentially, the Dervish would be a medium-armor caster with a high health pool. It could support/heal with the staff (currently the niche of heavy Guardian and light Ele), it could melee with the scythe (signature weapon), and utilize scepters, foci, and other items. Essentially, it could fit the flavorful niche of an eastern Shaolin Monk and a western Monastery Monk that was the monk in GW1 when wielding caster weapons. However, when wielding martial weapons like the scythe, it would act more like the middle eastern holy warrior from GW1. Overall, it would still deal extensively with enchantments/boons, but the depending on the weapon equipped, it would have different strip effects used offensively or defensively.
Unlike GW1, however, the human gods are no longer here. Thus, fitting the Dervish into a more general medium-armor boon-affinity caster role would work great. Guardians don’t use the human gods for their magic. Dervishes don’t either. If you’re a Human Dervish, though, feel free to use the Avatar of Grenth or Blessing of Dwayna.
As for armor, once we go to Elona, I’m sure the current fashion of trenchcoats wouldn’t exist there.
How does the Engineer fit flavorfully and mechanically into all this?
Firstly, the Engineer is quite underpowered as a class altogether. Giving them heavy armor grants them a role they seem to be going for anyways. With all the traits that give them an toughness from the Shield to Juggernaut, Engineers enjoy toughness. Additionally, Engineers have a plethora of condition-skills that Warriors and Guardians both lack. Engineers would be the “condition” class of the heavies, rangers of the medium, and necromancers of the lights. With all the bombs, grenades, pistol shots, and miscellaneous traits that trigger conditions, Engineers seem to enjoy conditions. With bunker builds becoming the only niche of Engineers, the move would allow them to at least be as good as Guardians in this role while allowing them to branch out.
Additionally, the move to heavy armor would differentiate the taxed-due-to-versatility Engineers from the untaxed-due-to-versatility Elementalists even more.
Finally, the heavy-armored Engineer could use a the hammer as a main weapon that people have been clamoring for. They need a melee option, and perhaps with heavy armor, they may get the chance to take an acceptable amount of damage in melee-range without their damage being taxed so heavily.