Guild Wars 2

This thread is a product of exam time procrastination

Anyone who played the Dervish, Monk or Paragon classes in GW1 and is carrying on in GW2 surely misses them. Since introducing new weapons will force making it viable for other classes as well, it would be best if all these classes were put together and something new designed to cater to the players that enjoyed fighting while buffing their companions and still be capable of dealing adequate damage. This would be a light armor class, using daggers, swords and greatswords as weapons. Their survivability would rely on evasion. Lastly instead of weapon switching their will be dances assigned to F1-3, switched between like Elementalist attunements, which will switch the mainhand weapons, leave offhand weapons intact.

Class Weapons

Mainhand:

Dagger- Control and condition weapon.

Sword- A balanced weapon with control and damage and mobility

Greatsword- Direct damage with evasion, lots of Breathe regeneration.

Offhand:

Warhorn – Offensive buffs[Fury, Might, Retaliation], AoE Debuff [Perhaps randomly apply Confusion with a Daze or Stun]

Focus- Defensive buffs[Swiftness, Vigor, Regeneration], Petal Rain(A Water or Light field that removes a condition and heals)

Class Mechanics

Breathe: A bar above the weapon skills which is at full at the start of combat it decays with switching dances in combat. Breathe can be restored using certain weapon and utility skills. It does not regenerate while using most weapon skills.

Dances

Dance of the Lover: Close range mode
-Dagger: Bleed and Burn with fast stabbing attacks, an attack that does extra damage per condition, another that can refresh unique conditions
-Sword: Mobile, bleeds, decent damage, medicore speed with rapier like attacks
-Greatsword: Lots of evasion and high damage with slow slashing attacks.

Dance of the Rose: Long range mode, all weapons have atleast one bleed source
-Dagger: Bleed and Confuse with throwing attacks
-Sword: Piercing attacks that sends needles of air towards targets crippling and immobilizing.
-Greatsword: High damage attacks sending air projectiles that hit multiple targets, knockdown and blowout effects.

Dance of the Snake: Mid range, atleast a Poison attack on each weapon
-Dagger: Bleed and Poison using boomerang/bouncing attacks
-Sword: Highly mobile set, throwing the blade and pulling back with ribbons
-Greatsword: Mobile set with evasion and mediocre damage with a few bouncing attacks

Utilities:

Charm: Charm the world around yourself to bend them to your favor, buff self, control enemies with dazes, immobilizes, cripples and the such.

Perfume: Create a pulsing region around self which adds bonuses to allies and penalties to targets. Similar to Banners but bonus decreases further away from the Blade dancer.

Rain: Creates a light/water field which creates a field and works like a consecration or glamour skill.

Blades: Summon bladed weapons to use in combat(Like conjured weapons)
-Killer Scythe: Large AoE attacks
-Swordmaster: Summon 5 swords that float around you and are used offensively and defensively
-Bloody Crescent: Summons a giant crescent blade to use for throwing and defensive attacks.
-Aromatic Sickle: Summon a pair of sickles to use as dual weapons which adds conditions.

Signet: Standard signet effects

Traitlines:

Lover(Power/Healing Power): Buffs attacks and reduces cooldowns in Dance of the Lover. Adds Healing effects to Charm or Regeneration effect to Perfumes. Reduce charm cooldowns.

Rose(Precision/Condition Duration): Buffs attacks and reduces cooldowns in Dance of the Rose. Adds more condition sources and control effects to Perfumes.

Snake(Toughness/Condition Damage): Buffs attacks and reduces cooldowns in Dance of the Snake. Adds Breathe on use Rain skills and reduces their cooldown.

Footwork(Vitality/Boon Duration): Endurance boost, add defensive effects to dodges, condition removal. Gain Signet cooldown effects, maintain passive effect on use.

Breathing(Breathe regeneration boost/Critical damage): Blades have reduced cooldowns, greater duration and leeching effects added. Breathe generation, overall boosts to dances specially to switching between them. Blades do more damage the more breathe you have.

Interresting, Oriental-styled class… I can see you put some thought into this one.
Curious how it would fit in with lore, though. Maybe viable with a Cantha expansion?

Edit: Added content.

At least sounds interesting

Heals:

Healing Breathe(30s): Take a deep Breathe, healing self and filling your Breathe bar. More Breathe you have greater the Heal.

Sweet Smile(Charm)(15s): Heal self and drop two conditions.

Holy Chakrams(Blades)(60s): Summon Chakrams healing yourself and using them as weapons for (30s)
1-Auto-attack throwing the chakrams(throw one, then the other, then both together)
2-Send conditions on self to target, damaging them
3-Throw chakrams bouncing them between targets and steal health
4-Block and reflect projectiles for a short while
5-Heal surrounding allies and grant random boon(Regen/Protection/Vigor)

Elite:

Master of Blades(Blades): Use key skills from each of the Bladed weapons summoning all of them at once, their effects slightly boosted(damage, boon duration, condition duration)
1- Scythe Auto-attack
2-Crescent throw
3-Swordmaster defense
4-Sickle move
5-Chakram heal and buff

Seduction(Charm): Grant retaliation to allies and Confusion to enemies, all enemies that strike you for a short while gain Confusion.

Rain of Swords: Make it rain swords around yourself immobilizing and bleeding opponents and planting giant destructible bladed weapons in the ground which inflict more bleeds on destruction.

Possible Lore

Dancers, sword jugglers, used to be no more than entertainers in courts and streets. Mesmerising and seducing the masses with their grace, aromas and beauty. However with the decline of humans they became less popular. There was little time for such mirth and enjoyment. There was a race for advancement in technology, magic and skill, there was little time or funding for them.

Near starvation and dying out, the old entertainers of man put their talents together to make their way into the battlefield, first as assassins, then as guards and finally mercenaries. The Orders noticed how important their skills can be in the battlefield and their skills were desired by the masses. And then leads into their current status.

Alternatively with the Sylvari being a young race this could be their contribution, dancing and singing is a part of their culture, aromas and scents a part of their life. Started as a pair of young Sylvari soldiers entertaining their Order/Guild members in front of the camp fire as night, their perfumes revived the tired warriors, their charm livened and mesmerised all. Over time the perfumes were shared, their movements became sharper and their talents were no longer just for entertainment and for morale. They became a vital part of the battlefield.

That does sound viable. Great imput!

The game doesn’t have enough sword usage imo.

I was sceptical at first but to be honest I like it.

One of the first concepts I’ve come across that has fairly unique mechanics and would fit in well with GW2’s fluid combat style. Also sounds like you could have some awesome graphics for the multiple floating weapons.

One thing I think you could emphasise is the aura-like Utilities you mentioned, they should be strongest closest to the blade dancer, which is where the group skill and coordination would come in, the dancers positioning would be all important to keep the groups buffs etc going.

Sounds like a Toreador =)

Jam.4521:

I was sceptical at first but to be honest I like it.

One of the first concepts I’ve come across that has fairly unique mechanics and would fit in well with GW2’s fluid combat style. Also sounds like you could have some awesome graphics for the multiple floating weapons.

One thing I think you could emphasise is the aura-like Utilities you mentioned, they should be strongest closest to the blade dancer, which is where the group skill and coordination would come in, the dancers positioning would be all important to keep the groups buffs etc going.

I liked your idea and have added it to the main post.

Seriously how much fun would it be to play a sort of dancing, fencer that supports the team?

Only thing Im skeptical about it that Seduction elite. Other than that it looks cool.

Usually I hate profession suggestions, but I actually like this one quite a bit. Not to mention it has the potential to look amazing.

I like the concept.

The only issue that I have with it is that thieve are already “blade-dancing” pretty good (animation wise) and that makes it feel somewhat redundant. But it’s a minor gripe.

I love the idea, but this becomes to close to thief, which is the most slippery and mobile class already.

RedSpectrum.1975:

Only thing Im skeptical about it that Seduction elite. Other than that it looks cool.

Yeah I felt so too, changed it slightly.

Also added more to the lore and some possible heals to my second post.

EDIT: Like a thief but no shadow stepping or teleporting, just mobile with evasion, party support and in light armor.

I like the idea of a blade oriented class that is not like the thief or warrior. However, calling the class mechanic “breathe” makes me think of that Colby Calet song of “Belly Breathe” on Sesame street. If you have kids, you know what Im talking about.

Well I was torn between Breathe and Rhythm both seemed like a decent name for the Mechanic.

Updated second post.

Yes, yes this actually looks very nice, however what exactly is “Breathe” for? What happens when it runs out? And does it regen ooc?

Or play a Dervish.

I love the theme of the class but sadly I have to disagree about the uniqueness of the class mechanic. Its a nice skin but mechanically operates like an elementalist with a resource pool instead of just straight cooldowns.

My recommendation to make it more unique is seperate the dance stances to utilities. Keep the breathe mechanic but instead of controling stance changes have it affect your overall damage. Potentially have it start at the middle and have skills that add or subtract from it. Strenuous powerful attacks could have a much shorter cooldown than other classes but lower your overall damage to use. Use frequently without rest or energizing skills you will lose potency. On the otherside build up the meter and those attacks become stronger. The meter would obviously move back to the middle when out of combat for a while. Breathe may still work as a name or maybe tempo, amplitude, poise, or grace.

I know this could be considered thief like. But I think the ebb and flow of damage being the driving force over use of skills differentiates it and would create a diffent playstyle. Coupled with several stance utilities and perhaps even keep weapon swapping but a small pool of weapons could prove quite distinctive

Do you mean dances start working like kits instead? That with summoned blades would just make the class too clunky. My idea was to fuse elements of the thief, elementalist and guardian classes to build this to get it close to the Dervish and Monks from gw1. An alternative to the mechanic of the blade weapons could be that when equipped they cause Breathe to slowly decay instead of being on a timer or number of charges and Breathe can be restored with utilities, weapon skills and traits.

Nice concept, +1

The thing is for a new class to have a chance it needs a unique class mechanic that will touch every build. Your original post has the mechanic a near copy of the elementalist. You can theme skills however you like but if the class mechanic, the archtype is not unique then the class will play nearly exactly like the other.

Having the dances work as utilites that a build could be made around vs just another form of attunements gives it a better shot of making it in.

Especially if you have the trait lines following the dances. You would likely spec down one or two of them making them appear less desirable to use the other dances.we already see this in eles, even if they should still be using all 4.

As for clunky leaving them as a mechanic I think would be clunkier. That would mean managing them on top of the summons. My proposal has you choose which fits what you want to do with your build much like guardian now and every other class. I see you tried to blend existing classes but you don’t want to just go I will take this as is you need something that ends up being its own vs pieces of several wholes.

But look at it this way. If you make dances utilities than you can keep weapon swap making it more versatile and a whole new playstyle. Opponents would have to keep up with what stance they are in but what weapon. As well as wonder which other dances they have equipped. They would be less predictable and that’s good.

Oh and consider swapping horn out. For a class themed around breathing something as strenuous as blasting a horn seems of. Maybe off hand axe instead, stay with bladed items?

I want this class

All classes need a ranged option, and the whole theme of the class is bladed weapons. With the dances and Breathe being the main mechanic it would allow the class to switch between ranged and melee freely. By making the dances utilities it would only limit daggers as the ranged weapon to be used as throwing weapon.

However I like your idea of the Breathe bar being half full all the time, switching depletes half the bar, certain skills increase it, others deplete it. Greater the Breathe greater the damage or speed of the user. Switching dances and certain attacks depletes Breathe, making the dancer out of Breathe. So the bar is the unique mechanic, greater it is more damage you do, more skills you can use. Etc.

However I still think there should be no weapon swapping since dancer wouldn’t carry multiple weapons and stuff.

Good mechanics ideas, I see you put a lot of thoughts into this, especially the change of dances stances.
I’m honestly not sure anyway with the appealing to the lore of GW2 fantasy style. It seems rather oriental and too much “flowers/fairies/manga kitten amp;skirts” style. Mesmers are already a bit “offtopic”, this one would be similar as putting a jedi into skyrim.

This bladedance sounds more like Perfumer kitten to me

What’s wrong with a perfume kitten?

I like the idea but I can’t see a Charr doing it. They’d probably see it as frilly and refuse to do it and then get cut in half. Such is the way of Charr. Norn I can see doing it, as well as the other races.

I did think of that, animating charrs for the class wouldn’t be particularly easy.