After the soon to come SF nerf and 600 nerf, there will likely be a need for new tanking builds. We may go back to old builds, like warriors and terras, but I had a Derv build in mind that might work pretty well.
General Idea:
Maintain VoW of Silence permanently - This can be done at 8 Mysticism with a 20% enchanting weapon.
Maintain Conviction - This can be done at 6 Earth prayers. PvE conviction gives +24 armor and 50% blocking chance while enchanted.
All Windwalker insignias on armor (+5 armor for each enchantment, max 4)
A shield off hand for +8 extra armor when needed.
With this simple set up so far, the build is invulnerable to spells, has a 50% chance to block all attacks, and 122 armor (once we get 4 enchantments on the derv), or 114 armor without the shield. There are also plenty of attribute points left.
From here, the rest is up in the air. I was thinking that a monk secondary would work nicely. It would grant some extra enchantments, maintainable ones, which would be nice since attempting to maintain vow of silence doesnt grant much room for casting other spells. Balthazars Spirit might be nice, since damage will still get through, the extra energy management it would add could come in handy. A zealous scythe would most likely also be a requirement of this build.
Ofcourse, this build is not going to be a completely independent tanker, it will require a little bit of help from a monk, which was usually always the case pre perma days. The monk in this case could bond the derv, some that come to mind are life bond, life barrier, and of course, strength of honor, which would give the derv another enchant plus big damage capabilities with their scythe.
As long as a monk is helping the derv out a bit, the rest of the dervs bar could focus more on damage than anything, making some scythe attacks excellent choices (zealous sweep, victorious sweep, and ofcourse standard popular scythe attacks like mystic sweep and eremite's sweep).
Perhaps a monk isn't going to help you out to much. We fear that protective spirit or spirit bond might get hit soon, but hopefully if they dont get hit too hard, either one would make an excellent spell to cast between Vow of Silence, leaving only about a second of vulnerability to spells. Spirit bond would be my first choice, if any attacks got through that were over 60 damage, spirit bond would heal against it.
Weaknesses:
-Obviously still vulnerable to attacks, with only 50% of them being blocked.
-Vulnerable to point blank aoe spells, or other aoe spells not originally targeting the derv.
-Vulnerable to non spell skills, like signets and some touch spells.
-Non spell enchantment removal, vow of silence will always be the first enchantment removed, meaning any non spell removal will instantly make you vulnerable to spells.
-Stance removal, conviction has a 20 second recharge, so if it gets removed, you might go some time without +24 armor and 50% blocking.
As always, every build has counters, and it's just a matter of knowing where it is going to work, and how to handle situations where it won't. That being said, stance removal and non spell enchantment removal is pretty rare.
So, I've provided the general idea and some ways to implement it, I'de like to hear your thoughts and ideas.
