Design Pattern也就是搭积木而已，也许你搭得比别人好。

BA speaks business language. What does business care? business, of course. IT is just a tool, nevetheless a necessary tool, to business. BA starts with understanding business processes, improves bisuness processes if you can (that's where one can contribute the most), extract business requirements and document them, pass it to IT ...

It may depend on which industry you are in. If it's silicon valley，may make sense stay as top notch developer. It pays to be a good BA any other places.

Just my 2 cents.