Please boost BRD to make it competitive again

[Olor]

Don't forget that Songs +10 would be 72 more seconds of duration for Ghorn 99 buffs. That'd be pretty awesome... for pre-buffing and dropping.

ha!

Well, at least Ghorn isn't *that* ridiculous to get. If they bumped it that much I'd actually feel it was worth the effort - even if it wasn't enough to get more parties really.

[Urmom]

Don't forget that Songs +10 would be 72 more seconds of duration for Ghorn 99 buffs. That'd be pretty awesome... for pre-buffing and dropping.

Full time marcato songs!!!

[OmnysValefor]

ha!

Well, at least Ghorn isn't *that* ridiculous to get. If they bumped it that much I'd actually feel it was worth the effort - even if it wasn't enough to get more parties really.

A relic can cost less than 50m to 99.

If you enjoy the job, horn is very very worth it already, even if bard's not in a great spot.

[saevel]

The sad part is that even if ghorn had songs+10, we'd still be the underdogs w/ weaker buffs that can be dispelled, and debuffs that can be resisted.
Minuet V = atk+62, each song+1 gives add'l atk+4 (above +1, which oddly only gives atk+1.) So MinV w/ songs+10 would give atk+99. That is less than half what a Dunna GEO's Fury would give the average 119+ geared melee... People like to argue that you can stack songs, but the end result is that BRD is going to be inherently weaker than GEO when it comes to buffing, at this time. That same GEO could also toss out a Frailty and double up the atk difference. :/

The only solution is to give BRD an overhaul. Convert direct combat buffs to a percentage basis, raise the combined cap to 900, and scale it so that, in comparable gear, 2x songs = 1x bubble.

Ok stop.

There is a huge difference between static and percentage buffs. Percentage buffs are tacked on at the end while static buffs happen before the percentage buffs. Take a job like BLU/WAR that applies Berserk and Natures Meditation. Give them +100 attack (easy math to use) before and it's now 145 attack, add on Chaos and / or Fury and that number gets bigger. This is why Honor March is so powerful, that 184 buff to base attack ratchets up to some pretty silly numbers once you start layering stuff on. BRD having static buffs is a good thing, they just need to scale better with skill. Minute V should be 100 cap @900 skill and +5~10 per additional "+ song". Doing an across the board increase to the skill cap along with scaling would greatly increase BRD's offensive power in melee orientated parties.

[Olor]

A relic can cost less than 50m to 99.

If you enjoy the job, horn is very very worth it already, even if bard's not in a great spot.

I am currently holding on to all my currency from dynamis farming, but I'm more likely to go for Aegis than a ghorn at this point, unless something changes big time for bard.

[Nyarlko]

Ok stop.

There is a huge difference between static and percentage buffs. Percentage buffs are tacked on at the end while static buffs happen before the percentage buffs. Take a job like BLU/WAR that applies Berserk and Natures Meditation. Give them +100 attack (easy math to use) before and it's now 145 attack, add on Chaos and / or Fury and that number gets bigger. This is why Honor March is so powerful, that 184 buff to base attack ratchets up to some pretty silly numbers once you start layering stuff on. BRD having static buffs is a good thing, they just need to scale better with skill. Minute V should be 100 cap @900 skill and +5~10 per additional "+ song". Doing an across the board increase to the skill cap along with scaling would greatly increase BRD's offensive power in melee orientated parties.

I used Minuet as an example because the effects of both Minuet and Fury are easily verified by using /checkparam. I'm not asking for a change to only Minuet tho, or only melee oriented songs. If songs were converted to a percentage based scaling of buff effects, that would allow for continued parity with other support jobs as player stats continue to climb. The only way that increasing static values would not be a mere stopgap would be to make them insanely stronger than what any other job is capable of providing, which IMO is a "bad idea" for the record. :x Player stats will eventually outpace any sort of reasonable static value buffs, which would only bring us back to the point we're at now.

Percentage based songs = "Hmm. Should we bring GEO or BRD for this fight?" < Parity = competition for the support spot
Static high-value songs = "Hmm. If we have a GEO, then we want a BRD or DD. If no GEO, then grab a DD." < Being a support-of-support = competition for a DD spot dependent on having a support to support
WAAAAYYY oversimplified and ignoring rest-of-group job composition and most other factors, but I can see the decision boiling down to something along those lines in a LOT of situations.
So long as our final values compensate for the loss of stacking buff increases, I see zero problems with moving from static to percentage.

Heck, I believe that given the other support jobs' ability to contribute directly to damage in addition to support, then a pure support like BRD should logically have greater buffs than they do to make up for it. I'm not gonna shoot for the moon though. I'm asking for equality among supports and I believe that, in addition to increased skill caps, a conversion to a percentage basis for our direct stat buff songs would be the simplest long-term solution.

The goal should be roughly around the "2x songs = 1x bubble" mark, in comparable effort-to-obtain gear. The decision on which support to bring should be entirely based on what unique advantages each provides and not on numerical strength of buffs alone. If the numbers say that a top-class BRD with full RME can provide less than a Dunna GEO, there is simply something wrong that needs to be fixed.

Also.... ABSOLUTELY NO JOB should be balanced around assumption of possession of a certain "Ultimate Weapon". Yes, Honor March is badass. No, it should not be used as a basis for balancing the job around UNLESS they gave it to us baseline. That would be like balancing THF around having access to Mercy Stroke after buffing it.

[Shiyo]

I'm not sure why people don't also complain about the fact that a Geo can magic burst for tens of thousands of damage while providing the strongest buffs in the game bar none. Or also the fact that certain jobs like RDM can't even do their role of enfeebler on certain fights that are LITERALLY DESIGNED AROUND BEING ENFEEBLED(Maju) without a geo giving them as much macc and lowering mobs mevasion as much as possible so they can land their enfeebles to disable a mobs aura/mechanic.

The job just does not belong in the game.

Nerf geo to the ground so that other other support jobs are actually good again and stop balancing bosses around geo buffs.

[Reain]

I'd concur it seems especially generous to give Geomancer elemental, enfeebling and dark magic while Bard hasn't figured out how to dual wield.

[Urat]

I think first and foremost bard needs songs that effect pets, akin to corsair rolls.

This would probably be one of the biggest buffs to the job and make it playable again, as a LOT of the meta on quetz is certainly pet burning fights. Being able to have songs that have "pet: accuracy+" or "Pet: Attack+" or whatever would be plenty to get the job back on the party list.

[Zhronne]

Devs just posted.
Their idea of fixing bard is to add new "All Songs +" equipment in slot other than the instrument one.
Sigh...


Aside from the sadness bursting out of such a weak choice, we can at least rejoice *something* is gonna happen to BRD.
Let's just hope these new items won't be too hard to obtain.
Honor March is gonna get quite... interesting.