Ninja Bard nerf?

I got the same numbers as well when I did tests.

Seriously try do PT etc doing stuff in game and no one complain about BRD nerf, I have done WP SR no problems in rush runs as it is now. Calm down BRD is not on the top of the world alone, we do things together as we should do as a support job.

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Originally Posted by Ruddi

Seriously try do PT etc doing stuff in game and no one complain about BRD nerf, I have done WP SR no problems in rush runs as it is now. Calm down BRD is not on the top of the world alone, we do things together as we should do as a support job.

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In your very own world, are you queuing as a support role also? or.... it s the same as in ours?

Quick test (10 non-crit shots on a dummy) indicates it is probably a tooltip error:

Heavy shot (150 pot): 208-226, average 216.5
Straight shot (was 140, now 130?): 193-212, average 202.3
Bloodletter (was 150, now 130?): 208-227, average 215.8

Don't forget that flaming arrow got fixed too. In 2.0 it always did crit (1.5x) damage, and now it does the stated 25 potency.

No I do want to be the best DPS as BRD and same time use support abilities but one have to choose and BRD is wanted for songs as first then DPS as second. Surely I got enmity over BLM many times but a equal geared BLM as me would blast my DPS away and because I help the casters damage with song.... So what BRD is still awesome as so many other classes in their purposes.

@Ruddi "BRD is wanted for songs as first then DPS as second."

That's 100% correct. It's a support job.. but NO ONE playing bard supports the party. I've only ever seen 1 bard the whole time i've been playing refill MP.. and not even on a regular basis.. probably hit the button on accident and forgot about it.

All bards want to do is spam aoe and high powered moves on targets the tank isn't even hitting even with marks.. Never met a good bard.. ever. Maybe this nerf will bring your head out of the clouds and help you realize what you should be doing.

That is because the best support is killing the mob faster, stop your anti Bard crusade you just look like a scrub. You don't even need songs in this game so you should be looking at what you are doing wrong needing them.

WHM/SCH/PLD doesn't need MP. Got it. Sorry I was under the impression that having MP to heal or Flash spam was good for speed runs was a good thing. Guess I was wrong. My apologies.

If MP is needed on t-4 or 5 it is played, there is no wiggle room or else everyone wipes and all eyes are on the bard. Anyone will learn that quick. If you want to play foe with mages in the party go ahead, there is no problem if you don't it is not a big deal. Please tell me where you are starving for mana outside of coil. I've done solo WHM heals on Titan that didn't need a song, if you are complaining about WP SR's...yeah who cares that is not even important content just a means to get tomes -faster-

The problem I have with this supposition that "BRD should do less damage because it has songs for support" is that it's a mechanic that's literally already built into the class.

Its speculated that the ninja bard nerf's were just tool tips that were corrected and not an actual nerf. There is no real change in brd dps. If you see a slight loss of dps it was because of the cross class changes but I have a full DL Zenith Brd and I don't notice a difference in dps honestly.

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Originally Posted by Whiz

Its speculated that the ninja bard nerf's were just tool tips that were corrected and not an actual nerf. There is no real change in brd dps. If you see a slight loss of dps it was because of the cross class changes but I have a full DL Zenith Brd and I don't notice a difference in dps honestly.

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Well they "fixed" Flaming Arrow and that wasn't mentioned in the patch notes. It now does its stated potency instead of 1.5 times.

One thing I noticed and mentioned to my FC when I was on my BRD last night before logging (meaning I didn't get a chance to test it) was that the level-38 skill "Barrage" seemed to have changed. If I am not mistaken, pre-2.1 it read "Increases the strikes per auto-attack to 3". Now it reads "2" instead of "3".

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Originally Posted by Prometheus1st

One thing I noticed and mentioned to my FC when I was on my BRD last night before logging (meaning I didn't get a chance to test it) was that the level-38 skill "Barrage" seemed to have changed. If I am not mistaken, pre-2.1 it read "Increases the strikes per auto-attack to 3". Now it reads "2" instead of "3".

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That was always the case. Bards have a trait that increases it to 3. They get it at level 50 I believe.

The dps nerf is noticeable, but it doesn't make the job useless. However, I feel I'm gonna skip using my Bard for 4 man content. It seems much more appropriate for 8 man support now.

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Originally Posted by LobsterBisque

That was always the case. Bards have a trait that increases it to 3. They get it at level 50 I believe.

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Thanks for the heads up. I wasn't sure.

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Originally Posted by Zartan

WHM/SCH/PLD doesn't need MP. Got it. Sorry I was under the impression that having MP to heal or Flash spam was good for speed runs was a good thing. Guess I was wrong. My apologies.

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I laughed. In 4 man content, almost NEVER should a Bard be using Mage's Ballad unless the WHM is under 50% MP in a boss fight or Holy spamming...the DPS drop isn't worth it otherwise. PLD doesn't need MP if the DPS is killing the mobs fast enough. Plus they have a combo that gets back MP, albeit by the time it reaches the point they need to use it, you're probably down to 1 mob anyway. SCH...if they run out of MP they're not doing it right.

Again, in 8 man, the same rule applies. Hell, due to the way they set up stacking of classes now, the only place Mage's Ballad will really be required is during boss fights, and again only for the WHM.

At this point Mage's Ballad is reserved for WHMs, just like how Foe's Requiem is reserved for BLM. Every mage class (and PLD) can restore their MP effortlessly except for WHM, which is why I say this.

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Originally Posted by Zartan

@Ruddi "BRD is wanted for songs as first then DPS as second."

That's 100% correct. It's a support job.. but NO ONE playing bard supports the party. I've only ever seen 1 bard the whole time i've been playing refill MP.. and not even on a regular basis.. probably hit the button on accident and forgot about it.

All bards want to do is spam aoe and high powered moves on targets the tank isn't even hitting even with marks.. Never met a good bard.. ever. Maybe this nerf will bring your head out of the clouds and help you realize what you should be doing.

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Sweet baby Jesus, ur in this thread also....

Unsub, l2p, and come back....

From what I can tell there is no potency changes at all. Blood Letter still does 150 potency like heavy shot (Identical damage variance) and Straight shot is still within the tolerance range when checked against known formulas. My guess is they just messed up the tool-tip for it. Only thing I can see they did change, which was more of a fix, was correcting Flame Arrow so it doesn't 100% crit - similar to what someone else said earlier.

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Originally Posted by LobsterBisque

Well they "fixed" Flaming Arrow and that wasn't mentioned in the patch notes. It now does its stated potency instead of 1.5 times.

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Umm. . .

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Originally Posted by Patch Notes

An issue wherein ground-target attacks (Flaming Arrow, Shadow Flare, etc.) were always critical hits.

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Totally mentioned. >_>

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Originally Posted by Kitkat

From what I can tell there is no potency changes at all. Blood Letter still does 150 potency like heavy shot (Identical damage variance) and Straight shot is still within the tolerance range when checked against known formulas. My guess is they just messed up the tool-tip for it. Only thing I can see they did change, which was more of a fix, was correcting Flame Arrow so it doesn't 100% crit - similar to what someone else said earlier.

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It's possible the tool tip was messed up pre-2.1. There other tool tip errors in 2.0. The abilities are probably still the same, and the tool tips now correctly reflect that. As others are mentioning testing on dummies are bringing up similar numbers.

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Originally Posted by Luso

It's possible the tool tip was messed up pre-2.1. There other tool tip errors in 2.0. The abilities are probably still the same, and the tool tips now correctly reflect that. As others are mentioning testing on dummies are bringing up similar numbers.

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That wouldn't explain why Bloodletter and Heavy Shot have the same damage, unless you're trying to posit that Heavy Shot is also 130 potency. Of course, Straight Shot is still below both of them, so you'd have to also be positing that they changed Straight Shot from one incorrect value to a different incorrect value.

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Originally Posted by Zartan

All bards want to do is spam aoe and high powered moves on targets the tank isn't even hitting even with marks.. Never met a good bard.. ever.

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A good FC burns thru content via skill and gear, it is accomplished by helping their players gear and learn their jobs. DF PuGs is like the lotto, every once in awhile you get a few good players.

I bring this up as everyone is different. There are many players that play with no FC or helpful LS and primarily use DF.

Notice no usage of "all". You obviously have an issue in general from your DF experience. Many things can effect this and it could be you as well.

- Player that FATE spammed and didn't bother learning the job's role in real content.
- You are getting matched in DF with higher iLVL players, which will test your Crowd Control even more.
- A geared and skilled player adjusts to their party dynamics. This can only go so far.
- Players unwilling to accept help or constructive feedback to improve their job.

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Originally Posted by Volux

Seriously...WTF SE/Yoshida, why leave that out of patch notes and explanations....lowering the lowest dps even further... the nerf to blood for blood (dmg) internal release (crit procs) and hawk's eye (dex buff) wasn't enough? Especially losing the internal release crit bonus already lowers the number of bloodletters we get but now all of them drop in potency as well?

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Maybe I will notice this at higher levels, but how exactly are we the lowest DPS? In just about every group I am in, every PVP group I am in, I am top damage by like 50%. I need a meter to see how I look in dungeons on paper, but I can tell by the mobs I am working on that I am the top contributor. For example, numerous times I will work on a mob the tank and other DPS aren't on, and I burn my mob as fast--if not faster--than they do theirs.

If you're using macros, I think it safe to say that Bards are OP. Besides, we're also a utility class.

lol i didnt even notice >< but i thought stuff was taking longer to kill than normal. thought it was just me. /pooh

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Originally Posted by Jyoeru

Maybe I will notice this at higher levels

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Even after the Blood for Blood/Internal Release nerfs, Bards still have some of the highest burst damage. We are also still potent on movement-heavy fights. So between those two factors Bards usually stay very competitive outside of 8 man+ environments.

Bards only fall to the bottom on sustained fights with little movement, so you really won't notice anything until Coil.

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Originally Posted by Mikejconnor

lol i didnt even notice

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Well it looks like the Straigh Shot/Bloodletter nerf has been debunked as a tooltip error, so that just leaves the Blood for Blood/Internal Release nerf. Which probably comes out to be....maybe 3.5% DPS nerf? (not sure how much Internal Release contributes but the Blood for Blood nerf should account for about a 2.5% damage decrease if I'm doing my math correctly).

And this assuming you are maximizing your uptime on Blood for Blood/Internal Release. So while it's a nerf, it's not a super huge one so most of the time you probably won't notice it. Though I'm not sure why we were nerfed dps-wise to start with, being that Bard's were already fairly low on sustained DPS. If anything they should have nerfed our ability to DPS unfettered while moving. Maybe toss .5 cast time on Heavy Shot or Bloodletter or something.

Honestly I'm more ticked off over the Rain of Death change than the damage nerf.

People are posting about how it has been tested and proven that the potency of those skills were NOT nerfed and that it is only a tooltip error, yet everyone is just skipping it and crying about a nerf that never happened.

Wow. Just wow.

jesus this whole thread is pathetic

so thats what happened.. havent played for long time when i started again i was wondering why i felt so weak in dungeons xD

Glad I just started gearing up my BLM/SMN.

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Originally Posted by KV-1

Honestly I'm more ticked off over the Rain of Death change than the damage nerf.

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^ This

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Originally Posted by Zartan

@Ruddi "BRD is wanted for songs as first then DPS as second."

That's 100% correct. It's a support job.. but NO ONE playing bard supports the party. I've only ever seen 1 bard the whole time i've been playing refill MP.. and not even on a regular basis.. probably hit the button on accident and forgot about it.

All bards want to do is spam aoe and high powered moves on targets the tank isn't even hitting even with marks.. Never met a good bard.. ever. Maybe this nerf will bring your head out of the clouds and help you realize what you should be doing.

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Sad to hear you haven't meet a BRD using songs and that is always bad bards, if you have BLM, SMN or even WHM Foe Requim is so nice and in SP SR BRD restore PT's MP during the runs and boosting magic damage during killing. A BRD who don't use songs when there is a purpose for it IS a bad bard.

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Originally Posted by ARR_Token

I could be wrong but thanks for ninja nerf done to bards.

Blood Letter = 150 potency and now it's 130 potency
Straight shot = 140 potency and now it's 130 potency

I didn't bother to go test on dummys and do the math to see if tool tip is wrong or it's a ninja nerf but yeah...what's up with the ninja nerf?

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kV4vHpqrj6E

a special song for u.
Bards are not Damagedealer they are supporter. If u read the liveletter u know that poor man

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Originally Posted by Chibiyoukai

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kV4vHpqrj6E

a special song for u.
Bards are not Damagedealer they are supporter. If u read the liveletter u know that poor man

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There are no support classes in ARR. There probably won't ever be support classes in ARR, because either they are going to be too good and be able to completely fill primary roles, or they will just be replaced by primary role classes (as we see people doing with Bards now).

Bard sustained damage isn't low because they are supposed to be a support class, Bard sustained damage is low because their damage is completely unaffected by movement and they basically have 100% uptime on bosses. That's not to say I agree with the recent nerf, but I think that's mostly because Bard burst skews numbers on trash pulls, short fights, and fight with down time. Most whining about Bards being OP came from people running AK months ago, now that people are in coil and actually getting a decent read on DPS performance, they are realizing Bard really wasn't OP at all. Sadly these realizations came too late.

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Originally Posted by Chibiyoukai

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kV4vHpqrj6E

a special song for u.
Bards are not Damagedealer they are supporter. If u read the liveletter u know that poor man

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The larger issue here is that this is an undocumented change. It's not in the notes, it wasn't in mentioned in any of the live letters and comments from the community reps seem to greatly imply something of this nature wasn't going to happen.

This sort of behavior is important to address because it can ruin any sense of trust between the players and the developers. It is incredibly important that any direct changes to abilities like this at the VERY LEAST make it into the patch notes.

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Originally Posted by Ferth

The larger issue here is that this is an undocumented change. It's not in the notes, it wasn't in mentioned in any of the live letters and comments from the community reps seem to greatly imply something of this nature wasn't going to happen.

This sort of behavior is important to address because it can ruin any sense of trust between the players and the developers. It is incredibly important that any direct changes to abilities like this at the VERY LEAST make it into the patch notes.

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Testing is showing that these are just tooltip errors. More than likely what happened is that Square originally intended to nerf Bloodletter and Straight Shot, then decided to nerf the cross-class abilities instead, but forgot to change the tooltips back for BL/SS.

There are multiple posts both here and on general of people testing numbers and finding SS/BL to be putting out the same damage range as pre-2.1.

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Originally Posted by KV-1

Testing is showing that these are just tooltip errors. More than likely what happened is that Square originally intended to nerf Bloodletter and Straight Shot, then decided to nerf the cross-class abilities instead, but forgot to change the tooltips back for BL/SS.

There are multiple posts both here and on general of people testing numbers and finding SS/BL to be putting out the same damage range as pre-2.1.

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Interesting. I'm wondering if the Monk ability Fists of Fire is also a tooltip error?

Tool tip errors or not, the dmg output is quite noticeable. If you can't tell a difference then you you don't know your class very well. It may not be the end of the world but don't try to deny the nerf.