Bard - they broke my job

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Originally Posted by JadeS

The best I've done so far is 1440 top burst in my opener(that getting a decent crits, especially SW crits). That being just on dummy with no food/party/buff going. I use WM for it and then take it right off, tapering off to about 760-790 after about 3mins. This being at full i180 with Hive Bow.

I found that:

(With WM going) HE > RS > EA > BL > SS > BfB > IR > WB > xdex pot > Blunt Arrow > VB > Flaming Arrow > Heavy Shot > Sidewinder > IJ > Barrage > EA > (all CDs end) > BL (take off WM) > SS and refresh basis after that. - Seems to get me the highest for open.

I haven't come up with a better way and always looking for anything that could increase that or be better output. Basically able to get that slightly buffed EA in and the dots before ending with a fully buffed SW + IJ (pot still running for dots as well) + Barrage EA to finish off.

Basically still....Just toss WM and let us have IJ + EA full time please.

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I burst 1,4k+ on dummy without WM on at all (just old opener with sidewinder added).
The gain from WM even in the opener is marginal if any at all but comes at the cost of a super shitty rotation, so straight potency buffs won't make me ever like this stance.

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Originally Posted by JadeS

The best I've done so far is 1440 top burst in my opener(that getting a decent crits, especially SW crits). That being just on dummy with no food/party/buff going. I use WM for it and then take it right off, tapering off to about 760-790 after about 3mins. This being at full i180 with Hive Bow.

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Tapering off meaning your overall parse is 760-790? That's way lower than average.

The instant I found out about what abilities/songs they were adding I was complaining, my first post about it on reddit (right after the ability showcase they did pre-HW release) was saying how clunky of an idea it is, regardless of if WM was good or not. You don't teach a job for 51 levels how to play as a mobile DPS and at the drop of a hat at 52 make you relearn to become a BLM-lite.

The changes honestly make me feel like they never wanted to have Bard in the relaunch to begin with. They either hated the original play style or in an effort to make MCH/BRD interchangeable they took MCH's upcoming design and found a way to work in a clunky workaround to make BRD post 50 the same (as close to as possible w/o being complete carbon copies).

Either way you look at it Bard gets the raw end of both deals. The other problem is I cannot see them changing anything drastically outside of some numbers tweaks. It's sad, it's one thing to want to change mains because new jobs come out, it's another to have to find another job to main because the one you have enjoyed for a year and a half was essentially erased from the game.

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Originally Posted by Panasync

They either hated the original play style or in an effort to make MCH/BRD interchangeable they took MCH's upcoming design and found a way to work in a clunky workaround to make BRD post 50 the same

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This! My impression is that they wanted to make MCH and BRD interchangeable, and it's a terrible waste. Going into Heavensward, I assumed BRD would be the (slightly) less powerful, more mobile support job and MCH would be the (slightly) more powerful but less mobile utility job. But this is what we got, a round peg being shoved into a square hole that is BRD's new playstyle, and it's a shame. This is the consequence of over homogonizing the jobs. Balance is great, and not wanting any job left out in the cold with raid content is great, but the pendulum has swung too far the other way in this case. Jobs are allowed to be unique and have things that make them stand out.

Anxiously awaiting a balance patch!

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Originally Posted by Cetonis

It's not about wanting a cast time so much as not-wanting a toggle. If it's easy to turn it on and off, that means it will be optimal to turn it on and off very very often.

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I'm totally cool with that. barrage off cd? pop wm and empyreal. Need to refresh dots and u don't have a bl proc/other ogcd? pop wm and ironjaw. seems sexy to me and would actually provide a flow to this horrendous bard change. What hurts most about 3.0 is that the skills are locked behind a 3 second cast .....

The changes overall are bad. I don't mind the cast bars on abilities as it does add a needed skill check to the class. However, casting our abilities interrupts the flow of cooldown/bloodletter weaving in dps rotation. Having literally all of the dps abilities we gained from this patch require minuet was a bad idea.

I would suggest any of the following changes:

-Allow bloodletter and/or abilities to be used while casting, limited by cast animations as before

-Reduce cast time of minuet and warden's paeon to 1 second

-Reduce base cast bar time induced by minuet to 1 second

-Allow E Arrow/IronJaws/Sidewinder to be used outside of WM, at the cost of either a tp increase, an added mp cost, a cast bar even though outside of WM, but not a potency reduction. A potency reduction would be incurred by default by not using WM

-As a cost to implement the other buffs, make minuet cost mp at a much lower rate than other songs, or have a ~15-30 second cooldown once dropped

So its better then lv up Archer to get all Cross Class Skills then go Rogue instead since Bard is so bad

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Originally Posted by Sessurea

I'm totally cool with that. barrage off cd? pop wm and empyreal. Need to refresh dots and u don't have a bl proc/other ogcd? pop wm and ironjaw. seems sexy to me and would actually provide a flow to this horrendous bard change. What hurts most about 3.0 is that the skills are locked behind a 3 second cast .....

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But having it as a toggle is the same as just removing WM entirely. Because you would -never- leave it on after your EA / IJ / maybe SW. It'd be plainly incorrect, and the WM toggle would just be a dumb hoop to jump through that has no reason to exist. What you're suggesting is strictly worse than just saying SE should get rid of WM outright (leaving the cast skills as casts).

I am totally on board with removing Iron Jaws from being gated behind minuet. I do not know if the sidewinder was intended to be gated as well, but currently does work correctly outside of minuet.

I think minuet needs some basic changes:
Auto attack reduced by 50% rather than removed
Iron Jaws automatically applies both DOTs while in minuet; functions as a refresher outside of minuet (removes needing to charge two dots to open or to refresh when lose focus to other mechanics)
Empyreal Arrow still only functions in minuet, but replaces Bloodletter and procs from DOTs critting - perhaps without the charge time as it has high potency.

I think its a start...or really tbh, just have minuet be a damage buff for melee damage so that a Bard has utility to affect damage output of either magic or physical damage. Then a Bard has to strategize on keeping up the damage buff vs replacing it with a tp or mana regen.

my favorite idea that I saw suggested is still: restore AA, removing the cast times, and add an incremental, stacking buff for weaponskills . I.e.: standing still your first ws gets +0, 2nd WS gets +5% damage, next +10, etc, up to +20%. If you move at all, it wipes your stacks and you have to start over.