MAJOR song missing - Bard - everything else is great

We are missing one really important feature... a song that helps melee DPS. Right now we have a mana song + a song to buff casters DPS.... Paladins benefit from the mana song but unless you are a range caster of some sort, the fate requiem means nothing to you.

Why do we not have a choice of a dps enhancing (direct damage.. or physical damage) song?

Seems sort of unbalanced and encourages groups to avoid having a melee person in the party if a bard is present... or vise versa!

All other changes in 2.1 seem fine to me so far though!

TP Song. It's just not viable to provide it solely for 1/2 people, at max(and reduces your damage), when you can either increase magic damage(2-4, at no personal damage reduction), or give MP(healers, rezzed SMN/SCH/WHM, increased AF uptime for BLM, etc).

Other classes provide debuffs for respective damage types. There's no double-dipping.

DRG provides Piercing(BRD and DRG)
BRD provides Magic(BLM, SMN, WHM, SCH, Garuda-Egi)
WAR provides Slashing(WAR and PLD)
MNK provides Blunt(MNK, Ifrit-egi, Titan-Egi)

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Originally Posted by Kevee

TP Song. It's just not viable to provide it solely for 1/2 people, at max(and reduces your damage), when you can either increase magic damage(2-4, at no personal damage reduction), or give MP(healers, rezzed SMN/SCH/WHM, increased AF uptime for BLM, etc).

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Main problem with the TP song is that we can't see other players TP, so we don't know when it's the right time to use or anything. I'd personally prefer if they gave 10% less physical resistance debuff to the Rain of Death, up its TP cost, and call it a day.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

Main problem with the TP song is that we can't see other players TP, so we don't know when it's the right time to use or anything. I'd personally prefer if they gave 10% less physical resistance debuff to the Rain of Death, up its TP cost, and call it a day.

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You don't have to see their TP.

All physical classes run out, and especially in endgame gear/SS stacking, and even more-so if they ever AoE. Are you ~3-4 minutes in or so of constant fighting? You can be sure that they will need some TP.

Can't have that unless you remove all the debuffs from other classes.

They don't want to do that. It's called class synergy, and they don't want complete dependence on one single class. Giving BRD that would make them required.

Remember, BRD isn't a support class. It's a DPS class that has support skills, just like every other DPS class. Sure, they have "more" support than others and do less DPS, but they're still a DPS class.

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Originally Posted by Kevee

.Remember, BRD isn't a support class. It's a DPS class that has support skills, just like every other DPS class. Sure, they have "more" support than others and do less DPS, but they're still a DPS class.

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How I wish those naive people would see this.

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Originally Posted by Kevee

You don't have to see their TP.

All physical classes run out, and especially in endgame gear/SS stacking, and even more-so if they ever AoE. Are you ~3-4 minutes in or so of constant fighting? You can be sure that they will need some TP.

Can't have that unless you remove all the debuffs from other classes.

They don't want to do that. It's called class synergy, and they don't want complete dependence on one single class. Giving BRD that would make them required.

Remember, BRD isn't a support class. It's a DPS class that has support skills, just like every other DPS class. Sure, they have "more" support than others and do less DPS, but they're still a DPS class.

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You missed the POINT! TP song is the Melee version on Ballad. There is no melee DPS boost from BARD like there is Casters. Often classes manage their TP well and as you stated, isn't worth using with the 20% DPS loss.

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Originally Posted by Thorauku

How I wish those naive people would see this.

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That isn't exactly true, no matter what PT I am in, at end game I am usually having to support with Foe or Ballad. We are a hybrid of DPS and Support.

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Originally Posted by Venom

You missed the POINT! TP song is the Melee version on Ballad. There is no melee DPS boost from BARD like there is Casters. Often classes manage their TP well and as you stated, isn't worth using with the 20% DPS loss.

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TP song boosts DPS if you're bottoming out, the same way MP song boosts mages bottoming out, and extends AF cycle for BLM.

There isn't one for physical because it's already provided by other classes(read my first post), plus there just isn't one for casters. It lowers a mobs resistance, it's not a buff that boosts damage.

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Originally Posted by Kevee

DRG provides Piercing(BRD and DRG)
BRD provides Magic(BLM, SMN, WHM, SCH, Garuda-Egi)
WAR provides Slashing(WAR and PLD)
MNK provides Blunt(MNK, Ifrit-egi, Titan-Egi)

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They manage it because they would bottom out faster, otherwise, and they can't AoE like a mage can.
It's not worth it because people don't form a party around it.

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Originally Posted by Venom

That isn't exactly true, no matter what PT I am in, at end game I am usually having to support with Foe or Ballad. We are a hybrid of DPS and Support.

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Foe Requiem doesn't lower your damage.

Ballad is rarely needed. Only for specific purposes(WP speedruns), if people dun goofed(using too much mana/needed a battle rez), or on longer fights like Twintania(which, when used, you aren't doing damage anyways[divebomb transition]).

You are supporting just as much as other DPS(except for maybe DRG, although they can cross-class Mantra, and Slow has a niche use on Garuda). MNK has Mantra, Blunt debuff, and an INT debuff. SMN has an AoE root, Eye for an Eye, Virus, heal debuff/heavy, slow, and battle rez. BLM provides an AoE sleep, AoE root, a (currently) useless elemental resistance buff, and an off-GCD Slow/Heavy.

Every DPS has support skills. That doesn't stop them from being DPS.

All I really see here is BRDs crying and whining, because they don't have a DPS song, but they do in fact get Disembowel from DRG for their Piercing damage up. It's just not enough. Unfortunately for you, you're a DPS class with heavy amounts of utility. If you don't like it, then play something else. TP Song is great; it may suck for you, but it helps the raid. Doing maximum DPS and being #1 is great and all, but what really matters is that everyone in the raid does their part and assists getting the boss down. BRDs really hit it home here, but they always have to go and cry, because nothing is enough for them.

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Originally Posted by Venom

That isn't exactly true, no matter what PT I am in, at end game I am usually having to support with Foe or Ballad. We are a hybrid of DPS and Support.

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If Foe or Ballad are the only skills that's making Bards a "support" class, heck A Summoner can offer so much more. Eye for an Eye, Virus, Shadow Flare (Slow), Ruin II (Blind), Miasma II (Slow), not to mention Resurrection, the only DPS class that can resurrect in the middle of battle, yet no one called them a (let me use your words) "Hybrid of DPS and Support" class.

TP song is the song that's nearly useless. With Invigorate, few jobs need it.

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Originally Posted by Illa

All I really see here is BRDs crying and whining, because they don't have a DPS song, but they do in fact get Disembowel from DRG for their Piercing damage up. It's just not enough. Unfortunately for you, you're a DPS class with heavy amounts of utility. If you don't like it, then play something else. TP Song is great; it may suck for you, but it helps the raid. Doing maximum DPS and being #1 is great and all, but what really matters is that everyone in the raid does their part and assists getting the boss down. BRDs really hit it home here, but they always have to go and cry, because nothing is enough for them.

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Our problem is that all of our support songs and abilities require highly specific circumstances, all of which rarely happen.

Mage's Ballad? Unless you have a WHM under 50% MP or it's a healer heavy battle like Ultima Weapon HM, you're not going to use it.

Army's Paeon? You don't know WHEN to use that TP regen because there's no real clearcut way to tell when somebody's low on TP unless they ask for it.

Foe's Requiem? If you're in any difficult fight, it's not worth using because odds are Mage's Ballad will be needed at one point due to a healer being rezzed by another one.

Rain of Death? It was the only good support skill with that 10% damage reduction, and they changed it into the useless 10% evasion drop.

All our support is garbage outside of those circumstances, and will not be used at all 90% of the time. I've ran numerous dungeons without even having to use a single Ballad, Paeon, or Requiem, and even ran through Crystal Tower without having to use any of them (we had almost 100% melee that run). Face it, the Bard support is a joke ever since they took out the healing abilities from 1.0 to give us the DPS we have now. 1.0 Bard was a support Bard.

If you don't have to use Paeon or Mage's ballad... why don't you use Requiem ? It does not decrease your dps and it increases greatly the dps of your SMN/BLM/PET... or you'd rather keep your mana for... nothing ?

BRDs in FFXI had everyone by the balls with their Minuets and Marches (Atk boost and Haste songs) I'm sure they wanna go a different direction since they know how it'll play out*. To that point they already have since BRD in XIV is a way better damage dealer than in XI at the cost of some of the more premiere songs XI BRD had access to.

*That's not to say how the situation ended up in FFXI was omg awful but a lot of fights were balanced with those buffs in mind especially in the recent expansion with Delve content (before they added ilvl revisions to SoA gear since those songs were what allowed accuracy and attack to hit relevant caps) and they probably feel like balancing fights in FFXIV around other things (though admittedly a seemingly small pool of other things). Having said that I'm sure eventually when they expand upon every job's and class' abilities we'll see a return of Valor Minuet and Victory March for BRD.

so much woosh going in this thread

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Originally Posted by Shamirah

If you don't have to use Paeon or Mage's ballad... why don't you use Requiem ? It does not decrease your dps and it increases greatly the dps of your SMN/BLM/PET... or you'd rather keep your mana for... nothing ?

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I'm usually in 4 man groups, and with me in the group, that leaves a single DPS slot open. Most of the time it's Monks, Dragoons, or other Bards. Requiem never sees a use for me because I never see a mage to use it with. 8 mans...it's usually with the FC, and only one person runs SMN or BLM (it's the same guy who plays one or the other) every time, and we're usually running Garuda EM, CT, or Ultima HM. All 3 I save my MP because face it, it's way too easy to screw up to the point where a healer will die and have to be rezzed and their MP restored.

I agree with the OP.
More songs please. MORE SONGS PLEASE!!!!

I'd like a few more options, but I don't think a direct damage increase would be wise. It would be very powerful.
Some more support songs, maybe slow enemies, haste allies (not running speed, actual haste), or low hp regen.

Maybe some instant effect songs? Instead of passive ones that drain, just an instant cast with a cooldown. There is a lot of potential for more song types here.

I guess probably just use tp song for longer battles. If you have a summoner or blm however then use the song to boost there damage.
(blm already does more damage so why not boost it)

The problem with TP song is the whole not knowing when to use it. The argument that "you don't need to know what their TP is" is pretty invalid. So I don't need to know what your MP is either? It's irrelevant for me to know WHEN to use my support ability so the timing is good and I minimize the impact to my damage dealt? In the end this boils down to party communication. I'll use the TP song if and when the party indicates I need to, but when do I turn it off again? When MP runs out? It's a moot point though, since nobody has ever requested I use the song anyway.

What about a "Haste Song"? Think it's going to be useful one way or another?

Foe Requiem does boost damage by lowering resistances. It's mere semantics; when the bard puts up Requiem, my Fires stop doing 650-750 and start doing 750-900. So what if the damage increase was achieved by "lowering resistances?"

Technically, SCHs already have Haste with Selene (skill/spell speed+), but it would be nice to see more songs. The Devs already said they'd add more SMN Egis when they increase the level cap, so safe to assume more songs then.

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Originally Posted by synaesthetic

Foe Requiem does boost damage by lowering resistances. It's mere semantics; when the bard puts up Requiem, my Fires stop doing 650-750 and start doing 750-900. So what if the damage increase was achieved by "lowering resistances?"

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Well, there's the (tiny) mechanical difference, in that one is a a debuff and the other a buff, but that only really changes where the BRD has to stand to get the effect working.