Optimising DPS for BRD

So BRD has become my main and I really love it after tanking and healing for most of the game its nice to shoot things and really not care about much else but shooting things til they die lol..

But something I am struggling with is optimal rotation and ironing out the kinks.. I know that watching the hate chart isnt the best measure of how much DPS you are doing because that has multiple factors including rate of attack etc but i see it as a good judge.. and i havent used parsers for a long time so don't have that to check up on..

But having said the above, I often find myself in the middle of the DPS in the hate chart.. so in a party of 8 i will often be 4 or 5, with or without Quelling. So I am wondering if someone has any BRD tips

I tried to watch Mr.Happys video to see if I was missing anything and I think I am in line with what he is doing.. though I could not sit through him just reading out ability names for 25mins.

and people who parse say I clock between 200 and 350 DPS depending on echo buff at ilv101

any tips appreciated

Bard has the lowest weapon damage out of all of the jobs. Unless all the dps in your party is bad or you have a full party of bards, you probably won't be topping any dps charts.

As you stated using the aggro bar isnt really the best way to determine how much dps you are doing. At i110 with nexus im doing about 340-350 dpish on turn 8, so if you can constantly hit around 300+ in the SCoB (excluding t7 if u kite) than imo you should be fine. Like Isomy stated, no matter how you look at it, our numbers aren't really big lol. If in doubt just do the usual "DPS Priority" check.

Buffs up? go to dots. Dots up? go to dps move. If neither are up? reapply. In bards case, always have straight shot crit buff up. But dont just spam straight shot for its buff. I like to reapply straight shot when it has about 1-3 seconds left unless it got a free crit proc from heavy shot. Keep up windbite and venom bite. again dont constantly reapply them. Wait till they are near the end of their timer. I usually weave in bloodletter with both dots because each dot least about 18 seconds and Bloodletter is a 15second recast timer. by the time bloodletter is up, you dots should be near the end of their duration. But if you get bloodletter free proc than just use bloodletter and reapply dots whenever there at 1-3 seconds left of duration. Use flaming arrow when available. People ignore blunt arrow and Repelling shot as OGCD but you should use these 2 skills as part of your rotation. But be careful with Blunt Arrow if the fight requires a silence rotation. Even if it just a little, little is better than none.

The rest is just how you use your buff skills like Blood For Blood, Raging Strikes, Internal Release and Hawkeye.

The trick is getting a feel for the best times to use your abilities. Personally I typically go around your max dps at 100 ilvl, depending on the fight, near 400 with echo in turns..opener around 500~

maintaining proper buff/debuff uptime is going to be your number one focus, and I see many bards that do not do this properly. Some just spam Straight shot, some forget about it, and letting your poisons fall is seriously crushing to your damage. Not watching for when Bloodletter procs can be seriously infringing on it as well.

One trick I learned (if your ping is good) is queueing two OffGCD abilities in between your GCDs, especially on your opener. The only delay I've ever noticed in the GCD is occasionally after Hawk's Eye, but that's pretty random. Too bad you're not on Lamia or I could show you personally; I've coached many of my friends on the intricacies that can help you out. Another protip is learning when bosses will disappear, fly off, go underwater, you get stuck in goo, etc...and put a fresh debuff on 'em! keep doing damage while you dodge randomness.

Some of the recent bard discussions:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...ove-mine%21%29

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...chieve-450-dps

200 DPS @ IL100 in SCoB is way too low, maybe the above 2 threads would help.

Bard is just that odd job without a traditional rotation like the other jobs. Its pretty much as Exia stated, Buffs up? > DoTs up? > Heavy Shot, always pop off Bloodletter when its up so its always on cd (similar with Internal Release.) Main idea of any job is to keep buffs and dots up, and to do straight dmg whenever possible, in almost every coil group I've been in I tend to take the top 2 dps slots in a parse, but I'm also usually the only one min/maxing my gear and trying to push it to do more. I'm not i110, I'm i106 but I am also the only one in my current coil group who has a Nexus aside from our PLD (half of them only have i100 or i110 weapon), but the group can't even clear t7 so I don't see them sticking around much longer after patch. I tend to put t7 and t8 after their last run of the week as it is, so I may end up finding a new group if it continues to be a slow group.

Straight Shot ( should always be up)
Venomous Bite
Flaming Arrow (While Waiting on GCD - if you cant apply it fast enough. ignore it)
Windbite
Bloodletter (Apply whenever UP, if you have strong delay, ignore it till you end this rotation)
Heavy Shot
Blood for Blood
Heavy Shot Or Straighter Shot (if up)
Hawk's Eye
Heavy Shot Or Straighter Shot (if up)
Raging Strikes
Heavy Shot Or Straighter Shot (if up)
Internal Release
Venomous Bite *Fully Buffed
Barrage *Fully Buffed. LOOK AT THOSE NUMBERS!!!!!
Windbite*Fully Buffed
----End Of Rotation----
Spam Heavy Shot Or Straighter Shot (if up)/ All Other OGCD inbetween
Wait for ALL BUFFs to reset Then redo (Notice Internal Release Can be used once more if applied as soon as timer resets. by the timer it resets again other abilities will be ready)

Pretty much what everyone above has said....with the exception that if youre a lazy, slow, socially unproductive brd like me, macros are your best friend. I use these for Frontline/ Wolves Den but have kinda started using them too in PvE. Better setups out there but if it helps at all..:

Heavy Shot macro-
Line 1> macroicon heavyshot
2>Misery's End
3>Haymaker
4>Bloodletter
5> Internal Release
6>Heavy Shot
7>Blunt Arrow
8>Repelling Shot

Straightshot and Bloodletter macros pretty much have the same setups. Using these, I never have to worry about Misery, Countering, or ESPECIALLY Bloodletter procs the very second they pop since list will prioritize on w/es up in listed order. The other was...

Burst!
Line 1> macroicon- Raging Strokes
2> Raging Strikes
3> Hawk Eye
4> Blood 4 Blood
5>Barrage

Sadly, in a good amount of PvE content..you'll actually lose Dps if gauging by Raging Strikes CD timer (like I said..i r lazy >_>) but (and make sure there are no /wait's in between, just mash 4 times) it goes off quick ;o

Keep Straight Shot up 100% of the time, during your opener pop two buffs before using a GCD and repeat until you run out of buffs.

My personal opener:
Quelling + Raging
Straight shot
Hawk Eye+Blood for Blood
Windbite
Internal Release + Barrage.
Venombite
Flame Arrow

Your dots are affected by buffs as well so you want those on before you apply the dot, after that just spam weave heavy shot and bloodletter. Another good tip is after windbite and venombite you can do 5 or more gcd's before having to refresh (depending on skill speed)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vethos

Your dots are affected by buffs as well so you want those on before you apply the dot,

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and crit dot ticks proc Bloodletter early, which is very nice too.

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Originally Posted by RinchanNau

Sorry, but that BRD guide is horrible. 'Achieve 450 DPS' rubbish. Their opener involves clipping your dots by 3 ticks. Zero sense made.

Hitting a lvl50 dummy (Misery's End), with a party buff, and DRG buff... Anyone can do that. And this looks better than '449'. http://i.imgur.com/lAOKgBU.png

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Boss that's why I said it is "recent bard discussion" :(

You saw that I disagreed with the guide and the OP too. But reading that I guess this thread's OP can understand some of the concepts and why people disagree etc. Negative example, you know...

First off, Mr. Happy's 2.1 guide is outdated and not the best source to go by (heresy, I know, but bear with me here).

Second, ditch macros. Regarding the way they work, they're a DPS loss and encourage senseless button mashing. You want to be fluid and concise with your inputs.

With that out of the way, your opener should look like this (which I got from a pretty damn good BRD):

DoT1 + Bloodletter > DoT2 + Hawk's Eye* > Straight Shot + Raging Strikes + Blood for Blood > Heavy Shot + Barrage** + Internal Release > Heavy/Straighter Shot + Flaming Arrow > Heavy/Straighter Shot filler until 2-4s remaining on your first DoT. Reapply your DoTs before they fall off and go back to your priority system.

*If your skill speed isn't too high, or there isn't a move that needs to be silenced, you can weave in Blunt Arrow right after Hawk's Eye.
**If you are using high-quality X-Potions of Dexterity, you might want to use it before Barrage. The potion greatly boosts your damage output, and Barrage grants us our biggest damage spike with three auto-attacks in a single auto-attack.
Here's a list of priorities BRDs should watch for:
1st) Use Bloodletter in-between GCDs whenever it is off CD. Should the recast timer refresh during your opener, use it and keep on going. Your DoTs will still be reapplied with all buffs still up regardless.
2nd) Reapply DoTs before they fall off. Letting DoTs fall off is not only a DPS loss, but you lose out on potential Bloodletter resets, which helps contribute to our spikes in DPS.
3rd) Reapply Straight Shot's buff before it falls off. Reapplying DoTs with the buff up improves your chances at getting more Bloodletter resets.
4th) Does Straighter Shot proc after using a Heavy Shot? USE IT. Guaranteed critical damage is always welcomed, and using Straighter Shot refreshes the Straight Shot buff.
5th) Make sure to face the target whenever possible. Auto-attacks contribute to our DPS and not facing the boss means a chance to lose out on that damage.

Before anyone bashes me for not suggesting the traditional Straight Shot opener, opening with either Windbite or Venomous Bite and following up with Bloodletter right after, in-between GCDs, exposes you to potential Bloodletter resets right from the get-go. That means you already have the chance for a 150 attack potency move to reset its cool-down and be ready to weave in again. On top of that, you reapply your DoTs with all of your buffs up, so you don't have to lose DPS to clip them before the buffs fall off. With the Straight Shot opener, you have to get a Straighter Shot proc within 3-4 GCDs or you have to reapply it before clipping your DoTs, or reapply your DoTs without the buff up which defeats the purpose of the opener.

Now for cool-down rotations, which are used throughout long fights like trials and raids. I credit our resident BRD Ooshima for this rotation of cool-down groupings, which I copied and saved in a text file months ago while lurking.

LEGEND
RS = Raging Strikes
HE = Hawk's Eye
B = Barrage
BfB = Blood for Blood
IR = Internal Release
FA = Flaming Arrow
XD = X-Potion of Dexterity

CD Groups
G1: IR + FA
G2: BfB + HE + B
G3: RS

Weave Rotation
Start: The opener I provided
60s: G1
80-90s: G2
120s: G3 + G1
180s: G1 + G2
240s: G3 + G1
270s: G2 (+XD between HE and B)
300s: G1
360s: Go back to Start (use XD when available)

With this rotation of cool-down groups, your overall DPS should see some definite improvement. Remember to keep your DoTs up, use Straighter Shot and Bloodletter whenever they proc, face your targets. Oh, one more thing: be mindful of how you use Repelling Shot and always sing Foe Requiem right when the tank begins the pull and turn it off after that pull is cleared. You don't want to have "loldrg" (or is it "lolnin" now?) moments with it. As for Requiem, it is the only song that doesn't nerf our damage while its up and boosts all caster damage. Even if you don't have caster DPS (BLM, SMN) in your party, sing it either way in case you get a healer who also helps with DPS when they don't need to heal. Just remember to turn if off after each pull or otherwise you'll pull the mobs instead. A lesson I learned the hard way. Sing the other two songs when needed.

I hope this helps you out, OP!

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Originally Posted by SlyRoyale

*snip*

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There is some okay info here and while I disagree with your opener for other reasons the notable lack of Quelling Strikes is the most worth mentioning. Unless woefully under-geared your opener should include QS.

thanks for all the info, i will be sure to try out some of the things i am not already doing in this list.. i think my problem is mostly missing straight shot and or dots.. only by a few seconds.. but a few seconds can be significant.. i already double buff between GCD skills so i am glad that came up.. glad i was doing something right :P

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Originally Posted by dday3six

There is some okay info here and while I disagree with your opener for other reasons the notable lack of Quelling Strikes is the most worth mentioning. Unless woefully under-geared your opener should include QS.

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Allow me to explain why I prefer opening with DoTs over Straight Shot.

1) Starting with Straight Shot means missing out on a potential Bloodletter reset, a 150 potency attack.
2) If you start with Straight Shot you need a Straighter Shot proc in about 3-4 GCDs (10% chance isn't exactly in your favour). If you don't get that proc, your options are as follows: a) reapply Straight Shot early, wasting potency and TP over a Heavy Shot (70TP for a 140 potency move vs. 60TP for a 150 potency move); b) clip your DoTs (again, a waste of potency); or c) reapply DoTs without Straight Shot which defeats the purpose of the Straight Shot opener completely.
3) With the opener I use, Windbite and Venomous Bite are reapplied with all of the buffs up without having to clip them. On average, I reapply my first DoT whenever it has 2-4s remaining, and by the time my second DoT is reapplied my first buff used, Hawk's Eye, still has 4-6s of duration left before it falls off. You don't need to have your first set of DoTs buffed, and besides...
4) With the traditional Straight Shot opener, to stack your buffs and get the biggest increase you can on your skills, you would have to hold them all long enough that you'd end up losing DPS. From another perspective, if you were weaving your cool-downs as soon as possible, you would only have some buffs up for your first set of DoTs and some buffs up for your second set, which isn't as good as having them all up for your second set of DoTs and none at all for the first.

As for Quelling Strikes, I omitted it due to its usage being on a case-by-case basis. If you have a tank who can hold aggro against top-notch DPS, there is no need for it other than to buy breathing room. If a powerful add needs to be grabbed by the tank, Quelling Strikes can help let the tank grab it safely (i.e. Clockwork Dreadnoughts in T8). If you need Quelling Strikes for anything outside of adds or speedrun pulls, that says more about the tank's ability to hold aggro instead of the lack of using Quelling Strikes. This is coming from someone who runs both BRD and WAR on a frequent basis.

This is the gear I use outside of SCoB, by the way: http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/O5A5

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Originally Posted by DenzelTaru

thanks for all the info, i will be sure to try out some of the things i am not already doing in this list.. i think my problem is mostly missing straight shot and or dots.. only by a few seconds.. but a few seconds can be significant.. i already double buff between GCD skills so i am glad that came up.. glad i was doing something right :P

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No problem. If missing Straighter Shot procs and not reapplying DoTs before they fall off are your only issues, that should be quick to remedy. After using Heavy Shot, wait a bit before using it again to see if you get the proc. With a 2.4s-2.5s GCD (depending on your skill speed), that should give you plenty of time to wait for a proc. For DoT reapplication, the best time to refresh them is around 2-4s on the first DoT. As DoT damage is based on server ticks and not the duration of the DoT itself, it's best to reapply them around that time lest you miss a tick soon after a DoT falls off.

Good on you for double-buffing, by the way! It gets tougher to do with higher skill speed and animation locks on certain skills, but damn is it good. Maybe Square will reduce the animation locks for a lot of skills like they did with the DRGs Jump abilities this patch one day? Anyway, keep working on your BRD and continue to strive for improvement!

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Originally Posted by SlyRoyale

*snip*

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I didn't feel like going into greater detail. Frankly I doubted it would change your mind, and thus only add clutter. Nevertheless, the short and sweet of it is basically summed up as follows:

Re-upping dots before 2 seconds is clipping them. The first at 2s, the other at 5s is the re-up window. You've given 2 instances of 2s holes at this point. That is nearly a gcd, and shouldn't happen optimally speaking. If you're really worried about the 10 potency of needing to re-up Straight Shot, how does 2 seconds or nearly another gcd skill not translate to a dps loss as well?

When you reapply your first DoT when it has 2s left on it, you don't miss out on the server tick and chance for a 150 potency attack that's off GCD for its recast timer to reset. By that time your first DoT is about to fall off and your second will soon follow. Clipping it earlier like around 5-6s just to reapply DoTs before buffs fall off is losing out on up-front DPS. Should you reapply as the DoTs actually fall off instead of just catching them before they do, you miss out on a server tick which is a loss of DPS. As for worrying about a difference of 10 potency, you are also forgetting the difference of 10TP. During battle, TP refreshes at 60 per tick. While Straight Shot does give a 10% critical hit rate buff, that is based on the specific stat rather than a flat 10% increase. On top of that frequently using a move that costs more than 60TP per GCD will eventually leave you TP-starved in longer fights should the management of the resource be an issue (there are BRDs who don't cross-class Invigorate or play a Battle Voiced Army's Paeon for 30-45s for a quick burst of TP regen. Heavy Shot has 10 more potency and costs 10TP less than Straight Shot, and has a 10% chance of proccing Straighter Shot which is a guaranteed crit worth the 70TP. The only time you should use Straight Shot outside of that is to reapply the buff. It all boils down to reliable and consistent DPS, which is never a DPS loss.

On a personal note, do not hesitate to go into detail. If you do not feel like delving into it, why bother posting when another person like myself doesn't mind explaining their case when asked? An exchange of information is never "clutter," and I seriously hope I'm not wasting my time on you if you actually think that way.

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Originally Posted by SlyRoyale

*snip*

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Yep I said that about dots. However in your posts you mention a 2 second window. Example:

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Originally Posted by SlyRoyale

...On average, I reapply my first DoT whenever it has 2-4s remaining, and by the time my second DoT is reapplied my first buff used, Hawk's Eye, still has 4-6s of duration left before it falls off...

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That's my issue. If you are re-upping dots at 3 or 4s left, you've clipped them. And if you did it at 4s you likely wasted a gcd in the process. Bringing up bad Bards, who don't understand TP management, or who lack the proper cross-skills does't change that. While TP management might have a place at the table during talks of optimization. Lacking the proper cross-class does not.

Ahh, okay then. 2-4s is usually a precaution in case a DoT falls off right when you reapply it. Depending on your comfort level and skill speed, reapplying around 1-2s left on your 1st DoT is optimal as long as the old DoT doesn't fall off. That is, of course, nothing interrupts the input like a latency issue (my inputs are being frequently interrupted by nothing lately, but I'm not sure if the issue is individual or wide-spread). It's tighter, but it's good DPS as long as the DoT doesn't fall off. Thank you for clearing that up.

Didn't really read anything, but here's a BRD tip that boosted my dps quite a bit.
Once you are close to perfect execution on most of your skills it is key to spam Bloodletter really fast, prioritizing it even if you loose 0,5-1 of your GCD skill, having bloodletter back on cooldown while the dots are ticking is key to increase your dps by a lot.

This is something that is not urged enough in any BRD guide imo but you can seriously boost your dps when you can machinegun Bloodletters.

I don't really agree with most of what's in this thread. I have my own rotations and they work well. At i100, I'm doing as much dps as some other i110 brds.
Generally if you can get 2 off-gcd skills off in between is best. I don't normally cause it can be a bit finicky.

My buff order is HE > RS > BfB > IR > Pot(if I feel like it) (order could be changed probably to maximize CDs, but I haven't bothered figuring that out).

Throw Quelling in whenever you feel you may need it.

Once you dip below 600tp, Invigorate on CD.

Boss Fights: (or any other single target)
Straight Shot
Buff (+ Bloodletter if you're quick)
Wind bite
Bloodletter (if you didn't get it off before) (+ Barrage if you're quick)
Venomous
Barrage (if you didn't get it off before, Flaming Arrow if you did)
Heavy Shot
Flaming Arrow (if you didn't get it off before)
Heavy Shot Spam.

Obviously use any Straight and Bloodletter procs you get. Especially Bloodletter, even if you have to lose a bit of time with your gcd not on.

As Dots are about to go off, restart the above rotation so that you reapply the Dots almost exactly when they fall off. You want to be buffing and hitting the first one when the old ones have around 2s and 5s left. If you get the timing right you should be able to keep DoTs on almost seamlessly without cutting them off.

If you had a Straight proc earlier, skip it in the rotation until you need to reapply it or you get another proc, whichever comes first.

Always buff BEFORE you put the DoTs on. I only use ONE buff per rotation on this. That lets me have a single buff up almost constantly, more-so if I use pots. It also means that almost every DoT you apply will be buffed (which they should be).

Foe Requiem while DoTs are ticking but not during Barrage.. Duh...

And for the love of God.. Don't Rain of Death Bosses for the debuff... read the tooltip people. Not the same as it used to be ages ago.

Trash Mobs: (3 or less) (can also do this with boss adds) (Needs a tank that knows how to hold AoE threat)
Same rotation as above onto first mob the tank hit (usually), until you get to Heavy Shot.
Instead of Heavy spam, switch to mob#2 and apply both DoTs + any Bloodletter procs.
After that switch to mob#3 apply both DoTs + any Bloodletter procs, then switch back to mob#1.
Heavy Spam + any procs for a few secs and Misery End.
Mob#1 should be dead by the time or before the DoTs wear off.
Move on to Mob#2 buff and reapply DoTs on it AND Mob#3 again.
Back to #2 and Kill.

That is the general idea, will need adjustments depending on party dps.

Trash Mobs: (4 or more) (General AoEing)
Straight Shot
Barrage (+Buff#1 if you're fast)
Wide Volley
Buff#1 and Buff#2 (+Bloodletter if you're fast)
Wide Volley Spam unless Rain of Death/Quick Nock procs
Use Bloodletter on CD
Reapply Straight Shot and Buff#3 and #4 when 1 and 2 wear off.
The AoEs do craptastic dmg w/o being double buffed.

Don't forget about those double Bloodletter resets! Getting two Bloodletters off between GCDs always feels good. It's one of the reasons why I use the DoT opener as Bloodletter is arguably our best move, maybe second to Misery's End around <20% of a boss's HP (and I feel that's a big maybe due to how often you can use Bloodletter). Getting a double Bloodletter right from the get-go is such an amazing feeling.

For that AoE rotation, Ravenloft, Wide Volley spam isn't exactly as effective as Quick Nock spam unless you luck out on Downpour of Death and Quicker Nock procs. Both Wide Volley and Quick Nock have the same potency, but the former is 20TP more expensive than the latter and does AoE damage in a circle around the target, while Quick Nock's range is a 12-yalm frontal cone from your character. More often than not, Quick Nock spam is worth more TP per point than Wide Volley spam in hopes of getting those procs. Even if you get a Downpour of Death proc, Rain of Death has 10 less potency and inflicts an evasion debuff that means squat outside of Coil trash (SE might as well change it back to the ol' damage reduction debuff as accuracy caps can be easily met from gearing up with iLv. 100+ gear now). After that, there's only a small chance for you to get a Quicker Nock proc after that. That's a 15% chance of hoping to get one proc for a weaker move that inflicts a meagre debuff, following by another 15% chance to get another proc for a stronger move.

Double-buffing for AoE is always recommended given our damage output for it. BRD AoEs could stand to see an improvement in the proc chances to make Wide Volley spam more viable.

One other thing I'd like to mention is using Invigorate at around 540TP in case you get a TP regen tick that puts you back to 1k TP. Anytime I used the move when I have a little more TP than that I feel is a waste because soon after the TP regen ticks me back up to full. It's more efficient to use it around 540TP for that very reason.