so i'm a bit bored and have a helpful urge at the moment so i'll throw out some tips. use them, dispute them, ignore them or improve them. also you can add tips for other classes if you'd like.
tip 1: sing! any bard that doesn't sing makes all bards look lazy. even if you're only singing for the healer you still sing.
tip 2: learn to manage your songs and mp. any bard that plays foe's and just let's it go until you run out of mp is only a decent bard(decent because you're actually singing. such a beautiful rare creature you are. like a duty ninja that uses goad <3). for big pulls with lowered geared allies sure it's ok to let foe's run out, if there's another bard that actually sings in the party or if it's during a boss that has no phases and is a straight "tank and spank". if it's not those three manage your mp pool. getting foe's for one pull is nice but getting it for every pull or almost every pull is nicer.
tip 3: use repelling shot!
tip 4: use repelling shot and blunt arrow together when nothing needs to be silenced! also mix them in between your global cooldown skills.
tip 5: practice your aoe spamming. yes wide volley is nice and yes it -can- give you free aoe moves but unless you're having a very lucky day learn to shift back and forth between quick nock and wide volley. they have the same potency but the trade offs are quick nock is a cone shape and 20 tp cheaper which adds up. wide volley is a spread aoe, it's not as large of an area as rain of death but rain of death is only useful when it's free(nobody needs that accuracy bonus silly se). so if your tank can gather up the mob use quick nock, if the mob is a bit scattered then you wide volley spam.
tip 6: 3 or more you single down and focus after you have applied your dots to all 3. 4 or more and you use aoe's unless they have silly amounts of hp and your partner/s are really lacking in gear or you get a monk(mostly kidding about the monk part)
tip 7: while this isn't 100% concrete and mostly a preference tip i found i got more mileage from stacking my buffs together after using them all at once on boss fights. i use blood for blood + internal release + flaming arrow. hawk's eye + barrage. raging strikes + mega dex potion. if the fight last long enough you'll be mixing them together more and more.
last tip for now 8: practice your invigorate timing. don't use it at 600. sure it gives you 400 tp so it seems like a perfect fit but you can do better and last longer. if you practice matching it with 650-670(depending on how you've used skills) right as you're about to get a tp regen tick you can get that free tick after invig. so you're down to about 650, you pop invig and use skills as usual, you get a tick right after invig and skill usage so you're right back to 1000 after using a skill or two. it requires some timing but i think it's worth it.
if this seemed harsh it wasn't meant to be, in my mind it's supposed to make you giggle but then again i'm sleepy and bored which can make for weird times.
the borrdom thread for bard helping(and other classes too)
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02-02-2015, 06:37 PMlxChrisxlthe borrdom thread for bard helping(and other classes too)
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02-02-2015, 07:17 PMAskaRay
Tip 9: Please don't forget about Battle Voice....it's soooo nice
For singing, what I usually do is pop Foe's at the beginning of a battle (let's say a boss battle) and let it run to the end of my MP. After my MP's regened a bit, I don't immediately put it back though... usually the healers/casters are good for one full MP Foe run, unless there was some emergency res or something. If it looks like everyone's MP is good, then I play Foe's again, but you gotta gauge it for every battle and every healer...
Also I'm going to have to support tip 1 and 3. HATE IT when other bards don't sing...come on guys. Also Repelling Shot is a great attack; dont forget about it. -
02-02-2015, 10:05 PMruskie
I think you mean 550-570 TP though I can go as low as 500(my general preference is 500-570 or so depending on fight and so on) before poping invig.
As for repelling shot yeah it's great.... just don't repel into the burning walls or off the arena or into an aoe etc... It can help you with some avoiding of AoEs as well(iron chariot, titan's plumes)
As for singing it's really up to the party composition. Got a mage - if you can sign for trash or for DPS checks(in which case it helpse with battle voice), keep an eye on healer MP as well - and yes have pots be it dex(X-dex) or mp(if I have a supply of hi-elixirs I'll use those else the X ether ones) ones you are likely to use either depending on party and fight.
As for CDs I've seen plenty of openers and combos of it. As I tend to spike a lot I tend to pop all of them at start thus giving the tank a good 2 gcds time to build up enmity before I snap pull it off of them just as they finish their first full combo to grab it back. Then just base it off the fight, I'll save raging for DPS checks(after the inital opener unless I know it'll be less than 2 min to dps check) the rest will pop based on the fight and rotation if I can use them effectively or not(i.e. don't pop any if the boss will be jumping off screen before it runs out. I tend to combo hawk+barrage and internal(though I'll keep this up 99% of the time I can)+raging. -
02-03-2015, 11:24 AMMrYaahIts higher dps to pair blood for blood with hawk's eye + barrageQuote:
Originally Posted by lxChrisxl
Also im pretty sure raging strikes + dex pot have massively different cooldowns so im not so sure how this will work out. -
02-03-2015, 11:29 AMMrYaahYou messed up some numbers, your tp ticks for 60 tp every 3 seconds and invigorate is +400. So you want to make sure you time it so that your next tp tick will put you back at exactly 1000 with no wasted tp. The easiest way to do this is hit invig the instant you see your tp hit 540. You literally cannot fuck up if it has at any point gone down to 540 or below, unless you stop attacking which is an entirely seperate issue and will probably resolve some tp issues on its own. Anyways, you can do slightly better than this by paying attention to the timing of your tp ticks, when you see the tp tick up right before the next gcd, as long as your skillspeed is < 3 seconds you should end up doing another gcd before your tp recovers so you can invigorate before that gcd and still not overwrite a tp tick. Its a difference of 3 seconds on when your invigorate will come back up, not a big deal but if you can do it then why not?Quote:
Originally Posted by lxChrisxl
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02-03-2015, 12:31 PMSessurea
Tip x: Skill speed is the enemy.
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02-04-2015, 09:40 AMlxChrisxlblood is 80 seconds or a minute and 20 seconds. internal release is 60 seconds or a minute. hawk's eye is 90 seconds or a minute and 30 seconds. raging strikes is 120 seconds or two minutes. barrage is 90 seconds also. dex potion is 5 minutes. flame arrow is also 60 seconds.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrYaah
you pop blood, internal and flame arrow. or you could wait another 10 seconds and pop blood, internal, flame arrow and barrage. popping internal release by itself isn't worth it in my opinion so you're already making it wait 20 seconds. fight has to be at least 2:40 before you can even use blood again(and i pray to any god out there any dungeon fight never last that long unless it's a brand new dungeon) so you'll hopefully never see a point to use it but if you do sure i'd agree you. for primals though unless your party is geared and really know the fight i think my way is better. my way you can use blood six times in exactly 8 minutes pretty lengthy but not unheard of. your way you'd need 8 minutes and 50 seconds for six uses of blood. so i'd say it really depends on who you're with, what fight and how we'll geared everybody is.
as for invig i tested both ways out using nothing but windbite on 1 dummy and weirdly they're so close it doesn't matter which way you prefer. your way did save about 3-4 seconds so anywhere between 640ish-540ish tp is good :] -
02-04-2015, 09:42 AMlxChrisxlhealers benefit from foe's as well unless they're the kind that doesn't dps. if they are you always sing. only reason not to is if you're in a dungeon with no magic dps classes and your healer doesn't wanna dps. they should never run out of mp in a dungeon and if they do well that comes down to how you feel about healers not using dps skills.Quote:
Originally Posted by ruskie
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02-04-2015, 10:03 AMLadyaceous
XI: Use Quelling Strikes just because.
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02-07-2015, 09:30 AMlxChrisxl
tip for monks: use your mantra. your mantra is the best. there's no reason why you shouldn't use it when the tank/healer is very low on hp.
tp for ninja's: if you're on pc and you feel comfortable downloading and running a parser you can download one called ACT that has a plugin which let's you view your teammates tp bars. handy for goad using. also use goad. -
02-08-2015, 09:11 AMlxChrisxl
seems people don't want to give out tips or anything :/.
tip for ninja's on ps3/ps4 or pc using a controller: i find that setting my mundra's in a triangle order that starts( from left to right) ten, chi, jin. makes it fast for when you want to use your mundra's. need raiton? ten, chi(left to right). need huton? right to left. need suiton? left to right.
tip for tanks: make sure you weave flash or the warrior equivalent into your rotation for better aggro holding. also don't forget about shield oath and sword oath -
02-10-2015, 04:13 AMMrYaahFine ill give you a bard tipQuote:
Originally Posted by lxChrisxl
Don't underestimate the value of bloodletter. It needs to stay off cooldown at all times, particularly it should never be off cooldown during a dot tick. Every time you get a bloodletter reset you have 3 seconds before you have to use it, but if you dont use it in 3 seconds you risk losing a 150 potency move. If you have to delay a gcd by half a second because you have a bunch of off gcds to use then do so, but dont let bloodletter sit off cooldown. If you ever get a natural bloodletter (goes 15 seconds without a reset proc) make sure you use it INSTANTLY, even if you have to delay a gcd, its coming up independent of your dot ticks and could overwrite one if you leave it up for even half a second. Learning how to never waste a bloodletter proc chance is one of the key skills to playing a high dps bard.
Along a similar vein, learn how to make the most out of your buffs. You always want to get each of your dots up during an internal release (for the increased crit chance and therefore increased bloodletters). As such never use internal release right after applying both your dots, wait a gcd or else it will fall off after you reapply the first dot and before you reapply the second. Similar thing goes for Hawk's eye, raging strikes and blood 4 blood. Because they are 20 second durations you can fit two dots, and then one reapplication inside of the buff timing without clipping any of them. To do this you want to either buff right before applying both dots, or between the first dot and the second (then you get one at the beginning and both reapplications buffed). Its ok to delay the second dot a little bit if your buff is about to come up right after the dot reapplication. The same isnt true for the first dot, since you can just apply the buff between the dots and still be ok. Don't wait for more than a gcd on your buffs though (the only exception to this rule is blood for blood for which it is a dps gain to delay it by 10 seconds every time in order to line it up with barrage and hawks eye), if it comes up 2 gcds after your dot applications then thats when you should use it . This is only important when buffs come off CD right around the time you're reapplying dots.
Further on buff snapshotting, everybody knows that venomous bite and wind bite snapshot the buffs up at application, but did you know the same is true for flaming arrow? make sure you use flaming arrow intelligently, dont pop flaming arrow then internal release if you can do the reverse without delaying anything too badly. -
02-12-2015, 04:06 PMruskieThe reason I said it as I did though was if there is a mage there are 2 magic dps in the party and foe really makes it worthwhile. If all we have is a melee or even double bard well I just don't consider it worthwhile(hell for double bard one can sing paeon the other mages and just go aoe crazy).Quote:
Originally Posted by lxChrisxl
And at times the tank can be so bad that the healer will use up most of their MP just keep them alive(I have had this happen personally with a few tanks(no CD use and such) - no way did I have time for any DPS during that time) - the other problem I've been seeing recently is chain pulling(pick one or two packs when nearly dead already grab the next one and just keep going) not even the usual time between trash to get some decent MP back.