Bard 3.01 How is it?

My only DPS was BRD pre-HW. At the release of HW, I heard some negative things about BRD and have put off leveling until 3.01 patch (Currently lvl 53). So my question is, how has the 3.01 patch helped BRD? Does the change from 20% to 30% increase in damage and lower casting time offset the lower potency changes made to Empyreal arrow and sidewinder? (Doesn't a 350 to 250 nerf on a 60 sec CD ability seem too much? Perhaps 300 would've been more reasonable?)

Also, do lvl 60 BRD players toggle WM on and off when CDs are up? Any insight on the changes in playstyle, WS rotations etc. would be appreciated.

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Originally Posted by kumo21

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Since WM is practically a direct copy of GB...

You want to maintain it as long as you can. It is a damage increase given that you can stand still and use it optimally. Pre-60 is still up in the air, though I'd imagine it'd still be a slight damage increase. If you can't find a time to stand still, you won't be able to use any weapon skills and you're not able to auto attack. If it comes to that, it's better to toggle it off for that duration.

The negative aspect is that it comes with a complete playstyle change to how bard played before 3.0. If you were a full-time bard main for quite some time, then you'd immediately notice that WM is pretty clumsy to use in regards to river of blood procs, and probably feel a bit slower/unreactive compared to before.

The potency adjustment was done in relation to the damage increase from WM. It didn't change overall for empirical arrow (which has a fairly short cooldown) but has for sidewinder. It was mostly to discourage burst WM/GB where people would just hard cast the 3 seconds to go into WM, use their burst abilities, then immediately turn it off.

Bard is in a really good spot if you can handle the playstyle change (A lot of people seemingly cant...)

You'll want to stay in WM until you decide for yourself that you're moving too much to warrant it on.
The patch helped a lot, I definitely wanted a shorter cast time (instant works too...) The toggle is good, just make sure you're prepared to be in it for fifteen seconds at the least.

Damage is fine, playstyle is still horrible and clunky.

DPS so far is good and we still need in most fight because we are angel to healer, with the semi mobility when WM is on kinda boring and game changing for bard. From my personal perspective Bard lvl 60 is hard because need lot of attention with the skill rotation, losing auto attack making us need to alert with all skill and CD.

2.0 BRD mains were hard wired to play the piano like an overzealous Mozart so transitioning to 3.0 will have you undergo some growing pains. You will now be required to switch between the old playstyle and the new, back and forth, if you want to optimize. That's why people say it's clunky. You were trained to ride those cooldowns before and are now being re-trained to slow your roll and prioritize those procs and/or skill cancel when they come up.

So far, as of the 3.01 patch, (currently lvl 56) I'm kinda enjoying brd for the most part. Yeah I see what people mean by clunky when you can't use blood letter/rain of death while casting and sometimes they reset more than once before you get to use them. I think it'd be nice if the resets save up stacks of BL/RoD for you. Also what's up with the removal of 0TP of Wide Volley and Quick Nock? I don't find myself using the skills anymore because of that. Should SE bring it back? Or at least WV proccing 0TP for QN so they'd be useful again.

Wide volley needs to all around be changed. it's just a higher costing quick knock atm sadly.

http://i.imgur.com/A3oVL5m.png[/url]

As much as I dislike the idea of cast-times on a bard, I think my biggest problem with it is the fact that the class toggles them on. No amount of playing my Bard will make me comfortable with hitting a button and suddenly having cast times on previously instant abilities within the same fight. It's just clunky. I don't like casting - if I did, I'd play a spellcaster - but I'd prefer if they did one or the other, not bounce back and forth between the two.

Overall I think the class is okay at best right now. It's honestly less fun to play than the 2.55 version. WM is a pretty drastic playstyle change and it seems like people are quitting the class in droves over it. If you've played a caster or a healer before and understand how to stutter-step cast then you'll have an easier time of it.

As far as DPS goes, the increase in WM does offset the changes to Emp Arrow and Sidewinder, and was a big statement from the devs that maximum WM uptime is what you should strive for. The issue I still have is that bards are still pretty much where they were in 2.55 percentage-wise behind other DPS classes. Bards gave up their mobility and didn't gain any ground on other dps or pick up any new useful support. I advocated for a DPS stance for the bard, but really did not expect stanced damage to still be bottom-tier when it makes them the 2nd least mobile class in the game.

For your last question, you really want to maximize WM uptime at all costs. Switching out of stance should only be done with your buffs on cooldown during high movement phases or to quickly pick up adds. Cross-classing feint isn't a bad choice now for when you have to move further than stutter-step distance but not so far that you want to drop WM.

I have mained a BRD in this game since I got it. And I loved it. Even though the DPS isn't stellar, and even though I really don't feel like the Ballads Utility makes up for the loss of DPS. But that was pre-HW. Now, I am thinking of playing either a different class, or a different game. In my opinion, and that is all it is, BRD is Broken.

I sincerely do not like WM. I have played BRD type classes in other games (LOTRO comes to mind) and they had cast/induction timers. Its not that. Its that the changes to BRD don't feel like a natural evolution to the class that I love so much. They feel like cheap bandaids that were tacked on at the last moment.

BRD can and SHOULD be fixed. Either take WM out, or remove the movement penalty of not being able to do damage. But something, even if its not my poor suggestions needs to be done. Either that, or people will speak with their wallets and either play a different class or play a different game altogether, as I am contemplating.

I'm more depressed that I wasted all this time on BRD when I could have been working on another class, I don't like feeling as though Im dragging my feet in a fight and that exactly how I feel when I play BRD now, the DPS numbers are laughable even if people give me the "Oh don't worry you still have your songs to play" , makes me wanna punt a Lalafell across the room....seriously the devs completely screwed over a vast majority of players that were having fun with the mobility in the class and feeling a freedom in combat, now its always "OMG PUT ON WM U NEWB", and refusal usually means getting kicked from a group.....but no no no, this is how we are supposed to play BRD...just glorified turrets that have a god damn cd player taped to their forehead for listening to songs, see we obviously we have to play the class the way the developers want us to. Oh well at least Im having fun with Ninja, gonna screw that class up too dev's?