New to bard and have some questions?

Decided to level bard to 60 since i had a machinist to 60 but feel some advice is needed.
For barrage if i am in content that doesn't let me use empyreal arrow what is the next go to weapon skill? I have no experience of using anything bard related until a few weeks before 3.5 released.
For the ogcd buffs such as internal release blood for blood hawks eye raging strikes after my opener do i use them as soon as they come up again or do i save them like how i was told to always use barrage with empyreal arrow? I am use to siting on them for my wildfire.
When it comes to foes do i just leave it up for magical dps until i run out of mp or is there specific times like,trash pulls ,add phase and openers.

If you can't use Empyreal Arrow with Barrage yet, use Heavy Shot with Barrage instead.

Personally I use my buffs ASAP; you'll want to make sure they are nicely timed with your DOT application, though (or Iron Jaws when you get it). Bard doesn't have anything like Wildfire though so you don't ever need to sit on your buffs.

Use Foe's during an opener for sure. If you can time it, you'll want to pre-cast it a little so you can immediately put on Battle Voice as the battle starts.
I use Foe's during trash pulls where I know my MP will be full for a boss again.

Buffs highly depend on the fight. Some fights you'll want to save them for area's where higher DPS is needed, like a dps check.. other bosses are just straight up use them when you get em.

The same goes for Foes. If you know there is a heavy DPS check coming, you should save it, or at least make sure you have some MP for when this event happens. Most cases I will start the fight with it active, then make the judgement on when to reuse it after that.


If the fight is healing heavy, you also might not want to use Foes, to ensure you have that MP available to help the healers out, if they are having trouble with MP due to heavy healing requirements. ( In this case, keep in mind that if you save your Battle voice, you can often top up the healers with very little MP use of your own)

If.. you cant use barrage with EMP arrow, heavy arrow is your next best bet.

According to Krietor, you should align your Hawk's Eye and Blood for Blood with your Barrage+Empyreal Arrow combo. Basically just apply them when your Barrage is 15s from resetting.

The other damage buffs can be applied off cooldown. Just try to maintain a nice rotation so you get as much out of your buffed dots as possible.

During the opener, reapply your buffs with Iron Jaws before any of yout buffs drop off. If you're doing it correctly, you will get around 27s of fully buffed dots during the opener which is pretty crazy.

Foe's Requiem: best to utilize it during big pulls if you have to scrape away from somewhere. In actual boss fights, activate it before pull with Battle Voice and after that activate it whenever Battle Voice is off cooldown, as it aligns with BLM/SMN Raging Strikes and any other 180s timer now. Ofc when to sing is a situational thing, but that's good "know-how" for most fights.

Thanks for the info. Another question I was going to ask was about the wardens paeon is removing pacification off a warrior the main thing I need to look for?

Look for any debuffs. If you get hit with a debuff and can cleanse yourself, it saves the healer from casting on you, and they can focus their attention on someone else without a self cleanse.

Yes, the most common way of using Warden's Paean is just casting it whenever you see the Berserk buff up on your Warrior (yellow buff on his buff bar). It's usually reserved for the Warrior, as you can negate it completely before it even happens and it is a constant scenario with a decent War.

Warden's paean can also be used to cleanse other nasty conditions, like Paralyze or a Bind, but those happen in more specific scenarios. It never hurts to look for situations to use your Paean, though.

My advice on Barrage if you Empureal arrow is on CD is to wait that it comes out of CD.
There will be a difference of 240 potency damage between a Barrage Heavy shot and a Barrage empyreal arrow. Even if your Raging strikes will end before your Empyreal arrow is back up since even if the 20% damage buff is good, it would require a 55%~ damage buff on Barrage Heavy shoto to be the equivalent of a non buffed Barrage Empyreal.
Moral of the story, never use Barrage with anything else then Empyreal Arrow.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Slyqc

Moral of the story, never use Barrage with anything else then Empyreal Arrow.

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The question was for levels 38 through 53 sync.



In re: Foe Requiem, even if the only magic user is the healer, it's a good idea to use it. Competent healers won't need a ballad unless more than one raise has been cast; if there have been 0 or 1 raises and MP is near zero, the healer let it get that low on purpose because s/he has cooldowns available to regain MP without you sacrificing some of your damage, and your MP will have been better spent on boosting the damage from all the spells they just spent all their MP on.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ShaneDawn

Warden's paean can also be used to cleanse other nasty conditions, like Paralyze or a Bind, but those happen in more specific scenarios. It never hurts to look for situations to use your Paean, though.

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yeah true... after it got buffed its an awesome instant esuna/dispell even i (playing all 3 healer on max lvl) am totally jealous about. top skill which is underestimated for sure. ^^

Something that hasn't been mentioned but well worth saying:

Do not use Off GCD abilities one after the other (series). For exemple, it's much better to go Straight Shot, Sidewinder, Heavy Shot, Bloodletter then going Straight Shot, Sidewinder, Bloodletter, Heavy Shot. By weaving in one off-GCD ability between GCD's, you get a seemless DPS output whereas you will experience very short but pretty noticeable downtimes while popping off GCD skills like a maniac.

Personally, while it's way more situational, I apply the same logic to CD's. I will go: CD, GCD, CD, GCD, and so on.

Advanced tip: Don't forget that DoTs are applied with an image of your buffs... So planning to Iron Jaw before a buffs wears off is sometimes much better than iron jawing just before DoTs fall off. ESPECIALLY if said buffs are Straight Shot and Internal Release.

As for off cooldown Priority, assuming you're weaving them in, my personal preference is: Misery's End, Bloodletter, Sidewinder, Blunt Arrow... in that order. I prefer Bloodletting before sidewinding because of the proc'ing...

Hope this helps. Keep us updated on your progress!