is BRD a better support choice than MCH in 4.0?

Comparison between bard VS Machinist
FOE VS Dismantle/Rend mind: seems like FOE is better just because its applies to all enemies near by + you can cast it up MOST of the time unlike dismantle/rend mind with a 90s cd.

Songs VS hyper-charge: the songs now can increase group party member crit by 2% with 15% battle voice and depend on a songs it also reduces magical/physical vulnerability by 10% while hyper-charge only reduces by 5% BUT!!! it has 60s less CD compare to troubadour.

notes that BRD also gets 2 support skills while MCH gets none. YES they are both meant to play as a "support/dps" role but i feel like MCH carries more dmg of their own while bard got less dmg also carries more utilities for their group. which one would you prefer to have in your group for end game raiding?

As it stands, one could say more of the MCH kit was modified to make the role actions for both. Both got a rework, though BRD needed it more than MCH did. I would hope that in the absence of the utilities that BRD has with their songs now, we MCH become more of a raw damage physical ranged who can still render support where needed. I personally don't agree with the Overheating debuff, but there are work arounds. Still with the return of autos and increased potencies, I hope and expect MCH will shine more in damage than support.

I guess we'll see in a few weeks

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Originally Posted by Jilliebeans

Comparison between bard VS Machinist

Songs VS hyper-charge: the songs now can increase group party member crit by 2% with 15% battle voice and depend on a songs it also reduces magical/physical vulnerability by 10% while hyper-charge only reduces by 5% BUT!!! it has 60s less CD compare to troubadour.

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Troubadour doesn't brings damage, its for enemies, its defensive, Reduces Magical/Physical Vulnerability by 10%, its for party members, its not for enemies.

Damage wise bard brings +2% crit with 100% uptime and +15% Direct Hit during 20 seconds every 3 minutes (Battle Voice). It looks like Foe's Requiem Tooltip could be wrong and its not 3% damage reduction from enemies but +3% magic damage taken, but its not clear at all yet.

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Originally Posted by Jilliebeans

notes that BRD also gets 2 support skills while MCH gets none. YES they are both meant to play as a "support/dps" role but i feel like MCH carries more dmg of their own while bard got less dmg also carries more utilities for their group. which one would you prefer to have in your group for end game raiding?

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I dont know whether you are referring to TP/MP managemente, both MCH and BRD have the same, TP/MP regen is an Action Rol for MCH and BRD, both can pick whatever they want, TP or MP or both.

unless am reading it wrong BUT troubadour reduces magical/physical vulnerability by 10% which mean your group member gain 10% more magical/physical dmg for 30s, so yes troubadour does bring dmg boost for ur group lol.

yes i know they both share the same class role but let be honest here, MP/TP regen isnt going to be as "useful" for BRD/MCH in 4.0 just because the cd is like 180s which is pretty long also now that mages can gives mana to healer, i doubt that brd/mch has to worry about it. Anyway my point is that would you take a BRD with more support utilities or a MCH with less utilities but more raw dmg?

Based on how Bard and Machinist are being designed it seems they are separating Bard and Machinist more than just gameplay but by function as well

Bard is the Group Support always providing party buff focusing completely on Party buffing with their damage boost being starting out as 4% then 8% then 12% then 16% on one Song for 30 seconds and 2% crit chance increase for the party BUT they do not have a passive self damage boost anymore due to WM changes.

Machinist focus more now on being the Pure Range DPS Job now with their mechanic focus on maintaining that 50 to 99% Heat to maintain a self 15% damage buff.


Stack that Machinist' 15% damage buff with Bard's 16% damage buff from their song will give Machinist a 31% damage and 2% crit chance buff but Bard would only have a 14% damage and 2% crit chance buff only if Bard and Machinist are pared together.

Though that means self damage wise Machinist may have higher damage than Bard for being focus more as the Pure Damage Range Job as a Machinist who can maintain a balance of 50% to 99% heat will always have a 15% damage boost for the entire run while a Bard will only have a damage boost during their Army's Peon for a Party buff that starts at 4% then reach 16% once there is around 4 seconds left for a duration of 30 seconds only but then lost it 4 seconds later for a new song.

In long run of things it comes down to the choice of having a pure party buff Job being Bard or a pure range damage Job being Machinist.

hmm.. i dont think bard gives any other dmg buff to party beside "troubadour" tho, Army peon only increase bard dmg buff by itself not for party (unless the translation is wrong). But you do have a good point tho, i guess they wanted to make bard and machinist to pared together even better in group while one being support and other can be just pure dps in the group.

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Originally Posted by Jilliebeans

unless am reading it wrong BUT troubadour reduces magical/physical vulnerability by 10% which mean your group member gain 10% more magical/physical dmg for 30s, so yes troubadour does bring dmg boost for ur group lol.

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You are actually reading it wrong. You reduce vulnerability of your allies. Your allies take less damage. Notice how the Mage's Ballad version gives bonus HP? They are all 3 defensive.

Famitsu tooltips reveal likely errors in some of BRD and MCH's information, some of which I'll address below in my comparison.

Before comparing it should be noted that all evidence points to overheating on MCH increasing your damage by 20% until it locks out, meaning it will be an essential component to Wildfire.

*Foe Requiem seems to increase damage taken by targets by 3%. Phys/Mag isn't specified so it likely means 3% from all sources. BRD also has a persistent 2% crit buff, and every 3m a 15% direct hit buff.
*Rook Turret Hypercharge also doesn't specify Phys-Resist down in either Eng or Jpn, so it could be 5% more damage from all sources. That said, it's single target and BRDs is most likely still an aoe effect, though switching targets CAN cause the rook to spread the effect, assuming the debuff works the same way as it does currently.

*In the Jpn tooltip, Dismantle reduces all damage outgoing on the target by 10%, not just physical.
*Alongside this, Troubadour can increase either physical resist or magical resist by 10%, or HP by 15%. MCH's is easier to use but only affects one target, much like the above debuffs - though Troubadour has twice the cooldown.

*BRD has Warden's Paean and that new Minne move (single target Convalescence), 2 support tools MCH has no answer for.

All information is subject to change, of course, but it looks at the moment as though

*MCH is superior for single target increased damage; the debuff can be spread by changing targets, but BRD can just play based on their MP and is generally better on multiple targets. Constant tiny crit buff and very occasional D.Hit buffs could more or less make them equal but we can't really say for now.
*MCH has a single target Virus every 90s, BRD has a party defense buff every 3 minutes. MCH gets 2 for every BRD's one. The difference between them, again, makes MCH superior against single enemies since you're more or less getting the same defensive utility for raid damage but more often, and it's also less of a waste to use on single hit tank busters. BRD's troubadour is superior if raid damage is coming from multiple enemies. The BRD buff also sustains for much longer than Dismantle's 5s duration which will need precise timing to be effective.

So as it stands...I wouldn't say Bard is absolutely a clear winner. They definitely have a slight defensive edge with Minne, Paean (as situational as it is), and Troubadour being a party wide buff; though Dismantle has less of a niche use and can be used twice as often. At this point it's hard to say whether Hypercharge 5% Vs Foe 3% + 2%Crit + 15% D.Hit compare. Requiem can be staggered / more easily used than a one off cooldown. At this stage I'd be tempted to say that BRD is definitely superior for multi target, but MCH might pull ahead with single target. All this of course still doesn't take into account their personal dps compared to each other. So for now while I'd say BRD has the more attention-grabbing support, and Requiem is more flexible than Hypercharge, I don't think there's a definitive enough difference to say at this stage until we can actually play and number crunch

thank you so much for corrected me on those informations!!! do we know for sure if Foe either reduces dmg taken or increase dmg taken by 3%?

I'm going to say Bard at this time, however we wont know till SB hits.

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Originally Posted by Jilliebeans

thank you so much for corrected me on those informations!!! do we know for sure if Foe either reduces dmg taken or increase dmg taken by 3%?

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I don't think we have anything definitive...in the active footage of BRD that's been uploaded there does seem to be a slightly higher amount of damage on skills when Foe is active, but 3% is such a small number that it's hard to separate from natural damage variance. So I wouldn't say 100% yes right now, but it does seem likely - and makes more sense considering the passive crit and battle voice would not be able to compete with Hypercharge alone.

Random side note: I noticed Foe drains MP much faster now.

foe has always drained mana at a faster rate than other songs. i wonder if its even faster now?? Dismantle being the new Disable is an amazing and welcomed change. however there is a slight edge for bard with the single target mantra.

Bard spanks Machinist in support now but Machinist is going to do significantly more damage. Bard's damage looks gutted.

BRD looks more Defensive utility oriented with Single Target Mantra and with Troubadour (Troubadour is full defensive buff, it doesn't bring damage, for english tooltip) and MCH looks more Offensive utility oriented with Hypercharge, but im speculating like everyone here.

I'm guessing BRD is the best dps support currently but it looks like you're paying the price of being the lowest damage DPS. Just look at the fact every other DPS has enmity reduction (besides MCH as well).

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Originally Posted by LunarEmerald

Bard spanks Machinist in support now but Machinist is going to do significantly more damage. Bard's damage looks gutted.

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That is the price Bard pays for being all around the Party Support Job for this game.

Machinist is now the Pure DPS Range Focus Job thus splitting Bard and Machinist into two different roles players can choose either picking Bard for Range Support Job or Machinist for Range DPS Focus Job.

Even now in 3.0 MCH is more focused on causing damage design wise than Bard.

Splitting the jobs up like this was a smart move. AAR BRD essentially took Bard and Ranger from XI and mashed them together. When MCH came along, it was designed to be more or less a clone of BRD where either job is potentially equally capable. Now, we're getting the support role Bard and the DPS role Ranger split apart. This honestly might be a case where people are going to want to have both leveled and geared, as with some fights you might be better off with BRD's superior support, but other times you're better off with MCH's basic support and superior DPS. Ultimately, it's going to be a wait and see. Raid content will ultimately decide which is the "better" job.

With the MCH dmg is increased by a lot, I think they trying to get both class to synce well together in raid. Mch can go pure dps with a few utilities while brd can go support.

To me, MCH has always played more as an offensive support that focuses on increasing damage and dealing it out, while Bard has been more of a general support that had lower personal offensive capabilities. This patch just enhances those differences by giving MCH better raw DPS and Bard more of an emphasis on the buffing aspect. I think composition wise though, it'll honestly come down to whether the party needs more support for their healers and tanks, or whether they need more support for their DPS. Bard is probably still going to be the better "support across the board" class, though I don't think the differences will be strong enough to make one a "must pick" over the other except for specific party comps......

Unfortunately, over on a Discord, with the infos we have right now about the class(MCH), the disparity isnt as pronounced as you make it appear, in fact, the heat gauge is extremely problematic for the fact that the buff it provides to Machinis damage doesnt outweight the Loss from being at 0 heat, and god forbids if you ever end up with no FlameThrower or Barrel stabilizer available for any reason, you're stuck with 40s to rebuild 90 heat at a rate of 5/cgd up to 50 heat ...
Overall Bard have extremely more stable damage ( because boosted dots and their proc system ) and globally better group utility than Machinist.

For some reason Machinist Main mechanic, the heat system, seems to be a goddamn punishment for a Machinist more than anything else ( even knowing that it's a +20% for 10s when in overheat )
I hear alot of complains about WHM, but Machinist took a monstruous hit to the face with this ""update"" of the class too...

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Originally Posted by CookieMog

Unfortunately, over on a Discord, with the infos we have right now about the class(MCH), the disparity isnt as pronounced as you make it appear, in fact, the heat gauge is extremely problematic for the fact that the buff it provides to Machinis damage doesnt outweight the Loss from being at 0 heat, and god forbids if you ever end up with no FlameThrower or Barrel stabilizer available for any reason, you're stuck with 40s to rebuild 90 heat at a rate of 5/cgd up to 50 heat ...
Overall Bard have extremely more stable damage ( because boosted dots and their proc system ) and globally better group utility than Machinist.

For some reason Machinist Main mechanic, the heat system, seems to be a goddamn punishment for a Machinist more than anything else ( even knowing that it's a +20% for 10s when in overheat )
I hear alot of complains about WHM, but Machinist took a monstruous hit to the face with this ""update"" of the class too...

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It really didn't. I'm a MCH main, and even just looking at the mechanic, I can tell that it's very easily a massive damage boost. It won't be hard at all to maintain a 50-95 heat rating, then overheat when you go to preform your wildfire burst, followed by flamethrower or barrel stabilizer to get back to 50 heat. The only way you'll not have those up when you're at zero heat is if you're playing the class wrong, or accidentally cut off Flamethrower too early for whatever reason. Even then, MCH has recieved a damage boost in the form of all of our potencies being higher than what they were before, and them being practically massive when over 50 heat.....

To top that off, we'll be getting more wildfire bursts than before. And if you want to talk about taking a massive hit to your DPS because a mechanic messed up a skill, clearly you're not thinking about how easy it is to lose Wildfire to an invincibility phase, when currently that's a significant portion of MCH's damage. With the reduction to its timer and duration, we won't be losing any potency to it, (1/3 less cooldown, but 1/3 less duration will balance out), but we are gaining more usability from it due to the fact that it'll be a lot more likely to go off and we can use it more often. Furthermore, the increased potencies will only further increase the damage on it....

While it's true that there is the potential for less experienced players to mess up and end up with 0 heat and no skills to bump it back up quickly, that doesn't present a problem as often for the MCHs that play at endgame, as it'll be easy to maintain it. Even though things happen, and it will pop up from time to time, the increased damage as a whole will make up for any DPS loss from those mistakes.....

Honestly as long as "Cooldown" is a standard shot with a solid 230 potency while over 50 heat, weaving it constantly in shot rotation to stay under 100 for sustained DPS should be fine. While it prevents a "hard" rotation of shots, we never had that anyway with procs, so you just have to remember to use it every 2 to 3 shots to stay in range. And once every two minutes at least you can skip back up to 50 heat with stabilizer.

I don't know what to do about all the ogcds and pushing into Overheated for Wildfire yet, but it will be fun to experiment.

Honestly this is looking to be pretty fun to try out.

It will be very hard to stay above 50 heat pre-level 70 (if you intend to overheat), but when you get Flamethrower there's going to be a clear pattern. You can use Barrel Stabilizer / Flamethrower in your opener to immediately get there, then when your barrel stops being locked out after Wildfire you can use whichever you didn't use in the opener to immediately get 50+ again. Then with Flamethrower being 1m CD same as Wildfire, you can use it after every single overheat+lockout (and have Barrel Stabilizer back for backup / inter-wildfire overheats?). At 70 when played right, with the current information, you should only see the original Split-Slug-Clean when barrel is locked out, or perhaps during an opener depending on how that works out. Not to mention MCH has potencies much higher than BRD. MCH isn't screwed at all, the main question will be if BRD's support is valued more.

I think people are forgetting something major about bards when comparing damage. Bard's did actually gain a decent amount of indirect damage buffs. Such as longer dots as well as losing the cast time on iron jaws to refresh the dots. This means many more globals to cast straight shot leading to more refulgent arrows (huge damage). I'm still trying to figure out if refulgent arrow is off the GCD though, which would be amazing.

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Originally Posted by Shunye

I'm still trying to figure out if refulgent arrow is off the GCD though, which would be amazing.

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According to happys stream and all of the spreadsheets I'm 99.99% sure it is on the GCD. It is just a replacement for using straight shot during procs for a damage gain.