Bard's Thematic Future

UPDATE 1: Please answer this 1 question poll on Reddit (up until May 16th, 2020) https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...happen_to_brd/
UPDATE 2: The Poll Results are in! A Breakdown and more charts/graphs can be found on page 11.

https://i.imgur.com/X74UgDP.png

In the recent digest, Yoshi said to continue to provide feedback on a thematic change to Bard. So, here I shall.

Bard songs buffing the group in SB was pretty rewarding. It was an added incentive and a goal for keeping songs up and rolling. I believe the Soul Voice gauge is supposed to carry that feeling over but falls flat in my opinion.

With the changes in SHB we see MCH as a pure DPS focused class, DNC as a high support focused class and BRD seems to be lost in the mix. I feel as though BRD should be a healthy middle option, maintaining their previous role of being a buffing job though not to the same degree as DNC.

Additionally, having more songs at their disposal would only be a boon. Moves like Straight Shot, Windbite, Venomous Bite, Quick Nock etc. could be turned into songs while under the effects of Ballad/Paeon/Minuet - similar to how DNC attacks turn into dance steps while not having the same dancing system (think of it more as ability glamours). Well-known FFXI songs could reappear such as Carnage Elegy and Foe's Requiem to replace the DoT animations, for example.

It would also be really neat to see a system where we play notes, akin to the actual DNC step system, but without stepping on DNCs gameplay. I love DNCs steps and dancing system but that should stay on DNC. But a big part to music and being a Bard is proper note playing. Perhaps bow attacks could correspond to notes, and every time you play a sequence of 3 different notes you increase the party buff that Ballad/Minuet/Paeon provide - up to a limit - to make it feel more rewarding to use multiple bow abilities and limit Burst/Heavy spam.

Tl;dr: We need more songs (even if just glamours during current song stances) and more party buffing (but still less than DNC) to feel more like a BRD.

How do you all want to see more songs/music added to BRD (or do you not want to see more songs)?

Make Bard a Defensive buffer.

Yeah, Foe Req is great, but giving them back singular and raid wide mitigation options has value too.

Bring back Palisade as a unique utility. Add a healing component to Apex Arrow (and extend the Soul gauge to give some flexibility in its use). Have Battle Voice (in addition to current effect) cause all the Bard's supportive stuff like Paen, Minne, and others (like Palisade) extend to all nearby allies.

Add some shot modifiers that enhance the next shot with bonus supporting properties.

I've been kicking around an idea revolving around Warden's Paean.

As Warden's Paean currently is, it's useless in 95% of content due to a lack of debuffs that it can cleanse. This lack of engagement with it results in most Bards not learning how to use it at all, even for the few situations where it can prevent a death (Hashmal's dash in Rabanastre and Orbonne being the most notable examples).

I think Warden's Paean should keep its current effect, but have another added depending on your current active song.

- Warden's Paean (Mage's Ballad): Additional effect of providing a 500 potency HP restoration when their HP reaches 40% or less. Effect lasts for 30 seconds or until activated. (Would have synergy with Nature's Minne.)
- Warden's Paean (Army's Paeon): Provides a barrier that absorbs damage up to 10% of the target's maximum HP. Effect lasts for 30 seconds or until barrier is broken.
- Warden's Paean (Wanderer's Minuet): The target takes 5% less damage from all attacks for the next 10 seconds.

(The effects seem relatively low-ish because I'd assume that Warden's Paean would retain its current 45 second cooldown.)

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Originally Posted by SaitoHikari

I think Warden's Paean should keep its current effect, but have another added depending on your current active song.

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If songs are a central component of the Bard's rotation, its utility should really be usable separate from that. However, we can solve that with adding a neat little OGCD for them that lets their utility morph while also retaining on demand use.

Remember kids, utility that can't be used on demand is effectively just an old Bole Card.

"Harmonic Arrow"
Ability
Effect: On first use, Harmonic Arrow ends the current song and retains it. On second use, Harmonic arrow deals damage and grants the Bard's other abilities any applicable bonus effects from the stored song for 6 seconds.

My suggestion was more about re-purposing an old skill to encourage greater use of it more than anything else, really.

You could more or less solve the issue without creating a new skill by reducing Warden's Paean cooldown to 30 seconds (essentially making it usable once per song), but that'd probably make it broken. Of course, you still won't get specific effects on demand, but all three effects are similar enough in theory, just with slight advantages in different situations.

Just want to say I like the current bard as a starting point for a Ranger/Sniper job.
So go ahead and make bard an actual bard, but those of us who actually want to play Archer are in a rather good spot right now, minus the tacked on song aspect.

As everyone else has said better than me the current is very well designed for an Archer/Ranger type job, but it’s missing that ‘spark’ from before that made it feel more like a Bard than Ranger.

I really like the idea of Bard being defensive oriented in what skills it brings, it fits really nicely with the lore and how the job is kinda ‘sold, plus it doesn’t take away from the support that a Dancer brings which is more focused on offense. While I’d love to see Foe Requiem to return, I wouldn’t imagine them making more offense songs besides Requiem since that’s not really what they’ve been about. Not to say that there couldn’t be like, a haste song, but i don’t think that kind of utility should be the main focus since they want to to be Dancer’s thing.

Mechanically speaking, Id love to see future ‘support’ songs be in the style of Foe Requiem with a cast time (1.5s) and MP (Soul Gauge?) drain. I feel like it’s a good way for them to let us have interesting skills but still keep it balanced by mp cost and the DPS loss from casting. That’s just personal preference though; going by the majority I believe any future ‘support songs’ will be in style of Minne/Paean, instant use with a cooldown. Which, I get, but I feel like the original style gave you a bit more freedom on when you’d want to use it. And it wouldn’t be hard for them to stick an MP Recovery effect on something like Empyreal Arrow or Bloodletter then you’d be able to manage how/when you used them.

My favourite part of being a Bard before now was when things were getting tough for the party and there was nothing more your damage could do. Singing could help pull your party back from that brink, but at the same time couldn’t do anything for you alone. You weren’t able to physically heal the party, but with your songs you could help the healer to push out those extra heals and raises, keep the DPS going on their AoE skills, strengthen their attacks to take down powerful foes (by weakening the enemy, I know lol). It was in those moments that I really felt ‘so this is what Jehantel was talking about’ lol.

I mean, the whole point of the Bard quests is largely trying to convince the God’s Quiver the military value of songs. No matter how well it’s performed, the songs are granted power from the fervent desire to protect one’s comrades. If that desire doesn’t ring true in the heart of the singer, their songs will be empty.

By level 80, it seems that the trainee Bards have begun to grasp this. But I can’t help but wonder, when did my own character lose the desire to protect their comrades? Why have my songs become hollow? It’s like the very thing the Bard quests warned us about has happened to us

(P.S: apologies for such a long post lol, I genuinely thought to myself ‘I should try and keep it short’ when I started writing)

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Originally Posted by SaitoHikari

As Warden's Paean currently is, it's useless in 95% of content due to a lack of debuffs that it can cleanse. This lack of engagement with it results in most Bards not learning how to use it at all, even for the few situations where it can prevent a death (Hashmal's dash in Rabanastre and Orbonne being the most notable examples).

I think Warden's Paean should keep its current effect, but have another added depending on your current active song.

- Warden's Paean (Mage's Ballad): Additional effect of providing a 500 potency HP restoration when their HP reaches 40% or less. Effect lasts for 30 seconds or until activated. (Would have synergy with Nature's Minne.)
- Warden's Paean (Army's Paeon): Provides a barrier that absorbs damage up to 10% of the target's maximum HP. Effect lasts for 30 seconds or until barrier is broken.
- Warden's Paean (Wanderer's Minuet): The target takes 5% less damage from all attacks for the next 10 seconds.

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Turning Warden's into a mini-Excog is something I would love to see, or a mini-Adlo. Either of the two fits with the idea of Bard being a defensive buffer as mentioned elsewhere in the thread. Would be nice to get Palisade back as well but maybe that's wishful thinking.

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Originally Posted by Connor

Mechanically speaking, Id love to see future ‘support’ songs be in the style of Foe Requiem with a cast time (1.5s) and MP (Soul Gauge?) drain.

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The cast time is largely why they got rid of it, because players felt it was clunky and disrupted the flow of the Job. Couldn't stop to cast it in WM or MB because we'd likely waste procs, and casting it in AP was still a DPS loss, a problem that would be even bigger now that Burst Shot is a thing and Refulgent Arrow got buffed. Still, I would like to see Foe Requiem back, just make it an instant oGCD. Giving us back some utility will bring us more inline with our Job lore which I think is incredibly important, and more offensive utility is just nice in general.

Stormblood bard seemed to be in a good place but now that bards just sing to themselves...may as well call that a ranger. I would like for them to have buffs or a stance where they sing instead of shooting arrows while giving the same effects as a Stormblood song. Perhaps their arrow skills could transform like how Summoner's do during their trance and become more music themed.

Honestly, I believe it was a mistake to melt the concept of a Bard with the Archer. These are two iconic RPG roles that have roots as deep as the origin of the genre itself, and they have very little in common. What we have is a job where the two identities are battling each other for control of the job. This isn't really fair to the players who want to be a bow and arrow master or the players who want to be a battle musician.

What I would seriously recommend if I were a part of the company would be a plan for 6.0, or maybe 5.5, but probably 6.0.

Step 1: Add the new job of Ranger which would take the place of Bard as the job ascension of Archer. The play style would largely stay the same with all the songs being completely removed from the ability list and would be replaced with heavier bow themed abilities.

Step 2: Convert the Bard identity we have into a new job slot available at level 30. The job quests stay the same for the most part, but is no longer associated with the Archer. Now, their weapon will be Harps while also using other instruments like how the machinist includes other machines in their actions. Sometimes you'll be playing the flute, other times strumming a guitar, and perhaps a few others. This could be designed as a foil to Dancer as another high support ranged DPS. Essentially, having both should feel like it currently feels to have dupes of Dancer: not ideal, but workable. Neither should feel like a requirement.

Essentially, Ranger is just a renamed Bard with a few reworked abilities and an all-new job quest line.

Bard is functionally a brand new job with an entirely different set of abilities, but uses the current job quest line.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

snip.

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Honestly I’d love to see this happen. If there was a traditional style ‘Bard’ job in the game that used a Harp as it’s main weapon I don’t think I’d ever look at another job. If it was a caster DPS/healer I’d turn into the ultimate Yoshi-P White Knight.

It would ultimately mean everyone wins; Rangers can have their Arrow stuff, Bards can have their song stuff. It feels like they backed themselves into a design corner by arbitrarily squishing these two jobs together purely because ‘Ranger’ was considered too similar to ‘Archer’ (though couldn’t you say the same about Pugilist and Monk?)A Ranger job could easily keep the exact same playstyle ‘Bard’ has now so that nobody has to lose out on what they like.

Sadly though with the amount of work it would require would be astronomical, since they’d be designing two new jobs, and then having to look at the design of every other job in the respective role to accommodate the new jobs and (try) to keep balance. New job quests, new job gear, new animations for both jobs, etc.

Still though, I honestly don’t think I’ve ever come across someone who liked Bard for what it actually is. It’s seems to be either, ‘I like playing Archer type jobs / using a bow’ or ‘I like playing Bard type jobs / the musical theme’. I’ve not encountered anyone who’s said ‘i like the way they combined Bard and Ranger into a single job’. Not that I want to demean the opinion of those who do like the combination, but I feel like I’m general it’s not this combination that brings people to the job to start with

So I mean, I feel like the Bard community is already split between two different jobs; the musical ‘Bard’ and the bow wielding ‘Archer’.

I’d also like to add a disclaimer that this is all for discussion’s sake and I’m not seriously expecting it to somehow change their stance on Bard/Archer being a shared job. Just wanted to say that I think if there was some way they could do something like it could resolve the whole ‘identity’ issues the job has

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Originally Posted by Connor

I’ve not encountered anyone who’s said ‘i like the way they combined Bard and Ranger into a single job’. Not that I want to demean the opinion of those who do like the combination, but I feel like I’m general it’s not this combination that brings people to the job to start with

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I like the way they combined Bard and Ranger into a single job.

Or at least I liked it before its support got nerfed to the point where Monk is arguably a better support job. I still like the way the job plays, but I'd much rather have stronger and/or more frequently-usable support abilities.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Honestly, I believe it was a mistake to melt the concept of a Bard with the Archer.

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I totally agree that they made a mistake in merging the two together. And I totally agree they should work toward separating them. However, I feel like the amount of work involved would be a major hindrance.

An idea I've thrown around over at Reddit would be a job glamour of sorts - toggle with a command like /jobglamour BRD or /jobglamour RNG. This would keep the gameplay exactly the same between BRD and RNG and just change the look of the abilities. So, BRD gets all sorts of song animations while RNG gets arrow animations. The 3 song stance rotation could turn into 3 different poisons. The Animals command from FFV could make a reappearance of sorts for some of the support abilities. They could even skip commands and make a Harp weapon to change to BRD glamours, having it function similarly to ACN jobs while not having to worry about balancing a new job.

This would considerably lessen the workload for a sooner implementation and could even be a stepping stone for total separation.

I honestly have zero problem with bard using bows to do their thing. I just dislike bards thematically and feel they are wasting my beloved Ranger job by prancing around like an idiot with a flute. Bards can keep the archer class, they can keep the 1-80 quest line. I just want them to add a ranger job. Call their bows greatbows, or short bows, or whatever, It just needs to do general ranger things and none of this musical nonsense.
https://i.imgur.com/ffWQLk1.jpg

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Originally Posted by Atamis

I honestly have zero problem with bard using bows to do their thing. I just dislike bards thematically and feel they are wasting my beloved Ranger job by prancing around like an idiot with a flute. Bards can keep the archer class, they can keep the 1-80 quest line. I just want them to add a ranger job. Call their bows greatbows, or short bows, or whatever, It just needs to do general ranger things and none of this musical nonsense.
https://i.imgur.com/ffWQLk1.jpg

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I think there are lots of people who feel this way about the job too; they’re drawn to the bow/archer style of the job but get the music aspects thrust on them. That’s why I think maybe one day in like 7.0 expansion or whatever they should maybe consider trying to make a separation work. Right now it’s a balancing act they just don’t seem to get right. There’s definitely the argument that the current design decision means that both ‘Bard’ lovers and ‘Ranger’ lovers lose out. I mean, there are only so many abilities one job can have. And Bard is the only job in the game that is still pulling from two different ‘traditional jobs, meaning that realistically it can only ever be 50/50 or weighted towards one identity more than the other.

Like, imagine if Black Mage and Monk just got randomly mashed together? Neither Black Mages nor Monks would be happy. It might be fun to play, but it’s neither one nor the other at that point.

And of course liking the mix of the two into one job is something people that people feel too. That said, I think there is the argument for people who like it is now, that changing it to Ranger but removing the musical aspects would change extremely little in terms of the jobs actual playstyle. Just replace songs with arrow coatings for proc activations and there’s really little else that needs done to make it a ‘pure Ranger’ job.

At the very least, maybe they could rename the current Bard to something else, leave it exactly how it is and add another musical job that’s more like a real traditional Bard? Having one class split into two different jobs doesn’t work as we’ve seen with Summoner and Scholar, so a real ‘Bard’ would need to be an entirely different job anyway (it could never have Archer as a starting class)

I mean, I always see people saying hybrids can’t exist for ffxiv. Yet Bard is, for all intents and purposes, an attempt at a hybrid class that’s support and DPS together despite the game clearly not supporting such a playstyle. In my opinion it’s ultimately failed at providing a satisfying hybridisation of the two jobs. Either there’s too much singing, or there’s too much archery; singing is clunky and gets in the way of archery, or the archery is getting in the way of the songs. I find it hard to have faith that they’ll ever find a satisfying combination of these two jobs.

My only wish is that someone was around at the time they finalised the job design and said ‘hey, this isn’t gonna work’ lol

IMO, they need to realize that there is no "inbetween" and just DPS-Support hybrid or selfish. DNC is way too weak, and BRD needs to feel like it's doing more support / interaction with songs, buffs, synergy et cetera. And they need to complete the merged BRD/RNG job concept. MCH looks great, please

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Originally Posted by Idolon

I like the way they combined Bard and Ranger into a single job.

Or at least I liked it before its support got nerfed to the point where Monk is arguably a better support job. I still like the way the job plays, but I'd much rather have stronger and/or more frequently-usable support abilities.

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I loved the combination too. But in D&D I always played ranger or bard and I could have them together in ffxiv. I also love support jobs and never cared about doing the most dps, it was all about pushing my team to see them get big numbers. Now I sadly sing songs to myself. The "ranger" aspect of the job feels good. But the bard side just feels empty. Overall the job is boring and way too simple. I don't even call myself a bard main anymore and have stopped raiding. I left my static in fear of being told that I have to master a new job with better support (looking at you monk and dragoon) to be in the new meta, which does not include any physical dps. And as much as I love dancer, it is being locked out by narrow minded speedrunners/harsh dps checks. But at least I feel like I am supporting my friends as a dancer in regular content.
Another bard thread had an idea for a stance button that sounded like a lot of fun to me. There were so many bards that I came across while leveling other jobs that just refused to use songs. It made me so angry. But they have been trying to over simplify the jobs and I don't see SE doing giving us stances. Just like they will never give it the arcanist treatment of splitting into 2 jobs.
At this point neither side, team bard or team ranger, is going to be happy. I have never seen the forums this bad about the identity crisis. My guess is that we are stuck with a ranger that mumbles to itself for the next 2 years.

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

I totally agree that they made a mistake in merging the two together. And I totally agree they should work toward separating them. However, I feel like the amount of work involved would be a major hindrance.

An idea I've thrown around over at Reddit would be a job glamour of sorts - toggle with a command like /jobglamour BRD or /jobglamour RNG. This would keep the gameplay exactly the same between BRD and RNG and just change the look of the abilities. So, BRD gets all sorts of song animations while RNG gets arrow animations. The 3 song stance rotation could turn into 3 different poisons. The Animals command from FFV could make a reappearance of sorts for some of the support abilities. They could even skip commands and make a Harp weapon to change to BRD glamours, having it function similarly to ACN jobs while not having to worry about balancing a new job.

This would considerably lessen the workload for a sooner implementation and could even be a stepping stone for total separation.

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Honestly, the only real work it would take is just making 1 new job for the most part, so it's really not unreasonable for a 6.0 scenario.

Ranger as a concept is essentially the same as the current Bard, just with new names and animations for Bard's current song abilities, which is only a fraction of the overall kit anyway. All you're changing is Mage's Ballad, Army's Paeon, Warden's Paeon, Wonderer's Minuet, Nature's Minne, Battle Voice, and Troubadour i.e. 7 abilities, which is less work than the Machinist rework since those abilities can still function identically. The only other thing would be creating a new set of job quests from level 30+ which is a bit more work than is put into a typical new job per expansion, but not alarmingly so.

New Bard is essentially just one of the new jobs, except it would start at level 30 and would just inherit the current Bard job quest line, so the only change would be to the NPC weapons associated with the Bard Quest Line, and whatever new Job quests got added.

So basically: 1 New Job by design, 1 new Job Quest Line. Not that much more work than adding in any other new job.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Honestly, the only real work it would take is just making 1 new job for the most part, so it's really not unreasonable for a 6.0 scenario.

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It will never happen. For one thing, it would mean the creation of Yet Another Ranged DPS ... something that simply won't happen after the brouhaha of "5.0 ignored healers".

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Originally Posted by DPZ2

It will never happen. For one thing, it would mean the creation of Yet Another Ranged DPS ... something that simply won't happen after the brouhaha of "5.0 ignored healers".

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So what about a Ranged DPS AND a Healer? Bard and Geomancer?

There is precisely zero possibility they covert Bard into Ranger at this stage. The undertaking would require a massive reworking for something ultimately not really worth the endeavour. Instead of a new job, we'd essentially have two halves rebuilt. Furthermore, Bard from previous FFs will not work in this game because it has to be a damage dealer. It essentially becomes Dancer... which means now you wield a Harp in lieu of a bow and maybe have a few more buffs. But at the end of the day, you're a DPS who is expected to DPS. Regardless, even if this were under some consideration, it's extremely unlikely they release another physical Range.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

There is precisely zero possibility they covert Bard into Ranger at this stage. The undertaking would require a massive reworking for something ultimately not really worth the endeavour. Instead of a new job, we'd essentially have two halves rebuilt. Furthermore, Bard from previous FFs will not work in this game because it has to be a damage dealer. It essentially becomes Dancer... which means now you wield a Harp in lieu of a bow and maybe have a few more buffs. But at the end of the day, you're a DPS who is expected to DPS. Regardless, even if this were under some consideration, it's extremely unlikely they release another physical Range.

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I have to disagree. 4 tanks, 4 melee, 3 healers, 3 ranged, 3 casters (4 if you count BLU). Adding a healer and a ranged would balance the roles out a bit.

Additionally, changing BRD to RNG would only require new quests, 7 animation changes and no balance adjustments in it's current form. RNG in the series did have very small amounts of defensive support, usually in the form of animals. Then, adding a new BRD from the ground up would focus on songs and could, hear me out, even be a healer.

Minnes in the series were defensive songs (could be HP shields), Paeons were heals and HoTs, Requiems were damage and DoTs, Goddess' Hymnus resurrected, Lullaby is present as Repose, Nightingale/Troubadour from XI are equivalent to Lightspeed/Presence of Mind. They could have a feature where the more they sing (heals and damage), the more their Soul Voice fills up (similar to fairy gauge) and they can use that gauge for party buffs like Minuet (similar to lily gauge, balanced with AST buffs) with a song that they can sing that builds the gauge during downtime like DNC but also provides group mitigation. There's a plethora of songs in the series that can fill in any unique buffs or mechanics, really.

I'm not saying that it is likely or even the best option for BRD, just that there are absolutely viable possibilities and solutions available to get a BRD whose focus is on songs. I'd personally welcome even a drastic change as this to get a BRD who sings.

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

Additionally, changing BRD to RNG would only require new quests, 7 animation changes and no balance adjustments in it's current form.

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You guys act like this is simple. It's not. Bard's skill set was already gutted this expansion to the point where we have an inexplicable 12 level gap between level 18 and 30 where we don't get any new skills at all. I'm not sure what a split would even achieve on top of that, assuming the devs actually do it.

For everyone who thinks this is actually feasible, I challenge you to come up with a list of skills/traits for the split classes from level 1-80. As someone who spent literal days coming up with those kinds of suggestions in my previous MMO, it's nowhere near as easy as you think. The vast majority of them turned out bad, wouldn't play very well in hindsight, or were straight up overpowered in hindsight. And I say this as someone that already tried to come up with a way to split Archer into Ranger and Bard, only to come to the conclusion that it isn't feasible development-wise. It'd entail designing a new set of weapons, a whole new quest series along with re-writing the current Bard quests (when the developers didn't even bother making a new series of job quests this expansion and just stuck them at level 80).

That's on top of trying to rebalance Ranger around all the other DPS AND balancing a theoretical healer Bard against all the other healers at the same time. Oh, and maybe ticking off a lot of the current Bard players who probably won't like how the new Ranger plays, and accusations from the Chemist/Geomancer fans and Healers in general that the devs are so lazy that they would rather split an existing class to make a new healer, instead of making an entirely new class from scratch. It's enough of a miracle that SB Bard was as well-received as it was.

Bard already gets overhauled every expansion, I'd rather not keep that meme going. The devs won't even fully split Scholar and Summoner despite them openly admitting that joining them together was a mistake for years, a Bard split isn't going to happen and I'd rather we focus our efforts on realistic suggestions.

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Originally Posted by SaitoHikari

Bard's skill set was already gutted this expansion to the point where we have an inexplicable 12 level gap between level 18 and 30 where we don't get any new skills at all.

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That 12 level gap already existed back in SB since the level 22 Swiftsong and the level 26 Hawk's Eye were removed. You're right on the money with everything else though. It would be a stupid amount of work to separate Bard and Ranger, not to mention it would involve severely retconning the hell out out Job Lore that's been established for the past 6+ years, including already published material like Encyclopedia Eorzea. The level 30 through 50 Job quests are all about the Archer becoming a Bard, the level 50 through 60 Job quests are all about finding the Ballad of Oblivion to convice the Adders to train Archers as Bards. They just going to rewrite the premise the all those Job quests? And that's to say nothing about developing an entirely new Job lore for the proposed Ranger, the effects of punting Bard into a different role, etc. It's genuinely confusing to see people write off as simple or "oh they just need to do this" when really it would be a massive amount of work to do something they already don't like doing.

Bard is currently a bit lacking thematically since they removed some of our support abilities, but to say it's a random mash-up of conflicting themes would do well to re-read what Jehantel says in the level 35 Bard quest:

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Ever since nations first quarreled, armies have fielded archers wherewith they rained death upon the enemy from afar. As the battle unfolded, however, the distinction between the lines of friend and foe would grow hazy. Yet the archer's part did not end there.

He had to stay ever alert, with arrow nocked and eyes trained upon the struggle.

Even as his comrades fell, turning the earth red with their blood, the archer could ill afford to avert his gaze, lest that moment cost another his life.

One need not have a vivid imagination to appreciate the torrent of emotions that raged within him in that moment.

Nerves near to fraying, his breast fit to burst, the archer did the only thing he could: he sang. His bow became a makeshift instrument, plucked as an accompaniment.

At first, the archer sang only to still the roiling within. But his voice chanced to carry to his comrades. It inspirited those engaged in combat, lending strength to their sword arms. And to those who lay upon the precipice of death, it granted a measure of peace.

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The Job identity is there, the lore and the quests support it, it's only the gameplay that is currently lacking. Splitting Bard into a separate Bard and Ranger Job is a terrible idea and it would piss off a fair chunk of people, myself included. I get that there are people upset about not having a Ranger, and I get that there are people upset about not having a Bard strumming a lute, but gutting Bard isn't the answer.

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Originally Posted by SaitoHikari

For everyone who thinks this is actually feasible, I challenge you to come up with a list of skills/traits for the split classes from level 1-80.

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You're misinterpreting. When it comes to a split, we're (or at least I am) saying that Bard as it is can be Ranger. All that is needed is swapping out existing song animations for animals, poisons, traps, etc. The current gameplay would translate 100%. There is no need to rebalance Ranger as it wouldn't be gaining or losing any actual abilities, just changing animations. Like how changing Ifrit Egi into any of the 3 Carbuncles doesn't change his abilities or potencies.

Instead of Warden's Paean to remove a debuff, it could be Leech (akin to FFTA2). Instead of Troubadour to reduce damage, it could be Camouflage (XI). Instead of Nature's Minne for enhanced HP recovery, it could be related to woodland creatures (akin to !Animals from FFV). Instead of Pitch Perfect, it could be Eagle Eye Shot (from XI). Instead of 3 Songs and repertoire they could use for example 3 different types of Traps, still have their ticks generated by wind/venom bites, all unchanged, just animations and theme. Nearly all arrow attacks would be unchanged even in animation. Exact same gameplay, just a new name, Ranger, and 7 or 8 animations changed out for different ones.

Then they devs would only be adding in 1 new job, Bard, to balance against the others in whatever its designated role should be. This would be no more or less of an endeavor than adding in any other new job except as far as lore. But, even then the SCH job quests are handled by a Marauder - so the actual amount of lore changing need not change by much at all. The reason I suggested healer before was simply to show that BRD needn't be a DPS, it has songs for either role and is flexible in that. Plus, BRD as healer doesn't step on anyones toes as GEO would with CNJ/AST lore, or CHM could with ALC/MCH (not to mention they tried to add CHM for HW but found it too difficult, instead splitting it into AST and MCH). But that's getting off topic lol.

I play a bard because I WANT to be a bard.
I don't want to be a ranger.
I want to be a BARD.

Please leave my bard alone. Petition for a new ranged class (hunter/ranger) whatever you would like to call it. But please, I enjoy bard for bard and I don't want to see the class have ANOTHER identity crisis in 6.0.

It would be far easier to implement Ranger as a new DPS job in 6.0 as opposed to changing current BRD into Ranger. People who think that turning current BRD into a Ranger would be easy are clearly not considering all that would need to be done for this to be feasible.

First of all, you would have to go about changing its quest chains and its lore: this would include completely rewriting and redoing the 30 through 70 quests, as well as redoing the level 80 quest; because it would make little to no sense for you to be obtaining BRD-y skills/abilities (which are mentioned throughout the 30~50 chain), chasing the Ballad of Oblivion during the 50~60 chain, and singing to inspire a group of Adders in the level 80 quest when you’re a Ranger. That is A LOT of retconning. Secondly, you’d have to change its toolkit and playstyle AGAIN: BRD has seen 2 major overhauls already (3.0 Bowmage and 4.0 Revamped BRD), and I would rather not see it have yet another one simply because some people want Ranger.

I want the job I have played for almost 4 years to return to the roots that attracted me to it. I don’t want it to be a Ranger. I don’t mind if they want to add a Ranger in the future, but I do not want our current BRD to become a completely new job to satisfy those who want a Ranger.

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Originally Posted by Beddict

It would be a stupid amount of work to separate Bard and Ranger, not to mention it would involve severely retconning the hell out out Job Lore that's been established for the past 6+ years, including already published material like Encyclopedia Eorzea. The level 30 through 50 Job quests are all about the Archer becoming a Bard, the level 50 through 60 Job quests are all about finding the Ballad of Oblivion to convice the Adders to train Archers as Bards. They just going to rewrite the premise the all those Job quests? And that's to say nothing about developing an entirely new Job lore for the proposed Ranger, the effects of punting Bard into a different role, etc. It's genuinely confusing to see people write off as simple or "oh they just need to do this" when really it would be a massive amount of work to do something they already don't like doing.

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If I could like this post more than once, I would. It’s a lot more work than people think it would be.

And very nice work, pointing out how much this retcon would affect Encyclopedia Eorzea. I know that there’s already some mild retcons regarding old skills/abilities that were labeled as “staples” being removed since then, but we’re talking about retconning the entirety of the Bard article within that book—not just a clause or bullet point.

Lets not forget some people chose archer expecting a ranger class and got bait n switched at lv 30. There is zero bardyness 1-30.
Some of us also got Archer to 50 before the soulstones were a thing.
The 'root' of bard is archer, not minstrel or anything music related.
I for one don't feel the need to hijack the current bard, i just want a ranger class similar to the current bard, have it start at lv 30 like any other new job (or lv60 if they want to continue that trend) and if they feel inclined have the archer guildmaster give the breadcrumb to find the rangers. If you don't want to add more lore that may conflict, just have the guild master be the one to start the ranger corp specifically so Gridania could take care of business outside the forest.

Job stones got introduced in 1.2 was it? The class advancement back in the day meant the end job result was a bard if you went archer. So I won't dispute that there may be legacy folks that wanted a ranger/hunter type job, but SE gave us bard instead, and a lot of players do enjoy it for what it is. The new jobs that get introduced now aren't really tied to any particular class. They just get added in, and people can pick up and play. So yes, there is no reason for bard to be hijacked. Anyone that argues the case is being, I feel, inherently selfish and forgetting that there are a lot of players that do in fact enjoy the bard job for what it is and are fighting hard for it to get some of its job identity back.

So please, stop trying to transform bard into a ranger and hurting all of the players out there that actually enjoy it for what it is currently and instead try making requests for a new job to be added, the ranger/hunter class you all want. I'm all for you making petitions and requests, just please be mindful that not everyone that has mained and played the job for 6 years want to go through ANOTHER transformation come next xpack.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

There is precisely zero possibility they covert Bard into Ranger at this stage. The undertaking would require a massive reworking for something ultimately not really worth the endeavour. Instead of a new job, we'd essentially have two halves rebuilt. Furthermore, Bard from previous FFs will not work in this game because it has to be a damage dealer. It essentially becomes Dancer... which means now you wield a Harp in lieu of a bow and maybe have a few more buffs. But at the end of the day, you're a DPS who is expected to DPS. Regardless, even if this were under some consideration, it's extremely unlikely they release another physical Range.

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No one said anything about an actual Bard not DPSing. It's really not impossible for a musical job to be a DPS heavy participant and I don't understand why everyone assumes a harp-wielding class would have no feasible move set other than exclusively buffing. Need an example?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMf6NdM55ws

Furthermore, it's literally about the same amount of work as adding in 1 new job.

Ranger adopts the identity current Bard has, so most of what Ranger would consist of would be inherited from what we already have, so it wouldn't be any different from the usual changes each job goes through in an expansion. The big thing would be adding in the job quests, but while Bard would be added as the real new class between the two, it would just inherit the current Bard job quests, so it wouldn't be adding more work at all. You'd still be updating 1 existing set of abilities, adding in 1 new set of abilities for a new job, and creating 1 set of job quests. The only thing extra would be that you'd need to make quests starting from level 30, not level 70, but that's really not that much work.

Bard would essentially be 1 of the 2 new jobs, having a completely different weapon type and ability set, and it could absolutely be a DPS unit. It could be another support-heavy DPS like Dancer as a foil to it (For example, it could have its major support not stack with Dancer, so having both would be suboptimal as is having 2 Dancers). It could also be another Caster. Just look at the clip of Deuce's abilities. Yeah, she has support, but they take a back seat to her fantastic damaging abilities.

On another note, if trying to salvage Bard is THAT much of a lost cause for people... why not just abandon it entirely?

Let's just gut Bard's music completely...
Battle Voice = Gone
Warden's Paeon = Gone
Nature's Minne = Gone
Troubadour = Changed to Palisade
Mage's Ballad = Changed to Owl's Eye
Army's Paeon = Changed to Hawk's Eye
Wonderer's Minuet = Changed to Eagle's Eye

We can just get a new Ranged or Caster DPS called "Minstrel," "Musician," "Flautist," or something like that. They use a Harp or Flute or some instrument as a weapon and music exclusively musical attacks:

Battle Voice, Nature's Minne, and Warden's Paeon can all be transitioned here, or perhaps everything is completely different.

Bard will just be an incredibly misleading name choice that has literally nothing to do with music.

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Originally Posted by Suniva

Job stones got introduced in 1.2 was it? The class advancement back in the day meant the end job result was a bard if you went archer. So I won't dispute that there may be legacy folks that wanted a ranger/hunter type job, but SE gave us bard instead, and a lot of players do enjoy it for what it is. The new jobs that get introduced now aren't really tied to any particular class. They just get added in, and people can pick up and play. So yes, there is no reason for bard to be hijacked. Anyone that argues the case is being, I feel, inherently selfish and forgetting that there are a lot of players that do in fact enjoy the bard job for what it is and are fighting hard for it to get some of its job identity back.

So please, stop trying to transform bard into a ranger and hurting all of the players out there that actually enjoy it for what it is currently and instead try making requests for a new job to be added, the ranger/hunter class you all want. I'm all for you making petitions and requests, just please be mindful that not everyone that has mained and played the job for 6 years want to go through ANOTHER transformation come next xpack.

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The transformation is just one of many ideas. Bards should be about music first and foremost, which simply is no longer the case. I don't necessarily want a Ranger despite my transformation idea. I want Bard to be a Bard, even if they using bows. I want Bard's gameplay to stay in the game whether it's current Bard with more songs, or on Ranger.

Really, this is why I say the best route would be a job glamour system. It's the least amount of work and least likely to contradict lore.

To reiterate: job glamour wouldn't change anything but animations. ARC could naturally evolve into RNG with bow animations, and BRD could change all the animations to songs and keep their quests which try to show music and archery going hand in hand. Both would have the exact same gameplay and button presses. All the work that is needed would be developing animations, the command toggle to swap between RNG and BRD animations, and some RNG themed quests.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Furthermore, it's literally about the same amount of work as adding in 1 new job.

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If you change current BRD into Ranger, you will have to:
—Redo the entire quest chain, because Ranger is completely different from BRD and would likely involve a completely different story,
—Retcon all the lore involved in said quest chain; and you might as well include in future publications of Encyclopedia Eorzea a “Please disregard, this is all defunct now” disclaimer for any and all references to old BRD (there are a few in there),
—Change the BRD quest NPCs’ functions and/or implement new ones entirely, since it make little sense for them to serve the same purpose with a Ranger,
—Reanimate the cutscenes in the new Ranger quest chain, since it would make no sense to see your character playing a harp when they’re a Ranger, and this happens more than just once in the BRD quest chain,
—Rework this new Ranger’s toolkit to make it more “Ranger-like”,
—Oh, and design an entirely new job (this “new Bard”) in addition to all this retconning.

How is this less work than making BRD more BRD-like, and implementing a Ranger job for a future expansion? Please explain; because, while future jobs have to have toolkits made from the ground up, they lack a lot of lower-level quests and lore one would have with an ARR job, since they tend to start 20 levels below the expansion’s level cap. So you get rid of the work needed to make level 30~50, 50~60, 60~70, and level 80 quests/quest chains. You just need to make the quests/quest chains starting from whichever level the new job starts at, and going to current level cap. You also don’t have to worry about retcons (which, a BRD > Ranger transformation is a retcon big enough that it would give the Kingdom Hearts franchise a run for its money), as the lore for a new job is a clean slate that one can put down whatever they want.

Personally, I don’t think you’re actually considering the amount of work one would need to do for this to happen. I think people who are so hellbent on having Ranger, or a Ranger-type job, in this game don’t stop to consider what BRDs want: we don’t want the job we’ve played for years to be turned into something different to satiate those who want Ranger. I don’t care if they add in Ranger as a new job in 6.0. But don’t take the job I started this game on and played as a main for over 3 years (and still play to this day), and change it into something else to please a specific subset of people. Because then, you’re forgetting about the people who played BRD to be a BRD. Why does BRD need to change for those who want Ranger? Why can’t these players be satisfied with Ranger being added in 6.0 or 7.0? Why do they want to take BRD and make it into their job?



You also can’t just give the old BRD quests to this new job, because most new jobs don’t start at level 30 anymore. Any 6.0 jobs will likely start at level 70—so, why is there a 30~70 quest chain for them again? It would make absolutely no sense, and they aren’t going to allow the job to be available at a lower level. I think they’ve set a fair enough precedent for me to say that.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

Ranger adopts the identity current Bard has, so most of what Ranger would consist of would be inherited from what we already have, so it wouldn't be any different from the usual changes each job goes through in an expansion. The big thing would be adding in the job quests, but while Bard would be added as the real new class between the two, it would just inherit the current Bard job quests, so it wouldn't be adding more work at all. You'd still be updating 1 existing set of abilities, adding in 1 new set of abilities for a new job, and creating 1 set of job quests. The only thing extra would be that you'd need to make quests starting from level 30, not level 70, but that's really not that much work.

Bard would essentially be 1 of the 2 new jobs, having a completely different weapon type and ability set, and it could absolutely be a DPS unit. It could be another support-heavy DPS like Dancer as a foil to it (For example, it could have its major support not stack with Dancer, so having both would be suboptimal as is having 2 Dancers). It could also be another Caster. Just look at the clip of Deuce's abilities. Yeah, she has support, but they take a back seat to her fantastic damaging abilities.

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You're still talking about hijacking bard because of the following point:

You want there to be changes to the level 30 onward quests to keep archer tied to whatever hunter/ranger job you would like to see implemented and make bard a separate job in the game not tied to anything. You want to keep the playstyle of bard to be transferred to the ranger, but want the bard to get all the new abilities. You're basically trying to argue that those of us that have mained the class for every expansion up till now, for 6+ years, should have our jobs fundamentally changed, AGAIN, all around simply so those who have made the decision to not main the class because it doesn't play the way it wants get to now have it, simply because of the bow and arrow aesthetic. That isn't fair at all to a majority of the bard mains out there. People don't main a class for 6 years (or less depending when you came to the game, I know I'm old) wishing for it to become something different, a majority main their jobs because they enjoy how the job plays.

The more REASONABLE argument and one that wont upset a majority of the players would be to leave archer -> bard alone and have the development team create a new job of ranger. None of the new jobs that have been added (Machinist/Astrologian/Dark Knight/Gunbreaker/Dancer) are tied to a class, therefore, no quests would have to be touched below level 70 (Since as Hyomin pointed out, all new jobs get introduced 20 levels below current expansion cap, I using this as reference). They all get introduced as their jobs, we do the initial quest, get a job stone and go from there. Hell, I wouldn't mind and actually would find it funny if they made the ranger job quests be a sort of mockery against us "spoony" bards.

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

On another note, if trying to salvage Bard is THAT much of a lost cause for people... why not just abandon it entirely?

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We have been fighting, both on English and Japanese forums, to have the bard identity restored. It is not a lost cause, we have been fighting since before Shadowbringers got released because we were concerned with how seemingly our tools got stripped from us to make room for the shiny new dancer. It isn't a lost cause to us. The Japanese forum on bard is 312 pages long and 53 of those pages are of how they are incredibly unhappy with how bard (poet they call it) functions in ShB. Many even pointing out of our 80 job quest is a mockery and a slap in the face to what it means to be a bard. So sorry, but we won't stop fighting for the job we love. Even if we have to fight on two fronts with trying to get the developers to give us some job identity back and on forums with players that want to hijack our class from us so they can get their ranger. We want to keep our job tyvm. Stop trying to take it from us.

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

SNIP

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Have you considered what you're truly requesting though? If they give one job a set of spell glamours, then inevitably, other players will want THEIR jobs to have spell glamours as well and now what you are arguing to be a solution that is the least amount of work for ONE job now becomes something they have to somehow provide for ALL other jobs. They won't do something like this for one job while ignoring the rest, it simply wouldn't be fair. It's an interesting idea, but it's one that is unlikely to happen.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ty_taurus

On another note, if trying to salvage Bard is THAT much of a lost cause for people... why not just abandon it entirely?

Let's just gut Bard's music completely...
Battle Voice = Gone
Warden's Paeon = Gone
Nature's Minne = Gone
Troubadour = Changed to Palisade
Mage's Ballad = Changed to Owl's Eye
Army's Paeon = Changed to Hawk's Eye
Wonderer's Minuet = Changed to Eagle's Eye

We can just get a new Ranged or Caster DPS called "Minstrel," "Musician," "Flautist," or something like that. They use a Harp or Flute or some instrument as a weapon and music exclusively musical attacks:

Battle Voice, Nature's Minne, and Warden's Paeon can all be transitioned here, or perhaps everything is completely different.

Bard will just be an incredibly misleading name choice that has literally nothing to do with music.

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That would flat out break the bard storyline, shredding it to pieces. And I'm all for altering lore to fix core problems with the class, but I don't think this is the right solution. I'd sooner see Army's Paeon removed, turn Mage's Ballad into an AoE stance, and Wanderer's Minuet into a single target stance and remove the stance weaving aspect of bard outright (it leads to weird game design if nothing else and the rotation for aoe and ST just feels rough because of the stance, AOE being especially bad).

And then find a way to work the song aspect into other parts of the class instead. BRD feels at its best in WM, at its worst in AP, and merely okay in MB, and with how busy the rotation is right now, changing stances regularly doesn't feel good.

All the class needs is a constant, persistent raid-wide buff and it can maintain some level of thematic cohesion. So just make it so they passively give 1.5% crit like they did in SB (if that's what it did) and that's the constant morale boost they give, Battle Voice can handle the rest.

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Originally Posted by Taranok

All the class needs is a constant, persistent raid-wide buff and it can maintain some level of thematic cohesion. So just make it so they passively give 1.5% crit like they did in SB (if that's what it did) and that's the constant morale boost they give, Battle Voice can handle the rest.

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It was 2% within 20 yards, which was nice. It felt like I was "singing" a song to "inspire" my party. Ya know, being a bard and stuff. Also, Foe's. For the love of all that is good and holy give me back Foe's. Can do without the cast bar, but give it back to us in SOME way shape or form so I line up with SE's own description of the class.

"The word "bard" ordinarily puts folk in mind of those itinerant minstrels, fair of voice and nimble of finger, who earn their coin performing in taverns and the halls of great lords. Few know, however, that bards in fact trace their origins back to the bowmen of eld, who sang in the heat of battle to fortify the spirits of their companions. - Having our songs inspire party with crit.
In time, their impassioned songs came to hold sway over the hearts of men, inspiring their comrades to great feats and granting peace unto those who lay upon the precipice of death." - Giving us Foe back

That's what I would like to see and how I interrupt SE's own description of the class.

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Originally Posted by Suniva

Have you considered what you're truly requesting though? If they give one job a set of spell glamours, then inevitably, other players will want THEIR jobs to have spell glamours as well and now what you are arguing to be a solution that is the least amount of work for ONE job now becomes something they have to somehow provide for ALL other jobs. They won't do something like this for one job while ignoring the rest, it simply wouldn't be fair. It's an interesting idea, but it's one that is unlikely to happen.

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I really don't think that would become an issue. All the jobs aside from BRD and WHM have very clear identities. I would even support a GEO (or something similar) job glamour for CNJ/WHM due to the recent changes to Aero and Stone - that is the only other case of a clear disconnect between class and job. This is about having whole job identities preserved instead of hacking two together. Every other job is very much in line with their own identities.

And it's not unlike SE to offer some things to just one or two jobs. In order to unlock instruments, you need to level BRD - no other job has even a similar equivalent and we don't see people asking for one. ACN remains the only multi-job class despite people wanting other jobs to split (once upon a time people were clamoring for GLA to split into DRK/PLD for example to echo Cecil).

I don't think I can be convinced this would ever be an issue.

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Originally Posted by Suniva

It was 2% within 20 yards, which was nice. It felt like I was "singing" a song to "inspire" my party. Ya know, being a bard and stuff. Also, Foe's. For the love of all that is good and holy give me back Foe's. Can do without the cast bar, but give it back to us in SOME way shape or form so I line up with SE's own description of the class.

"The word "bard" ordinarily puts folk in mind of those itinerant minstrels, fair of voice and nimble of finger, who earn their coin performing in taverns and the halls of great lords. Few know, however, that bards in fact trace their origins back to the bowmen of eld, who sang in the heat of battle to fortify the spirits of their companions. - Having our songs inspire party with crit.
In time, their impassioned songs came to hold sway over the hearts of men, inspiring their comrades to great feats and granting peace unto those who lay upon the precipice of death." - Giving us Foe back

That's what I would like to see and how I interrupt SE's own description of the class.

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I'm personally not a fan of foe requiem, it's easy to just ignore that mana exists on non-casters (and DRK I guess). Maybe if it was reworked in some other way instead, because Foes was kinda boring to me.

2% crit buff for existing, maybe use foe for...altering the buff somehow? Boosting it? Maybe make Foe Requiem the "stance dance" mechanic of the current Bard, but having it simply alter the buff to other forms instead of the weird "These oGCDs recharge faster now!" and "Now your GCDs fire all the time!" and "Suddenly megadamage!"

There could be something done, and I feel Bard should be an "aura" type support class (whereas Dancer should be a partner-type), but I'd still like to see the gameplay refined and focused more to make more overall sense with whatever path is chosen.

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

I don't think I can be convinced this would ever be an issue.

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Then there is no further reason for you and I to debate the issue. I wish you the best of luck in garnering support for your endeavor.

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

ACN remains the only multi-job class

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Much to their regret, they have stated many, MANY times that they are not happy with how arcanists split and every expansion we see them doing more and more to try and separate the two jobs that came from it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MartaDemireux

(once upon a time people were clamoring for GLA to split into DRK/PLD for example to echo Cecil).

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And what did they do? They kept GLA -> PLD route while introducing DRK as a new job that people could pick up and play. That is why many are putting forth the suggestion of adding in the ranger job so that way bard players can have their bard and those wishing for a hunter/ranger type class could have their idea of a bow & arrow type class being more focused on damaged fulfilled. If there is enough demand for a ranger type class, then I feel it would ultimately be better in the long run to add in that job rather than upsetting both sets of players because one wants to play the class one way vs the other way.

I even suggested at one point that we get a hunter/bard stance that way the two types of player bases could be satisfied, by having the abilities function in different way dependent on which stance we were in, but that was criticized with valid concerns and I have since withdrawn from that idea. It seems like the best solution (and one that is more or less agreed on on these forums as far as I can tell) is rather than trying to make the one job cater to two different play styles, would be to split them up.

Just separate the two, I feel as if that would be the path of least resistance for the development team that would satisfy both sets of the player base.