At 95th percentile in 5.1, BRD's total contribution is the lowest of all DPS

https://i.imgur.com/7ybyvhE.png

Ouch.

Hmm... look where NIN has landed though. :o

wanna see something fun ? try for data of 1 week instead of two, brd actually lost dps compared to other classes (as seen if you watch the "normalized score"), brd score relative to other classes actually dropped in the week since the patch, or in simple words, compared to everyone else bard is now WEAKER than before the "ranged buffs"

Mind you, being last isn't inherently bad (as in, someone will allways be the worst) its just that if your whole role is allready struggling to begin with being the worst even in that role (and by quite a lot) is when its starting to turn into a problem

And no... I'm not changing this into a NIN discussion. I just wanted to point out they have improved a bit. So... which job do you think could be last in the DPS list? If not BRD...

:confused:

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Originally Posted by Akiudo

wanna see something fun ? try for data of 1 week instead of two, brd actually lost dps compared to other classes (as seen if you watch the "normalized score", brd score relative to other classes actually dropped in the week since the patch, or in simple words, compared to everyone else bard is now WEAKER than before the "ranged buffs"

Mind you, being last isn't inherently bad (as in, someone will allways be the worst) its just that if your whole role is allready struggling to begin with being the worst even in that role (and by quite a lot) is when its starting to turn into a problem

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I already set it to only include patch 5.1 data. So even though it says 2 weeks, it's really only pulling a week's worth of data, as 5.1 hasn't been out long enough.

I don't expect the data to change much overall. Even though the time frame is relatively short, we're late into the patch - people already know their rotations and the boss fights very well, they're geared, and so on.

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Originally Posted by Akiudo

wanna see something fun ? try for data of 1 week instead of two, brd actually lost dps compared to other classes (as seen if you watch the "normalized score"), brd score relative to other classes actually dropped in the week since the patch, or in simple words, compared to everyone else bard is now WEAKER than before the "ranged buffs"

Mind you, being last isn't inherently bad (as in, someone will allways be the worst) its just that if your whole role is allready struggling to begin with being the worst even in that role (and by quite a lot) is when its starting to turn into a problem

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Ah... alright.

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Originally Posted by Miu-Tiiu

And no... I'm changing this into a NIN discussion. I just wanted to point out they have improved a bit. So... which job do you think could be last in the DPS list? If not BRD...

:confused:

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Well it's kind of interesting because SE said they didn't give BRD stronger raid buffs as if they did, they'd have to reduce their DPS considerably.

It looks like this "considerable reduction" happened anyways, but BRD didn't really get much for it.

As for which job should be last, well, I think the whole band could afford to be narrowed a bit. Summoner is too high, bard is too low.

Beyond that, it is usually utility vs DPS, ie mages with rez and mobility should be lower than mages without. This was the justification for Dancer being so low on the list too. But now bard is in that position, yet also offers (much) less utility than dancer and less DPS than machinist.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

I already set it to only include patch 5.1 data. So even though it says 2 weeks, it's really only pulling a week's worth of data, as 5.1 hasn't been out long enough.

I don't expect the data to change much overall. Even though the time frame is relatively short, we're late into the patch - people already know their rotations and the boss fights very well, they're geared, and so on.

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well, i didn't so my point still stands, feel free to try it out for yourself ^^ its truly a thing of glory

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Originally Posted by Akiudo

well, i didn't so my point still stands, feel free to try it out for yourself ^^ its truly a thing of glory

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Fair enough. 100% agree with your earlier point too - being the weakest job in a struggling role...

Well. I'm glad I'm not a bard main right now.

In general it was kind of strange to shift BRD power in the same patch they just buffed other ranged damage. Like, I am not sure if they should have lowered personal DPS just because they added the song buffs back when in the same patch SMN, RDM, MCH and DNC all got boofs.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

Well it's kind of interesting because SE said they didn't give BRD stronger raid buffs as if they did, they'd have to reduce their DPS considerably.

It looks like this "considerable reduction" happened anyways, but BRD didn't really get much for it.

As for which job should be last, well, I think the whole band could afford to be narrowed a bit. Summoner is too high, bard is too low.

Beyond that, it is usually utility vs DPS, ie mages with rez and mobility should be lower than mages without. This was the justification for Dancer being so low on the list too. But now bard is in that position, yet also offers (much) less utility than dancer and less DPS than machinist.

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Sorry.... I meant to say "I'm 'not' changing this into a NIN discussion". Went back and edit my post. But I see what you mean. Weakening the BRD even more... I guess it's true what people were saying, BRDs are more like rangers now.

It seems like the developers seriously overestimated the power of the new song buffs, perhaps they didn't expect that Army's Paeon would provide such an absolute pittance of rDPS compared to the other two songs. The only real way forward for Bard is for the DoT nerfs to be reversed as soon as possible, since the data clearly shows this was an unnecessary nerf.

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Originally Posted by Esmoire

In general it was kind of strange to shift BRD power in the same patch they just buffed other ranged damage. Like, I am not sure if they should have lowered personal DPS just because they added the song buffs back when in the same patch SMN, RDM, MCH and DNC all got boofs.

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Just to clarify one thing: This chart includes BRD's raid DPS buffs, ie songs.

So BRD's total output is lower including the damage 7 song-buffed players add. Very good players, as this is the top end.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

https://i.imgur.com/7ybyvhE.png

Ouch.

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Against SE rules to utilize 3rd party parser utilization’s. GG

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Originally Posted by AbelArchaniEA

Against SE rules to utilize 3rd party parser utilization’s. GG

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I didn't use a parser.

I looked at a website that aggregates performance data. There's nothing wrong with taking a screenshot of a website that collects data on jobs.

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Originally Posted by Esmoire

In general it was kind of strange to shift BRD power in the same patch they just buffed other ranged damage. Like, I am not sure if they should have lowered personal DPS just because they added the song buffs back when in the same patch SMN, RDM, MCH and DNC all got boofs.

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problem is that square during the last liveletter basically admitted ranges are struggling and will get buffed, yet when the actuall buffing happened everyone else but the strongest 2 classes got buffed for basically the same amount.

If you put aside the strongest 2, classes that were very clearly seen as outliers and until the patch happened as at least slightly overpowered than literally nothing changed for the physical ranged compared to pre patch, only that the role in itself is even more unbalanced than before the patch with mch being the one that actually gained a slight edge compared to pre patch (mind you its still pitifully weak), dnc basically taking over bards level of "hey at least i'm not the worst" and bard getting the short end of the buff stick by far

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

Well it's kind of interesting because SE said they didn't give BRD stronger raid buffs as if they did, they'd have to reduce their DPS considerably.

It looks like this "considerable reduction" happened anyways, but BRD didn't really get much for it.

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Yeah I remember that too. Well at least now we have plenty of reason for them to add back a reworked Foe's Requiem and rework Warden's Paen into something useful.

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Originally Posted by RadicalPesto

It seems like the developers seriously overestimated the power of the new song buffs, perhaps they didn't expect that Army's Paeon would provide such an absolute pittance of rDPS compared to the other two songs. The only real way forward for Bard is for the DoT nerfs to be reversed as soon as possible, since the data clearly shows this was an unnecessary nerf.

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They fully admitted they were playing it REALLY conservatively when they added the buffs back to the songs. If bard is weaker than it was before (I'm going off what I'm being told since I have no first hand knowledge) then it seems they may have gone too far with the nerfs when adding the song effects. BUT I would still argue this is the better outcome than if they hadn't been so conservative. If they had broken the job and made it over powered, then it's a lot harder for them, from a player backlash perspective, to apply nerfs after a buff than to do what they've done now and then buff the job afterwards, this can even be done in a small patch, like the 5.11 patch.

Though they likely won't change the job so soon since they want to give the changes across all jobs time to settle in, most likely, before applying new balance changes. This could easily be adjusted come 5.15.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

They fully admitted they were playing it REALLY conservatively when they added the buffs back to the songs. If bard is weaker than it was before (I'm going off what I'm being told since I have no first hand knowledge) then it seems they may have gone too far with the nerfs when adding the song effects. BUT I would still argue this is the better outcome than if they hadn't been so conservative. If they had broken the job and made it over powered, then it's a lot harder for them, from a player backlash perspective, to apply nerfs after a buff than to do what they've done now and then buff the job afterwards, this can even be done in a small patch, like the 5.11 patch.

Though they likely won't change the job so soon since they want to give the changes across all jobs time to settle in, most likely, before applying new balance changes. This could easily be adjusted come 5.15.

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bard is on average 500~ dps below mch, if this waits till 5.15 brd is dead for ultimate, and thats completly ignoring that the state of the phys ranged as a whole , even mch is pretty much as bad as it was before the patch

also, on bard being weaker or not you could read my post on page 1, it should be the second or third post, basically what it boils down to is that while we are not weaker in a "deal less dps than before" sense we are indeed weaker in relation to everyone else than we were before the patch, you know, the patch that should buff us (well, all ranged) as we were struggling

well... there will always be a class at the bottom

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Originally Posted by Hysterior

well... there will always be a class at the bottom

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It would be a bit different if that the spread was, say, only 100 or 200 rdps instead of thousands. And if that bottom class at least had rez or something to make up for it.

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Originally Posted by Hysterior

well... there will always be a class at the bottom

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which is true but not the problem, being hyperbolic here for a moment, but just to illustrate a point, if the best dps did 15k dps, the second worst dps did 14k and the absolute worst dps than did 10k dps, would that be fine because "there will allways be a class at the bottom" ?

obviously its not as extreme as this, but brd right now is actually about as far below mch as ninja/samurai was below monk last patch, yet these classes acted like the sky was falling, that was with 2 slots generally reserved for melee and melees in general being the strongest role by far, brd is that much behind mch in a role that is very much struggling as a whole and will sooner lose its one slot than get a second one as the dps distribution currently stands

While I'm glad MCH is not in BRD's shadow anymore and finally "worth" filling the ranged spot, man I'm so sorry to all BRD main out there.

We've been in that situation for 2 years on top of having a tiring and annoying rotation. BRD is officially really bad and I don't understand why they nerfed their damage but did nothing about MNK, BLM and just went yolo with SMN?

Ranged overall are the worst jobs. BRD is still outshined by an average melee, it's also a bit the case for the MCH and DNC.

Buff the ranged, now that the SMN is at the top the "Mobility" argument means nothing at all. The bottom DPS should never be that far from the top.

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Originally Posted by Akiudo

bard is on average 500~ dps below mch, if this waits till 5.15 brd is dead for ultimate, and thats completly ignoring that the state of the phys ranged as a whole , even mch is pretty much as bad as it was before the patch

also, on bard being weaker or not you could read my post on page 1, it should be the second or third post, basically what it boils down to is that while we are not weaker in a "deal less dps than before" sense we are indeed weaker in relation to everyone else than we were before the patch, you know, the patch that should buff us (well, all ranged) as we were struggling

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It's very likely that the developers thought the song buffs were going to add more rDPS than they have. There's two reasons I can guess as to why this is failing right now. First, it's only been a week and several jobs underwent changes that gave them new rotations. Specifically I'm thinking of red mage, summoner, and ninja, though other jobs were effected too. Seeing as we've seen some of those jobs jump up dramatically either this point is not the problem, and people jumped onto them and figured out the new jobs quickly, or the jobs were overturned. If people are, however, still figuring out their jobs, then it's fair to say that bard's rDPS contribution will increase as player skill increases since the song buffs are tied to the performance of other players.

The other is that the developers over valued the increase in damage the songs bring. Like I stated, they admitted that they were worried about the job balance of the game if they added these effects back, so they nerfed parts of the job in order to add them and meet player demands. And it's entirely possible they messed up and nerfed the job too hard to add them. This wouldn't be the first time they've made this kind of mistake, and I can see that this would be infuriating if you're the one playing the job that got hit.

All that, I wouldn't count bard out entirely for ultimate since there are utility features bard brings to the table that aren't damage related that could be valued depending on the mechanics thrown at you, similar to why people valued Vercure on Red Mages in previous groups. For example, Nature's Minne might prove, depending on mechanics, to be a needed part of the toolkit, especially now that it's stronger on a single target than Mantra, additionally Warden's Pean might have the ability to make certain mechanics easier by preventing a debuff that might otherswise take hold. They can't make bard mandatory by requiring either of these skills, but they can make it so that certain phases of an encounter are easier if you have those tools at your disposal.

Or possibly none of this, and there will need to be more balances to bring the job up to par with its counterparts. But I really do think they're likely to hold off on buffs until they see how the jobs actually are performing after more than just a week or two. I could be wrong, but rarely do they change a job, then change it again so quickly.

Edit: I would also say as a personal opinion, considering machinist has no other utility like the healing buff or esuna, a 500 DPS hit to have those skills in your toolkit seems a reasonable difference. Every bit of utility comes at a cost.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

It would be a bit different if that the spread was, say, only 100 or 200 rdps instead of thousands. And if that bottom class at least had rez or something to make up for it.

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Yeah but it will always happen. It has always been the case since the game ever existed.

• They will do some buffs/nerfs in an upcoming patch
• Then new jobs will be at the top/bottom
• Then they will do some buffs/nerfs in an upcoming patch
• Then new jobs will be at the top/bottom
• Then they will do some buffs/nerfs in an upcoming patch
• Then new jobs will be at the top/bottom
• Then they will do some buffs/nerfs in an upcoming patch
• Then new jobs will be at the top/bottom

Rinse an repeat.

Bard use to be the GotO ranged DPS for quite some time. It will survive at the bottom for a bit and get back up. Don't worry.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

Or possibly none of this, and there will need to be more balances to bring the job up to par with its counterparts. But I really do think they're likely to hold off on buffs until they see how the jobs actually are performing after more than just a week or two. I could be wrong, but rarely do they change a job, then change it again so quickly.

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The "it's only been a week" would hold more weight at the beginning of the expac or tier. Right now, people are geared and experienced, and we already have thousands - in some cases tens of thousands - of patch 5.1 submissions for each job. There might be some slight variation as we get a full 2 weeks, but expecting a major change in the rankings - especially hundreds of DPS worth - is hopelessly optimistic.

That said, you're still right. If there is any hope for changes, it needs to be before ultimate opens. Once that does, SE has a policy of no balance changes during progression, so bard will be stuck as is for months.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

It's very likely that the developers thought the song buffs were going to add more rDPS than they have. There's two reasons I can guess as to why this is failing right now. First, it's only been a week and several jobs underwent changes that gave them new rotations. Specifically I'm thinking of red mage, summoner, and ninja, though other jobs were effected too. Seeing as we've seen some of those jobs jump up dramatically either this point is not the problem, and people jumped onto them and figured out the new jobs quickly, or the jobs were overturned. If people are, however, still figuring out their jobs, then it's fair to say that bard's rDPS contribution will increase as player skill increases since the song buffs are tied to the performance of other players.

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not gonna go into the "well theres still natures minne" argument, don't want to simply ignore it but the track record of the playerbase for the last 5 years or so pretty clearly shows that "non mandatory utility" will pretty much allways fail flat in the face of 300 or so dps, see whitemages having an easier time healing encounters compared to AST, as long as the damage simply wasn't there, and ast could make do, even if with extra effort the community at large shunned whitemage. wardens paen though literally works on nothing in a raid setting right now, and i mean NOTHING, it's less usefull than summoners phoenix is as a healing tool, that one will align correctly at least sometimes

however, on the "overestimating the strength of the buffs" . the buffs are pretty clearly designed to average out around 1% group dps (sans bard) you got a 1% buff, a 0,75% buff you will keep up for only 2/3 the time of the other buffs and than you got the "a bit stronger than 1% buff, like 1,1% that will get stronger with more gear" , for a 1% buff as it stands to overcome the difference between brd and mch the best groups in the world would need to add another 50.000 raid dps (without bard contribution), pretty sure not even square could think whatever they did to all the classes will raise raid dps by another 50.000

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Originally Posted by AbelArchaniEA

Against SE rules to utilize 3rd party parser utilization’s. GG

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You must be fun at parties

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Originally Posted by Akiudo

not gonna go into the "well theres still natures minne" argument, don't want to simply ignore it but the track record of the playerbase for the last 5 years or so pretty clearly shows that "non mandatory utility" will pretty much allways fail flat in the face of 300 or so dps, see whitemages having an easier time healing encounters compared to AST, as long as the damage simply wasn't there, and ast could make do, even if with extra effort the community at large shunned whitemage.

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Jobs are taxed for utility even if that utility isn't considered mandatory. Monk just got a nerf to mantra because they decided it should deal as much damage as it does while also having as potent a healing utility skill as it does. Red mage does less damage in every fight even if no one dies, and no one needed to be raised/cured. What you're looking at is a 3% difference at the top level of play, which is a gap that would be difficult to close completely, and again I would say that I'm not sure they should. Machinist should do more damage than a bard because bard has non-damage related utility skills. Bard should be about on par with Dancer who also has these same types of skills with Improvisation and Curing Waltz. And there you're only looking at a 200 DPS difference rather than the 500 DPS, or a DPS difference of 1.3% between the two jobs. Unless DPS checks in a fight at max level play with max level gear are SUPER tight, 1.3% will not make the difference of a job being viable or not.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

Jobs are taxed for utility even if that utility isn't considered mandatory. Monk just got a nerf to mantra because they decided it should deal as much damage as it does while also having as potent a healing utility skill as it does. Red mage does less damage in every fight even if no one dies, and no one needed to be raised/cured. What you're looking at is a 3% difference at the top level of play, which is a gap that would be difficult to close completely, and again I would say that I'm not sure they should. Machinist should do more damage than a bard because bard has non-damage related utility skills. Bard should be about on par with Dancer who also has these same types of skills with Improvisation and Curing Waltz. And there you're only looking at a 200 DPS difference rather than the 500 DPS, or a DPS difference of 1.3% between the two jobs. Unless DPS checks in a fight at max level play with max level gear are SUPER tight, 1.3% will not make the difference of a job being viable or not.

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yes, every bit of utility comes with a price and all, i even agree with that this is the correct way to handle things, as if it didn't that is the point where one class indeed is clearly superior to another, if two classes where functionally equal , would do exactly the same dps in exactly the same fights, could handle mechanics equally well and all that, than you get the very clear cut question of "do you want the class with or without this extra skill" ? the answer in that case is clear and means one class is indeed simply better, whereas the value of things like natures minne is a lot more debateble.

that still doesn't change that paen simple doesn't work, there is literally nothing to use it with and even if there were something in ultimate that is the situation where generally 2 people get hit by shit and both heals have like 2 seconds to react, basically all it would do is free up 1 global cooldown for the healer which would end up in a dps skill used as healing cant be required right that very second or bard would be mandatory so at the end of the day every paen would end up being worth like 10 dps.

which leaves natures minne which is single target, you nearly never get anything out of raising the heal a single person gets by 20%, in fact mantra is still probably more useful in 95% of cases, does this mean its worth nothing ? no, it totally is worth something, but not a 500 dps hit, it doesn't help survive tankbusters or strong group aoe, when titan is throwing his hissy fit at the final phase of the fight mantra is really usefull as it hits everyone, natures minne ? great going, one of 8 has a slighty better chance of survival, single player gets marked for some mechanic ? again all it ever really does is potentially opening up a global cooldown for a healer, and thats a big "potentially" if you are at 10k hp and need 80 to survive the next mechanic it doesn't matter if you get healed twice for 40k or for 48k, it will take 2 heals anyways, i'm not saying the are worth nothing, i'm saying even in a "perfect" scenario they aren't worth 500 dps and 9 out of 10 scenarios aren't gonna be perfect which has to be taken into consideration aswell.

or to go to your own redmage example, if a redmage can rezz 2 people quickly that would otherwise be dead for 30 seconds or so as the healer has his hands full they would than easily save the group 1500 dps, let him throw another cure at the right time saving someones ass (way more realistic than natures minne saving someone sadly...) and considering this person gets spared a debuff thats easily worth another 1000 dps. this however is not generally what happens which is why you don't put them 2500 dps below the competition even though in some very rare fringe cases it could happen, in the same vein natures minne and wardens paen (if it ever gets any use at all again) may save someone the time to deal another 100 dps ,maybe even 200 if they get used correctly and multiple times in the fight but these is all this skills will ever be good for as otherwise they would be mandatory, helping the healer changing 1, maybe 2 global cooldowns from heals into dps skills, the skills simply are not that good, they have use, they have value, but this value is miniscule even in the fights it can be used correctly which is nearly no fight.

summoners would riot if square told them tomorrow "you know, we kinda think you should deal at least 500 dps less than blackmage cause you have a rezz" and being able to pick up a dead teammate is worth WAY more than helping the heal do more overheal on the tank

My frustration is not with being the lowest DPS. I didn't sign up to play Bard for the big numbers. My frustration is what led to this point in making Bard the lowest DPS. Bard was already in trouble before the song buffs were added back, barely beating out Red Mage or Dancer in most fights. My anger comes from the fact that my jobs identity got destroyed for the sake of 'balance' and yet 5.0 and 5.1's balance has been far worse then the balance of 4.5. The identity that I played the job for, being a hybrid support/dps got absolutely ripped to shreds, with iconic abilties I've had since day one like Foe's Requiem and Refresh (original Mage's Ballad) got absolutely deleted with little but a couple upped potencies to make up for it, all while the identity I loved was given to the new guy on the block in Dancer. If I still had things like Foe's, like Refresh, like palisade, and got more impact and uses out of things like Minne and Paen, I wouldn't care about the lower placement on this list. Because numbers can always be adjusted, but job playstyle and identity are MUCH harder to fix, especially when dev's disagree with players on what a job should look and play like (See Monk players frustrations since 3.0).

The only other frustration I have is the amount of imbalance. Like I said I don't care being the lowest. But I do care that if I play my job to absolute perfection in the most difficult fights this game has to offer, that another job being played that can do the same exact mechanics as me could be played "average" or "mediocre" and do just as much if not more damage then me. The devs said in the live letter leading up to 5.0 that player skill will always trump job choice. But for Bards and Dancers especially right now and to a lesser extent Machnisits, this is simply not true.

Meanwhile the pot smoking SMNs are complaining about doing too much damage.

Well first off, a ranged class that can use skills while moving constantly will not have high DPS overall. That would make the class OP. It's annoying when people think that all classes should have the same DPS. People be complaining like "Why can't BRD do as much damage as a BLM". Just play what ever class you like.

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Originally Posted by EtherRose

Well first off, a ranged class that can use skills while moving constantly will not have high DPS overall. That would make the class OP. It's annoying when people think that all classes should have the same DPS. People be complaining like "Why can't BRD do as much damage as a BLM". Just play what ever class you like.

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Good work completely missing the point.

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Originally Posted by EtherRose

Well first off, a ranged class that can use skills while moving constantly will not have high DPS overall. That would make the class OP. It's annoying when people think that all classes should have the same DPS. People be complaining like "Why can't BRD do as much damage as a BLM". Just play what ever class you like.

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Points at summoner

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Originally Posted by Dogempire

Points at summoner

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I forgot the actual math but the balance guys worked up that a well played summoner right now approaching Firebird Trance can map out their cool downs and essentially go 50 seconds without hard casting a single spell. A little over 20 GCD's worth, and not a single second of it would be a potency loss. And let's be real, no savage mechanic would require that level of movement, heck no savage mechanic at all requires a Bard to spend the majority of it's time away from the party and running around for anything longer then two or three GCD's at the absolute MAX.

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Originally Posted by Rika007

I forgot the actual math but the balance guys worked up that a well played summoner right now approaching Firebird Trance can map out their cool downs and essentially go 50 seconds without hard casting a single spell. A little over 20 GCD's worth, and not a single second of it would be a potency loss. And let's be real, no savage mechanic would require that level of movement, heck no savage mechanic at all requires a Bard to spend the majority of it's time away from the party and running around for anything longer then two or three GCD's at the absolute MAX.

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Honestly, even if you have to move you're only losing 40 potency per gcd. Not really much of a penalty even if it does raise the skill ceiling.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

Well it's kind of interesting because SE said they didn't give BRD stronger raid buffs as if they did, they'd have to reduce their DPS considerably.

It looks like this "considerable reduction" happened anyways, but BRD didn't really get much for it.

As for which job should be last, well, I think the whole band could afford to be narrowed a bit. Summoner is too high, bard is too low.

Beyond that, it is usually utility vs DPS, ie mages with rez and mobility should be lower than mages without. This was the justification for Dancer being so low on the list too. But now bard is in that position, yet also offers (much) less utility than dancer and less DPS than machinist.

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From Yoshida:

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[Bard]

The synergy the bards can provide with their songs are "so so".

The players' opinion on bards having party synergy or not is divided, but Yoshida personally thinks the 5.1 bard landed on a balanced spot.

If players want even more synergy for bard like in the 4.x series, they would have to nerf bard's personal damage to a dancer's level.

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The irony...

At this point, I'm convinced what the dev team does and what they tell is not the same thing because this routinely happens. They make themselves look... well, shortsighted to... be a little less blunt?

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Originally Posted by Hysterior

Bard use to be the GotO ranged DPS for quite some time. It will survive at the bottom for a bit and get back up. Don't worry.

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Uh... no, it did not. The last time Bard was on the bottom was back in Heavensward when they overbuffed Machinist. Bards were outright excluded from parties for being straight up inferior. This flip flopped between the two until both were tuned so much, they eliminated the Casters entirely. The existence of the party bonus is strictly because the devs couldn't figure out how to prevent the Range, and subsequently Casters roles, from cannibalizing each other. Astro is another example, where it remained dead last throughout all of Heavensward until they gave it 10% AoE Balance—making it comically overpowered just to get people to play it. Look at Samurai in Stormblood. It was a walking meme, and stayed one due to the sheer dominance of Dragoon and Ninja.

If anything, XIV has a history of not fixing these problems in a timely fashion.

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Originally Posted by Rika007

I forgot the actual math but the balance guys worked up that a well played summoner right now approaching Firebird Trance can map out their cool downs and essentially go 50 seconds without hard casting a single spell. A little over 20 GCD's worth, and not a single second of it would be a potency loss. And let's be real, no savage mechanic would require that level of movement, heck no savage mechanic at all requires a Bard to spend the majority of it's time away from the party and running around for anything longer then two or three GCD's at the absolute MAX.

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That's not something we've said at all, and if you're burning your Ruin IVs out of Bahamut then that's a potency loss per Ruin II you're having to use instead. Please don't put words in our mouths with hyperbolae.

Yes, the mobility is far higher now, but the only truly free mobility actions are egi assaults, 2-4 dwt gcds, FBT GCDs that aren't before Enkindles and 1-3 R4s, all per 2 minute cycle. Those are not all strung together in one continuous sequence, nor is going yolo with instants potency free.

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Originally Posted by Nemekh

That's not something we've said at all, and if you're burning your Ruin IVs out of Bahamut then that's a potency loss per Ruin II you're having to use instead. Please don't put words in our mouths with hyperbolae.

Yes, the mobility is far higher now, but the only truly free mobility actions are egi assaults, 2-4 dwt gcds, FBT GCDs that aren't before Enkindles and 1-3 R4s, all per 2 minute cycle. Those are not all strung together in one continuous sequence, nor is going yolo with instants potency free.

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This wasn't in the Summoner section and I never said it was. Was just some guys discussing it in a channel and I just assumed they were theory crafting how long a summoner could do prolonged movement, not that it will be in anyway an ACTUAL rotational thing or that it would be in anyway something that is the way to play Summoner, which my post also in no way implied at all. I play summoner quite avidly as well. This was just something I remembered seeing that was relevant to the point that jobs the ranged DPS are falling behind to do not have the same sort of disadvantages we attribute to. Don't be so defensive please.