Is bard in a bad spot right now?

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

As a new player bard main myself, I wanna find out too.

so far, I've been enjoying playing bard tho.

All ranged are 0.9 of a DPS.

However there is a role bonus for each different role you have in your party, Tank, Healer, Melee DPS, Caster DPS, Physical Ranged DPS.
That bonus is 1% of main stats, including HP.

It's quite strong and never worth to replace a ranged for a BLM/SAM/MNK/SMN composition.

In simpler words, you'll always get a spot as a ranged DPS in any party.

All ranged DPS are in a tough spot. Dancer can go away at least thanks to the huge buffs he gives.
But machinist and bard.. oh boy

Peloton shaves 1 minute off a dungeon run though, that's something.

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Originally Posted by Minnel

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

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BRD has the unfortunate distinction of basically having its primary role stolen by DNC, while also having a rotation that's not quite there, that's getting worse in EW, and in general it's just outclassed by DNC.

It's perfectly valid. I've cleared Ultimate fights with a bard in my group, as well as all of Eden's third tier. It just has the luxury of not caring about what the boss is doing (provided it's handling mechanics otherwise correctly) and it pays for that luxury with lower-than-average damage.

Since Summoner is going to be about 84% free movement as well, I'm expecting it to be similarly penalized and just not do full damage compared to a RDM or BLM as well.

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Originally Posted by Yuella

Peloton shaves 1 minute off a dungeon run though, that's something.

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Don't forget having AoE rotations that scale at 2+ targets. While definitely not the best AoE in the game, all 3 rDPS tend to crush other classes not named BLM in AoE damage due to ease of use and how well it scales compared to single target.

Right now? I would say yes, Bard lost his popularity from Stormblood because he gives mostly nothing to the party when dancer gives so much more. That will change in 3 weeks, for the better I hope.

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Originally Posted by Minnel

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

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So basically what happened is this.

SE wanted to introduce a new physical ranged DPS based around buffs while also wanting to reduce job synergies generally, so they severely weakened bard's buffs. But physical ranged already had a job for dealing pure damage, so said job was just better.

Problem is, this new job still outperformed bard via buffs. So, it was just worse from both standpoints - contribution via buffs, and contribution via pure damage.

Now with the buffs it got in recent patches, it's pretty much a wash.

But then bard also has this other problem - it's very easy to play imperfectly and "leak" DPS via imperfectly catching procs and so forth. e.g., if you delay that bloodletter by a GCD because you didn't notice it fast enough or incorrectly prioritize it, that all adds up.

And so in the hands of imperfect players, bard goes from "lowest red DPS in our group" to "really, really cruddy DPS".

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And none of this matters if you don't raid. It's always been "enough DPS to clear content."

Most other jobs gives buffs too (outside of sam and blm), so in the end what you bring is just a subpar version of what a ninja or a rdm can bring while having 10 to 15% less dps than them, let alone a higher dps job. The only reason you'll be taken in a group is the 1% role bonus for bringing 1 of each tank, healer, caster, melee, ranged and that's it.

bard is in fact in worst spot currently, machinist out damage them. dancer out buffs them. they have extremely boring kit. only really gets exciting 50+. they do the worst dps out other 2. dancer has limitless scaling thanks rng and massive raid wide buff

however bards buffs are so terrible and tiny as if your songs don't do anything at all

Astra can buff whole party 6% damage but mage ballad only 1% other songs direct hit 3% and crit 3%

you have complete total useless abilities that like ranged dps esena, things only start to pick up until 50+ you get more damage buttons. most of them so undertoned. bard is in need heavy rework, most ppl level bard only 30 just so they can sick

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Originally Posted by VictoriaLuv

bard is in fact in worst spot currently, machinist out damage them. dancer out buffs them. they have extremely boring kit. only really gets exciting 50+. they do the worst dps out other 2. dancer has limitless scaling thanks rng and massive raid wide buff

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Ehhh not true both in rdps and adps they are never last (second from last but yeah) and best rdps for TEA, as a ranged ofc. But in any case, all 3 ranged are just a mile away from the other dps with shit buffs anyway.

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Originally Posted by VictoriaLuv

bard is in fact in worst spot currently, machinist out damage them. dancer out buffs them. they have extremely boring kit. only really gets exciting 50+. they do the worst dps out other 2.

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Share your source please.
On mine, that you shouldn't speak about, BRD takes the lead on TEA and sometimes beat the DNC. But is more often above MCH.

That is considering latest savage Tier and TEA which is where you can get the most consistent data.
Unless anyone can correct me with logics and facts, not their opinion.

Granted DNC has busted buffs that needs nerfs/balance/removal but your potential is not limitless, you are limited by mathematics.
I don't have to hire an Harvard Astrophycist to explain that you will mostly fall in the average when it comes to RNG. You may have a "good RNG" but will never get the perfect RNG.

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Originally Posted by Minnel

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

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I wouldn't worry about it. Pick what you personal enjoy the aesthetics and playstyle of. FFXIV isn't challenging enough for people to drop DPS over small % differences.

I'm suprised some mention the rotation, when it was widely praised as one of the best designed jobs in Stormblood, and rotationally nothing has changed except the addition of Apex Arrow; which while not the most fun skill ever doesn't particularly change what's fundamentally the same rotation as in Stormblood. Not saying SB Bard was flawless, but it does confuse me when this is brought up.

Gripes mainly stem from what was essentially them being shifted a bit away from the support identity they're known for; with MCH as the selfish ranged, DNC as the high support ranged, and BRD somewhere in the middle. That and a combination of the physical ranged role seeming less essential in Shadowbringers, with the removal of party MP/TP support which was previously quite invaluable. Casters are so strong that in optimal play, the damage from having 2 could overcome the 1% party deficite for not having the role present.

It's not a huge deal, since the balance in this game is still very tight, and it's not like phys ranged are a burden or anything (hell, cleared TEA with both DNC and MCH in the team). But it does feel like the whole point of the ranged phys role has been lost somewhat. They logically can't have as much damage as casters, but they've also lost most of their supportive features apart from DNC. Even Machinist is traditionally supportive in other FFs, I don't know why the whole role can't split some really useful damage buffs between them. At least if things like resource support are no longer necessary.

It would be nice if Bard were actually a Bard and not an Arcane Ranger.

Oh dear; reading all these posts is really bad! I've just hit level 36 with my bard (I'm a new player and just thought the bow would be cool!), is there a case for just staying as an archer?

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Originally Posted by Eric-Twinkletoes

Oh dear; this is really bad! I've just hit level 36 with my bard (I'm a new player and just thought the bow would be cool!), is there a case for just staying as an archer?

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Nope. Staying as an Archer in 30+ instanced content is considered griefing by many. The base classes are nowhere near as useful as full jobs. I would love for there to be a dedicated Archer/Hunter class in this game and for Bard to be its own thing.

Take everything people say about DPS differences with a grain of salt. In terms of balance this game is more balanced then most MMOs out there. ( And its to an extreme level) The difference in DPS is not as high as you would think. If you like Bard Play Bard. No ones going to shame you for playing it let alone as your main. ( If they are you need new friends) Every Job can do the content. Bards also getting a few nice changes with End walker one being another party wide buff ( similar to current Astros Divination) and 2 new skills and many Quality of life changes to make the kit feel even better. ( personally even now I like it plenty which is good because all they did was add to it.)

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Originally Posted by HappyHubris

I wouldn't worry about it. Pick what you personal enjoy the aesthetics and playstyle of. FFXIV isn't challenging enough for people to drop DPS over small % differences.

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Exactly this the % differences are so small every job is viable if you like it play it. Bard is fun if you like it play it. Not all jobs fit everyone's playstyle.

Honestly Bard’s problem is that it’s support buffs feel too passive to be impactful and procs have this feat or famine nature to them thanks to their RNG that makes me wish they’d increase the Repertoire proc rate during Minuet only.

I’m fine with it’s dual aspects of Poison Ranger/Wind Magic Musician but I agree its songs need more impact. Coda does NOT accomplish this in my opinion. I would have vastly preferred a fourth song to align with raid buffs as opposed to the current iteration’s extension of the current song phases. I also kinda miss snapshotting. The mechanic for Coda could have more potential for fixing up the Voice gauge with an oGCD that consumes it for damage, ideally with a musical animation.

Though even if none of that got attention, Rather than ruin the job with another culling rework I’d rather add to their support kit or upgrade some actions to have a more musical feel to them. Ballad strikes me as a window where that could be possible by upgrading Bloodletter/Rain of Death during it.

When deciding what jobs to play, don't go straight to which ones have the lowest dpsMax vs highest dpsMax. Start with which jobs you like the look of. The gear, the animations. If you like two or more jobs' aesthetics equally, decide based on which one feels better to play. Then, if two ore more are have both your favorite aesthetics and your favorite rotation, choose the one that has higher damage potential.

If you enjoy a job enough to learn to play it well, you will deal more damage than you would with the "high dps" jobs that you don't care about.

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Originally Posted by Aeliott

I'm suprised some mention the rotation, when it was widely praised as one of the best designed jobs in Stormblood, and rotationally nothing has changed except the addition of Apex Arrow; which while not the most fun skill ever doesn't particularly change what's fundamentally the same rotation as in Stormblood. Not saying SB Bard was flawless, but it does confuse me when this is brought up.

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Rotationally, it’s similar to SB BRD, but still a shadow of its former self. The repurposing of Repertoire into a flat 40% chance to proc removed optimization from Iron Jaws, where it was common practice to single snapshot 1 Crit buff, and double snapshot more than 1 Crit buff—especially during burst windows for more Pitch Perfect/Bloodletter procs. So now IJ is used less because the gain from double snapshotting is less than it was prior. There was also Straight Shot’s personal buff which was reapplied every 30s and maintained throughout, but it too was removed. Not as glaring as the dumbing down of IJ, but still a change. Foe Requiem optimization was also removed—which, again, not the most glaring change in rotation, but a change nonetheless. Empyreal Arrow was also changed from a weaponskill to an ability, and that also brought about issues with it.

Any complexity and depth this job had was gutted in ShB—and it’s why I dropped the job like a sack of hot potatoes. BRD had been my main since I started; and I honestly enjoyed bowmage more than I did this shade of it ShB gave us. EW doesn’t seem much better: Alex Arrow is near universally condemned, and what do they do? Give us Apex Arrow II!! And we get AST’s Divination! Riveting! At least we got Bloodletter charges finally?? But only at level 84 and higher…

The support still isn’t really what people have been asking for either. Song buffs being readded was a failed attempt at placating requests for party support—but that wasn’t the kind of support BRDs were even asking for. They wanted active support like MP management for the party, or to bring things like Palisade back. Minne’s change was nice—but not enough. And Warden’s Paeon continues to be incredibly niche, since so many debuffs in higher level content are not cleansable. I guess it has the advantage in E8S and TEA, but still extremely niche and easily forgotten. Troubadour is kind of whatever at this point because everyone has an x% AOE mitigation button; so it feel less impactful than it did in SB. It made BRD slightly preferred in UwU over MCH because Dismantle couldn’t affect what the primals were doing around the arena; it could only affect what Ultima was doing. Plus, 30 seconds of Wanderer’s Troubadour was *chef’s kiss*.

Physical ranged may not be a “burden”, but they are kept in parties purely for the 1%. If that 1% didn’t exist, there’d be no reason to even bring them. Both their personal and raid damage are super low.

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Originally Posted by Taranok

Since Summoner is going to be about 84% free movement as well, I'm expecting it to be similarly penalized and just not do full damage compared to a RDM or BLM as well.

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Funny thing about that is SMN can't be weaker than RDM as it lacks the utility to compensate. Therefore, it'll likely stay in its current position just under Black Mage and Samurai despite having near free mobility. Further proving the 1% party bonus exists only because the dev team doesn't want to balance the Range against other jobs.

Not a complaint in how Bard plays because it's still "relatively" alright although not really.

But,
Wish they'd just hurry up and get rid of the last remaining remnants of Bard's archer motif. Bard doesn't feel like a bard and certainly no longer looks like a classic archer anymore. Bard visually and in SFX, in my opinion, looks sad and pathetic compared to bards in other games and to all the other jobs in this game. You barely use music as Bard and fire magical arrows of magical light out of your bow like Dragon's Dogma's Magick Archer.

If only Radiant Finale looked and sounded as epic as Siren's Deathly Cadenza instead of a despondent and depressed orchestra. But I suppose after years of not being a real bard and being neglected Bard has truly become despondent. Every expansion with Bard I always pray it gets something as beautifully sounding as Deathly Cadenza yet we get nothing but more magic arrows and boring sounding music SFX.

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Originally Posted by HyoMinPark

I honestly enjoyed bowmage more than I did this shade of it ShB gave us. EW doesn’t seem much better: Alex Arrow is near universally condemned, and what do they do? Give us Apex Arrow II!! And we get AST’s Divination! Riveting! At least we got Bloodletter charges finally?? But only at level 84 and higher…

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Gods do I genuinely miss HW Bowmage. It's also amazing that Bard still uses Bloodletter which still has an animation from way back in 2.0. They couldn't even have been bothered updating its VFX or SFX and now you'll be using it 100% more often. Riveting.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

Funny thing about that is SMN can't be weaker than RDM as it lacks the utility to compensate. Therefore, it'll likely stay in its current position just under Black Mage and Samurai despite having near free mobility. Further proving the 1% party bonus exists only because the dev team doesn't want to balance the Range against other jobs.

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SMN will only need to hardcast around 4 GCDs per minute in EW making it deal more damage than any of the 3 ranged jobs and have almost the same amount of mobility making the mobility tax on ranged an even bigger joke. And SMN has Devotion (soon changed to Searing Light, which is a straight up better version of Devotion, maybe), it does have utility. It will also still have Resurrection.

I admit I play casters because the ranged jobs are boring mechanically, boring visually and just plain suck, and I'm truly beginning to think the devs are heavily biased towards casters and against ranged. Every expansion casters get new things with impressive weight, VFX, SFX and mechanics while ranged gets trashed on. Like HyoMinPark said, Apex Arrow 2.0 which is a far cry from the weight, power and excitement you get from using Verholy/flare, Deathflare, Foul, Stardiver or Midare.

Take heart in the following:

It doesn't really matter what you play, as long as you enjoy the playstyle. There may be content where a 1% increase in DPS will save the day, but that extra 1% may come from a Bard who plays really well, as opposed to a Summoner who only play adequately.

Bards are not troubadours, nor have they ever been. They are, first and foremost, ranged DPS who use bows and arrows. Their songs can buff their party at critical times, but not as much as in past years when it basically guaranteed a spot in a raid group.

Min-maxers will always choose the jobs that produce the "most", even if they dislike the aesthetics and the job itself.

You are not condemned to play only Bard for the rest of time. You are welcome to try out Machinist and Dancer (in the Heavensward expansion, and thereafter). You are welcome to try out healers and tanks and melee/magical DPS. This is not like some other games, where you are doomed to create an alt character in order to enjoy a different playstyle.

Focus on the storyline, for which there are no 'wrong' jobs. See how much you can accomplish with Bard before abandoning it because min-maxers determined it to be a less useful job in more extreme end-game content.

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Originally Posted by HyoMinPark

Any complexity and depth this job had was gutted in ShB—and it’s why I dropped the job like a sack of hot potatoes.

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Complexity from what, exactly? Snapshotting I can agree was more fun, but the need to stack a specific party composition to be viable due to proc variance and gear scaling affecting your base crit chance was decidedly antithetical to the support aspects of the job, purely because it bizarrely required that support to be given to it to function as a real job. I didn’t think there was a problem with ShB Bard as long as we got increased Repertoire proc rate on Raging Strikes. Ballad has proven to survive unscathed, so with the lower cooldown in Endwalker I’d only want it to apply if RS is used during Minuet. Hell the Coda management could unlock that function and I would be satisfied.

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Originally Posted by Minnel

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

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Honestly, yeah, bard has been the weakest DPS for all of the Shadowbringers expansion basically. Early on, RDM and NIN were down there in the garbage with them, but those two got fixed while Bard is still pretty lousy overall.

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Originally Posted by Grimoire-M

Complexity from what, exactly? Snapshotting I can agree was more fun, but the need to stack a specific party composition to be viable due to proc variance and gear scaling affecting your base crit chance was decidedly antithetical to the support aspects of the job, purely because it bizarrely required that support to be given to it to function as a real job. I didn’t think there was a problem with ShB Bard as long as we got increased Repertoire proc rate on Raging Strikes. Ballad has proven to survive unscathed, so with the lower cooldown in Endwalker I’d only want it to apply if RS is used during Minuet. Hell the Coda management could unlock that function and I would be satisfied.

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The change in repertoire removed Iron Jaws optimization. It dumbed down the job; thereby, removing complexity and depth from those that wanted to do more than the average or bare minimum play. Those that wanted that extra layer of optimization. What optimization is there in IJ now? Far less than there was in SB. Sure, you still snapshot—but under stricter circumstances now. Snapshotting crit buffs doesn’t matter nearly as much now as it did before. And you don’t snapshot as frequently as before. I believe now there has to be at least 2 damage buffs out to snapshot, where as before you could single snapshot if just one crit buff was present. This will likely change again with increased DoT duration in EW. IJ seems like it will become less relevant then than it is now.

BRD was more than capable of functioning “as a real job” without its optimal comp. I’m honestly not sure what you’re even trying to say with that statement. Your post almost insinuates that, without a DRG and SCH, BRD wasn’t viable. BRD was viable. It was just extremely feelsbadman to not have either; especially to not have a DRG.

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Originally Posted by Minnel

I've been asking about dps jobs to my dps friends and they are kind of acting like bard is sort of 0.9 of a dps. I thought bard was a good dps to have with the buffs and all but I guess not?

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Bard is always in a bad spot because they don't k now if they want to make it a Bard or a Ranger. Honestly it's almost like SMN(current SMN) where it's two ideas crammed into one.

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Originally Posted by Eric-Twinkletoes

Oh dear; reading all these posts is really bad! I've just hit level 36 with my bard (I'm a new player and just thought the bow would be cool!), is there a case for just staying as an archer?

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I would ignore online forum threads about MMOs. You'll get the people complaining much more than the people having fun.

haha, yes I will try to do that too, reading all these hate towards bard is really sad.

moslty hyperbole but at the very least BRD and DNC support, i dont see a reason to pick MCH over any job unless its supposed to be a crutch job

These are some... wild takes in here.


1. Presently, ranged dps all bring about 6-9% less total damage (between what they deal personally + buffs to the group) compared to other roles, depending on what fight / job you want to compare to.

Despite this, groups will bring a ranged because of the 1% party-wide main stat buff you get per role. This is a bit of a band-aid, basically SE really doesn't want 2x ranged to be the go-to and this was their solution for ShB.

It is not known if this will be the scale of the gap in Endwalker. Also, Summoner's redesign is going to put a lot of pressure on SE to come up with a new plan, and hopefully manage cross-role balance in a way the players buy into more.


2. Between the three ranged, the balance is very good, and has been for about a year now. People are incredibly bad at keeping up to date on job balance, and lock in ideas from x.0-x.1 that have long since been patched up.

It will probably be shifty to start 6.x as well, and whoever is behind for the first few months will be branded for the whole expac, no matter how well SE closes the gap.

People are also quite bad at wrapping their heads around (9 + 3) = (10 + 2) = 12. Somehow they think 10+2 is less than the others.


3. Regardless and in general, SE does not tune content tightly enough for the small differences in job dps output to have a meaningful impact outside of i.e. competitive speed running. You can make a case for early prog, but even then world racers just bring their favorite / most comfortable jobs a lot of the time.


4. What is true is that Stormblood Bards are, almost universally, disappointed in the Shadowbringers version of the job.

SE removed a lot of popular elements from the kit, and didn't particularly replace them. Most individual removals made sense, but SE failed to see the forest for the trees.


5. "Identity" complaints have no relation to gameplay. There's nothing actually wrong with having a music-themed archer class, some people just really want a pure archer or pure musician and it's simply not going to happen.


6. Endwalker's changes are a substantial improvement, even if they're not exactly a full return to the glory days. Bard mains should look forward to it with light, comfy optimism :)

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Originally Posted by HyoMinPark

The change in repertoire removed Iron Jaws optimization. It dumbed down the job; thereby, removing complexity and depth from those that wanted to do more than the average or bare minimum play. Those that wanted that extra layer of optimization. What optimization is there in IJ now? Far less than there was in SB. Sure, you still snapshot—but under stricter circumstances now. Snapshotting crit buffs doesn’t matter nearly as much now as it did before. And you don’t snapshot as frequently as before. I believe now there has to be at least 2 damage buffs out to snapshot, where as before you could single snapshot if just one crit buff was present. This will likely change again with increased DoT duration in EW. IJ seems like it will become less relevant then than it is now.

BRD was more than capable of functioning “as a real job” without its optimal comp. I’m honestly not sure what you’re even trying to say with that statement. Your post almost insinuates that, without a DRG and SCH, BRD wasn’t viable. BRD was viable. It was just extremely feelsbadman to not have either; especially to not have a DRG.

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DRG + AST or SCH I considered pretty much necessary, as any healer combination really couldn't cater to it enough on their own despite one of SCH/AST being guaranteed to show up. SCH in theory aligns well, in practice you'd rather have Piercing and align on the 3m buffs consistently. Piercing + Litany + 6m aligned Dragon Sight for Minuet windows basically meant the two were joined at the hips the whole expansion and Bard suffered far more for DRG's absence (particularly with the 80s window in average play screwing with their alignment) early on. It was only 'viable without catering' for the last tier, and even then we've had those numbers for all of ShB and I don't recall them being impressive until SE buffed Burst Shot how many times?

Hell I remember the frustration with the first tier rates getting to the point I actually swapped to Summoner on O4S just for the consistency despite losing a significant amount of item level. Though even that was also fuelled by a combination of external incentives within the group I had at the time on top of the damage differential. We had SAM/BLM/RDM/WAR/DRK/AST/WHM, which meant Contagion was far more reliable in that group while SMN's low-end DPS was absolutely better than a DRG-less Bard's high end at the time. SMN also could still fill in the ranged slot I was acting in, including providing MP to a raid that needed it (nevermind being able to raise on top of it). It took it into the second tier, and basically got my first orange parse off of abusing the one day one person playing DRG that month (who was trying to find a melee he wanted to stick with) with a SCH decided to just align their Chain Strat with Litany because both were forgetting to press it on cooldown.

I pretty much swapped off of it and stuck to Summoner the rest of the expansion when said DRG decided to swap to Monk the next week, and showed him our O7S logs to prove why. He felt bad but I told him I'd rather we -both- enjoy what we're playing than just one of us.

The variance was just that bad if you were below 35% proc rate, and it was similarly way too good if you got over the 63% threshold inside Minuet, something that could consistently happen in the later tiers. Gear Scaling made their first tier god awful and final tier barely tolerable on its own, which is where that 40% proc rate we have now came from. How that translates in terms of game feel, is basically either you had buffs to align on or you weren't getting to play your job. I don't consider that a viable way job, but the perspective that definition of viable is focused on how fun it is first, though the secondary balancing effect does play a legitimate role.

To be clear though, while I do miss some instances, I do not think every single Iron Jaws snapshot timing needs to come back on them, And I certainly would not add the gear scaling aspect either. You'd have to really nerf Burst Shot and buff their DoTs significantly to accommodate that playstyle to the same degree, something we already know SE hates. I'd rather Bard simply get the boost it needs in Minuet using the Endwalker Raging Strike & Song timers, since that's all it really needs to be 'fun' again, even if it means nerfing Pitch Perfect's tuning to justify that change in the first place. That would give enough of that SB feel back without becoming a raid-composition problem. That's the part I want to avoid inserting back when changing it.

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Originally Posted by Cetonis

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The problem is that instead they bring 2 casters that have A LOT of mobility since ShB.

Don't forget that the 1% that they bring is too brought by the 2 other dps role, so in the end only the 4th job have to be considered. if the 1% wasn't there, never would a range be picked as any caster can do movement as good as ranged atm and even if they don't, their dps will compensate largely.

Yes it is possible ton bring any "comp" but it's still feeling very bad to know you are being largely outdps'd by a rdm having 4 times your utility when you were supposed to be a support role, or even worse, supposed to be a selfish dps as a mch.

But yeah people are sad about shb's bard because they only got apex arrow that is .. really a weird ability, the crit not affecting your procs, the songs not being a buff anymore (was given to the dnc in the form of partner dance) and them still not getting a dot spreaded.

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Despite this, groups will bring a ranged because of the 1% party-wide main stat buff you get per role. This is a bit of a band-aid, basically SE really doesn't want 2x ranged to be the go-to and this was their solution for ShB.

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Because square has absolutely 0 interest in actually making ranged dps interesting. If not for the 1% buff, not a single group that's serious in any capacity would bring a ranged dps.

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2. Between the three ranged, the balance is very good, and has been for about a year now. People are incredibly bad at keeping up to date on job balance, and lock in ideas from x.0-x.1 that have long since been patched up.

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Not a single person here is talking about balance.

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People are also quite bad at wrapping their heads around (9 + 3) = (10 + 2) = 12. Somehow they think 10+2 is less than the others.

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I'll be honest I have no idea what this is referencing.

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4. What is true is that Stormblood Bards are, almost universally, disappointed in the Shadowbringers version of the job.

SE removed a lot of popular elements from the kit, and didn't particularly replace them. Most individual removals made sense, but SE failed to see the forest for the trees.

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The problem is they removed a lot of fun stuff in order to nerf bard but went overboard and now its a 1 button class.

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5. "Identity" complaints have no relation to gameplay. There's nothing actually wrong with having a music-themed archer class, some people just really want a pure archer or pure musician and it's simply not going to happen.

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I'm sorry this is just flat wrong. Aesthetic and identity are 2 separate things.

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6. Endwalker's changes are a substantial improvement, even if they're not exactly a full return to the glory days. Bard mains should look forward to it with light, comfy optimism :)

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I disagree. the changes are middling at best, with double song procs still making Mages' Ballad a pain to endure, and its locked to level 6.0 content, and the dot changes makes bard even MORE of a 1 button class if that was somehow possible.
The reality is that bard will probably be worse in 6.0 than it's ever been.

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I disagree. the changes are middling at best, with double song procs still making Mages' Ballad a pain to endure, and its locked to level 6.0 content, and the dot changes makes bard even MORE of a 1 button class if that was somehow possible.

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This complaint is objectively incorrect. Bard uses less filler GCDs now than they did in Stormblood, and will use slightly fewer still in Endwalker (Blast Arrow outpaces the Iron Jaws count reduction).

BL charges being at 84 is indeed disappointing, but it's better than not having it. You don't seem to understand what they actually mean gameplay-wise; it sounds like you're going off of second or third-hand complaints, or things people who don't play the job very often say.

BL charges should start at lower lvls once u get mage ballad for example

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This complaint is objectively incorrect. Bard uses less filler GCDs now than they did in Stormblood, and will use slightly fewer still in Endwalker (Blast Arrow outpaces the Iron Jaws count reduction).

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I define a filler GCD as a GCD that does nothing but damage upfront with no additional effects. for example, burst shot and refulgent arrow are filler gcds because they do nothing outside of do damage. Something like old straight shot would not be a filler gcd.

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BL charges being at 84 is indeed disappointing, but it's better than not having it.

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I'm in the minority when I say this but i would rather having something that fixes the issue rather than a half measure.

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You don't seem to understand what they actually mean gameplay-wise; it sounds like you're going off of second or third-hand complaints, or things people who don't play the job very often say.

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No, I understand exactly what they mean.

End of the day it won’t matter unless you do high end content and even then it never feels like it’s underpowered. The community just cares a ton about minuscule numbers, does BRD do more than SAM? Course not unless you do the fight properly and the Sam dies which ultimately is the important part. Knowledge of The fights and half the time when I enrage it’s because half the party has the res debuff not because of we had a BRD in the group