Bard buffs

Don't get me wrong, i'm not gonna complain for anything lowering that absurd gap between melees and second rate dps jobs like ranged physical, rdm or smn, but they buffed bard, out of all the rphys jobs? Literally the job that's already ahead of mch and dnc?

Is SE trying to reinflate the amount of bard players in savage with this or something? :D

That's what you get when you update your game based on KPIs.

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Originally Posted by Valence

Don't get me wrong, i'm not gonna complain for anything lowering that absurd gap between melees and second rate dps jobs like ranged physical, rdm or smn, but they buffed bard, out of all the rphys jobs? Literally the job that's already ahead of mch and dnc?

Is SE trying to reinflate the amount of bard players in savage with this or something? :D

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Probably trying to attract players to play Bard again in general. Personally, I don't see very many at all when doing roulettes and whilst I did enjoy playing it myself, I do find it hard to justify as I slightly prefer Dancer and Dancer does something similar, but does it better.

I think they balance based on popularity and not actual stats.

In which a lot of players, including myself stay away from BRD entirely for aesthetic reasons. And on the high end, DNC is likely going to always be the meta phys range for its raidbuffs and abilitiy to buff the dps jobs SE actually likes.

Yeah, it’s definitely about getting more people to play the job than actually buffing the job lol. I mean, I’m grateful for the buff I guess, but I think people’s problems with Bard go bit deeper than personal dps, since it’s always been fairly decent overall (I think?)

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Originally Posted by Oizen

I think they balance based on popularity and not actual stats.

In which a lot of players, including myself stay away from BRD entirely for aesthetic reasons. And on the high end, DNC is likely going to always be the meta phys range for its raidbuffs and abilitiy to buff the dps jobs SE actually likes.

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That's not how I understand meta, but perhaps for a lot of people meta actually means padding, I guess.

Because otherwise, even before this buff, BRD is outpacing both DNC and MCH on sheer party damage results.

I don't buy the aesthetic reason completely, or perhaps there has been a drastic change in mentalities with that new fad of people asking for a hunter with bow archetype instead of a music with bow archetype. But BRD enjoyed very high numbers in past expansion, with the same core mechanics since Stormblood. Or perhaps people are getting bored of the lack of novelty, added to a few debatable changes? Hell if I know. BLM I do understand, but BRD, it's beyond me.

As a BRD player, I was only half expecting buffs in this patch so I'm not complaining lol

Numberswise, it seemed Fine™, but in terms of job feel It should have a lot more firepower than it does now in my honest, but also probably totally biased opinion. BRD uses a bow, it should feel lethal. BRD also uses music, and it should feel as powerful as the game's soundtrack. Let DNC be a cheerleader, and make BRD a rockstar.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

I think they balance based on popularity and not actual stats.

In which a lot of players, including myself stay away from BRD entirely for aesthetic reasons. And on the high end, DNC is likely going to always be the meta phys range for its raidbuffs and abilitiy to buff the dps jobs SE actually likes.

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If this were true, monk would have been by far the top damage dealing job in the game since Heavensward. It has a long history of being the least played job in the game.

i play monk for pve and BRD for pvp , i use to play monk all round until the change they the pvp ui skills for crystalline conflict , when i pvp to much i get lost in my skill rotation when i start doing pve content. but it ok , but with BRD i find it lacking not in dps but in output of how quick it can deal dps in a short time , while if you had a monk and a BRD in the Arena, in a one on one fight you would have to be a skill player with a BRD to pull a win off , while a monk wouldn't have to lift a finger. but if these changes for BRD are only for pve i don't see the point, but only to get more player playing them

and I like to pvp with my BRD more because i like a challenge, since i dont have a Limit brake that can hit 51000 , it more satisfying downing someone that can.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

And on the high end, DNC is likely going to always be the meta phys range for its raidbuffs and abilitiy to buff the dps jobs SE actually likes.

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If DNC really did have a significant advantage in/from dancing for BLM/SAM in a given meta comp... wouldn't its 6.4 top rankings noticeably eclipse BRD, instead of BRD being ahead of it?

While we should probably be including the difference in buff exploitation, too, whereby MCH might even pull slightly ahead of BRD, even then it seems to make little sense to leave DNC as low as it is while buffing BRD alone.

I feel like BRD is to DNC as RDM is to SMN, and that's why it's not played as much. I really don't think the average player looks at parse data to make a job determination, if anything they just ask the community and the community is pretty bearish on BRD cuz of its wacky job identity and it feeling like garbage to play wherever you have downtime because your songs are so impossible to reorder and yet necessary to align with the Almighty 2 Minute Meta, including between dungeon trash packs.

Can't argue that they seem to buff or nerf jobs based on things other than their damage performance a lot of times, though. Especially mid expansion, because they hate adding new things for jobs mid expansion if they can avoid it, they almost always limit their changes to 'numbers up or down', regardless of what the actual problem is.

I do not agree with that hypothesis, for the simple reason that BRD hasn't change fundamentally in structure since Stormblood that introduced the song system and repertoire, and it used to be played very heavily by everybody, be it casual players or raiders. It was already a pain to line up in dungeons and what it has gained in pain (longer songs) it has also gained in flexibility (gauge charging up between pulls which wastes songs a lot less, and you end up essentially letting your songs cycle freely rather than try to stagger and realign them all the time). If anything, BRD used to be a lot messier the more you go back in time (crit procs and no control over RA procs for barrage, then dot procs, etc).

It's possible people were more attached to the old procs and dots, though, but I have a hard time imagining that's such a crucial factor, especially for more lightcore raiders or casual players (if anything it made the job easier and more predictable/approachable, even if still finicky to optimize).

Honestly though, beats me why. I'm starting to suspect it's just because of staleness and how the job has been very similar for 3 expansions now.

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Originally Posted by Valence

It's possible people were more attached to the old procs and dots, though, but I have a hard time imagining that's such a crucial factor, especially for more lightcore raiders or casual players (if anything it made the job easier and more predictable/approachable, even if still finicky to optimize).

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This line here is why I am a former Bard main. What attracted me to Bard in the first place was the support offered, and the dynamic gameplay (procs and dots as you say). Stormblood Bard understood and leaned into this. Shadowbringers and Endwalker Bard smoothed off all the edges, which you're likely correct about making the class more approachable, but also took away what had me playing it in the first place.

I also think the theory that the devs buffed Bard specifically to try and boost the number of people playing it is a good one. After all, if the DPS numbers were fine before the buff, and the percentage of people playing Bards are low, it's a fairly easy conclusion to reach. What I'm interested in is, if the representation doesn't go up, maybe that means that many of these former Bards are like me, and dropped the class because of gameplay, not numbers. It might even be the sign that gets the devs to take notice and bring back some of the complexity that once defined the job.

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Originally Posted by Phia

This line here is why I am a former Bard main. What attracted me to Bard in the first place was the support offered, and the dynamic gameplay (procs and dots as you say). Stormblood Bard understood and leaned into this. Shadowbringers and Endwalker Bard smoothed off all the edges, which you're likely correct about making the class more approachable, but also took away what had me playing it in the first place.

I also think the theory that the devs buffed Bard specifically to try and boost the number of people playing it is a good one. After all, if the DPS numbers were fine before the buff, and the percentage of people playing Bards are low, it's a fairly easy conclusion to reach. What I'm interested in is, if the representation doesn't go up, maybe that means that many of these former Bards are like me, and dropped the class because of gameplay, not numbers. It might even be the sign that gets the devs to take notice and bring back some of the complexity that once defined the job.

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I agree with this as a former Bard main.

I'm really hoping(coping?) they consider a rework and really think about what players actually liked about the class. The stats don't lie, DNC is picked over twice as often as BRD in high level duties, there's clearly something fundamentally wrong that SE has to look at. You can buff/nerf the numbers as much as you want, but if there's an underlying issue with the class, it won't help at all.

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Originally Posted by Lucan_Astral

I agree with this as a former Bard main.

I'm really hoping(coping?) they consider a rework and really think about what players actually liked about the class. The stats don't lie, DNC is picked over twice as often as BRD in high level duties, there's clearly something fundamentally wrong that SE has to look at. You can buff/nerf the numbers as much as you want, but if there's an underlying issue with the class, it won't help at all.

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I think Phys ranged needs to be semi support based to function better in reality.

As Phys ranged you can't really have them do high DPS compared to melee or casters like BLM, because of how you can attack from any range with no cast times. (even if EW design seems to want to make it as easy as possible to keep melee uptime), So adding actual benefits to phys ranged outside of just damage seems like the right way to go.

I think when Bard got their heal boost changed into aoe (and mch got their mitigation) it was a step in the right direction, but I think fights should Lean into bringing a Phys ranged more, they should get more interesting utilities and abilities, I just think fights need to design those abilities in mind (aswell as tank support tools, otherwise it will give healers nothing to do).

I'd kind like scholars speed boost on bard (ignoring the out of combat speed boost) Maybe give their single target esuna thingy a additional effect like a decently strong single target mit, Unsure what else they could add with *current design* but leaning more into support aspects is what I really want on Phys ranged in general to have some powerful utility, Obviously we need to actually make raid wide and out going damage more of a thing, But I love skills that aren't just "click do damage or click and buff damage" they're boring at this point. I think encounters really need to be looked at, they need to hopefully make fights lean on allowing utility abilities to be more useful.

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Originally Posted by Lucan_Astral

I agree with this as a former Bard main.

I'm really hoping(coping?) they consider a rework and really think about what players actually liked about the class. The stats don't lie, DNC is picked over twice as often as BRD in high level duties, there's clearly something fundamentally wrong that SE has to look at. You can buff/nerf the numbers as much as you want, but if there's an underlying issue with the class, it won't help at all.

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In my opinion DNC is a flawed comparison point for the exact same reason that SMN would be a flawed comparison variable when compared to RDM or BLM.

DNC is exactly like SMN, it's been simplified and watered down so much from the subtleties that it had that it's the path of least resistance by FAR in the rphys department. It was already before in ShB, but closer to MCH back then, because you still had as a DNC to account for proc overwriting with Flourish (and Sabre Dance optimization), not drifting standard step, and melee phases. It wasn't much, and like MCH you could still pull solid numbers even when just not caring about this, but it was still something that has been completely removed. DNC today is no different than SMN but for the procs, and the only arguably more difficult part of the job is the semi variable structure of the burst phase, which is the only part of the job that still requires some brain cells.

Therefore it's no surprise that 50% of the rphys charts are people just picking up DNC. In a way it's not that different from SMN vs RDM or BLM yeah.

What I find more interesting is to compare BRD to MCH actually, because they 1) don't share a similar role and structure in party with party buffs and 2) don't share a similar proc based structure. MCH, while still with a ludicrously low skill ceiling (or at least damage ceiling when optimizing), still offers at least some kind of execution to follow unlike DNC that can just press whatever button lights up and be fine.

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Originally Posted by Rithy255

I think Phys ranged needs to be semi support based to function better in reality.

As Phys ranged you can't really have them do high DPS compared to melee or casters like BLM, because of how you can attack from any range with no cast times. (even if EW design seems to want to make it as easy as possible to keep melee uptime), So adding actual benefits to phys ranged outside of just damage seems like the right way to go.

I think when Bard got their heal boost changed into aoe (and mch got their mitigation) it was a step in the right direction, but I think fights should Lean into bringing a Phys ranged more, they should get more interesting utilities and abilities, I just think fights need to design those abilities in mind (aswell as tank support tools, otherwise it will give healers nothing to do).

I'd kind like scholars speed boost on bard (ignoring the out of combat speed boost) Maybe give their single target esuna thingy a additional effect like a decently strong single target mit, Unsure what else they could add with *current design* but leaning more into support aspects is what I really want on Phys ranged in general to have some powerful utility, Obviously we need to actually make raid wide and out going damage more of a thing, But I love skills that aren't just "click do damage or click and buff damage" they're boring at this point. I think encounters really need to be looked at, they need to hopefully make fights lean on allowing utility abilities to be more useful.

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They can't do anything for support with their current design because their current battle system had made sure they removed all of those avenues for ShB. This is why we have party role bonus (1%) since ShB came out, to ensure people still take up the role into parties, no more, no less.

Don't get me wrong I'd love for them to move back to a more RPG based battle system, but I really don't think they'll do that, ever.

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Originally Posted by Valence

They can't do anything for support with their current design because their current battle system had made sure they removed all of those avenues for ShB. This is why we have party role bonus (1%) since ShB came out, to ensure people still take up the role into parties, no more, no less.

Don't get me wrong I'd love for them to move back to a more RPG based battle system, but I really don't think they'll do that, ever.

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They should Move back to that design, It's a case of they likely won't, The current SHB now EW design is just so uninteresting for any job that isn't just a pure DPS (Even then DPS is getting worse with things such as 2 minute raid windows).

Party role bonuses feels kind of unfair, a role like phys ranged shouldn't only serve the purpose of "well you bring 1% damage extra by existing that's only why we bring you!" that's just a really flawed design choice, I think the 1% buff is fine as it serves a purpose of making sure you'll always want to bring a role type, but at the same time I think they really need to consider Phys ranged being something that brings a lot more to the table then just the 1% buff.

I feel like DT is either going to be make or break for me personally, If we're getting more of the same with EW design I think I'll start only playing for story, I've been uninterested in playing a lot lately. I just hope they start to realise that the current design doesn't fully work for anyone wanting more then just damage buttons, I feel like a middle ground between stormblood and shadowbringers would have been pretty perfect for new and hardcore players.

DT is either going to have drastic changes (for better or worse) or just double down more on what was started by SHB, Now EW design. I'm not saying they're going to be struggling for players, but clearly I know some people are getting fed up with EW Job design.