A Bards point of view.

[Cyrus-Wallace]

3. People think THEY know the best song to play at any given situation. Imagine this scenario I have ran into: BRD,PLD,WHM,DRG.

Dragoon ran out of TP.
Paladin was dying.
White Mage is out of MP.

My decision was: Mage's Ballad.

BUT NOPE. The healer yelled at me for not casting Foe Requiem so she could Holy better. Yeah umm... just thought you'd like to heal the tank?

If the WHM didn't know you, he should have asked for Foe instead of assuming that you should use it. On the other hand, if you see the WHM is repeatedly using Holy, you can kindly ask if he'll need Foe on the next pull.

As a BLM second class, I love my fellow bards. I always ask them for Foe on big pulls or bosses and they always help me as I help the group with the HP increasement.

[Vespar]

Snip

Before you go bashing Kat, her points are very relevant. I also play Bard and I sing all the time, but if people start legitimately yelling at me over what I need to play and when, then I wont sing at all.

That being said, I have been in some Syrcus Towers with 4x Bards and I was the only one singing Foe Requiem when we had that one BLM/SMN, or I was the only one singing Ballad bcuz the mage's desperately needed it. There are 4 of us? Why not sing? It's not gonna hurt a single person's damage that much and will benefit the party. I was however recently in a Syrcus Tower party with 4x Bards and one BLM where the other Bard and I coordinated our efforts. He would use Ballad and I would use Foe's. By the time the bosses died, I was just about to run out of MP for Foe because his Ballad was also regenerating my MP. It was awesome and our BLM and healers loved it! This is what being a bard is all about. We're a partial support class So please.. Support your party :P

[Genesis-xyx]

I understand your miseries OP. There's always a constant battle between doing right and wrong with people in this game.
Somewhat related note: was in a high level roulette the other day and got yelled at for dpsing on my whm when there was no healing to be done, completely put me down for it. Next dungeon I got into I got yelled at for doing the exact opposite; not dpsing enough.
There's just no wining with people. Play how you want and ignore everyone else.

[radius0]

I'm a BLM with WHM as my secondary. I try to make life easy for bards. TBH, Healers' role is now questionable these days so it's understandable that bards are confused on what to play. Some healers focus on heals, others want to DPS. Mages Ballad or Foe? I try to make life simple for my bard. If I need mage's ballad, I call it out. However, i always look out for my MP and automatically come with the assumption that the burden of MP management is on ME, not on my bard. If MP is running low due to Holy spams and Foe is already up, it's the WHM's fault for not monitoring their own MP during their spams. (That's why we got shroud and ethers in the first place.)

On the other side of the coin, bards need to keep an eye out, especially when healers resurrect people or have just been ressed themselves. Because healers are trying to recover from a setback it's tough to yell 'mage's ballad' especially if you're trying to dodge plumes. o_o

[Zaiken]

Foe Requiem when there is mage when during big pull or at boss. Ballad if Healer MP is at 1.2k or 800 ish. Paoen, shouldn't even bother with it.

Now you're a good Bard. I never get any complains when I do this.

[LunarEmerald]

Definitely need paeon for Turn 8 but nothing else.

[ispano]

Well, number 2 is fairly irrelevant, as the only people who can tell that you DPS has dropped by whatever small amount are those that run DPS parsers, which you can report anyway if they start calling you on it.

What? Ballad and Paeon both reduce your outgoing damage by 20%. No one needs a parser to know that the bard who is playing Ballad or Paeon, good reason or not, is reducing their dps.

[Vanguard319]

I look at it this way: For every idiot playing Bard, there are three idiots playing a tank, a dps, or a healer respectively.

[MilesSaintboroguh]

I look at it this way: For every idiot playing Bard, there are three idiots playing a tank, a dps, or a healer respectively.

Could have said "everyone is an idiot" in fewer words then.

[Vanguard319]

Could have said "everyone is an idiot" in fewer words then.

My point is that there are some people who suck balls at a job, while others excel at it, and that fact applies to every class and job