You can look WM and BRD from this perspective.

[UBERHAXED]

I am really (not) interested in what people who dont even have BRD on 60 have to say about WM. You probably even havent seen 2 same equipped BRDs in same fight one with WM second without it. It is not fine even if other people have cast times because they atleast have the damage. If I am supposed to be banned from moving as others, okey, but then give me the DPS as others. If I am support and I am not supposed to have same DPS as others OK, but give me my movement back. Why should I deal with crappy off GCD skill management and no movement for like 5% dps boost in case I wont have to move. Thats a joke.

Let me show you how ridiculous you sound:

I am (not) really interested in what people who don't even have PLD on 50 have to say about Shield Oath. You probably haven't seen 2 of the same equipped PLD in the same fight, one with Shield Oath, one without it. It is not fine even if WAR have Defiance because at least they have the damage. If I am supposed to be holding enmity as others, okay, but give me cookies as others. If I am tank and I am not supposed to have the same cookies as others okay, but give me my DPS back. Why should I have to deal with holding aggro and low damage for like 20% DPS reduction in case I have to play properly. That's a joke.

Sorry, couldn't keep the same terrible grammar, but you can replace cookies with w/e you want.

[UBERHAXED]

I liked when my bard could fire off bloodletters like dakka dakka dakka dakka. There wasn't anything more exilherating when hearing the bow string from bloodletter repeatedly in a single GCD cycle. You can't reasonasbly fit more than 1 oGCD inbetween each weapon skill with WM up.

Er... Bloodletter con only reset on a dot tick... which is longer than GCD. Whatever you encountered was a bug or bogus. Oh and as GCD shrinks, dot ticks stay at 3 seconds so...

[Sylve]

Er... Bloodletter con only reset on a dot tick... which is longer than GCD. Whatever you encountered was a bug or bogus. Oh and as GCD shrinks, dot ticks stay at 3 seconds so...

Before Iron jaws (which refreshes duration of both DoTs to 18 seconds each) the DoTs were staggered, which slightly changed their damage timing, allowing Bloodletter to sometimes (rarely since you need to crit with both DoTs AND get lucky on the dice) trigger a second Bloodletter refresh literally as soon as you fired the first.

Now that Iron jaws syncs the durations and timers, that doesn't happen. Though you can still see the Bloodletter cooldown refresh twice in a row, Even without WM, its impossible to utilize both refreshes since they technically happen at the same moment.

Right now, You can hit an oGCD skill between casts as there is a full 1 second recast left after the skill fires. Except now we have Empy Arrow to fit in there and Sidewinder when its up.
The claim "we used to be able to weave oGCDs but now we cant!" is bullshlt. Before 3.0, we had BL and RoF. Blunt Arrow could be used when a Silence wasn't needed. That was it.
It was always better to hit a cooldown after a weaponskill because animations would cause you to lose time if you tried to activate multiples.

[RiceisNice]

...

Actually ironjaws only refreshes the duration. Their individual ticks (or crit ticks, whatever) are still staggered according to someone who looked into it.

[Sylve]

Actually ironjaws only refreshes the duration. Their individual ticks (or crit ticks, whatever) are still staggered according to someone who looked into it.

That sounds like a hell of a bug.
Also, it does not simply refresh the duration, it wholly reapplies the DoTs along with any damage or crit chance bonuses you have active at the time.

[Rekujin]

It is a fact WM adds to the BRD job a degree of complexity it never had in the expansion (you literally had 4 GCD skills in your entire rotation -.-). No offense...but there wasn't much difference between a very good BRD and an ok BRD in ARR provided they both dodged stuff and sang.

Stopped reading here....

The fact tha..... you know what? I'm not wasting my energy on this.

[QiLymePye]

I think that the problem is that people who normally don't play the Job are trying to tell people that do play not only that the Job is ok, but also how to play it. I think people complaining about BRDs complaining need to chill out and listen more. I have BRD lvl 50, NIN lvl 50, and MNK lvl50. I haven't done any Heavensward stuff yet, so I can't comment on how the BRD job plays now. But I rolled/played the job not only because of the mobility(Not running around like crazy, but knowing that I could move when needed and still keep my dps was important to me), but because of its utility. Not support, Utility.

For example: I felt as a BRD, my job was to help with adapting to new situations. If an add popped, I felt like it was my job to tag that ass...I mean ADD..lol..even before melee dps can move. I felt if I can help whittle away at enemies and finish them off, thats less time the melee dps has to spend away from boss. Also, not only did I have range, but mobility. I could attack pretty much almost anywhere on battlefield. Add popped to my left, turn fire off shots, another popped on my right a few yalms further away, I might not even have to move to target that one. Oh, attack boss some more, reset DoTs..etc. Kiting when necessary, pulling when necessary, finishing off that mob. Having a BRD was like those movies when the good guy was like "Hey, cover me" and you would provide it.

As a BRD, I didn't ask for more dps to catch up to melee and be on even par, we asked to be SCALED properly to keep the same distance behind melee in dps, whether through scaling weapon dmg properly or scaling dps in general. IMO, BRD would be considered a sidekick, similar to Hawkeye in the Avengers. Yes, he was support, Yes he wasn't super duper like Hulk or Thor, or Ironman, but he had utility. Well placed arrow..finishing off enemy at right time. Even shifting focus from other players. Do you know how many times I have covered healers cause if they are being attacked, its easier for me to shift focus from boss to add attacking healer in an instant whithout moving, without forcing a melee thats already working boss to stop rotation, chase add thats attacking healers, losing dps as a result. Thats what BRD brought to the table.

And from what I'm hearing, SE hurt the Utility of BRD. BRD didn't get invited to raids just because of songs. That was a bonus, yes. But what I see as the problem is that alot of you who never played BRD, but maybe played with the in your group can't look past the songs. Im pretty sure if you were to go back and watch old videos of BRDs prior to this update, and actually look at what they did during fights, you would understand where BRD players are coming from and why they are concerned.

Also, I would like to point out, because I've been on these forums for a while and have read and commented on many BRD threads, that there have been a very small percentage, very very small, that asked for DPS to rival/be even/ match melee DPS. BRD's don't want to kick ass like a mnk or nin or drg, they just wanted their dps to scale to remain the same distance behind, not drop farther behind with every patch and update. With that drop in DPS, its makes it harder for BRDS utility to shine. Now, I challenge all non-BRDS to, if you have the time and ability, to actually watch what the BRDS bring to the table and how they operate. Its like music the way we flow in a fight. Take this analogy:

If party members were compared to musical Instruments in an orchestra: MeleeDPS=percussion Section (Drums), Tank =brass section, Heals=Woodwind/flutes, and Ranged DPS=Percussion(Xylophones, Timpani, Piano, Cymbals, etc) AND String section. The Music heads will understand this analogy but in case you don't understand:

Melee DPS dictates the tempo of the party, like the drums in a band. If you can't meet DPS checks, not going anywhere.

Tank is the Backbone. They are the ones that are flashy and stand out more, especially when you need a solo, like sax, trumpet, etc. When people look and listen to bands(talking classical music here) they tend to focus on drums and brass, cause they are showy and bring fun to the songs, like melee dps and tanks bring to the party

Heals make me think of woodwinds, especially flutes. They play that melody but when they need to make an appearance, they show up loud and fast, like spam healing. lol.

And now Ranged DPS. I think of their songs like the strings section. Playing in the background..soothing and accompanying the woodwinds melody(heals) with the occasional solo(think BLM). BRDS do that but a little extra. Remember those instruments in school that many people didn't know how to play, or play well, or passed them up because they didn't look interesting, like tambourine, triangle, xylophones, timpani, etc? Thats the class I put BRD/MCH into. Most of the time, a band that has those instruments has one person (sometimes two) that play all of those instruments when needed.They jump from cymbals to xylophone, from tambourine to maracas. From the triangle to the woodblocks. Each of those instruments might not seem important and even many of them seem they would be easy, but it doesn't mean they are unnecessary.

The person that plays all of those and fills those roles isn't skating by. Its a challenge. They read the same sheet music as a trumpeter and have to be on time and consistent just like everyone else. Its their utility that makes them unique and important. I am sorry about the long post. I've been trying to get people that don't play the job on a regular to understand why BRDS were upset. From what I'm hearing from most of the BRD's using WM, that its like telling the percussionist to now play with one stick or mallet while waiting for next Bar to load on your sheet music, without moving. Remember...its about Utility and adaptability with this class

[ShaneDawn]

Er... Bloodletter con only reset on a dot tick... which is longer than GCD. Whatever you encountered was a bug or bogus. Oh and as GCD shrinks, dot ticks stay at 3 seconds so...

You could weave 2 Bloodletters during one GCD tho.

[nuyu11]

I feel funny seeing people who don't know about bard saying like they know a lot. To be honest most Bard player hate new playstyle, but some of them stick with it because Bard are their favourite, same like me.

SE make a drastic change but it give a huge DPS to Bard. DRG can burst up to 1.4k Bard cant match with that the highest number I can see is 1k, but I still feel glad compare with other melee even their DPS to dummy is higher than Bard but in actual fight we are in par with them.

The rotation and timing is a bit problem and Bard not mobile like before but still agile compare with other class. If you go to Alex F4 you try check average DPS there, mostly 750-1k and bard can maintain 800 without dying a lot compare with other melee and contributes song to healer and caster. Alex F4 will be harder without Bard and I can EA 1 hit kill ADD sometimes.

BTW I still don't have Blood For Blood buff, not lvl yet DRG to 34

[QiLymePye]

I do have a question about parsers which I'm hoping some will answer for me. The data that it shows in relation to DPS output, Is it measuring that output during single attacks , or is it adding it all up from beginning of fight until the end? I don't know if I'm framing my question properly.