Bard - they broke my job

[lordjoosie]

[QUOTE=AkashiXI;3171934] Right now Bard isn't terribly behind many jobs with the current buffs. I parse with my drg friend, and even without disembowl, you can put up great numbers. -snip-

Unless you consider doing 20-25% less damage to be "great numbers" your friend is not damaging up to his/her potential. Even if you don't do a bit of parsing, it only takes a few groups with 2 bards or machinists to realize that their DPS is more than just a little below the other jobs.

Let's do this experiment. Assume we're building a party for A1 savage. Assume everyone is between i185 and i189. Your first 2 members are bards. You can fill the rest of the party with anything you'd like. What are your odds of making it past the first boss?
Now let's do the experiment all over again, but this time replace the word bard wit ANY job other than bard or machinist. What are your odds of winning now?

You're right in that the damage numbers don't mean much. I'd be fine even if bard did half the damage of other jobs. The problem is that right now, unless the party has poor MP or TP management skills, bard is a burden to the party. I say this because if you replace that bard with ANY other DPS that is equally geared/skilled, your party will be better off.

If bard is ever going to be a job that is more than just something your friends let you play because they don't mind picking up your slack, they need to either boost the damage, or increase the usefulness of bard's utility features so that their benefit to the party offsets their lower damage.