Can you tell me bards why so much hatred....

[basketofseals]

If you play MMO's you have to take with a grain of salt that the job you play may completely change in an expansion or two down the line. Classes in Vanilla WoW are nothing like they are now.

Casting times added a skill level BRD needed. Sure it needs some adjustments to have the procs and OGCD's flow better, but it works just fine. On either BRD or MCH, I actually have to plan my next move accordingly to how the boss is going to react next. In 2.0 on BRD, only thing to do after the opener was only worry about boss mechanics and if someone needed a song. It was really a brain dead job. Even then, BRD is still the easiest job to play of the DPS. It is still easy to be mobile if you actually take time to learn how to react and move in between GCD's.

Why was skill "needed?" Is having an easy job a problem?

[SlyRoyale]

Why was skill "needed?" Is having an easy job a problem?

Back in 2.0, BRD had a bunch of strong cross-class buffs. Blood for Blood used to give a 20% damage boost before the trait, and a 15% crit rate for Internal Release if my memory served me correctly. Their weapon damage wasn't nerfed around that time, too, so any good BRD worth their salt could easily out-damage the other jobs without having to worry about positionals or dodging AoEs. BRDs were even strong enough to have BCoB statics bring two of them just for rotating Blunt Arrow without having to worry about a loss of raid DPS, and this was also before the nerf to LB generation by having multiple players in the party as the same job. Come 2.1, BRDs were nerfed by having the power of their cross-class buffs tuned down alongside their weapon damage.

Raising the skill floor for BRD to allow it to do more damage is more of a balance issue for SE to avoid a repeat of 2.0, I believe.

[Rowyne]

Why was skill "needed?" Is having an easy job a problem?

That's actually a really good point. The tradeoff is that before, BRDs could more easily concentrate on lending support. Now they have to concentrate so hard on stance dancing, timing and weaving of skills, they don't have time to pay attention to who's low on mana or TP. You're lucky if you get a Foe's, if anything.

Sure, you can still do somewhat respectable DPS, but now you really have to work for it and it's just not fun for many people anymore. If it's a balance issue, I think it could have been achieved another way.

[Malevicton]

That's actually a really good point. The tradeoff is that before, BRDs could more easily concentrate on lending support. Now they have to concentrate so hard on stance dancing, timing and weaving of skills, they don't have time to pay attention to who's low on mana or TP. You're lucky if you get a Foe's, if anything.

You make occasionally looking over at the party list sound way more intense than it actually is.

I do feel lucky if I ever get Foe's. And that's the problem. I really shouldn't feel that way. I don't feel lucky when I get battle litany, I just feel like "oh this person is actually using their abilities. This is normal."

[Inferiae]

You make occasionally looking over at the party list sound way more intense than it actually is.

I do feel lucky if I ever get Foe's. And that's the problem. I really shouldn't feel that way. I don't feel lucky when I get battle litany, I just feel like "oh this person is actually using their abilities. This is normal."

Take away its three seconds cast time and you'll see Foe a lot more

The problem with Foe is that we never know if we will need MP for something else. Can you imagine me singing Foe and then people start dying, healers need mana and I'm OOM? Yeah.

Knowing when to sing and when to preserve MP makes a good BRD, of course, I'm just saying this because you compared Foe with Battle Litany, and they are fundamentally different.

[Malevicton]

The problem with Foe is that we never know if we will need MP for something else. Can you imagine me singing Foe and then people start dying, healers need mana and I'm OOM? Yeah.

I can get this in general, but it still annoys me if I don't get foe's for my opener. If ballad is needed that badly that early it's probably a wipe no matter how much mp the healers get. May as well roll the dice and line up foe req with everyone's cooldowns imo.

I agree that knowing when to preserve mp is a good skill for brd, but I see significantly more brds on the overcompensating end of the spectrum. I'm pretty sure I can count on one finger the number of times when we needed ballad and the brd didn't have mp.

[RapBreon]

You make occasionally looking over at the party list sound way more intense than it actually is.

Lmao, this needs some intense action scene followed by it cutting to a BRD watching their party list and TP/MP bars going up and down slowly. Then cuts back to a massive explosion and that victory pose they pull at the end of A4. Maybe some Lux Aeterna for the soundtrack? Michael Bay please!