Something I've noticed over time regarding the Bard community is that we are essentially split into camps because of the whole Archer -> Bard situation.

There are the true Bard players who want Bard to either largely or even entirely abandon archery in favor of becoming musicians that not only support, but also attack with music.

There are the true Archer players who picked up the job because they wanted to play the fantasy of a master marksman with the bow and arrow. They don't necessarily want to become a Bard, but are happy that they do have an Archer-like role all things considered.

Lastly, there are what I would define as the "New Age Bard" players who actually love that Archer and Bard are mixed as, for them, it gives the job some new life rather than just being your standard musician or bowman class.

The problem, regardless of play style, is that it seems very difficult to move Bard toward an identity that makes all three of these groups happy... but maybe a rework could actually make that happen.

For that reason, I kinda want to see something big happen. Something I think could work would be taking some inspiration from jobs like Black Mage and/or Red Mage. Create two separate sets of tools, i.e. your archery tools and your musical tools.

Your archery attacks become entirely selfish DPS and effectively act as your burst window. In this moment, your use of music is almost completely non-existent.

Your music attacks are weaker but focus on setting yourself up with a self-buff play style, some of which can still splash over to the rest of your team, but rather than just using your Mage's Ballad or Wonderer's Minuet, you have to build up to get that song in effect by using your musical attack rotation. Kinda like a reverse Black Mage where you want to start with your Blizzard spells to build your MP up first, and then blast through it with Fire. Here you want to set yourself up to use one consistent song that would appear on the gauge, then get 30 seconds to blast through your high damage archery attacks. The process to get there could take about 30 seconds itself, so it's a game of juggling your two themes.

The reason this could work is because it could make each camp happy. Yes, you'll still have this big archery window, but if you want that dedicated musician, you at least have a 30 second window where all you do is sing and play your harp and flute. The same is true in reverse where you may need to play these instruments first, but if you want to be an archer, you get an uninterrupted window of pure archery. The people who like that XIV's Bard is a hybrid will still be able to appreciate this thematic as well.

The numbers and mechanics of this concept would need to be tested, prototyped, and not made to be quite as directly inspired by Black Mage as my example, but that was more about getting the point across. I don't think it should be exactly like that, but something within that ball park.