Job change suggestions for BRD in 6.0

[Akiudo]

I think fans of bard know what the job could be and SE is to scared to do it. They said they don’t want 2 main support jobs but they themselves have backed themselves into a corner because bard was the first true support then dancer arrived and just took all of it. It’s not fair to bards. Bards support is nowhere near dancers at all and dps is nowhere near machinist. The job doesn’t flow well and to me is all over the place. I feel the job is 90% archer/ranger and 10% support, when dancer is a healthy 50/50. All I’m saying is bard could be on the same level but SE seems scared to do that because they don’t want another bard/dragoon situation where bard/dancer are mandatory for high end raids. That’s very sad and honestly not a good excuse for what they did to bard. They stripped bard of all its support when 5.0 came out. Player backlash made them give back support but they gave crappy support back. No where near dancers level of support. Give bard is healthy 50/50 or heck even a healthy 60/40 and I’ll be happy with that.

sorry but dancer is not mandatory for "high end" raiding in a way most people think of actual high end raiders, i.e. the "we go for world first" way. its mandatory for speedruns and even than only because speedrunners literally don't give a flying **** for the 20 runs were dancer performs worse than mch as long as at the end they get their one run where dancer suddenly has every procc in existance on his side. for one its a sad joke at best to try to balance around that kind of play, especially as square does not support it in the slightest, given their stance on the very tools players use to upload and parse these fights. Also, given the current level of dps even if bard was dancer 2.0 you would not want both of them. even in these very specific (i.e speedrun) settings, at the end of the day dancer is still only the best physical ranged for speedkills, the role as a whole is still bad enough you would hardly want two of those.

the extreme synergy between Bard/Dragoon was flat out broken, especially do to crit scaling

[MartaDemireux]

I just want it to have more music. Whether that comes from animations or a job split, I don't care.

If they split, I would love a full-fledged Ranger focusing on traps and bows, lorewise being an anti-poacher and seeing the Animals command return from FFV in order to have a fully musical BRD. A fully musical BRD could be an interesting ranged, healer or caster.

If they stay combined I'd love for all oGCD buffs to be songs when the soulstone is equipped (Raging Strikes for example). Having music notes and stuff appearing as aura visuals (gently, not big in your face) for our song stances would be nice too - it would add a musical feel to the job and show where to stand for DPS that go too far.

[SweetPete]

I just want it to have more music. Whether that comes from animations or a job split, I don't care.

If they split, I would love a full-fledged Ranger focusing on traps and bows, lorewise being an anti-poacher and seeing the Animals command return from FFV in order to have a fully musical BRD. A fully musical BRD could be an interesting ranged, healer or caster.

If they stay combined I'd love for all oGCD buffs to be songs when the soulstone is equipped (Raging Strikes for example). Having music notes and stuff appearing as aura visuals (gently, not big in your face) for our song stances would be nice too - it would add a musical feel to the job and show where to stand for DPS that go too far.

I actually love these ideas. Honestly I never thought of a split. I’d love a split to be honest. Can you imagine a bard healer or caster? Yes please sign me up

[Beddict]

I actually love these ideas. Honestly I never thought of a split. I’d love a split to be honest. Can you imagine a bard healer or caster? Yes please sign me up

And on the other hand: hell no. I love the lore behind Bard, with the archers who saw the horror of war and sang for their fallen comrades using the twang of their bowstrings as the first instruments. It's a fantastic spin on both Archer and the classical Bard we see in other games, and I don't want them to just pitch that in a bin and retcon the shit outta everything. SE may not be executing the Job fantasy as well as the could and need to strike a proper balance between Archer and Bard, but burning everything to the ground and screwing over fans of the current Job is such a terrible idea. Thank God they already said that splitting Jobs like they did with Summoner and Scholar was a bad idea because it means this will never happen. I just hope SE works hard at striking the balance in the future, especially after they kneecapped Bard in Shadowbringers to make way for the fancy new Dancer that stole it's identity.

[Akiudo]

And on the other hand: hell no. I love the lore behind Bard, with the archers who saw the horror of war and sang for their fallen comrades using the twang of their bowstrings as the first instruments. It's a fantastic spin on both Archer and the classical Bard we see in other games, and I don't want them to just pitch that in a bin and retcon the shit outta everything.

i second that wholeheartedly. i get where people are coming from if they say bard right now is too much of an archer, i also understand why people may want something like a pure musical bard/pure ranger but i feel like to often people asking for a split like this ignore that theres also a part of the playerbase that likes something as is, at least from a general standpoint.

I mentioned this in another thread where someone mentioned "simply" splitting bard into bard/ranger, i like my bard/ranger as is, as a bowman that uses song to inspire his comrades still alive while lamenting those allready gone. Personally yes, i agree that gutting bards support in favor of dancer (if even that, may aswell have been in favor of bringing physical ranged as a whole down, and have nothing really to do with dancers introduction) was a bad move, and yes i wish current Bard had a bit more "Bard".

But simply deleting this class that saw their comrades fall, couldn't help them with their fight do to the nature and limitations of their fighting style, this class that in their own helplessness started to sing, started to once again help their comrades, this time through giving them hope and inspiration and in exchange giving us 2 completly different classes is a slap to the face for those that actually like the current bard lore.

[HyoMinPark]

I think fans of bard know what the job could be and SE is to scared to do it. They said they don’t want 2 main support jobs but they themselves have backed themselves into a corner because bard was the first true support then dancer arrived and just took all of it. It’s not fair to bards. Bards support is nowhere near dancers at all and dps is nowhere near machinist. The job doesn’t flow well and to me is all over the place. I feel the job is 90% archer/ranger and 10% support, when dancer is a healthy 50/50. All I’m saying is bard could be on the same level but SE seems scared to do that because they don’t want another bard/dragoon situation where bard/dancer are mandatory for high end raids. That’s very sad and honestly not a good excuse for what they did to bard. They stripped bard of all its support when 5.0 came out. Player backlash made them give back support but they gave crappy support back. No where near dancers level of support. Give bard is healthy 50/50 or heck even a healthy 60/40 and I’ll be happy with that.

I think the developers are really hesitant to have a return of any meta where there are hard-locked jobs. BRD was in the meta for so long—and I feel like they worry a lot about optimization groups taking both BRD and DNC, and then seeing the trickle-down effect to the midcore and below. Then there’s the issue of MCH being unwanted because DNC/BRD is the better physical ranged combo. BRD has ended up the strongest physical ranged at the end of the last two expansions, and I think the developers want to avoid that. However, in the process, BRD lost its identity.

I honestly dropped the job after the ShB changes despite having played it for almost 4 years (it was the job I started this game on—I played it all through HW when it was the dreaded bowmage and into SB where I raided almost exclusively on it, optimized on it, progged UCoB on it, and cleared UwU on it). I don’t like how it moved away from its support roots, and I also have a lot of issues with the way it plays now. I miss the old Repertoire and how it could be manipulated—I don’t like the static changes even though I know why they made it a fixed percentage instead of scaling off of critical hit. I don’t like the removal of MP support for the part. I don’t like the removal of Foe’s + Refresh. I also think Apex Arrow and the Soul Gauge are tacked on abilities that really need to go back to the drawing board.

[SweetPete]

sorry but dancer is not mandatory for "high end" raiding in a way most people think of actual high end raiders, i.e. the "we go for world first" way. its mandatory for speedruns and even than only because speedrunners literally don't give a flying **** for the 20 runs were dancer performs worse than mch as long as at the end they get their one run where dancer suddenly has every procc in existance on his side. for one its a sad joke at best to try to balance around that kind of play, especially as square does not support it in the slightest, given their stance on the very tools players use to upload and parse these fights. Also, given the current level of dps even if bard was dancer 2.0 you would not want both of them. even in these very specific (i.e speedrun) settings, at the end of the day dancer is still only the best physical ranged for speedkills, the role as a whole is still bad enough you would hardly want two of those.

the extreme synergy between Bard/Dragoon was flat out broken, especially do to crit scaling

I can agree with this.

[SweetPete]

i second that wholeheartedly. i get where people are coming from if they say bard right now is too much of an archer, i also understand why people may want something like a pure musical bard/pure ranger but i feel like to often people asking for a split like this ignore that theres also a part of the playerbase that likes something as is, at least from a general standpoint.

I mentioned this in another thread where someone mentioned "simply" splitting bard into bard/ranger, i like my bard/ranger as is, as a bowman that uses song to inspire his comrades still alive while lamenting those allready gone. Personally yes, i agree that gutting bards support in favor of dancer (if even that, may aswell have been in favor of bringing physical ranged as a whole down, and have nothing really to do with dancers introduction) was a bad move, and yes i wish current Bard had a bit more "Bard".

But simply deleting this class that saw their comrades fall, couldn't help them with their fight do to the nature and limitations of their fighting style, this class that in their own helplessness started to sing, started to once again help their comrades, this time through giving them hope and inspiration and in exchange giving us 2 completly different classes is a slap to the face for those that actually like the current bard lore.

I wouldn’t complain if they split the job but I know they won’t. As of now bard is more of a ranger than a bard. I can understand SE being worried that brd/dnc will become meta etc but there is balance to everything. They didn’t have to strip bard of its support in favor of dancer. When shadowbringers came out bard lost its support. How can you call the job a bard then? Dancer is a healthy mix of both dps and support. If they can do it for dancer why not for bard too?

[Akiudo]

I wouldn’t complain if they split the job but I know they won’t. As of now bard is more of a ranger than a bard. I can understand SE being worried that brd/dnc will become meta etc but there is balance to everything. They didn’t have to strip bard of its support in favor of dancer. When shadowbringers came out bard lost its support. How can you call the job a bard then? Dancer is a healthy mix of both dps and support.

thats fair, and like i said i also wish that bard right now was bit "more bard", its just that more than once people mentioned splitting bard/ranger completly as a "fix all" where everyone is happy, and i think its important to realize that no, that would not mean everyone is happy. Wishing for current bard to be a bit less archer and a bit more bard as a middle ground between pure bard/ranger is also a completly fair opinion, in fact its what bard originally was designed to be lorewise.

If they can do it for dancer why not for bard too?

with that i agree, the question however is what square intends in that regard as a whole. right now their balancing inside the roles seems to be "no support->weak support->strong support", which i would say is not necessary but kinda the easy way out solution. you have that the clearest with the physical ranged, but it also exists with the casters and the melees (well, if you want to call dps buffs support at least), i.e you have 1 selfish class, 1 (2 in the case of melee) middle ground class and 1 support heavier one. at any rate, we'll have to see how they move forward with that, personally i don't see any real necessity or even good reason for that but in the end we'll have to wait and see how square will move along with both its role aswell as class balance as a whole.

[ty_taurus]

i second that wholeheartedly. i get where people are coming from if they say bard right now is too much of an archer, i also understand why people may want something like a pure musical bard/pure ranger but i feel like to often people asking for a split like this ignore that theres also a part of the playerbase that likes something as is, at least from a general standpoint.

I mentioned this in another thread where someone mentioned "simply" splitting bard into bard/ranger, i like my bard/ranger as is, as a bowman that uses song to inspire his comrades still alive while lamenting those allready gone. Personally yes, i agree that gutting bards support in favor of dancer (if even that, may aswell have been in favor of bringing physical ranged as a whole down, and have nothing really to do with dancers introduction) was a bad move, and yes i wish current Bard had a bit more "Bard".

But simply deleting this class that saw their comrades fall, couldn't help them with their fight do to the nature and limitations of their fighting style, this class that in their own helplessness started to sing, started to once again help their comrades, this time through giving them hope and inspiration and in exchange giving us 2 completly different classes is a slap to the face for those that actually like the current bard lore.

Honestly, the best way to satisfy this would be to create 2 versions of every action: a ranger version and a bard version. The job would play the same, but players could have the option to take away the bow completely outside of auto attacks, or take the music away completely and make it exclusively about archery. The problem is this is very scope heavy as you'd need 2 animations for everything.

I agree that it's not fair to take away a job people currently like, but I think it's equally unfair that in a game where one of the goals is to allow players to play their favorite Final Fantasy job, a true Ranger and Bard aren't allowed to exist simply because the current "Bard" that was created mashed them together. Someone who's favorite Character was Edward from FFIV, for example, is not allowed to have a playstyle like him period. stop. end of discussion. And yet, in the same game, retaining that traditional experience was so important to the game's identity that Blue Mage isn't allowed to be a real job, because instead of designing it to fit in the game's design like any other job, they felt that doing anything other than importing the job 1-to-1 from FFV would've been sacrilege.