Bard pre-launch tweak wishlist

[Tulzscha]

This is actually the motivation behind the third point in OP As it turns out, with PP2 = 220p, and PP3 = 360p, using PP at 2 stacks is effectively free - the risk of a double proc counters the added potency of PP3 almost exactly.

Similarly, using Apex at anything from 80-100 gauge is roughly the same potency per gauge. So you have some flexibility there as well.

Oh nice, didn't know that.

[HappyHubris]

One tweak that I would love is making the Songs into GCD skills with more involved/longer animations. We could then have potency compensation elsewhere for the lost GCD. oGCD songs just feel like they are being swept under the rug between ARCHER PEWPEWPEW.

[Easayia]

Yes this 100% this. While I have no trouble filling soul gage to 100% usually almost full with mages ballad and then peon I think for the times when its quite not there this would do wonders!!!

[Easayia]

Quick nock is being replaced with the new skill.

[Cetonis]

A little car ride thinking, an alternative to EA charges would be just to do anything at all that makes BL and EA not have the same cooldown. That could be a 12s BL cd, a 20s EA cd, 30s BL, whatever really. The numerical balance can be altered to suit.

[Jirah]

One tweak that I would love is making the Songs into GCD skills with more involved/longer animations. We could then have potency compensation elsewhere for the lost GCD. oGCD songs just feel like they are being swept under the rug between ARCHER PEWPEWPEW.

I’m almost certain this will be the case in 7.0 as we’ve been using the song animations since 2.0. Names would be like Wayfaring Minuet, Sorcerer’s Ballad, and Warlord’s Paeon. Shocked they didn’t do this in but the songs themselves could use some more interplay besides background noise for buffs and triggers which is just fine and all but more is better and BRD lost its more frantic dot shuffling and could use more tools

[Cetonis]

Should share this here too -

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...-z8bj_1SGaRNJA

Some of what's in here illuminates the thinking behind some OP points more. Haven't put BL-natural-cooldown stuff in there yet because it's a headache and I kind of hope for some change to not have to deal with it -.-''

[Cetonis]

Bumping to complain about 10s Muse in more detail :P


At a 2.5s GCD, if a player uses The Wanderer's Minuet at a normal time (right after their last GCD in Army's Paeon), they will only get 4 GCDs under the speed bonus (1.35s, 3.55s, 5.75s, and 7.95s into the buff).

Moreover, there will be a GCD 0.2s after WM ends, which means the player will need to do a PP-MB weave in the window before that, or else spend about a full second songless.

Newer Bards rarely ever want to leave WM early, so they typically take the songless route and leak song uptime over the course of a fight.

But even if they (correctly) cut WM early, it means giving up the last 1.5s of WM, which feels wrong. It's the kind of thing that makes people say the job is "clunky" with no ability to put their finger on why.


If the player is a little more advanced, and hold off on WM until the late part of the window, they can get five GCDs under the buff (assuming they don't try to double weave with moderate-high ping).

However, now there's a GCD about 44.25s into WM, which is even worse than the above. It tempts players into thinking they can get a PP off after the GCD when they can't, causing it to ghost at best.

Or, they can again leave WM 1.5+s early, using a late weave PP and then going to MB after the GCD, while spending the 1.5s in between watching PP procs show up that they can't use.


Nobody likes this. There's no positive to it, it just feels bad every time. The ghosting side of this makes Enhanced Army's Paeon almost feel like a nerf, rather than a beneficial trait.


The "solution" is to take some Skill Speed, to get to a GCD of 2.46 to 2.48s. This allows players using a delayed WM to get a fraction of a second that lets them get that end-of-WM PP off instead of ghosting it.

That works well enough, but it's unforgiving, and requires medium-high ping players to be very careful with their weaves. And it's still unclear to the common player what's going on, whether or why they want the skill speed, and they still need to know to do the delayed WM besides.


Making Army's Muse last 15s would make delayed WMs lead into a clean exit even at 2.5s. WMs used asap after the last Army's Paeon GCD would still lead to a dicey end situation at 2.5s, but they'd at least get the full slate of buffed GCDs out of it.

Not a perfect solution, but it'd be a nice improvement to a murky, irritating problem few players know about, but many of them feel.

Or, just rework Enhanced Army's Paeon to do anything-else. (random example: if it added 10% to straighter shot procs per stacks, the average player would be excited by it - even though it's actually a very small change numerically. There's tons of stuff like this SE could do)

[Rika007]

Bumping to complain about 10s Muse in more detail :P

...

Or, just rework Enhanced Army's Paeon to do anything-else. (random example: if it added 10% to straighter shot procs per stacks, the average player would be excited by it - even though it's actually a very small change numerically. There's tons of stuff like this SE could do)

Yes please for the love of god yes. Muse is awful. I've been getting my Bard back on in anticipation for Endwalker and good lord am I reminded how terrible of a trait Army's Muse is. I personally would once again like to voice my want for higher pitch perfect proc rates, and just make it that Muse instead lasts 20 seconds (same duration as Raging strikes), and during those 20 seconds instead of a haste effect it grants a higher proc rate to repertoire in some way. Some trickery would need to be done to insure this is not a buff that is snapshot able since that would be pretty nuts with new DoT durations. But it would sure as hell make our 2 minute burst window feel MUCH more better and active. I just want to see 4 or 5 Pitch full power perfects during raging again more often. Or gods forbid actually make 2 stack pitch perfects more useable.