Should BRD lose one of the DoTs?

[ForteNightshade]

When I saw SE removing the DoT interaction with the Bard kit and the removal of DoTs on Summoner my first thought was they are priming the game for the complete removal of DoTs. I honestly think Bard will have them removed in the next expansion.

I'll be shocked if they aren't removed. The only thing which may halt their decision is how woefully unpopular Bard has become since Shadowbringers. It went from the most popular DPS in Savage to the least played. Yes, even Black Mage has overtaken it which says a LOT about how incredibly unpopular the changes have been. While they may have handwaved it in Shadowbringers due to Dancer being the new shiny toy. You can't really use that excuse for what will be almost four years.

7.0 will be curious on whether they course correct changes players have been extremely vocal about (two minute meta, certain job designs) or double down on them.

[Eorzean_username]

The only thing which may halt their decision is how woefully unpopular Bard has become since Shadowbringers. It went from the most popular DPS in Savage to the least played. Yes, even Black Mage has overtaken it which says a LOT about how incredibly unpopular the changes have been.

Of course BRD popularity was going to drop in ShB — BRD was a hard meta pick in SB, because it pumped into the Crit Buff meta, synergized with Piercing Debuff from Dragoon, provided higher overall RDPS than Hypercharge with Crit Buff + Foe + BV, no one cared about Dismantle, the MCH rotation required a PhD in Machonomics to execute correctly, and BRD scaled grotesquely with Crit stat and Crit buffs. SB BRD was one of the strongest PvE Jobs in the game, in addition to being completely-mobile — which MCH was not, due to needing to rely on FT channels (and psychic tick-estimating powers) every 60s, which usually lined up nicely with some hell mechanic that forced MCH to bait death to do its burst correctly.

Jump to ShB, and Piercing Debuff is gone, Foe is gone, Crit Buff is gone, crazy BRD Crit scaling is gone, MCH is remade to be new, shiny, high-damage, and freely-mobile, and DNC has been introduced as something even newer, shinier, and more RDPS-positive, while also being completely-mobile.

Yeah, they turned Straight Shot into a proc, and crammed in the largely-pointless Soul Voice thing (because GAUGES!), but BRD overall didn't change that much in feel in ShB. The real reason that BRD lost popularity relative to its glory days is just because actual alternatives became available — MCH was considered unplayable by a lot of people in SB, and DNC didn't exist yet. Now there's 2 (3?) equally-viable "no-castbar ranged" to choose from, and BRD's damage contribution and toolkit is merely on-par, rather than obviously-superior.

If both BLM and RDM had the simplicity and mobility of current SMN, you'd probably see a spike in BLM players and a drop in SMN players — in most cases, it would likely have nothing to do with rotational simplification or dullness, and everything to do with whether people feel like they have accessible alternatives. Most players simply do not care about things like gameplay complexity, or quirky things like Foe Requiem. In fact, one of the biggest actual playerbase revolts against Bard was when SE introduced difficult(?) castbar Bow Mage gameplay in HW.

If SE actually wanted to see Bard numbers rise dramatically, they could just rename it "Ranger", make the DOTs a single trivial button, return Flaming Arrow, chop out the flutes and harps and magical-girl spins and musical-note burpy-bubbles, give it chainmail AF instead of RenFest cosplay suits, give it Stealth and Tracking for flavor, and give it 6.0 Summoner-style "animal companion" attacks where you launch tigers and wolves and eagles and crap at the target.

The rotation could literally be Heavy Shot into automatic Refulgent Arrow procs and nothing else, and it would still see high participation numbers if it:

a) looked cool

b) embodied a popular fantasy aesthetically (Note: "Flute Mage with a Bow Glued On" is not this)

c) was easy and comfortable to play

d) did high total DPS

And "d" might even be optional in a lot of cases, since it hasn't really saved, for example, MNK, whereas WAR popularity is still pumping strong.

People in hyper-focused XIV discussion communities tend to think like, "Oh they took away Kaiten, my beautiful gigabrain non-homogenized skill expression, they will PAY for this, just watch the revolution break out!" And then probably 92% of the playerbase is like "oh Kaiten is gone, lol. Anyway, let's go shop for the new glamour outfit and then build a shrine to Grynewaht in my house's basement" and is perfectly-happy as long as they still see a katana slashing things on their screen when they push buttons.

[Seraphor]

There's still a lot they could do with DoTs without disrupting the direction they're going in, which includes fewer debuffs at a time (so limited time instead of 100% upkeep) and flexible job rotations that can fit into the 2 minute burst window, so jobs aren't separated by uptime/burst capacity.

Instead of having two DoTs, it could be one DoT, with a buff to yourself that increases the potency of your one other DoT. This is functionally identical, instead of having two DoTs at say 30 and 20 potency respectively, you have a 30 potency DoT, and a buff that increases the potency of your DoT by 20. Simple and effective, reduces the number of 100% uptime debuffs.

Secondly, they could work in a skill to the 2 minute burst window that either increases the potency of DoTs further, or does what some existing skills do by dealing more damage if target is under the affect of the DoT and/or the aforementioned DoT buff. This means the DoT itself doesn't need to be particularly high potency, and it can still be the functional baseline for that jobs mechanics. Reducing sustained damage and putting more focus into bursting, while maintaining job identity.

You can 100% design a DoT class without multiple or potent DoTs, and they should do this with Bard.

[Amenara]

7.0 will be curious on whether they course correct changes players have been extremely vocal about (two minute meta, certain job designs) or double down on them.

With the change to paladin I assume SE is going to double down on everything in 7.0.

[Marooned_Pilot]

DoTs should stay but compared to something even less used Repelling Shot is another matter. Backwards gap-closer / escapee maneuver barely has any pull in current content.

[Connor]

DoTs should stay but compared to something even less used Repelling Shot is another matter. Backwards gap-closer / escapee maneuver barely has any pull in current content.

I totally agree that in practice movement skills like Repelling Shot makes no sense on one of the the most mobile jobs in the game lol. At the same time though I honestly enjoy being able to somehow yeet myself out of AoEs, so part of me would like to keep it