So about bard 7.0

[Valence]

I may have an unusual take on dots. I've never been a big fan of them but for one single reason that's exactly the same as self buffs: the UI is absolutely terrible and it's hard to keep track of them. And even if it wasn't, sometimes you just forget and remove your eyes for less than 5s from them and poof they're gone. It is just annoying to deal with, and I'd be happy to have actual feedback tied to them to make it less tedious. I also agree that having two dots of the same duration is redundant and adds 2 unecessary buttons (the second dot and IJ).

I do however miss repertoire proccing from them, and right now they serve almost no purpose, at least no more than any generic dots on other classes, which is a shame.

All in all dots or no dots on that class don't especially concern me, because it's a bard/ranger, and I don't consider them central to the core identity of the job. However, I don't wan't them to remove things without adding new interesting things, and it's been a pattern with almost everything in the shb/ew battle system so far, so I'm not holding much hope for the future of said pve battle system, which includes jobs as well.

[Kazamaiya]

They're probably going to drop one or make a new one and have the two dots upgrade into one.

The devs hate dots atp and have slowly deleted them from the game. And due to the de/buff bar being so limited, they'd sooner rid of them to avoid actually fixing it.

But honestly I love dot based jobs but just like pet jobs, the devs don't know what to do with them.

The thing i have never understood is the logic behind the De/buff bar being limited.
Jobs had like three times the amount of Debuffs back in ARR almost ten years ago, so what gives?

Regardless, i do hope the DoT's will stick around, but i am not counting on it anymore. Personally, i'd be ok with them being removed if we got a different mechanic to replace them. Like MP management or perhaps a Mobile cast or two. Idk, would prefer if the DoT's stayed, but again. Not holding my breath at this point

[Shurrikhan]

As much as I adored dot procs in shb, I think it's time to move on.

Having a timer ticking down on the boss that needs to be kept up is good busy imo, but having two timers with same duration and are maintained with one button (and this button isn't even music or archery related) is redundant busy, and should be reconsidered. I can see them reworking Stormbite to not be a dot, and replacing Ironjaws with with something actually archery or music related while leaving Caustic Bite as the only dot skill (BRD already has some snake themed skills, and a snake needs its venom).

Wouldn't this imply that just removing Iron Jaws and varying Caustic's and Stormbite's durations would also be a sufficient solution...?

I think it needs more GCDs that are frequently used in its rotation, and reworking/replacing some of the dot related skills will free up hotbar space for such skills

Likewise... just reducing DoT durations from their current ridiculousness (say, back to somewhere between 30s and their original 18s) and removing Iron Jaws would reduce the portion of GCDs spent on Proc->Filler macros.

(And allowing us to bank up to two proc-shot casts would give us a reason not to simply consolidate those two keys / continue to simply key-swipe Refulgent->Burst together as to never pay attention to said proc, while Iron Jaws' removal could finally give us a reason to prioritize RA procs from other sources over perfect DoT maintenance.)

There's nothing inherently dated about DoTs. They're just a mechanic that manages a great many good things (soft-CD, tactics differing with target count between ST and pure AoE, rhythmic consideration, etc.) with minimal needs or apparent complexity.

I wouldn't mind seeing Stormbite or Caustic turned into something else, but let's not treat an arbitrary turn (such as away from Bard DoTs) as necessarily progressive / a turn for the better.

I may have an unusual take on dots. I've never been a big fan of them but for one single reason that's exactly the same as self buffs: the UI is absolutely terrible and it's hard to keep track of them.

While I can't say I've particularly had difficulty with this, there's an easy solution there we could easily borrow from add-ons: Enmity List DoT trackers and the current (or last selected) target's DoTs being tracked via the charge wheel (the 'cooldown indicator' that doesn't grey out the skill but still shows progress until the 2nd/3rd charge's completion) over one's DoT skills.

[mallleable]

Wouldn't this imply that just removing Iron Jaws and varying their durations would also be a plentiful solution...?


Likewise... just reducing DoT durations from their current ridiculousness (say, back to somewhere between 30s and their original 18s) and removing Iron Jaws would reduce the portion of GCDs spent on Proc->Filler macros.

There's nothing inherently dated about DoTs. They're just a mechanic that manages a great many good things (soft-CD, tactics differing with target count between ST and pure AoE, rhythmic consideration, etc.) with minimal needs or apparent complexity.

I wouldn't mind seeing Stormbite or Caustic turned into something else, but let's not treat an arbitrary turn (such as away from Bard DoTs) as necessarily progressive / a turn for the better.

I actually messed around with such changes on a striking dummy, and I was indeed pressing more buttons outside of Burst Shot. I tried 30 /45 seconds, and 15/30 seconds. And I ran into issues. The biggest issues were proc traffic jams, and them feeling kinda janky, and tedious to refresh under personal, and raid buffs. There are solutions to these problems, but compromises would have to be made in other parts of BRD's kit to make them work, and they don't feel good to consider -- at least to me.

The kneejerk potential solutions that did not sit well with me: DOT weapon skills no longer granting GCD procs, letting GCD procs stack so they can't be overwritten, making one or both dots Sonic Break clones, making one of the dots an oGCD.

Granted, my experiments were very limited, and I was fighting muscle memory. The oGCD rotation stayed relatively the same. I also was not even taking into account the hypothetical skill that would replace Iron Jaws. I encourage anyone to play BRD (or any other job) "wrong" to discover potential ideas on how to improve the job feeling and rotations --- on a striking dummy of course!

[mallleable]

This has left me further questioning whether or not having two damage over time debuffs to maintain is even critical to the fantasy, and identity of bard/archer because it feels keeping them around is holding the job back, and the only reason they seem to be kept around is that BRD always had them. It begs the question is it worth keeping dots if it means compromising the bard or archer aspects of the job? I agree I don't think dots are inherently bad or outdated, but I don't think they are appropriate or necessary for BRD to be BRD at this anymore.

BRD to me is in a weird spot where it has to wear two hats at the same time. BRD has to be a good archer, a reliable DPS that feels lethal in the right hands. BRD also has to be a good bard, and provide support for its allies through music. If DNC is a cheerleader, and MCH is the big guns then BRD should be a rockstar on the battlefield. In my experience, PVP BRD does a decent job at conveying this fantasy (at least in Front Line). The raid buffs, and utility are strong, and its attacks secure kills. The job feels strong, and not broken and oppressive or weak and useless. PVP BRD does this without dots

The recent buff to Nature's Minne was a great bard buff, but I feel the archer part still needs some love. I am totally biased, and I am not in the BRD is a pure support crowd, so I think in terms of firepower, BRD should be right in the middle of DNC, and MCH, and not where it it currently being interchangeable with DNC. BRD is the only physical ranged DPS that a new player can start the game with so I feel like it should be a branching point into the other two jobs in terms of damage vs. utility while also remaining a strong pick if they want to stick with it. But right now it seems like the attitude is start with BRD so you can abandon it to play DNC or MCH.

[Shurrikhan]

I actually messed around with such changes on a striking dummy, and I was indeed pressing more buttons outside of Burst Shot. I tried 30 /45 seconds, and 15/30 seconds. And I ran into issues.

What tuning contexts were you assuming for this? Did you try to (im)balance the DoTs around total damage (hard to delay the shorter DoT)? Tick potency? PPM contribution over nonuse?

Did you allow for any RA banking (allowing the proc to stack or applying some other mechanism that keeps it from capping straightaway) / did you remove the RA proc chances from DoTs?

Those things will make huge differences to the use of two DoTs (as opposed to the current basically one DoT that happens to take an extra GCD to reset once per target or upon maintenance failure).

The kneejerk potential solutions that did not sit well with me: DOT weapon skills no longer granting GCD procs, letting GCD procs stack so they can't be overwritten, making one or both dots Sonic Break clones, making one of the dots an oGCD.

While I agree that the others would be "kneejerk" or at least cross-purpose, I see nothing wrong with letting GCD procs stack.

RA, for instance, has literally no reason to exist as a button separate from Burst Shot in its current state (nor our Procced-AoE from our AoE), because there is never a time in which it's worth using the filler over the proc. Allow those procs to bank a second stack and... there you go: that second button then actually has some value, and our burst periods gain an extra element of prep that makes them more interesting. Without that, there's no more reason for Refulgent to exist separately from Burst Shot than for Leaden Fist Bootshine to exist separately from regular Bootshine.

I encourage anyone to play BRD (or any other job) "wrong" to discover potential ideas on how to improve the job feeling and rotations --- on a striking dummy of course!

Likewise!

Ultimately, we're trying to create a gameplay state where (A) the rhythm and diversity of button-presses and (B) the count/frequency and depth of decision making (i.e., the job's cognitive load, and the types of optimizations backing it) both... feel good. It's hard to beat actually trying things out in a variety of ways / according to diverse premises for informing ourselves individually of what... feels good -- and later, from that, as a sort of equilibrium or "consensus" on the subject.

This has left me further questioning whether or not having two damage over time debuffs to maintain is even critical to the fantasy, and identity of bard/archer because it feels keeping them around is holding the job back, and the only reason they seem to be kept around is that BRD always had them.

I don't think they're essential or particularly "Bard-like" about two DoTs, no. But, I might say that multi-DoTing has largely been iconic, since Bard would tend to (A) do that in periods where other physical fighters with even 3 DoTs might not bother to multi-DoT, and (B) they traditionally gained funnel-able resources through doing so. Even that isn't iconic to theme, though -- only to its XIV gameplay.

Of course, neither is there anything wrong or "un-Bard-ish" about having those two DoTs, and so long as they remaining on the GCD, the fact that DoTs can essentially have as many charges of its "soft-CD" as there are targets could allow for some really interesting interactions with songs.

As such, I don't think it's the fact that Bard has DoTs that is holding it back, but that we've never bothered to do anything more or increasingly "Bard-ish" with them; on the contrary, we've only ever done less and less with those DoTs (or, with the skills that hold them).

In ARR, they made up 2 in 7 GCDs. In HW they became slightly more integral but made up only 1 in 7. In Stormblood, 1 in 12. With Endwalker, they were made absolutely irrelevant except as a modest DPS boost and were used for only 1 in 18 GCDs. And across that whole time, the DoTs themselves have never picked up an additional effect (unless you count Sidewinder-prep which has since been removed anyways).

[Shurrikhan]

BRD to me is in a weird spot where it has to wear two hats at the same time.

Is that necessarily a weird spot, though, especially for a Bard? Nearly every iteration of Bard (outside of those chucking physically manifested musical notes as if a guitar were a gattling gun, which strikes me as about the least "Bard"ish form of Bard there is) has involved considerable learning in/of synergetic but separate domains.

If lore- and information-gathering is your aim, then taverns and parties are often your game, at which point a knife is very handy thing to know your way around, along with the slitting of money pouches and messenger bags, and maybe even training in dueling arts for in case your caught with your hand too near to a noblelady's ass (for different but equally damning reasons). If command and coordination is your aim, as per the Ishgardian basis for Bards seen in 1.x, then a ranged weapon is about the perfect fit to a strong voice and a winning personality -- all forming together a damn good skillset for a sergeant.

BRD has to be a good archer, a reliable DPS that feels lethal in the right hands. BRD also has to be a good bard, and provide support for its allies through music. If DNC is a cheerleader, and MCH is the big guns then BRD should be a rockstar on the battlefield.

I'd largely agree with this, but I have to point out one potential issue of scale: If DNC only needs 1 other party member to get a huge part of its value, while BRD only scales linearly with party count to reach its max at 7 other allies, there's little room for those broad support tools to become a more significant part of a Bard's total kit/value (relatively speaking) without it becoming inferior in light parties.

In my experience, PVP BRD does a decent job at conveying this fantasy (at least in Front Line). The raid buffs, and utility are strong, and its attacks secure kills. The job feels strong, and not broken and oppressive or weak and useless. PVP BRD does this without dots.

Fair, but there's little reason to look at a massively reduced kit size as per every job's PvP version and think that DoTs were removed from that kit because they're DoTs and DoTs are an ill fit to Bard's being able to complement (and maybe even supplement) its party's needs. That a given tool is trimmed along with half or more of the original kit does not mean the job would be more thematic without it. While it'd suggest that DoTs don't need to be part of the kit, any further conclusion would seem spuriously ad-hoc.

The recent buff to Nature's Minne was a great bard buff, but I feel the archer part still needs some love. I am totally biased, and I am not in the BRD is a pure support crowd, so I think in terms of firepower, BRD should be right in the middle of DNC, and MCH, and not where it it currently being interchangeable with DNC. BRD is the only physical ranged DPS that a new player can start the game with so I feel like it should be a branching point into the other two jobs in terms of damage vs. utility while also remaining a strong pick if they want to stick with it.

Almost fully agreed. My own take is basically just a small twist on this. Personally, I think Bard's rDPS tax on even having support available to it should be very minimal, but that there should be an rDPS cost for using those tools, albeit to a net gain in value.

Its ideal scenario, then, would max out the effective use of broad tools in a full party or a balance of broad tools (e.g., only during raid buffs per 2 minutes) and more focused or single-target ones in smaller parties, but I feel it should still be able to dig deeper towards DNC levels of support (again, at cost) or MCH levels of "selfishness" if all is going well but no one else has the Bard's level of skill + gear.

Of course, to me, DNC should also have even deeper support pockets and MCH should be capable of some at-cost support, with each just having rather different portions of their value built into support during ideal or "meta" play, and each performing those support functions by means that pretty darn distinct from each other.

Just my headcanon/pipedream $0.02, ofc.

[dspguy]

I'm going with a single DOT is what we'll have. They love to remove abilities with every expansion. They can claim two abilities at once - 1 DOT and Iron Jaws. IJ would become redundant at that point. Just reapply the single DOT.

Otherwise, I think BRD will get an ability like MCH has: Barrel Stabilizer. Something that bumps up their soul gauge to be used earlier. It can't bring it to 100, that might be a bit OP. But, I could see it going to 50. If not that, then possibly a MNK-like ability akin to Brotherhood. Party attacks something, Soul Gauge goes up.

[ty_taurus]

A feature I've been hoping for with all jobs in mind is adding in "action skins" where you can select between different animations for one ability. The immediately easiest thing to do in this regard is allow players to choose between past iterations of spells that have upgraded over time, such as replacing Glare III's animation with Stone IV without losing the potency on White Mage. This could also be used to restore removed animations from the past as well, such as having the option to swap Rain of Death for Wide Volley, or another example could be swapping Aeolian Edge with Dancing Edge on Ninja... the list goes on.

But what you could also do is add new animations that can either be unlocked in game or even just purchased on the online store that allow you to retheme your job more drastically. Why I bring this up here is because you could have reskinned versions of archery-themed actions that turn them into musical attacks and vice versa for Bard's current songs. This way, players would have the ability to choose if they want to go full archer, full bard, or stay as a mixture without compromising any gameplay.

We already see an example of this from Atori in Bozja, an NPC that assists in skirmishes who is a Dragoon with entirely original cherry blossom themed animations, something that could become available for our Dragoon.

[SaitoHikari]

They removed DoTs affecting song procs, but I can't see why they can't just merge both DoTs into one and then have that one DoT affect the soul voice gauge as it did before the expansion, just without it affecting song procs this time.

More things need to affect and use the Soul Voice gauge in general. Actually, while I was in the process about thinking about the Soul Voice gauge, I had one realization...

The Bard rotation barely changes at all from level 52 all the way to level cap. We get a grand total of 1 skill on the GCD that isn't tied to some kind of proc at 56 (Iron Jaws), 1 GCD tied to the Soul Voice gauge at 80 (Apex Arrow), and 2 damaging oGCDs (Empryeal Arrow at 54 and Sidewinder at 60). Everything else is tied to a proc that is merely a higher damaging version of the skill used to trigger it, a party buff, or is merely a damage increasing trait.

You could literally move the Soul Voice gauge and Apex Arrow to, say, level 60, and all the pieces would already be in place for it to work there. I don't think any other ARR job actually unlocks a new gauge so late at freaking level 80+.

Also, Shadowbite and Refulgent Arrow still being separate buttons from Heavy Shot/Burst Shot and Quick Nock/Ladonsbite makes very little sense, unless the devs at one point planned (or are planning) for us to be able to stack procs for both skills.