What Are Some Easy Wins for Improving Combat Content?

[LilimoLimomo]

True, but they both could be and have been distinct. Sidewinder used to require having one's DoTs up, back when they were 18s a little less reliably maintained. And EA, moreover, has the potential to overcap gauge or be more desirable if held a second to be used in the upcoming song instead (though, yes, simply weaving the song a second early instead is usually preferable).

As such, it would be, to my mind, and equal or better solution to simply reinvigorate those abilities if/when/where possible.

They are, now that no context could ever make TTK difference matter, but for a moment... consider Iron Jaws. IJ itself is... almost negative gameplay, in its current form (increasing BRD's filler/proc_filler casts from 8 of 9 to 17 of 18 casts). If we consolidate VB and WB, we're still stuck with their being dead buttons due to Iron Jaws, whereas if we remove Iron Jaws, we're stuck only with 2 overly-alike DoTs that each see use... for which the best solution is just to, again, diversify them. Which would probably do BRD a lot of good.

Which is a verbose way to say I'd rather not have consolidation preclude improvements to the actual kit, and therefore would rather not lock in boring-ass abilities by consolidating them before even giving them a chance not to be so dull.

Oh certainly, I'm not familiar with the history of Bard but replacing "redundant" abilities with something that actually breathes life into the kit seems great. So changing a redundant skill so that it does something novel and interesting that changes the way a player thinks about their class, rather than adding yet another button to unload during unload times...that sounds smashing.

And as for Iron Jaws, yeah...it's only purpose is to "simplify" the already needlessly complex DoT game. So it's prime to just be removed. Or alternatively, have Venemous Bite just become Iron Jaws when you're aiming at a target that has 2 stacks of poison or whatever. Lots of similar solutions to this issue.

Given that we only see this in, what, at most three fights, and none of those uses are remotely interesting... I almost wonder if it'd be better just to remove those bloat QTEs entirely.

Wouldn't oppose this!

There is another in the hidden box, though, that would cover this, in a fashion mentioned in your macro thread: Just un-neutering the macro system, by having it perform, with queuing, one action per button-press (as plugins can already do, by just undoing the flag telling it not to queue macro actions).

Yeah if macros could do something along the lines of trying every macro line in sequence until an action triggered or 0.5 seconds expired, that would be great!

Add to that conditionals like range and movement and voila, you can have Thundercloud > Scathe > Thunder III all in one button, Fire IV > Despair > Blizzard III all in one button, etc., per user preference in button-flow.

Oh my god, if macros could intelligently cast a charge spell if I'm standing still but instead do an instant-cast if I was moving, that would be amazing. That would solve some of my biggest issues with my BLM setup.

Though I'm not sure if you could really make a good "Fire IV > Despair > Blizzard III" macro regardless, because depending on circumstances, there are times when you can cast Fire IV but if you do then afterwards you won't have enough mana to cast Despair, which means you should choose to cast Despair instead of the Fire IV. But I'd love to be able to pair Despair and Blizzard III without any loss!