Tank needing Bard's opinion

[Seaside8]

Hi,

When I queue for WP in DF and I am grouped with a bard, I tend to ask the bard use Mage's Ballad in almost every pull. The reason for this is simply because this allows me to pull much bigger, and it also eliminates any downtime. However, I have noticed that some bards simply refuse to use it even when they have full mp pool, and seeing how I do not even have a lvl 1 bard, I can't tell if he/she is not doing their job, or if I am requesting too much from them.

So, my question is this: do you hate it when a tank makes such request? I understand that there is some opportunity cost associated with using Mage's Ballad, but is the alternative more beneficial to the group than using Mage's Ballad?

[Allfy]

Honestly, in a 4-man group running an instance normally you should never expect the bard to give you mana. On the other hand if you are doing something such as WP speed runs or generally doing 2-3 group pulls (or more) where massive aoe's are needed, then yes it can be expected as you will need the mp to keep hate.

I do not know all of the tank taunts and skills n such but in general as i understand. Tanks should use flash (aoe taunt?) then tab and individually taunt mobs with emphasis on whichever is marked 1 or to be killed first. This keeps mana usage low but hate yield high.

With well geared and under geared tanks alike, in normal runs i have never been asked for mp nor do i believe i should have to give mp for general pulling. On the other hand when it is absolutely needed I will put it up. But realize that using an mp song lowers a bards dps by 20% thus making most reluctant to use it.

[Seaside8]

I do not know all of the tank taunts and skills n such but in general as i understand. Tanks should use flash (aoe taunt?) then tab and individually taunt mobs with emphasis on whichever is marked 1 or to be killed first. This keeps mana usage low but hate yield high.

This would be true in a normal pull 2~4 mobs - but I am talking for multi-pulls with 5~7 mobs at a time. For WP, this seems to be expected of me.

[Allfy]

This would be true in a normal pull 2~4 mobs - but I am talking for multi-pulls with 5~7 mobs at a time. For WP, this seems to be expected of me.

As i stated, in runs such as WP speed runs, where you pull many groups at once; yes it should be used. and as Stalkster stated, most bards play the class to be "OP" but as friends of mine explain... we were only op to begin, as we gain more gear we hardly increase our dps while other classes increase exponentially. I saw hits of 240-260 normal before, now i'm at ~270-280 normal (not including crits obv) while other classes talk of hits up in the thousands... but i digress. For large pulls, 5+ mobs or so, you can ask but dont expect to get it as most bards mentality is that of a dps not support. for large pulls of 8+ they should be using it or they're worthless as a bard.

[Stalkster]

Well some bard see it as this tank wants me to lower my DPS to give the party MP.
I think some brd's play brd since some think it's 'op' DPS, /yawn. And don't see it as a support DPS.

I never seen getting ballad allowing bigger pull's, but more for flash to spam for hate(to not kill the Blm). Can it be done without ballad? Yes. Is it needed? -Depends-. Is it nice to have from a tank perspective? Yes.

A overgeared Pld wont need it really if the Blm is not on par. If the Blm is overgearing the Pld it's kinda needed.
Even more so it helps the healer, assuming Whm to Holy spam between cures and not have MP issue's.

[SleepyMonkey]

I have both tank and bard, and honestly if a tank has less than 70% mp for the next pull (on speed runs) that means he is not doing it properly for the most part. There is no need to spam flash all the way till mobs die, you can gain mp and even get mp back as you pull mobs. However, I do use MP ballad when needed and most of the time I don't need to be asked for it, as I tend to watch everyone's MP.

That being said, I rather use Requiem Foe over MP ballad unless the tank doesn't know how to manage his MP, but I also tend to switch Requiem to MP between pulls. If a tank asks me to use MP ballad all the time, to me that means he is lazy and just wants to spam flash the whole instance, tho that's just how I see it. Btw, I'm used to do WP speed runs with my PLD which is undergeared compared to the i90 BLM's I tend to go with, I'm not just talking from a BRD point of view.

[Norbi]

I use Ballad in between pulls to get everyone's MP up quicker, but during the actual AoE-fest after the pull stops moving I generally leave it up to the tank to regen their own MP with Fast Blade > Riot Blade. If there's a BLM in the party, the AoE phases are better spent in Foe's Requiem. A couple Flares and a couple Holies augmented by Foe's, and the mobs melt.

[Kirk3611]

I usually do Speed Runs in WP 15-18mins each. When we pull big groups with black mage in the party, I have Foe Req. up after fight is done mages ballad, generally.

[RyuDragnier]

I normally avoid speed runs for WP if I can. It's not because I don't like casting the Ballad (I prefer using it so I actually feel like a Bard), it's that I feel speed running requires a specific level of trust between all the players involved. You all trust each other to do your jobs properly. And with my connection constantly being shaky and lag, I don't feel I could be trusted to not DC during the run.

[Fantasy9]

For the most part I don't use Ballad for the tank's sake. If I need to use it, it is because the Healer is blowing through their MP like no tomorrow.