BRD rotation

[Lyrinn]

Always go Raging Strike > Windbite > Venomous Bite and not the other way around. This will ensure your DoTs were powered up.

Windbite before Venomous Bite. As Dot crit from Windbite will refresh your Bloodletter CD. You need to keep these two Dots on the boss/enemy at all time.

Well, the reason for using IR/HE first is to maximize crit chance for BL resets, since RS only increases damage. At least, that's what I've read.

On buffs - always stagger. Why? To maximize the buff time and up time. First, although buffs are insta-cast but they have animation time. Imagine the time required to pop all your CDs all at one go together => that's the amount of time you are doing NOTHING. As such pop your CDs during your GCD time (which is the waiting time in between your weaponskills) because CDs are OGCD. This ensure that you are always dealing damage whenever you can. Same as using OGCD damaging skills => Heavy Shot -> Blunt Arrow -> Heavy Shot -> Repelling Shot for example.

What I meant by "stack" was basically overlap in buff timers. The guides I've read say oGCD --> GCD --> Repeat, but like in the example above, if you do IR --> WB --> HE --> VB, then you have both IR and HE up at the same time. What I've been doing is (again, for example), IR --> WB --> VB --> Heavy Shot or Straighter Shot procs until DoTs need to be refreshed --> HE --> WB --> VB --> repeat. I guess I run into the problem where buffs like Barrage sit on the side for a while, but if you burn all your cooldowns, don't you have downtime anyways?

Maybe it would help if I linked one of the references: http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen..._rotations_cd/

[Drakuaza]

To those saying Raging strikes before windbite and venom over internal release, no, basically when you are done with your rotation and have to reaply dots, they will have the raging stikes buff + blood for blood before it wears off.

This is the one i use the most.

Quelling Strikes as tank Pulls > Straight Shot > Bloodletter > Internal Release > Windbite > Hawk’s Eyes > Venomous Bite > Raging Strikes > Blood for Blood > Heavy Shot > Flame Arrow > Heavy Shot > Barrage > Heavy Shot > Bloodletter/Blunt arrow > Straight Shot > Bloodletter/Repel Shot > Windbite > Bloodletter/Repel shot > Venomous Bite > Bloodletter/Repel Shot > Heavy Shot > Blood/Blunt/Flame/Repel > Heavy Shot > Blood/Blunt/Flame/Repel > Heavy Shot > Blood/Blunt/Flame/Repel > Start again with Straightshot and utilizing the buffs as they come back from cooldown.

Demonstration:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZwPA1Nfzqo

[Ooshima]

What I meant by "stack" was basically overlap in buff timers. The guides I've read say oGCD --> GCD --> Repeat, but like in the example above, if you do IR --> WB --> HE --> VB, then you have both IR and HE up at the same time. What I've been doing is (again, for example), IR --> WB --> VB --> Heavy Shot or Straighter Shot procs until DoTs need to be refreshed --> HE --> WB --> VB --> repeat. I guess I run into the problem where buffs like Barrage sit on the side for a while, but if you burn all your cooldowns, don't you have downtime anyways?

Maybe it would help if I linked one of the references: http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen..._rotations_cd/

I see what you mean where. With regards to BRD, no hard and fast rule. In fact BRD has many ways to play despite limited weapon skills and no combo to play with.

How you want to pop your CD largely depend on the instance you engage and what you will be expecting next.

Straight forward instances like WP bosses? Just pop all your CDs and re-pop again whenever they become available.

Titan EX? Phase 1 you can just pop all CDs and go ape shit. After Titan EX jumps and geo crush and enters the next part, your faster refresh CDs like IR/BFB should be refreshed while Hawk's Eye and RS might be still on CD. You can go ahead and re-pop IR/BfB. However when Hawk's Eye and RS refreshed, you might want to save them for Heart Phase since it will be next very soon.

Other situational cases could be say, T5. Phase 1, just pop all CDs and wallop because all your CDs will be refreshed when Phase 2 starts. Then, you will want to "stagger" your CDs instead of popping all at one go. You can choose Hawk's + IR for one of the fast conflag and BfB+RS for the other fast conflag.

In general, get to know the sequence of the fight well. If there is an upcoming phase where you need to burn, check again how long more till that phase. Very long? Go ahead and pop all since your CDs will be refreshed by then. Not exactly very long? Maybe pop a quick one like BfB/IR. VERY VERY SOON? Save them up and stagger their usage if need be (like T5 conflag phase example above).

With regards to Barrage -> use it after Raging Strikes. Personally, I will pop Barrage right after Hawk's Eye and Raging Strikes are up because your auto attack dmg are affected by the above 2 CD boosts.


P.S. => Then again, evaluate your team's overall DPS. If it's very high for that instance you are in that you don't really need to pop CDs during "burn phases", just whatever and pop your CDs whenever they become available

[Lyrinn]

Would it be reasonable for me to think of popping all cooldowns as "burst" damage? Because it seems like every scenario you describe has you saving them for burn phases or using them all otherwise. But then I still don't get why you would "burst" on pull with a rotation like what Drakuaza uses.

Really appreciate the advice. Sorry if these are stupid questions, I'm a healer trying to learn BRD as a main DPS class. ><

[Drakuaza]

Would it be reasonable for me to think of popping all cooldowns as "burst" damage? Because it seems like every scenario you describe has you saving them for burn phases or using them all otherwise. But then I still don't get why you would "burst" on pull with a rotation like what Drakuaza uses.

Really appreciate the advice. Sorry if these are stupid questions, I'm a healer trying to learn BRD as a main DPS class. ><

By keeping a steady use on your cooldowns will allow you to have a constant burst dps to the degree where you will always have at least 1 up at 80% of your attacking time after the initial burst, and that usually is more than enough to go through dps check heavy phases. Not only that, it ensures most of the time(usually all my cooldowns are coming back 1 by one so i can pull them off by doing em in-between my attacks during heavy dps phases)

EDIT:
Forgot to say about barrage, but Bardo below my post got it.

[Bardo]

The reason you want to "stack" your cooldowns is because of Barrage.
Raging Strikes, Blood for Blood, and Hawk's eye are all additive.
If those were the only buffs you had, then you would want to just weave them on cooldown and it wouldn't matter if you stacked them or not.

But Barrage interacts with each of those in a multiplicative manner.
So the more of those buffs you stack on top of Barrage, the more damage you get out of them.

Of course you don't want to sit on them when they're off cooldown waiting for the others to all come off cooldown just so you can stack them again though.
Unless you actually need them for a specific burst phase like Titan Heart or Conflag, in which case saving them will lower your total overall dps, but it's necessary due to fight mechanics.

So the best way to handle buffs is to stack them near the beginning of the fight to take advantage of the Barrage interaction, then unless you need them for an upcoming burst phase, just weave them as soon as they come off cooldown.

[Tinks]

At one point I tried explaining in text how to best go about playing BRD...then I came across this video. While it isn't perfect and doesn't take every situation in to account, its pretty awesome for getting a general idea.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5XAHGXedNo

[AunaYuuki]

Just pop everything at the start of a fight and pull the boss. Everyone will scream. That is how you bard. (In serious-ness youtube is your friend for bard tutorials and suggestions.)

[Viridiana]

I was wondering if anyone can give me a few tips regarding a decent rotation.

I'm currently using SS - VEN - WB - HS and rotate while hitting blood letter when available

You've got the right basic idea. SS buff is most important, followed by the dots, then HS. HS loses to Straighter Shot procs, of course. One thing to note is that most people do WB->VB, because WB is the higher potency of the two (except in some fringe cases).

Is it better to stack/stagger buffs or use them one at a time? Every time my DoTs need to be refreshed, I pop a cooldown. I've read some rotation guides saying it's better to stagger them - like Internal Release --> Windbite --> Hawk's Eye --> Venomous Bite --> Raging Strikes --> etc. but I don't understand why that's better.

Stacking them is going to lead to more damage overall. Note though, that sometimes you'll want to spread them out to make certain mechanics easier to deal with. A high-end example would be Conflags, where you pretty much have to split them to meet the dps check. Conversely, I tend to save mine in GX for sister phases to burn one down ASAP. Basically, it depends on the needs of the encounter, but stacking is more beneficial.

Also, if you're popping more than one at a time, start with the longer duration one. For example, RS->B4B->HE->IR->Barrage. This allows maximum overlap. I'll point out, though, that the desire to maintain this order is why I usually put my buffs off until the second set of dots come around, but that's largely personal preference. I find it a little simpler this way, while acknowledging that it's probably a very slight dps loss.

[MrDiezel]

While DMG buff CDs are definitely good to use before applying DoTs, if you have to choose one, let it be Internal Release. Assuming Straight Shot is up, thats another 10% to crit chance for DoTs, proccing Blood Letter. Additional Bloodletter is pretty much a DMG buff in itself.

But yes, buff before DoT, Stagger buffs, I personally dump all my CD's (still staggering) at once since they work with one another. Hence Quelling Strikes. Just know your fight so all Buffs arent on Cooldown when you need them most. i.e. Titan's Heart.