How about a non-support ranged dps?

[Alahra]

Still a damn fun job though, as far as I've gotten to see (lvl 55 atm, and many a lvl 60 dummy MCH dps video drooled over).

I want to love it, but the "rhythm" of their ability usage feels too disparate from that of the other classes for me to play it at all. It's somewhere in between the standard GCD classes and the casters, and I just can't acclimate to it. Outside of the crafting mess at the start of HW, MCH was probably the thing I was most disappointed in on a personal level.

I'm crossing my fingers that they completely revamp both WM and GB in 4.0, as I think they're ultimately both detrimental to the game in the long run.

[Shurrikhan]

I want to love it, but the "rhythm" of their ability usage feels too disparate from that of the other classes for me to play it at all. It's somewhere in between the standard GCD classes and the casters, and I just can't acclimate to it. Outside of the crafting mess at the start of HW, MCH was probably the thing I was most disappointed in on a personal level.

I'm crossing my fingers that they completely revamp both WM and GB in 4.0, as I think they're ultimately both detrimental to the game in the long run.

That's the thing for me, though. I actually prefer WM Bard. I think it could have been done way better, but it's still an improvement. I like the gambles and the fighting for my free double-weaves. Maybe a slightly higher Straighter Shot chance would be nice, maybe being able to stack two of them, but all in all I've come to enjoy working with and around it. That said, I also really like going back to level 50 synced runs (especially with everyone overgeared) as Bard. But what makes those level 50 synced runs fun to me on my 60 Bard isn't the lack of WM, which makes the original rotation feel flat by comparison, but just the sheer crit rates and RoD/BLs I'm getting from the cheaper secondary stat scaling. It's like I can't not oGCD on a given GCD... ever, at least in when there are more than two mobs present. That, and the tanks usually remember then that with Quelling up, I can have a mob pack up to half dead by the time we reach the final mob gather point from running AoEs...

Overall, my biggest issue with WM is its acquisition level - why here, why now? It's a hugely jarring change, especially for those who've never played a caster, or perhaps more fittingly a healer (sub-recast cast times). I would have much preferred it to be a level 25-40 ability (e.g. Full Draw) with a lesser stance cooldown, which gradually increased benefits and disadvantages through traits to reach something much like WM by level 50. Ideally, the optimal Bard would then stance-dance between both forms, Marksman and Hunter, Full Draw and Quick Draw, whatever you might call them, with more interesting rotational priorities in each (simply put, more internal mechanics, rather than just River of Blood). We need things to rotationally look forward to and set up. As is, pure-dps WAR seems like the best example of this kind of thought or gameplay, albeit just barely starting into it, and that's by wasting freaking defensive CDs to time out Abandon stacks and Infuriate with Fell Cleave and Berserk. That's just sad... MCH itself is probably a close second, or perhaps DRG or BLM through BotD and Enochian timing with BFB and the Astral cycle.

Edit: But oh god that WM animation. Going to charge up the light-juice in my quiver. Glowy hand. Somehow it make things stronger.

P.S. If a weird hybrid of two different GCD-handling styles isn't your thing, pretty much all the jobs I try to make up when bored to death probably wouldn't fit your preferences, either. : (

[Alahra]

That's the thing for me, though. I actually prefer WM Bard. I think it could have been done way better, but it's still an improvement.

You're not the only one that likes it more (though at least among those I talk to/read on the forums, you're one of the few). The distaste is so great for me that I won't even play either class in level-50 content anymore because all it does is remind me how much I liked them before 52. BRD was my third Zeta in ARR, and I had rather grown to enjoy it as an alternative DPS choice next to my main NIN.

But I definitely agree that if it were implemented better, it would have been a much different story. That sort of core gameplay should really be introduced early on (as you suggest, perhaps around level 30). MCH in particular should have had Gauss Barrel from the start, and the fact that it doesn't suggests to me that the cast times were a late-development addition to the two classes (and it's generally pretty obvious they didn't get enough testing given that).

Compared to other classes that received "larger" changes, like BLM, DRG, and SMN, BRD and MCH just feel really careless in the overall implementation. The other three all introduce you to the new concepts gradually—and ultimately the problem with suddenly adding cast times to the class is that it's not something you can add gradually, in addition to the change feeling like a penalty (that doesn't really adequately make up for the loss in mobility for several levels).

By the time I got BRD to 60 I was so disgusted with the mechanics that I did my level 60 class quest and shelved it, not even bothering to do a level 60 dungeon (which is something every other job so far has gotten the courtesy of). And I had leveled MCH first, so I was already accustomed to some degree to the cast times. Both classes are just glamour fodder for me now (and MCH is something I'd been dying for since I had always wanted to use guns in FFXI but never did).

BRD's implementation overall is just really messy—MCH at least has a number of mechanics that interact with GB in a positive way (such as shot procs and Rapid Shot making your shots normal GCD skills again). BRD, though, feels like it was shoehorned into the paradigm in a way that none of its skillset really seems like it "meshes" with WM.

And yes, the animations for both WM and GB are awful, especially when you throw in the really cool oGCD animations and sound effects that both classes have that are constantly getting clipped because of it.

[Sardonia]

You're not the only one that likes it more (though at least among those I talk to/read on the forums, you're one of the few). The distaste is so great for me that I won't even play either class in level-50 content anymore because all it does is remind me how much I liked them before 52. BRD was my third Zeta in ARR, and I had rather grown to enjoy it as an alternative DPS choice next to my main NIN.

But I definitely agree that if it were implemented better, it would have been a much different story. That sort of core gameplay should really be introduced early on (as you suggest, perhaps around level 30). MCH in particular should have had Gauss Barrel from the start, and the fact that it doesn't suggests to me that the cast times were a late-development addition to the two classes (and it's generally pretty obvious they didn't get enough testing given that).

Compared to other classes that received "larger" changes, like BLM, DRG, and SMN, BRD and MCH just feel really careless in the overall implementation. The other three all introduce you to the new concepts gradually—and ultimately the problem with suddenly adding cast times to the class is that it's not something you can add gradually, in addition to the change feeling like a penalty (that doesn't really adequately make up for the loss in mobility for several levels).

By the time I got BRD to 60 I was so disgusted with the mechanics that I did my level 60 class quest and shelved it, not even bothering to do a level 60 dungeon (which is something every other job so far has gotten the courtesy of). And I had leveled MCH first, so I was already accustomed to some degree to the cast times. Both classes are just glamour fodder for me now (and MCH is something I'd been dying for since I had always wanted to use guns in FFXI but never did).

BRD's implementation overall is just really messy—MCH at least has a number of mechanics that interact with GB in a positive way (such as shot procs and Rapid Shot making your shots normal GCD skills again). BRD, though, feels like it was shoehorned into the paradigm in a way that none of its skillset really seems like it "meshes" with WM.

And yes, the animations for both WM and GB are awful, especially when you throw in the really cool oGCD animations and sound effects that both classes have that are constantly getting clipped because of it.

Cannot agree more with this post. The implementation of WM was not very good. In my opinion it makes Bard easier to play since you now just wait for 3sec between shots. I just thought the original Bard played faster and more smoothly then what we have now. I have gotten use to it but I really do not like it.