Perform: what are your initial thoughts?

[Big_Panda]

Didn't even bother unlocking the feature

I heard maybe one guy playing in 3 hours of game time, but in fairness I did not really go into the cities.

[MichiKyou]

The fact we can't make macros for this is daunting enough. Even if we could make macros, 15 lines is not enough. SE, please?

[Kohdo]

Not having macros is fine, but there really should have been some kind of UI element for Performance. Making us use a hotbar workaround involving two other classes is haphazard and lazy for what was touted as one of the two main aspects of this patch.

A welcome fix (for me at least) would be a "Perform" action which when activated would change your hotbars to the notes, and back again when deactivated. This would save the whole workaround headache that we currently have.

Maybe have performance mode that can only be done out of combat in open world areas that also brings up a UI with notes/instrument selection/music sheet actions?

This sounds like it would be perfect.

[TaranTatsuuchi]

Do you think a MIDI Keyboard would work if someone was tech savy enough or not really?
...

I recall seeing a reddit post earlier about how to get a midi keyboard to work with bardic performances.

[dinnertime]

I like it, but it's not perfect. It's not a failure by any means but it could use improvements.

I think it should have its own "macro" system or I guess a music maker interface but something more user-friendly than typing codes, although that can be an alternative for people who prefer that and also having a way to share and copy-paste music.
It should have things like setting delays between each note and also the duration of holding a note but that is something only possible on instruments like a violin or flute and not a harp.

It could use its own hotbar mode like people have been suggesting.

[Dustytome]

It ate up a good chunk of time while I was waiting for a couple roulettes earlier, but my coordination with this many actions isn't very good. I'd like to be able to macro (or a music-sheet interface with better timing than macros would be even better) songs together. Maybe have performance mode that can only be done out of combat in open world areas that also brings up a UI with notes/instrument selection/music sheet actions?

[superhbman]

Loving the ability to play music in-game. To really make this amazing is to have a separate "mode" for Perform which uses it's own hotbar and keybindings.

P.S. Oh, and also the ability to play in dungeons. Muh immersion.

[Labrini]

I just wish we could "save" notes in any way and after making a song, to be able to see the bard playing it again with only one click!

[Laerune]

I just wish we could "save" notes in any way and after making a song, to be able to see the bard playing it again with only one click!

Like a macro?

Yoshida did not want this so they made it so we can not do it, atleast not legally.

[Kaoru_Nagisa]

I've started using my Shared Macro tab space for putting down "sheet music", so to speak, in the macro table for ease of reading a piece I might want to practice - but in all honesty, without a dedicated UI for the keys and the ability to macro in any capacity so the music can be replayed easily and without error on my part... I don't really see myself using this system much. Maybe to waste time with on the odd days I queue endgame stuff up as my BRD, but never much beyond that.

Macros aren't just for copying though, they are also for creating your own things. I have no musical background whatsoever so I don't remember what each note sounds like. It makes creating songs really difficult when most of my effort goes into finding a key that doesn't clash with the previous one. If I wanted to learn music properly I would buy a real instrument and get lessons, not mess with a game system with horrendous timing and combat job keybinds.

If there was a way to save my melodies and have them played without mistakes, I would enjoy and use this feature. It doesn't have to be our current macro system. Special hotbars with a "play all notes" button would work fine. Then I could place the notes on the bars and play the whole thing in rhythm.

This quote pretty much sums up my opinion. I want to enjoy the Perform action - they obviously did put a fair bit of work into it, to give us such a wide range of notes. But with how it is now, I'd just be better off buying a real instrument and learning to play that.