Bard: The (Nearly) Perfect Job

[Cetonis]

10% Magic Foe would mainly be to nail-in-coffin the BRD+MCH "meta", BRD as presently designed will and should always be the speedrun pick over MCH as presently designed - BRD has more group synergy upsides/downsides, so it's worse for rando pugs and better for dedicated speedruns - so nothing would really change there. But yeah I'd be equally happy with 5% for everything. It was just thinking SE might wish to deal with the all-physical issue.

As for Battle Voice, the main thought that comes to mind would be "reduce the cooldown of all songs by 20s", still on the 180s cooldown (if not longer), which would give BRDs some capacity to shuffle their song order mid-fight. I'm sure there's some kind of dps gain there somewhere, but optimizing BRDs already manipulate WM uptime vs. buff alignment vs. clear time to some extent.

[HyoMinPark]

10% Magic Foe would mainly be to nail-in-coffin the BRD+MCH "meta", BRD as presently designed will and should always be the speedrun pick over MCH as presently designed - BRD has more group synergy upsides/downsides, so it's worse for rando pugs and better for dedicated speedruns - so nothing would really change there. But yeah I'd be equally happy with 5% for everything. It was just thinking SE might wish to deal with the all-physical issue.

Understandable; I’m just not sure how well that would work, since the current issues with 2/3 casters are them offering very little utility/synergy themselves with utility jobs at large—the “selfish DPS job” design just doesn’t work that well in this game when utility is preferred (i.e., “Why take someone who can buff themselves when I can bring in someone who buffs everyone”), and RDM has its own bundles of issues in terms of utility given to a group and personal damage. I still have a sense that physical meta would reign regardless, or the comps would be DRG/NIN/BRD/SMN. Maybe BLM over SMN if the BLM is really good, but since groups that optimize tend to prefer utility, they would probably still go with SMN over BLM. MCH is already being benched as it is now by good SMNs, so I think that could cause more issues with them unless they adjusted Hypercharge some more... which then things would have the potential to remain the current NIN/DRG/BRD/MCH.

As for Battle Voice, the main thought that comes to mind would be "reduce the cooldown of all songs by 20s", still on the 180s cooldown (if not longer), which would give BRDs some capacity to shuffle their song order mid-fight. I'm sure there's some kind of dps gain there somewhere, but optimizing BRDs already manipulate WM uptime vs. buff alignment vs. clear time to some extent.

Interesting concept to say the least.

[Saphri]

Jumping in to tag this thread and maybe ask a newbie question...

What about Palisade? That's one of the buffs I've tried to set on a "quick fire macro" [/ac "palisade" <tt>] That way, I can use my targeting and I'm thinking it will more than likely buff the tank. Even if not, it will buff whomever the targeted monster is going after so, that's still not too bad...

[Raldo]

What about Palisade?

What about it? What even is your question?

[HyoMinPark]

Jumping in to tag this thread and maybe ask a newbie question...

What about Palisade? That's one of the buffs I've tried to set on a "quick fire macro" [/ac "palisade" <tt>] That way, I can use my targeting and I'm thinking it will more than likely buff the tank. Even if not, it will buff whomever the targeted monster is going after so, that's still not too bad...

Palisade is a tank cooldown that reduces the amount of physical damage a tank receives from a boss/mobs by 20% for 10 seconds every 150 seconds. Note that it only works on physical damage, so any boss that does magical damage only will render it useless. During dungeons, throw it on a tank during large pulls with anything that deals physical damage; it will typically not be needed for bosses in that setting. Things are different in 8-man and 24-man raids; for those, you will want to use it typically for any sort of physical tankbuster.

Ok, another noob observation....
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It's been my experience that the AOE's (Quick Nock, Rain of Death) are best used to "weaken" a group of monsters. That is, at some point, it seems more efficient to just pick them off one at a time after they've been sufficiently "softened up" so to speak. Especially since Quick Nock cost TP.

That would be correct. For BRD AOE, you will Quick Nock at 3+ mobs for it to be a gain, and Rain of Death will be used over Bloodletter at 2+ mobs. Taking the cross-role skills Invigorate and Tactician will lighten up the costliness of Quick Nock; alternate Invigorate and Tactician between pulls to keep your TP at high enough levels to AOE the next pack.

BRD’s AOE is strongest in its Mage’s Ballad and Army’s Paeon songs. In Mage’s, you will DoT 3 to 4 mobs with one or both DoTs (typically all four with Stormbite, and then Caustic Bite on the 4th one so that you can Sidewinder it), and alternate Rain of Death with Quick Nock spam. In Army’s you will still maintain your DoTs on mobs, and just spam Quick Nock, using Rain of Death when it comes off cooldown every 15 seconds. In Minuet, you will do the same as Army’s, and use Pitch Perfect procs (at 2 stacks) in between Quick Nocks.

[Zerathor]

If I were to pick a QoL aspect for bard, it would be an iron jaws countdown bar on their job gauge just so you don't have to watch debuffs tbh. Most of the other suggestions would be broken enough to fully remove disembowl from the game if it wasn't enough already

Jumping in to tag this thread and maybe ask a newbie question...

What about Palisade? That's one of the buffs I've tried to set on a "quick fire macro" [/ac "palisade" <tt>] That way, I can use my targeting and I'm thinking it will more than likely buff the tank. Even if not, it will buff whomever the targeted monster is going after so, that's still not too bad...

Palisade is a rampart you give the tanks, and an extremely potent cool down for the group when used correctly. It's ONE of the abilities that makes ranged jobs one of the most core requirements for a group in challenging content. The primary still being refresh.

[Saphri]

Ok, another noob observation....
.
It's been my experience that the AOE's (Quick Nock, Rain of Death) are best used to "weaken" a group of monsters. That is, at some point, it seems more efficient to just pick them off one at a time after they've been sufficiently "softened up" so to speak. Especially since Quick Nock cost TP.

[Zerathor]

Ok, another noob observation....
.
It's been my experience that the AOE's (Quick Nock, Rain of Death) are best used to "weaken" a group of monsters. That is, at some point, it seems more efficient to just pick them off one at a time after they've been sufficiently "softened up" so to speak. Especially since Quick Nock cost TP.

Typically 4+ means aoe. 3 or less means pick for most jobs ( except in the case of off globals like rain of death, then do for multiple target) also dotting multiple targets if you're a dot heavy job like smn and bard apply to lower number groups if they will survive a good portion of said dots.

[Saphri]

Oh yeah, "tactician"....forgot about that one. Thing is, I use a Steam Controller. I like it, but I had to learn to create macros to get the most effectiveness out of it. I can select anything with it but, it helps to make "smart decisions" about how to combine related functions....
.
Oh, and as for "Magical Damage"....."Warden's Paeon" is on my "to incorporate effectively" list...But I suspect that will be a way to protect the tank from magical attacks.

[HyoMinPark]

Oh yeah, "tactician"....forgot about that one. Thing is, I use a Steam Controller. I like it, but I had to learn to create macros to get the most effectiveness out of it. I can select anything with it but, it helps to make "smart decisions" about how to combine related functions....
.
Oh, and as for "Magical Damage"....."Warden's Paeon" is on my "to incorporate effectively" list...But I suspect that will be a way to protect the tank from magical attacks.

Tactician shouldn't require a macro, as it is party-wide radiating outwards from your current position. When it needs to be used, weave it between GCDs. The only macros I recommend you using are Nature’s Minne (level 66 ability) and Palisade macros for Target-of-Target (<tt>); Warden’s Paeon can be macro’d if you want, but since its usage is so situational, I would not suggest it. Other things should not be macro’d, as they are generally frowned upon for things like combos and GCD skills.

If you can, I would recommend you purchasing a PS4 controller to use. It should be compatible with the Steam version, but I cannot confirm since I don’t use the Steam version. If someone else can clarify, please feel free to do so.

Warden's Paeon does not protect from magical damage. It acts like an Esuna either preventing OR cleansing a debuff. It used to do both, but now it only prevents OR cleanses an already active debuff such as Bleed, Pacification, Silence, or Paralysis. Cleansable debuffs are denoted by the white line over their marker. I generally toss it out on whomever needs it to save healers an Esuna cast.

I’m going to give you my Discord again, as I do not want to derail this thread any further (since it’s talking about potential QoL buffs). Please feel free to message me on there with any BRD questions — Hyomin Park#0055. I can also drop you an invite link to The Balance Discord, which is also full of individuals that can help you with BRD questions.