Will bard lose it's identity/class fantasy?

[Kabooa]

The biggest departure from Final Fantasy precedent is that you want bards in your party.

[Gaethan_Tessula]

The biggest departure from Final Fantasy precedent is that you want bards in your party.

I'd readily take a Bard in my team during the 3rd World in FF5. It's a laughably weak job in the first world, mediocre in the second, but in the third it breaks the game in a way only Dualcast, Quick, and Mimic BS really competes with. Yes, I DO want my entire party to be level 255 in a game where level affects nearly everything.

Even outside that one busted song, the rest of the tunes are massively stronger buffs after 2-3 ATB cycles than the usual buff spells.

Bard was popular in FF11 too for some fights. Though it was very much in the Geomancer boat of "sit here, set up your thing, do NOTHING else."

[Connor]

The biggest departure from Final Fantasy precedent is that you want bards in your party.

I guess we should delete Scholar based on this principle too then, because outside of the Amon fight and cheesing some bosses with attack items there’s really no use for it. And how about Astrologian? You can’t even get that in your party lol, it’s guest-character (npc) specific, and it’s a Squire clone with Orran’s added unique ability. I wouldn’t want that in my party (Tactics has cross-classing so you can’t even really argue that Celestial Stasis would make it viable in the party, because you could still use it on other jobs if he was a party member and not an NPC)

Why does something have to have been viable in previous games for people to like it anyway lol. Or are you saying that if we follow one precedent then we have to follow every other one? I don’t think that’s how it work lol, I mean ffxiv is full of instances where they’ll happily follow one precedent but ignore another if there’s no reason to follow it

[Rika007]

Man if anything this whole situation has given me more of an appreciation for Scholar players issues right now with their whole DPS kit being gutted. It's literally a mirror image of how their threads go.

-Scholar/Bard player laments the gutting and simplification of their support/dps kit.
-Other Scholar/Bard players talk about why they agree or disagree, but the majority seem to agree they dislike it overall.
-Players of other jobs come in and start throwing out their opinions on why players who have been playing the job for over 6 years are wrong. Arguments normally centered around "These abilities were bad anyway/those abilities were really difficult to balance/your job is now more focused on what it's supposed to be doing/that wasn't your real identity anyway"
-Scholar/Bard players rationally inform why these opinions don't really equal out to us.
-Players of other jobs devolve into the standard responses. "You're just mad you're not part of the Meta anymore/Let other jobs have their fun in the sun/just play another job then/just wait till the next expansion then/y'all are just a bunch of negative nancy's like everyone else on this board."

Seriously. Bet I could go back and pull conversations about 3.0 Bow Wizard and 4.0 White Mage that literally look the exact same way.

[Raikai]

If you'd ask me to redesign the job completely, I would simply give the archery abilities just as the "filler" and rotational... Everything else, from song upkeep, procs, cooldowns, I'd put as songs.

And above theme, the other thing is that I would put it as an equal to Dancer in terms of support... Except bards would benefit more casters and healers, and dancers would benefit more physical dpsers and tanks... a bard would be able to benefit the niche it isn't supposed though, but at reduced effectiveness, same for dancer.

[ty_taurus]

If you'd ask me to redesign the job completely, I would simply give the archery abilities just as the "filler" and rotational... Everything else, from song upkeep, procs, cooldowns, I'd put as songs.

And above theme, the other thing is that I would put it as an equal to Dancer in terms of support... Except bards would benefit more casters and healers, and dancers would benefit more physical dpsers and tanks... a bard would be able to benefit the niche it isn't supposed though, but at reduced effectiveness, same for dancer.

I've thought of this myself too, though just the rotational being arrows and everything else being music. I think this is the best possible scenario that's plausible for the future.

[MPNZ]

And above theme, the other thing is that I would put it as an equal to Dancer in terms of support... Except bards would benefit more casters and healers, and dancers would benefit more physical dpsers and tanks... a bard would be able to benefit the niche it isn't supposed though, but at reduced effectiveness, same for dancer.

That's cool, but it creates class-synergies, which is bad. And, TBH, It would be nice to have Foie and the crit buff re-implemented. Also, designing Mage's Ballad so that it would restore the party's MP every time bloodletter and RoD was used would be more useful in all situations in general would probably be really fulfilling to players, and go in line with BRD's identity and fantasy thing.

I really want a single target spell that would cast aoe dot that would remove windbite, require it to be active on the target, cast a new type of dot on any mob in a cure III aoe radius, and also be removable from a target if windbite was recast on it for balacing, though.

Oh, and a bow that would look like a combination of a keyboard/electric guitar when sheathed. And, something like a music based version of the spriggan hoodie and a few music themed glamours for shoes and accessories.

And a cure three AOE for minne and wardens, and have there recast timers lowered to like 12 seconds...

Even DNC kit looks a little bare, you know

[Gaethan_Tessula]

Also, designing Mage's Ballad so that it would restore the party's MP every time bloodletter and RoD was used would be more useful in all situations in general would probably be really fulfilling to players, and go in line with BRD's identity and fantasy thing.

That's an inspired suggestion. I'd like to see the other two songs get a similar effect.

And then raise the other classes to match that sort of improvement if it makes BRD stand out too much.

Seriously, I don't get SE's obsession with pruning the jobs over and over until every one is a bare role trunk with one flavor twig and a leaf on it.

[MPNZ]

That's an inspired suggestion. I'd like to see the other two songs get a similar effect.

And then raise the other classes to match that sort of improvement if it makes BRD stand out too much.

Seriously, I don't get SE's obsession with pruning the jobs over and over until every one is a bare role trunk with one flavor twig and a leaf on it.

3. I get why they do it, but then cow clicker vs buttons-for-miles are just as bad, and hopefully we can get closer to like P4 Arena instead.

2. Like...

DGN. new gauge "body of the Dragon" with abilities like "Reverse Scale" (consumes "bidy of the dragon, resets all cooldowns, increases dmg by 40%, stacks w/ BfB, new attack special effects for attacks, jump to create ice circle dot, infinite blood of the dragon gauge, time limit 20 seconds, inflicts pacification after time limit is exceeded, cannot be used with steel-like scales), "steel-like scales" (consumes "body of the dragon gauge", grant a massive defense and emnity boost, dragoon will roar like a dragon and changes aggro to A, 30-60 time limit, enters pacification after exceeding time limit). They're a bit OP, but only SMN has utility like that, I think

1. Well...

Army's would probably be fine if the effect affected the whole party as well, or if it helped with the job gauges in some way. But Minuet just seems fine. It's basically our solo/selfish song in the game, but they could just make it increase straight shot proc rates, or just half the recast of empyreal arrow for the song's duration or something. TBH, I'd like to just try out the 5.0 version first. It's like way too early to really examine it right now

[Xieldras]

To add to suggestions, maybe with Bard's mobility, it could be cool to add a medium AoE effect to songs instead of raid-wide. Of course song effects would need to be boosted (I also quite like the last suggestions for song effects).

Adding an AoE effect like that could maybe bring more challenging gameplay? Like, having to decide the most optimal place to stand while avoiding mechanics and getting the most out of your songs' buffing effects to party members, which party members to buff with the ongoing song, etc.

Minuet is our "Time to DPS" song, Ballad has always been about MP since the ol' Bow Mage days, but I don't know what Army Paeon could do. The only thing I can imagine is granting Haste to you and party, but it needs to be worthwhile (it currently takes 4 procs to get a slight speed boost, the effort is not worth the reward in my opinion). Maybe have the Haste effect stack depending on the number of procs?
Other than that, although I understand the removal of some Role Actions, I want Palissade back (or an equivalent that grants defense).

Being told "Well you're DPS, you're not supposed to have so many buffs available because of the Trinity" is angering to a certain degree, especially since Dancer shows up to rub salt in the wound. In MMOs and games in general, heck even in normal fantasy, Bard is traditionally associated with Support. In FF14, Bard is a DPS. Sure that's okay, but there has to be a way to keep the support aspect that's glued to Bard's identity throughout the fantasy genre so the class doesn't turn into another selfish-dps-but-with-2-raid-buffs.
The key to that balance is, of course, the songs and procs however Bards should have more buffs available compared to the other DPS classes while also not being so good as it invalidates some Healer actions. Perhaps all of our buffs can only be used under song duration like Battle Voice (and also affect the bard itself). Or maybe it costs procs to use certain buffs? That way, it would show the players to ABS (Always Be Singing) lest a big part of their kit is greyed out.

Some of those are only some of the things from the top of my head, but I firmly believe Bard should keep over 1/3rd (or even half) of it's kit for Support skills. I personally chose Bard because I like to support my team (and Healer is a bit too stressful for me) while also enjoying the Archer aspect of it. I might very reluctantly pick up Dancer or just stay a Fisher main for ShB.