Volcanic Heart is a bad map

[Corbeau]

[words]

The experience of playing against something is not at all the same as piloting it yourself. I played most of the cast, settled on Bard for bronze to crystal, and then went back to playing variety after getting there. I say that you do not have the full picture of how Bard functions.

It's easy to feel when you get silenced and killed by an opposing Bard, but that's only one part of Bard's kit - and a Machinist will erase someone far more easily. No, Bard's unique advantages run deeper, are far less visible, and are very attritional. One of those unique quirks is that it's filler at range is much more powerful than that of other classes. Filler casts not only hit harder, wearing down the enemy over time, they also generates your burst damage charges - and you lose all of that value every time you get a cast canceled (casts that slow you down, making it even harder to maintain LoS). It doesn't help that the camera becomes your foe on VH, too. You almost never notice the camera issues on VH as a melee, but when you need to create space and survey the field from a distance it becomes a miserable experience having your camera constantly squashed by the walls. All which is why Bard suffers particularly badly in VH. No match is ever unwinnable in CC, there are too many variables at play, but playing Bard on VH is putting a tangible extra weight on the scales against you. Why bring a partially functional character when you could bring an entirely functional one?

(For the sake of completion, the other unique advantages Bard brings are Paen's amazing cleanse and the invisible but powerful team damage buffs, which also shine particularly bright when playing an attritional strategy.)

[Gserpent]

The experience of playing against something is not at all the same as piloting it yourself. I played most of the cast, settled on Bard for bronze to crystal, and then went back to playing variety after getting there. I say that you do not have the full picture of how Bard functions.

Based on what? Literally everything you said after this point is stuff I already know. Like I said: I *know* Bard. I know every single class. I *have* to, if I want to win games reliably. I agree with the camera fuckery, but that happens to everyone with knockbacks involved. The camera is so generally shit (not just on VH but I'll agree it presents more opportunities for the camera to get caught on things) that pushing people into corners is actually a completely viable strategy because it makes it almost impossible to see anything but their own character's nether regions. It's definitely something they ought to look into addressing, although I think that's just a general issue with how the camera actually functions in the game.

It's funny you talk about attrition - I main Scholar. Suffice to say, I am very, *very* familiar with the idea of attrition and fudging numbers to be in your team's favor. I am also familiar with the idea of needing to move around a lot on a class with few to no mobility tools, and as a class that generally does not want to be close to their targets.

Like I said: I *know* Bard. And Bard is not somehow unable to compete on Volcanic Heart. LOS can be used both ways. As someone a page or two ago mentioned, and was completely ignored (probably because the information they were dispensing wasn't favorable to the OMG VH SUX narrative people like Apeman are trying to push), you can *easily* use LOS to force melee to overextend in order to attack you.

LOS doesn't disfavor ranged or melee. Both can make effective and reliable use of it. Losing 1-2k damage per GCD on your filler for a couple GCDs is not going to somehow tank your performance and make you useless.

But I don't think you need to be told that, do you?

[Apeman]

Like I said: I *know* Bard. And Bard is not somehow unable to compete on Volcanic Heart. LOS can be used both ways. As someone a page or two ago mentioned, and was completely ignored (probably because the information they were dispensing wasn't favorable to the OMG VH SUX narrative people like Apeman are trying to push), you can *easily* use LOS to force melee to overextend in order to attack you.

LOS doesn't disfavor ranged or melee. Both can make effective and reliable use of it. Losing 1-2k damage per GCD on your filler for a couple GCDs is not going to somehow tank your performance and make you useless.

But I don't think you need to be told that, do you?[/QUOTE]

Pleas stop changing the topic of the argument to fit your narrative. No one has said bard can not compete. What has been said is bard and the other ranged jobs are at a disadvantage on this map( which, again, you agreed with). LOS can obviously be used by both teams regardless of class as an advantage but the way classes play makes this more of a problem for ranged. You claim LOS gives no job an advantage then detail how one job will lose potency because of it. You are once again contradicting your own arguments with your own words. If you don't think LOS issues and the fire hazards negatively affect range more than melee then i i'm sorry you do not grasp the basics of this game as well as you claim to.