Why do bard songs need a target?

[HyonaCookie]

I don't get why with the amount of times bosses become untargetable, bard songs still need a target. It breaks the song rotation and ends up being punishing for no reason. I guess cheesing could be a problem with songs being no target required, but then it could just be made to only be useable in-combat. It would be great if they could not need a target instead.

[Ransu]

Because they are attacks...They all deal unaspected damaged for 100 potency.

[Archwizard]

Because they are attacks...They all deal unaspected damaged for 100 potency.

I think that's part of their question: Why they include the unaspected damage element at all, when for the most part they're cycling buffs on the user and their damage is negligible anyway. If you removed the damage (and distributed it elsewhere in the rotation), you'd see negligible difference in how the job works.

I think the answer to that question is in how the songs work during downtime... but then again, what benefit do they have without a target anyway?

[Ransu]

If I had to guess, its to prevent pre-pull stuff, especially since the buffs proc without dots now.

[Mithron]

Technically, I think it might be because all GCDs require some kind of target, but it could be changed to be more like an AoE around the player (like Medica GCD) instead for usability. It's just BRD is a DPS so it's rare you would not be targeting an enemy at all times outside things like Nature's Minne so I'm not sure what the problem is.

Never mind, I think it's an OGCD? I can't test right now and BRD is literally my second least played job hahah.

[Archwizard]

If I had to guess, its to prevent pre-pull stuff, especially since the buffs proc without dots now.

Sure, but as OP suggested, they could easily go on the same system we see with abilities like Aetherflow that cannot be activated while out of combat anyway, preventing any sort of pre-pull.

As I was saying, being able to cast without a target would only affect downtime periods where enemies can't be targeted, and in that scenario (or even including pre-pull), without a target to uncap Bloodletter on, the most you would get is... pre-charging Army's Ethos, or maybe a single Pitch Perfect? Either of which is already a potential waste of buff uptime anyway...
Which frankly, the idea that a Bard doesn't get any sort of downtime effect, even just humming to pause their song timers, is already kinda curious.

[Reimmi]

It makes things very frustrating if you drift songs between boss transitions, would love to see them become a AOE or just remove the damage

[Ransu]

Every job has to deal with drift. Its actually extremely bad on BLM with their thunder proc. The design is intentional to make you adjust your rotation.

[Cetonis]

Stuff that only works in combat can be weird in terms of how long it takes for the game to realize that you're "in combat". But you're right that aside from that fact, it would be a clear improvement to just have the songs not deal damage and be combat-only. Personally, I would also accept an 80s cooldown on MB and AP, which I think overall would do more good.

SE just hasn't prioritized Bard QoL concerns, is all. Other than, for some reason, making a couple changes nobody asked for in 6.1, while ignoring issues that are actually frustrating people.

Presumably SE just doesn't have the bandwidth to properly care for all 20 jobs at this point. It's a guessing game of which jobs they're going to decide most need attention at any given time, and then a second stage of guessing at whether they actually understand what a job's needs are.

[Kalaam]

Honestly it is weird, when you consider that dancer doesn't (and its dance does way more damage in an AoE)