Bard nerf is garbage

[Valence]

Their reasoning on range is stupid. Melee players that get the brunt of 90% of the CC in any game, will never see a difference because they'll still be at range of the bard anyway (that will be a lot more vulnerable from it though). Ranged players that used to be affected by nocturne from time to time, one of the only CCs you ever get to deal with unless you go melee, are finally free from being silence ever again. This kind of nerf is completely counterproductive and the best way to miss the mark period.

Yeh I haven't really played much of DNC in there tbh. On the odd occasion I have seen some really good Dancers in there and I wonder how they get the high numbers and watch in awe lol!

It's a job that needs a very specific mindset to play. You need to abuse and literally spamm your dashes all around, not only to get your procs, but for survivability. Only counting on Fan Dance and Honing Dance for damage mitigation is foolish. As DNC you should almost always be using procs and Sabre Dance more than the regular attacks. You need to work on your dashes so you don't suicide into the enemy, but otherwise they actually make you so annoying to catch and kill that it makes it the most slippery job by far (more than Nin, or even Mnk/Blm). Obviously you're still weaker than a melee so it's more punishing. If anything DNC is still stringent on the range you keep with enemies because it's still a ranged job. You don't want to go to melee range unless you have a safe window for Honing (Honing is a noob death trap if you're too trigger happy with it). You'll always ideally be dashing around just behind your own melees, not with them.

The high AoE the job is capable of outputting is just tied to almost every skill it has being a good AoE move, among them Sabre Dance and Starfall which are great at bursting people yes, but also used exactly like BLM under LB, meaning on the main blob of enemies.

And the burst meta is true. Sustain just isn't good in such a fast pace mode. The mode itself is short on top of things like recuperate being a thing. Its why using fire on BLM is nine times out of ten a dumb thing to do because burst/cc is way more important and since fire and ice do the same base damage, the "sustained" damage from the dot from fire is completely worthless.

I agree with the statement, although I'd say I still use fire on BLM during LB, half fire then superflare on an enemy blob before finishing with half stacks on ice while they're burning. If we're losing or there is not an enemy concentration making it worth it though, yeah I'll go full ice for sure. I do believe the fire dot is only worthwhile if spread over many players, because it really, really burns their resources down just recuperating and healing, and that passive is pretty powerful on its own.

[Nikoto]

Anyone here who thinks this nerf was needed literally is biased AGAINST bard.

I don't even play bard, but this shit was inane.

[Nubrication]

Anyone here who thinks this nerf was needed literally is biased AGAINST bard.

I don't even play bard, but this shit was inane.

Yep, I’m not even a bard main in pvp, I occasionally play bard and noticed the difference right away. It’s like night and day. It definitely seems like the people saying it was OP and needed a nerf were melee mains. The best way to counter a really good mnk, sam, drg? It was BRD. RIP to all the music lovers out there. Watch out for those meteodives, drg lb and sam bursts cause now all the bards are in range to explode from 100hp to zero.

[Cidel]

This nerf came out of the left field, and their vague explanation located on the 6.4 PvP Guide doesn't hold water:

Silent Nocturne is an incredibly effective tool to deal burst damage to enemies in conjunction with attacks from teammates. Because of the difficulty in countering this ability, however, we believe it required significant adjustments. We've reduced its range to both force tougher decisions in choosing targets, and increase risk in its execution. This should also give opponents a better chance at potentially dealing with the attack. To compensate for this, the potency of Apex Arrow and Repelling Shot has been increased, improving bard's area of effect and close-range damage potential.

Many jobs have incredibly effective tools to deal burst damage. Also, other jobs have difficult abilities to counter. We don't see any of those getting significant adjustments. There were other ways to tone down Silent Nocturne without completely gutting the ability. The range nerf is the most egregious part of this change. Silence effect too long? Fine, bring it in line with RDM's 2s Silence duration. It's burst potential is too high with Pitch Perfect attached? Whatever, remove the Pitch Prefect proc from Nocturne and put it on Blast Arrow instead. The nerf to it no longer doing damage is just petty. I'm sorry that they thought 2000 dmg was a deal-breaker.

But don't try to peddle B.S. when RDM's line AoE Silence Resolution is untouched at 25y on a job that actively has to get into close range to function properly and has no penalties on the range of their ranged skills. How will players counter such a difficult ability? Nobody knows, but I guess they'll have to find a way, but in the mean time BRD's single-target 25y Silence range needs to be nerfed. It's ridiculous, BRD's filler attack requires them to be at 15y or further from the target for max damage; they clearly designed BRD to try to keep its distance, but it has to move-in to exactly 15y or closer if it wants to use its only good burst window? But RDM gets to keep it's long range (and damage) on their Silence despite being better equipped to stay in close-quarters? lol If they have to be closer than RDM, they should have at least kept their 3s Silence.

To be honest, the whole things stinks of whoever is in charge of PvP balance getting bullied by a good BRD player one too many times in CC and deciding that BRD shouldn't be allowed to secure kills at a range anymore the way other ranged jobs still can as a salty kneejerk reaction.

[Luluna]

Thanks for those that replied with tips for Dancer it is much appreciated ^^