So how would you buff bard? (Just like to hear peoples thoughts)

[mallleable]

I would looooove a cool down reduction on Barrage, and Ranging Strikes. Please reduce the cool down of Barrage, and Raging Strikes to 60 seconds!

[Carighan]

I would looooove a cool down reduction on Barrage, and Ranging Strikes. Please reduce the cool down of Barrage, and Raging Strikes to 60 seconds!

Job overloaded with all kinds of non-fitting seemingly-random oGCDs requires shorter CDs on oGCDs?!

Although to be fair, if some of the random guff gets removed, I would be all for making the "big" hits have shorter GCDs. But Barrage in particular I'd love as a GCD instead, and make it a sort of "everything but the kitchen sink"-approach to combat where it does everything once. It basically uses every other ability in one GCD except the party/raid buffs. It's called "barrage" after all!

[Shurrikhan]

Job overloaded with all kinds of non-fitting seemingly-random oGCDs requires shorter CDs on oGCDs?!

Although to be fair, if some of the random guff gets removed, I would be all for making the "big" hits have shorter GCDs. But Barrage in particular I'd love as a GCD instead, and make it a sort of "everything but the kitchen sink"-approach to combat where it does everything once. It basically uses every other ability in one GCD except the party/raid buffs. It's called "barrage" after all!

If we actually had some complexity from our GCD actions (e.g., at minimum the value of Heavensward multi-DoTing), I'd almost rather go the other route, whereby once per minute you can recast your most recent GCD as an oGCD and then that same oGCD-weaponskill again once more within 2 seconds more. Would look similarly barrage-like, but would offer more choiceful use (e.g., for forcing procs, capitalizing on them, spreading DoTs, or what have you).

Wouldn't mind seeing Raging Strikes reduced to 90s, but I'd like for it to remain impactful enough to be worth resetting DoTs (ideally twice, if durations were reduced back to <21 seconds) under.

[Connor]

If we actually had some complexity from our GCD actions (e.g., at minimum the value of Heavensward multi-DoTing), I'd almost rather go the other route, whereby once per minute you can recast your most recent GCD as an oGCD and then that same oGCD-weaponskill again once more within 2 seconds more. Would look similarly barrage-like, but would offer more choiceful use (e.g., for forcing procs, capitalizing on them, spreading DoTs, or what have you).

Wouldn't mind seeing Raging Strikes reduced to 90s, but I'd like for it to remain impactful enough to be worth resetting DoTs (ideally twice, if durations were reduced back to <21 seconds) under.

It’s basically copy+pasting but maybe they could do something like Astrologian’s Doublecast in PvP where it adds additional effects to the skill? Like Iron Jaws resets DoTs, then the ‘echoed’ / ‘barrage’ version spreads them in an area? Or maybe a second Burst Arrow would cause some kind of ‘resonance’ with the current song that gives them a debuff or buffs party or whatever? It would be interesting how Refulgent and Shadowbite work with it too since they require procs so it could potentially result in ‘free refulgents’ etc

[Shurrikhan]

It’s basically copy+pasting but maybe they could do something like Astrologian’s Doublecast in PvP where it adds additional effects to the skill? Like Iron Jaws resets DoTs, then the ‘echoed’ / ‘barrage’ version spreads them in an area? Or maybe a second Burst Arrow would cause some kind of ‘resonance’ with the current song that gives them a debuff or buffs party or whatever? It would be interesting how Refulgent and Shadowbite work with it too since they require procs so it could potentially result in ‘free refulgents’ etc

I figured just the value of getting that out free of uptime or resource cost would already be enough so long as our main skills had enough going on, but yeah, something like that.

[Carighan]

Oh an "Encore" as the core central skill you learn at lvl30 sounds interesting.

And then Bard could have a relatively small kit, but you can press Encore (a GCD) after many of them to cause a similar, but not quite the same, effect. Is that ultimately a lot like what Gunbreakers do? Yes and no, it'd be a GCD in our case. Like you'd only have one DoT, but then the second you get via Encore, and in fact Encore could become the soul of the job in a certain way with more reworks.

Example:

* As Archer, you get "rhythms" you can, well hum while shooting I suppose. Selfbuffs that last until you replace them with another one. You'll have 3 in total.
* The Encore of a specific rhythm would replace the current songs. They'd also last until overridden, but importantly affect the whole group.
* Barrage would simply be that a limited set of Encores, if used within the next X seconds, will be able to be repeated Y times.
* Straight Shot would be an encore.

Etc. I dunno, I'm kinda envisioning a thing here where the whole lore could be rewritten in a way in that you continue to learn archer stuff after 30, but your Bard nature means you can 1->2 most things, and that's where your Bard skills comes from. Plus it'd seriously clean up the messy hotbars.

[Shurrikhan]

I'm not sure I understand what you're going for, but I think(?) I like it? I'd be wary about making any mechanic a near-only mechanic, though, for core gameplay augmentation/variation.

Also, a small note: Cleaning up our hot bars really doesn't take much. We'd just need Perfect Pitch to replace Bloodletter while WM is active even if that might make WM and MB seem a bit more similar in some ways (both would generate BL charges, but WM would also let you spend up to 3 at a time for increasing efficiency per charge simultaneously consumed on a piercing shot [Pitch Perfect, replacing BL] or circular AoE with greater primary target damage [Resonance or whatnot, replacing RoD], and give RA and SB reasons to exist in their own right (i.e., be more than just a check as to whether one can hit the flashing light). While that'd only decrease the button count by 1, it would nonetheless "clean" the bars in that none of it would then be unnecessary bloat nor, despite occasionally being a frequently hit action, only being usable only a third the time.

[mallleable]

Feeling a little envious seeing how bow plays in Monster Hunter Wilds. I neeeeed those walking casts, and barrages.

[Shurrikhan]

Feeling a little envious seeing how bow plays in Monster Hunter Wilds. I neeeeed those walking casts, and barrages.

I never really understood the desire for movement-penalizing casts that are thereby inherently harder to cancel (requiring an actual cancel key where one could previously just... move) over conditional cast-time decreases.

I suppose, as with the likes of a charge-up cast or doing everything by mouseover, it comes down largely to player preference, but I'd prefer the (wholly competitive) option at least to opt out of them.

[Valence]

Ultimately I can't say how it would work in pve (I'd probably hate it but that's just me), but I can safely tell you that walking casts are an absolute cancer in pvp, where they got introduced.