Upgrades for 45 Bard?

[Mandalore93]

Coming back after a mostly away period of a few months. Was looking to get some feedback.
This is my current equipment:
http://wiki.project1999.com/Magelo_Blue:Muzikal2

I figure the things I should be upgrading to are as follows
Waist: Thick Banded Belt
Arms: Guessing Mithril Vambraces
Ears: Earring of Essence and later Fishbone Hoop
Legs: Probably just stop gap using Sebilite Scale until I start raiding hate since the leg piece is one of the better ones.
Feet: Wait for planar?
Neck; No idea.
Back: Sold my HBC for now since it's an easy camp and even a bard my level can do it.

Also, are there any good camps for bards to make solid PP? Only things I can think of would be HGs in RM, HBC, GGR in LOIO, and maybe the TT circuit of mobs. That and selling PLs

[zanderklocke]

I'd look at investing in some of the mystic koada'dal stuff if you can find it cheap (this may be difficult due to them now requiring blue diamonds to make). I consider most of it better than planar...sans maybe BP for overall stats and boots/greaves for resists/random circumstances. Otherwise, everything better is raid or planar obtained. Planar and mystic koada'dal each have really great pieces but most of the best armor for bards is actually obtained from Ragefire. Ragefire armor is sort of like suped up mystic koada'dal armor. Singing Steel is only best in slot for the breastplate; the greaves are pretty good too but probably not the best or worth the cost. The Singing Steel breastplate and greaves are not very affordable pieces of gear though.

Based on your specific questions, here are some of my recommendations:

Waist: Thick Banded Belt is a good choice until you get the plane of sky belt or upgrade to a RBG, RBB, or BCG in the high end down the road.

Arms: I'd go with Mystic Koada if you can find them cheap. These are better than planar. Only better arms in the game are from Ragefire.

Ears: Fishbone Earring is good for breathing under water, but it's not that great of an earring aside from that. I like the black sapphire electrum earring or opalline earring for the other earring aside from the Earring of Essence. If Velious does launch soon, blue diamond earrings are great too.

Legs: Mystic Koada'dal or planar. High end you probably want to alternate between Ragefire and planar legs based on the situation.

Feet: Mystic Koada'dal or planar.

Neck: Gypsy medallion is a good cha necklace you can wear on a bard. Otherwise, Necklace of Superiority or the Sky Quest necklace are what bards wear, and those are not easy to get.

Back: Cloak of Shadows or Hooded Black Cloak for mid range. High end, you'll want to strive for probably Cloak of Flames or Hiero Cloak. Cloak of Flames is pretty much the best haste+hp item a bard can get in game right now unless you are in a Class C guild that does VP.

[Daldaen]

Think he meant fingerbone hoop.

But Zander's suggestions are good otherwise.

[zanderklocke]

Think he meant fingerbone hoop.

But Zander's suggestions are good otherwise.

Honestly, I think fingerbone hoop isn't that great for bards.

Cha is a main stat of bards for lull, and that earring depletes 10 of it. Also, you're losing resists to wear the earring. I don't think the +5 to Str, Sta, and MR make it that appealing.

I think an earring of magic reflection would be a better investment or just waiting until blue diamond earrings are back in Velious.

[falkun]

Upgrades for a L45 bard:
1) L60. More than any gear set or single item, get this...aka: focus on making exp, not pp nor items.
2) Resists. MR, FR, CR, PR, get 100+, preferably 150+.
3) HP, to take more AoE's or nukes while pulling/raiding.
4) CHA, to improve lull.


For the item slots you mention:
waist: BCG if Class-C or loaded, otherwise doesn't matter.
Arms: Mithril, Blazing
Ears: EoE, BSEE, wait for Velious BDEE
Legs: Planar, Blazing
Feet: Planar, Blazing
Neck; White gold, NoS if loaded.
Back: HBC, Heiro if loaded.


TL;DR: Get levels, spend minimal money on bard gear.

[zanderklocke]

Resist are key when raiding.

Hp, dex, and cha are key when grouping, unless you're in Sebilis where frogs are always nuking you. Then, you'll want more MR because bards are king when pulling Sebilis, and you'll probably get hit by spells.

[zanderklocke]

Upgrades for a L45 bard:
For the item slots you mention:

Neck; White gold



TL;DR: Get levels, spend minimal money on bard gear.

Forgot about that necklace. Great for raiding. I do agree with Deajay, you'll notice the greatest return from pure levels.

I used cha rings all the way until I was in my high 50s to try to avoid getting lull resists. However, once I hit about 57 or 58, I didn't really get lull resists in Sebilis anymore, so I swapped to hp rings except when raiding. In raiding, I always wear pure resist gear based on the encounter. However, I'm still uncertain how effective resists really are for Dragon AoEs aside from Fear. With over 400 PR on Trakanon with a damn epic and shield of the green dragon equipped, I still do not resist his AoEs. Hopefully the next patch that decreases max resists to 255 will actually fix all of this. Then bards can actually just rely on songs for the most part to max resists instead of wearing subpar stat gear just to increase resists.

[Mandalore93]

Ya, I already had sets of initial resist gear vetted by you guys. Pretty sure both of you responded to it. But that was months ago now. Also, I was referring to when I get to high fifties/sixty. This is my first char so I need to take baby steps in upgrading equipment. Were the farming things I mentioned any good? Or just stick to PLing?

[zanderklocke]

Ya, I already had sets of initial resist gear vetted by you guys. Pretty sure both of you responded to it. But that was months ago now. Also, I was referring to when I get to high fifties/sixty. This is my first char so I need to take baby steps in upgrading equipment. Were the farming things I mentioned any good? Or just stick to PLing?

Bard is not really a farming class. You'd only be able to do camps like Haden or HBC. I recommend either doing seafuries or PLing if you're dead set on making money on your bard.

[stakha]

The TT cycle is doable (if you dont get one of the wiz mobs up) by the late 40s, albeit a bit difficult. One could also farm in Droga if you can get ahold of one of the camps (estimating by 50 this should be rather easy. prob not doable at 45).