Melee vs instrument for bard

[digitz80]

For non-epic bards, what are your opinions on Melee vs just twisting songs with instrument modifiers and not bothering with melee?

Personally, it seems better to just go with songs, as bard melee is pretty crappy. Twisting dots with drum equipped is more damage if dps is really needed. Maybe if I had some really good weapons or something..

[Tupakk]

Your going to want both. A group bard is mister utility. Somethings the group will need mana and you be sticking being the battery so mana dot dot mana inject RnR... Other times people will ask you to melee/pull your going to want a BoH and Symphonic Saber to mitigate aggro and have good dex. Plus melee songs VoV -Atk SnareSlow Niv

[brecon]

As a Bard your DPS contribution is a secondary objective. Your primary objective is to make the group kill more efficiently. Whatever DPS you can add is helpful, but not if it reduces the overall DPS and downtime of the group.

I agree that you do more individual DPS most of the time by twisting 3x chants with a Drum than if you Melee. But most likely you will be doing something else...either Pulling, CCing, Slowing or Hasteing, or helping with healer mana by playing HP/Mana regen and Runes to mitigate damage on the tank.

So it really depends on the group and how you guys are doing, but my rule of thumb is:
(1) If pulling outdoors: keep a drum equipped
(2) If pulling indoors: keep a Lute equipped
(3) If CCing multiple mobs, keep a Lute equipped to play Runes and HP/Mana regen between Mez/Charm refreshes
(4) If slowing/hasteing, I most likely keep melee weapons up. Sometimes if tank aggro is bad and I'm pulling aggro from slow song, I'll pull out a Lute and just keep distance.
(5) If your group has a dedicated CC (enchanter or bard), a haste (Shaman, Bard or Enchanter), a Slower (shaman, bard or enchanter) and a puller (whatever), and the healer is fine on mana...then I would probably melee and twist chants and a ds. But that sort of scenario rarely comes about.

On occasion, as a bard, you find that there's not a really essential song in your twist at a given moment. The problem there is, do you really have room on your spellbar to keep up enough chants to make chant-dps worthwhile? Even if I'm just doing DPS, I ALWAYS keep up Mez, Charm and Snare in case things go badly, I always keep up hp/mana regen, and if I'm outdoors I ALWAYS keep up Selos. That only leaves 3 'swap slots', and normally I have something more useful to put in one or two of those slots than a chant.

[lowner411]

As a Bard your DPS contribution is a secondary objective. Your primary objective is to make the group kill more efficiently. Whatever DPS you can add is helpful, but not if it reduces the overall DPS and downtime of the group.

I agree that you do more individual DPS most of the time by twisting 3x chants with a Drum than if you Melee. But most likely you will be doing something else...either Pulling, CCing, Slowing or Hasteing, or helping with healer mana by playing HP/Mana regen and Runes to mitigate damage on the tank.

So it really depends on the group and how you guys are doing, but my rule of thumb is:
(1) If pulling outdoors: keep a drum equipped
(2) If pulling indoors: keep a Lute equipped
(3) If CCing multiple mobs, keep a Lute equipped to play Runes and HP/Mana regen between Mez/Charm refreshes
(4) If slowing/hasteing, I most likely keep melee weapons up. Sometimes if tank aggro is bad and I'm pulling aggro from slow song, I'll pull out a Lute and just keep distance.
(5) If your group has a dedicated CC (enchanter or bard), a haste (Shaman, Bard or Enchanter), a Slower (shaman, bard or enchanter) and a puller (whatever), and the healer is fine on mana...then I would probably melee and twist chants and a ds. But that sort of scenario rarely comes about.

On occasion, as a bard, you find that there's not a really essential song in your twist at a given moment. The problem there is, do you really have room on your spellbar to keep up enough chants to make chant-dps worthwhile? Even if I'm just doing DPS, I ALWAYS keep up Mez, Charm and Snare in case things go badly, I always keep up hp/mana regen, and if I'm outdoors I ALWAYS keep up Selos. That only leaves 3 'swap slots', and normally I have something more useful to put in one or two of those slots than a chant.

I agree with everything Brecon said. If you are in a pickup group for a long time, you might find your role changing as people take afk breaks and as the group composition changes. I usually keep haste, slow/snare, heal, and selo's up, so that leaves spaces for charm, mez, mana, fear, or whatever shielding is needed.

[indiscriminate_hater]

There are very few situations where you are going to want to use non-epic weapons for melee. The DPS is just too dismal to justify using weapons. Even if you have to be the tank, you're better off swapping instruments to twist dots and aggro-generating songs.

At 60 with decent instruments you can be twisting 6 dots (Angstlich's Assonance last a minute) for over 350 damage per tick. No way you can hit close to that even with great weapons and full haste.

[indiscriminate_hater]

Maybe if you're rocking epic and a VP/NTOV weapon with a 160DD procs and 255 dex it'll be worth it. Twisting dots along with that would be pretty damn good

[Cillaz]

I noticed around level 40 mele started to suffer and by 45 I sold my FBSS and bought walrus skin drums and am very glad I did. I use boh/css for weapons and see no need to change them til epic as mele isn't that important now I'm in the 50's. Instruments are better most times. Only situation I still mele in is if I'm tanking, other than that I rarely use weapons anymore.

[brecon]

If you're tanking you should probably use a Lute anyway. More than doubling Rune song + HP Regen probably more important to a full group than your DPS output if you're the only one that can tank, and aggro won't be a problem regardless.

The only real 'reason' to use weapons 40+, realistically is to (1) proc weapon effects, (2) push mobs to prevent gate or CH, or (3) Mez/Melee mobs in dungeons that you don't have room to fear kite.

Someone might argue that fear kiting with epic MH + worn haste + chants/dots is more damage than drums of the beast MH....but I'd be surprised. Again, the 'reason' you melee is when your group doesn't need you to be enhancing your songs with an instrument effect.

[Tecmos Deception]

At 60 with decent instruments you can be twisting 6 dots (Angstlich's Assonance last a minute) for over 350 damage per tick. No way you can hit close to that even with great weapons and full haste.

Looks like the 6 dots you're talking about do about 170 per tick without instrument modifiers, right?

Epic puts that at over 300 per tick, plus you'd be meleeing with epic + whatever offhand. A bard is going to melee for more than 10 dps against any enemy that he can land 6 chants on, right? Plus then you'd be proccing epic and perhaps offhand too.


Can a bard actually do that many chants without having like 5x as much aggro as the tank though? Lol. Or are you assuming the bard will be twisting 6 chants and kiting cause he'll have aggro? Do 60 bards often kitetank with chants against stuff that doesn't summon? :p

[brecon]

A bard will never, in practice, run those dots in a group situation bc the highest damage dot is an AOE that'll ruin CC..and it includes a snare so it will probably pull aggro off the tank. I think what he is describing is more for solo fear kiting scenarios or trash killing.

Also I doubt you could keep 5 dots up without losing them to server ticks, even 4 sometimes has one drop off...but it could be my connection I suppose.

[Loke]

I primarily used weapons all through the 50s. Lull and charm aren't really affected by instruments - at least not to a noticable degree where it made sense to me to switch every time. The mana regen component of songs also isn't affected by instruments. Neither is haste.

Dots are, but I can hardly think of any situations where my group benefitted more from dots than they would have from other songs. HP regen and dmg shields are affected by instruments, but imo it seems like it would be hard for those to out weigh other songs I could play plus bard dps. Bard dps might suck a bit, but with BoH / Guardian Mace I bet bards are able to put out 30ish+ dps melee against exp mobs.

I could be wrong, but chanting with instruments never really made sense to me. Always seemed like I could do more with melee and support songs that weren't affected by instruments.

[thewrush]

Since we are talking about instruments why is Selo's Drum's of the March like 15-20k whereas Walrus Skin Drum is averaging around 3k. Is the 1 point modifier difference that huge? I'd honestly not buy Selo's Drum and only get one if I could roll to win.

Also, can anyone confirm Walrus Skin Drum only drops in SG? Can it drop from a siren just outside?

On a side note my human bard acquired 5 pieces of Guardian armor in Skyshrine thanks to two people farming for their own alts but only needing 1 specific piece. I got some nice upgrades and I'm rockin the fashion quest even more now. Plus I look wickedly better than those Elf cultural pansies (everyone plays half elf these days...best stats blah blah blah, still ugly af).

[Loke]

On a side note my human bard acquired 5 pieces of Guardian armor in Skyshrine thanks to two people farming for their own alts but only needing 1 specific piece. I got some nice upgrades and I'm rockin the fashion quest even more now. Plus I look wickedly better than those Elf cultural pansies (everyone plays half elf these days...best stats blah blah blah, still ugly af).

If it was this past weekend, you're welcome. Spent entirely too much time trying to get that damn robe.

[Trollhide]

Dots are, but I can hardly think of any situations where my group benefitted more from dots than they would have from other songs. HP regen and dmg shields are affected by instruments, but imo it seems like it would be hard for those to out weigh other songs I could play plus bard dps. Bard dps might suck a bit, but with BoH / Guardian Mace I bet bards are able to put out 30ish+ dps melee against exp mobs.

I could be wrong, but chanting with instruments never really made sense to me. Always seemed like I could do more with melee and support songs that weren't affected by instruments.
I parsed my 46 bard with BoH/GM vs LOIO Bloodgills a couple weeks back. I don't have the log handy but IIRC the results were something like:

Nostrolo's Tambourine
Snare, Fear, Magic Chant, Fire Chant, Frost Chant
~27 dps

BoH / GM
Snare, Fear, L45 Haste, Fire Chant, Frost Chant
~30 dps


Only had song haste, no haste item

[brecon]

That's a pretty close margin. Obviously a better drum increases output, as would worn haste. The ratio on those weapons is solid. Epic would allow you to drop haste and twist in another damage song.

The other thing to consider though is: it is way easier to chant kite than it is to melee with the hitbox issues. Whenever I am doing long fear-kiting sessions I much prefer to chant kite since it's just less strain, you only need to be in melee range once every ~18 seconds for the fear refresh. I start off with a tash orb equipped, I mez / Snare / Fear, then I melee til tash lands, then switch to drum.

[Droobie]

yea do urself a favor and dont be "one of those bards" that just sits there and plays songs. get in there and help dps believe it or not were not to shabby and every little bit helps. At lower levels i just manily use Mana song and when pull comes in ill play haste song then back to mana. Songs are about 18 seconds and having a MMO mouse makes shit alot easier. As u level and get better songs twisting is not that hard at all. Just a little more button work u got to do. Make sure u make /stopsong macros makes life so much easier just got to hit song once instead of twice.

Droobie Snacks LvL 56 Human Druid - Karana
Shagee LvL 26 Halfelf Bard