Bard Question (Green Server)

[BUSHBOYS]

Certainly a lot of information/specifics are still up in the air so a lot of this is purely conjecture....but on launch will/would the number of mobs able to be hit while kiting once again be limited or is this something that eventually gets patched in?

[Wallicker]

25 most likely but good luck finding that many mobs in the karanas with 12 other bards trying to swarm the same spot

[Troxx]

The most fun I had barding was in groups. I wish I had done less aoe kiting from 25-45 (this was before the nerf).

Bards played properly in groups are gods.

[Wallicker]

Bards mana free charm on mobs up to lvl 37 is nothing to scoff at either that will easily Take you to 50 as fast as an enchanter.

[BUSHBOYS]

I have no issue with grouping as I too love that aspect of the game. I play this for that social interaction, not to just solo to end game. That leads me into another question though, whether Bards will be shunned with the xp penalty? Read a lot of people pointing out how hard it is for Hybrids/Bards to get a group (despite our ability to be pretty good in one) and that you will be perma LFG.

I have not charmed on my bard though, so I will look that aspect.

[Benanov]

Bards add so much to a group that they should still get invites from all but the min-max crowd - you know, the kind of people that only duo so that their pet doesn't steal 50% xp.

As opposed to PAL, SHD, MNK...and least of all, the poor RNG.

[Legidias]

People dont utilize fear enough. At the lower levels, bard fear + bard snare (best snare in game) is the best tanking you'll do as mobs die so fast. Even higher levels later, fear is the best 'tank' mechanism with 0 downtime.

[Crede]

People dont utilize fear enough. At the lower levels, bard fear + bard snare (best snare in game) is the best tanking you'll do as mobs die so fast. Even higher levels later, fear is the best 'tank' mechanism with 0 downtime.

Because having to get in pbae range to fear when you’re already mashing a bunch of other songs is annoying.

I wonder if they purposely decided to give bards pbae fear as opposed to a ranged single target one that would have paired amazingly with ranged dots/snare

[Legidias]

Ive never had issues with pbae fear. If you find that the simple action of walking to a mob annoying, you shouldnt really be playing bard anyways...

[Tingowingo]

I think people who pilot bards are true gamers. The intensity of twisting the right songs at the right time is what allows your brain to really engage and get the most out of this game skill-wise. Have yet to play any other classes that provides that other than a soloing enchanter in SG or PoM, but even that doesn’t compare. If your love in games are to maximize your skill - especially in this complacent game - don’t see why playing a bard would ever be annoying

[Issar]

Ive never had issues with pbae fear. If you find that the simple action of walking to a mob annoying, you shouldnt really be playing bard anyways...

I was thinking the exact same thing. It's not like it has a directional requirement like with melee attacks. Those can be a little annoying on this server due to mobs path changing and server updating. But I find fear kiting on my Bard to be pretty relaxing. I tend to do it when I've run out of Mana for charms and I want to keep a camp broken.

[loramin]

Certainly a lot of information/specifics are still up in the air so a lot of this is purely conjecture....but on launch will/would the number of mobs able to be hit while kiting once again be limited or is this something that eventually gets patched in?

The AoE limit was not a part of the classic timeline.

It was something the P99 staff introduced (at no special time in the patch history) to address the amount of staff time AoErs were taking up (and also to make P99 more classic, because on live in '99-'01 very few people had the computers/connections necessary to AoE that many ... just like very few people had multiple accounts AND multiple computers, or a way to run multiple accounts on one computer, so P99 bans boxing even though that was technically possible also).

Therefore, while no one knows for sure and we should all just patiently wait for the Green announcement ... I'd bet $50 IRL that Green will have the AoE cap from day one.

[Zuranthium]

AoE limit was classic in that virtually nobody was capable of swarming entire zones in classic because of internet/computer lag.

[Legidias]

If were gonna go classic with computer issues, I want my bard song spam to be able to DC random people too from overheating their CPU.

[Cen]

Bards mana free charm on mobs up to lvl 37 is nothing to scoff at either that will easily Take you to 50 as fast as an enchanter.

Best part is, its perfectly worked out to work on 100% of hill giants ;D

[stewe]

Good luck finding even 25 mobs at a time when green comes out, luckily for me i havent even gotten a character to 60 yet on blue so i wont even be playing on green, no point for me when i can still enjoy and look forward to alot of things on blue.

[Tobius]

People dont utilize fear enough. At the lower levels, bard fear + bard snare (best snare in game) is the best tanking you'll do as mobs die so fast. Even higher levels later, fear is the best 'tank' mechanism with 0 downtime.

Yeah I could kill red and yellow hill giants with my low 30 shit geared bard.

I'd still be doing it if over levelled hogs didn't pinch the camp all the time.

[Insaiyan]

Can bard be lazy?

Meaning... would I still be able to exp / solo decently if I'm not up for song twisting, or only twisting 2 songs at once? Granted -- this obviously isn't optimal and wouldn't be playing like this consistently but I'm just wondering for on those "off" days... do you always need to be on your A-game song twisting to have fun on bard?s

[Dolalin]

In classic EQ, everyone would just want you to play mana song anyways, so yes.

But here, everyone is like "why are/aren't you meleeing, why aren't you singing [x|y|z] song, do you even know how to play?", people are too smart-arsed and mouthy.

[Legidias]

At low levels, bard are way better soloers (just face tanking) than any other melee since gear is so crap at the start and theres no skill caps. You start off with magical dmg and regen by lvl 5. Use selos if you need to run away.

[Tenlaar]

You can make two macros that each play two songs for easy four song twisting. If hitting a hotkey every 6 seconds is too active then no, you probably shouldn't play a bard.

That's why on blue my two main characters leveling up were bard and mage. On the days when I wanted to be lazier or chat more in groups I'd play the mage.

[Insaiyan]

That is great to hear. I am not trying to be a lazy player 24/7, but the class is insane in the APM (actions per minute) compared to the other classes if you want to be a super try-hard... or so it seems to me as a newbie.

I was just worried if I could still kill stuff on the days I'm not feeling like going super saiyan mode. Sometimes it's nice to alt-tab and kill something easy or just give your fingers a rest day and I'm wondering if I'll be able to "chill" on a bard.

[Tenlaar]

It does tend to be kind of hard to do anything "chill" mode with a bard. If you're grouping and just using buff songs or doing hp/mana you can do a four song twist with two macros and it's not a big deal if you miss a note and a song drops for 9 to 12 seconds until it picks back up on the next go around. That is generally as chill as it gets for a bard.

When soloing I don't really like to use multi-song macros because, for example, missing a snare or fear and having to wait another 3 seconds to be able to start casting it again can cause a lot more problems than missing a round of mana song or haste dropping for 10 seconds.

If you're worried that you're going to have days where you're just not up for the constant action of a bard I'd just start thinking about a less active alt to play on those days.

[Legidias]

Nah, bard in pure vanilla is ez mode to chill. Get your first slow songs and just use that / haste and melee down mobs. Solo melee with 20% slow and 10-15% haste is amazing with no gear and low level. Sit somewhere with regen on after. Congrats, you solo better than a monk. Its not the fastest / most efficient way to kill, but its super easy to do.

[Insaiyan]

Nah, bard in pure vanilla is ez mode to chill. Get your first slow songs and just use that / haste and melee down mobs. Solo melee with 20% slow and 10-15% haste is amazing with no gear and low level. Sit somewhere with regen on after. Congrats, you solo better than a monk. Its not the fastest / most efficient way to kill, but its super easy to do.

Thanks to both replies. This is exactly the kind of info I was looking for and great to know.

[Tenlaar]

What he said really only holds true at the low levels. By the time you're out of your 20's you're not going to be meleeing down mobs that you're soloing for xp. You won't be able to unless you do things like melee until you get low, mez and regen for a bit, and go back to melee. It becomes drastically less efficient to try to solo that way beyond the low levels and bards will do much more damage using DoT songs and instruments than they will using easily available classic era weapons.

[Legidias]

As long as you're staying on top of gear, it still holds true up till way later. Given the same gear level as say, a monk, you will still be able to just face tank stuff in vanilla better (get dem HG's) since you can slow / haste, and they cant. Even just slow, being a straight 20% damage reducer, is super strong.

Again, I never said its the most efficient, but being a chill bard isnt efficient either.

[Tenlaar]

I think that you are overestimating the ability of a bard in banded and with low level/low ratio classic weapons to stand up in solo melee against xp giving mobs beyond the 20's.

[Legidias]

I am not. You underestimate the power of haste and slows. I am comparing the facetank solo ability of a classic bard to a class melee.

And again, it ts about the feasibility of a 'chill bard', not what is the most effective way to XP. He might finish each fight with like 10-20% hp, but still doable and can regen it fast.

[Videri]

Luckily, bards get fear at 26 and charm at 27, so right after they start to suck at meleeing/tanking, they gain the ability to fear-kite (combine with snare song) or charm (charm-kite a group of mobs, or just make two mobs 1v1). Then they get the single-target mez at 28 and become even better in groups!

[Tenlaar]

He might finish each fight with like 10-20% hp

This is where you are wrong, though. Beyond the 20's that's not what will happen. What will happen with your method is that he'll get to 10-20% hp and the mob will still be at 60% hp and he'll have to mez the mob and regen back up before going back into melee.

Bards are great at a lot of things, but even with bard slow and bard haste, out DPSing mobs with melee is not one of them.

[Legidias]

My experience is different than yours was then. I mean, you don't have to believe me but its entirely feasible.

[Bazia]

you can twist like 4 songs but I mean I never really care what a bards doing as long as he's playing haste during fights and regen songs during pulls/breaks

you dont have to go full tryhard

[Bazia]

My experience is different than yours was then. I mean, you don't have to believe me but its entirely feasible.

i had a similar experience if I twisted dots during the melee

[Tecmos Deception]

you can twist like 4 songs but I mean I never really care what a bards doing as long as he's playing haste during fights and regen songs during pulls/breaks

you dont have to go full tryhard

I always thought bards were either tryhards or bads.

How many of you dudes pulse CCC like a pro instead of just letting it autorepeat?

[Aaramis]

I was always an advocate for Bard melee, ever since seeing a raid-geared Bard guildmate just mow through things like butter back in Velious, and so I recreated that on live for Velious to PoP era to test for myself.

Yes, other melee will do more damage. But as mentioned, you have self-haste plus a slow song. It doesn't quite even out, but it's not as bad as many think.

There's an entire generation of Bards who leveled naked by kiting and have no clue what they're capable of.

[Barlimous]

Any tips and tricks for a bard freshly starting out?? Send me a tell in game characters name is Barlimous

[Neverwinter27]

Is Bard twisting= Skill rotations in another MMO like Final Fantasy 14's Bard class?

[mookie]

Are bards now only limited to aoe pull 4 mobs at a time?

[Wallicker]

Can only HIT 4 at a time, dots last 3 tics though so with different run speed mobs and/or proper positioning it’s possible to keep 12 dotted

[Frug]

Can only HIT 4 at a time, dots last 3 tics though so with different run speed mobs and/or proper positioning it’s possible to keep 12 dotted

Isn't the 4 mobs it hit random (or effectively so; even if it's the 4 closest, good luck getting that to cycle through while running)?

If that's the case you're wasting your extraordinarily absurd luck by using it on a game.

[Wallicker]

Not how it works, you just have to dot the slower mobs first then get out of their range but in range of the faster mobs. It is skill not luck I assure you

[Legidias]

It will always hit the same 4 mobs in zone, given that all are in range. IIRC its based on what order mobs spawned in zone.

[firestorm106]

Thinking of starting again was curious are bards popular or in demand or people ask for other classes...

[Wallicker]

I have had zero issues leveling solo or finding groups as a Bard. Some people hate on the hybrid penalty but if you play well their hate quickly turns to love.