Understanding Bard Song ticks
 

I've noticed varying durations when twisting songs. Because of that I tried to experiment with a few songs followed by a /stopsong.
And despite the description in the wiki of 3 ticks (18 sec?) for most songs (Selo's and Restoration for example) I only get the buff 2 ticks (12 sec).
On the other hand songs like Shauri's invis always get the full duration, sometimes even longer.

Is there any rule or reason to know about the real duration of the songs?

I think it’s based on many things like dexterity, instrument skill, charisma for songs like kellins pixie strike and charms etc, also enemy resists stuff like that but I’m not 100% certain either.

This is 100% incorrect

Depends upon when server tic lands, you will be able to twist 3-4 songs typically

Always 3, usually 4, sometimes 5 if you time it just right

My observation is just that Shauri's is very consistent being whole 18 seconds while others not so much, even with better instruments.

I think the way it works is that that's how many ticks it will see. So let's say there are ticks at 0 seconds, 6 seconds, 12, and 18. If you finish a song at 1 second, it won't see 3 ticks until 17 seconds have passed since the song started. If you finish a song at 5 seconds, it'll only take 13 seconds to see 3 ticks.

That said I was just testing some stuff out and it definitely seems like certain things are wonky. I tried out Hymn of Restoration and a few of the Chants on myself, and I was getting a lot of cases where I only got healed or damaged twice. It seems like there's something odd going on with it.

Maybe so, there isn’t a definitive guide on bards with the detail of some of the other classes, an example being shaman. I’m having a blast as always barding it up now on green.

There are some songs in EQ that have durations, not the regular 3 ticks.

However, what you are describing is almost certainly the server side tick.

If your song lasts three server ticks that translates from a maximum of 18 real world to as few as 12 seconds. It all depends on when your song finishes relative to the server tick. If you finish casting with only 1 second left before the next server tick then your song will last only 13 seconds (1 sec till first tick...then 6 to next...then another 6 to last). You can squeeze a little benefit out of this sometimes by the order you sing the songs in your twist, in particular the mana pulse since it doesn't rely on the server ticks).

ASFAIK there is no way to automate/parse (gamparse, gina,etc.) keeping track of the server tick (depending on your UI you can watch your mana increase, like for canni dancing)...but this would be horribly painful and for little gain except in very specific strats (like indoor bard charming where you could time your charm by the server tick and start recasting with exactly 3 seconds left, etc.).

Is Shauri's one of those fixed duration ones? Or maybe is the wiki not right and is lasting 4 ticks? I get at least 18 seconds each and every time