More Bard Questions

[Goseals6]

so after much failure on kiting orcs in kelethin, I've come to the conclusion that it's impossible. Hit boxes are so wonky that if you pull more than 2, you're screwed and they stun you. Plus 40% exp penalty. Yah woo go bards. /rant off

[SirAlvarex]

Have you tried fear kiting? It wouldn't be possible to do with all 5 songs if it weren't for the fact that all detrimental songs are on a minimum 18s duration. It's also why all of our DoTs hit 3 times, since the server ticks every 6 seconds.

You'd have to find the bug report, but I think it was 2 years ago the beneficials also lived by the 3-tick rule. Meaning they lasted 18 seconds and it *was* possible to keep up 4-5 songs without a drop. But they changed it, because someone found evidence of a song only lasting 12-18 seconds, and the "3-tick" idea came from people noticing the high-end duration of songs.

That nerf made the next day of circle kiting reaaaal fun.

Found the bug report on the nerf: http://www.project1999.org/forums/sh...ad.php?t=57246

[t0lkien]

I only fear kited with melee from behind, I didn't DoT. I didn't see the point when it's safer to circle kite with DoTs, Selos never being "resisted" like Fear could be. As a result I was fearing and snaring, so wouldn't notice a dropped duration if it occurred. This was on Live though, not on p99.

However as I said, this variance theory never surfaced on Live. If it's a reality on p99, it's not "classic". I haven't noticed it, but then my experience here is much less than on Live.

[SirAlvarex]

The DPS from the 3 DoTs is insanely better. Against non-high resist mobs (of which should be easy to find near max level) you'll do over 30 DPS with Selo`s Drums. I haven't parsed out using melee weapons, but the mobs definitely die faster.

---

I decided to continue my tests, and found this interesting.

I never really noticed with the healing spells their duration, but constantly with Cantata I am getting the following reaction.

-1 - start casting Cantata
0 - server tick, health raises 3
2 - Cantata fires, stop singing
6 - regen for 15
12 - regen for 15
18 - regen for 15, buff immediately ends

So in other words, it lasts just the duration of the 3 ticks no matter what. For spells like our regen songs, that's fine because we only get the benefit on the server ticks anyway. The rest of the buffs tho don't have such a defined cutoff. So if you were to just twist Regens/Mana for a caster group, then you'd be perfectly fine doing Cantata+4 mana twists (15-18s cast time) to maximize your regen capabilities for the casters.

[t0lkien]

Isn't that bug post pointing out the extended duration of fear and the DoTs is a bug? Fear lasting 10 ticks is insane, and obviously not as intended. Naturally that would work better, but it's not "classic" [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Selo's DoT kiting allowed me to land all DoT's *just* before or after having to recast Selos, though if I remember I'd cycled through the DoT's, using two each time to make sure Selo's never dropped. That would put 3 DoTs on the mob every second tick, with two otherwise. Much better to miss one tick of a DoT then get hammered from Selo's dropping. Often mobs were resistant to one of the DoT's too, so I never lost much by it being cycled out. I graduated to this over reverse fear kiting as soon as I got my third DoT at 46.

Which brings me back to the original point really - it's safer to play the inside of timers, than push for a "perfect" result which is rarely going to happen, especially where something critical like Selos or resists are involved. The lost time/XP from a death way overbalances anything gained from sneaking in that extra tick of song.

[SirAlvarex]

I don't remember fear lasting that long, but the DoT's use to tick off 4 times sometimes. Actually it was 4 times *most* of the time.

[astuce999]

5 song twist + BoH click.

All 3 dots hit every single time, mob doesnt break fear or snare at any point, only time I get hit is a riposte.

http://youtu.be/00IG22ip5bA

[t0lkien]

Are you doing a straight twist (1,2,3,4,5... etc.) or is Fear lasting the (bugged) 10 ticks it was before? If you're doing a straight 1 for 1 twist, then all the songs are still one tick longer than they should be as noted here: http://www.project1999.org/forums/sh...t=57246&page=4

In which case, this is a bug, and not like live *shrug*. I forget we're working with a different code base than on live. Either way, good job.

[astuce999]

Strait twist; song 1, song 2, song 3, song 4, BoH click, song 5... repeat.

Fear only lasts up to 17.9 seconds like it should, and can break early on tougher mobs.

Songs are not lasting longer than they should, it's just that there's no wearing off message on detrimental songs, and as long as they are reapplied before the next time the server ticks there is no loss in efficiency.

cheers

[t0lkien]

Here's the thing though - it absolutely was not like this on live during Velious. No-one on live could hold down 5 songs, ever. No-one could hold down four without one dropping briefly. There are issues with the EMu implementation of this which have been pointed out in other threads and other discussions on other boards. The anecdotal evidence of that is that conversations like this about song persistence variance never occurred on Concert Hall, EQDiva, or The Safehouse that I ever read. If it was a factor, Thott and others would have been all over it and it would have been common knowledge. There was lots of discussion about server ticks, but nothing that suggested a mechanic that would allow 5 songs to be held down. That *may* have been because by far most of the conversation centered on group and raid mechanics. They do do five songs easily now on live, but everything has changed so direct comparisons aren't valid.

It's moot though really I guess. Whatever is different in the EMu implementation is foundational and isn't going to change. The game still feels pretty darn close to what I remember in all other respects.