Intro & Some Noob Questions

[dhill89]

Hey all, just started up playing on green after playing on blue several years back. Really looking to being part of the community 😌 I had a few questions hopefully someone can help out w/:

1. what are the most active zones for grouping/leveling from lvl ~5-20ish? Kinda tough soloing out there

2. what's the best way to make some $$ at low levels for basic gear?

3. what's a good custom UI skin?

4. is there a way to have a second hotbar?

<3 thank you, if anyone wants to group up my char's name is Sluntee, lvl 6 bard currently

[WarpathEQ]

I would say the most active zones are Crushbone/Unrest and East commons/Oasis for those levels.

I did Crushbone for the entirety of 5-20 (can do some Orc Hill outside CB from 5-8 or so). You can save up the crushbone belts and shoulderpads which turn in for EXP in Kaladim and usually sell them for ~2pp per belt and ~3-5pp per shoulderpad. I was able to sell enough backpacks full to make like 700 plat by lvl 20 and buy some gear in EC. The EC/Oasis route has similar item drops for EXP quests that people will buy off you.

Also this server is several years old and a lot of people have all sorts of gear. Not uncommon that someone will through you a couple newb items for free to help you on your way (more common in EC since the tunnel is there with people buying/selling).

My favorite part in a bard's life is at lvl 15 when you get the AoE mez song. Literally everything in Curshbone is under the level cap. Get a few peeps go into the Throne room, play AoE mez on repeat and slay the orcs one at a time for easy exp all the way to 20.

I don't use custom UIs or additional hotbars so hopefully someone else can provide some tips on those Qs.

[dhill89]

thank you for all that info! I'll give those things a shot, much appreciated

[Toxigen]

Crushbone for sure. After that just keep an eye on /who all (+/- like 3 levels from your own) and see where the peeps be at.

I think the most important thing for bard UI/config wise is just having those /stopsong macros so you don't drive yourself insane.

Don't forget to use the wiki! I played for years with it constantly open.

[dhill89]

ahh did not know there was a P1999 specific wiki, thank you <3

and sorry, what do you mean by the stopsong macros? pretty new to bard

[Toxigen]

Originally Posted by dhill89 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

ahh did not know there was a P1999 specific wiki, thank you <3

and sorry, what do you mean by the stopsong macros? pretty new to bard

Just create macros for each spell gem.

/stopsong
/cast 1

/stopsong
/cast 2

etc

If you do a bit of searching I'm sure there's more info but thats basically it. Its super easy to twist 4, and if you want to tryhard it can be 5 but honestly no XP groups ever need a 5 twist ever.

Even doing 3 is usually enough, even more so if you're busy pulling / charming / CC.

You picked the absolute highest APM class. If this scares you now its time to rethink a different character.

Also while I'm on this rant: never let people tell you to melee as a bard. Until Epic, the only bards doing melee are bad bards. A good lute and drum are your best friends.

[WarpathEQ]

Originally Posted by Toxigen [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Also while I'm on this rant: never let people tell you to melee as a bard. Until Epic, the only bards doing melee are bad bards. A good lute and drum are your best friends.

Really poor advice IMO. Melee is a great tool for a bard and extremely important to skill up when you're at low level. I've leveled up multiple bards on classic live and again on P99. Really the only point I've found where the math actually leads you to higher dps/faster kills without melee is at the very high end when you just simply can't take any hits. 50+ is when I put away the weapons and pull out the drums to solo 50-60 via charm/ drum dot kiting. In the mid range the DPS boost from instruments is lower than the DPS boost from swinging your arms (melee doesn't reduce your ability to twist songs, just slightly modifies the effects of applicable songs). Ultimately you are likely mixing both swapping instruments and weapons in and out constantly through battles if you're a truly great bard.

Additionally some fights just require melee like if you're going to solo some of the mobs for your epic. I also often times bust out the melee on raid targets as well. Atleast when you're raiding in a guild where you actually matter and you're not just some mana pump bot that stands there mostly useless.

[Troxx]

Originally Posted by WarpathEQ [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Really poor advice IMO. Melee is a great tool for a bard and extremely important to skill up when you're at low level. I've leveled up multiple bards on classic live and again on P99. Really the only point I've found where the math actually leads you to higher dps/faster kills without melee is at the very high end when you just simply can't take any hits. 50+ is when I put away the weapons and pull out the drums to solo 50-60 via charm/ drum dot kiting. In the mid range the DPS boost from instruments is lower than the DPS boost from swinging your arms (melee doesn't reduce your ability to twist songs, just slightly modifies the effects of applicable songs). Ultimately you are likely mixing both swapping instruments and weapons in and out constantly through battles if you're a truly great bard.

Additionally some fights just require melee like if you're going to solo some of the mobs for your epic. I also often times bust out the melee on raid targets as well. Atleast when you're raiding in a guild where you actually matter and you're not just some mana pump bot that stands there mostly useless.

Disagree. My first main here was bard and to 60. It’s been a long while since I’ve played him so I don’t recall the exact levels where you get your dots/charms … but bard melee dps is just plain bad. It’s ok until 20s to maybe 30 but it takes a nose dive. Once you get your first charm, that is by far the best dps/kill rate apart from swarm kiting. For single target dps 40s and onward you will do more with stacking your dots with instruments than you would with melee weapons. For groups, your most valuable contribution starting the moment you get it is hymn of restoration with a lute.

Keep your skills capped. Melee at low levels when benefits exist and the melee discrepancy remains small.

When I see a bard constantly meleeing 40+ and NEVER bagging their weapons for instruments, one of 2 things happens:

1. I politely inform them and help coach them to play a hard better. They listen and adjust play style accordingly. Everyone profits and fun times are had (current and future).

2. I politely inform them and they make no changes. Mental note taken to avoid grouping/playing with them moving forward.

Bards are heavily armored mobile casters beyond level 20-30. Pretending you’re helping by hitting things with lower skill caps and lack of double attack is just bad.

Everything changes, of course, if and when they get epic. That proc is just really nice and it’s an all-type instrument.

[Toxigen]

Originally Posted by WarpathEQ [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Really poor advice IMO. Melee is a great tool for a bard and extremely important to skill up when you're at low level. I've leveled up multiple bards on classic live and again on P99. Really the only point I've found where the math actually leads you to higher dps/faster kills without melee is at the very high end when you just simply can't take any hits. 50+ is when I put away the weapons and pull out the drums to solo 50-60 via charm/ drum dot kiting. In the mid range the DPS boost from instruments is lower than the DPS boost from swinging your arms (melee doesn't reduce your ability to twist songs, just slightly modifies the effects of applicable songs). Ultimately you are likely mixing both swapping instruments and weapons in and out constantly through battles if you're a truly great bard.

Additionally some fights just require melee like if you're going to solo some of the mobs for your epic. I also often times bust out the melee on raid targets as well. Atleast when you're raiding in a guild where you actually matter and you're not just some mana pump bot that stands there mostly useless.

All of this is wrong. I stopped taking you seriously when you said instruments only slightly modify the effect of applicable songs.

Increasing the effect of songs by 1.8 - 2.6x multiplier is slight? mkay

OP should get a Lute of the Gypsy Princess, Mistmoore Battle Drums, and store bought horn/flute and he is good to go. Will be far more effective than worrying about weapons, even more so if he is in a group which will likely be his path.

Thanks for playing.

[WarpathEQ]

Since math is hard let's do some for you. I find the biggest miss when people are thinking about damage is ticks versus seconds. 1 tick is 6 seconds so when comparing your melee DPS (you can find a DPS calculator that makes this pretty easy for your specific character) to your damage from songs you have to either multiply your melee damage by 6 or divide your song damage by 6.

At level 46 is when you have all 3 drum dots: Fufil's, chant of frost, and chant of flame. At that point they do 64 damage per tick with no instrument (16+24+24). At best someone that is a new character could probably obtain a walrus skin drum with a 23 modifier aka 230% of the effect. The first 100% is the original 64 damage per tick that you can get with melee weapons on so you're really adding 130% or an additional 83.2 damage per tick (divided by 6 gets to 13.86 dps extra). At that level you're easily putting out 20+ DPS with melee damage (over 120 per tick). My actual number was 22.67dps at that point, with 2 weapons that combined cost less than the drum. So you're leaving a lot of damage on the table by saying a bard shouldn't melee.

The math simply does not improve your DPS by using instruments over melee, the reason bards switch off melee is you get to a point at higher levels (50+) where you just simply can't live through the fight to melee the mob. The factual reality of math is playing one haste song without an instrument gets you more additional DPS than adding an instrument and twisting all 3 dots. Additionally it frees up songs in your twist to use for more effective things like haste, charm (as Troxx pointed out charmed pet DPS is the highest in the game, better than any character can create on their own), slow, fear, healing, and a variety of other songs that you can now twist that create more utility and DPS than dotting with instruments.

Ultimately using melee doesn't prevent you from using instruments either. If you're good and find an efficient system to do it you can have an instrument equipped when the song effect hits and melee equipped in between to achieve the highest level of DPS.

And if someone tries to tell you that your highest and best use as a bard is to sit in a group playing regen song with your lute on....politely ask them to delete their character and find a different class. That is an absolute pitiful waste of what is arguably the most versitle class in all of EQ.