Convert to Bardcher?

[samthedagger]

Leveling my bard into epic levels is interesting. Fatesinger has some cool stuff. And there is lots of stuff I would like to twist. But as it stands I just do anemic damage any way you slice it. I like playing support classes, but often I have very little to do outside of making sure everyone's buff's are still active.

I was thinking of reincarnating as a bardcher, half-elf or elf bard with arcane archer enhancements and archery feats. Is this a viable strategy? Even worth attempting?

[CabooseJTS]

I think it's worth it. I don't have Precise Shot, or IPS, but i do have manyshot on my lvl 20 elf AA Bard (I went Spellsinger, but I've been told Warchanter works just as well.) I usually run with my cousin on his lvl 20 elf paladin, and together we're usually pretty hard to kill. i can handle far away enemies with slayer arrows and he gets the close range ones with me healing us.

[~kruemeli]

I think it's worth it. I don't have Precise Shot, or IPS, but i do have manyshot on my lvl 20 elf AA Bard (I went Spellsinger, but I've been told Warchanter works just as well.) I usually run with my cousin on his lvl 20 elf paladin, and together we're usually pretty hard to kill. i can handle far away enemies with slayer arrows and he gets the close range ones with me healing us.

Dont Forget to bear in mind what the enhancement pass is looking like.

[Fleckislaupir]

I was thinking of reincarnating as a bardcher, half-elf or elf bard with arcane archer enhancements and archery feats. Is this a viable strategy? Even worth attempting?
Preferable in what sense? I mean, if you're disappointed with your melee DPS as a bard, I'm not sure why you'd think your ranged DPS as a bardcher will be any better (outside of Manyshot, ofc, esp. if you go the Furyshot route). Did you have a sense of how you wanted to play?

[Aashrym]

I think bardchers work well enough. Manyshot going shiradi or fury or fatesinger will work for you for the occasional burst.

Reign and Turn the Tide are nice and grim fate or fragment of valor are not exactly bad either. I'm a bit curious what you consider anemic damage because you won't be furyshotting or blitzing but there are a few nice damage bonuses in fatesinger.

[Rull]

Fatesinger is just horrible, don't judge a bard damage output, or overall viability, on that. Pick a DPS destiny and you'll be fine.

Although if you like manyshotting you can go 16 bard 2 ranger 2 fighter and be TWF DPS with manyshot bursts. (2 ranger gives TWF so you have a feat tot take manyshot).

But go fury either way if you want to be useful.

[Aashrym]

Fatesinger is just horrible, don't judge a bard damage output, or overall viability, on that. Pick a DPS destiny and you'll be fine.

Although if you like manyshotting you can go 16 bard 2 ranger 2 fighter and be TWF DPS with manyshot bursts. (2 ranger gives TWF so you have a feat tot take manyshot).

But go fury either way if you want to be useful.

Yeah, a person wouldn't want to have better IC, grim fate, or stacking sonic vulnerability to go with reign and turn the tide. So useless.... ;)

I don't think I share your opinion on fatesinger being horrible. I don't think it needed nerfed in beta but it's still not bad as is.

[Rull]

Yeah, a person wouldn't want to have better IC, grim fate, or stacking sonic vulnerability to go with reign and turn the tide. So useless.... ;)

I don't think I share your opinion on fatesinger being horrible. I don't think it needed nerfed in beta but it's still not bad as is.

We're talking a different level of useful. Sure it's better than no destiny at all, but when looking at damage output, where 3 bards with no destiny deal at all deal about as much damage as 2 with fatesinger.. they do about as much as just 1 with fury. Tripling is no exaggeration, I'd say quadrupling is more accurate.
When looking at survivability, 100 HP is a LOT. fatesinger would need to drop STR by 8 to equal this.
One of the fatesinger's best abiilties was the no-save hold which deals about 1000 damage... except the cooldown isn't 6 seconds like on fury. :-/ Fury is about the best CC in the game. In a party, getting everything helpless adds way more to your party members' damage output than the minor buffs of fatesinger. But the primal scream alone is a better buff than all the additions to your songs.
For healing, I makes no difference.

Fatesinger gets outclassed on all areas, DPS, survivability, CC and even buffing. It's really no competition.

[Aashrym]

We're talking a different level of useful. Sure it's better than no destiny at all, but when looking at damage output, where 3 bards with no destiny deal at all deal about as much damage as 2 with fatesinger.. they do about as much as just 1 with fury. Tripling is no exaggeration, I'd say quadrupling is more accurate.
When looking at survivability, 100 HP is a LOT. fatesinger would need to drop STR by 8 to equal this.
One of the fatesinger's best abiilties was the no-save hold which deals about 1000 damage... except the cooldown isn't 6 seconds like on fury. :-/ Fury is about the best CC in the game. In a party, getting everything helpless adds way more to your party members' damage output than the minor buffs of fatesinger. But the primal scream alone is a better buff than all the additions to your songs.
For healing, I makes no difference.

Fatesinger gets outclassed on all areas, DPS, survivability, CC and even buffing. It's really no competition.

Yeah, I'm not feeling the whole 1/3 damage on my fatesinger compared to when he was in fury. Your "best CC in the game" is dependent on using adrenaline with limited uses and limited regeneration when I can just as soon use fascinate ability for entire rooms much more often or easily, otto's IR single targets, and possibly use siren's. The helplessness is nice but it's still a limited ability. While I was in fury I was using fascinates and otto's IR's for CC most of the time.

Chord of disruption does more than 1k damage as well. The base average is 1250 plus change. The massive CON damage building up to that point can be nice, and sonic vulnerability from attacking during the mezz boosts the damage up more. It's not the best ability, however. The sonic vulnerability is because is amplifies several sonic damage bonuses including reign and turn the tide, and various weapons.

Turn the tide isn't as good as unbridled fury against some enemies but grim fate is nice choice and works on the same concept as IC; the more players using it the better it is. Turn the tide does the bonus damage on every hit, however, is amplified by sonic vulnerability, does some nice damage, and lasts longer than unbridled fury while requiring no counter to fill.

Also, primal scream doesn't stack with the rage spell, so the bonus is smaller, and +2 IC reasonably equivalent in damage benefit. That's ignoring how easy it is to twist in.

More hitpoints would be nice, but I think I like more songs better. Needing to drop STR significantly for CON when Grandeur gives a stacking +3 to damage (as in 6 STR) makes that point less impacting even if I were to have room for more CON.

Healing is not the same. There is spell power in fatesinger and caster levels for mass cures because those cap high. 25% caster level loss on the base number is amplified out through other effects and the 16-18% rough impact could get over 100 hit points on average difference after spell power and healing amp are considered on a MCMW for healing focused bards.

When you say "useful" you mean "more dps" and that would be pretty hard to argue but fatesinger is more useful than you seem to think.