My observations on Bards

[gavijal]

join date : feb 2011

Whats your statement with that? That i only play this game for 7 months? You are prolly one of those guys who also take kill count as dps meter.I have lvl 20 sorc, and few mid lvls . And u can be noob and ****** after 7trs if you are born like that

[Daerius of the Blessed Blades]

Two issues I saw in this thread, and this bard's comments...

(1) Bards? Who needs the buffs? Smart players will proudly say I DO!
The original poster mentioned groups not waiting for bard songs in Epic. Any player in Epic that things bard songs aren't welcome ought to get a quick invitation to your do-not-group list. That's silly.

Epic mobs have tons of hit points. Sure, your barb/fighter/(insert your kewl melee build of teh week (BOTW) here) may do some great damage, and hit on most sings. Hooray for you. But even a bard without maxed-out Inspire Courage Damage Enhancements should be able to add at LEAST 3-5 points of damage per swing, per weapon. Take a party of 3-4 melees swinging at Epic mobs, and it adds up. They go down significantly quicker.

But let's assume you don't care.... longer living mobs means your kewl fighter/monk/pally BOTW gets to see big numbers more, and work on your uber twitch skills, right? Uh, not exactly. The longer mobs are alive, the more damage they do, the more the clerics have to waste spell points, and the more resources other party members use on crowd control, etc. It's just as thoughtless as the stereotype of the Barbarian charging ahead, getting whacked and typing HJEALSSS!!!1!! the whole time. It demonstrates to me that the player is focused on your success and not the party's.

That being said, there's no need for the party to wait in most cases. Bards can play on the run. Most bards at endgame have more songs than they'll ever use. Play em again if you missed someone. Keep' em buffed and understand your role.

Which leads me to Issue #2

(2) Random PUG player doesn't respect the need for the bard.
The bard is a unique character in D&D and DDO. They don't do ANY key skill (heal/buff/CC/fight) better than any other class. But they do them all above average. Sure, Fascinate has a high chance to succeed. But it's not as effective as Hold Monster, Otto's, etc, because glancing blows, AoE spells, etc awaken them.

Video game players want to see big numbers. Casters want to see 4 digits on their spell damage, fighters want to see lots of big numbers on damage, etc. Bards are never going to be the "star" of the party (except for my Virtuoso that time vs. the Beholders in epic VoN3...but I digress). Many players play bards, and when they find that they don't lead in the kill counts, their fascinates aren't always effective (hello, CC spells and glancing blows?), and that they can't really heal as good as a full cleric, they give up. Often, this is accompanied by the "if I don't like the bard, they must suck' philosophy that you've apparently seen. Several of my guildees hate playing bards. But they respect them because of what I bring to the table, and are glad when I show up with mine.

Also, for those who have played the game for a while, there were a few popular bard builds "Back in the Day" that focused on haggle and other non-combat skills vs. more practical feats and enhancements. I would argue that these haggle bards did as much to taint the reputation of bards early in the games history as events like the previous paragraph did. A server full of gimped bards looking to level fast so you can save 50gp when you repair didn't do much for the classes reputation, and I think that stereotype lingers.

So what do you do? Play the best bard you can, plan your character for what YOU want to specialize in, and join a top-notch guild. Leave the Puggers who reject you behind... you don't need 'em, anyway.

[Ryan220]

Agreed! When I hear that white boy playing that funky music I come a running!

I always am glad to see a bard in any group I'm in. (And my next alt is a Bard for sure!)

Whenever my Chanter is feeling lonely in a quest I just strike up a tune and 99% of the time the group comes running over.

Inspire this, Ironskin that - nope, I just call them my 'make instant friends' songs

Bard love

[jandhaer]

standing still is not an option for me and the many powergamers i play with, we have x amount of time to play so we make the most of it, MOVE THOSE FEET while you buff thats just not bards but anyone who cares enough to throw some out for the group, run jump cast, run jump cast not hard :P

[gavijal]

Its not problem with running and playing songs, but if 45 sec on start makes so huge difference , then that's not a game..that's work, and I'm here for playing, not working, showing how uber I am, just playing and relaxing from my work. I'm playing d&d since ages ago, played WoW when it was still vanilla and never understood POWER GAMING. Rush is for work hours . Point of my post was just to preview some ppl who never played Bards what 2 expect.

[BangsLiekWhoa]

Bard is a class where you can be under appreciated. For me, that's ok. I know what I brought to the party even if i don't have the top kill count, etc.

You can't be worried about the size of your e-peen and how you think it will grow if you have the top kill count or the party's praise for healing/buffing them. Bards have gotten a bad name I think, as stated above, because of the hagglebot generation of bards that came through and because of bards who think they just need to sing a couple songs then pike.

Bards are very diverse and you never know what kind of bard you will get when you take one into your party, but there are a lot of great bards around that can do all aspects of the class really well and those are the ones you are glad you brought with you. Good players will notice a good bard in the party when they have one. They will notice the extra damage your songs add when all the mobs are going down faster than normal.

Just don't worry so much about being noticed or handed SP potions, rather spend your time enjoying playing your bard. They are great fun to play, and if you play your bard really well people will notice.

[Kmnh]

Inspire courage and inspire reckslessness are amazing, and they can be played one right after the other. It takes about 10 seconds, and hey make everything die faster. Running away from those is stupid.

Inspire greatness is only useful if your party is undergeared - it doesn't stack with spectral gloves or any crafted +2/+4 to-hit items. The dr 5/- song is cute, but not that much useful. the rest of the songs are caster buffs or saves buffs, you don't need to wait for those. Zerg ahead


I love playing my bard.

[jandhaer]

standing still is not an option for me and the many powergamers i play with, we have x amount of time to play so we make the most of it, MOVE THOSE FEET while you buff thats just not bards but anyone who cares enough to throw some out for the group, run jump cast, run jump cast not hard :P

really neg rep for this... so lame

[Rydin_Dirtay]

really neg rep for this... so lame

Apparently, we have someone who lacks brain matter griefing this thread, because I got negged for this:

Yeah, if all you ever zerg are Dhakaan runs.

You run Sins on elite and you will get a faster smoother completion WAITING for all the buffs, than not waiting. You can say that about lots of other at-level runs in the game, Blockade Buster elite at level, I'll take everything I can get to avoid a 220 hp Delayed Blast Fireball.

Oh, and +1 to counter your undeserved neg rep jandhaer.

[voodoogroves]

I had the pleasure of doing some House D epics the other night with a small guild. Two clerics from their guild, me on a pseudo-gimp rogue assassin, one of their rogues (monk splash assassin) ... and a Virtuoso.

We did 2 epics - Tide Turns and Spies in the House.

In some ways, it reminded me of brief forays into permadeath - we were slow, calculating, precise. Only, we weren't that slow due to the 2 rogues. Drow sorcerer? Song of Capering, 2x assasination attempts, sneak-attack to death otherwise. Big room? Fascinate them all, we start on one end and one at a time the other rogue and I just beat them down. Undead? Got a song for that. Constructs? Got a song for that.


It was a much different pace of play, but it was incredibly refreshing to see. I'm a huge bard fan, and that set up was just rock solid and awesome.