More Bard Questions
 

So Dramor has reached the vaunted level 47. He's actually still pretty good at this level, but I'm definitely having some problems with a few things.

#1. Multiple mobs absolutely fuck me up. On Loraen this isn't such a big problem because I cast color flux (1.5 second cast time) followed by AE mez. I would regularly ivu pull 3-4 HS south mobs to one of the "safe" spots in HS and kill them without problems. On Dramor my mez is 3 seconds. That just doesn't cut it with multiple hasted mobs on me. As a side note, is it classic that bash interrupts casting even when it doesn't stun? That seems weird and pretty annoying.

#2. Related to #1, how do you recharm stuff? I have a GamTextTrigger that tells me which tick it is, but that's still a 6 second window. I kind of keep casting charm (and recasting it when it gets down to 1.5s or so) but in general I feel it doesn't work that well. Also the 20 mana cost of the new charm really sucks. Or I am just fucked there until FT items?

#3. The bard stacking on resists seems really funny. Guardian Rhythms stacks with the Psalm line so I can boost MR to insane values (even without the drum) but the Psalms don't stack with each other (I guess for damage shield purposes?) but I was hoping I could stack Mystic Shielding with the other ones and I can't (and I don't see why? They don't conflict with anything.

#4. Has anyone ever tried just using a lute rather than weapons? Obviously if you have the epic then whatever, but with a nice 2.5x modifier you could twist a 5-songer Snare/Shield of Songs/Haste/Cantata/Shield of Songs. That's 30hp/tick as well as 2 50 point runes every 2.5 ticks, so 40 points of Rune per tick. Speaking of which does anyone use Shield of Songs? It feels like it might be pretty strong although not stacking with Nivs really sucks.

#5. Am I the only one that uses Syvelian's Dispell? In fact I don't think anyone dispells shit (I certainly haven't on Loraen) but I'm realizing everything in SolB is 30-40% hasted and dispelling that haste makes a huge, huge difference in how badly I get beat up.

#6. Am I the only one that fears all mobs at ~40%? Maybe this doesn't work as well at higher levels? But it seems to be the only reasonable way to kill the Kobold shamans.

#7. Targeting can get so fucking annoying on a bard. The problem is stuff gets slightly pushed into the walls and my client won't tab target. Do you guys have any suggestions?

#8. Do other bards have macros for mez and charm? I tried them but the amount of spam they generated (between missed notes and bashes) was just unholy

try another class heh

... Zanderr is in your guild and he has always been really helpful to me.... Send him a tell!

#6 have you tried to mez-lock casters versus fearing? It should interrupt and prevent mob from running all over hell. Not sure if it works well on 99, but I used it on live. This was especially huge for gating mobs in Velks and DN.

Swarm kite my dude!

#6
 

I use the Mez/-MR song...pixie strike? to interrupt casters/healing. has worked for me.

However, if you dont cast it until you see the blue heal pixels, it's usually too late and they get the heal off.

bards can't solo all that well if you're not fear/swarm/chant kiting

low hp, poor defensive skills, no double attack

Your sig fucks with my formatting so I'm blocking you. fyi

#1: Your PBAOE mez only gets worse with level. The mez is supposed to be less effective on higher level mobs, but the way it was implemented on P99 is that the song gets less effective the higher level the bard caster, not the NPC recipient. I don't agree with this implementation, but do not have any evidence to the contrary. This was done to combat zone-wide mezzing in Fear and more-so KC. Yes, songs (and spells) can be interrupted without actually stunning the player, this is classic. Its the same way PC 'kicks' suddenly start interrupting at L55.

#2: You get a super-human feel for it. I typically get 5 songs in between charms. So where my normal twist is four songs, I charm (song #1), sing 4 more songs, and then recharm. The mob is usually uncharmed for <1 second. This is different than non-mezzing/charming twists, where I just do 4 songs total + click BoH. As for mana intensity of charm, you are still fucked after FT. Classically, FT does not function on bards (http://www.afterlifeguild.org/Thott/retune.php), neither does mana song, clarity, nor medding.

#3: Just learn the quirks. Guardian rhythms stacks with the other resist rhythms, but the AC component of guardian prevents it from stacking with the AC component of Chant of Battle and others. The issue is bard buffs (and debuffs) typically have multiple functions, if one of those functions conflicts, the rest of the buff doesn't work. As an example, we're currently in an era where root and snare do not stack, which sucks for bards whose slow is tied to snare and cannot slow/snare when someone's rooted the mob.

#4: I typically use weapons in a group unless I'm the only melee, then I'll ask the group to root and I'll DoT. I haven't done true parses, but I just feel my melee DPS is about on par with DoT DPS (for solo targets), but if I can't put up full DoTs because I am hasting other groupmembers, I might as well not DoT at all and just melee while buffing the melees.

#5: I do not typically dispel. I feel I don't have the spell slots, but I might reconfigure. (I typically use snare or mez to pull so my two or three pull comes staggered into camp instead of all at once).

#6: Fearing in dungeons is dangerous. You could also chain mez shaman, but then you aren't getting your other songs in.

#7: Click on it with your mouse. Get used to camera angles that maximize your clickability of the camp/kill-zone, even if they make moving slightly more annoying.

#8: I do not announce what I've mezzed/charmed with a macro. I usually pull 2, charm the second that gets to camp and let the tank kill the first. If I pulled 3+, I just manage it quietly. I'm already pressing songs and click-targeting, I don't have time to spam mez messages on songs that fade every 12-18seconds, plus its annoying.

1. Stopped using the pbae around the early to mid 40s - as has been said you'll be lucky if it lasts a tick and you'll be getting crazy resists on it. Multiple mobs fucking you up in dungeons is just how it is for bards - you can control 5 or 6 at a push but you won't get any killing done.

2. Lol, this is true - the four song rule generally works out until you get the hang of it. Once you're a bit higher level you will barely notice the mana aspect when charming in groups unless you die. Then it sucks as mana takes forever to regen.

3. As Falkun says.

4. Depends on what I'm doing in the group - if we're melee heavy and I end up doing the cc/haste/slow/snare/mana/hp regen/str etc. I will probably swap instruments around with a BoH for the click. More regularly if I'm only picking up some of those functions I'll be using my weapons.

5. Depending on what else I'm doing I'll sometimes swap dispell in if a mob that requires it comes into camp. As with Falkun spell slots are generally a bit precious to use with dispell.

6. Fearing in dungeons isn't something I do - risky stuff.

7. If its in a wall just need to click it. I will usually use the mez push to get it out of the wall for easier targeting next time. The direction you are facing relative to the mob will change the direction of the mez push/pull.

8. I don't have announcements in my casting macros but have them in seperate macros and will hit them the first time I mez or charm so the group knows what I'm doing then will recharm/remez without any further spam.