More Bard Questions

[Splorf22]

Thanks for the tips guys!

[kaleran]

If you ever find yourself in a group with another Bard (it happens....sometimes...) and have decent single pulls/room to operate, don't forget that most/all of the Bards DoT's stack with one-another. All of the single target dots + Chords + Denon's + Selo's Chords of Cessation can all be stacked at once. I never reached 59, but Denon's Bereavement might also mix in there. If you swap instruments, you can do some pretty sick DPS (for a bard). Just have to be careful with those AE's.

It also has the side affect of having all those resist debuffs and slow sticking on the mob.

Your actual questions were covered already in well formatted responses. So think of this as a bonus "TIL"

[astuce999]

I know a lot of people have answered your questions already, but I thought I might put in my 2 cents as well.

#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.

>>> The advantage of bards is being able to cast on the run, mez park them while pulling them or snare them on the way back so that they don’t come in all at once.

#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?

Hide works well for me, otherwise it’s all about the feeling.


#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.

Is Reed’s Spreadsheet still around? The stack blocks is all about the “slot” where the buffs or debuffs take effect, in this case it’s highly likely that it’s the AC buff that occupies the same slot on both songs.

#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.

If BoH didn’t exist the case of Shield of Songs could be made successfully. Fun part of being a bard is that depending on group make up, sometimes it’s better to melee, sometimes it’s better to use instruments. It’s some sort of bell curve, if you’re alone use instruments, if with one melee that has good agro use instrument, if the melee has bad agro, use weapons. With two melees use weapons, but with 3 or more melees use instruments 

#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.

Dispelling haste should be a non-factor since any kind of slow will dictate mob attack speed. Dispelling in general when soloing can work well, you mez the mob and dispel it until it dispels the mez, then you know you’ve gotten all the buffs, but in a group setting it’s tough because of the 1 slot dispel at a time that will either force people to wait to use other debuffs, or more likely will still debuff and then you will dispel them.

#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.

Fearing as a bard is an art, and it is a very sharp double-edged sword indoors. You do seem like the type that likes to live on the edge of disaster so I encourage you to try out some stuff. Mez, bellows, bereavement, are also good options if the only goal is to interrupt healers.

#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?

Clicking, assisting, toggle last 2 targets, /target a_kobold…

#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

I don’t even have an inc message. I mean I have the macros for all those things, but I never use them, no time for that nonsense.


'Stuce

[Cords]

I think these are all valid questions, but here is the truth. Dispelling waists time, buffing is great in groups, not so much in swarm kiting, fear kiting, or charm kiting. I never macro my bard in groups, unless the raid requires it. Have fun, you are one of the few classes who can pull a whole zone and live to reap all the exp and loots from it.

[Goseals6]

Question related to twisting.

1) Can you set up a loop macro for group songs or do you have to manually twist gems on hotkeys

2) After being spoiled with /melody on live is/are there anything like this in game currently or in the works? Yes I'm a lazy bard :P

3) Are bards at the point right now pre-PBAOE nerf where they can swarm kite without having to charm/swarm?

that's all for now. I'm anxious to get back into the mass chaos that is the Bard lol

4) I scrounged up enough money to buy a hand drum only to find out I can't even use it (Secondary only) Do I need to wait until lvl 17 for DW or whats the store on using instruments??

[Cords]

1) nope, melody came out after POP, I think way after POP to be honest.

2) no to the whole question.. sorry, believe me melody is my jam

3) the nerf came out around 2009 or so, we are good for a LONG time

4) normal drums start working at 5, and all drums are secondary. I thought you could equip the hand drum at level 1 though it doesn't modify until level 5. but I haven't been your level in a while. Don't forget, even though you may get a skill at a certain level, you may need to go train it to 1 for it to start leveling.

[Barkingturtle]

Originally Posted by Goseals6 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

4) I scrounged up enough money to buy a hand drum only to find out I can't even use it (Secondary only) Do I need to wait until lvl 17 for DW or whats the store on using instruments??

You need to unequip whatever's in your primary. Unless an instrument is listed as primary usable it must be placed in the secondary slot and it takes both hands.

[Goseals6]

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

You need to unequip whatever's in your primary. Unless an instrument is listed as primary usable it must be placed in the secondary slot and it takes both hands.

Yeah derp I didn't think of that. Thanks for the replies!

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

1) nope, melody came out after POP, I think way after POP to be honest.

I meant for a loop /cast gem 1-9 repeats?? I could have swore I remember a /cast gem whatever number then next line /pause 30 or however long it is to cast the song/spell then so on and so forth. I suspect you can just macro one key and set up a list of songs and do it that way? Sorry just trying to keep my hotkeys as clutter free as possible :P

[liveitup1216]

you can make macros that are /stopcast /cast 1 and so on so you can one touch your songs but thats about it

[Goseals6]

Originally Posted by liveitup1216 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

you can make macros that are /stopcast /cast 1 and so on so you can one touch your songs but thats about it

Thanks! Appreciate the infos