Bard Question

[Rattle Squirrell]

So i was thinking of starting to do some kiting again on my bard.

Is there a list of zones that won't pull so much heat from the players to go to ?


Don't wanna get flamed the moment I try to kite lol

[iruinedyourday]

you're already pulling heat right now bro

[Daldaen]

There are very few zones bards can AE kite due to mob Runspeed, amount of open space, size of mob hitboxs a and prevalence of casters.

18-24 East Karana
18-25 Overthere
25-30 South Karana
30-50 Overthere
50-55 Burning Woods

99% of all complaining occurs in Overthere. The thing those people neglect to mention is a the Sarnak casters, tigers and rhinos the bards don't pull. Plus... OT is really a kiter zone if you're grouping there, you should try another zone.

[Juryiel]

Loio is good mid/high 20s to 32 or so as well
FV is a good alternative to Overthere, and can be good up to 46 or so, even though a lot of stuff is green by then (sooooo many drovlargs in such a small space and almost no one killing them). The level range is basically comparable, people say hitboxes are larger and that is probably true but it's still easily doable since the difference is relatively small.

Doesn't matter where you go though (except possibly FV), if you have more than 5 mobs someone will surely yell at you in OOC at some point.

[Destron]

Ignore the hate, people who level in these zones need to recognize how many zones a bard can do this in vs how many groups or other soloers have available to them.

Embrace the darkness, let the hate flow out of you.

[fahlen]

Just be courteous man. Stay away from areas that people are clearly set up at or pulling from. And tell them they're welcome to pull from your swarm if mobs are scarce.

[Daldaen]

Just be courteous man. Stay away from areas that people are clearly set up at or pulling from. And tell them they're welcome to pull from your swarm if mobs are scarce.

This sort of. People need to realize bards do this is maybe 3-5 zones.

There are SOOO MANY other zones where literally any killing style EXCEPT AE kiting work, yet they would prefer to complain than find a better location to kill.

[indiscriminate_hater]

seriously, people will always find a way to bitch at you even if you're not impacting them at all. the good part about this is that it tends to be bad players who are the ones making the unfounded complaints. let this act as a natural filter for those you choose to group with later.

start with misty thicket until 7 or so, then hit up south ro until you're high enough for east karana. SK/OT until 31

firiona vie is excellent 31-46, has the most mob density and least amount of competition from other bards. dreadlands has some good potential with chickens and drolvargs up to 51 but the terrain is rough.


burning woods can get you to 60 - it slows down a bit 55+, but stick with pulling skellies, gorillas, and bees from the northern half of the zone. TD raptors are good too but you're guaranteed to piss someone off there

[Rattle Squirrell]

When you say 50-55 burning woods. Is 55 really where it stops ?

[iruinedyourday]

This sort of. People need to realize bards do this is maybe 3-5 zones.

There are SOOO MANY other zones where literally any killing style EXCEPT AE kiting work, yet they would prefer to complain than find a better location to kill.

Though this was my initial feeling when people would complain. I would ask myself, "wtf they leveling in OT anwyay this place sucks for xp" and then that good guy voice of reason in my head would say, "dude come on maybe they leveld here when they were 12 and they are doing what you are doing, re-living that game they missed for the last 15 years, of course its their right to be here."

So at that point I would do my best not to interfere as much as possible.

Then they would call me a bunch of ethnic slurs and i would say fuck it and be on my merry way kiting without remorse.

le sigh..

[iruinedyourday]

When you say 50-55 burning woods. Is 55 really where it stops ?

no it stops like after 3 or 4 pulls at 50 when you decide that its just not worth it to bard kite anymore because fuck burning woods.

[indiscriminate_hater]

no it stops like after 3 or 4 pulls at 50 when you decide that its just not worth it to bard kite anymore because fuck burning woods.

eh it ain't too bad. sarnak fortress area is legit because it's huge and flat, you just gotta avoid roamers. i kind of preferred the extra challenge, it kept it from getting too boring

[Juryiel]

no it stops like after 3 or 4 pulls at 50 when you decide that its just not worth it to bard kite anymore because fuck burning woods.

This.

eh it ain't too bad. sarnak fortress area is legit because it's huge and flat, you just gotta avoid roamers. i kind of preferred the extra challenge, it kept it from getting too boring

It's not the terrain or the roamers, at that point mobs have enough HPs to where rhythmically tapping 'turn right' for that long without a break becomes a serious annoyance to me (though, I did my 3 kites at 46 so maybe the 48 dot makes things better). I'll probably still do it every so often, but nowhere near as often as I've AoE kited other levels for hours on end.

[Daldaen]

Adding in a PBAEer in BW may be worthwhile just to speed up kites and reduce the time you're tap turning. There is also the perk if the person you're teaming up with is a 50 cleric who can Rez you should you explode.

[iruinedyourday]

for me its the horrible humm of those wasps... the 45 minuet kite gather.. the 20 minuet dps kite...

...

...I just threw up a little sorry.

rofl respect to the lvl 60 bard.

But - I would not mind duoing with a 54 bard in BW... The solo circle kite was just the worst for me personally.

Adding in a PBAEer in BW may be worthwhile just to speed up kites and reduce the time you're tap turning. There is also the perk if the person you're teaming up with is a 50 cleric who can Rez you should you explode.

true dat

[Destron]

I kited to 50. Then grouped to 60. I did mix in some kiting post 50 but for the most part I was grouping.

If you kite to 60, no one is going to know you. You aren't going to have any connections, which help when finding a group.

The bard group game is a ton of fun, don't miss out on that.

[Kekephee]

Just be courteous man. Stay away from areas that people are clearly set up at or pulling from. And tell them they're welcome to pull from your swarm if mobs are scarce.

This. The only way you're NOT going to bring down the hate upon yourself is if you go out of your way not to be a dick. And even then, people will still just assume shit. I always pulled micro-pulls, never more than like 15 or 20 mobs at a time, from the dumbest BFE parts of zones where no one went, and I still got hate tells because people are sheep who see other people hate bards and think that's what everyone does. Hell, even at 60, every single time I ever go into OT or FV without pulling a single mob, 100% of the time I always get a tell from someone shrieking about how I'm taking all the mobs and I need to get out and let other people exp. Then when I tell them I'm not even pulling anything, they get all paranoid and accuse me of lying.

When you say 50-55 burning woods. Is 55 really where it stops ?

It gets to be more trouble than it's worth. After 55 most of the stuff in BW is going to be green, and since the mobs take forever to die and have huge hit boxes, there are tons of casters everywhere that you have to deal with, it's just a huge hassle for a ton of green mobs. You can still do it all the way to 60, but eventually it gets to a point where you may as well just be grouping. And well before that point even comes, you have learned to hate AE kiting with every ounce of your being, because you can only spend so many hours running in circles clicking a macro and periodically lagging and dying instantly before it begins to take a toll on your mind.


There are very few zones bards can AE kite due to mob Runspeed, amount of open space, size of mob hitboxs a and prevalence of casters.

18-24 East Karana
18-25 Overthere
25-30 South Karana
30-50 Overthere
50-55 Burning Woods

99% of all complaining occurs in Overthere. The thing those people neglect to mention is a the Sarnak casters, tigers and rhinos the bards don't pull. Plus... OT is really a kiter zone if you're grouping there, you should try another zone.

Add FoB, FV, Nro, NK, and Oasis in there as less-common but entirely possible bard kiting areas. If you're really good you can also do it in WW, but I gave up on that pretty quickly myself because there are no open spaces and it was too much hassle to dodge trees. Also I kept getting lost. You'll have to really watch yourself in FoB, Nro, and Oasis, because there are so many low-level toons grinding there, and especially in Nro there are so few mobs. People will be very easily upset.

[tanknspank]

Add FoB, FV, Nro, NK, and Oasis in there as less-common but entirely possible bard kiting areas. If you're really good you can also do it in WW, but I gave up on that pretty quickly myself because there are no open spaces and it was too much hassle to dodge trees. Also I kept getting lost. You'll have to really watch yourself in FoB, Nro, and Oasis, because there are so many low-level toons grinding there, and especially in Nro there are so few mobs. People will be very easily upset.
Any suggestions for pre-18 levels that won't step on people's toes? I have a little bard I did kobolds in SF (at a very very late hour when noone was in the zone) with. Not a char I play often, but sometimes bard AE kiting is a welcome change of pace from grouping / charming / rotting with my other chars.

[Getsmurfed]

I kited to 50. Then grouped to 60. I did mix in some kiting post 50 but for the most part I was grouping.

If you kite to 60, no one is going to know you. You aren't going to have any connections, which help when finding a group.


Verified, 60 bard here as well, my first EQ char to 60 and first time EVER playing EQ has been here on my bard. It's going to be hard to find groups unless you make your own, or if you've got an active guild. But once you get in with the current "crowd" of people in the area you'll find groups easier. Mix it up and get XP the way you want to. If you spend all your time LFG and not getting groups, or if you spend all your time kiting you're going to want to quit either way. The hybrid penalty isn't too bad 50-54 but once you get into 55 and beyond it really starts to hurt. Find another bard to kite with and you'll be golden. I levelled with Jete and in about 12 hrs of kiting we banged out nearly 60% of 59-60 for him. I got into HS west and grinded for about 12 hrs on Sat, then 6-8hrs on Sunday and got 59-60 in 2 days.

EDIT: Granted when I was doing HS west with a group I had it stacked with 3-4 dps and a healer. I was tanking / pulling / ccing all myself which greatly sped up the process. I don't want to think how many completed clears we had =x

[Kekephee]

Any suggestions for pre-18 levels that won't step on people's toes? I have a little bard I did kobolds in SF (at a very very late hour when noone was in the zone) with. Not a char I play often, but sometimes bard AE kiting is a welcome change of pace from grouping / charming / rotting with my other chars.

If you want to AE kite pre-18, with the caveat that pre-18 AE kiting is its own entirely different animal because the pre-18 PBAOE has a shorter range than the 18 one (so it's a lot harder) you can pretty much do it in any of the noob zones other than Innothule because there's always big open space in all of them. Misty Thicket would be good. Both Commons are good. Like I said, Nro and Oasis. If it were me, I would do FoB until like...10? I think you can actually do FoB into your teens but I don't really know. Or, if you don't want to go all the way out there, Steamfont until around 8-10 and move to EC, EC until around 12 and move to Nro, Nro until around 15 or 16 and move to Oasis, Oasis until around 18-20 and move to SK, SK until around 28-30 and move to LOIO for just a couple levels, then to OT, and from there your options are pretty much limited to OT-DL-BW with slight deviation.


There's overlap between zones, which is good. Too many people in SK, you move to LOIO for a while. Too many people in LOIO, try a little OT. You don't always have to pull 100 mobs. You can do pulls with 8 mobs and that's still twice as good as quadding. People think a zone is shut out to them because there's only 15 mobs up that con black to them so they have to move to the next zone where there's 100 yellows, then they get pissy because some other bard is taking those 100 yellows. You have to understand that every other bard on this server is now your brother, but they are also competition, your enemy, your anathema, and you're better off avoiding them by finding someplace where they aren't than crashing into them and arguing and training each other over that sweet, sweet OT cornucopia.

[Kekephee]

Deajay wrote a guide that I used while I was levelling up. It's really good. My only beef with it was that I couldn't deal with all the tree-dodging in WW. I mostly grouped my way through the levels, so I skipped a few of these places, but other than WW it looks to all be legit.

http://wiki.project1999.com/Deajay%27s_AoE_Bard_Leveling_Location_Guide

[sox7d]

I'm really surprised that the sentiment here is, "you 18 people grouping here can/should just move to another zone because 2-3 people can/want to kite."

[Getsmurfed]

http://wiki.project1999.com/Deajay%27s_AoE_Bard_Leveling_Location_Guide

Pretty damn good basic guide to levels / location. There's a lot of other hidden gems that aren't listed here, just do some roaming.

[Juryiel]

I'm really surprised that the sentiment here is, "you 18 people grouping here can/should just move to another zone because 2-3 people can/want to kite."

That's because you're reading it from your biased perspective.

18 people with a billion zone choices to exp in
2-3 people with 10 zone choices to kite in

Also I don't think anyone is saying so-and-so should move. Anyone is welcome to stay in OT and compete with bards for spawns or try to work out a compromise. Bards are not the ones who care about that, given that they have a huge upper-hand in that competition. It's other people who are saying bards shouldn't AE kite in places.

But bards won't stop AE kiting, you can get multiple levels a day doing that with fairly little play time. You should take that as a given, and work from there to find a solution. The alternative is the equivalent of banging your head against a brick wall and thinking the wall will break before your head does.

[Getsmurfed]

I'm really surprised that the sentiment here is, "you 18 people grouping here can/should just move to another zone because 2-3 people can/want to kite."

Maybe if you 18 people didn't hate on hybrids so hard to the point that you don't even invite them. And then when the hybrids you don't invite try to earn their xp like everyone else in the game by using the tools handed them, you then traverse to the like one zone in 300 that is so ideal for kiting.

[sox7d]

That's because you're reading it from your biased perspective.

18 people with a billion zone choices to exp in
2-3 people with 10 zone choices to kite in


A billion zone choices, but OT is more ideal than many, many spots.


Also I don't think anyone is saying so-and-so should move.


page 1



But bards won't stop AE kiting, you can get multiple levels a day doing that with fairly little play time. You should take that as a given, and work from there to find a solution. The alternative is the equivalent of banging your head against a brick wall and thinking the wall will break before your head does.

Or make threads till the admins do something about bullshit like that. There have already been quite a few non-classic measures implemented to solve unfair/monopolizing players.

Maybe if you 18 people didn't hate on hybrids so hard to the point that you don't even invite them. And then when the hybrids you don't invite try to earn their xp like everyone else in the game by using the tools handed them, you then traverse to the like one zone in 300 that is so ideal for kiting.

I play a ranger and a paladin, but that doesn't matter. I've also never, ever, ever, ever heard "don't get a bard, they're not worth the penalty." A bard is spending just as much LFG time as any other non-hybrid.

Rofl at the "I'll exact my revenge on a world that turned its back on me" angle.

[Juryiel]

A billion zone choices, but OT is more ideal than many, many spots.




Sounds spoiled to me. You want to stop other people's form of fairly unique exping so you can exp by your 'ideal' method even though you have many other similarly viable methods and they don't? Good luck with that. But in general arguments of "you should decrease your exp-rate by 20x so that I can exp more lazily" won't get you very far.


page 1


Your interpretation of page 1 is bad. As I said, people CAN leave if they don't like bards in OT and it would even benefit them to do so, or they can stay and compete with bards. Bards don't care if you stay and try to compete with them and in fact most of the time they will accommodate your poor decision to stay in a sub-par grouping zone.



Or make threads till the admins do something about bullshit like that. There have already been quite a few non-classic measures implemented to solve unfair/monopolizing players.



Could be a fine solution. Rather than making anti-bard crying posts people should ask the GMs to make these changes directly, and the GMs can make a decision as they see fit. As long as bards can AE kite, they will, so complaining about them doing it is a poor method to get anything done other than increasing your own frustration. Just ask the GMs for your changes and abide by their decision.

[indiscriminate_hater]

Or make threads till the admins do something about bullshit like that. There have already been quite a few non-classic measures implemented to solve unfair/monopolizing players.


Read: "cry about classic mechanics that don't benefit me until someone changes it"

You must have gone far in life

[Getsmurfed]

To be honest, I don't even know why I'm arguing this. I'm a 60 bard and haven't kited for over a year! I'm a recovered addict, but I'll never be completely over my addiction. I must always stay strong. You guys crack me up. Level however suits you.

[Ciroco]

OT is sub-par? There are good reasons why people group there instead of dungeons, and nostalgia isn't one of them.

[sox7d]

Read: "cry about classic mechanics that don't benefit me until someone changes it"

You must have gone far in life

If classic mechanics directly and negatively impact the playability of a significant number of players then they should be changed.

You might as well say training should be legal since it's a classic mechanic and gets you access to more mobs while denying other people experience.

[iruinedyourday]

OT is for cowards

[indiscriminate_hater]

If classic mechanics directly and negatively impact the playability of a significant number of players then they should be changed.

opinion noted

[Champion_Standing]

Already have my petition typed up just waiting for OP to start kiting.

[Kekephee]

OT is for cowards

Back in my day, you endured the gauntlet or you weren't a man. Times have changed. It used to be bard-on-bard, a warzone of intersecting trains, groups of mobs splitting off from groups of mobs to go across the zone and hit the other guy whose hp had dropped because he'd turned too sharply into the front of his train. Chaos. Bloodshed. No one was safe. Game OThrones.


Antonin knows, he and I killed each other so many times. But we had a much more amicable bard relationship than either of us had with most of the other prominent bards at the time. Like who was that half elf chick who was the big EC trader and used to sell group proxy PL, sac herself down, sell the EEs, and use all that money for RMT? Does anyone remember her name? She was originally Krazie I think, got banned for RMT, started this bard, probably got banned for RMT again. Man she was a pain in the ass. Thought every mob in the zone was hers. She would send me bitchy tells if she zoned in after me and I was killing mobs, because OT was HERS damn it. I'm sure she's still around, but learned to keep her fucking mouth shut because she had such a high profile that everyone knew her as that horrible RMT bitch and no one would do business with her/she probably got banned again.

[slappytwotoes]

Back in my day, you endured the gauntlet or you weren't a man. Times have changed. It used to be bard-on-bard, a warzone of intersecting trains, groups of mobs splitting off from groups of mobs to go across the zone and hit the other guy whose hp had dropped because he'd turned too sharply into the front of his train. Chaos. Bloodshed. No one was safe. Game OThrones.


Antonin knows, he and I killed each other so many times. But we had a much more amicable bard relationship than either of us had with most of the other prominent bards at the time. Like who was that half elf chick who was the big EC trader and used to sell group proxy PL, sac herself down, sell the EEs, and use all that money for RMT? Does anyone remember her name? She was originally Krazie I think, got banned for RMT, started this bard, probably got banned for RMT again. Man she was a pain in the ass. Thought every mob in the zone was hers. She would send me bitchy tells if she zoned in after me and I was killing mobs, because OT was HERS damn it. I'm sure she's still around, but learned to keep her fucking mouth shut because she had such a high profile that everyone knew her as that horrible RMT bitch and no one would do business with her/she probably got banned again.

That's some pent up rage brah

[Kekephee]

That's some pent up rage brah

You have no idea how many fucking times I had to deal with this skillless waste of pixels, running around in a singing steel bp and no other gear at level 40, making millions and millions of platinum every day that mysteriously disappeared because it sure as fuck wasn't going to gearing her, killing me with her poorly managed trains or bothering me day in and day out because I made the unfortunate choice to exp on mobs that she wanted to eat and turn into money.



I'd forgotten she existed for a year and now the memory of her has returned to my life and I'm fucking upset

[iruinedyourday]

Back in my day, you endured the gauntlet or you weren't a man. Times have changed. It used to be bard-on-bard, a warzone of intersecting trains, groups of mobs splitting off from groups of mobs to go across the zone and hit the other guy whose hp had dropped because he'd turned too sharply into the front of his train. Chaos. Bloodshed. No one was safe. Game OThrones.


Antonin knows, he and I killed each other so many times. But we had a much more amicable bard relationship than either of us had with most of the other prominent bards at the time. Like who was that half elf chick who was the big EC trader and used to sell group proxy PL, sac herself down, sell the EEs, and use all that money for RMT? Does anyone remember her name? She was originally Krazie I think, got banned for RMT, started this bard, probably got banned for RMT again. Man she was a pain in the ass. Thought every mob in the zone was hers. She would send me bitchy tells if she zoned in after me and I was killing mobs, because OT was HERS damn it. I'm sure she's still around, but learned to keep her fucking mouth shut because she had such a high profile that everyone knew her as that horrible RMT bitch and no one would do business with her/she probably got banned again.

My favorite thing to do in bard on bard kite wars is to tag a mob in their kite because I had a feeling they were gona flop. And when they did you got their kite! Free mobs. Only once did this end badly for me.

[indiscriminate_hater]

Back in my day, you endured the gauntlet or you weren't a man. Times have changed. It used to be bard-on-bard, a warzone of intersecting trains, groups of mobs splitting off from groups of mobs to go across the zone and hit the other guy whose hp had dropped because he'd turned too sharply into the front of his train. Chaos. Bloodshed. No one was safe. Game OThrones.


Antonin knows, he and I killed each other so many times. But we had a much more amicable bard relationship than either of us had with most of the other prominent bards at the time. Like who was that half elf chick who was the big EC trader and used to sell group proxy PL, sac herself down, sell the EEs, and use all that money for RMT? Does anyone remember her name? She was originally Krazie I think, got banned for RMT, started this bard, probably got banned for RMT again. Man she was a pain in the ass. Thought every mob in the zone was hers. She would send me bitchy tells if she zoned in after me and I was killing mobs, because OT was HERS damn it. I'm sure she's still around, but learned to keep her fucking mouth shut because she had such a high profile that everyone knew her as that horrible RMT bitch and no one would do business with her/she probably got banned again.

Nocturne's bard, i forgot the toon's name though. that guy would massacre people in DL. he would wipe out every fifth pull and everyone leveling near KC would die from the swarm of shit that trained over them earlier

[Kekephee]

SONAA, HER NAME WAS SONAA



I don't know where I got Krazie from, but that was wrong.



http://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=100149&highlight=sonaa

[Glenzig]

If classic mechanics directly and negatively impact the playability of a significant number of players then they should be changed.

You might as well say training should be legal since it's a classic mechanic and gets you access to more mobs while denying other people experience.

So now we shouldn't AOE Chardok, Poopsock raid mobs, kill guards (cause they might have been able to save that newbie), quad kite raptors, or seafuries, offer MQ services? Because I'm pretty sure people whine and complain about all those things negatively impacting them also. Where do you draw the line?

[Kekephee]

So now we shouldn't AOE Chardok, Poopsock raid mobs, kill guards (cause they might have been able to save that newbie), quad kite raptors, or seafuries, offer MQ services? Because I'm pretty sure people whine and complain about all those things negatively impacting them also. Where do you draw the line?

People draw the line when there's only one class that benefits from it and it's not theirs. There are far too many wizards, enchanters, clerics, monks, and necros for whom Chardok is bread and butter for the popular opinion ever to be that it needs to go away. But no one cares about bards but bards and that makes it ok.

[iruinedyourday]

People draw the line when there's only one class that benefits from it and it's not theirs. There are far too many wizards, enchanters, clerics, monks, and necros for whom Chardok is bread and butter for the popular opinion ever to be that it needs to go away. But no one cares about bards but bards and that makes it ok.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/theatermove.gif

[Flotsam]

This bard hate seems strange to me. Back in 2000, when I was levelling my ranger from 30-39 in OT (because it was easier than dungeons; we all knew it was a slightly soft option, and EQ was short of soft options), I never once recall being troubled by a bard kite, nor do I recall anyone ever hating bards.

I certainly recall the ranger jokes ("Quick, heal the ranger- it's raining!"), but I was never in a group that considered the hybrid penalty an issue, and rangers were always useful as outdoor pullers, of course.

What is going on here? Was Quellious back then just nicer than other servers? I somehow doubt that.

[Champion_Standing]

I hate bards, one time a bard joined my group then just went AFK with the heal song on. Oh wait...that's every time a bard joins my group.

[Valdarious]

I personally don't ever remember seeing bards kiting stuff back on live. I don't think they thought that much outside the box back then. Not sure when that started.

[Juryiel]

I hate bards, one time a bard joined my group then just went AFK with the heal song on. Oh wait...that's every time a bard joins my group.

But he was still probably contributing the most, increasing the group's exp rate more than anyone else by not taking all the mobs for AE.

[Flotsam]

I personally don't ever remember seeing bards kiting stuff back on live. I don't think they thought that much outside the box back then. Not sure when that started.

I guess you are right. I saw it a bit, but I seem to recall people being more annoyed about druids and maybe quad-kiting wizzies.

I suppose by the time I had my own bard, it was because my guild needed a bard for raids, and so I was always grouped, except for charm kiting VT shards for people, because it was easier solo than with a group.