Playing a bard without kiting.

[thewrush]

Xenodon,

Creating macro's that let you twist songs with 1 button press instead of 2. That can be easily done by:

/stop
/cast 1 - 8

Also I would like to add by keeping songs you know you're going to twist frequently in the 1,2,3,4 spell gem slots. I also devised another way of organizing songs on the spell bar. My macro's for pushing 1,2,3,4 were spells located in 5,6,7,8 slots but I kept them in the hotbar 1,2,3,4 slots. This way I could alt cast and keep all my buttons like this without having to stretch to push 5,6,7,8. For example:

Hotbar
1 = Anthem De Arms (spell gem slot #5)
2 = Hymn of Restoration (#6)
3 = Jonthan's Whistling Warsong (#7)
4 = Kelin's Lucid Lullaby (#8)

(1) alt + 1 = Selo's Accelerando
(2) alt + 2 = Kelin's Lugubrious Lament
(3) alt + 3 = Guardian Rhythms
(4) alt + 4 = Shauri's Sonorous Clouding
(5) Anthem De Arms
(6) Hymn of Restoration
(7) Jonthan's Whistling Warsong
(8) Kelin's Lucid Lullaby

For the alt + # songs you have to hit them twice... but to me it is better than stretching to hit 5,6,7,8 once. This also creates less macro's on the hotbar if that matters.

Hope this makes sense.

[gildor]

Barding in EQ is no different than managing cooldowns on any other melee class in modern mmos [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] lots of button mashing at the right time

[Stepper]

So I am doing the same thing. I however AE'd the 35 hell level, and am looking to AE 45 as well when I get there.

Bards are a lot of fun in groups when there is no enchanter, and definitely wanted in that case. When a group has an enchanter, which happens pretty frequently, you might not be in high demand, and find yourself doing sub par DPS. But you do bring awesome buffs.

If the group has no enchanter or shaman, you're king. I haven't received any tells asking me if I want to group like I have on tanks or clerics in the past.

I will say, that if you want to group with a bard in the hot spots like Mistmoore and City of Mist, you should definitely have an alt, because you might be waiting for a while to get into a group. I'm personally leveling a druid to stick into Dial a Port eventually.

[Troxx]

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

Barding in EQ is no different than managing cooldowns on any other melee class in modern mmos [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] lots of button mashing at the right time

Exactly.

1-8 for me macros are:

/stopsong
/cast #

9 is Breath of harmony click

0 is just a simple /stopsong

To be honest, the only time I developed wrist pain or hand fatigue was prior to level 42 when i was holding my hand/wrist at awkward angles strafe running and aoe dotting things dead. For general play purposes, you're doing any standard movements and clicking a button every 3 seconds. When you compare that to playing almost ANY class on live EQ (in the modern era with dozens or a hundred or more discs, abilities, aa's and cooldowns) that is a lot fewer keystrokes per unit time.

Once you have intelligent hotkeys set up, playing a bard on p99 shouldn't give you carpal tunnel syndrome.

(2) Also because of this utility, you can duo with almost any other class - and in duo, you will gain xp faster than solo.

I disagree about the 'faster' part. All the way up to 60, after velious launched I could put down 10 mostly dark blue (some high greens) every 15 minutes for the better part of 2-3 hours before I ran out of mana and had to med up. Alternately could put down 6 dark blues and maintain mana. That's between a mob ever 80 seconds and a mob every 130 seconds right in the sweet spot of xp. To this day, I don't know of any other class that can maintain that kind of kill speed and xp over time other than necros (even then that kill speed might be pushing it). Enchanters and necros can solo harder content indoors and have a lot more options. Bards are limited to a few outdoor zones and camps that will take you all the way to 60 (and if they're camped you're out of luck).

Bards will get more xp solo than duo if they know what to do and where to do it. Duoing does open up a lot more areas, and they duo well with most all other classes.

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

Bards are a lot of fun in groups when there is no enchanter, and definitely wanted in that case. When a group has an enchanter, which happens pretty frequently, you might not be in high demand, and find yourself doing sub par DPS. But you do bring awesome buffs.

If you know what to do, there's plenty a bard can be doing in the group alongside an enchanter. With quick assistance with charm breaks, this also allows the enchanter to go nuts with a hasted/charmed pet. Between group regens (both hp and mana - not a trivial contribution in and of itself), assistance with charm breaks and crowd control, pulling, and buffs - a bard brings a lot more to the table than just our crappy dps.

It really is a great class. Most bards I've grouped with on other characters are adequate and round out a group nicely. Every now and then I'll group with a really good one and it just makes all groups that much better and more efficient.

[Tann]

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

Bards are a lot of fun in groups when there is no enchanter, and definitely wanted in that case. When a group has an enchanter, which happens pretty frequently, you might not be in high demand, and find yourself doing sub par DPS. But you do bring awesome buffs.

If the group has no enchanter or shaman, you're king. I haven't received any tells asking me if I want to group like I have on tanks or clerics in the past.

Some of the best groups I had on live had myself (bard) and BOTH a shaman and enchanter. Of course it was different back then and not all about min/max hogwash.

[Xaanka]

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

I'm thinking of leveling a bard, but I don't want to kite my way to 60. Are bards good at solo melee combat or will I find myself feeling the need to kite at some point?

I decided to level one of my bards without doing a single swarm kite. Grouping should be your bread and butter whenever possible. You are a good group class and things always go smoothly when you're around, whether it be from regen and mana songs, or clutch mez's and charms saving the day.

You can fit into just about any group and fill a variety of niches: pulling, mana/hp battery, haste, dot's, mez, charms, tanking until 50+, etc etc. If there isn't an enchanter or a monk around, you can fill the niche. use that to your advantage when you're lfg.

You will never be efficient with soloing, but you can duo pretty well with some classes. For instance, rogues can't solo either, but a bard can quickly pull in an outdoor zone and fear kite a mob while the rogue quickly kills it with backstabs. Good way to exp while you're waiting for people and filling groups, but you should always try to group when possible. Might be a little bit better of a strategy on red than blue, because you can be fear kiting while finding a group with the global chat channel that blue doesn't have.

[Troxx]

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

You will never be efficient with soloing...

Uh ... what?

Not true at all. Even outside of swarming very few if any classes can solo faster than a charming bard.

[falkun]

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

Bards are a lot of fun in groups when there is no enchanter, and definitely wanted in that case. When a group has an enchanter, which happens pretty frequently, you might not be in high demand, and find yourself doing sub par DPS. But you do bring awesome buffs.

Bards pair FANTASTICALLY with shaman and enchanter. If you have an ENC in your group, ALWAYS pull 2-4 mobs. This makes leveling even easier prior to SS helm trivializing pulling at L45. If you have a shaman, then you can pawn off haste and slow to him. I hate having to be puller, CCer, debuffer, and buffer in the same group. I love being able to pawn off at least one of those tasks to a shaman and/or enc. Allows me to be better at the other jobs I'm still doing. Until you get into certain raid situations, the bard should almost always be the puller, and that's not a job you'll ever pawn off to ENCs or SHMs.

[TeemoOfAstora]

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

Uh ... what?

Not true at all. Even outside of swarming very few if any classes can solo faster than a charming bard.

Truths! And particularly so in outside zones where you should be getting hit minimally. I solo'd Coldain rings 1-7 around 50, 51 and I'm sure 8 can be done too, if it weren't such a poopfestival. You can also do some pretty incredible things with fear kiting / charm rotting too. The xp bar moveth solo, even when not swarming (because BW can go fist itself).

That being said, grouping can be challenging/fun in its own way. I recently revisited KC and felt like a true lord of the dance in a group without a chanter/shammie. Sure there was manasong twisted in there (when a group asks you over for manasong and nothing else it gets really boring), but I got to do everything else too (haste, str/dex, slow/snare, regens, charm/mezz). I almost managed to keep everyone alive the entire time too (thanks to clutch roots by my groupmates), but hands train much too strong. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Xaanka]

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

Uh ... what?

Not true at all. Even outside of swarming very few if any classes can solo faster than a charming bard.

Oh yeah charming is good, I only play on red so I'm just not used to it being comparably viable.