Flute or Harp?

[Omega31589]

As you can see, I'm just starting BRD and im planning on making it my main job. I was wondering what's better to skill up in, String or Wind instrument skills? What is the difference, and does it effect my song's effects? And any other tips you can give to a beginning Bard?

[FFXI-FREAK96]

ive Seen alot of bard carry both. Just For Speical Build up on Certain songs..

and im Planning on Getting bard too after i get pld..

but im using Harp and Flute

[Vilurum]

While it's ideal to keep your skill capped in both, prioritize wind. Most of your buffs will be played with wind instruments to limit their range (so you only hit a few people, not everyone). Furthermore, most of the song-specific instruments are wind instruments.

Having said that, try to keep your string skill up too, because there will be (less frequent) times you want to use stringed instruments. And it will be bad to have severely underskilled string when those times come.

So use both, and keep wind capped, and *try* to keep string capped. (As for singing, that'll go up whether you use wind, string, or no instrument at all. Which is good, because you don't have to raise it exclusively. So keeping singing capped is easy.)

Buff effectiveness depends on the following things:
- The song itself
- Your singing skill
- Your wind or string skill depending on what you're playing
- Whether your instrument boosts that particular song

(If all other things are equal, a buff will be equally effective with wind and with string. String will have larger range, which is usually a bad thing rather than a good thing.)

Debuff effectiveness depends on the following things:
- Everything above
- Whether the enemy resists the debuff, which depends on some *more* things:
-- Your level relative to the enemy's
-- Enemy's elemental resistance to the debuff's element
-- Your CHR

Other tips:

- Skilling up is faster on debuffs (on even+ enemies, of course) than on buffs.
- When starting out, use a sword, buff yourself, eat a mithkabob, and go melee. Your buffs, at low levels, very nicely make up for your bad base stats. Dagger also works all right, but sword's probably easier. WAR and WHM subs both work at low levels, but switch to WHM when you start PT'ing.
- Find a list of where to get songs, and get them from NPCs. Almost every song until level 50 is cheaper from an NPC than from AH. And yes, the NPCs are all over the place. By the time you can get BRD, you can travel around easily, by choco at least, and by airship for some. Due to the travelling, and the cheapness of songs, it's not a bad idea to buy songs five levels at a time.
- Have a good dental plan, to make up for the teeth-grinding you'll do at parties which can't position themselves properly. It *will* be frustrating.

[tnt118]

My suggestions follow the above posters.

1st - before even starting bard I'd hit each city with a song list in hand, and get all the songs up to level 20-25. After that, make another trip for the next 15 or so levels. Markup on songs at AH are mostly 125% or more; often 200-2000gil more than from NPC. If you are rich, that's one thing.. but you'll save 20k or so getting songs from vendors.

2nd - Keep a close eye on the price of Ballad II and Minuet IV. You'll likely get both from the AH, but prices can fluctuate wildly over the course of time. If you can catch a good deal on them, even if they are 30+ levels away, do it!

3rd - Wind skill is far more important, but don't neglect string either. I use a level 1 harp for my post-battle songs, and for every Finale (once you hit that level). Using only those two situations, my wind skill is *always* within 4-5 levels of staying capped. As a sidenote, I've never had a Finale resisted, and I estimate I've sung that some 300+ times.