New Bard SOngs/Active Abilities

[Seeker_Onos]

Bards appear to be the only advanced job without addtional abilities that come at later levels (akin to the Divine Seal or Elemental Seal or Fast Cast for WHM/BLM/RDM respectively)

Ideas for Bard that might further increase its versatility:

New Level 52 song: Healer's Reprise (BCNM50 drop)
Adds a *ga effect to any *healing* spell casted, and some non healing enfeebles such as Stoneskin, Blink or Aquaveil. Only good for the very next spell cast by a PLD, WHM or RDM. Healing spells include Cure series and Regen/Refresh, and status effect heals such as Poisona, Cursna and Viruna.

New Level 58 song: Warlock's Canticle (BCNM50 drop)
Doubles the intensity of elemental magic, doubles the duration of enfeebling magic cast by BLM, RDM or DRK. Also gives a bonus to Holy Magic cast by WHM/PLD.

New Active Abilities:

Chorus: (5min) Allows a Bard to select a specific PT member for what would normally be a PT buff (such as rebuffing a PLD for Ballad w/o interrupting the Madrigal and Minuet on the other melee fighters.

Harmonic Voice: (10min) Allows a Bard to cast a third song on the PT.

What do you think?

[{Pug}]

i really like the active abilities

[Schozie]

I really like the harmonic voice idea. Seems like its the sort of thing that would actually have a chance of being implimented.

Healers reprise would be sweet for sneak/invis

[Vilurum]

The active abilities actually sound quite reasonable, but the songs are, I'm afraid, easily overpowered. Refreshga? Hastega? Cure V-ga? Stoneskinga? Blinkga? Phalanxga? (Notwithstanding that it's kinda duplicating some SMN abilities.) It would be very very cool but definitely overpowered. Unless the song had some ridiculous recast time like 20 minutes, and even then it'd be iffy. Same with the automatic doubling of nuke effects for the other one, but the doubly effective enfeebles would be more reasonable.

Btw, just on a technicality, level 52 and 58 songs do exist in the game data. They're called Chocobo Hum and Cactuar Fugue respectively, and they're more in the line of useless status resistance songs. One is paralysis, I forget what the other is. They're either not yet available in the game (like Thunder Spirit was for a long time), or they're available but nobody knows/tells where to get them. {Hum} is in the translator though ... which is kind of odd if it's nonexistent.

(There are lots of other unavailable songs in the game data, but most don't even have levels assigned to them, so those obviously aren't usable. Besides those two, the only other unavailable songs with levels assigned are Paeon V and VI, at 65 and 75 respectively.)

[Seeker_Onos]

The songs were kind of a lark idea (not having thought of the two songs in the game data you mentioned)...

The original seed of the Healer's Reprise idea was as a counterpoint to Finale (remove buff) as an Erasega (makes WHMs very happy that they don't chew through a ton of MP casting Viruna or Cursna on everyone after taking a stroll through Eldieme Necropolis.

The main points of interest to me (as I was discussing this with a few LS mates) would be the active abilities that we seem to lack as compared to other jobs.

On another note, if you do /recast Mage's Ballad III ... it will report back 00:00 (suggesting that it is in the game data as well.

If it follows the pattern... (Ballad at 25 and Ballad II at 55) it won't apper until level 85 (assuming SE ever hikes the level caps up that high, if ever)

[Xccoortri]

The abilities make no sense, since they aren't bard related. If you were a bard/nothing, you would not be abe to use them...if you were a bard/war, you would not be able to use them. They won't ever make an ability for a job that utilizes a spell of a nother job 0.o

[Seeker_Onos]

perhaps so...

but I did not mention what levels te abilities would be gained at, either.

Most of what a BRD does is not geared strictly to itself, but rather to support other jobs.

BRD fits almost perfectly with RDM or WHM as a subjob - I see very few BRD/BSTs (possibly the next best combo after WHM or RDM) and I can count on one hand the number of BRD/BLMs that play the BLM sub on a regular basis (mostly for farming).

BRD/WAR? Seriously... I have done /sea all BRD on many occassions and have yet to see any BRD/WARs above level 15 in any PTs. Including the popular pre-20 leveling spots. And at least on my server, I'll be astonished find any Garliage/Crawler's Nest level PTs that will even consider the idea of a BRD/WAR. Poorly leveled, but properly matched subs... yes. Totally incongruent subs.... not likely.

But lest this thread turn into another "this race or that race" or "this subjob or that subjob" arguements...

What should a BRD's abilities to, if not to serve the Bard's purpose of supporting the PT?

Nevermind the songs. Those were not entirely well thought out beyond an LS discussion I had a night or two ago.

Having an ability to land a third song on a PT - or specifically directing a song onto someone without forcing everyone to soak it up that falls into the song radius? Paladins who want Ballad whilest not disrupting the Minuet/Madrigal on the DRG or MNK next to him? That's gold, I think.

Granted, these ideas will likely never see the light of day, let alone translation into game code.

On the otherhand, as I re-read through your post, I see you might be thinking particularly of the BRD's solo experience.

In which case, Let's consider the application of Harmonic Voice ability again:

A BRD/THF (which I play with on occasion whilest goblin farming or Tiger farming) would definitely benefit from Double Minne+Vital Etude, or Double Mambo with Dexterous Etude, or the STR+ Etude with Double Minuet... I think I'd really have fun with such an ability.

Don't flame me too harshly.... my doctor told me my asbesto underoos are prone to giving me all kinds of bad diseases.... so I left them at home.

[Reaperx90]

Great ideas! Only one thing I saw that could stand to change though...

Chorus could stand to have a smaller recast...it's not exactly a powerful skill anyway...just a useful one. I think a 1:30 cooldown would be very reasonable.

Harmonic voice is just pure genius...I would love to have that in my arsenal of abilities (granted, I'd love to have ANYTHING in my ability arsenal other than my accursed 2hr >_<)

A possible third ability would be like BLM's elemental seal - it makes the next offensive song unresistable. And it would have a recast similar to that of elemental seal. Oh, and don't even try to make me come up with a name for it

Oh, and the songs are kinda EXTREMELY overpowered. Maybe a song that shaves some cooldown off of spells/job abilities...maybe like cuts 1/4 of the time off. Of course if the song wears off before an ability cools down it adds the time back on.

Now if only S-E would implement SOMETHING in the way of BRD JAs...

EDIT: Danget - I always forget something when I'm posting...

Another good JA would be one that doubles the duration of either the next song cast, or doubles the duration of ALL songs cast for a minute or so - probably the former. but the ladder (or latter...can't remember how it's spelled -_-; ) would be nice....it would give us Bards some time to sit back and catch our breath

[Theiry]

Haha, I've thought up so many songs and abilities (for most jobs). =l I'm weird like that, I can't play a game for more than an hour without nit-picking at all the flaws and thinking up stuff they should have added =P (I guess that's why I want to be a game programmer so much..)

Anyway, here's a list of some songs and stuff I've thought up: (Some of these are kinds strange, but I think I've balanced them well enough)

Before I had learned of Goddess Hymnus (sp), I had thought up an entire line of 'Hymn' songs. They went as follows:

Martyrs Hymn, Level ?? (Above 60 I would guess, probably 70+):
Lowers EXP loss after being raised (or home pointed)

Angels Hymn, Level ?? (60+ again):
Raises the effect of any restorative magic on party (in other words, anyone with Angels Hymn active will get more HP cured when someone casts cure on them, or faster Regen rate from Regen)

Saints Hymn, Level ?? (Somewhere near the other two)
Raises the effect of non song buffs (like Protect, Shell, En-, -Spikes, Blink and so on)

For Angels Hymn and Saints Hymn, some of the other ideas I've had are as follow, (obviously just one for each =) )
Angels Hymn: Reflect (I know, WAY to powerful..),
Full Resist Light (no damage taken from Light attacks),
Absorb Light (Any damage done by a light attack will give you HP instead of taking it, this would also let White Mages cast Holy on party members),
Light Spikes, and/or , En-Light

Saints Hymn: Full Dark Resist,
Dark Absorb

(I know, the other stuff I listed for the Hymns is way to powerful, there's no way they could add it)

I've also thought of the following line of songs (Yet again, before I found out about Chocobo Mazurka):

Chocobo Theme, Level ?? (Who knows..)
(No idea what this does. I think I would make it a low level version of Mazurka.. Maybe it would call a chocobo for someone in the group)

Moogle Theme, Level ?? (Around the same)
(I don't know.. I was thinking of it allowing you to get into your mog house for a little while. To get items out of the safe and stuff. Maybe, though it would be maybe to powerful, allow you to change sub jobs out and about. If it does this, it would have to have a HUGE recast. And probably only target one person)

Opera Theme, Level ?? (Who knows, lol)
(This one I have completely no idea on...)

Anyway, the only thing that makes these special is what happens when you play them. I had dreamed them up as playing the old Final Fantasy music to go with each one, you know, the old Chocobo and moogle songs, and the Celese Opera Theme. =) I would LOVE to get these. If they add these, I wouldn't mind them making the effects next to useless, and having you do a hard quest for each one. I'd do it, I'd love to play cool music =)

=l I have a bunch more ideas, but I should probably stop boring you all. Not just bard stuff either, I have some really cool stuff thought up for Thief, White Mage, and Dragoon. Anyway, last thing I swear! I want to see the following instrument:

Olivant (Or Rolands Horn): Wind Instrument
Level ?? (Low I hope)
All Races
Song of Roland + 2
Wind Instrument skill + (Something..)
Brd / Pld

Yeah, you read that right =) I want to see a horn equipable to Paladins. I don't know what Song of Roland does.. but I would guess it would intimidate the enemy, causing them to stop attacking for a few seconds. (If you have no idea what this is in reference to, go to Bartleby.com and search for Roland, Orlando, Song of Roland, or many other such things)

Alright, I'm done.. I have other songs and abilities thought up for Bards, and many other jobs. If anyone cares, let me know =) lol. Thanks to anyone who actually read any of this. I know it's all just random novice game maker wanabe dreams =P

[Aniga]

Originally posted by Reaperx90
A possible third ability would be like BLM's elemental seal - it makes the next offensive song unresistable. And it would have a recast similar to that of elemental seal. Oh, and don't even try to make me come up with a name for it

A little too powerful I think. If 3 bards on a HNM raid can keep a super monster stuck with Elegy without fail due to this ability, something may be a bit overpowered (Elegy tends to last 2-3 minutes each cast). Plus it negates the need for high charisma in the high level game.

Maybe a song that shaves some cooldown off of spells/job abilities...maybe like cuts 1/4 of the time off. Of course if the song wears off before an ability cools down it adds the time back on.

Well, it doesn't shave time off Job Ability re-use, but our regular haste song (March line) decreases the amount of time needed to recast spells I'm pretty sure, just like how WHM/RDM haste decreases recast time and Slow/Elegy increases recast time.

[AurorABLaZe]

If you add in anything to BRD it will be too powerful. >< Pisses me off, lol.

But I agree, S-E has to do something. We seriously got so gimped with these useless songs we never use, and we got super crappy JA.

The resist-songs have to be replaced IMO or given some new effectiveness. They should make it so that resist-type songs can be played as a third song, and the actual effect repels the status ailment produced by the enemy mob. Maybe not all the time but at least try for 80% of the time a resist(or 85-90% even better. Not 5%. ><).

Ballad +2 instrument. =o Quite powerful indeed, but not ridiculously so. It would make BRD much, much better, but not overpowering.

TP song.....

This is definitely not overpowering, and would bring so much to the BRD job. It shouldn't work as fast as Meditate, but at least be effective to some extent. It's not like you are going to be pulling off a WS every 20 seconds.

[Teffie]

An ability that I would think would fit perfectly for BRD's would be;

Job Trait
Encore:
If a song of the same type is played twice in a row (consecutively), the second song requires half the casting time that it originally would have.



What I mean by Same Type, is B.Madrigal+S.Madrigal, PaeonIII+PaeonIV, MinuetIII+MinuetIV, BalladII+BalladI. After all, the auto-translate function never says "Mage's Ballad" it only has the word "Ballad"

So you start casting Ballad II, 8 seconds go by and it is done. Right after Ballad II, you sing Ballad I, which is a song of the same type. So it would only take 4 seconds to sing it.

Some would probably say that half the time is a little farfetched, but maybe making it 6 seconds to cast, instead of 8 would be good enough. This Idea originally came from Ragnarok online XD. Bard's have a skill called Encore, which allows them to use the last song they just played, with only half the MP cost. I just thought it was pure genius.

[poweryoga]

i really like the ideas :D :D

imagining 2x preludes + valor minuet.... whoooo baby. don't try to stop me!

Chorus+sneak/invis = sneak/invis that lasts 2 seconds instead of one!!!

jk jk...

[Vilurum]

Ballad +2 instrument. =o Quite powerful indeed, but not ridiculously so. It would make BRD much, much better, but not overpowering.

Gjallarhorn. All songs +2 (and CHR+4, singing+10, wind+10 while you're at it). Of course, it can't be easy to get - it's the fully upgraded Relic Horn.

Notwithstanding that I don't have the slightest idea of where to get the things for the third and fourth upgrades ... you need a bloody Shofar for the second upgrade. Ya know, that thing you craft from a Behemoth Horn which only drops from King Behemoth. That'll be fun to get ... -.-

[sudo]

how about a passive job trait of chr bonus? won't be huge but might be kind of neat

Personally, I kind of like brd the way it is. I don't know how much better it can be with these new ideas but they sound good.

And one question about ballad +2 insturment, what does the +2 actually do for the song effects?

Do you get more mp/tic or does it just make song last longer?

Same thing as the paeon +2 insturment?