About Prelude..

[PetriW]

Originally posted by Layoneil
i don't know where you get that from. most Bows have around 500 delay, plenty of time to get a few stabs in with the dagger for extra TP between shots.

You clearly don't understand how the delay works.
As a rng with nin sub dualwielding hawkers I sneak in two melee attacks every 3 or so ranged attacks. The normal melee timer is paused while you're firing an arrow so if you were 2 seconds from using a melee attack before you start shooting you're still 2 seconds from it when done 6-7 seconds later.
So in the time I get 36% from ranged attacks I get 8%(?) from the daggers.

Sure, it's SOME extra tp but if a bard was singing madrigal + prelude on me for the extra melee accuracy I'd call him a fool. I mean, what ranger ever complains about +rng acc rings being -acc?

[obsidian]

RNGs should have minuet and prelude. My song order is madrigal > prelude > minuet.

It's better when the RNG is pulling because then I can do madrigal when he is pulling and prelude him as he comes in with minuet after.

[Laehn]

Well, i think every bard should discuss what songs should and shouldnt be played. Ask the rng if he would like prelude or not. Some of my parties still prefer other songs other than just the normal madrigal minuet stacked ballad thing.

[Layoneil]

Sure, it's SOME extra tp but if a bard was singing madrigal + prelude on me for the extra melee accuracy I'd call him a fool. I mean, what ranger ever complains about +rng acc rings being -acc?

sometimes the extra TP is very important. Sidewinder accuracy is not that good, and it's more accurate with more TP.

with the standard Prelude + Minuet, SW missed a little less often than with Prelude + Madrigal. when the THF is at 100 TP, you want to go with the SC, the difference between Madrigal/Minuet is sometimes the difference between 130 TP for the RNG or 150 TP. i don't know the exact numbers, i don't sit around asking for it, i just know its higher and Sidewinder misses less with Madrigal.

one missed Sidewinder means the mob doesn't turn for Viper Bite/Dancing Edge on the PLD and no SC, that is huge, and a lot of a bigger loss than not having Minuet on the RNG.

RNG/WAR and RNG/NIN also factors into it. RNG/NIN has more Ranged Accuracy because of the dual daggers (which makes more TP for Sidewinder less significant), RNG/WAR however does not. RNG/WAR also hits harder, so Minuet is less important.

nobody asked me for more melee accuracy, i recognized something wasn't going as well as we'd like, so i tried something else to see if it helps and it did. how foolish of me.

[PetriW]

Originally posted by Layoneil
RNG/WAR and RNG/NIN also factors into it. RNG/NIN has more Ranged Accuracy because of the dual daggers (which makes more TP for Sidewinder less significant), RNG/WAR however does not. RNG/WAR also hits harder, so Minuet is less important.

Hmm yeah, I admit I didn't really consider warrior in this but...
Wouldn't a warrior get just as much benefit from minuet as a ninja? I mean the reason for a warrior doing more damage is he has higher max damage right?

You also base your argument on only sidewinder which you exclude 25ish levels from the discussion plus that daggers aint all that stellar damage but while madrigal adds lets say 1-2 extra hits a minute (I think that's a an overestimate, at least at lower levels) minuet affects every ranged and melee attack.

Note that the original poster is nowhere close to Sidewinder.

[Shiymmas]

Ranger should always end up with Minuet + Prelude. Their WS damage seems to be related to attack bonus, which (aside from the str and agi bonuses) is why most rangers will eat mithkabobs, and why some rangers sub war for Berserk and trait attack bonuses.

As several have mentioned, the TP gained from melee is negligible, and unless your ranger is cheap, they'll be ranged attacking non-stop which with the way bow/gun/xbow delay works, they'll very rarely get an extra melee swing in (especially if their sub is ninja, and they use a weapon such as Francisca with higher delay). Bow delay is incurred during the actual shot, so as soon as their shot is fired, they're ready to fire again.

All of this in mind, a ranger also almost always uses +range accuracy, -melee accuracy items, and they don't buff melee accuracy at all, so giving them madrigal won't suddenly make them hit like a normal melee which will be wearing as much melee accuracy gear as possible. So, at the end of the day your ranger is far better off with minuet for higher WS damage, and prelude so they never miss their far more important ranged attacks or weapon skills.

Another interesting note to think about~ there are no ranged attack foods, and no bard buffs for ranged attack, so at times I've almost had to think that perhaps meat kabobs and minuet may well buff ranged attack as well, however there is no way to tell since you cannot check ranged attack as you can just check your attack. Just food for thought, since attack bonuses do give noticably higher WS damage.

[Laehn]

Minuet does effect normal ranged attacks considerably. I can vouche for that. But the largest different is in the WS.

[PetriW]

Originally posted by Shiymmas
Another interesting note to think about~ there are no ranged attack foods, and no bard buffs for ranged attack, so at times I've almost had to think that perhaps meat kabobs and minuet may well buff ranged attack as well, however there is no way to tell since you cannot check ranged attack as you can just check your attack. Just food for thought, since attack bonuses do give noticably higher WS damage.

Meat Mithkabob has a very noticeable effect on ranged damage.

[Azurewrath]

It may be because I have +1 instruments, but If I play Madrigal > Prelude(On Rng) > Minuet, the Rng gets Madrigal and Minuet :confused: I just fixed it easily by playing Madrigal when Rngs pulling (Doesnt really matter if he gets it, Itll be overwritten anyways) Then Minuet while hes out, but I time it right so he comes in with the pull right as minuet lands then Prelude.. Works well for me =)

[Vilurum]

Play Prelude with its instrument as well to correct that problem. The reason is that the song replaced is whichever song will wear off first. So if you play a boosted song (+20 sec or so) followed by an unboosted song, the unboosted song - despite being sung later - will be the first to wear off, so it'll be the one replaced by whatever you sing after that.

Alternatively, vary your timing or targets. Madrigal the melees while the RNG is out pulling, or use Madrigal > Minuet > Prelude, or use Madrigal > Debuff/Cure > Debuff/Cure > Debuff/Cure > Prelude > Minuet.

[Peanut_Midgard]

Prelude should ALWAYS be on RNG, I don't really care how much accuracy a RNG has on himself More ranged accuracy never hurts.

The debate is whether to have Minuet or Madrigal as second song. I still believe that NEITHER is bad and should be totally up to the RNG to choose. Most RNG prefers bigger numbers so 99.9% of the time they would want Minuet. Communication is very important

[Vilurum]

Considering that I generally do not see RNGs with any difficulty keeping up with TP (unless they're cheap and "conserving arrows", which means they have other issues), and considering that at 65, the difference between Minuet and no Minuet is a good 200 damage on Sidewinder ...

Well, let's just say that I give them Minuet + Prelude. Sidewinder missing on a regular basis is more a problem of the RNG than a problem of the BRD buffs. (Even under the best of circumstances, Sidewinder will always occasionally miss. That's not a big problem, it's having that happen regularly which is.)

If the RNG either has poor ranged accuracy equipment, or is slow to build TP due to being cheap, and tends to miss Sidewinders for either of those reasons, it's not up to the BRD to "fix" the RNG.

(And ultimately the best we can do is give them slightly more TP from landing a few more of their melee hits, which is an inelegant "solution" at best.)

[K9999]

From a rangers point of view, most of the bards i have grouped with would sing melee acc > attack up > prelude me. The prelude would overwrite my melee acc and everyone was happy.

[Beaginator]

Yeah, like others have said...minuet + prelude on the RNG.

I've had some RNGs ask me for double minuet though...which is pretty difficult to do if you want madrigal on the other melee. I pretty much ignore them and give 'em prelude anyway...screw that. :confused: