Newbie instrument question

[lufia22]

I just started Bard and having an extremely easy time soloing thus far to level 8. However, I'm wondering about instruments. I swear I remember readon a LONG time ago that different types of instruments were made for certain types of songs. Is this true? If not, is there any use for an instrument without a +??? on it or is it there just so a low level without money could level up their skill?

I'm also finding it a bit hard to find some songs in the AH. Do the three starting towns sell the same songs in the music shops? I might have to take an airship trip soon cuz I don't think I can find everything I need in Bastok on Unicorn currently.

[tnt118]

First, as for songs: they are quite spread out. If I recall correctly, each of the three main cities all sell several songs (and often items several versions of that song). Esp. with Bastok & the music shop, inventory will be dependant on that city's conquest rating.

Go to the AH and take a look at Instruments (under weapons). Scroll through the list and you'll see a lot of instruments listed something like this: Elegy +1, Mambo +2, Requiem +1. Technically any song can be sung with any instrument (or even without one, were you so inclined). But I can not stress enough that instruments that give +2 to a song (which are often called "Instrument +1") are critical to maximizing your effectivness as a bard.

Instruments will do three things. 1) They'll extend the duration of the song (I believe :20sec for +1 and :40sec for +2) That's a 33% increase. 2) They will make your songs more powerful.... both PT buffs and mob debuffs (requiem for example will do 2 more damage per tick with the +2 instrument). 3) While I don't think this is proven, it's commonly accepted that the corresponding +2 instrument will make a song debuff easier to land on the mob.

Seriously, bard songs are cheap.. but they aren't what make a bard good. It's the +2 instruments that really boost the effectivness of a bard .. I don't think its ironic at all that they are listed under weapons at AH. They are what let us do the job to the best of our ability.

EDIT: Never never buy songs from AH if you can help it. Prices will be at least 150% of vendor cost, and they are really easy to get from NPC. At low levels, I think all songs are available from vendor (although you'll have to visit each city) but it's well worth it. Either Requiem or Lullaby, I forget which, is a mob drop ... but its so common you could probably get it for 10 gil on AH.

[RuneGrey]

OTOH, once you get past level 50, do buy your songs from the auction house, as the vast majority of them will be sold from anywhere around 1000 to 5000 gil. Since most bard songs are drops, and are only available or useful to a very limited segment of the server population, people will price them cheap just to get them out of their inventories. This won't be an issue very much before then, however - only one of your most important songs, Magic Finale, will be a drop before 50.

But really, try to stay current with your insturments. The most critical are the Minuet +2 and Madrigral +2 insturments, since these are the songs you will be singing the most.

[CarbonFibre]

Just look up the scroll on Allakhazam or something before getting it to see if it'd be better to get in on AH or from a vendor somewhere.

[lufia22]

So this crappy level 1 (correct?) Flute that gives no pluses does nothing beneficial? What I was asking is are there any natural instrument affiliations? For example (making this up outta my ass), a Harp is naturally good at Etudes or does effectiveness of instruments bare fully on what +'s they give?

Guess I'll take a trip to windurst soon and see what's going on there and get to level 10. For some reason I like getting from level 7 or 8 to 10 in windurst...it's just more enjoyable to me. Then I might have to head out to my favorite town Sandy before I start partying if Windurst doesn't give me all I need.

BTW, I remember seeing a post on IGN about the best +'s to get but I can't find it. What are the most commonly used songs and what types of songs are least used/more acceptable to not have an instrument for? I'm assuming Minne, Minuet and Threnody would be the best...but I'm just looking at the song list and seeing what looks like the best songs. What, in your opinion, are the best songs to have instruments for? At this point, I do not have near enough room to buy tons of instruments. So any managment tips (besides gobby bag and mog safe) would be great.

One last thing. What's the earliest actually expensive piece(s) of equipment I should buy and by what level should I have it/them by?

[RuneGrey]

When it comes down to it, there are fix songs I always cast when XPing. Valor Minuet (Strenght Bonus on Melee), Sword Madrigal (Accuracy Bonus on Melee), Foe Requiem (DoT to Enemy), XXXX Threnody (Lowers Elemental Resistance for Magic and seems to help Skillchain Burst Damage), and Mage's Ballad (MP Regen Over Time), and Magic Finale (Dispel Positive Buffs on Enemy).

Of these, the three main reasons you get invited are for Madrigal, Ballad, and Magic Finale. Enhanced accuracy means more hits, means more skillchains, means more magic bursts, means faster kills, means more XP when leveling. Ballad means that the mages regain MP even when not resting. Again, less downtime, more spells, more XP when leveling. Finale removes a lot of the really *annoying* buffs enemies use that you had to cope with at earlier levels (Defense Bonus or Evasion Bonus are real killers before 32-33), and is critical for killing the enemy quickly. The fact that Bard and Red Mage roll together all 3 of those bonuses to some degree (Reg Mage has faster cooldown Dispel, Refresh is slightly better than non stacked Ballad, Gravity hampers enemy evasion) makes them very critical for a successful party.

Of all of these insturments, you can get +1s for Madrigal and Threnody that actually has much effect. A +1 Cornette is also good to have, since until you get both Blade and Sword Madrigal, you'll probably be casting Minuet + Madrigal on your melees. Finale has a +2 effect insturment (Military Harp) but the effect is minimal on anything other than a God.

But the only difference wind insturments have against stringed insturments is the range of casting - wind insturments have a smaller radius of effect than string ones do. This is both good and bad - its good when you want to buff only part of the party later on, bad if people are spread out and you want to get them all. Beyond that, there is no inherent bonus for any song that is not listed on the insturment itself - the level 1 flute is one of the rare insturments that actually does *not* have an inherent +1 song bonus on it. (The HQ Flute +1 has +1 Requiem).

[Lushipur]

other thing to know:

the instrument you choose to use decide wich skill you will use, stringed or wind instrument skill. The higher the skill the higher the effects of the song. So you will like to have both of them maxed always (at the first 40 lvl is easy).

another thing about +1 instruments is how they stack song...if you sing 4 song one after the other on the same target, the bonus of the song decide wich song remains in effect. however it is not so important, because you will song two song for melee and 2 song for magic user.

the duration bonus of the song should be 10sec for +1 and 20sec for +2.

ps: sorry for the poor engRish but im italian

[Schozie]

I suggest finding one of the lists of songs online somewhere and printing it off. (being at work I cant look for one for you, but theyre there) Mine has every song, in level order, the effect, and where theyre brought/dropped etc. What I tended to do at lower levels was buy the songs for the next 5 levels and using the sheet I had in front of me I could plan out where I needed to go for all my songs to avoid having to buy any from AH. I would definately reccomend this, as some songs are way more expensive at ah, sheepfoe mambo (i think) is a good example, you buy it in selbina if I remember rightly. It sells in selbina for about 2300 or something like that, i checked ah before running out there (to try and save myself the time) and it was up for 6 or 7k. Wouldnt be surprised if people just went and bought them from selbina and put them up at jeuno ah.

as others have said pretty much all the songs up until 50ish are best bought from vendors, appart from a few that are dropped. foe lullaby is another example of a dropped one, you get this from yags in giddeus.

50-60 most of the songs (excluding ballad 2) are dropped from castle oztroja, I thought about going and trying to get these with some of my LS, but most of them go at AH for 1 or 2k so theres little need.

[Lushipur]

best site ever

mysterytour.web.infoseek.co.jp/ffxi/us

good search

[lufia22]

Few more questions:

1.) What exactly do the Singing, String, and Wind skills do?

2.) Do tanks need defensive songs (i.e. Knights Minne or Sheepfoe Mambo) or do they just go with the typical melee songs (excluding PLD when I get mage's ballad)?

3.) I'm confused on how I should go about things:

A.) Right now, since all I tend to cast is accuracy, attack, and foe's requiem at the beginning of a fight then Paeon if needed at the end, what's the best way of going about things (I'm a level 14 BRD right now). Should I wait and time my song so that the first one lands on the puller or should I just not care about the puller and just keep my songs cast before they get back to the camp?

B.) When I do begin to split up my groups, I have a feeling I'm going to be confused. I already tried splitting up the tank in our PT and giving him defensive songs to see if they helped (which they didn't seem to, but I could be wrong) and I was confused how to go about things. How exactly do you go about singing for split groups? Give me a battle example if you can. However, now that I think about it, I think it's the whole reason I was trying to cast defensive spells that was hard. I think ballad will be easier...

4.) What's a good way to judge how far your songs reach? How did you learn?

[Drachol]

1. I honestly don't really think it does shit, maybe help a little with landing debuffs.

2. Mostly just normal songs, if you have a NIN and are bored ask if they want mambo and you can give them that, otherwise keep the same buffs.

3. A. Time it so it lands right when the puller gets there, don't worry if you don't get it right at first, it takes some practice.
B. I woulnd't really worry about this, kind of hard to explain just experience it your self and you will get the hang of it.

4. If you zoom all the way out and make the camera go as far out as it can your song with wind insturments will reach to a little past the top of the screen.

[Vilurum]

1. The stat increases your buffs give depend purely on your music skills (though the correct instrument for the buff will give a flat bonus on top of that, +5 attack with Cornette +1 for any minuet, for example).

If you sing with no instrument, the skill number used for this is Singing. If you play with a wind instrument, the skill number used is the sum of Singing and Wind. If you play with a string instrument, the skill number used is the sum of Singing and String. Almost all types of buffs will improve in some way with more skill. Even paeons eventually give 1 more HP/tick than they did originally. (So Paeon I eventually does 2 HP/tick, Paeon IV eventually does 5 HP/tick, etc.) Ballads never improve with skill.

As for debuffs, I don't know whether skill affects potency of elegy or threnody. (Requiem doesn't have much leeway for increased potency, though it may improve by 1 HP/tick like paeon does. The others either work or they don't.) It's kinda hard to get an exact numerical effect when it's a song that affects an enemy instead of an ally.

They do, however, affect resistance ... though it's still largely believed (and probably true) that +CHR helps land songs unresisted more than +skill does. My belief with this is that unlike buff potency where you get Singing added in no matter what, debuff resistance only uses Singing skill if you sing it. Otherwise it's just Wind or just String.

Because come on, if it were the sum for debuff resists too, then a level 75 BRD with capped skill and no skill+, in other words 225's in all three, would have 450 effective skill when landing debuffs. That's quite obviously not the case, our resist rates are more appropriate for a skill level around the 225 that any of them are individually. So I believe +Singing is useless for landing debuffs unless you're not using an instrument. As for +Wind (or +String) compared to +CHR, I already mentioned that most people believe +CHR helps more.

Point of all that? Skilling up makes your buffs more powerful and helps you land debuffs better. There is no reason *not* to be capped, except from sheer lack of opportunity (which may or may not be the case at lower levels but definitely is no longer the case once you get into the 50's and five-digit TNL). You may or may not consider skill+ equipment to be worth using but it's always worth capping your skill, especially since it's so easy.

2. Not in exp parties, aside from ballads on PLDs (depending on situation this'll be either during pulls only and otherwise they get melee buffs during battle, or they get ballads all the time). Minne and Mambo take a very long time to be worthwhile, and even then it's situational. For example, Minne for PLDs on Byakko and Mambo for NINs on Fenrir.

Madrigal + Minuet are the standard melee buffs for a reason. You can (eventually) experiment with March instead of Minuet if you like, but most BRDs are pretty disappointed with March's effectiveness compared to Minuet's. Always have Madrigal unless you're in a non-exp situation fighting wimpy things, as attack speed and damage are meaningless if you don't hit.

3. A. Time it so it lands on the puller. Continually maintain mage songs while waiting for a pull, but at this point you don't really have any (and it's definitely not worth the trouble of making a Valkurm party position itself intelligently, just so you can give minne/mambo to the mages in case they get hit).

The only other thing I suggest is that you make use of threnodies. Right now you don't have very many, but you get one every other level from 10 to 24 inclusive (one for each of the eight elements). Light/Dark/Earth Threnody, your first ones (the ones you should have at level 14), are admittedly not gonna have much use at your level. But you'll eventually get threnodies that correspond to the elements your BLMs are actually casting. (So you can use Ice Threnody when they use Blizzard, etc.)

Threnodies lower an enemy's resistance to that element, so that also helps land debuffs. Ice Threnody helps land Paralyze and Bind, Earth Threnody helps land Slow, Wind Threnody helps land Silence and Gravity, Light Threnody helps land your Lullaby sleep and Dark Threnody helps land the black magic Sleep spell, and so on.

B. Generally speaking you'll have your mage group, and your melee group, and if they're reasonably competent they'll be able to stay separate. You use wind instruments for a fixed predictable range so that you only hit one or the other group. Mage buffs on mages, melee buffs on melees, and then you can throw around targetable buffs such as Prelude or Etudes. (Don't go crazy on Etudes.)

You can't really make a tank "group", because the tank needs to be right next to the enemy and so do the melees. (RNGs do not, but most of them will melee anyway.) What you can do, and only bother with this for ballad on PLDs as I already mentioned, is put the tank on one side of the enemy and everyone else on the other side of it. And have them stand as far back from the enemy as possible while still able to hit it. (In other words, put as much space between the tank and the melees as possible.) That way, with some careful positioning on your part, you can hit the tank and the tank only. And maybe the mages too depending on where they are, but since you're doing this for ballads on PLDs anyway, that's actually preferable.

As far as mage group vs. melee group (PLD ballads notwithstanding), that's easy as I already mentioned. Just put them far enough apart that you have no fears of hitting the other group, when you buff one group with a wind instrument. But not so far the mages can't heal the melees or hurt the enemy, of course. It doesn't have to be all that far.

4. Practice practice practice. You're gonna be buffing for hours upon hours upon hours if you play BRD to a high level, you eventually get a very good feel for the range of a wind instrument, when the range is just barely too small to hit someone you were intending to hit, or just barely too big to hit someone you were intending not to hit. It eventually becomes mostly intuitive. But yes, zooming all the way out and making the camera go up as far as possible is a pretty good indicator, though it's not perfect.

(String instruments are a whole different question, as although their range is always bigger than wind, it's sometimes only very slightly bigger and sometimes enormous, and that varies by song. It's thus much harder to judge range with string. I still can't do it too well.)

[lufia22]

Wow, A+ Vilurum! Everyone else gets a C-. J/k.

Just for future reference, do etudes count as one of your two songs on that person?

Is there a list of skill levels and how that skill level effects each (type of) song?

[Drachol]

Etudes count as a song, WTF at second question.

[lufia22]

Originally posted by Drachol
Etudes count as a song, WTF at second question.

Vilurum stated that as you progress through your skill level your songs get better. Is there a list of how your skill effect each type of song (i.e. at which point your paeon starts to heal 2 HP a tick)?