After 17 years I have finally decided to join the Dark Side and get a second account. As the title states, I am running my heroic bard around. For the magicians out there who run a bard box, what songs are you using? The goal is eventually single pulls, auto attack, and /melody...
Not near my PC, but I will write down what I use when I get there. On fights longer than 25 sec I run my bard in and autoattack. Also use IS boxer to spam his short duration abilities, including kick and chest clickie. Did his epic 2.0, but it disrupts melody, so not using it at the moment.
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq...oper-care-and-feeding-of-heroic-bards.209160/ I used this as a guideline for my heroic bard. Works well so far!
Dang I thought it was gonna be a joke. A magician and its bard box walk into a bar.......the mage's pet ducks.
If I trigger the bard epic click and then start melody, there isn't a problem. If I click melody, and then the epic, not only is melody interrupted but it seems difficult to restart.
Clicking another item will typically correct that. Haste rapier or Harmonize saber are handy for me. Mostly just don't do that, though. A hotbutton every three minutes for /stops, click, /melody is pretty easy.
Bard setup Aura Aura of Sionache Songs (all rnk 2) Aria of Maetanrus Fjilunak's song of Suffering War March of Jocelyn Pulse of Sionache Chorus of Sionache Fjilnauk's Spiteful Lyric <-- because Loner can never have too much AC. Loner is my pet. Arcane Melody on Assist-button [1] /pause 1, /assist Ibliz /pause 1, /alt activate 3702 (QuickTime) /disc thousand /pause 1, /alt activate 1421 (Second Spire) /useitem 17 (robe) on Engage-button [2] /pause 1, /assist Ibliz (redundant... probably can remove it) /pause 15, /alt activate 8204 (Lyrical Prankster) <-- Important for of Many /pause 1, /alt activate 777 (Funeral Dirge) /pause 1, /alt activate 544 (stone pets) <-- helps of Many /pet swarm on DPS-button [4] /pause 1, /alt activate 3506 (Fierce Eye) /pause 1, /alt activate 8205 (Selo's Kick) /pause 1, /alt activate 553 (Cacophony) /pause 1, /alt activate 199 (Boastful Bellow) /pause 1, /alt activate 669 (Bladed Song) I don't use Vanglorious Shouts, because it breaks mezz I use Silent Displacement from time to time, it was my main pull/split AA until I got my enchanter, also used Silence of Silicia (pacify). Now I use it if I want to break something that looks really scary, like 6 yellows... displacing one will make the others come and hit my bard, where an AE mezz from the enchanter is waiting... The problems with Dicho and bard 2.0 in a multi-box setup is the necesary interruptions of melody. With a very high pulling cadence, I prefer to run things smoothly, and the dps is already quite high. I was a bit disappointed after spending a day doing the bard epic . I guess if the toon was mained, I would make a button that I could use at the exact right time when a melody restarts, perhaps with some GINA, and never miss out on the goodness. Ditto with Dicho, which will drain me dry of Endurance if I try to have it running all the time. We consume quite a bit of mana in the group, which is the reason behind the song choices, I guess.
You're losing out on significant amounts of damage by not running Aura of Maetanrus, far more than you gain from the mediocre mana regen Aura of Sionachie gives. Swarm pets, including Magician Remorseless Servant pets, are only affected by auras, making Aura of Maetanrus one of the only ADPS abilities that actually affects them. Furthermore, because they have no buffs, swarms see far greater gains than real pets (or players) who have a myriad of abilities that dilute the benefit of such effects (e.g. 25% haste is going from 100% to 125% for swarm pets, rather than 200% to 225% for normal pets). For reference, here is the effect from Aura of Maetanrus: [44095] Aura of Maetanrus Effect II Target: Single Range: 100' Resist: Beneficial, Blockable: Yes Focusable: Yes Casting: 0s 1: Increase Spell Damage by 30% (Before DoT Crit) 2: Increase Melee Haste v3 by 25% 3: Limit Effect: Current HP 4: Limit Max Level: 105 (lose 5% per level) 5: Limit Type: Detrimental 6: Limit Target: Exclude Caster AE 7: Limit Target: Exclude Caster PB 8: Limit Target: Exclude Target AE 9: Limit Type: Exclude Combat Skills 10: Increase Chance to Triple Attack by 25% 11: Increase Chance to Flurry by 21% 12: Increase Pet Chance to Flurry by 27% Edit: I also still think not using epic is a big mistake, even on a boxed character. There's nothing in your melody that is important enough that it outweighs the use of epic, even if you don't get around to restarting it for 10-20s or whatever. In general, not desiring more DPS seems counter intuitive to trying to kill a mob or to bringing an ADPS class in your group, especially when, given the option between pressing all of the incredibly minor buttons (i.e. those that aren't Aria/FE) and using epic, epic is both more potent and much easier to use.
Really good points, thank you Sancus. I didn't realize the big difference on swarm pets, we all swarm as much as we can in the group, so we are often 15+ pets on the mob. Switching that aura asap. I guess I could do an epic "on assist", and try that out. It would cascade a melody reset every 10-20 sec, my experience is that the melody has a huge impact... alternatively I allocate some very sparse mental clock cycles to a Gina-triggered process. I am puller and main tank (with mage), and also occasional CCer with enchanter, and I try to pull so that we ideally have a new mob in camp 10% before the former mob dies (we clump together in a narrow spot inside the forts in FM for optimal pull range (very short) and high mob availability. For me at the age of 48, that is quite intense *feels old*, and I have shawed away all unnecesary actions... an empty camp costs us 250k dps on average, so 4 seconds between pulls is a million damage lost... and will lead to the guys I play with starting to pull spontaneously, some kind of empty camp restlesness syndrome . Not a lot of respect for slow pulling... As you can hear, I am whining and coming with excuses. I will make the bard epic button and spare you my laments
