I keep reading that Bards are more ADPs for a group that has melee in it than a chanter. Now chanter is my main, so he has better gear etc.. but ADPs does not have anything to do with gear. The thing is if I play my bard, the group drops in DPS tremendously when compared to the chanter. Maybe I'm using the wrong melody? Maybe enchanters are just in a much better spot than bards? Do bards need serious loving right now?
The issue is, there are no specifics in this post, so it's hard to understand under what circumstance you're saying your grp's dps drops.
As Romance said, we can't help without any info... What is your group makeup? Which songs are you playing in your melody? When / how often do you use the bard's activated abilities and epic?
How much a bard adds is entirely dependent upon being in sync with your group mates. My bard in group with my paladin as an example basically makes my sustained dps go from 12ish k to closer to 25 k if I sync perfectly. Zerks/monks and hybrids gain a ton if they sync discs with activateables.
Short answer - bards are still definitely more ADPS to a melee group than enchanters, purely because of Aria. The sheer amount of extra hits melee DPS get out of a bard make us worth it. However, the ADPS of every other song is pitiful in comparison. Some #s related to Aria: What I'm trying to show here is the % increase in total swings, for each buff - - With plain 25% overhaste (225% haste), a bard sees a 13% increase in total swings - Aria increases that total by 14% (from its Flurry & Triple Attack Chance), or 27% more than 200% haste - Hastening of Prokev Rk. II increases Triple Attack by 2.1% (total swings by 1%) - The overhaste aura increases total swings by 6% (over 225% haste) - Aria and the overhaste aura increase total swings by 19%; which is undershooting it, as my flurry % maxed out. Note that bards have different triple/flurry attack chances than other classes. For reference: - Bards have 525 Double Attack, 465 Triple Attack, and 18 Flurry AA - Rogues have 270 Double Attack, 555 Triple Attack, and 19 Flurry AA - Berserkers have 270 Double Attack, 540 Triple Attack, and 19 Flurry AA Some classes also have AA to give bonus attacks (Ferocity, Punishing Blade, Lightning Strikes). Classes with higher Triple Attack likely get more out of the same buffs (ENC haste, Aria, Aura), making it challenging to figure out exactly how much ADPS they get out of various buffs. For ENC vs BRD ADPS, bards are still king, depending on the class. My cleric parses slightly more DPS over time with the bard than the ENC, because of the other bard goodies (45% spell damage, overhaste, epic, FE). However, the ENC + CLR is still more total DPS, because the ENC on her own can sustain much more DPS than the bard. ENCs are in an awesome spot right now, and bards are still good, but I think they could use some work. I wouldn't say we're hurting to be desirable, but a lot of things about the class are worrisome. These are, IMO, the current obstacles bards face: 1. Improvements to bard ADPS are seen as overpowered/unbalancing - DPS classes hate needing us 2. Bards are coded separately from other classes, making it difficult for us to get things/stuff (mana regen, song foci, etc) 3. Utility is more common than it used to be Songs other than Aria have negligible benefits to DPS, and our group ADPS discs have not being upgraded since 2007 (Fierce Eye) and 2011 (Quick Time). Many classes have alternative abilities that negate the benefit of Aria (WIZ familiar, Fire Core, Hand of Death). Bards haven't had a focus effect upgrade since SoD (2008). Many SPAs are not effected by instrument mods. The consequences of this are that we have almost no purpose in obtaining gear upgrades (other than bard tankability and melee DPS, both of which are laughable), and no way to improve our contribution to a raid other than rank 3 spells (extremely rare in TDS). I don't know the solution to this (if there even is one), but it makes progressing in EQ as a bard quite boring. Most classes in EQ have a lot more utility than they used to, which is fine, but leaves something to be desired when bard's forte is utility, and requests for other class abilities are denied (we don't want class homogenization, but bards historically have had lesser versions of many abilities). As an example, Twinsong exists on beta but was never implemented, because apparently bards did not want it at the time. Now, we cannot have twincast because it is an enchanter niche. I don't know where things will go from here, but I'm not optimistic. The bard community is small, and bards have a reputation of being overpowered. It makes it difficult to get improvements in anything.
It is kind of sad (as a bard) to see, in comparison, how much utility has been given out to the other classes while the bard's utility has remained pretty much the same over the years. We've gotten some useful abilities outside of group enhancements, but nothing has really been added to our existing ADPS utility... it's just sort of being maintained and nudged up every expansion. There was once a time when I'd agree bards were overpowered, but it has long since passed, in my opinion. I'm not sure the developers realize it though. The bards used to have a strong community, but even those who were active on The Concert Hall have disappeared and haven't posted for over a year or two. It's a ghost town over there (also doesn't help that the Admins are inactive, I know). It would be nice to see more active bards in the serverwide channel (/join serverwide.bards:bards). There are fairly talkative days in there on occasion. And given that we are a small community, It also does not help when individuals disagree about upgrading existing abilities simply because they don't use them (or don't think we should have it... whatever their reasoning is). Just because one bard doesn't use something, does not mean the others do not use them. An example that comes to mind is Dissonant Chord. I could see arguing one way or another if maybe we were given a choice of upgrading this or that, but we never see options like that from the developers. So, until we do, I ask that we do not deny fellow class members something simply because one of us has no desire for it. Ask for everything you can, and hope you get something... anything. And maybe one day Elidroth will learn the word, "Yes."
There seems to be an issue with a few in melee DPS classes being very irate with the fact that they'll never get their maximum DPS without a Bard and I don't think that's particularly productive for Bards either.
I don't really think this is the issue per se - most people realise that EQ is a group effort. After all, only a select few classes can accomplish anything in the group game without a few other helping them, and everyone needs 53 other people in a raid helping each other. Anyone that takes it exactly as you say must be quite the diva and I would be surprised they had lasted so long in EQ. The issue as I see it, is the disparity within the DPS classes on how reliant they are for support. In a game with a limited player base, if a berserker needs a bard for 40% (random number) of their DPS but a wizard only loses 5% (random again) this leads to some annoyance among players. Especially if that wizard is doing more DPS than the fully supported berserker in any case.
melee are extremly dependant on bard ( too dependant, according to melee people). casters not so much ( wiz kerafyrm familiar is better and don't stack with bard songs... so...). the general rule is bard for melee, ench for casters*. mage/necro get more out of bards than wizards
