Not sure if this helps, but perhaps look at it as the number of fades a bard can do before they are OOM. Not matter what your gear level, from full mana, you are able to do 8 fades with the first rank, 16 with the second, and 50 with the third (ignoring that they probably can do more since they will be regaining mana after the first fade). Definitely incentive to get the subsequent ranks of fade. Some will come out better and some worse depending on what their maximum mana pool is, but overall you still have arguably one of the best abilities that any class has in the game (personally I would say it's the best ability in the game, along with feign death, followed closely by Selos...running as fast as the gods solves so many problems other classes face). We are not factoring in that it also automatically is perfectly successful to something 5 levels above your current level, so it is scaling with you, that you don't have to go for a jog to fade (damned summoners) against non-see invis mobs, it still drops your hate by a ton if you can't fade it off, and you don't need to purchase 37 extra ranks to get the full advantage. Some may have lost in this decision, but we have all gained as well. I echo what you say that I am really interested in what levels ranks 2 and 3 available? All this said, I am a simple bard, and would just like my song keys not to lock up when I use a clicky without having to stop my twist to do so. Either that or make all clickies instant for bards
So, it's not really a scientific test by any means, but messed around a bit on Test server. Difference between fully T2 TBL group geared 110 Bard (172063 mana; 312 combat regen) and naked 110 Bard (13956 mana; 183 combat regen) was a total of 5 Fades (50 fully geared; 55 naked) before being OOM. Fully geared was the bare minimum 50 Fades (2% Mana per click * 50 clicks = 100% mana). So, I doubt going from group to raid gear is going to change that very much. Or going from 110 to 115. The effective cost is going to stay about the same, 2%. If you're fading often enough for it to effect your mana usage, regen isn't going to matter.
So I just checked my bard on agnarr that is MOSTLY PoT geared and lvl 65. my mana pool is just above 7.6k and on normal TLP servers I cannot gain the second level of fade until TSS that means for 6 expannsions I will be getting thousands of more mana in my pool but only a few more mana regen though the expansions.
But ... As a Bard (or any class for that matter) progresses won't their skill reach the point where these things take LESS mana to do? When one becomes skillful and masterful at one's craft, would not one also become more efficient. Thereby SAVING mana. Meaning the "mana cost" would actually decrease slightly! Having the mana cost increasing means we are all slow witted dolts . Just a slightly different point of view ...
Despite the way it looks when you do the math, in practice my mana management is FAR more concerned with other things I use mana for.
The only thing I could figure is that the devs wanted bards to only being able to cast fade so often over a period of time no matter how much mana they had and this was the way to do it.
