Need a bit of help with bard

Discussion in 'Hybrid' started by Gkimaxe, May 28, 2021.

  1. Gkimaxe New Member

    I have recently returned to EQ after a 15 yr hiatus and was thinking of launching a bard on Mischief. I am a bit confused on how to run melody. I was watching some of Ion Blaze's videos and when twisting are you changing instruments for each of the songs in the sequence? Is that what is suggested to maximize the effectiveness of each song in the melody? If it is how do you do it? Thanks for any help
  2. code-zero Augur

    If you're running a song that you absolutely, positively need to be maxed then equip an instrument that mods that skill. /melody will save you from carpal tunnel

    Later instrument mods come on pieces of gear, making bandoliers and swapping will get old in a hurry
  3. Winnowyl Suffering is optional.

    /melody 1 2 3 4 will play your first 4 songs, in order, and repeat it when it's done. You can also choose to do like, /melody 1 4 3 2 and it'll sing them in THAT order and repeat until you get stunned or miss a note.
  4. Gnomereaper Augur

    Proper Care and Feeding of Heroic Bards

    https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq...oper-care-and-feeding-of-heroic-bards.209160/
  5. Jennre Band Leader

  6. MichaelPants Journeyman

    Read this for the first time. Useful info, though some maybe isn't relevant quite yet on my server, Thornblade. It actually got me thinking about Melody differently. As a novice bard I have my standard /melody 1 2 3 4 and a /melody 1 2 for selos and levitate. My travel mix.

    Now seeing the example melody of something like /melody 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 6 1 2 3 4 just made my head spin. I didn't consider something like this. Could be useful for Boastful Bellow for a bit of extra farming DPS. It also got me thinking of macros like;

    /stopsong /pause 100 (random pause length, but would be for how long it takes to complete melody.)
    /melody 1 2 3 4
    /stopsong /pause 100
    melody 3 7 8 1

    I'm not sure what for yet, but just excited to think about Melody in more ways than /melody 1 2 3 4
  7. Cragzop Cranky Wizard


    In EQ macro notation, /pause command goes in front on a line, but runs second. So:

    /pause 10, /stopsong

    will run the command /stopsong and then pause for 1 second before going to the next line (note, that's a comma between the two commands). As you typed, I'm pretty sure the /pause commands get ignored.

    That said, I have no idea what you are trying to accomplish in your macro. I "think" you want the pauses on the /melody lines to then run /stopsong, start /melody 1234, pause 10 seconds, etc. But I have no idea if that actually work not being able to access the game atm.
  8. MichaelPants Journeyman


    I'm not trying to accomplish anything, I had just not recognized that versatility with /melody before. My thinking was two sets of songs, and yes I get that you can't have 8 song buffs up at once with one bard. Its not so much that its obviously useful, but instead that it could have situational and novelty use.

    I can't test the macro either, server downtime, but I'm imagining two melody sets with a pause between each set that will stopsong after one cycle of each set. A long /melody also maybe accomplishes this. i.e. /melody 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 6 1 2 3 4

    There are certain songs I like to keep in rotation that don't need to be up at all times. Hymn of Restoration being one of those. Often it is correct to have it up always, but there is just so much versatility in /melody that I simply hadn't recognized before.
    Black likes this.
  9. Niskin Clockwork Arguer


    Yeah, I think that's what he's trying to do, and that is the correct syntax. For more fun, he could add a line in front of all that, with: /timer 200

    Then he would see the hotkey go red and tick down to show it fired and how long the melodies have to go before they end. Also the last /melody wouldn't need a pause as nothing happens after it. Unless he intended to put another stop song in there, otherwise it would just repeat that last melody when the macro ended.
  10. Syylke_EMarr Augur

    As you mentioned, the macro pause would need to be long enough to account for the entire melody set (so ~12 seconds), which is typically not the best idea. The syntax for something like that would be (I think, can't remember if /pause and /timer use the same time metrics):
    This would melody songs 1, 2, 3, 4 and wait until that finishes (approximately, lag is a thing), then stop singing and run the 2nd melody (5, 6, 7, 8) ad infinitum, or until you push the key again.

    The better option would be, as you noted, to use a longer melody line for a song you only want to run every once in awhile. Or just manually adding it in as you go.
  11. Trebla7th Augur

    I'm fairly certain that pauses are in tenths of seconds, not hundredths, so adjust accordingly (e.g., /pause 7200 would pause for 720 seconds or 12 minutes). To pause for one melody cycle you'd want something like /pause 120.

    That said, and I haven't tried this, I don't think you want to do this. Pauses in macros prevent some other actions such as other macros... if you might be trying to bellow using a macro, or pull with an incoming message, you'll be blocked until the /pause ends.

    If you want to cycle one set of songs, then another... a far better option would be two separate melody keys and use them as appropriate (e.g., hotkey 1: stopsong then melody 1 2 3 4, hotkey 2: stopsong then melody 5 6 7 8) or alternatively exhaust the length of a melody command (255 characters?) with /melody 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 5 6 7 8 5 6 7 8 ... <repeat 5-8 until end of line>
    Syylke_EMarr likes this.
  12. Syylke_EMarr Augur


    Ha, you're right. I was so used to multiplying by 60 for my /timer's on discs/AAs that I just did it automatically.
  13. Shakara Augur

  14. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    I would avoid using multiple melody chains with pauses in between to flip between song chains or you'll have issues with it being cancelled by using any other macros while your multiple melody chain macro runs.

    Better to use a single & longer melody chain that has the song swaps you want to use built in.

    I use a macro to trigger epic 2.0 and have the melody chain start afterwards and another separate macro to use AE Mezz song & restart melody after - both use the /timer command at the start so I can visibly see when the Epic and Spell are available again.

    e.g.
    /timer 1800,/stop action
    /gs Bard Epic + Fierce Eye Activated
    /alt act 3506
    /pause 35,/useitem Blade of Vesegran
    /melody 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 11
    code-zero likes this.
  15. Gnomereaper Augur

    I use separate keys for melody keys and epic.
    code-zero likes this.
  16. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    Nothing wrong with that if that's how you prefer to play.

    Over time those extra keypresses add up, so all of the macros I use on my SHM/BRD are designed to minimise how many times I need to interact with them using as few key presses as possible.
    code-zero likes this.