So, I played EQ for several years when it came out in 99. Long story short, I missed it and I'm back. I always liked bards but never played one, seemed like too much button pushing. Since they added /melody it peaked my interest. With some simple math and things like armor that shortens casting times, lengthens songs etc i find that i can twist 5 or 6 songs without much trouble. My problem is that i am now lvl 65 and have refused to group because i wanted to learn the class well first. I now need to group but would apreciate some pointers from experienced bards so that i don't embarass myself. I have gotten pulling down pretty well. My spell book is a mess though and the song titles are confusing overall to find quickly (which a group would have little patience being made to wait 5 minutes while i pick appropriate songs to make everyone happy) So, are there any suggestions for some spells for hotkeys at my lvl to cover all the bases? I know it is basicly situational but any wisdom would be apreciated greatly!!
I don't have any bard specific advice to give you, but sounds like you're missing one of the pretty great improvements to EQ in recent years. Right click on an empty spell/song gem and it will bring up a cascading list of all your songs, sorted by functions and types and then by level. Pick one and it'll memorize into that gem. Makes it quick and easy to memorize what you need without having to page through your spell book. When I first came back to the game I was also trying to keep my spell book in order so I could find things quickly, but when I found the right click menu I just scribed new spells as I bought them and never even flipped through the book anymore.
I've got a Bard AAing at 65.... For pulling, Bellow AA, Fade AA, Lull and Highsun are my key tools. Then Mez and/or Charm to take care of adds as needed. For grouping I look at the key areas... Echo of Trusik for 25% spell damage and overhaste Warsong of Zek for normal 60% haste, etc. (not necessary if haste buffs are available in the group, i.e. chanter) Song of Storm for melee proc Psalm of Veeshan for AC/DS/resists Wind of Marr for HP/Mana regen When slowing is needed, hitting with Angstlich's Assonance is nice because it lasts a minute and doesn't have to be twisted. Requiem of Time is our best twisting slow for the hard hitters. If I'm in a group with another Bard and I'm pulling, they would take care of all the above and I'd just stack five chants for extra DPS. Which ties into an important point, if you are pulling for a fast kill group you may not be spending enough time with your group to have a multi-song twist make sense. In that case, I might just focus on one or two key songs to twist for the 20-30 seconds I'm back in camp fighting.
You can also right click within the spell book to move spells around. One related question I have is why don't I always get the option to delete an obsolete spell when I right click? You can also right click the icon at the bottom on the spell gems to save and load song sets.
Thanks guys/gals. Good info. You gave me the info i needed. I also took 30 minutes to move old spells i will never use to the back of my spell book. That helped a lot. I was unaware that i could click on a gem and choose spells like that. Thanks again! PS: I wonder if SOE has thought to make the spell pages changeable, like instead of numbers we could title the page. Like aoe spells, direct damage spells, medical spells, etc.
I'm not sure if this is true for everyone, but I think most people just ignore the spell book and use the right-click to memorize function now, so the the layout of the spellbook is rather irrelevant. But yes, the entire spellbook UI could be much improved.
Yeah. I'm willing to bet any modifications to the spellbook UI that may have been on the to-do list got thrown out when the right-click drop-downs were introduced.
