Chanzoon@Unrest_old wrote: Sorry if I offended you. It just didn't seem like UT/BC was really that hard of a decision. You get your raid group and there's maybe 2 options for who gets the buff and the other gets TC. As for jcap/gravitas, I always thought bards were a utility before dps and that's where jcap/gravitas comes in. If they didn't have that we'd just be playing assassins with less dps and more group wide buffs. Iono, it just seemed like based on your complaints you'd rather play a tier 1 dps. I'm not too sure I can understand your complaint about clicking either for troubs. It seems like you're focused on avoiding favoritism, which in my opinion, is easily solved by just asking the highest dps what he/she wants.
justanotherplaya wrote: We are scouts. We dont just show up to the raid, buff people and go afk. When I play my dirge I am SO busy in raids that I have to prioritize whats more important. I even have to use third party software just to maximize my potential. All I'm saying is that it would be nice to focus on other things and still be just as effective and desired in raids. Anybody who says either bard is not incredibly busy during raids has obviously never raided a bard or played a horrible bard. Gravitas and Jcap along with debuffs can be a full time job all by themselves. Honestly I get to the point where I just pick a couple healers for gravitas and a couple mages for jcap. Seriously, the expectation of casting jcap and gravitas to me is the worst part of playing bard and the reason I would LOVE to see them passive. It's wishful thinking and will never happen.
I've played both classes in raid. If you're talking about dirge, I think they have plenty to do. Last expac I was parsing top 5 in my guild (which isn't that great considering we had 2-3 good dps that time around 30-40kish in T3 gear) while sonic barrier/beating ppl to res/spot healing/keeping a macro to cure my healer from stun/stifle/gravitas rotation. Yeah I admit it's not easy trying to time your dps with temp buffs while eyeing the raid window and dropping death prevents and heals while parsing well and getting ready to res a group that's near death. I still did it just fine. That's not the problem though. This is a troub issue. And if you ask me what I do as a troub, I jcap/deadly dance for my main dps on time warp which is about 20-30 seconds into the fight, rotate the jcap afterwards on 7 targets, occasionally power regen if I see a chanter dead and a group that needs power, VC before my first jcap on myself is up, and parse. If you're telling me that's hard to do, I don't know what to say. It might be hard to do perfectly and maximize the heck out of that VC and the temp buffs that go up - but it's not hard to play decently. I don't really even have to look at my jcaps, I just hit each one in order and I already know for example that a time warp is coming on jcap 2 and jcap 4. Again, if people want their jcaps, you have timing slots and you make them work with the jcaps that you can put out. Aside from that, it's every 15-20 seconds cast the next jcap. Fire and forget really. You may delay a jcap a bit to meet up with timewarp but I don't see how it's hard? Seriously though, maybe I'm missing something and you could give me some pro tips. EDIT: Sorry. Anyways, this is all pretty much off topic. I disagree that making some of the troub buffs into groupwide buffs would make the class more fun to play though.
xdeadumx wrote: These are horrible changes and make me glad you aren't a troub dev. a) Poisons are useless, and have been since around EoF times. Check your predators/rogues dps from them, and you'll see they don't even do 2k. b) If I wanted to sit at range, I'd roll a ranger. (Granted I mainchanged to ranger a few weeks back, but still....). Troubs should be meleeing the mob just as much as dirges, and 95% of fights, mages are meleeing the mob or within a 10m range anyway. c) Increasing group dps - I think most people in this game would agree that troubs give a lot to a group. That isnt the problem any more. The problem is self dps. You could park a troub on AF on the mage group, and nobody would really complain. The thing that needs changing, is the 'Fun Factor' of troubs. Other changes suggested, changing Jcap to group only? Thats a silly change, most mages don't need it any more (apart from 10 CB, not make or break), so you'd just be making it useless. More PBAOEs? For all the hundreds of fights with lots of adds in raiding any more? As I said in my previous post. These changes are a start, but they aren't going to make people enjoy troubs any more, or want to start playing them again. The Enjoyment factor of a troub is low, and thats what needs fixing.
What Errror said (again; stop being reasonable and insightful damnit!). The changes on Test minus CSong and Overture are fine. I'd say the Raxxyl's and Jester's Cap changes are unnecessary (drop the agi from Raxxyl's and add 45-60s immunity on JC imo), but neither affects me terribly that I'll lose sleep over it. It'd be better if CSong was 20s duration and 6min base reuse, and Overture was untouched and they just made Painful the blue, but it's not the end of the world. However, these are BALANCES. Yes, I can no longer comment on Dirges being vastly better then Troubs due to their OP myth proc because it got changed on Test, but it's still a million times better than what we get (which is basically a 400dps proc). Therefore we'll have to wait until feedback from Test rolls in and we get a sense of how the two classes compare once again. But, imo, Troubs still need some additional things over and above mere balancing. My favourite is still adding Spell MA to the STA line, which buffs us (given that auto aside most of our dps is spells) and the mages we're supposed to be buffing. That, combined with adding 25% cb/reuse (or something, similar to the Dirge proc but tailored to Troubs), combined with the current changes and fixing CSong/Overture might well be enough imo. Dirges would no longer be doing a lot more dps without requiring much effort (but good ones will still do well, obviously), and Troubs get a slight buff and add more utility (which is, after all, our main priority). Ono
In theory these changes sound great, but I'd prefer to test them before giving my opinions. What works in theory could be terrible in reality. On the other hand it could be as good or better than it sounds. I just don't know. Still looking forward to testing them.
Errror wrote: If i was in a high end raiding guild i might agree.. however just the AA poison we get in class tree is 2% of my parse when im parsing 55k. I feel like poisions would add another 3% to my parse, since they are still adding 1-2% to the sins in my guild parsing 100-120k. As well, being in a non high end raiding guild, the casters still stand at max range on most fights with their 150cm. This game isn't designed strictly for high end raiding guilds. Which is shown by all the adjustments to herioc content. Again... lets change it to non hard mode raiding guild... none of the casters i have grouped with or raided with are at cap. so jcap for group would be a nice benefit. I would suggest adding 5-10% spell double attack to it. Now.. sounds like what you are looking for is a assissinate type ability that makes you feel good inside and to brag about. OH SNAP! i just hit with my super sonic blast note for 850k... WOOT! I just went back to troub a couple months ago, for the guild, from being a dirge for over a year. I have found myself lacking without the constant chaos of a dirge in a progression raid force. Jcap rotation is hardly a distraction from dps abilities. So to be honest having more shortterm clickies to rotate/keep track of that increase group dps would be nice. If you want to self dps... roll a sin. Ya, you like it... It's ok.. beastlords will wtfpwn you anyways.
xdeadumx wrote: Well I think poisons are ok but pretty unnecessary and I'm not sure I'd really notice if I had them or not. Casters do stand at range but I think part of being the scout class is you have to learn to joust well and time aoe blocks. Also about the reuse of casters, my raid is geared out in EZmode gear with 2 HM armor pieces and pretty much every caster is capped on casting speed and reuse. All they really want out of Jcap is the 10% crit bonus. The reuse really just helps me and the assassin/scout that I use it on. I expect with the current stat inflation, people are going to be capped out on reuse from just legendaries next expac anyways. This has been mentioned previously but having Jcap not be a group wide buff allows us to be put into a mage group while buffing the assassin in the tank group. <-This is huge and why Jcap shouldn't be changed. I pretty much agree that playing a dirge is a huge difference from troub in raid. I basically fall asleep on progression fights because my raid won't let me risk going in and I have nothing to do since I'm sitting at max range auto attacking with my bow. Debuff. Jcap. Range autoattack. This idea might be completely stupid but I just wanted to put this idea out there anyways. Maybe we can get a toggle ability added to our myth buff that makes our HO into a solo HO and changes the attributes/way it works. Make it able to perform different abilities by pressing CA/Spells in a certain order (something like CA/Spell/CA or CA/CA/Spell or Spell/Spell/CA). And then add several buffs that would last a minute and limit it to only having 1 buff at a time so you can't stack them all. This would make it so every minute we're inclined to HO and put up the right buff or override our current buff with something new to adapt to the situation. Ideally, the buffs would be group wide and have some useful effects: a massive arcane/elemental ward, group potency/crit bonus, 1 time proc group aoe block (this might be broken), group power proc. In the case of the ward/aoe block, you'd want to HO more often in order to keep the buff refreshed where as the group potency and power proc could be used ideally in other situations. This would definitely make things a little more interesting for us but I do realize it'd probably take a lot more programming anyways. Further benefits is if it does work out it'd be easier to implement new content that would be interesting and fun to play with for bards. On the side note, the other thing I've been wondering is what happened to itemization for bards? Instruments/drum of the ethernaut sort of things and collecting all the different effects to maximize your buffs. Man if they could bring that back and give unique weapons for bards like they do for bruiser/monks it would be so cool. I for one would not be complaining if these sort of things dropped off our current raid content.
Ok just read a lot of these...first off why you trollin buffrat? You know you play a troub very occasionally and you have a good understanding of the maths behind it, the actual experience is much different playing one constantly. Buffrat@Antonia Bayle wrote: You ended well, but I doubt the extra agi is going to make that huge of a difference even with stats the way they are now. Buffrat@Antonia Bayle wrote: I wouldn't say this. Consider how group make ups are? You as a dirge are pretty much going to be gauranteed the same number of classes that directly benefit from your dps and melee increasing buffs (that number being 3). Generally the same as a troub in a mage group. The 10% potency difference between a mage spell and a melee CA is a gap, but I wouldn't call it an overpowered gap. At the very least it's not a gap that benefits the troub in any way. In addition your buff helps yourself (yes I'm counting dirges among the 3 in this group) In addition, you generally have a coercer and sometimes a shaman in there. I know they can't change classes based on min/max of a high end guild, but troubadors aren't getting dps mods and the disparity is quite telling. How are we the best at debuffing compared to dirges? Do we get some awesome buff that dirges don't get I should be using more? If you're counting our magic resist debuff, I wouldn't count that as putting us over the top in utility. Sorry I'm not trying to call you out specifically, just have to disagree on some of your points As others have suggested, make lamentations a blue AE, and change the dirge equivalent to a blue AE (or put a damage component on their equivalent of bellow, which is already a blue) This proposed change to overture will just decrease our single target dps, which is most of this expansion. Unless you had a LOT more AE encounters it's not going to be a welcome change. The Jcap issue has been discussed. A shortened immunity? Sure. Lack of immunity? not so much. Countersong I've used plenty either to counter initial AE's before mob is debuffed, or for those moments when the named wipes and is standing by the raid casting it's AE. If you're going to shorten the duration, shorten the recast by a fair amount or it will be never be used as anything but the most extreme emergency situations. The vexing verses change is pretty awesome imo. Some of the named take almost 2 full seconds to cast their AE and a 30% increase in that will be very helpful for that little bit of extra time to joust out (and please if you give us this don't EVER change it to *unless target is epic* because that will just be a big FU to us all) Breathtaking bellow: Not sure about the point of this change. Literally on raids the only reason I have to cast this spell is to complete HO's or proc PoTM. Unless you're going to create a lot more encounters where there are "heroic" (IE affected by stun, etc) mobs among the summoned adds or something, this one is going to be pointless for anywhere but PvP. Pretty much all the other changes look promising. I don't pretend to have all the answers. I just know when I'm doing HM kolskeggr, burning all out from the start with temp adorns on and etc. using incinerate with my RO and my VC is hitting for 140k, and I STILL lose to a mystic? Something really needs to change. *note* I am not in absolute min/max gear atm. I have a lot of crit mit adorns on for HM drunder zones and don't have switch out peices of gear, really. So potentially I could be doing a *bit* more dps. Probably an extra 30-40 MA I'm missing out on from that. Also I'm specced for DD, so yes I know I could have more personal dps. I do wish to thank the dev team for giving troubadors a look. We've needed it for quite some time. I have led raids and recruited for guilds since this game was released until the end of TSO, and the very reason I MADE a troubador is because they were an asbsolute nightmare to recruit and retain. Anyone who started as a troub and then raided generally didn't last for long, and quite often I had to have guildies make one specifically for the guild. There needs to be some change that makes troubs at least competetive with dirges on the parse (or at least not losing to healers) Our current utility is fine imo. Every raid guild out there knows they need a troubador, it's just a matter of finding someone who wants to play one and won't get frustrated with being the bottom rung scout.
Onoddil wrote: Ty SOE for working on troubs, me thinks ono suggestions is on the spot , Thats the way to go
Just wanted to put this out there since I wasn't sure why people were preferring keeping some sort of immunity on Jcap. Fundamentally Jcap kind of changes but it's still pretty much hit Jcap every 15 seconds on target X. I think having no immunity on Jcap was meant as an indirect buff to Troub DPS as we can now maintain it on ourselves as well as 2 other targets. Some bonus extra stats along with pretty much permanent 50% reuse on a scout class is especially helpful to troub personal and group dps. More PoTM, more deadly dance, more turnstrike, and if you really wanted to, max out the RO duration AA and you have more CC immunity to use when VC isn't up. This will also mitigate the problem people have with TO being a significant source of DPS when you can be casting stuff like perfect shrill more often and allow us to prioritize more DPS oriented stats over reuse (our heroic AA tree for example would change significantly). All in all, I don't consider the immunity a nuisance, but without it, troubs are getting significant buffs. I'm down for zero immunity unless there's some other particular reason I'm missing. Oh yeah, and still hoping for a class-defining mechanic that will make playing utility more than just hitting Jcap, PoTM, Deadly Dance, VC, and just....generally staying alive. Who knows, maybe the dev's will come up with something super cool to revitalize the bards.
already some changes are opperational and troubs benefit more from them than dirges: for every 14-15 haste between 200-300, you get 1 flurry for every 30 haste between 300-400, you get 1 flurry. So basically, with illu, troub respec and inq in mage group, you get over 400 haste (i have 420ish in raid), which is around 11-12 more flurry; add CoB to that and you get the picture. It shows on parse nicely, dps gap between dirges and troubs dropped to 10% now. I just fear that within the process of boosting troubs, the dirges will be left behind, creating another gap between similar classes...
Yeah. To be honest I really don't like the nerf to dirges. I was pretty sure sony wouldn't do it considering a lot of the troub threads I read specifically detailed that they did not want the dirge to be nerfed or changed in any way and only for the troub to be altered. At this point, I think it'd be better if dirges kept their mythical - it kept alot of players happy and was a unique mechanic that pretty much defined the dirge. Pretty much win-win for sony and this whole change doesn't really make any sense to me. I don't care if a mythical is overpowered/underpowered, if it's unique I think most people would be satisfied. Why change something that was perfectly fine into a dull increase in stats? While the troub myth is actually pretty good aside from the proc, it's the fact that the proc has become so bland and uninteresting that it annoys me and possibly some of the other troubs out there. I almost think this isn't really about balancing but rather to just fix some things that were meant to be fixed when stat inflation occured. As long as the proc is somewhat unique or interesting, I really don't care what it is. If troubs do outparse dirges come this update, I don't think I'd be happy that there's a new dead class that people don't want to play. I'm perfectly fine with adding more to group dps rather than personal dps as a troub and I've accepted that as our role. The test update sort of missed the point for me and I wasn't looking for a scaling in dps but rather a more involved utility role.
justanotherplaya wrote: Although this might not be the only reason, it's an important one. With the current imunity, you can make a single macro with all your Jcap targets in it. If you press that macro, it will then cast Jcap on the first person in that list without imunity (or the last person if you queue the macro). Without imunity, all troubs will have to go back to a single macro for each target, or even going back to having to actually target whoever you want to cast it on. This is anoying to do, and also forces us to remember who our next target is. So please keep some imunity (at least 30 seconds) on it.
Lemilla@Permafrost wrote: I use profit. I was able to edit my quick raid buttons to send a tell to the person to tell them they have j-cap. To me whether there is immunity or not doesn' matter. I only give J-Cap to myself just before I run RO, but with no immunity I'm sure my mages will love that. I also think that if they remove the immunity from J-cap they should also remove the immunity from Gravitas.
