So less resists from debuffs with Ordination mods is what your getting at? Ok, I can see the point of having the occasional piece of gear/effect with that mod for bards, but subjugation still sounds like a complete waste to me. IMHO we're still better off with weapon mods in general. I use my weapons every single fight, but I don't debuff everything I see and debuff resists aren't a big issue anyway. But this was mentioned in regards to raid gear so perhaps it's an issue for raid dirges.
How much does intelligence actually help debuffs? I suppose I could look at the stats while playing with my equipment, but that sounds like work. My understanding is that intelligence from items doesn't factor into resist / no resist type calculations. Whysp
I think that stat-wise, then the Vhalen set looks alright... except perhaps for the many pieces with +parry. Since bards arent exactly known for our deeds as tanks, then increasing parry is kinda pointless... dont get me wrong, having extra parry skill is nice, its just not often that we get to make use of it. Perhaps ditch 2 of the +parry and make them into +5 slashing and piercing instead. The set bonus on the Vhalen set seems fine to me as well... infact I wouldnt change a thing. The Requiem set needs quite a bit of tweaking when it comes to stats. The severe lack of INT on the 4 known pieces is obvious to most people. I found the stat spread on the Nightchord armor extremely nice and I am quite amazed that this trend wasnt carried over to EoF. Again this set has +parry and +defense, which is rather pointless to a dirge... especially one who is able to get hold of the Requiem armor. Those stats should be replaced with perhaps increased mitigation or resists.. both of which are of ALOT more use to a raiding dirge than parry and defense. Set set bonuses are imo to drool over... they are really what makes this set worth getting in its current state.
My biggest issues with the armor is distribution. For me on armor the order of importance on stats tends to be Int/str then agi. So when I get a piece of fabled or legendary armor that has no int or str I get irritated. It is even more frustrating to get the pieces of the set that have no Int. When you have the whole set the loss of str and/or int from that piece isn't going to hurt so bad, but when you only have a few pieces it really hurts. For example the first two pieces of relic armor I got where my boots and my hat. Those two pieces while they helped my str agi sta and wis, took a bug chunk of my Int away. When I had to drop my self buff and switch out to resist jewelry, I became a very very sad dirge as my Int dropped below 200. So I guess to sum up I'd rather have the Int more evenly distributed on armor. Form what I can see so far of the Requiem set I've got to assume that alltheInt from the set is loaded on the chest, boots and legs, which got to be the harder pieces to get since we don't have any info on those yet. The distribution on the the vhalen on Int isn't that great either with only three pieces having Int and five pieces with str, nevermind the chest piece which has neither. For bard sets and especially dirge sets, I'd like the total Int increased and distribute the stats so at least five pieces have Int on them and at least five have str and there not be any piece that doesn't have one of those two stats on them. The next important stat would be Agi and I'd rank about even wis/sta below those. As for the specific sets, I'd prefer melee and spell crits and to replace two of those parrys with a slashing and piercing on the Vhalen's set. For the Requiem set i got to agree unless something changes with boons I'd switch boons and CoB skills on that set, I'd also want some ordination somewhere.
The argument of "for a raid dirge/for a non raid dirge" is kind of irrelevant in the case of the fabled armor set. If you are not a raid Dirge then the Fabled set is out of reach for now. With that said I do believe both sets need to have Int on at least a few of the pieces. The Fabled chest and legs may, we don't know yet, but all signs are pointing to them not having Int. I'd gladly settle for half the stamina on these pieces if it meant getting a few points of Int. The other wild card in all this is that I would be OK with no Int at all if our self buff did not take up a concentration slot. Personally I think that would make up for the fact a little bit. I love the effects on the armor sets, pretty useful, though as someone mentioned maybe add some +piercing/slashing. Otherwise they are spot on. The wisdom is also nice on these sets since resists seem to be a major factor in this expansion.
I definately would like to see more INT/STR rather than STA. We don't get much hit points per STA point. I agree with removing ranged crit and put spell crit instead. Also would love to change one of the 2 set bonuses of skills in the fabled set for dirges. The first one is great though (COB).
The Requiem armour does look great, although the Vhalen's isn't so hot. It is surprising that the Requiem's has no Int though, as that seems really odd for bard armour.
I'm more of the mind for a type of balance in the pieces. Focus on int/str on shoulders, bracers, and gloves. Use +piercing/slashing or +disruption type effects Use agi/wis/sta on the breastplate, helm, legs, and boots. Use a combination of +parry/defense on a couple. for example: Shoulders: str/int Wrist: int/agi Hands: int/str Chest: Agi/Sta Head: Sta/Int Legs: Str/Agi Boots: Agi/Wis Int: 4 pieces, Str: 4, Agi: 4, Sta: 2, Wis: 1....I'd be happy with that balance. Would the boots suck? sure...but you don't have to wear them :smileyvery-happy:
I don't know why raiding bards are so concerned about Stamina. I only have about 300 some odd sta, and in the MT grp i have around 10k hp. So, for me, i say screw STA. Give me int or agi. If i'm rezzing and debuffing, and trying to maintain the modest DPS that i can do, i need all the power i can get.
Amen Kaeylum, For a raiding dirge in my opinion its all about Agi/Int since they are the main for our power pool. Agi helps also helps our avoidance and Int our spell dmg. I dont mind seeing some wis every now and again just because of how Wis effects resists. I believe its 5 points of resist accross the board for every point of wis, so if you have a piece with +20 wis then you get 100 pts extra too all resists. Str is nice but as a raiding dirge I spend alot of time Debuffing & Rezzing then lastly DPS. Even getting on the heal parse by tossing some Oration out there to bump the MT or save a healer/caster.
I would also like to see more Int put onto our gear. Since the fabled class sets are obtained by raiding, we should have stats that would benifit us on raids, not when we're soloing stuff. I don't need more Sta in raids, my guild has awesome healers and I keep plenty of resist gear/jewelry on me, I only die from epics when I do stupid [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] or the whole raid wipes. I just don't understand why our Nightcord gear fits our class so perfectly then this x-pac comes out and it's like the devs forgot what our class was all about. Also, I dont spend a lot of time reading through the forums, but has any Dev posted on why they designed our dirge gear around some other class? I would like to hear their reasoning behind this change, it's sad when the healer gear has more Int than ours does.
Its pretty simple... couldve all just said....... SOE we are half casters so please for the love of god...... ADD SOME STINKING INTELLIGENCE TO OUR GEAR!!!!!!!
I'm kinda surprised it hasn't really been discussed, so maybe I'm off base. But what do you all think about Dissonant Boon being improved with the entire set of the fabled gear? Do any of you ever even use this buff??? No Dirges I've talked to have ever had it up, we just have too many other important buffs running.
I personally never use Boon. In MT group Guardian, and I think Warden both buff those skills...So its worthless to improve that over the multitude of other buffs the set could enhance...I'm thining get the 3 piece set maybe 5 and call it a day...
Definitely not worthless on the face of it, since the revamp. However, given the amount of +skill buffs already available, it's the buff I sing last. I would definitely have preferred to have another buff modified on the fabled set. Not that it matters, I don't have the set. =)
I find it very odd that people complain about this gear so much. Although more int would be good, it would seem excessive to put it on every piece. Most importantly though, the 25 seconds off a 60second recast on CoB is amazing. It makes it almost twice as useful for long fights or quick pulling. I think it odd that you only need 3 pieces for such an amazing ability. That should let us keep CoB up about 50% of the time, that is stunningly good.
The trouble with Boon.. as I see it anyway... is that its more of a self buff than it is a group buff... let me explain. Bards are the only (melee) classes that do not have melee skill increasing self buffs (be it stances or other buffs). So whenever we as dirges put up Boon, then it benefits us a great deal more than the people we are with, since they are most likely already using offensive stance and/or something else. The MT may also benefit from Boon, but chances are that his/her melee skills are already being buffed from one to two other classes in the MT group, so the MT should really be covered in that area. Some may argue that more is better, but to be honest, then if the MT can hit the target and thus able to gain agro through damage, then I see no point in using Boon. And to tell you the truth, then I very ... VERY rarely use Boon because of it. I dont really care if I personally have trouble hitting a mob, cause my primary job aint to parse in the top 5. My job is to make other people look better, be that the MT or the DPS freaks, depending on what type of group I am in. So, in conclusion to my rambling, then I find the added bonus to Boon on the Requiem set a rather big disappointment as a full set ability. I am not saying that the set abilities should be swapped around. Instead I am saying that either the Boon enhancer effect should be exchanged with something entirely new, or *shrug* something should be done to Boon to make it more desirable. This could perhaps be to remove the concentration requirement on the song.
Ehhhh...Cause INT is good :smileytongue: I love INT long time...AGI/INT/STR are my favorites in that order. A lot like Kaeylum said, in MT group you'll have like 10k+HP without issue. So, I'm all about more power pool. Considering
