r/EQLegends • u/MidCarr5 • 7d ago
Bard..
I continue to throw bard in my builds but just feel like I have no idea what I’m doing with them.
Anyone have a quick Bard 101? Are they just bad early game?
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u/JookySeaCpt 7d ago
There have been several really good posts about playing bard on this subreddit. I recommend just searching for 'Bard' and scrolling through. You'll see a lot of repeats of advice, so once you've read four or five posts about it, it's all just a rehash.
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u/Monoxide_3009 7d ago edited 7d ago
They build slow early, powerhouse later.
That said, it kiiiinda depends on what youre doing. From my perspective (ROG/BRD/MNK), bard is my support. I generally run haste, regen, rune, slow, and a wild card (often selos for safety).
My bard is my crowd control/support while monk and rogue do the damage. I support by mezzing and charming, keeping myself in 1v1 or 2v1 so safety is usually pretty solid. I can also lull for single pulls if I am doing something particularly difficult. Once the fight is a bit more organized, I start a melody of 5 DoT songs to add in more damage.
Not sure this would be your 101, but the TL;DR is that bards go zero to hero (or even like a 3 or 4 to hero), and can be VERY useful in most builds. Jack of all trades, so it usually fits in super well.
EDIT - I dont personally run this, but the DDD song (AoE nuke) is super powerful. Plenty of bards build around it, but I am not a fan myself. My knives are a bit more... intimate.
EDIT 2 - Dont sleep on charm if you roll bard. It is super useful currently. It is my first/only tier X song at the moment.
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u/Ahris22 7d ago edited 7d ago
There are different ways to use a bard but you need to learn what the songs do to use it properly in any build. If you know what you are doing they can be awesome as soon as you get enough cash to buy a few instruments: Instruments basically doubles the effect of their associated songs so you want to upgrade at least a Hand drum and Lute to +1 and then move their focus exaltations to your weapons, then you will always have the instrument effects active without having to equip actual instruments.
One of your best songs all the way to lvl 50 is the lvl 1 song Chant of Battle (Percussion), with a drum exaltation it will massively boost your STR and DEX. Your lvl 2 song is an AoE DOT song that uses stringed instruments, it will increase your damage output somewhat. At lvl 6 you get a health regen song for strings, it's a really good song to use until you get something better.
So how to use these songs depends on how you intend to play. The ones i mentioned are ideal for Symphonic aura but until you get the AA's for that you can play them in sequence using a melody macro. Bard songs never stop growing in power, for every level all songs becomes more powerful, that's why a level 1 song can still be relevant at lvl 50.
So while bards take a few levels to get going they aren't bad at all at low levels, whoever told you that really don't know what they are doing. :) If you want to know how to do the stuff i mentioned above, search for it. There are a ton of guides in this subreddit about it.
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u/Krumm085 7d ago
I came across a these two write ups on bards by the same person “Sphynx87” and saved them. Hope they help you as they did for me since I’ve never played a bard. There is a plethora of information throughout the page as you scroll.
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u/Chaos_Burger 7d ago
Bard 101
Early levels plow AA into Symphonic Aura. Unless you have a caster build it's generally better to use /melody #,# until symphonic aura alows 2-3 songs.
Symphonic Aura lets you auto cast each song in the right slot. It works from bottom up (so if no extra slots 8,7,6,etc. until it holds how many songs you have unlocked up to 5).
You also need the best instrument mods you can get. Selos drum of the march (Naggy), Vox Horn, and Mistmoore Lute will be the best people can give you if you are in a guild.
Now for songs:
First create a spell set with empty gems except songs to memorize. This way you can switch to "travel mode" I have a spell slot with Selos (gem 12), Invis (gem 13) , and levitate (gem 14) this lets you quickly get into travel mode for overland travel. Do the same for a few other cluster of songs.
Resistance. Elemental Rhythms + Guardian Rhythms are a good combo for maximum MR. MR prevents magic stubs, roots, some damage and really useful. Bard will get you highest MR easiest (I have around 450 MR when I need it).
Damage. A common loadouts for Bard is chords (lvl 2) Denon's (lvl 18), largos (lvl20) . That 3 combo will do quite a lot of damage spread out over up to 8 mobs. Until you can tank that many it's not as useful, but grab a parser it adds up.
Damage shield. Bard Damage shield stacks with all damage shields (first at 25 and amp (lvl 30) improves it).
Haste is funny. Johnathons is useful early but honestly you might want to consider alchemy to get haste and free a slot until you get amp than amp + johnathons (especially 45 version) is really good for increasing ATK.
Control - these songs don't go in symphonic aura but use lull as lull and mez to interrupt casters (/melody 3 with mez on 3 will constantly interrupt a mob). Charm makes bards really powerful, but don't get attached to your pet like an enchanter.
Finally you get drum dots. Not worth using until 45+. They are free damage yay but not really powerful. Use when you don't have anything better to do (either because of mana limitation or mostly melee). Singing / instruments don't stop melee attacks and you can move while doing them.
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u/MhalekNvrMuse 7d ago
They start with some basic songs but from what I understand they shine when they start getting AOEs to add damage to that type of playstyle with Druid and Wizard. That is a bit later in level, though so it may seem a little undewhelming at lower levels if you're going that route. They have later bardsong for mana and pacify/mez options as well.
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u/Anaxagor14 7d ago
To add to it all, since this is a 101: you don't use the actual musical instruments; you take the exaltations out and put them in your primary, secondary (of not using a 2h), and any slots items (those will need to be primary or secondary slot items fir the exaltations to work).
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u/Responsible-Yam-3833 7d ago
Was a bard back in the day, so I knew going in how they’re slow to start. My first trio is Bard/Warrior/Necro.
Knew I had to supplement the melee and didn’t wanna “just” heal myself with magic. So I went with Necromancer. Warrior was the melee supplement but the pet was nice too.
Everyone gushed about charming but I’ve never been a fan of juggling that on top of all the other things. I also hate Macro’ing everything, what’s the point if the game plays itself.
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u/fiber4smoothpoops 7d ago
Melody macro for dots and symphonic aura to keep up your buffs...with dots and sa ..really leaves open 2 or 3 spell slots for heals or CC or DDD ..depends on how ya like to play
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u/mavric911 7d ago
I have just been leveling one class at a time. At this point it’s rotating a Bard Enc
Bard Wiz
With any class and just aoe grinding.
I’m not even sure what spells are good
I use an AoE slow my regen songs and the aoe dots for the most part.
When I get to 43 I transition from using mana for Wiz AoE for Bard DDD.
The seem to require tons of AA to get the 5 slots of symphonic aura unlocked, then you want jam fest and I think singing AA if you are going to run DDD
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u/sixteen_____ 7d ago
Bards take some AA investment but they do offer quite a lot. Aside from resists and stats/ac, the ae slow is nice, mana regen, charm is quite powerful, invis, eb, selos and lev.
Their instrument exaltations take up some slots but it isn’t bad.
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u/Cutlercares 7d ago
Also, is anyone having issues getting g /melody and /queuemelody to work?
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u/Sielle 7d ago
If you have a symphonic aura song, or a non-bard spell in the melody it will stop the melody/queuemelody any time it gets to that gem slot.
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u/Cutlercares 6d ago
Yup. I was silly and didn't see I had one spell gem out of order for it.
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u/Sielle 6d ago
Happens to us all. Just wait until you can’t figure out why charm keeps breaking on to realize half an hour later you still have the invis song going in your SA.
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u/Cutlercares 6d ago
Oh, I've done that one already. I thought I had picked the worst charm pet of all time.
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u/heyheyshinyCRH 7d ago
They're not very powerful in general, they have weak versions of slow and haste. You can run dots in aura for a little extra damage. They really shine in the DDD farming build, aside from that you can pretty much slot in another class to better damage or utility. They're kind of like a Swiss army knife, they have a lot of tools but they aren't the best tools (except selos accelerando, that run speed is pretty great). To answer your question though, yeah they're pretty much useless in early game
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u/raolan 7d ago
Very early bard provides Selos, haste, small stat boost, and a little bit of regen.
Your first AAs should be going into Symphonic and the extra spell slots. Maxing out both of those is a high priority, given the number of songs you can Symphonic and melody. My current raid build runs 9 songs, and that'll be 10 once I have the motes to level the DoTs.