They won't do them, they still can. You are in a self imposed catch 22.

I'd make comments on this topic, but nothing I said would be constructive =) Well, the new archetype will do one important thing - make people switch classes a bit, which means more credits, which means more money for Lusternia. So, all in all, it does serve a purpose, just like opening the bards guild before they were ready did.

Quite frankly, Visaeris, if you don't like the game, quit playing it. You'll feel a lot better about things, and those that do enjoy it will enjoy it more with one fewer dissenting voice.

It's hard to put on a one-man show, even with high Illusions. Unless you sit down for four hours and work out the timing for Programmed Illusions, minus the suspension of belief for krokani and people with good Arts skill, you're unlikely to pull it off. So, you need more actors. As you add more people, the chances of someone not being able to be around increases exponentially.

I can't say for certain if I'm going to be in the realms on a particular date until probably the day before. If I'm the lead role and I don't show up, what now? We don't have Biff the Understudy to show up and do my performance. I don't show up, the show is cancelled, and people are disillusioned, making them less inclined to want to take part in the future.

Furthermore, what of the inner-Basin conflicts? If I had a performance planned for last week, I'm fairly certain my show would have been cancelled in light of the kephera/illithoids. All right, we'll try to reschedule. See above.

Additionally, there's no way in hell the Cacophony is going to be able to tell Celest "Hey guys, we have a play going on, please don't raid Nil or slay the Earth Lords. Pretty please, with Nifilhema kisses on top?" and have them agree. In fact, finding out that there's a performance with most of attending only increases the chance that is going to raid. Voila, now you have performed a raid and screwed over a guild's performance. High fives all around, guys.

I have better odds of trying to kill Ashteru with a single club than most bard guilds do of pulling off a successful performance. I've been way too cynical in this post, but I think it's warranted given the fact that the odds are highly stacked against it.

There are countless facets of this game that I have negative emotions about: ranging from an absence of like, to an active dislike, to an emotion very near to despise.

The fact is, that in a lot of ways I feel like I'm the lead Bard envoy and I'm still fighting the good fight and Championing our cause. Maybe I'm tilting at windmills, who can say.

All I know is that I love Bards in games. I've been playing one in various games for 10 years now. I want Lusty's bards to be good. I don't want to abandon them for Monks. I want to see some serious coding and design time dedicated to Bards, to bring them up to spec and make them *fun*. That's what I want.

I want to feel like I can participate in a fight in a meaningful way besides popping my adept-skillrank skill.

If I quit, if I don't bitch and throw a fit and try and get that crucial look, that final postview by Estarra or Roark or whomever, that chance to be heard so that something can be done, we're just looking at another Amazon situation four times over. I don't want that.

So here I am, going postity post post, because I believe.

Now I need to translate my two main ideas into something coherent and concrete for the Envoys board, and maybe.. just maybe.. Monks can be put off a bit and we can get some serious changes put together for the Bards. Beyond even the scope of a special envoy report.

I want to believe.

Edit: can you guys discuss performances and stuff elsewhere? in all frankness, a guild lives or dies based on its skillsets and viability (across a the spectrum of pve and pvp). Froofy performances are really a minor facet of any guild and retention of players is not predicated on their presence or absence.

A lot of the replies on this topic border on personal attacks and outright flaming. I believe in letting off steam and open discussion but stop outright complaining and posts that border on personal attacks or this topic will be closed.

Constructive feedback is also more likely to catch the attention of the admin that actually work on this.

Indeed, bards could use some work. Offense has always been lacking and is expected based on guild with each one getting something particular to use. However that isnt an option.. Citys can soulless or trans song.. but wait those are both timed instas. They need a retoning, not just more offense, make less of it passive, remove earwort again or if its needed make it more accessable. Its the fact you get a bunch of things to hit every 10 seconds if you arent deaf that makes earwort needed, and earwort is a large part of what ticks off bards.

Give more instas with other conditions, change the stanza system as was suggested, alter acrobatics to be more usable without also making them harder to hit and kill (because sure they dont kill you right now, but they can be a royal pain to try to slay when they dodge at that exact second or if they tripleflash), someone stated to add more songs to them to give more options, change the tertiarys a bit maybe with specializations.

Now dont get me wrong, we love our divine, we love the effort you all put into it. However the bards were put out before there was really player base for it, and for that their numbers were poor and remained so, the guild masters should have been prepared for it, and the concept of giving a single room demesne with songs is always either too weak (deaf) or too strong (merge with other things and the songs abilities.. ouch). Bards need a true reworking, or enough tweaks to essentially change them entirely around. I often hear bards unhappy about certain things, largely songs (when you have 3 high stanza songs and 3 high stanzas you arent making choices), deafness, and acrobatics.

Recall however that with this new guild idea it may seem like making a new ship, but its possible to look back at bards and make sure guilds are ready, at the same time yeah monks wouldnt be as sweet as assassin but we will live. Never a good sign when all bards really are ready to jump ship to monk though.

Wow 3 posts in the time it took me to write my one.. but I am willing to look and work on bards with bard envoys help of course.

But aye less personal attacks please.

Well I have tomorrow off, so I'll try and assemble a solid proposal for submission. As I said earlier, the point of this was to get some eyes ont he topic, throw down a big red flag, and try and call a timeout.

I think on a few levels this topic has achieved its objective.. Thus it can be safely closed.

I'll have that proposal in by the end of the day tomorrow

Pacifists are the reason our skills suck so much, go back to you're holes
_________

I've been with the Harbingers since they started, and got champion about a month after that and have held it ever since. I've been the only guild member on for days at a time, and worked with my crap skills and still pulled it off.

As a bard illusionist purely for the skill terrain (was also for phantoms till the envoys screwed me over with the 2 power cost, honestly add a bloody defence stripping to it if you're gonna make it cost power) I don't have much choice in how I fight, but I do fine just the same. Note it's bloody hard, but not impossible even with a broken class. (Fix perfectfifth already people! I can't kill anybody since they just tumble/roll/leap/climbup/somersault out of it. hello?!)

I don't do preformances and I don't run around singing about daisys and honeycakes, Dae kills people who do that crap. I dislike the idea of an RP only guild, I like to RP just as much as anyone else but if I can't PK some moron I don't like.. what's the point.

Also, if you close bards before I get fedup and guildhop, I want a full refund of my lessons in my guild skills, kthxbi

It really is disappointing to me personally that Bards haven't been a very popular archetype thus far, and have had a lot of growing pains, and I know it disappoints Estarra and other admins who had a hand in the design of Bards equally. I can assure you, though, that Bards are not forgotten or ignored simply because there's much ado about Monks right now. The Envoy reports are an ongoing process, and we're also working on things outside of that process to help out Bards (though I can't say what!).

While it makes an appealing argument to say that Monks should be shelved in favor of a Bard re-design, I don't think that's really necessary or desirable. If all the coders were to drop our varied projects and leap into Bards (or Monks, or anything) then we would just end up getting in each other's way - complicating and lagging the development process. This is one of the major reasons why we develop multiple aspects of Lusternia in tandem, and it is a refutation of the thought that Bards are being ignored because a different archetype is receiving prominent attention. Putting more coders on a particular project will not advance that project any faster (and in many cases, quite the opposite), despite the turf appeal of the idea.

Visaeris already knows how I feel about the counterproductive nature of his particular brand of 'rhetoric'.

But to dip my finger into this embryonic flame-fest:

Yes. Bards do need work. However, (with the disclaimer that my combat experience with bards is predominantly cantors) they are not entirely as bad as they are made out to be. One on one, they are weak but not toothless, and a good bard (especially with tarot) should be more or less immune from death, except when ganked by a group; in groups they can turn the tide of battle.

In any case, for all that PvP is a central part of Lusternia, it is (as Callia observed) alarming that so many Guild Champions from the so-called failing guilds are preparing to 'jump ship'. If bards -are- failing, there are two reasons for it: the first may be the skills, but the second is the environment that the guild itself has created. Whether they like it or not, the bard leaders have to accept that a significant portion of the responsibility for their guilds' difficulties rests on them. Given this, it is hard not to be nervous when, en masse, they announce their intention to populate the new guilds and (potentially) repeat as before. (An aspect of my unease is the illogical decision to jump to an equally new guild, rather than one of the old established guilds that you might know and that you can rely on - why monks? why not mage or guardian or wiccan or warrior?) Anyway, as far as I'm concerned, it's far more important for a guild to develop an immersive and exciting atmosphere than it is to have a nice skillset. To attach a disclaimer to that, I have not tried the bard guilds out. I do not know how well or not they have done in creating an exciting guild atmosphere, and I do not wish to pass judgment on it one way or the other. I am also aware that it takes a critical mass in a guild before it will take off. If you only have four or five proper guild members, it is hard to grow because you will (despite your best efforts) have a poor novice retention rate.

Really? I'm curious how we're managing that, considering I can count on one hand the amount of members I've seen, including the other novice. Estwald, Linaeve, Ibycus, Myself, and Ensua. Let me guess, it's mostly because they're the ones disagreeing with you?
And a Theatre, unless peaced, would turn into a killing field.

I just want to put in my 2 cents worth...

I understand the arguments that many "fighters" have put forth re: the bardic archetype. I totally agree. The bards are not great in PvP by themselves.

As a still outsider, being new to the game (have played maybe about a month), I see Lusternia as practically conflict requisite. The cities are always fighting, the communes are always fighting and the cities and communes are always fighting. If it isn't to do with politics, then it's to do with village influence etc. etc.

While I tried to make my char stay away from this to start with, he was inevitably drawn in eventually.

However, with this all said, the time that my char stays passive is probably the most enjoyable experience I have had with any of the IRE games. I like to build things up rather than pull down. And having the opportunity to play a Bard who is expert in influencing has made my introduction to Lusternia most enjoyable.

The extra RP stuff I did by my char doing some, dare I say myself, great performances at the Pool (since the stage is out of the way), has been an enjoyable experience for both myself and my char's audience.

The Bardic Archetype is not a complete loss. It needs tweaking so there's a balance between combat and RP/Peacetime stuff. But in the end being creative with your char is what makes the game what's enjoyable.

Personally, I consider the bardic archetype not to be a failure because it was never balanced from a combat prespective before release, but because of the devestating effect it had on the other guilds. Lusternia wasn't a very populous game before the bardic archetype came out, and spreading the already thin player resources even thinner didn't help matters. Many guilds became practically deserted at first as people went over to the bards. When people decided that the bards weren't very interesting, they flooded back and left the bardic guilds nearly completely empty.

All in all, the playerbase simply couldn't support sixteen guilds when it was barely supporting twelve. The jump from nine to twelve (release of Glom) wasn't as bad because it happened at just the right time, if you ask me. This new jump from sixteen to twenty seems like it is also coming at a bad time as far as the playerbase goes, regardless of how interesting this new archetype is.

On average what, 100 people play Lusternia at a time? With 16 guilds, that's on average, six per guild online at once. With twenty guilds, that will be five per guild online at once. Is the game really enjoyable with the playerbase so spread apart? If we still only had twelve guilds, that would be eight per guild - a far improvement over five, if you ask me.

30 players on right now. This is fairly average for Lusternia outside of American times sadly. 1-2 per guild. =(

This is a fair point, if marred slightly by being couched in Visaerian terms.

The bards -did- spread the other guilds more thinly.
But they also brought new players to the game.

There will also be a little bit of a wobble after a new archetype comes out. I do not believe that currently things are as bleak as they are being painted.

Monks will, no doubt, do the same. There will be a wobble, people will switch about, guilds will empty and fill. Again, it will spread players more thinly across the guilds, but it will also bring in new players.

Either way, it is all too easy to sit about and moan rather than thinking of a solution. Our player base has far too many emo tantrum-sprouting moaners and far too few Noolas, Tullys and Quigyboos.

In guild terms, this new archetype is going to take a rolling pin to player dough. In org terms, it makes no difference. Most of us here think that the Monk archetype is a good thing - and if we need to strengthen org RP as a consequence.. well then, so be it. I might also add, that in an extraordinary and hypocritical volte face (in the context of my comments on Estarra's suggestion of CNT in an earlier thread), what goes hand in hand with this is the necessity for org based novice teaching. The glass half empty crew are going to squeal at the potential horror of change; the glass-half-full crowd will welcome the prospect of new opportunities. And so it goes.

I am not usually one to say things like this, but, QFT. This is one of those truths that needs to be brought to people's attention regularly.

People of Lusternia.

I give you, the Harbinger Champion.

Daedalion Rillaen. Lord of Roleplay and Layer of the Bard Smackdown.

As for the Spiritsingers..

We really don't perform that often. We've probably got five or six people who actually write stuff, three of which ever perform them.

We probably succeed because of the people, or a novice/advancement system that keeps people engaged. Or, well, both.

Personally, as a Bard Champion, I don't sing. I only dance to kill someone who hurts the Forest and my Guild. If you'd like me to sing or play you music, you'll have to deal with a Bardoon to the head.

Time for my comments.

1. You can RP and still be a fighter. Daedalion is a good example. Also, bards don't have to be snuggly retards who sing about flowers, bunnies and hugs. A Magnagoran bard could have very dark, death-metallish like songs.
As for roleplaying your performances - don't make them in advance. Rather, make stuff up on the spot. People staying at Megalith/Pool/whatever doing nothing? Start playing. People in a combat group, waiting for an enemy who did not quite arrive yet? Start playing. Roleplaying games are not about "fountain RPing" (a very good term I picked up on some other mud, describing idle chatter or producing a lot of emotes while standing in one place which was their equivalent of the Nexus), it's about fleshing out your character by making it do things which you believe it should in a given situation.

Okay, that was incoherrent. Let's move on.

2. Bards ARE weak. Yes, that's a fact. However, their skills in my opinion simply need tweaking, not a complete redesign. They'd need such a redesign if they lacked options in a fight - and frankly, Visaeris, how can you say that they lack options? Do you remember playing other archetypes? You say that all that a Bard can do with their primary skill is playing a triggered song, using blank note on the enemy when they use earwort. Well, compare that to Wiccans, whose primary skill's combat capabilities include 1. ordering your entourage to kill the enemy and 2. toadcursing when their mana is low enough. That's it! Guardians? Imbue your devil/angel with powers and let them at the enemy! Their primary skill, I admit it, offers more choices with Torture or whatever for Nihilists and the whole Infidel combo for Celestines, but it's only marginally more choices! Mages? Demesne, staffcast. Druids? Demesne, sap.

Basically, EXCLUDING warriors, every archetype has very little options if you use only it's primary skill. To have many options, and win any PvP match, you need to utilise your secondary and tertiary skills - well, tertiary in Bards' case, as Acrobatics are almost purely defensive. Bards have Tarot - use it. If you don't, don't be surprised you'll find combat hard and boring, just as you would if you fought as a Healing Moondancer.



EDIT:

3. Stretching out population, thinning them between guilds. I see the issue, but it is not a big one. The admins are taking steps to make sure novices are trained and welcomed regardless of their guild, as long as there are people in the city/commune itself. (Of course, it would still be best if Guild Masters/Admins could set up an automated greeting for new novices - can we please implement that? It would help tremendously) The only guild that suffers from stretching out the populace are warriors, because less warriors = less forgers = harder to get stuff made. It is not critical though, as a warrior does not need new weapons on a regular basis, they get one and stick to it for a long time.