Why should somebody need a bonus or payment for taking a position involving combat? If they like combat, they should enjoy the position or they should be paid in a way that doesn't harm the environment their position is about.



I think GC being decided by FFA would be nice - even though it allows the problem of random outside forces screwing up a contention (lag, for instance). However, that's a thing of the game. I find the assumption that champions -need- an artifact to be pretty foolish; if they need an artifact to stand on like a crutch, they shouldn't have the position.



Nothing?

Everyone always assumes that Champs are the best fighters.

In a guild with -no- fighters, I assure that that is not always true.

The point still stands that champion artifacts are really not necessary.

Looks like the nerf was toned down. Either that or my trans magic target is randomly taking more damage then anyone else I've tested on. I can live with the damage now, will see how it goes.

Marry me.

I'm curious to know what the envoys think of Lendren's suggestions for making bards more useful as team-buffers, and what they've suggested so far in this vein that was rejected.

I really like his ideas, and completely agree that as a feature of the archetype it would draw better than simply a different variation of 'kill-by-nonaccumulating-damage' class.

!

I haven't seen it, but keep in mind that all classes should have useful roles both as solo combatants and in general as "someone useful to the team/commune/city."

That means that you still need a "different variation of kill-by-nonaccumulating damage" slant to your skills.

True, but there is definitely room for an archetype to focus prevention, protection and cure in both their solo and team strategy. A warrior is useful to a team, for instance, precisely because of the same reason they excel in 1v1 combat. I don't think bards need to be useless individually just because they focus on protecting and strengthening themselves and allies.

They could still have achievable kill conditions, just as long as they aren't based on the same assumptions that go with a more offensively weighted class.

At the moment, I think 90% of support songs are just there for flavour. I can't see how they would change combat dynamics in any significant sense. The main reason having a bard along seems useful is because of their offensive song afflictions or their tertiary skills. That doesn't really align with their game description.

Acrune can you honestly be complaining? I'm a lvl 61 Mugwump, not high, but not -really- low either. One hit from you practically insta kills me from 2.6k health. That combined with the passive stunning and proning and blinding. You CANT seriously be complaining that your damage was lessened. It was obscene, and you knew it, because you bragged about it on here a lot

Of course it was. Halving it was unnecessary though, but that no longer seems to be the case. It wasn't even that bad before the change, it was a lot less then it used to be, back before the DMP changes. Like I said, we'll see how it goes.

Edit: And no passive stunning.

It is 25%, I tested and retested it.

So far as I know, my ideas for ways to make CaptiveAudience do what it was originally intended to do have not gotten as far as being shown to the other envoys. Nor have any of the earlier approaches I tried to propose. If they did, I didn't hear what came of them.

It seems to be a chicken-and-egg problem. In order to convince anyone to seriously evaluate whether I've really found ways to plug the gaps in support songs without contravening the "deafness stops Music" requirement, I first have to convince people that the support class approach is the right way to proceed. But I can't get anyone to really consider the reasons for it so long as they're convinced that it can't be done.

I wish I had been far more aggressive back in the first few months when there were "special envoy reports" about bards. I think those were too influenced by guildhoppers and other people who weren't particularly drawn to what bards were advertised to be, many of whom didn't end up sticking around anyway. Maybe someday we'll get one more chance that can be dominated by the people who stuck to bard guilds because that's actually what they wanted.

You don't want to trade single combat power for support class emphasis in your primary skillset. As a tertiary skill choice, sure, that's great. As your primary skill? Eh. That's got bad news written all over it.

I'm not sure if this is the place to have that debate, but I'd sure love to have it someplace. I don't think it's a bad idea and I think no one has really presented a reason why it is. I've heard "this isn't WoW" (irrelevant), "you can't do that" (why not?), and "there's no demand", which is the key question I'd love to see seriously answered. Clearly, if you want to be a non-support class, Lusternia's got you covered, and we've proven there are people who want that. But since Lusternia offers few if any options to be a primarily support class, it's hard to tell how many people want that by looking at current guild populations, since those people are often driven away by the lack of a guild that'll let them do what they want. Seems clear to me that we'll do better by being something different, rather than being yet another guild that works like the ones we already have, though. And it seems clear to me from looking in non-Lusternia places that there are people who would flock to a role like that, and the only way Lusternia's going to grow is by attracting people that it doesn't currently serve. Go give newbie chargen a try and look at the descriptions offered for bard guilds: clearly, they're intended to be a support class, and I bet we are getting novices who expect that and drop out when they find it doesn't work.

But for what it's worth, I'd be perfectly happy to have another tertiary skill that makes the support class option work, along with a tertiary (Glamours probably) that makes people good as a primary combatant. And not just because we have fewer choices than anyone else except monks (total guild skill combinations available: bards 2, monks 2, druids 3, wiccans 3, guardians 3, mages 4, city warriors 8, commune warriors 12... hope I got that right). Remember how Estarra said city bards get Tarot because of the "gypsy" association? Wouldn't that same reasoning make Astrology a reasonable extra choice, bringing our available choices to on par with other guilds? Of course, Healing's a better support skill, and I'm hard-pressed to find a solid IC excuse for why bards should get it, but then, I can't find one for why druids get Runes either, so do we really need that solid an excuse?

Edit: fixed a skillchoice options mistake.

I don't know how you work out that monks have less skillchoices than bards. Both of us get low/highmagic, and we get acrobatics/psychometabolism where you get ecology/glamours.

Anyway, one reason I don't think a primarily-support class is likely to work is that people (fairly) expect a chance in 1 vs 1 combat. If bards are designed to have a good group combat application but worse solo combat ability, then ceteris paribus in a fight between (say) a bard and a warrior, the warrior "should" win. This isn't particularly interesting, and from a balance perspective it should be the case that every class has a fighting chance against every other class.

I don't see why an optional tertiary that makes them good at team support wouldn't work though, necessarily, especially if it was varied again between cities and communes somehow. One thing I'm glad about with monks is that there is a difference both between each guild AND between the kephera/illithoid factions, as with mages/druids. Bards are really similar, especially since their combat ability mostly comes from glamours.

EDIT: And this isn't to say that I don't think changes to make existing support songs in bard specs work is out of line either. I just don't think the class should be balanced around that first and around solo combat second.

Don't monks have a choice in both secondary and tertiary? I thought you did.

I don't buy the "people expect to have a chance as primary" argument because the fact is, people who expect that have 16 guilds catering to them already. Surely there's room for 4 guilds to cater to the people who don't require that as an option, and who do want something that none of the 18 guilds can provide now. That you don't see a lot of those people around right now today may well be explained by the fact that we don't offer them a way to play the way they want to play, so they don't stick around, rather than that they don't exist. (After all, outside Lusternia, you'll find they do exist.) If Lusternia wants to grow it can do so best by offering something it's not already offering, rather than just adding yet another means of catering to the people it already caters to.

Of course I would be even more pleased if we got tertiary options that made both possibilities work. If Glamours were toned down and Music specs were made so the support songs were usable through changes in CaptiveAudience, we'd be 2/3 of the way there. Want to be a primary combatant bard? Take Glamours. Want to focus on support? Take... well, that's the other third: Ecology and Tarot aren't great for that either yet, which is why I'd love to see Astrology, Healing, Dreamweaving, or maybe something entirely new that was support-oriented.

In any case, if the admin really don't think we should be, or ever will be, a viable support class, can they please change all the help files that direct newbies to us on the assumption that that's what we are?

Nope. Celestian/Seren monks get Harmony, Magnagoran/Gloom monks get another skill. Fixed.

EDIT: And I don't get how you got that many for warriors. City warriors have bonecrusher/blademaster/pureblade/axelord and hunting/necromancy|sacraments, making 6 each. Commune warriors have bonecrusher/blademaster/pureblade/axelord and hunting/stag|crow/night|moon, making 7 each.

Possible ur'Guard:

• Bonecrusher hunter
• Bonecrusher necromancer
• Blademaster hunter
• Blademaster necromancer
• Pureblade hunter
• Pureblade necromancer
• Axelord hunter
• Axelord necromancer

Possible Serenguard:

• Bonecrusher hunter
• Bonecrusher Stag
• Bonecrusher Moon
• Blademaster hunter
• Blademaster Stag
• Blademaster Moon
• Pureblade hunter
• Pureblade Stag
• Pureblade Moon
• Axelord hunter
• Axelord Stag
• Axelord Moon

Hence, there are eight flavors of city warrior, and twelve flavors of commune warrior.

I'll fix my misconception about monk skillchoices (I bet it's not the last fix needed). Sorry about that. I'd also support you guys getting more skillchoices too; seems only fair.

Orrr we could just ditch hunting.

I wouldn't mind bards heading more towards support, but every class needs to be capable 1v1, otherwise they'll just get mauled by the next bored person walking around where a bard happens to be. Either that, or we'd need more running away skills, though there'd still be the problem that they couldn't really have fun sparring. If there was a more support heavy skillset for bards, I'd likely switch once I was comfortably into demigod territory (Glamours helps me bash, and kill people who try to jump me)