Bard Overhaul

by Unknown

Back to Ideas.

Unknown2008-01-19 16:35:58
QUOTE(Forren @ Jan 19 2008, 09:46 AM) 478336
Incabulos, I'll say this again.

Just because you lack the personal ability to kill people with your skills does not mean those skills need to be upgraded.


QFT. You don't see the rest of us who suck at fighting complaining about our guilds/archetypes.

Wait, yes you do. Forren, I think it's best to ignore threads like these, unless they garner undue attention. tongue.gif
Unknown2008-01-19 20:35:34
Uh. No.

See, this is the problem (and it's one that creeps into the envoy process):
Bards are obviously OP because they can do the most damage as a class and dodge, and if you say otherwise, you suck at playing and need to kill yourself.
Seriously, get a grip.

I'm not asking for more damage, or more afflictions, I'm asking for a BALANCED class.
But, no, everyone's selling tickets to the nerf train because all they see is glamour spam and decide to pull assumptions out of their ass. Really, unless you are a bard, or have been one, you should shut up and listen.

Acrune doesn't suck, so if you're not going to listen to me, read his post instead.
Unknown2008-01-19 22:19:31
Glamours Ideas:
Colourburst does a maximum of 2 afflictions, but you can choose one of them.
Rainbowpattern does no damage when sixthsense is up.
Hypnoticpattern lasts longer, has a chance to prone if not blind, disrupts balance instead of equilibrium, time between hits is increased.
Maelstrom acts like carcer if you have no sixthsense.
Deadlypattern allows you to choose which defences you remove, but has a 50%(?) chance of failing if sixthsense is up.
Fascination strips blindness first (0p), then adds afterimage (1p), then transfixes (2p).
Flare strips blindness and adds afterimage in one move, but is 2p.
Afterimage lasts longer.
Maze is a timed instakill a la Judgement. Takes 12 seconds to fire, then the opponent has 10 seconds to escape the maze before dying. Ditch the 'rubble' effect inside the maze, or reduce it at least. Lower powercost.

Music ideas:
Earwort takes a few seconds to work (like sixthsense).
CaptivateAudience passively strips deafness somehow. Either can be turned on and off but drains endurance/willpower, or can CAPTIVATE to passively strip a single person's deafness once every 12(?) seconds.
Blanknote no longer stuns.
Perfectfifth only works if target hasn't got sixthsense or truehearing up.
Discordantchord kills instantly, costs 10 power, requires all the music afflictions.
Make Octave 5 power.
Killing notes work as long as the target isn't deaf at the end of the song, and eating earwort doesn't stop the killing note from continuing (whereas currently if you're in the middle of the killing note and the other person eats earwort, it stops the song).
Unknown2008-01-20 00:35:14
QUOTE(Inky @ Jan 19 2008, 04:19 PM) 478448
Glamours Ideas:
Colourburst does a maximum of 2 afflictions, but you can choose one of them.
Rainbowpattern does no damage when sixthsense is up.
Hypnoticpattern lasts longer, has a chance to prone if not blind, disrupts balance instead of equilibrium, time between hits is increased. Hypnotic pattern is already amazing. No.
Maelstrom acts like carcer if you have no sixthsense. not that I wouldn't like to see this, but no. OP.
Deadlypattern allows you to choose which defences you remove, but has a 50%(?) chance of failing if sixthsense is up. God no
Fascination strips blindness first (0p), then adds afterimage (1p), then transfixes (2p).
Flare strips blindness and adds afterimage in one move, but is 2p. I like this one
Afterimage lasts longer. YES PLEASE
Maze is a timed instakill a la Judgement. Takes 12 seconds to fire, then the opponent has 10 seconds to escape the maze before dying. Ditch the 'rubble' effect inside the maze, or reduce it at least. Lower powercost. Maze is amazing. No.

Music ideas:
Earwort takes a few seconds to work (like sixthsense). Why? You already have the earache delay after blanknote
CaptivateAudience passively strips deafness somehow. Either can be turned on and off but drains endurance/willpower, or can CAPTIVATE to passively strip a single person's deafness once every 12(?) seconds. Any kind of passive deafness stripping is going to get pimp slapped by the envoys
Blanknote no longer stuns. I think they are doing this
Perfectfifth only works if target hasn't got sixthsense or truehearing up.
Discordantchord kills instantly, costs 10 power, requires all the music afflictions.
Make Octave 5 power. Why? Bards are already power heavy. Octave really isn't the problem
Killing notes work as long as the target isn't deaf at the end of the song, and eating earwort doesn't stop the killing note from continuing (whereas currently if you're in the middle of the killing note and the other person eats earwort, it stops the song).

Unknown2008-01-20 04:27:27
The point of those was to nerf Glamours a bit so it's less about affliction spam, and more about keeping people still so that they can be threnody/mazed. If you think there's any chance of a longer afterimage or better flare without killing at least SOME of the other stuff first, you clearly underestimate the nerf bat. Keeping the other changes in mind, I don't think a carcer-maelstrom would be too overpowered. Also: Maze is not helping bards' reputation as an overpowered class. It's pretty overpowered. Making it a timed instakill nerfs it (since a lot of people simply die from it anyway), but makes it more useful in the long run since it becomes something to work towards, instead of something to work from.
Unknown2008-01-20 04:34:16
I'd be really happy to see glamour mugwump bards nerfed and other options made more viable, but this reads like a Malarious thread.
Unknown2008-01-23 02:03:33
Okay, reading the monk thread, I've come to the conclusion that a class based on damage kills is a flawed concept: you either destroy them completely, or can't kill them at all.
There's not much middle ground.

New ideas:
Nerf the minorsecond damage down to at least staff/symbol level.
Make song effects more comparable to demesne effects and make death songs either conditional or timed, depending on what is easier to pull off with said effects.
Give Glamours an instakill (to replace Maze, probably), better afflictions, and more control over afflictions.

Really, there needs to be some kind of bard summit with an admin to look at changes and such, but there's not much chance of that happening before Emofist coming out (unless they decide to divvy up coders between the two). I'd kind of like some admin input, anyway. As long as it isn't the shoe. ohmy.gif