At most, if you were a bard champion you would get what? 450 seconds of song?
For myself it would be 300 seconds of song currently.

Druids/mages would get 1800 seconds of passives over 50 rooms.

So bards pay twice as much and get less than half the return for their artifact.

Could this be reviewed by the administration and the bard artifact cost reduced or the effects brought inline with cost?

They aren't really that comprable.
Also, the music rune was in an auction and sold for about that price. It wouldn't be right to make it a lot less than the people who bought it earlier.

I belive that there is a hard cap on song length topping out at 350 seconds. I'm not sure if that is going to stay in place or not if the rune boosts you past it or if the tempo enchant does as well.

You forget that attaching this rune to an instrument instantly boosts it to maestro-level. Though I wouldn't mind a longer song time, the increased benefits of a maestro-level instrument do play some role in the cost of the item.

You can get maestro without spending 400 credits though. It's not like the only way to get maestro is to buy the artifact and attaching any rune will do this. So you can again not spend 400 credits and get the Maestro instantly.

In fact, my mandolin has no runes on it and is maestro. So the 400 credit cost has no bearing on maestro.

Yeah, hard cap is 350 seconds.

I know that I altogether skipped the maestro build-up process instantly by purchasing a rune and I found the benefits well worth the cost for it. I've no problems with throwing up the suggestion to lower the cost, though.

I think you misunderstood what I was trying to say. I am not saying there is no benefit to getting maestro instantly. I am saying it is not the only way to get it and you can do it with any rune that you can attach. Many of which are half the cost of the bard specific rune.

I don't mind paying 400 credits for an artifact, but making my song go from 200 seconds to 300 seconds is not worth 400 credits and if there is a hard cap of 350 seconds it is even worse for those with songs greater than 200 seconds.

Bear in mind as well that the mage rune is about to take a hit when the demesne changes go through.

From what I read that is not a certainty. It was just on the list of possible things. They haven't posted the final cut yet.

Mind then that getting this rune is optional considering you can just get a Tempo enchantment and use that if you feel that 400cr for ~100s extra isn't worth it.

I realize there is alternatives, including the alternative of just not buying it. However, I feel that 400 credits is a steep price to pay for the very little it does. If 350 seconds is the max song length, as well, then the artifact does less and less as your song naturally increases in length, making that 400 credits even less of a bargain.

I'm not sure if there is an actual reason for the hard cap but perhaps that is something that can be changed

Hey, at least you're not paying 3150 credits for a set of weapon runes.

As the only person who got one in the auction who's still a bard, let me say, nah, I wouldn't mind at all if the cost were lowered. (For one thing, when I paid that much, we didn't know about the cap, so it seemed like it would help a lot more than it actually does, and I wouldn't've bid as much as I did if I'd known about the cap. And besides, auction prices aren't always a fair comparison because auction items are worth a little more than mainstream items only because you don't know if they'll ever be available again.) I think Davock makes good points. 400 seemed too much when I first saw it and now that Davock makes me think about it it seems even more so.

Xiel, I can't help wondering, did you trade yours in or do you still have it?

I traded mine in once I found out that they're made available to the general public once again.

Quick napkin math comes out to any natural song length greater than 234 seconds is losing percentages on the artifact. A champion's song at 300 seconds is actually only getting 16% of that 50% artifact boost, with the hard cap.

If the cap can't be changed, or the artifact made worth 400 credits, then a disclaimer should be put into the help file under the artifact stating that it has diminishing returns as your song length increases and no song will go over the hard cap of 350 seconds.

Apples and oranges.

Firstly, a demesne requires power, and two (sometimes one, three if you count sapling/terrain) abilities, all of which take eq, just to meld a room. Then, after it is melded, they must set effects separately. For druids, it's over a minute to time them all together.

A bard's song are entirely mobile. They follow the bard wherever the bard goes, and can be sustained indefinitely until they are needed. I want to emphasize that bard songs are vastly more mobile than a demesne could ever dream of being.

Secondly, to reset effects all at once, a druid/mage uses 8 power. Otherwise they have to set them one by one again.

A bard can refrain all stanzas for 0 power.

Thirdly, a meld can be broken.

Bard songs can be lost with fugue, but if you are careful, it's not really a problem.


Saying it's unfair because mages/druids have effects that last longer isn't really an argument. If your song lasting a minute and a half longer isn't worth 400 credits to you (I can certainly see the benefits of 100 extra seconds between each refrain, especially in combat) then don't buy it.

I don't think you read everything I said. At trans the 400 credit artifact does not give you +50% as it says it does. I am unsure what a trans bard non champ max song length is, but the champ is paying for +50% and only getting +16%.

I am making an assumption here, but I am guessing a non champ is not getting more than +20% of that +50% they are paying for.


Actually as I already pointed out as soon your song is > 234 seconds you are not getting what you paid for.

Either way, 400 credits is too much for it. Tempo enchantment lasts an hour per charge and is a far better option, not to mention cheaper.

Yes, I did. You tried to justify a change by comparing to dissimilar things, and I explained why you can't use the disparity between mages/druid and bard arties as an argument. They are very different animals.

Nor is presenting a champion who receives a free artifact a real argument either.

The problem isn't with the artifact. If the issue is "you aren't getting the full 50%" then the clear solution is raising the cap. You can reduce the price all you want, but you'll never get your money's worth if it's not doing exactly as advertised.

Losing a song is 8-9 equilibriums. Even with the ABSURB and useless skill of encore it' s still 8 equilibriums. Yes, that skill fails hard.

I personally have no interest in buying the artifact at that price. If I'm going to toss away credits, there are so, so, so, so many other things worth the money.

Careful, tempo will probably be nerfed now!