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Musical Instruments as weapon type for bards
khitomer
Member, Alpha One, Adventurer
One of the best things about AoC it seems to me is that it can really introduce a genre defining way to play a staple fantasy theme character in the form of a bard. Usually when i hear the word bard, I think of when I was first introduced to the concept of what a bard is back when as a kid I would read Asterix comics. The bard of the village was Cacofonix, who in a tragic twist of irony was actually the literal antithesis of musical harmony personified, and used to reduce all listeners to howls of displeasure and pleas to stop the infernal racket he produced. Now, I realize bards have a much deeper foundation in D&D/mmo fantasy which is far more akin to their actual historical reality, but I wonder if there are certain conventions to do with bards that can be adhered to properly for the first time in a ground-breaking mmo like Ashes.
One thing which comes to mind is if bards, and especially something like the class variant of minstrel, could have specific weapon types that are perhaps unique to them (not necessarily ubiquitous relative to other weapon types in the game), such as lutes or harps/lyres. Imagine for example a legendary lute, specific in both visual design and lore to a minstrel, having appropriate stats or properties fitting to that class. And imagine if there were animations where a minstrel actually plays cords for various abilities on it. Does anyone else have the idea that to really realize the class fantasy of a bard or minstrel, something like that should be woven into the game? Imagine also as a cosmetic variant of cords played, you could get different musical genres. Like, for a heavy duty longer cooldown spell like some sort of group buff, the minstrel plays a heavy metal tune.
One thing which comes to mind is if bards, and especially something like the class variant of minstrel, could have specific weapon types that are perhaps unique to them (not necessarily ubiquitous relative to other weapon types in the game), such as lutes or harps/lyres. Imagine for example a legendary lute, specific in both visual design and lore to a minstrel, having appropriate stats or properties fitting to that class. And imagine if there were animations where a minstrel actually plays cords for various abilities on it. Does anyone else have the idea that to really realize the class fantasy of a bard or minstrel, something like that should be woven into the game? Imagine also as a cosmetic variant of cords played, you could get different musical genres. Like, for a heavy duty longer cooldown spell like some sort of group buff, the minstrel plays a heavy metal tune.
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To me, a bard in a fantasy setting like this is anyone joining a company of adventurers with the primary goal of gaining insperation for what ever art it is they have chosen.
I am not a big fan of the notion that a bard should have to play music at all - to me, a bard that is all about the spoken word is every bit a bard - and more specifically with a minstrel, that could include jugglers and comedians if you wish, as it is simply a term (long since out of general use) for all entertainers. Professional sports players could call themselves minstrels if they wished, as they are entertainers first and foremost (don't tell Anthony Joshua I said that).
While I want to see bards have the ability to play musical instruments (all people should, in fact), I don't personally see it as key to the class, and absolutely don't see it as something that should be happening during a fight.
Singing maybe, but if the group of adventurers the bard is with is under attack, that bard should have some form of stabby weapon to stab those would be attackers.
It would be unfortunate if a minstrel for example was relegated to being a minstrel type of character in name only.
Since their head were covered, many ninjas roleplayed as monks to infiltrate cities.
They could carry weapons in plain sight.
This is a brief run down of how they utilised instruments and weapons.
A Minstrel had drum which gave them a group speed buff, a flute to CC enemies and put them to sleep & a charm spell to get a pet whilst the spell was active. A lute for a mana regen over time song/spell and a health over time song/spell. A couple insta damage "Shout" spell's, and a instant stun "shout" spell. You could only use 1 instrument at a time, or swap to a weapon.
The neat thing at the release was you could only have 1 spell active at a time but when the spell it ended it still ticked over for say 3 secs, so that meant you could weave 2 spell's/songs at a time with the overlap. So most twisted group speed and the pet charm before/during combat, and during down time it was pet charm and mana or HP regen. This brought a certain skill level to the class, if you could weave it was a strong class.
It might sound quite convoluted but really you had a certain instrument for a time, so a drum for speed and pet or your main hand and a sword on your 2nd weapon before combat. During combat you switch to a flute for CC, with a sword as 2nd weapon, and after was Lute and sword for regen.
You could do all this with 1 bar for the active necessary skills such as 1.Speed, 2 CC, 3 Charm,4 Mana Regen, 5 Dmg Shout, 6 Stun Shout and 7 Weapon skill and 8 class skill. (DAOC actually had lots of skills and bars as time went, this is just an example if AoC wanted to keep it simple.)
Then after some years with a DLC they brought out a harp which did it all in 1 instrument, which was a drop from a dragon raid which was cool.
They could spec into a melee damage skill line which was for minimal damage, but the CC, buffs and skills they brought were invaluable.
EDIT: it's really worth a look at youtube for DAOC Minstrels, as it really is how people want/describe them on forums.
The biggest problem was that disjointed musical sounds don't make for fun combat and get annoying really fast. If bards are like this, there needs to be an option to mute them and they DEFINITELY should not be EQ'd to the front of the soundscape.
You could also consider the Hunting Horn class in Monster Hunter - they're pretty clunky though and still spend most of their time using the horn as a heavy bludgeon.
For RP purposes i would go even further: https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/46191/idea-for-further-rp-content-after-launch-music-instruments#latest
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