I am worried the Bard will be broken at the release of A2
I think the class that has to greatest chance of being broken is the Bard. So, on the eve of the Bard reveal I am going to give my 2 cp about what I am hoping for in a Bard.
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All I hear about the Bard is that it is a music class. Even so far as Nyce saying that he gravitates towards a Bard, since he is also a musician. WTF, a Bard has nothing to do with music! If you want to RP an IRL Bard by playing a Bard in game, that is totally cool by me. But playing music is not what a Bard does, any more than a Tank is a lover of metal plates and heavy things. A tank is a damage mitigator and aggro manager. In no game I have ever played does a Bard mean you are a musician. Bards do CC, speed boost, buffs, and mild healing. In some games (like DAoC) they may have partial stealth. They are a utility class.
If the Bard is designed well as a class, it will “round out” an unbalanced group in PvE. If a PvE group has too many dps, and needs an off tank. Then the Bard can armor buff a Fighter archetype, and help heal, so that group is viable. Do you have too many squishy melee rogues that are dieing to AoE, instead of mage and ranger types that can nuke at a distance? The bard can tab target between the rogues and refresh a damage mitigation/armor increase. This would be designed such that it helps the low armor class folks more, but doesn’t help the mitigation of the tank much (law of diminishing returns), but helps bring up the weak armor of the rogues so that they can survive a bit. This is their utility in PvE. Or maybe the DPS is OP and the tank is having a hard time holding aggro, hey, maybe there is a tune for that too? Something that gives the tank double threat for 10 seconds….This is utility too!
In PvP, a Bard does CC and interrupts and provides utility where it is needed. They will not have massive heals like the Clerics, but a good Bard, just like a good healer, can carry a group and help them overcome when the odds (and numbers) are against them. Do you need to hightail it away from a large zerg, or chase down a runner? In some games Bards have run speed buffs. Bards are the utility class in PvP too! They are not a musician, and they are not a buffbot. In fact, I would like it if they had NO STATIC BUFFS at all. Their utility should be in their actions. Imagine a Cleric that just has to sit there holding up a staff in order to heal, and their whole group is passively healed around them. Or only slightly better spam an auto heal that automatically heals the person with the lowest health (this is common in many games, and makes healing mundane). How boring for everyone! A Bard should not just sit there and play a song and everyone gets a group buff. Even if they are “weaving” songs…its just boring to play a class like that in PvP. There should be no static buffs or group “songs”. Since we can tab target, and there can be single target heals for the clerics, why not single target utility spells for the Bards?
Imaging this scenario: There are two equal forces fighting each other, 8-10 players on each side, neither can get the upper hand, since their healing and dps is equal. But one group has a Rogue and a Bard. That Rogue goes into stealth and sneaks around to get the other groups healer. The Bard, being a veteran, notices this and gets ready to provide support when the time is right. Bam! The rogue pops out of stealth and hits the healer with a short stun, which is instantly purged, because healers should be able to do that. The rogues has debuffed the healer and has multiple bleeds stacking. The healer can keep up at first, but then her health starts dropping. The damage is coming hard and fast now because the Bard is now giving the Rogue a single target +crit boost. The healer tries to distance themselves but is snared with a Hamstring. She is PVP speced and pops her huge self heal, but the Bard anticipates and switches targets fast and interrupts the healer negating the spell that would have saved her. Cooldown foiled! Finally, the healer is overwhelmed and succumbs. The victory is short lived however, because now all the close by group members are on the Rogue.
Seeing this the Rogue burns their class defining cooldown and Vanishes into stealth, but the other groups Ranger uncovers the Rogue and pops them out of stealth with an AOE barrage of arrows from the sky. No more cooldowns for the Rogue, they are a tender morsel now 😊 But maybe the Bard plays a Mitigation tune, or short duration group CC that allows the Rogue to get out of combat and enter normal stealth normally? Amazingly this works! But again, a short-lived victory because the enemy group has a Summoner…and this Summoner is a Rogue killer! He has already called up a Hound, which is able to sniff a character who has recently entered stealth and pop them back out. The rogue is uncovered and then mauled by the hound and seconds later is obliterated by the enemy casters and dies.
This sort of depth of play and counterplay is what the AoC Bard and other archetypes HAVE TO HAVE at a minimum, in order to make combat interesting. Yes, it should be a hard task to take down an enemies healer, but that is what rogues live for. But they would be too OP if they could do it on their own. But with the help of a Bard, it just might be possible….no static buffs needed. And no, you shouldn’t always be able to get away if you are a rogue. But sometimes, yes, sometimes you should be able to make that kill, even if you die in the process.
Thanks for reading. Comments welcome. I did take some liberty talking about other archetype abilities (particularly the Rogue and Summoner archetypes), but you get the point.
~Vulfr
