How to make Bard an active archetype: Mobility + Engage, inspired by another game

I think it's safe to say that of all the archetypes being presented, the one that has the most potential for passive aoe spam play is Bard. We've seen this example in many games, they're simply buff bots that are 'required' in a sense, but don't have a lot of agency in the way of setting up their team in a mechanical way.

Personally, I love the role of bard in theory. I've played guitar for half my life and really enjoy writing/producing music. In practice I find it fairly dull to play usually, and it doesn't normally feel as dynamic and exciting as music truly is.

How do you solve this? I believe that you give Bards great mobility and engage tools, while keeping them relatively squishy in terms of defensivenes, and allowing their buffs to be proc'd from active ways. This keeps their identity from the tank and cleric separate, and requires a unique state of flow/dancing on the battlefield to achieve results.The main inspiration for this idea for me was actually from a game that many will recoil from: League of Legends. (please dont get triggered, this isn't about league, but specifically a single champion design from that game)

Rakan is an engage/enchanter support that has low tankiness, mild healing and shielding, but amazing mobility and crowd control tools that he can combine to create very interesting gameplay setups.

GLEAMING QUILLl-
https://gfycat.com/medicalunfoldedgermanspitz
Flings a magical feather that deals magic damage. Striking a champion or epic monster enables Rakan to heal his allies.

GRAND ENTRANCE
https://gfycat.com/candidfatantbear
Dashes to a location, knocking up nearby enemies on arrival.

BATTLE DANCE
https://gfycat.com/unsungbestbarasingha
Flies to an allied champion granting them a shield. Can be re-cast for free for a short duration.

THE QUICKNESS
https://gfycat.com/academiccheapamericanalligator
Gains Move Speed, charming and dealing magic damage to enemies touched.

Obviously, stealing these abilities 1-1 is not what im suggesting, but the CONCEPT of making Bard an archetype that relies on 'dancing' around the battlefield to apply buffs, shields, and crowd control sounds so much fun. Rakan can combine his different types of mobility together as well, sometimes using his knockup dash to get in range to be able to shield allies, or beginning his 'dance' before engaging with Grand Entrance.

You could even have abilities like the quickness which also leave a trail of music for people to follow, giving them a large movespeed buff as they run in the 'music'. Or maybe give them buffs that can only apply the full effect after getting a certain combo.
The potential is sorta limitless, and I think this style of bard gameplay opens up way more options!

What do you think?

Find more posts tagged with

Comments

Solvryn

Bigbys Hand, with complete emotes.

NishUK

I just wanna say, I feel you, I know healers/bards should have mechanics that force them toward some commitments so that they actually become a fun class to play and fight against....

BUT

You're talking with mmo nerds in this forum, they don't care for a potentially great mechnical PvP game, they simply want a job fufilled and for that job to be fairly straight forward, regardless of the potential great and clutch plays that can happen from better PvP genres that involve supports (+ significant pick rate improvements!).

BaSkA_9x2

I played a game (Silkroad) where the Bard was broken because they wanted to make it strong in PvP and a great buffer. Obviously, just because one game fucked it up it doesn't mean anything, however it showed to me that balancing Support classes, as in intentionally "nerfing" some aspects of them, is important or else they might become something they shouldn't.

All in all, I agree with your concept idea that the Bard should help with the team's mobility and probably hold the best buffs in the game, both offensive and defensive, but I don't think anything better than minimal CC should be a part of its base kit.

From the classes available to the Bard I hope that:

Tellsword, Trickster, Magician and Songcaller are the best PvP options, which add offensive treats to the Bard, more/better CC or something else to improve its base kit.
Siren and Song Warden are the most versatile classes for PvX.
Soul Weaver adds (more) healing to most of what the Bard does.
Minstrel is the Bard we're used to and has the best buffs in the game, period.

That's what I expect from the Bard class, and if done right, I believe they can all be very interesting and useful classes.

Dygz

Well... Ashes is a PvX game; not a PvP game, so...

NishUK

@Dygz what kind of arguement is that?

Dygz

What kind of question is that?

Leiloni

I always thought the Chanter in Aion was a great version of a Bard. Active, dynamic, really loved in groups. Definitely the one I'd pull ideas from.

KapStoan

If you played Overwatch, another good example of active combat support is Brigitte. Extremely mobile and would probably fit as the Siren (Bard+Tank). She's not a main healer, is tanky but can be killed quickly when you get in a bad position, and gameplay is - spazzy - is the best way I can describe it. You'll have tons of assists, but won't have top kills or top heals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7F4SpGOdjgM

Also notable she has a hybrid kit. Her melee is action combat, she has an active block, her ultimate is a buff for allies, medium heal with armor buff which often looks like she's throwing a shield on someone but thats because they were at full health, knock back, shield bash / dash which stuns, and passively heals allies when her melee combat hits enemies.

https://youtu.be/nakvfXTDH8w?t=67

Wraithtouch

I like the bard of Daoc which offered Speed some buffs and some crowd control but was squishy and had terrible dps

KapStoan

Wraith that was a cool class on Hibernia side. The equivalent on the Midgard side was the Skald, which had speed, wore chainmail, and had solid melee dps in exchange for not getting AOE mez like the Bard and Minstrel.

Shoelid

I like Overwatch's Lucio as inspiration for bards. They can be the focal point of teamplay, or they can go solo and annoy the enemy team. Lucio heavily rewards both raw mechanical skill and awareness of everybody's position and abilities. Lucio isn't the best at damage, healing, or support but in the right hands he's a real jack of all trades.

To me, this is peak Bard. The ability to do everything, for yourself or for your team, is what would get me excited to play bard.

daveywavey

If it's anything like the Paragon from Guild Wars, I'll be happy. A damage skill tree, then two buff trees. Some party-wide, some nearby allies, some close-by allies, etc.
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_paragon_skills

Asgerr

For me something like a Hunting Horn from Monster Hunter (obviously usable with all sorts of different instruments) where you need to line up different skills to obtain a series of "stickers" and depending which and how many and in what sequence, they give you a different effect once you cash them in with a specific "closer" skill.

So let's say you have 6 skills on your bar that revolve around the instrument. 5 of them are "Notes" (numbering 1 through 5 for this example) and the last of them is a "Finale".

Examples:
You play 1+2+ Finale = a regen on your target ally or a dot on your target enemy
You play 1+2+3+ Finale = AOE buff/heal
You play 5+2+ Finale = A big damage attack
Etc etc.

Depraved

Treefrog wrote: »

I think it's safe to say that of all the archetypes being presented, the one that has the most potential for passive aoe spam play is Bard. We've seen this example in many games, they're simply buff bots that are 'required' in a sense, but don't have a lot of agency in the way of setting up their team in a mechanical way.

Personally, I love the role of bard in theory. I've played guitar for half my life and really enjoy writing/producing music. In practice I find it fairly dull to play usually, and it doesn't normally feel as dynamic and exciting as music truly is.

How do you solve this? I believe that you give Bards great mobility and engage tools, while keeping them relatively squishy in terms of defensivenes, and allowing their buffs to be proc'd from active ways. This keeps their identity from the tank and cleric separate, and requires a unique state of flow/dancing on the battlefield to achieve results.The main inspiration for this idea for me was actually from a game that many will recoil from: League of Legends. (please dont get triggered, this isn't about league, but specifically a single champion design from that game)

Rakan is an engage/enchanter support that has low tankiness, mild healing and shielding, but amazing mobility and crowd control tools that he can combine to create very interesting gameplay setups.

GLEAMING QUILLl-
https://gfycat.com/medicalunfoldedgermanspitz
Flings a magical feather that deals magic damage. Striking a champion or epic monster enables Rakan to heal his allies.

GRAND ENTRANCE
https://gfycat.com/candidfatantbear
Dashes to a location, knocking up nearby enemies on arrival.

BATTLE DANCE
https://gfycat.com/unsungbestbarasingha
Flies to an allied champion granting them a shield. Can be re-cast for free for a short duration.

THE QUICKNESS
https://gfycat.com/academiccheapamericanalligator
Gains Move Speed, charming and dealing magic damage to enemies touched.

Obviously, stealing these abilities 1-1 is not what im suggesting, but the CONCEPT of making Bard an archetype that relies on 'dancing' around the battlefield to apply buffs, shields, and crowd control sounds so much fun. Rakan can combine his different types of mobility together as well, sometimes using his knockup dash to get in range to be able to shield allies, or beginning his 'dance' before engaging with Grand Entrance.

You could even have abilities like the quickness which also leave a trail of music for people to follow, giving them a large movespeed buff as they run in the 'music'. Or maybe give them buffs that can only apply the full effect after getting a certain combo.
The potential is sorta limitless, and I think this style of bard gameplay opens up way more options!

What do you think?

steven already said that the bard isnt going to be a passive buffbot 😭😭😭

Krald

Asgerr wrote: »

For me something like a Hunting Horn from Monster Hunter (obviously usable with all sorts of different instruments) where you need to line up different skills to obtain a series of "stickers" and depending which and how many and in what sequence, they give you a different effect once you cash them in with a specific "closer" skill.

So let's say you have 6 skills on your bar that revolve around the instrument. 5 of them are "Notes" (numbering 1 through 5 for this example) and the last of them is a "Finale".

Examples:
You play 1+2+ Finale = a regen on your target ally or a dot on your target enemy
You play 1+2+3+ Finale = AOE buff/heal
You play 5+2+ Finale = A big damage attack
Etc etc.

Monster Hunter and the Overwatch example are good examples as well.

The idea of creating 'songs' sounds really fun

Krald

Asgerr wrote: »

For me something like a Hunting Horn from Monster Hunter (obviously usable with all sorts of different instruments) where you need to line up different skills to obtain a series of "stickers" and depending which and how many and in what sequence, they give you a different effect once you cash them in with a specific "closer" skill.

So let's say you have 6 skills on your bar that revolve around the instrument. 5 of them are "Notes" (numbering 1 through 5 for this example) and the last of them is a "Finale".

Examples:
You play 1+2+ Finale = a regen on your target ally or a dot on your target enemy
You play 1+2+3+ Finale = AOE buff/heal
You play 5+2+ Finale = A big damage attack
Etc etc.

Seems like they have some of this type of gameplay in bard! And they even added mobility and unique CC to the kit as well

Pretty cool!

nanfoodle

Lost me at make Bards squishy. You get every class can use all armor and weapon types? You want to be a frount line Bard with a sword and board and heavy armor. That's a design choice you can make. You want to play a Bard in light armor and a wand with high mobility, that's an option as well.

RocketFarmer

Good archetype design should allow players to play different styles without feeling underpowered. Mainly for variety. There are still things Bards will do that others can’t, and the main style(s) will be the go to option. Just not having a dominant strategy in a game would be refreshing. Too may games offer false choices.

Child Item