when I play bard, sometimes there are some players who will complain that I am healing other party members when they are low on health.
but then when I focus only on atk buff some players tend to die or not do dps and play it safe because they are low on health.
I tend to focus on buff atk when the party is good at dodging. but when I see someone is having a hard time I tend to heal them so that they won’t run out of pots or die.
should a bard use heals if 1 or two members is low on health or just focus on atk buff even if it meant people low on hp might die or are not doing dps because they are playing it safe.
If the same guy keeps getting slammed and not the 2 others then just boost dmg, otherwise heal.
edit : obviously it depends what content you are doing, if you are doing Brel etc just heal if it’s needed, if someone keeps getting hit in valtan/vykas and wont use pots then use damage buff for the capable DPS…
Interesting. when I play dps, I prefer if bard focuses on healing if even just one member needs it. I don’t like it when one dps is dead because it means a longer fight even if the two remaining dps are getting that 3 bubble atk buff from time to time. unless there is a over geared dps then obviously ill just keep using atk buff to quicken the raid.
but some players demand atk buff and are just running around with half hp and not doing dps and they still want atk buff. its usually players without a bard that does this. if I just drop a heal so they could continue doing damage, but instead they are running around waiting for an atk buff while they could be doing damage instead.
I think bard should focus on healing so that no one would die. unless there is an over geared carry, then its better to just give atk buffs to that dps to quicken the raid, I also like to use atk buff whenn a boss gets countered or staggered, I think that’s a perfect time to boost the damage. even if its just 1 or 2 bubbles, if a boss is down im using atk buff regardless of bubbles.
I think this is also one of the advantages of a bard over pally, you can choose to give atk buff when a boss gets countered of staggered, even if its just 1 or two bubbles, its still a really good time to boost the damage when a boss is down.
Depends on the content. If upcoming mechnics need bodies alive, then I heal regardless since just a single death means a wipe up to that point.
Remember a dead dps does 0 DPS so even if your buffing, if that DPS was at least doing a small part, your buff isn’t going to overcome the loss of that 1 dps player either.
yup if a mechanic requires 4 players alive I just focus or healing but then again there are some who still complains not getting buff, its usually players that don’t play bard
Sometimes it is hard to convince someone off their bad habits.
The best way is to recommend the player either use defense cards or stick by you as a bard. I normally don’t have problems with melee sustaining shields but when there are multiple hitmasters and they are all far away from each other then that is a big problem.
At this point, I think some players are exposed on bard gameplay that they should do what is “easy” if they want more shields. More shields equals more greed dps.
I’ll be real what’s more important a team that is alive or a team that is dead? Your dps buff is a conditional buff, where most players don’t even know it’s been proc’d. Because they’re to busy in their rotation to know what’s going on a round them. But universally as a habit, when you see a massive blue circle on the ground what do you do? You walk into it, making it more viable long term. Again whats better? High up time with healthy players, or healthless chickens to cheap to pot, so they run around like headless chickens with a sub 20% hit rate on rotations. There is no arguing what’s better commonly. DPS buffs are only good either in statics or when your overgeared. That is all. There is no argument for it for the majority of the time. From my experience from raids, raids that tend to have higher wipe chances are dps buffing bards comparative to healing bards. Makes sense, dead players can’t finish raids.
It comes up to the situation to make an optimal choice. But assuming all is about equally geared…
I “try” to hold heals to 1.8 or 2.8 bars before making a decision unless an emergency or if it is dangerous (unable to babysit without heals & using only shields). If it’s safe to not heal at 1.8 bars, you move to 2.8 bars, at which point you need to decide whether to go 3 bars dps, or 2 bars dps + a heal, or even 3 bars + awakening if it’s available. You’ll get better the more situations you encounter on your decision-making based on awakening availability & shielding & boss mechanics, and very dependent on if you have good meter gain.
Eventually, you’ll notice yourself doing both buff & heals in most pugs, and so far haven’t received a complaint when I’m on my bard. For breshalza, I find myself using heals more relative to damage buffs though, compared to older content.
If upcoming mech like shape drop brel g5 and u see low ppl heal.
Hugh Dps window and u want to push dps in like g6 to force next golden but only got 2 bubbles? Put lvl 2 att buff.
Its super situational. Just try to think what helps the team in the next like 10-30 boss bars the most.
That’s why supp isn’t easy u always need to know what happens next and what ur team needs to do. And also adjust to ur team. If ur in pug just heal them. In static? Communicate tell them if u want to hold for lvl 3 and that this one sorc should start dodging or using hp pot.
It is not your fault, use a macro text to let the party know you are healing makes it easier, it’s their job to get into your heals, dps move all over the place you can’t cast 4 heals for all 4 of you in the party at different location.
are you playing with mokoko seeds? attk buff is the key to skip mechs/attk patterns that will kill you overtime due to long fight so with attk buffs you shorten the fight, less battle items usage.
Goodjob
Do what you see fit, support plays a huge role that you have to babysit 3 dps + yourself.
They need to get good and play like there’s no support. Can’t be holding their pacifier for them.
Not really sure why they can’t do both? There’s very very few lobbies I run my bard in pug or otherwise that I can’t sit and spam level 2 serenade and still be dropping level 1 heals. It’s extremely rare I find myself in a position where I don’t have a heal available. Though I have noticed when I’m on my DPS many other bards seem to struggle to be able to spam dmg buffs and still have heals. Not really sure why though.
Use Serenade of Courage always after a counter and/or a stagger check (right after the boss cower on the ground) with one or 2 bubbles; heavenly tune, sound shock and sonic vibration.
If u are out of bubbles, cast awakening Symphonia and use your Serenade of Salvation when they are around half health.
Don’t waste the big heal for one weak (or a badly positioned) player only: use rhapsody of light for shield him/her: with the engraving expert it helps a lot.
If u are good with shield (guardian tune and wind of music) there is no much need of spam the heal.
However you have to adapt the use of damage buffs or healing according to the situation, the context (before or after a boss mech for exemple) and always according to team allies’ behavior.
I’ve personally stopped using Rhapsody in favor of Stigma. Rhapsody was nice in Valtan but the later fights are so chaotic and movement intensive it seems wasteful. Generates minimal meter, the stagger is questionable and the destruction from it is worthless. The best thing it provides is extra shield, which is remedied by rotating guardian tune and wind of protection for 100% uptime. Using the dmg reduction window of guardian tune with the shield window of Wind of Protection you can maintain a near 100% uptime on 40k+ shield quantity half of that time is with 30% dmg reduction. Stigma is a throw and forget ability with a 200%+ serenade meter generation allowing you to obtain a bubble in 3 skill uses.
With the rework we receive in march I think myself and my friends also running it will be swapping it out for the new skill as that has even better meter generation plus some extras from what I’ve seen.
Its also extremely wasteful for me to just sit at 3 bars generating no meter what so ever because no one needs any healing. Might as well burn the 2 bar right before I get 3 to just add 10% damage in the middle of the fight. No reason to wait strictly for staggers. I build a bar in 3 skills though so I generally over generate more then I can use. In-fact the CD reduction QoL coming in march is huge I run into CD issues more then generation issues.
yes, of course, you are right. I repeat: a good use of shields prevent any emergency situations.
I find Rhapsody handy for those distant players who get lost and don’t know where to position themselves to avoid some boss animations.
I’ve never tried Stigma. Thanks, I’ll test later. I use the harp of rhythm for the bubbles and prelude of storm…I’ll see if it is more effective, so I can change the prelude to the faster counter.
They need to get good and play like there’s no support. Can’t be holding their pacifier for them.