so, the dust has settled....

[Poo]

its been a couple of weeks now with the new barding spellsongs.

there were some pretty heated talks going on right when they came out.

now that cooler minds are about what are people thinking of the new spellsongs.


i must admit, as a discord fanatic i have only tryed the provo and peace ones a couple of times.
but the disco on i still enjoy.
i had to tweak my bards a bit to get the mana pool and lmc and MR needed to use it, but i rather like it.
i must admit i dont use it 100% of the time.
but i consider it another tool in my tool box that my bard can dip into should he want to.
I have been doing doom a lot of late and a guild mate of mine has been using the discord spellsongs on the DF.
unfortunatlly as soon as a ranged target hits the DF with anything you get a unholy bone to the head for your trouble.
so he was complaining that he was getting knocked out of his spellsong all the time on the DF.

now that things have settle down for me i plan on getting out and sinking my teeth into the spell songs a bit more.

i must admit i was kinda waiting a bit till they where all 'tweaked' before i went out to learn them, i hate learning how to use something then having to re-learn how to use it again cause they want to change it.
but i think from what i read that the only changes possibly due down the pipe are the being able to cast while in spellsong without loosing your focus on the spellsong and a tweak to the disco 'tics' to either less or boost their HP (cant recall which way its suppose to go)

anyways, what do you the bard community think as to what we have for spellsongs now that it has been a couple weeks of game play.

is anyone still even using them?

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

Still waiting for the updates Logrus posted to go in. So nothing has changed.

I tested Tribulation some more, used it on a Slasher with an AI spamming wammy friend (to try and make the most of it rather than it going off on peoples small damage), and it was still inferioir to using Despair.

Changing mastery is not worth the effort or a practical option for multiple bard skilled bards.

 

[yars]

ive been using the provo ones with my drag, i see no difference with buffs, the mana still hogs
i also tried them with guild, they enjoyed the buff, but again really no difference but mana loss. theres a patch right now, maybe theres something in there for us.

 

[Garm The Green]

I was pretty excited at first but yknow, who needs to spend that amount of mana on dispair when i've got a GD or Beetle/Mare doing the job. I'd rather save some mana to spam GHeal...

So i've not actually even picked the spell up yet...

I wudda jump at them as a pure bard, but then you can only have 1 mastery?

Hmmm.

Nice to have an extra tool I'm sure, icing on the cake - but their not a required asset to a solo hunter or team as yet from what I've read...

 

[Luke Carjacker]

is anyone still even using them?

No. We've been through all the reasons why, but for the 3 bard templates that I use regularly (bard/mage, bart/tamer, bard/archer), I haven't found a use for the bard songs that justifies the mana use over alternatives.

As I pointed out right at the start, there's a huge community of bards that have been patiently waiting for something useful for a really really long time. These bard songs do basically nothing for existing bard templates. The developers seem to be spending an inordinate amount of time trying to make sure that the songs are not imbalanced in PvP; and the limit of their imaginations is how to pigeonhole long-standing bards into stand in the corner support characters.

So, for me the answer is no. Beyond testing trying them out a few times, it never crosses my mind to use the bard songs because, quite simply, they suck @ss when compared with the multitude of other options. Does anyone have a template or situation where any of the songs would be considered highly useful (and better than other alternatives)?

 

[Jandruz]

I do like Despair, but what others have said is correct. If you're using a GD, you might as well just keep GHing the drag.

The main problem, as others have said, is mana use. It just uses too much too fast. I have pretty good MR on my suit and it can't even come close to putting a dent in the drop while I'm using the song.

 

[Verthandi]

I've been playing with the disco/provo ones a bit. I have a disco/provo/mystic whose suit is built with very high MR and max LMC. The mana cost of these spellsongs is still prohibitive for her, and there're precious few situations in which I'd waste my mana reserves to use them- there's just no bang for my buck. It's much more effective for me to spam mysticism or magery spells to buff, heal, and score some extra damage.

It's also very rare that I'm able to keep a spellsong up for very long before I need to interrupt it and cast a magery/mystic spell-- and in small bursts the songs haven't been helpful to me. I'm hopeful this is going to be changed, but I've seen mixed messages about it?

I also have a peace/tamer (sometimes swapped to disco/tamer), but can't be fussed to spend the gold or time to build her an even more MR-friendly suit right now, so I haven't played with the peacing set of songs as much.

 

[Shelleybean]

I'm not using any of the spellsongs. If some of the changes that Logrus mentioned get implemented, then I will reconsider.

 

[Brytt]

I had been excited to use the Provo Mastery set but mana drain is simply too much, let alone that events happen so suddenly on Baja that I can't get anyone to party during them.

I'd be better switching to discord, which works regardless of being in a party.

 

[It Lives]

I like the disco songs, I was provoking Swoop onto CU's and found that Its faster than my tamer or mage. They are nice for that bit of extra damage at the end. Nothing really to get excited about.

 

[Illumina Zero]

I can destroy the Ratmen bosses in the Cavern of Discarded, I use a Disco Sampi. I can leech enough mana to keep despair on him the whole time.
So with my Ornate axe, lesser Hiryu and Despair damage... I can slay them faster than anyone!!! *Flex* Other than that? ... ... Not horribly useful unless I can find another monster with low resist, tons of hp, and hits like a wuss.

 

[Beastmaster]

Just another waste of Dev time.

I think it was just a failed attempt to bring bards into PvP. The Mythic folks will tell you they are the experts when it comes to PvP in MMOs and I guess they thought they could just slap this in and everyone would love it. IMO they should just resign themselves that bards are PvM and give us full use of all 6 songs with drastically cut mana use.

 

[Logrus]

So let me know about that dust and settling.

 

[Poo]

your scaring us old bards each time ya tweak something!

we are the old cranky people of uo, we are so use to no one changing out skill over the years that all this attention is freaking us out!

 

[Garm The Green]

get on TC poo and give us a write up... only you can, becuase you're the mod

 

[Poo]

only i can?

this isnt monarchy!!!!

or is it...... *insert evil laugh*

i cant, im sitting on the beach with my ass in the sand and my feet in the water and im not leaving this spot for another 10 days!!!!

thats right people, theres a white skinned canadian on the beach, avert your eyes!!!

 

[jojo_la]

I can destroy the Ratmen bosses in the Cavern of Discarded, I use a Disco Sampi. I can leech enough mana to keep despair on him the whole time.
So with my Ornate axe, lesser Hiryu and Despair damage... I can slay them faster than anyone!!! *Flex* Other than that? ... ... Not horribly useful unless I can find another monster with low resist, tons of hp, and hits like a wuss.

curious - what does your template look like?

 

[Garm The Green]

lol....

 

[sirion]

I am disappointed to see that the new abilities is ALL ABOUT stats.

 

[ultima77]

I am disappointed to see that the new abilities is ALL ABOUT stats.

No offense, but what the heck are you talking about?

 

[sirion]

"stats" -- changing the buffs/stats/resists of self/party/mob???

http://www.uoguide.com/Bard_Masteries

inspire : +party HCI, +melee DI, +SDI
invigorate: +party HP/DEX/INT, heal party HP
resilience: stat regen, +casting focus
.....


correct me if i'm mistaken

 

[Poo]

the 2 disco ones deal out damage.

but ya the peace and provo ones are buff'r's

 

[ultima77]

"stats" -- changing the buffs/stats/resists of self/party/mob???

http://www.uoguide.com/Bard_Masteries

inspire : +party HCI, +melee DI, +SDI
invigorate: +party HP/DEX/INT, heal party HP
resilience: stat regen, +casting focus
.....


correct me if i'm mistaken

As Poo said, the Disco masteries do direct damage. The cooldown timer has also been drastically reduced, especially in your mastery, and the success rate has been increased 10% for your mastery ability and 5% for all other bard skills when you have one mastery. So, you have masteries that buff, masteries that cause direct damage, and acquiring a mastery in general greatly enhances the bard experience in general. What more could you seriously want???

 

[Petra Fyde]

I have a request.

Could someone who understands all this please check this over and let me know where any mistakes are?
http://uo.stratics.com/php-bin/show_content.php?content=31481

 

[Storm]

There may be some changes on tc so its kinda hard to be for sure till they publish to shards

 

[Poo]

ya, these are constanlly being tweaked on test then put into action.

ya may wanna hold off a bit to see how the latest changes pan out before changing anything