Bard as a sub?

[DevineLight]

just wondering if it works out if u sub bard. are the effects of the songs still the same? or are they less powerful?

[Malachite]

The songs will be just as effective but in 90% of the situations you'll be in the sub will be worthless or a hinderance. I honestly don't feel like writing an essay type response so I'll just bullet some points.

- You can't use an instrument, this means you can only have 1 song in effect at a time.
- You'll be using low level songs since bard is a song. Example: At lvl55 a mainjob bard will be stacking ballad 2 & 1 for 3 MP/tick you'll only be able to use ballad 1 for 1MP/tick since your subjob will be 27brd.
- If you're a melee don't even consider the possibility, it won't work. 1) You waste time singing(even if you start singing while your target is being pulled). 2) You need a subjob that enhances your damage or tanking abilities.
- If you're a caster you really need a subjob that enhances your main abilities. As in be a blm/whm or blm/rdm, whm/blm or whm/smn, rdm/whm, or rdm/blm or smn/whm or whatever caster combos are good.
- The only situation I would ever even consider to be brd sub is if you're in a PT with a ninja tank, no bard and you have a summoner with you. In this situation you would have to be a whm, rdm or blm. The reason for this is that because with a ninja tank and smn support you're not going to be spending as much MP as you would with a warrior or paladin tank. Since you can afford to sacrifice a bit of MP you can give the other mages ballad 1 and your melee sword madrigal. Even in this situation it's kind of a risky choice.

[DevineLight]

lets say u have a party with: DRK/WAR, DRK/RDM , WHM/SMN, BLK/WHM, SMN/WHM, and urself. you also a SMN/WHM but there are already enough curetanks and warriors in the group. wouldnt it be useful to be singing a song in the meantime? your not needed as a summoner or a cure tank so what else would u do?

[Tokitoki]

If you are a eally high lvl you could do Mage's Ballad and regen some MP but that party setup isnt goig to be a commoin one considering theres no real tank, too mant mages, and nobody with provoke to even TRY and tank... but back onto topic you could sing a song but you probably wouldnt be invited into a group like that if they already have mages galore...

[subjectivist]

http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/sho...threadid=20867

I highly recommend NOT subbing BRD for SUM because sub WHM is much much more fitting for SUM as they have lots of mana and not much to do with it. BRD sub would be better for RDM or WHM.

[Malachite]

lets say u have a party with: DRK/WAR, DRK/RDM , WHM/SMN, BLK/WHM, SMN/WHM, and urself. you also a SMN/WHM but there are already enough curetanks and warriors in the group. wouldnt it be useful to be singing a song in the meantime? your not needed as a summoner or a cure tank so what else would u do?

1) I know it's a hypothetical question, but what I would do is leave that PT. It's horribly unbalanced. PT's tend to work like this: 1 Tank, 2 Dmg Jobs, 3 Mages. Bard counts as a mage in this setup. An example of an average PT is:
1)Paladin
2)Thief
3)Monk
4)Red mage
5)White mage
6)Bard

2) If you're not needed as a cure tank or a summoner, you find another group. If you have enough healing power then the smn spends their MP on support abilities like blinkga and earthen ward. If you're not needed as a summoner then you have no room in the PT and should have never been invited to that particular PT in the first place. PTs are delicate and you don't just grab the first 5 people you see and go on your way. This is why your job combination is important. You need to fill a specific role. Sub bard usually has no room in that role.

[Oni5115]

Low level

How about for low level (10-15) cash making runs? I was planning on crystal farming as a Drg/Brd. Mainly because I was hoping that I could use Pheon and regen both my wyvern and my own HP's. Less downtime, more crystals. =)

Would this idea work at all?

[Trev]

though ive heard its not a good idea i wouldnt say no to it.
everyone is always saying the disadvantages for having a brd as a sub but the same can be said for every SJ. eg. a black ar white mage SJ is less powerful than the primary job neway. no sub job can take away any thing from u just adds to ur char. so if u wanna d do it do it

[Tenkei]

I, personally, would not invite someone with a Bard subjob (despite their songs still being effective) in the party. To me, it just seems like a waste of space.

The fact of the matter is this: Playing a bard is hard work. It takes about 8 seconds to cast your songs. Since you don't have an instrument, you'll only be playing (maybe) one for melee, one for mages, and then one at the enemy. That's 18 seconds, plus the time it takes to run back and forth.
In a normal situation, you CAN'T be a WHM/BLM/WHATEVER and just run around doing this for half of the battle. You won't be helpful doing this at all. Or at least not as helpful as you could be.

In the situation you pointed out - where there are too many cure tanks already, here's the thing. If there are already a lot of people healing the group, why wouldn't you just be BRD/WHM, that way you can actually do your job efficiently? (Since you don't need to heal anybody, anyways, presumabely).

Also, your bard subjob will not give you ANY MP to a mage main job. You'll basically be cutting off a lot of MP compared to any of the other combos (WHM/BLM, WHM/SMN, BLM/WHM, etc.)

If you really want to do it, do it.
Just know that you won't be nearly as useful as a BRD/WHM(RDM).

[subjectivist]

http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/sho...threadid=28742 bam

[Sylvanis]

songs dont effect your wyvern

[Thingol]

I'm doing it atm to level my WHM sub (WHM/Bard usually Bard/whm) I know..I know.. I need to bring up my blm too (My other leveled jobs are war and monk soo till that happens..) I've just been doing alot of 1-10 runs lately (brd, whm, paly) and I do still think at low levels that Bard makes a better sub than pal (less mp but even one song makes up for it IMHO)...

Again this is temp and I wouldn't recomend it. Basically I will never level whm over 38 or so ^^ so I do need to get my blm or rdm up to about 19 but oh well... I should be ok till my whm is level 15 anyhoo... only take a few hours from 12 ^^

[Maxim]

I used to be anti-BRD sub too, until Shigeru (Rank 10 anti-gaikokujin PT leader) on Ragnarok told me to sub it in a level 50+ PT. Worked out surprisingly well the first time. About three days later he invited me into his PT again and asked me to sub BRD once more, but unlike the first time I didn't hesitate to do so.

BRD sub seems to work best when your main job is a supporting job such as RDM. It probably won't work as well when subbing on melee jobs because every second you're singing is time that you could be using to attack and store TP.

RDMs only have to worry about back-up healing, Refreshing, and enfeebling/MBing so you can squeeze in just enough time to sing Madrigal and Ballad if you completely give up attacking (which is not a big loss since RDMs don't do any damage at all anyway). I'm not too sure if BRD sub would work with jobs like WHM though, because they need to concentrate on keeping the tank alive and if they are singing they can jeapordize the PLD's life... which can lead to a total PT wipe-out (‘S–Å). XD

[Rekiem]

Im not so sure that BRD sub is so useless for the other jobs. I mean think about it, people sub things to boost their stats and effectiveness. Bard do that in the same way, the only difference is that it can boost everyone around you. I see a THF subbing BRD so he can cast Madrigal on himself or Minuet. But not only he boost his own stats but he do this for all his PT members.

The downside with subbing BRD is that if theres already one in the PT, it becomes rather useless..

I see Rangers subbing Ninja so they can use two Archer Knife to boost their accuracy. But what about a RNG/BRD who cast Hunter Prelude on himself, Madrigal on the fighters and Mage Ballad on the mages, wouldnt that be more usefull? This is just an exemple...

[Niland]

as stated above theres one place it works, and thats for a red mage at 50+ madrigal and ballad fit nicely with the red mage's other abilities.

however even then i'd say only do it when you can't find a bard of the same level