But actually, Welcome to Khuja's Bard Guide, where you can learn to HIT THEM WITH FUCKING ARROWS. Efficiently. :) To note about this guide is that it will take place from the perspective of a level 60 Bard. Strategies and skill usage is assumed to be under the effect of The Wanderer's Minuet, and to have all Traits unlocked for the class, as well as cross-class abilities.
Table of Contents
Weaponskill, Ability, and Spell descriptions
Cross-class spells, which ones?
Bard Opener? How to begin hitting things effectively
Basic Rotation of spells for Single Target and AOE
Straighter Shot and other high level skill usage
Stats, gear, and other important information
1. Weaponskill, Ability, and Spell Descriptions
WEAPONSKILLS
Heavy Shot Potency: 150 TP Cost: 60 Additional Effect: 20% that next Straight Shot will deal critical damage and require no cast time. (Straighter Shot)
Bread n' Butter attacking weaponskill. Essentally, if you have nothing else relevant to be using, you should be using Heavy Shot. Get used to pressing this button a lot, because it fills a lot of the dead space. Fishing for Straighter Shot procs is really important, so make sure you're not overusing your other skills!
Straight Shot Potency: 140 TP Cost: 60 Additional Effect: Increases Critical Hit Rate by 10% (20s)
Arguably the second most important skill in Bard's kit. You have to ensure Straight Shot is buffing you at. All. Times. Now, with that being said, one of the easiest mistakes to make as a Bard is overusing Straight Shot, and to a certain extent, Straighter Shot. In the effort of ensuring that the Straight Shot Buff is always up, people will cut it short by as much as 10s. This is wasted DPS that accumulates slowly over the course of a fight.
Venomous Bite Potency: 100 DoT Potency: 35 DoT Duration: 18s TP Cost: 80 Additional Effect: When DoT is critical damage, 50% chance to reset the timer on Bloodletter/Rain of Death.
It's a DoT. You put it up at the start of your rotation and then never miss Iron Jaws and it just keeps doing it's thang. It's doubly crucial to not miss Iron Jaws, too, because every time you do you waste not only a huge chunk of DPS, but also a huge chunk of TP. Recasting both DoTs is an extra 40 TP that you just threw to the wind.
Windbite Potency: 60 DoT Potency: 45 DoT Duration: 18s TP Cost: 80 Additional Effect: When DoT is critical damage, 50% chance to reset the timer on Bloodletter/Rain of Death.
Same as Venomous Bite, really. Let it do it's thang, Iron Jaws when it's runnin out.
Iron Jaws Potency: 100 TP Cost: 60 Additional Effect: If the target is suffering from Venomous Bite or Windbite inflicted by you, the effect timer is reset. Clause: Can only be cast in The Wanderer's Minuet
This is actually the most crucial piece of the Bard rotation, and why I tell people not to worry about their rotation until they have it. What if I told you this move has an effective potency of about 500? Seems crazy, so here's the math of it. However, before the numbers, one thing you need to know. DoT's tick every 3 seconds after application, not and do not tick immediately upon application:
Initial Potency: 100 Windbite DoT Potency: Ticks at 15s, 12, 9s, 6s, 3s (5 ticks total) 45 potency per tick 45 X 5 = 225 potency Venomous DoT Potency: Same ticks as above 35 Potency per tick 35 X 5 = 175 100+225+175=500
WOA!
It's basically a free fell cleave every 20s or so. SICK NASTY DUDE
"But wait Kooj," I hear you exclaim, shoving your glasses so far up your nose they cover your hideous uni-brow, "What about the last tick at 0s when the DoT deactivates? Wouldn't that make it more powerful? I've reapplied dots after it sometimes hueheuhue"
first of all shuddup nerd
Second of all, yes that's a thing. It's also incredibly unreliable. How does it work, though? I'll explain. Iron Jaws checks to see if there are any Venomous Bite or Windbite DoTs on the target instantly once the cast timer is finished, but doesn't reapply the DoTs until after the cast animation has finished, which is approximately 0.5s after the cast timer finishes. So you can technically have the DoT expire in the period AFTER the Iron Jaws cast timer finishes but BEFORE the cast animation finishes and have that last tick apply damage. The difficulty of applying this is because DoT timers in FFXIV aren't checked every second, so the amount of time when the debuff reads 1s remaining could be 1.25s or 0.75s or anywhere in between. It's too unpredictable, and too much of a DPS loss to miss it 50% of the time trying to get an extra tick of 80 potency. Do not rely on this concept, it will burn you more often than it helps you.
Empyreal Arrow Potency: 220 TP Cost: 60 Recast Time: 15s Additional Effect: Does not share a recast timer with any other actions Clause: Can only be cast in The Wanderer's Minuet
This is your consistent hard-hitter. It's sort of weird to use, because it's a weaponskill and therefore has a cast time, but also can be cast independently of all other weaponskills, so you can use it between other global cooldowns. Essentially, it should fit very nicely into your rotation if you use it right after Iron Jaws every single time, because you'll be using that to reset your DoTs every 15s anyway.
Quick Nock Potency: 110 TP Cost: 140
Go-to AOE spam. The only thing to note is you generally need to be sorta close to the mobs in order to hit them all, so you may have to dodge a bit.
Wide Volley Potency: 110 TP Cost: 160
WHY DOES THIS SKILL EXIST! It has exactly 1 use, which is AOE mobs that are too big to hit everything with Quick Nock. Other than that, they're the exact same thing except this one costs more for whatever reason.
ABILITIES
Bloodletter Potency: 150
Your go-to single target ogcd spam. Especially in fights with two major targets (A1, for example) if you can keep your DoTs on both, this will be resetting like crazy! Have it somewhere easy to hit because it's a common spell. You can also mash the button if you have no other ogcd spells to be using, because the time very well could reset on you.
3. Bard Opener? How to begin hitting things effectively
The Bard Opener is very possibly the most efficient opener in the game, In that it uses all of it's spells together in the smallest time-frame possible. I'm by no stretch the best bard out there, and even I can rack up 2k DPS over 16 seconds with it. It's incredibly powerful, and also has the added benefit of having similar cooldowns which help focus your rotation as they come back off cooldown. Sooooo let's take a look!
BEFORE THE TIMER
Foe's Requiem* (if necessary)
DURING THE TIMER
Quelling Strikes Barrage The Warden's Paean** (if necessary) Battle Voice Hawk's Eye Blood for Blood Raging Strikes
AT THE PULL
Empyreal Arrow Windbite weave Bloodletter Venomous Bite weave Internal Release Straight Shot weave Flaming Arrow Heavy Shot weave Sidewinder Heavy Shot weave Bloodletter if reset. If no reset, weave Repelling Shot. If not in melee range, weave Blunt Arrow. Iron Jaws weave Empyreal Arrow Heavy Shot weave Bloodletter If not reset earlier OR reset a second time. If no reset, weave either Repelling Shot or Blunt Arrow.
*Foe's Requiem is only used here if The Warden's Paean is being used in the opener, otherwise use it there. **The Warden's Paean is only used here if there's a Warrior in the party, to negate the Pacification from Berserk. If not, don't cast.
Dank nasty opener tho. Let's take a look at a few of the specifics, since we're here. The main goal of this opener is to emphasize buffing your big hitters, Flaming Arrow, your DoT's, Empyreal Arrow, and Sidewinder.
Empyreal Arrow is cast twice throughout the opener. The first of which doesn't need the added crit from Straight Shot or Internal Release as Barrage takes away any chance of crit. The second one will benefit from both of those crit modifiers.
It should also be noted that Internal Release, Flaming Arrow, and Sidewinder all have the same cooldown and therefore will come off cooldown together, which is why they are used back to back in the opener. Additionally, every second set will have Raging Strikes up as well, being exactly double the cooldown. Those spells should get used together as they cycle through your rotation.
Iron Jaws cuts off the DoTs early in the opener because it allows the DoTs duration to extend an extra ~12s while buffed up. Windbite before Venomous Bite is marginally different (445 potency versus 435 potency,) but still technically better.
Similarly to the Internal Release/Flaming Arrow/Sidewinder triad, Barrage, Blood for Blood, and Hawk's Eye share very similar cooldowns (B4B being 10s shorter than the other two.) These cooldowns should be getting used together as well as they come back off cooldown since buffing an attack through Barrage effectively buffs that hit 3x rather than twice. Excellent opportunity to use Straighter Shot!
5. How to use Straighter Shot
Straighter Shot adds two effects to Straight Shot: One, it auto-crits, and; Two, it eliminates the cast time on the weaponskill. GETTING RID OF THE CAST TIME IS UNBELIEVABLY POWERFUL FOR BARD (the crit damage is also good.) This allows you to use your Abilities way more efficiently by popping 2 of them, or any with difficult cast conditions or animations, in between Straighter Shot and your next weaponskill without penalty.
So what moves are the most efficient? Let's have a look:
Double Buff/Buff+Ability/Double Ability: Always a viable option. Generally speaking, Bard has lots of buffs that have similar cooldowns, being Internal Release/Raging Strikes (Raging Strikes is exactly 2x the cooldown of Internal Release), or Blood for Blood/Hawk's Eye/Barrage (80s/90s/90s respectively.) This means those buffs will likely come off cooldown at the same time. Personally, I like to use it to put both Blood for Blood and Hawk's Eye up together, since they also share the same duration and can be used to buff the combo damage from Barrage/Empyreal Arrow. There are other viable options, too, like using the extra time to weave in a Buff>Bloodletter, but usually 2buffing is stronger since it sets their cooldowns closer together and applies their buffs to more skills more quickly.
Repelling Shot/Flaming Arrow: These two spells are slightly more difficult to weave between GCD's than your others. Flaming Arrow because it's a 2 point cast (meaning you have to select the skill and then place it) and the time between GCD casts is pretty quick. Usually, if you're efficient with it, you can do it without losing any time at all, but it's still tough to get down consistently, making it a viable option to use in the extra long period after straighter shot to use it. It's also very easy to use with a second ability– the main issue with using Flaming Arrow is that it can't be buffered while, specifically, CASTING. It can, however, be buffered after another ability, say, Bloodletter. Repelling Shot, on the other hand, is a bit of a different beast. It has the unfortunate effect of the movement lasting longer than the cast animation. This can be really bad, especially if you're playing with a lot of latency. After using Repelling Shot, you can try to start your next cast near the end of the animation. But because you start the next cast before you've finished moving (even though the animation is technically "done" at that point,) the game interrupts your cast, since moving interrupts casts (duh.) You can avoid this by either using straighter shot before, or in fact after the repelling shot (since there would be no cast time for it to interrupt.) It also helps to have bloodletter or another OGCD up to cancel the end of the animation, where needed.
Empyreal Arrow: Arguably the most efficient use of straighter shot. Empyreal Arrow is a weird skill in the context of FFXIV, because it's a weaponskill (therefore has a cast timer) but doesn't set off GCD, which means you can use it between other GCD casts. Rather than doing some lengthy explanation here's some numbers that make it sorta obvious:
Using Empyreal Arrow without Straighter Shot: Straight Shot > 140 potency 1.5s cast Empyreal Arrow > 220 potency 1.5s cast Heavy Shot > 150 potency 1.5s cast
Total Potency: 510 over 4.5s
Using Empyreal Arrow with Straight Shot: Straighter Shot > 210 potency (approximate with crit damage) 0.75s cast Empyreal Arrow > 220 potency 1.5s cast Heavy Shot > 150 potency 1.5s cast Bloodletter > 150 potency 0.75s cast
Total Potency: 730 over 4.5s
Essentially, you're gaining 220 potency over the same period of time by using your skills efficiently. Pretty op, if you ask me. Now, this is somewhat skewed given that you would gain 150 of that potency back a mere 0.75s later, assuming you use the bloodletter right after in the initial scenario as well. However, it's still a more efficient way to use your spells, as it cycles through your GCD normally.
Potions (especially of dexterity): If you use Dex Potions, you'll start to notice that potion usage doesn't quite operate like your normal skills. Potions don't have as much of an input buffer as your abilities do. What this means is that you have to wait for your previous action to have finished before inputting that you want to use a potion, which makes it really hard to fit in between normal casts without wasting time. Using Straighter Shot provides more than enough time to use one. That being said, this is another case where latency and framerate might be making this harder for me than it's actually intended to be 'cause of my chitty computer, so if you can find a better system, go ahead and use it!
I should also add that Straighter Shot is a buff that lasts for 10s once it activates. This means you have those 10s to choose when to use it. A common mistake is seeing Straighter Shot up and immediately casting it, thinking it has to be used right away. What if your Repelling Shot is up in 4seconds? Or your Hawk's Eye is coming off cooldown? It can be worthwhile, in certain circumstances, to hold off on dropping the cooldown right when it pops and waiting for an opportune moment to maximize usage of your spells. With that being said, don't let it go to waste either. Find the right balance.
Kooj Officers replied
520 weeks ago