Bards. One of several classes that I believe needs some help.

The most notable ability of a bard in Distant Lands is that they can charm a bijillion (I might be exaggerating) mobiles. But, without a way to move them around (read: magic-user), that isn't very effective. Ah, backstab. Nice skill, that. Unfortunately (though this is something that builders might want to address) bards don't seem to do so well in that department. Songs, you say? The songs are nice, out of the 15 you get, most of them are worthwhile. I haven't had the ability to tinker with them myself, so I really couldn't say how beneficial they are. Bards don't get dual wield, and the only two-handed weapon they get is a stave. I can understand that they don't really get any two-handed weapons, but dual wield might help them out. Or perhaps something similar.

Ideas. There are several things that bards should be doing. They should be what they are, jacks of all trades, and masters of none except the lore and song. So what do I suggest? How about group buffs. Songs that provide benefits upon those it was cast upon. Heightened hit roll and damage, temporary hit points, resistances. These types of things should be the Bard's bread and butter. What else? Skills. They should be able to do most of the skills in the game, if only to a limited extent. Give them repair skills, even if they max at inexpert, and so forth. They should also have access to a lore-type skill - A skill that would tell them if there are mystical properties embedded into the item, a myth that has been handed down for generations.

As you examine the item of foretold awesomeness, you remember hearing a ballad of a mighty barbarian once wearing this item. Simple stuff like that would add some flavor. When you examine it, you learn that some of the items abilities only works for certain classes or races. Or maybe when you examine items, you see all the properties of it as usual, only it doesn't hold your level against you. For instance, if you're level 50, and the item's attributes don't start working until level 150, you would still see the full stats of the item, even if it doesn't work for you.

There's plenty of things to be said about this class, but the first thing I think of when I hear "bard" is "underpowered and underplayed". Bards could be an awesome class, were some things changed.

-Jorlain

I agree a lot, Bards could be an awesome class all around.

DL2 seems to have only about 4 classes people love to play.. Cleric, Mage, Warrior and Paladin.
The reason I think this is, is mainly because so many people played them and got the bugs worked out on them years back. Yes, I understan there are still bugs on these classes. There is still room for improvement. But, that's the problem with classes like a Bard, Ninja, Monk, Thief, etc. The classes not played a lot.

I spoke out about rogue classes awhile back, I got no back up because, (and this is from what the players told me) nobody plays those classes, so they cannot stand next to me and agree.

I agree with what Jorlain is saying even though I've never played the class. But I feel the pain when a class is so far behind when it comes to some of the smallest things.

Some of the simplest things will turn many people away from something, such as a BARD class.

ALSO, i'm not saying this is a "You guys up there are slacking." I've come to realise, DL is very low on active staff members with free time to deal with this type of situation. The staff we have now, is already knee deep in bigger situations.

Perhaps some of us who play 23hrs out of 24hrs should think about dropping our weapons for a bit and helping out?

I think the biggest problem we have with this sort of thing, is that Nezmar is the only one that's able to adjust these sort of things, and he's a very, very busy man. So, as any logical person would do, he works on things in terms of most important to least important.

We've spoken before about class balancing, and at the time we spoke, agreed that the classes needed to be worked on a little to balance things out across the board. On the other hand, he'd have to completely write the classes to have them balanced the way he wanted to.

I'm not quite sure what all would be involved with adding skills, spells, proficiencies, and that sort of things to certain classes. However, I do know that the ability of macros are seemingly endless, and that something of this degree could probably be obtained through them. Unfortunately, I simply do not possess the know-how or the aptitude for macros.

I'm good at coming up with ideas. I'm a thinker. I, unfortunately, need to look to other people for help with implementing said ideas, should the populace feel that these sort of things are beneficial to the game. Much like how I wrote up a couple classes a while back. Unfortunately, many of the players do not frequent the boards, and thus many ideas fall by the wayside.

-Jorlain

It's also because the system we have is not very well put together. To be blunt, it needs to be completely rewritten (bestow/invoke powers is a significant step in this direction). I've long tried to avoid adding code that I was just going to delete later and that's a large part of why significant time has not been spent on spell/skills in the last 4-5 years. Part of the wait is also as Jorlain says -- I need to implement my vision of things before builders can use these tools to build things. Eventually this will change, I appreciate your patience.

Best regards,

--Nezmar

Thank you for responding, I know how little time you have these days.

I think my biggest question is this: what can we (players and staff members) do to bring new content into the game? I think the classes and races are more or less sufficient, as it has been for the past 4-5 years as you have said. However, those of us that have been around for a while and had experienced the previous skill/spell/proficiency system can see how much certain classes are hurting. When we took away all of those abilities, so that classes were not super-powered at the high levels, I believe we hurt some of the less-played classes (maybe due to inadequacies?) by taking away avatar abilities that helped balance the class out (albeit made them less unique).

I loved that we added the spell "mirror image" to illusionists. It helped bolster the class and set it apart from the others. While there are a few that still are of the opinion that the class is lacking a little bit, I feel that the one spell made illusionists far more worthwhile to play.

But back to the main question: What can we do? Should we builders simply produce areas and items to give these hurting classes some help in some of the areas that we're able to address? I suppose that would be a start, in all honesty. Sometimes the simplest solutions can be the most effect.

Also, Eracules and I had discussed the possibility of a very high cost spell (we speculated up to 100 song points) that was akin to "portal" to give Bards the ability to make use of their "charm song". As you said, though, you're trying to avoid adding code that you'd need to remove at a later time, so I don't know how feasible this would be.

At any rate, if there's anything that *we* can do to help, just let us know and I'm sure we'd be more than happy to do what we can.

-Jorlain

I suggested this long time ago, but like all the other suggestions I am guessing it got pushed aside. Since bards are masters of charming, why not let them be able to walk their charmies from zone to zone without restrictions that mages and illusionists have. That way bards won't need a portal spell, which just wouldn't seem right anyway.

I agree, Bojan. I agree with them not getting a portal spell, I was just trying to go with a solution that'd be easiest code-wise. Any situation in that which would generate easy movement for bards to be able to use their charm spell effectively would be beneficial.

Charming a creature is one thing, but marching them half way across the world to engage a fire-breathing dragon in battle is borderline absurd...

Two alternate ideas to avoid a portal type spell for bards:

1 - Fading Inspiration = Let bards walk their charmies where ever they want. But if they cross into a zone that would currently stop their followers, each charmed creature must undergo an 'Inspiration' check (as if they were being charmed.) If they fail the bard loses her charm over the creature. If they succeed they move into the zone with the bard.

2 - New bard song: 'Rally' = Rally allows the bard to summon all her charmed creatures in adjacent rooms into her current room. If Rally is used to summon creatures into a room they would not normally move into they must undergo a charm check to move successfully.

Both of these ideas work on the concept that a Bard has an easier time moving her charmies between zones than other classes but must exert more effort to keep them under her control.