Bard: Guide to Playing the Job

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Job Overview
Available after completing the quest Path of the Bard. A bright tune to soothe a party's wounds... A brisk march to raise a party's spirits... A forbidden chant to weaken a party's foes... The bards of Vana'diel use music as their weapon. A bard uses songs as its main advantage to boost the partys stats. Bards have many magic spells but no Job Abilities.

Strengths

 * Extremely sought after by party leaders.
 * Has the ability to strengthen the performance of every party member.
 * Can weaken enemy with DoT songs, slow songs that stack with a WHM/RDM/NIN's slow, and weakens resistance towards elements.
 * Lowers downtime for recovery after battles by being able to refresh MP and Regen HP.
 * When used well, a BRD can dramatically increase exp/hour in any party.
 * One of the most useful jobs for the majority of BCNMs and ENMs.

Weaknesses

 * Physically weak and poor in combat.
 * Extremely dependent on party, without others cooperation, they are unable to do their job correctly.
 * Can be one of the most frustrating jobs to do, in particular when a party refuses to cooperate. Partys often demand too much of BRD's at higher levels, and they may be responsible for more than 8 songs at a time.
 * Cast time on songs are generally 8 seconds, and a situations can change greatly within that time frame.
 * Only job that must be concerned with positioning of all members of a party.
 * Lack of Job abilities.
 * Extremely consistant and repetative actions. Bard's will often be using the same songs over and over again in a party, running from the same two spots over and over again, and may never use some of the songs they learn other than for skilling up purposes.
 * Two hour ability has little use unless a dire situation is detected very early on, or it will be used for a temporary increase in experience points.
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Stats at Level 70
Information obtained from [JesterX's Guide to Vana'Diel]

Support Job Options
The choices listed here are by no means the only ones available, although they are the most common. Feel free to try out whatever combination suits your fancy. {| width="100%" border="0" cellpadding="10"
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White Mage
The most common choice, WHM as a subjob gives access to a number of abilities that greatly help the party and generally help reduce party downtime by reducing the strain on the main healer with such spells as poisona, erase, silena and curaga. Early on, debuffs such as paralyze and slow also help, but as a BRD begins reaching higher levels; these spells have reduced effectiveness or are resisted outright.


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Red Mage
Another popular choice. This gives the ability Fast Cast which reduces song cast time by roughly 2 seconds. At level 64 this subjob gets dispel which helps with Magic Finale's long recast time. Unfortunately this subjob option suffers from a significantly reduced magic pool(about a 30mp difference at level 75), and no status effect heals. Also buffs such as Phalanx and Stoneskin are relatively wasted due to the low enhancing magic skill.
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