Itazura's Bard Puller Guide

This guide is aimed at Bard players who with to go beyond enhancing the exp party by songs, but also contribute by performing as a Puller. Not all parties benefits from using its Bard as a puller; in some, a BRD/WHM as a part-time healer is more far helpful than leaving the backline manned by a lone mage. However, in many parties, the best thing a Bard can do for the groups' performance is to pull--in a controlled, steady manner.

Worship the Exp/Hour!
There is only one true measurement of an exp party's performance: Experience Points per Hour. That's not "300 Exp on that last mob!", nor "Did you see my bad ass xxxx damage on WS?" It's experience points, per hour--everything else is just a distraction.

Every Bard's role is to enhance the exp/hour. No exception.

To perform that duty, though, a Bard player must understand what are the major obstacles to getting decent exp/hour, and how to help a party overcome them. Pullers included, too.

Obstacles to Decent Exp/Hour

 * Over-hunting: This is when party hunts monsters which takes too long to kill or are too dangerous to the members. Keeping up the buff songs on melees and Ballad on BLM is about the only thing a Bard can do to compensate for this, and only so much.  Stomping feet and demand a new camp with more appropriate targets is likely a better solution.  Sometimes, not Level Sync to the lowest member, and go for a level or two above can solve this, but that's not something to count on.


 * Under-hunting: This is when party hunts monsters which do not give enough exp per kill. Pulling faster is how a Bard can help, but that's not a cure all.  Level Sync to a lower level may help, but again, not something that's always possible.


 * Death: Nothing kills exp/hour faster than a party member getting K.O.'ed, especially if it's a tank or healer. A Bard with mage support job needs to keep an eye on HP of party members, and prioritize emergency cures over buffs and pulls--otherwise, exp will drop to 0 for 5 minutes.  Once again, emergency cures first--worry about songs and pulls after.  Same goes for dangerous pulls; dead puller means lousy exp--don't link fast moving monsters, and don't bring critters 18 levels above your tank.


 * Bad Tanking: Notice it's bad tanking, not bad tank.  Even though the tank shoulders a lion's share of the burden, it's everyone's responsibility to ensure the party is function smoothly, with the monster mostly attacking the tank and not melees or mages.  Bad tanking is most noticeable when mages or Dancer is using excessive amount of MP or TP to cure, especially curing the non-tanks.


 * Unfortunately, this is not something Bard can do a lot about. Help keep the tank high in HP can encourage some players to use Provoke more often for the Bards with mage support job; switching to March song(s) can help Utsusemi based tanks with recast timers; angling for Ballad on the Paladin can help him last longer and cast more spells.  Those little things should help, but nothing a Bard does can force a reticent tank to perform or truly hold back a showoff DD sponging off the curing resources.


 * Replacements: Someone leaving the party interrupts the fights. A player is distracted and inattentive to the fights while  looking for replacement.  May cause confusion as new arrival may not know how the party has been operating.  Often need additional time to renegotiate who performs which roles.


 * Simply, a Bard should help by not contributing to the problem. Refuse replacement invites.  Ask to make sure everyone joining the party has reasonable amount of time, and do not include those "I'm 3500 TNL and I'm leaving as soon as I get my level!" members.  Do not put up seek flag unless intend to stay in party.  Do not look for replacement--a Bard puller should be too busy to even contemplate such a thing anyway.


 * Replacement, is a stupid way to party.


 * Bad Pulling: Now this, a Bard is well suited to address. A "bad puller" means almost the same thing as a "slow puller" in many people's minds, though pullers who get themselves killed or keep bringing back unintended links also fit the bill.  Links often means the party has to use up resources faster to handle (or die/wipe).  A dead puller brings nothing but a five minute long, 0 exp headache to the party.  Slow pulling is... a waste of everyone's time.


 * Buff songs take a while to apply, but do not wear off all that fast. That means a Bard has time on his hands.  In the early years of FFXI, that meant helping out with bar- spells in parties without White Mage or someone with native enhancing magic and /WHM, and back-up cure.  In parties with sufficient curing powers and enough mages, though, those activity are still helpful, but not essential.  Instead, the best use of the free time is to pull.


 * While the buffs/Ballad songs are up, a Bard away takes nothing from the party's firepower, unlike using a DD (such as a THF or RNG) to pull. This means a Bard can have the next target ready at camp just as the previous one dies, speeding up pulling without taking a DD or mage away from the fight prematurely.


 * Further more, a Bard has two Lullaby songs to keep critters asleep. That means a Bard can pull early, and just leave the critter sleeping at camp, while the party is working on a current target--and resume reapplying buffs.  This ensures the party can quickly go from one critter to the next despite uneven damage output (BLM uses a big spell, some melee WS'ed twice or landed far bigger hits than normal, etc.) with no break in between.  This is called staged pulling, and is the goal of every Bard puller.


 * (Those same Lullabies are also good for getting out of jams from pulling links or dangerous prey, by the way.)

Staged Pulling
Staged pulling is readying the next target for battle while working on the current one; it is about reducing down time to 0, so every second of the hour the party is working on getting exp. This helps to keep the exp chains going, too, which further ups the exp/hour. Which is good, because a good party want high exp/hour--EXP/HOUR is the performance of the party.

Now, staged pulling isn't something exclusive to Bards. Red Mage, Corsair, and White Mages have all been doing it in merit parties and earlier, if not as often as Bards. Heck, theoretically a BLM/NIN with Herald's Gaiters can beat out a Bard in both speed and safety, with two single target sleeps, two AoE sleeps, and a stun spell to boot. The reason why Bard is the king of staged pulling isn't that it's the only job suitable; rather, it's because a Bard is the only job which can perform its core duty while being away on pulls, by using the time between buff songs.

Generally, the process is staged pulling is:
 * Play X number of buff songs.
 * Run off to find preys in range.
 * Select target, and pull (with Elegy or another spell).
 * Run back to camp.
 * Lullaby the pulled target; this stages the next fight.
 * Repeat. (Sometimes, may have to reapply Lullaby between buff songs if the party is taking a while with current battle.)

The goal of staged pulling is to ensure the party does not have to spend time waiting between targets to fight. To achieve safe and effective staged pulling, some conditions must be met:


 * Damage Mitigation vs. Healing Power Balance: The DDs must not take more damage than the mages and/or Dancer can sustain curing resources (MP for mages, TP and Waltz timer for Dancer), and sustain with a reasonable buffer for emergencies.
 * A Bard assists with this by keeping Ballad on mages (and Paladin), and Madrigal and/or March on Dancer. Bard with White Mage, Red Mage, or Scholar support job also can directly lighten healers' load with cures.
 * DDs should use /NIN if the party doesn't have abundant healing power; /SAM is nice, but Utsusemi is stronger damage mitigation than Seigan/Third Eye.
 * A good tank save healing resource, and allows DDs to do more damage. Keep a critical eye on the tanking performance, and be prepared to switch songs if the tank needs an edge.  (Generally, this means using a March over a Minuet or Madrigal.  Minne is generally too great of a sacrifice even for a Paladin tank; consider position the party member in such a way so that PLD can receive a Ballad song instead without hitting DDs.)
 * Proper Pull Timing: Pull too late, and the party will have to wait for something to kill. Pull too early, and the critter may wake up after initial Lullaby, and damage the Bard or someone who used Provoke, needlessly wasting healing resources, as well as wasting Bard's time to reapply Lullaby.
 * A condition often overlooked is overcrowding; even the greatest puller will bring in substandard exp/hour if there are too many competitors. A more out of the way place, no exp bonus, slightly harder to kill monsters---but free from competition local--will usually bring in better exp/hour than a crowded camp with favorite targets.
 * Correct Buff Cycle: It's great to never let buffs drop, but spending too much time buffing and the staged pulling will become spotty, and not so well staged. On the other hand, letting buffs drop for more than a few seconds means a Bard is neglecting his core duty.  A party without BRD buffs can still stage pull, but will kill slower, and result in lower exp/hour--the same result as slow pulling due to over buffing.
 * With a party which has uneven kill speed, a Bard must be vigilant of the monster's HP bar, and be flexible about the number of buff songs to play before running off to pull. The easiest way to remain flexible is to keep to a buff song order. Sounds counterintuitive, but keeping a strict order means one always know which song to play next by checking the song icons on the screen to see which song was last played.  (Well, mostly; single target buffs like Prelude isn't listed.)

To recap, staged pulling is all about bringing in the monster at the right time, so the party always have something to kill. To do this, the party must have right balance of damage mitigation vs. curing power, be at a good, clear camp that fits the party, and a Bard who's always keeping an eye on the monster and the party so he knows when to run off and get another monster.