Bard

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 stregnthen the performance of every party member. Whereas RDM are primarily restriced to Mage enhancement.
 * Has the ability to dispell enemy buffs.
 * Can weaken enemy with DoT songs, slow songs that stavk with a WHM/RDM's slow, and weaken resistance towards elements.
 * Lowers downtime for recovery after battles by being able to refresh MP and Regen HP.
 * Can participate in the greatest exp/hour yielding party setups, including madaburn and arrowburn.
 * When used well, a BRD can dramatically increase exp/hour in any party.
 * One of the most useful jobs for the majority of BCNM's

Weaknesses

 * Physically weak and poor in combat.
 * No MP naturally recieved from BRD job.
 * Extremely dependent on party, without others coperation, 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 demend too much of BRD's at higher levels, and they may be responcible for more then 8 songs at a time.
 * Cast time on songs are generally 8 seconds, and a situation can change greatly within that time frame.
 * Only job that must be concerned with positioning 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.
 * 2 hour ability has little use unless a dire situation is detected very early on, or it will be used for a temporary increase in experiance points.

Abilities
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Job Abilities
Level 01 Soul Voice
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Job Traits
Level 05 Resist Silence Level 25 Resist Silence II Level 45 Resist Silence III Level 65 Resist Silence IV
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Song List
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Magic Skill Ratings

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Information

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Artifact Equipment
Artifact Gear


 * Paper Knife
 * Choral Slippers
 * Choral Roundlet
 * Choral Cannions
 * Choral Justaucorps
 * Choral Cuffs

Relic Gear
 * Bard's Roundlet
 * Bard's Justaucorps
 * Bard's Cuffs
 * Bard's Cannions
 * Bard's Slippers

Songs 101
As a Bard, your job is to sing. All of your songs have different benefical effects on party members within range. However, when you get to higher levels (25+), you'll need to start singing different songs on different members. You wouldn't want Mage's Ballad on a Warrior, would you? The question now is; how do I do that? Simple. You spread the party members out. For example, having the melee up front and attacking, but far enough away so that the mages won't be hit by Valor Minuet and Sword Madrigal, while the mages stand far behind the melee, so that only mages are hit with Mage's Ballad. Sounds complicated doesn't it? Not to worry, you'll catch on pretty quickly; this is easier to do than it sounds.

Instruments
As a Bard, you can choose between two different types of instruments; a flute or a harp. I suggest the flute for several reasons. Flutes generally give bonuses to offensive songs, while harps generally give bounses to defensive spells. (exceptions exist to this generality. The Rose Harp Increases Etudes instead.) flutes are also more useful because generally, by the time you learn Madrigal you will not be using defensive spells much, or even at all. Therefore, they'll make Valkurm Dunes parties a bit easier. Second of all, a flute has shorter range. Why would you want shorter range? So that it's easier to get the right buffs on everyone. In addtion, the two primary songs that will be asked for by your melee section of a party will ask for Minuet and Madrigal, both of which use a flute to play.

Of course, you don't want to stick to just ONE flute or harp! What if you need to sleep many different monsters at once? The wider range of the Harp AOE might be just the boost you need to hit every monster with Horde Lullaby. Also take a look at the Rose Harp; it increases the ability boosts of the single-target Etudes. There are many different types of instruments you can use to produce different effects.

First let's look at a Cornette... We have here a level 4 ranged weapon useable only by the Bard job. This is perhaps one of the most basic type of instrument, a normal +1. The Cornette has the average range of a wind instrument, and when the song Valor Minuet is played on it the duration and power of the song listed on the instrument is increased. There are instruments for virtually every song in the game. So in order to keep your songs at their fullest potential it is best to carry as many instruments (and high quality instruments) as you can.

By now your probably wondering how to use so many instruments without being forced to consitantly refer to the Equipment menu. This can best be described in our next section...

Macros
No matter how hard you try to escape them, you know that it is impossible if you wish to deal with the sheer number of songs and subjob spells that are availible to the bard job. In short, macros are a set of twenty pre-defined commands availible for activation from your keyboard using CTRL+# or ALT+#

For more information on macros go HERE --> Macro Now, the most common macros a Bard will use is an equip and song macro. For example, my Minuet macro is


 * /equip range "Cornette +1"
 * /wait 1 (this is included for areas where lag can be a problem)
 * /ma "Valor Minuet III"  (/ma and /so have the same effect for Bard songs)
 * /p (Casting Spell) (Minuet)

These four lines allow me to both change to my instrument (the +1 version of the Cornette, +2 minuet) then waits one second and begins casting Valor Minuet (  is designated as all Bard status buffs are targeted on the caster.) Now let's say we have a single target song like... Archer's Prelude

this time we have an Angel's Flute instead of a Cornette, and the song is single target, meaning i will need to select WHO is hit with the Ranged Accuracy boost song. (Archer's Prelude)


 * /equip range "Angel Flute +1"
 * /wait 1
 * /ma "Archer's Prelude"
 * /p (Prelude) (Ranged Accuracy Bonus)

The in my third line will hold off the entire macro and displays a blue targeting arrow over player charachters in the vicinity. Allowing me to scroll using the arrow keys (or controller keys), Tab, or the F1-6 keys to choose a player charachter. Using this method you cannot pick an NPC or monster.

Now we will take a look at songs cast on monsters.

These songs are different in macro usage as they are not targeting party members, but rather monsters outside of the party.

Monster songs are split into two catagories, Battle target only (1) and sleep spells (2). This distinction is notable from the effects that occur from these spells. Battle target only (Elegy and Requiem), should be macroed so that they can be cast as fast as possible so you can move on with other business in your party, while sleep spells (both Lullaby songs) should be macroed so they can hit monsters that you are not currently hitting (in case of a link).

Battle songs. (Elegy, Requiem, Threnody)

These songs should be sung every fight, as soon as possible to increase the effects of duration should they last the entire fight. A slow early on can make much less hassle for a Ninja tank or the White Mage who is curing your Paladin. Slow on the monster means your tank get's hit less, less mp is used to cure your tank, and you can chain longer and higher. Threnody means an extra 30 damage on certain ordinary spells, and Requiem can add up over long fights to a acceptable amount of damage delt.

Battle songs are generally best to be used in the  or  format,  is preferred.

A song in  will be cast on whatever monster has the most hate from the party, in essence, the monster the tank is provoking. Macroes in  will look somthing like this.


 * /equip range "Horn +1"
 * /wait 1
 * /ma "Wind Threnody" 

 will never miss a monster that is currently being attacked, but please be careful when casting requiem when there is a monster being slept nearby, occationlly that monster will become the battle target, making it impossible to sleep untill the DoT effect wears off.

Sleep songs are saved for emergency situations when you have multiple opponents attacking your party (or just you). In general, it is wisest to have all sleep songs equiped to a macro, allowing you to scroll though monsters much like a macro does with single player buffs.

An example of a sleep macro
 * /equip range "Mary's Horn"
 * /wait 1
 * /ma "Foe Lullaby"

On the topic of macros, that is all that I can say at the moment. Happy partying with your new shiny macro set and equipment, and good luck with Bard!

~Jami (edited by Choboru, corrabalative work done by Ciros) ~Edited by Shendi (Changed Angel Flute/+1 to Angel's Flute/+1 plus fixed a spelling error)

The Right Songs for each Job
With a Bard's wide varity of songs, it can be hard to figure out what songs should be applied to what member. The basic idea behind different song effects is to enhance the perfomance of each member. Therefore, songs should match what said job is commonly doing. For example: The melee section of the party should be hit with Valor Minuet and Sword Madrigal. Why? Simply because Minuet enhances Attack, and Madrigal enhances Accuracy. This means that the melee will hit the enemy more often, and thier attacks will do more damage. Simple, no? Now, let's take a look at the mage classes. As soon as you hit level 25, you should be hitting any and all mages with Mage's Ballad. Ballad regenerates 1 MP every three seconds; the mages can cast more often. Black Mages should be hit with Learned Etude, it increases INT, and INT adds more damage to spells. White Mages should be hit with Spirited Etude, it increases MND, and MND makes healing spells heal more HP. Now, Etudes are single target songs, so you won't have to seperate White Mages from Black Mages. See the logic behind this yet? Ballad allows mages to cast more frequently, and Etudes make their spells more powerful.

Misconceptions about song choices
Within this same large variety, many Bards will make simple errors in song choice that are truely ineffective. This practice can continue a long time since many parties like to avoid telling a BRD what to do at all costs, BRD can typically find a party very easily and parties fear losing one. Some Bards will use March songe, assuming the +Haste will make a major increase in party efficiency. However, this is not so, the first march song is very weak, with a +10% Haste increase (I believe). The second is not much better at only +15% (also not certain of this). The only uses of these songs would be on a Ninja, but it takes a very skilled Bard to avoid interfearing with this song with Minuet and Mandigal needed on the other Melee.