On Fri, 17 Sep 1999 jhenders@... wrote:

>
> Yes and no. He's a factor in the fight in that he can stand there being
> beaten on for 30 seconds with out taking any damage while everyone else
> in the group can nuke or beat on the mob. Now granted, I have never seen
> anyone use this technique (and if it became popular and well known I
> would be willing to bet Verant would nerf devine aura, assuming it was
> effective) but in a way it makes them the perfect tank for 30 seconds.
> They can soak up huge amounts of damage without actually taking any.

I too have never seen a cleric use it this way. Seems all of
them want to save it just in case they really do get in
trouble. Go figure. :-)

> The biggest problem with Bards at later levels, IMO is that most groups
> (at least on our server) go to item distribution based on need, rather
> than the various schemes like alpha used by lower levels. I believe this
> is used on other servers as well. Unfortunately, as the Bard is known as
> a mediocre fighter and inadequate tank at that point, and the weapons we
> can use are all weapons multiple classes can use because we have no bard
> only weapons, there will always be someone in the group who could use
> the item more than the bard. Why would a group want to give the first
> Ykesha they find to a bard, who can't double attack and thus won't be
> making as effective use of this special weapon as a warrior or ranger.

I kind of agree and disagree. When I group randomly, the
items usually go via lotto. So far people have been pretty
good about withdrawing their names from the lotto if they
can't use or don't need an item (i.e. already have something
better). But I see your point about need-based distribution
being worse than lotto in long run for bards.

When I group with friends - folks I spend most of my time
with, I *want* the items to go to the person who can make the
best use of it. I spend a large portion of my time grouped
with them, so making them lots more effective is usually
better than making me marginally more effective. We're also
pretty good about redistributing old items when someone gets
an upgrade, so it's not like I never get anything. I may not
get something fresh off the mob's corpse, but I do get things.

Anyhow, more special instruments would help alleviate this
problem. There's not question who those go to. :-)

--
John H. Kim
kim@...