Minstrel 101 has been updated to incorporate the recent overhaul. Click here to read the guide and post any comments related to the guide here. Thanks!
Kyle "FordyTwo" Horner "I want to go back to being weird. I like being weird. Weird is all I've got. That and my sweet style." -Moss
Great update, much more detailed and informative. I would like to see the other guides include things like virtue recommendations and trait lines.
Maybe there should be a series for each class or topic: 101 covering the basics, say to level 19, 201 covering levels 20-40 with grouping and traits and trait lines, and 301 covering legendary traits and items.
Back to Minstrel 101, I don't recall seeing the stances called compositions before, and it feels off. I like the idea of keys instead, setting the tone for what follows. It doesn't fit with the stance names perfectly; then again, no musical term is going to wrap around "war-speech" well. Perhaps it's better just left as stances?
Other than that, the anthems section needs expansion--what they do, what they affect, and what happens on executing coda to their effects.
I'd like to see a little bit of information about anthems, covering the following topics:
Anthem buffs
Anthem post-coda buffs
Using anthems for their post-coda buffs is one of the more complex mechanics of the minstrel and should be at least introduced in a Minstrel 101 post. Anthem of the Free Peoples is a good example:
When first used: ICPR for whole fellowship
After coda: HoT for just the minstrel
You don't need to list out what every single anthem does. But the pre-coda/post-coda behavior of anthems extremely powerful and should be introduced in this article.
This looks more like a Minstrel 201 guide to me, especially in comparison to what the other classes have for their 101 guides. The complete description of all the trait lines and class deeds might be overwhelming for someone who's truly just starting out in the game. Perhaps some of that could be moved to a separate guide, if at any point the other classes get slightly more advanced guides also, which I do think would be nice.
All that being said, I am very happy to see this, since I have seen players asking for an updated Minstrel 101 many times since the class revamp. It's great to get advice from fellow players, but it is also important to have some sort of official Turbine guide.
@Harperelle That's a very good suggestion. We'll add that to our notes and incorporate it into the next refresh of the x01 guide series.
@Elinnea @banhorn This was definitely a shift to more detailed information in the 101 guides. I agree that separating that detailed information into a 201 & 301 has more beneficial merits; although we still need to work out how to best organize all the information available, guide-wise, for each class. We could post each x01 guide into separate articles, or have them in one master article and separated with nice imagery and "Sections" that clearly state "101," "201" and "301".
Thanks for the feedback everyone!
Kyle "FordyTwo" Horner "I want to go back to being weird. I like being weird. Weird is all I've got. That and my sweet style." -Moss
I would suggest taking your que from this amazing player created guide Cloudie-Wan's Guide which currently has much more detailed information. This guide is helpful for both new and experienced Mini's alike.
Last edited by Winterfell; Dec 15 2011 at 05:27 PM.
For My BW Brethren or Those Who Love Stick Figures 3 Years of Stick Art
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I would suggest taking your que from this amazing player created guide Cloudie-Wan's Guide which currently has much more detailed information. This guide is helpful for both new and experienced Mini's alike.
Linking to it at the end of the article would do nicely. Cloudie-wan's guide is definitely the graduate level course!
I would suggest taking your que from this amazing player created guide Cloudie-Wan's Guide which currently has much more detailed information. This guide is helpful for both new and experienced Mini's alike.
Personally I prefer this guide much better.. I also disagree with cloudie saying that the Minstrel can never truly fill a dps role in a group setting. Her post is nice but it is very pro healing. That's ok too.. but it's not really balanced since she includes her personal opinions as facts almost.
Using anthems for their post-coda buffs is one of the more complex mechanics of the minstrel and should be at least introduced in a Minstrel 101 post. Anthem of the Free Peoples is a good example:
When first used: ICPR for whole fellowship
After coda: HoT for just the minstrel
I agree that separating that detailed information into a 201 & 301 has more beneficial merits; although we still need to work out how to best organize all the information available, guide-wise, for each class. We could post each x01 guide into separate articles, or have them in one master article and separated with nice imagery and "Sections" that clearly state "101," "201" and "301".
On that note, can I just point out that those of us from out with North America don't necessarily use the x01 naming convention for classes. XXXX 101 is common enough in TV/film usage that it's (probably) well enough known as a synonym for "beginner", but the progression to 201 and 301 certainly isn't. Indeed, it appears wrong to my UK brain, as I'd expect the next one to be 102, then 103 and so forth. Can i suggest that you either go with your latter idea of one big article broken down into sections or swap terminology to "beginner", "intermediate" and "advanced", which don't require any additional cultural knowledge to understand? Thanks!
On that note, can I just point out that those of us from out with North America don't necessarily use the x01 naming convention for classes. XXXX 101 is common enough in TV/film usage that it's (probably) well enough known as a synonym for "beginner", but the progression to 201 and 301 certainly isn't. Indeed, it appears wrong to my UK brain, as I'd expect the next one to be 102, then 103 and so forth. Can i suggest that you either go with your latter idea of one big article broken down into sections or swap terminology to "beginner", "intermediate" and "advanced", which don't require any additional cultural knowledge to understand? Thanks!
I agree with this very much.
Spiders in V1Pre-B13: 8-legged menace. B13: 8-legged bait. B14: 8-legged trap... no more! B15/MoM: 8-legged *splat!* Spiders in V2B7: We cope. B8: FotM? B9: 8-legged menace. Spiders in V3B3: Mourning for my hatchlings.
On that note, can I just point out that those of us from out with North America don't necessarily use the x01 naming convention for classes. XXXX 101 is common enough in TV/film usage that it's (probably) well enough known as a synonym for "beginner", but the progression to 201 and 301 certainly isn't. Indeed, it appears wrong to my UK brain, as I'd expect the next one to be 102, then 103 and so forth. Can i suggest that you either go with your latter idea of one big article broken down into sections or swap terminology to "beginner", "intermediate" and "advanced", which don't require any additional cultural knowledge to understand? Thanks!
I agree as well. At the universities that I'm acquainted with, 101 or 100 is the intro level, followed by a sequence of 102, 103, etc. Then 201 would skip to a higher level of difficulty, and 301 and 401 might be intro to advanced sequences of classes. All of this depends so much on the school, national standards, etc. and I could see how terms like these might be too culturally specific.
Besides, having a single article that's visually divided into sections would be much easier to keep track of, rather than having a whole bunch of pages that need to be cross-linked.