I am always poor. I always was as my bard was not a twink or an alt but my only, I just liked the sound of it. So I get around this by not needing money.
I dont buy anything really. Havent in a long time. I do buy peridots, try to keep 20 (buy more at 5 or so, time permitting) in case I get in a grp with a cleric. They really dig it when you slip them a dot and dont say much except a tell with your TOTAL HP, I have found that move gets my life saved by clerics more than all the groupsays and hotkeys "bard is dying, oh please heal" anything. Just a well placed handshake with the gem in the palm.
What else do you need to buy? Gems for quest armor, I did buy some of those - also farmed a bunch at times and stashed them away or gave them to guild vault. Warning, do not give all your gems to guild vault in case you leave guild - it can get ugly.
I get armor slowly by drops or from friends, or work with a friend who is a smith to make some for me... What else? I guess if you really are a massive twinker you just gotta buy that 65000pp cloak of whatever the $$ but not me. Im thinking if I dont get a Breastplate drop upgrade soon (I am raiding for them a lot) I might break down and buy a SS BP, but that would involve selling my existing BP (3k), my mosquito boots (7k) and finishing the Tiny Cloak quest, and selling my MQ armor items (8k or so each - 2, thurg armor, maybe just 1,) I saw a SS BP for 20k or so last week.
Bingo, got a BP. As far as the rest of it goes I just sort of give people who seem like cool bards old gear when I get something new because thats what a lot of bards have done for me. Its weird, to me there are basically two kinds of bards out there, bards like me, who are *real* bards as I think of us, who play them because we LOVE them and help each other out, and bards like *THEM* who are twink chanters or whatever with 100k + in their bank who bought all their gear at lvl 1 they had all blueberry crap and they dont know what they are doing - or way crazed PL bards who are just insane, they dont twink they EARN it but they go too fast to talk to and do scarey things like kite dragons for fun solo. Both of these grps tend not to say hello, chat a sec, look each other over, the way *we* do. If I see a bard needs an item I have I will go to the bank and give it to them, usually, sometimes if its really worth something, like 1k or more I will tell them and usually they have it, if not I ask them to NOT SELL it when they upgrade but to give it away like I did.
I like to think that this has some effect, that these people, I talk to them, I try to get a feel for them first I dont just run around twinking bards, that they are going to perpetuate the thing and be cool to other bards and thats basically why I think we seem to be the most thoughtful, intelligent class as well as versatile and fun, and with all that why get too worked up about money? At lvl 56 I havent ever needed something I couldnt buy, but thats just like RL, I dont drive a Mercedes, though I guess I could go into hock for one...
Hmm, that was a tangent, wasnt it? Anyone else have anything to say about money and bards, and / or the whole idea I have that we are kind of a class of thoughtful types who find curious solutions to problems because we have to for one, given our limitations (no 4000hp nuke, no 500 dam double hit with 6000HP stats, that sort of thing, really our *strengths* not our limitations, it forces us to think outside the box and endlessly frustrate Verant and some players who get freaked out when they see us swarm kite - druids in particular seem to be very nasty right away, I have noticed, not all of course but I can go start swarming have a druid come INTO the zone and start in on /ooc about how bards are a menance, etc). So has anyone else noticed this characteristic of bards being these outside the box thinkers?
And does anyone else not really care too much about cash?
Or am I alone?
Gileas Dreamsinger, MM server, bard of the 56th string