I’ve been having a great time playing Bard in my weekly Rabanastre runs, which is a good thing because the Ivalician Fusilier’s Jacket has continued to elude me. I’ve been trying to get that drop for a few weeks now, and all the while, I’d been getting ever closer to the purchase of my next Lost Allagan weapon. With how much I’d been enjoying Bard, I made the decision to fully gear it (which is made a bit easier since I already have Aiming accessories for Ninja), and one of the first things I did during the last weekly lockout was pick up the Lost Allagan Composite Bow.

As I recently did for Ninja, I wanted to make a glamour that works alongside the bow, which I thought would be relatively easy, since Bard has access to one of my favorite pair of gloves for this sort of thing, the Ironworks Vambraces of Aiming. I’ve used them before for a Machinist-themed glamour, and I used them for quite awhile in A Realm Reborn alongside the Kirimu Coat for Bard simply because of how much I liked them. Things weren’t as easy as I imagined, though! The Lost Allagan Bow is more grey than silver, which meant I couldn’t really work with Metallic Silver (which meant I had to do more than simply go back to that old Machinist look).

After a frustrating glamour session where it felt like nothing was going to work, I was just about ready to give up on the idea and go back to glamouring the Yoichi Bow like I usually do for a default Bard weapon. While I was putting various Aiming gear back onto my Bard/Machinist retainer, though, I happened to try on the classic Replica Allagan Gauntlets of Aiming, and something clicked for me—so I have a glamour for Bard after all!

Glamour Components (Required Level: BRD 50)
Weapon: Lost Allagan Composite Bow
Head: Augmented Choral Chapeau (Jet Black)
Body: Replica Allagan Cuirass of Aiming (Jet Black)
Hands: Replica Allagan Gauntlets of Aiming (Jet Black)
Legs: (Common) Makai Markswoman’s Quartertights
Feet: Bogatyr’s Thighboots of Aiming

With the Lost Allagan gear having a lot of elements that are a sort of off-white/grey color (which reminds me a bit of various cermet elements in Zilart architecture from Final Fantasy XI), the color combinations suggested with the bow didn’t work with the bright silver plating on the Ironworks Vambraces, and it wasn’t until I saw the black and grey on the Allagan Gauntlets instead that I realized where I needed to go. Since the Gauntlets work best alongside the corresponding Cuirass (and there aren’t any good body pieces for the bow anyway), that was the next obvious piece of the puzzle.

The Bogatyr’s Thighboots came next—I’ve always favored them for Bard, though it’s actually been quite some time since I’ve used them, and it’d be remiss of me to use anything else in a predominately black Aiming look (at least, in one that doesn’t have red to go along with the Scion Healer’s Highboots). The Markswoman’s Quartertights were also an easy choice, replacing the Lady’s Knickers (Black) from the last go I had at an Aiming Allagan look.

All was well and good except for head gear. When I last used the Allagan body, I went with the Griffin Leather Blinder of Aiming, which I didn’t want to use again. Instead, I originally opted to use the Elegant Rimless Glasses, but something about those left me unsatisfied this time. I left them on after I “finished” the glamour and ran off from the Summoning Bell to do something else, thinking I’d figure out something else later. The final piece hit me almost immediately once I was far enough away from my retainers to make things just slightly inconvenient. Thankfully, the /isearch function let me test out the Choral Chapeau before heading back to grab it, but I knew as soon as I saw it in the preview window that it was going to bring the whole look together.

That’s it for this one! I might revisit Bard if the Royal City jacket drops, but I’m struggling to see how it would work alongside the Lost Allagan Bow, so for now I probably won’t have a new Bard glamour for a little while. My next goal is to use the Scion Liberator’s gear in some way, probably for a new Monk glamour. While I see a lot of potential for it in general, I feel like my Monk really needs something new to get me excited about leveling it again, and Lyse’s gear is likely to do the trick!