So my question is: "Can a Bard be a valued member of the party or are they just the jack of all trades guy that doesn't excel in any?"
Let me know what you peeps think
Cheers
also, do a search for "sublime chord"
please read the posting guidelines stickied at the thread at the top of the forum before you make a post
+1.
Look for the Bard Handbook.
Two quick examples:
The aforementioned Bard/UrP/SC/MT ends up with 9th level cleric and wizard spells and other goodies. Speaks for itself.
A Bard/Virtuoso/SC/Virtuoso ends up with 9th level wizard spells and (almost) full bardic music progression. With optimized Inspire Courage, this results in up to +16 (or +12, depending on how you stack WoC) to hit and damage for everyone who hears you play (4 base, +1 horn, +1 Insp Boost, +1 Song of the Heart, +1 item, x2 Words of Creation). Or, with Dragonfire Inspiration, it's +16D6 / +12D6 damage (fire, but other elements are possible) on every single you or an ally lands. Far from weak.
please read the posting guidelines stickied at the thread at the top of the forum before you make a post
also, do a search for "sublime chord"
Err...ok sorry ???
Sublime chord is ok while the Seeker of the Song is far better, being able to have 2 songs active while using the refrain abilty can do some damage and provide the party with some much needed energy resist and heals when the time comes
Seeker of the Song doesn't advance spellcasting.
Sublime Chord kicks Seeker's ass.
Sublime Chord provides 9th level spells. Virutso can advance Sublime Chord with no caster level loss if you take the 1st level prior to SC.
Seeker of the Song doesn't advance spellcasting.
Sublime Chord kicks Seeker's ass.
+1
Bard 7/Virtuoso 1/Seeker of the Song 2/Sublime Chord 2/Virtuoso 8. You get Combine Song, decent Bardic Music, full Sublime Chord casting (although you may want to pick up Practiced Spellcaster along the way; lacking 3 CLs is already hurting). Of course, you'll have a poor repertoire of Bardic Music, so you may want to ask if you could combine all your Music-effects instead (Virtuoso and Sublime Chord too). Really, Seeker tends to be more trouble than it's worth even as a 2-level dip as Combine Songs isn't that good and most of the Seeker Music-effects are just week replicas of spells.
Hey guys and gals I enjoy making characters however in any of the campaigns I have played in I have never seen a decently played/build bard character. Is it possible that bard are just JUNK with lower caster progression and mediocre combat abilities that can set a tune to their own demise?
So my question is: "Can a Bard be a valued member of the party or are they just the jack of all trades guy that doesn't excel in any?"
Let me know what you peeps think
Cheers
*sigh*
Bards aren't junk. If anything, a properly used bard is positively gamebreaking.
First, there's Bardic Lore. A bard built to optimise Bardic Lore knows everything. If you can reach +28 with Bardic Lore, that's knowing the most trivial details about your advesaries on the roll of a 2 - and if that doesn't help you, then there's no hope for you. (Or more accurately, you have the wrong sort of DM). And I've demonstrated on the "How can you break a Gestalt Bard" thread how if you try you can reach this point by level 10.
Second, there's Bardic Music. Without reaching for the Book of Exalted Deeds, I can get a Bard to give the entire party a +5 to hit and damage by level 9. Yes, everyone will be hitting harder than the bard - but the Bard is responsible for most of that damage.
Third, there's socials. Diplomacy is FUBAR'd if you chose to abuse it. And the combination of Glibness and Bluff is effectively entering "Social God Mode" where you can convince anyone of anything.
Fourth, there's skills. The Bard is a better skill-monkey than the rogue. With Silence, Sculpt Sound, and Glibness it can sneak better. With Alter Self it can disguise better (and do a whole lot of other things better). Like the Arcane Trickster, the Bard needs to work by adding its spells to its skills - but if done this makes for a potent combination.
Fifthly there's healing. A Bard can use a wand of Cure Light Wounds every bit as well as a cleric. But a Bard also gets ranged healing in the middle of combat - at Level 9, Inspire Greatness can effectively heal 2d10 + 2* the target's Con modifier in hit points from a fair distance. (3d10 + 3*Con if you have Song of the Heart, as all bards should). Yes, the cleric can heal more (although not a lot more if you have high Con modifiers to deal with) but the Cleric needs to touch the target. The Bard only takes a move action. (i.e. a Bard makes a better combat medic than a cleric - and that's before taking the tumble skill into account).
Bards can be extremely powerful - but they are very hard to play well and need the sort of mind that reflexively spots all the synergies in order to get them right. (And I'm just talking about straight bards here, not multiclass).
If you really want to pull off double songs, try this:
Bard 7/Virtuoso 1/Seeker of the Song 2/Sublime Chord 2/Virtuoso 8. You get Combine Song, decent Bardic Music, full Sublime Chord casting (although you may want to pick up Practiced Spellcaster along the way; lacking 3 CLs is already hurting). Of course, you'll have a poor repertoire of Bardic Music, so you may want to ask if you could combine all your Music-effects instead (Virtuoso and Sublime Chord too). Really, Seeker tends to be more trouble than it's worth even as a 2-level dip as Combine Songs isn't that good and most of the Seeker Music-effects are just week replicas of spells.
Illegal build. Seeker of the song cannot be taken before level 10.
Seeker is ONLY for melee bard builds and even then it mostly sucks. You can get some mileage out of Song of Spelldeath+ (dragonfire) Inspire courage, but that's about it.
Bard6/Crusader8/Seeker6 might do something.
Bards are the most powerful non-full-caster in the game, IMHO. They're geared for Diplo-brokeness, and can bluff their way through almost anything. They also make great buffers.
As someone said, the Best "assasssin" build is a Bard 20, who diplo/bluffs his way into the castle, stabs the king to death, and calmly walks out without any interference because everyone is dazzled by her awesome or in love with her.
Err...ok sorry ???
Sublime chord is ok while the Seeker of the Song is far better, being able to have 2 songs active while using the refrain abilty can do some damage and provide the party with some much needed energy resist and heals when the time comes
Right there, ladies and gentlemen, is the moment I decided this guy was trolling.
Right there, ladies and gentlemen, is the moment I decided this guy was trolling.
Haha so did you agree with me or what? LOL :P
*sigh*
Bards aren't junk. If anything, a properly used bard is positively gamebreaking.
First, there's Bardic Lore. A bard built to optimise Bardic Lore knows everything. If you can reach +28 with Bardic Lore, that's knowing the most trivial details about your advesaries on the roll of a 2 - and if that doesn't help you, then there's no hope for you. (Or more accurately, you have the wrong sort of DM). And I've demonstrated on the "How can you break a Gestalt Bard" thread how if you try you can reach this point by level 10.
Second, there's Bardic Music. Without reaching for the Book of Exalted Deeds, I can get a Bard to give the entire party a +5 to hit and damage by level 9. Yes, everyone will be hitting harder than the bard - but the Bard is responsible for most of that damage.
Third, there's socials. Diplomacy is FUBAR'd if you chose to abuse it. And the combination of Glibness and Bluff is effectively entering "Social God Mode" where you can convince anyone of anything.
Fourth, there's skills. The Bard is a better skill-monkey than the rogue. With Silence, Sculpt Sound, and Glibness it can sneak better. With Alter Self it can disguise better (and do a whole lot of other things better). Like the Arcane Trickster, the Bard needs to work by adding its spells to its skills - but if done this makes for a potent combination.
Fifthly there's healing. A Bard can use a wand of Cure Light Wounds every bit as well as a cleric. But a Bard also gets ranged healing in the middle of combat - at Level 9, Inspire Greatness can effectively heal 2d10 + 2* the target's Con modifier in hit points from a fair distance. (3d10 + 3*Con if you have Song of the Heart, as all bards should). Yes, the cleric can heal more (although not a lot more if you have high Con modifiers to deal with) but the Cleric needs to touch the target. The Bard only takes a move action. (i.e. a Bard makes a better combat medic than a cleric - and that's before taking the tumble skill into account).
Bards can be extremely powerful - but they are very hard to play well and need the sort of mind that reflexively spots all the synergies in order to get them right. (And I'm just talking about straight bards here, not multiclass).
Isn't a properly using anything gamebreaking??????
Haha so did you agree with me or what? LOL :P
trolling= to provoke ppl with posts against the common sense, the troll is generally aware that he's saying crap but he writes that just to have fun seeing the reactions of ppl... more or less this is what troll means (well this is the easiest way to explain it...)
so NO he isn't agreeing with u by any means :D
he just thinks u made this post to have fun of anyone who would reply to u seriously....i dunno if he's right or not but btw SC is clearly one of the best option for a bard, if not the best....(JJ's bardic badass is an interesting and very powerful option also but imo 9th lvl spells are better......just my 2cents...)
Is it possible that bard are just JUNK with lower caster progression and mediocre combat abilities that can set a tune to their own demise?
The core Bard doesn't offer much. However, splatbooks have been kind to the bard - especially with ways to prime your Bardic Music ability.
This makes a well-made Bard that uses splatbook material the best buffer in the party. Better than a buffing-wizard, better than a buffing-archavist (which are both excellent buffers in their own right).
Buffing is one of those wonderful things that doesn't worry about saving throws, SR (unless a party member has it), type of enemy - etc. That makes a buffing specialist really nice.
Also, using splatbooks (as pointed out) a Bard can get 9th level spells. However, this is not quite as great as it sounds in actual gameplay. Expect to spend about 15 levels vastly inferior in casting to the other primary spellcasters until you start to catch up.
First, there's Bardic Lore. A bard built to optimise Bardic Lore knows everything.
This is an overstatement IMO. A successful Bardic Lore roll (even if you roll a 100) gives you one piece of relevant information on a subject. That is less than a successful knowledge roll will give you.
"Revelant information" is also a vague term. That your Demon enemy has Blasphemy once/day is relevant, that he has SR is relevant, that he has a strong Fort save is relevant - though none of those pieces of information (though all relevant and helpful) will win you battles. Some you probably could have guessed anyways.
A core bard however, or a Bard made by a non-optimizer - is junk. However, it is still better than a core or non-optimized monk.
JanusJones did a very good essay on the Bard/Warblade and Bard/Crusader builds using various maneuvers and optimized Inspire Courage. Warblade was stacking massive damage from Dragonfire Inspiration, Rabid Mongoose, and Time Stands Still, while the Crusader utilized Aura of Chaos stance to increase the damage on those d6s by ~17%. Both had some pretty impressive numbers. Try searching this forum for Bardic Badass for more details.
Song of Death by J.J.
Also, using splatbooks (as pointed out) a Bard can get 9th level spells. However, this is not quite as great as it sounds in actual gameplay. Expect to spend about 15 levels vastly inferior in casting to the other primary spellcasters until you start to catch up.
Additionally, getting to Bard 9 / Virtuoso 1 / Sublime Chord 1 requires just about all the skill points a base bard gets. You need to have 12+ int or be human to have any skill points to spend on other things like Diplomacy, Bluff, etc. Forget about Hide / Move Silently or anything like that. It's totally doable, but it really ties up your skill points and likely forces you to push a 14 int or so.
Frankly, in some recent Bard builds I've been looking at, I've thought about ditching Sublime Chord entirely, in favor of going with straight bard in order to play levels 1-12 more like a bard.
Additionally, getting to Bard 9 / Virtuoso 1 / Sublime Chord 1 requires just about all the skill points a base bard gets. You need to have 12+ int or be human to have any skill points to spend on other things like Diplomacy, Bluff, etc. Forget about Hide / Move Silently or anything like that. It's totally doable, but it really ties up your skill points and likely forces you to push a 14 int or so.
Frankly, in some recent Bard builds I've been looking at, I've thought about ditching Sublime Chord entirely, in favor of going with straight bard in order to play levels 1-12 more like a bard.
I've always been of the opinion that a bard using Hide/move silently has failed as a bard already. Bards walk up and demand entry, bluffing their way through. Sneaking in is for rogues. Then again. that's only my style of playing bards.
Keep in mind that the best way to suck as a bard is to try and do everything. Bards have 4 general areas of expertise:
Non-magical combat (Mostly melee)
Casting
Music
Skills
A bard that tries to do all four is just flat going to fail. In general, you pick two and specialize in them, while trying to remain decently competent in the other two- but that's not as important.
This is, in a way, one of the strengths of the bard... you can pick two. Many classes can only do one thing, if even that.
Additionally, getting to Bard 9 / Virtuoso 1 / Sublime Chord 1 requires just about all the skill points a base bard gets. You need to have 12+ int or be human to have any skill points to spend on other things like Diplomacy, Bluff, etc. Forget about Hide / Move Silently or anything like that. It's totally doable, but it really ties up your skill points and likely forces you to push a 14 int or so.
Well, Bards are skill monkeys for me, so I've always considered Intelligence as high as possible to be taken for a Bard. Words of Creation also requires an Intelligence score of at least 15. Though I do have to agree that the skill requirements do hurt. Fortunately most of the skills you really have to try to keep maxed to meet the requirements are skills you'd spent points on anyway, so they're not entirely lost. Try making a build with both Sublime chord and Fochlucan lyrist, now that's wasted skill ranks!
In order to pull off a standard Bard9/Virt1/SC2/Virt8 progression, you need:
13 knowledge arcana by 10
13 listen by 10
6 profession by 10
6 spellcraft by 10
10 perform by 9
4 intimidate (cross-class) by 9
4 diplomacy by 9
That's a total of 60 skill points by level 10, which is all of them at int 10. That leaves you without ranks in bluff, with nearly no ranks in diplomacy, only Knowledge (arcana) ranks, and a number of relatively useless skill ranks. If you want to work in UMD, Gather Info, more Diplomacy, Sense Motive, Search, Spot, etc, you'll be very squished. That's even before you look at hide and move silently, or any of the physical movement skills.
Sure, Bards get to choose their area of focus. My claim is that the sublime chord needs to be a buffer/caster, and cannot really fit the skill-monkey slot without huge stats, and even then is at a disadvantage. At least concentration is obsolete these days (with melodic casting). And if you're playing 1-20, it's a long way before you actually start feeling the sublime chord love. When your friends need you to do some backup searching, they ask why you put all those points into profession (astrologer), and then you say "but at level 17, I'm going to be awesome!"
What I'm getting at (slowly and repetitively) is that SC is a great PrC, but it shouldn't be the go-to PrC for all bards. Sometimes, bard20 is better. And sometimes, bard16/LT4 or so is even better, delaying a little music progression in favor of a few little casting bumps.
That's a total of 60 skill points by level 10, which is all of them at int 10.
Bards have 78 skill points at level 10 (at int 10).
You'll either pick up Jack-of-All-Trades or spend a skillpoint in all Trained Only-skills (one is enough), either way conserving a good number of points. Also, since you'll have Int+decent number of ranks in all Knowledges, you can do a decent Bardic Knowledge-imitation. At this point, the extra point can be pumped into opposing checks and synergy bonuses and you'll end up just fine. I'd always aim for 14 Int in a point buy anyways; it only costs 6 points so it's a bargain and having 9 SP per level (you're Human, right? You need tons of feats and skills) is friggin' awesome. Also, Words of Creation requires Int 15, so you'd be well adviced to pump it up there anyways.
Another Exalted feat which could come in very handy is Nymph's Kiss which singlehandedly fixes all your social skill needs and further increases your skill count by 1. In other words, it's good to be an Exalted Bard - no other class probably benefits as much of being Exalted (although VoP Druids are also quite great - almost comparable to non-VoP druids! And VoP breaks level 1 game), and no other class is probably as interesting to play Exalted as a Bard, since Bard's role is already the morale support, the talker and so on, so it has a lot to offer for Exalted Roleplay.