I'm considering a couple changes for my game, which should help the flavor of bards and get a few more of them playing lutes and lyres rather than the common twink of having most player bards being someone who recites poetry while stabbing things with a rapier.
The first is, for the cost of a feat, allowing bards the wizard's Arcane Bond power, but only for a bonded object, and the bonded objects are limited to musical instruments: harps, lutes, lyres, flutes, drums, fiddles, etc. The bard can put enchantments on them at level 5, the same time a wizard could access Craft Wondrous Item, and with the same rules for bonded objects where they only work for the bard. All the rules for loss, damage, destruction and restoration are the same as they are for the wizard. Damaged bonded objects that are instruments are miraculously restored the next morning, allowing you to beat goblins to death with your lute one day and have it clean and pretty the next.
The second is that, for bards, the Master Craftsman feat allows the bard to create magic items so long as they are musical instruments. The +2 bonus goes to the Perform skill that the bard uses for a specific class of instruments, and Perform is used by the bard when crafting the item, the same as Craft or Profession is used by a regular Master Craftsman, or Spellcraft is used by a wizard.
Thoughts on these?
I'm considering a couple changes for my game, which should help the flavor of bards and get a few more of them playing lutes and lyres rather than the common twink of having most player bards being someone who recites poetry while stabbing things with a rapier.
The first is, for the cost of a feat, allowing bards the wizard's Arcane Bond power, but only for a bonded object, and the bonded objects are limited to musical instruments: harps, lutes, lyres, flutes, drums, fiddles, etc. The bard can put enchantments on them at level 5, the same time a wizard could access Craft Wondrous Item, and with the same rules for bonded objects where they only work for the bard. All the rules for loss, damage, destruction and restoration are the same as they are for the wizard. Damaged bonded objects that are instruments are miraculously restored the next morning, allowing you to beat goblins to death with your lute one day and have it clean and pretty the next.
The second is that, for bards, the Master Craftsman feat allows the bard to create magic items so long as they are musical instruments. The +2 bonus goes to the Perform skill that the bard uses for a specific class of instruments, and Perform is used by the bard when crafting the item, the same as Craft or Profession is used by a regular Master Craftsman, or Spellcraft is used by a wizard.
Thoughts on these?
I always preferred a musical instrument over poetry. I do think that the Arcane Bond power is a good idea. Why shouldn't the bard be able to enchant his musical instrument. Though I would not suggest using the instrument as a weapon.
From my experience players are very stingy with their feats and a lot of the time if the player has access in game to wizards or artificers they will fore go gaining crafting feats inlue of class feats and just pay the extra for having the item crafted for them.
Hmm, I think you're right on both counts.
Would it overpower the bard to give him the Arcane Bond with his musical instrument for free?
What kind of enchantments would you allow to be added to the musical instruments? As far as I know, all magical musical instruments are unique items. Unlike weapons and armor there are no rules for building your own, by adding Keen or Flaming, etc.
I was thinking more along the lines of Drums of Panic, Pipes of the Sewers, and the various old "Instruments of the Bards" that have been around since 1st edition. The last haven't been put into the SRD and thus Pathfinder, but for a home game, it doesn't matter, and you can easily make more magical musical instruments.
I expect it's a lot like a wizard with a ring as his bonded object, which he at first makes into a Ring of Invisibility and later upgrades to a Ring of Elemental Command.
Parting out the various enchantments wouldn't be too difficult.
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Okay, so you are planning to make up your own list of what is allowable. That sounds reasonable, I just wasn't sure if there was already something out there.
Here are a few suggestions for musical instrument special abilies.
- Extra Music/Perfomance - grant a number of extra rounds of Bardic Performance per day.
- Potency - Increase save DCs of performance by +2.
- Self Playing - once started the instrument can play for x number of rounds on its own, perhaps allowing the Bard to start a second performance. This would still cost rounds of Bardic performance.
- Screaming - allow a perform check to make some type of sonic attack.
Now you could also asign each of these a value (+1, +2 +3) like weapon and armor values and have a cap of +5 or +10. Then you could mix and match abilities like weapons and armor.
Any Thoughts?
Hmm. I'm thinking to go with more the standard Wondrous Item pricing, since looking at the most recent version of the various Instruments of the Bards in Complete Arcane, it wouldn't be hard to tack in the various bonuses and spells and whatnot and let the individual bard player customize their instrument. I don't think the weapon pricing is a good idea, since the weapons and armor are priced because all of those perks stack--you hit someone with a magic sword, all the magic effects go off at once--whereas a musical instrument that casts spells only casts one spell at a time.
I'm also thinking that with bardic instruments, there should be a legacy function. While the instrument's magic only functions in the hands of the bard who owned it, some time after the bard dies of old age (or would have died of old age) the enchantments return, but only in the hands of a new bard who takes it as his instrument.