darsant's page

With all do respect Jess, that is like saying rogues can open locks without spending points on open lock, or disable a trap without ranks in disable device.

No, it's like saying rogues can open X lock 0% of the time below skill level Y, but once they reach Y skill rank it suddenly becomes available, with a chance based on their 1/2 their rogue.

Want to make perform a non-useless skill? Change it back to factoring into the bardic effects rather than just a minimum requirement. Right now there's absolutely no reason to go above 14 in the secondary perform skill other than the a minor bonus to countersong or distraction ability. It doesn't change any of the other track abilities at all.

Basically, I just always saw the Bard as the guy that was the literal jack of all trades. Not as good at combat as the Fighter, not as good at skills as the Rogue, not as good at casting as the Wizard, not as good at buffs as the Cleric, but he could do all 4 pretty darn well. I don't want to see the Bard be equal to another class in one area, that seems to undermine its purpose.

One of the problems is that as they level, bards scale from pretty darn well at all 4 to mediocre at everything except buffing (which they can still be outclassed by a cleric of same level who has a lot more flexibility and utility).

KnightErrantJR wrote:

But the bard's job isn't to slug it out toe to toe with enemies, or even to pick off foes that the front line fighters are engaging with, but to improve everyone's abilities in the fight, and then be competent enough to contribute after they have started buffing the party.

QFT

Except for the fact that they aren't the best group buffers, and then after buffing, they usually can't contribute very much at all. You're almost 100% better with having a cleric of the same level in your party than a bard for combat purposes.

That's why I'm really looking forward to some actual bard playtests. It's important to remember too that if you play a bard as a cleric or a wizard or a fighter... of course he'll feel "underpowered." Bards have a pretty unique role in a game, one that's relatively easy for the GM to ruin, to be frank. After all, if you play a fighter and the GM runs a lot of adventures where fighting is illegal and you spend most of your time in political machinations or stealth operations, suddenly the fighter is underpowered. Since the basic guts of the game are built to focus and expect fighting, with social encounters (the bard's forte) generally taking a back seat... that's probably got more to do with the perception of the bard being underpowered than anything else.

Or maybe not. In any case, playtest them bards and let us know if they DO still feel week and no fun to play.

I love playing bards and find them fun, but that's probably more for lore reasons. I definitely agree with you about out of combat social situations being a bard's strength. They have no end of out of combat potential. In combat though, they do feel especially weak in a balanced party, especially against mindless / enchantment immune enemies and the fact that other classes can buff just about as well as you. I have no problem with bards taking a secondary support role, but they should at least feel like they provide something extra, not just replacing existing bits and pieces of other classes. Sometimes it feels like the cleric can pretty much replace the bard's in combat role. It'd be nice if bards had something special that just their class provided, that way even if you already had a fully balanced group, a bard would bring something more to the table. I would say remove morale bonuses / penalties from other classes as others have suggested, but I'd rather see something new than nerfing other class spells.

Hey there everyone,

The design decision to add new powers to the bard were balanced by the fact that most bards (those with only one perform skill) could only use one track of the added abilities. If you see these as mandatory adds then it would indeed cost you two skill points per level. That said, I do not see that as a necessary route for the power level of the bard. There are other issues with the bard, but I do not feel this is necessarily one of them.

That said, as always, I am open to other thoughts...

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing

If the idea is that most bards will only have one track of the new abilities, then I think that bards as a class are still really far behind the power curve when compared to other classes such as wizards, clerics, fighters, etc. and still need some other form of boost then.

I have a few issues regarding Bardic performance.

The other issue regards the Bardic perform "Dirge of Doom".
"The effect lasts for as long as the enemy hears the bard and remains within 30 feet, and it persists for 3 rounds after the bard stops playing or the enemy leaves the area. Affected enemies are shaken and take a –2 penalty on ability checks, attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks."
The ability itself is not overpowering, but what if a character is already shaken (by any means)? Being without Saving Throw, it should be better if it cannot be used on an already shaken character.
Just my 2c.

By definition, if the enemy is already shaken, Dirge of Doom would have no effect on them. The only time it can really get overpowering is if another character has an AE ability that moves any shaken creatures to the next fear level (like the barbarian rage ability)

While I am interested in making the bard a bit more secure in his role, merging his music into spells is not the way to go. I like that the bard has a separate mechanic for his primary ability and this is a feature I intend to keep.

Does anyone else have more play experience with the bard as written. I would like to hear it.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing

I'm currently playing a bard in one of Brodiggan Gale's campaigns. While not a long time DND player, I can offer my insights. Out of combat, the possibilities with a bard are only limited by your imagination. They've got a great variety of skills that can make the campaign fun. However, in combat we seem to be delegated to either being a buff bot or a 2nd rate participant. Most of my combats end up following the same pattern of turning on the buff songs, and the AE no-save debuff, then attempting to cast the occasional spell. It's fine to have the bard be the jack of all trades, and master of none, but in the case of actual combat, being a jack of all trades means you're usually not doing anything offensive (other than maybe the AE -2 debuff).

A feat to double to the length of the duration based bard effects (Inspire Courage, Inspire Greatness, Dirge of Doom, Inspire Heroics) would really help reduce the amount of rounds wasted doing combat twisting. You could even have it double the bardic music usages to keep it balanced.

Other than a handful of spells, it feels like most of the offensive spells duplicate a lot of effects we already get for free. I'd like to see a few bard-only spells that either provide different effects, or enhance the existing bard song effects, and not replace them. I'd also think it'd make sense for bards to receive the sonic spells at an earlier spell level before wizard/sorcs.

To be honest, it seems at times that a cleric can pretty much fill a bard's role and provide more general party support without sacrificing so much offensive capability. With the changes to bardic knowledge, wizards can now just as easily fill the knowledge gap (with the exception of the lore master ability).

It would also be nice if the bard had options to focus the character growth a bit more as well, maybe sacrifice offensive ability or spellcasting for a bonus in the opposite.

Also, I really don't think bards scale as well as other classes. Playing another class and getting a bard cohort 2 levels below you provides you with almost all of the party benefits, with almost no penalties.