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In my game, the bard guy said "I guess I'm kinda a REMF in this game." For those of you that weren't even a REMF National Guard in real life like me,....that's "rear echelon.....person..." in the jargon. The cant......
So posit me, if you will, any cunning strategies or setups you as the dungeonmaster or as the player have witnessed to make the bard feel like a perky pup every once in a while. I did give him a ghostbusters gun style wand of lightning liberated from some serpentmen that he can bust caps in individuals wit' on accouta his use magical device, so....
I really feel like this is all my fault; any help is appreciated.
Some of the cool new bard songs from the Pathfinder RPG would be a good start, I think.
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Is that in the beta?
Yeah, the last song is an instant death effect with a ridiculously high DC. I think it'll be changed for the final.
I've never had bards in my group (my players just aren't interested, I guess), but having a bard be a spy could work very well, I think they're the best class for this kind of role.
I could totally see a Bard being a kind of James Bond who uses magic instead of guns. That would be sweet!
Is that in the beta?
Yes, there are various songs for fear, paralysis, confusion, etc.
The ludicrous DC (DC = perform check) was only in the Alpha rules; it was toned down in the Beta (DC 10 + level/2 + Cha).
Throw is Bardic Knowledge checks for lots of stuff.
I also try to throw in the occasional sonic-based attack that the bard can counter.
Bards ARE more effective in larger parties, because they can buff more people. At mid-to-higher levels, they can use Haste, which is always appreciated, and Dimension Door, which can be really useful depending on the terrain.
The Bard I DM for uses her whip for trip and disarm attempts, so that's really useful for slowing down or hindering the opponents.
She also has enough skill points for unusual but campaign-necessary skills, like Profession sailor and navigator.
There are even some magic items that are activated with Bardic Music uses, so maybe throw some of them in. Also, very few critters are resistant to sonic damage, so the bard's few attack spells (shatter, sound burst, shout, greater shout), are usually effective.
How does the group and the bard's player see the bard PC? Is he some fop in the back with a lute or a harp singing blithely as everyone else fights for their life? I don't know how that image of a bard got started, but it needs to go away, at least as the default. Gives me elves who perform battle-dances or recite epic poems of their people as they fight; give me dwarves with warhorns or deep rolling chants; give me orcs with drums in the deep. Those are the bards I want.
Is anyone familiar with the Old English "Battle of Maldon"? It shouldn't be too hard to find a copy. It's a poem commemorating a battle of the Anglo-Saxons against Viking raiders, in which the lord leading the defenders falls. The loyal thanes fight to the death around his body, giving heroic speeches. The most famous goes something like this:
"Spirit must be by as much the harder, heart by as much the keener, mood must be by as much the more, by as much as our strength lessens. Here lieth our elder all hewn to pieces, good man on the ground. Ever may he be sorry who now from this battle-play thinks to turn. I am old of life; I do not want to go from here, but I myself beside my lord, by so beloved a man wish to lie."
That's a bard. With Use Magic Device and some nice wands, perhaps some buffing spells and his own bardic music to up his combat abilities, and tactics such as flanking, he should be capable of getting into a fight and partaking in the glory. I still wouldn't go toe-to-toe with a dragon, of course, even if the rest of the party has your back. But in general combats, a bard is capable of joining the fray. But most importantly, it's about how he (the player) and the others see the character. I've seen characters before that were really nothing special statistically and mechanically, but the player could talk the talk so well, everyone thought their PCs was the best in the party.
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Well, he's....
he always comes up with a cool song to say he's playing when we're doing stuff;
I ran one set of encounters that I transposed the basic setup of Beowulf and Grendel onto and ran with it; had a halfling barbarian fighting a half/vampire/half/lizardman/half fiend succubus chick naked and there was a vampire lizardman....good stuff....and the bard's transposing the names and doing lines from Beowulf so everybody's having fun with it all.
I've noticed, though, that if the bard wades in to the fray, he's got a bit of a glass jaw due to low h.p. so it's not really how the others see him per se, it's the nature of the beast due to the low h.p.
If everybody's 8th level, they end up fighting these things that can realistically kill the bard with one really good hit.
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The bard I played in my last group did some serious crowd control. Tasha's Hideous Laughter is pretty sick at low levels - use it on the enemy who appears to have the lowest Will save, and in many cases they're out of the fight completely. My usual M.O. was to open with a buff or two and then start knocking enemies out of the fight (or at least debuffing them significantly), and the other party members always appreciated both of those things. I only waded into combat as things were winding down.
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The coolest thing I've ever done with my Bard was using some Illusion magic at a river crossing to make it seem that our warrior was crossing the river (we were suspecting an ambush); once the gnolls on the other side started firing at the illusion, we knew their positions and started shooting at them from the other side of the river.
The best part is, they kept failing their Will saves to disbelieve my illusion, so they thought a huge warrior was coming at them as fast as he could! So, naturally, they kept shooting at him, worried about what would happen when he finally crossed the river. We ended up getting through that potentially tough encounter with only a few scratches.
That's probably my favourite moment as a player, actually.
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The bard I played in my last group did some serious crowd control. Tasha's Hideous Laughter is pretty sick at low levels - use it on the enemy who appears to have the lowest Will save, and in many cases they're out of the fight completely. My usual M.O. was to open with a buff or two and then start knocking enemies out of the fight (or at least debuffing them significantly), and the other party members always appreciated both of those things. I only waded into combat as things were winding down.
(lol) the group's bard did take out one of the giants they were fighting with that spell once...
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The coolest thing I've ever done with my Bard was using some Illusion magic at a river crossing to make it seem that our warrior was crossing the river (we were suspecting an ambush); once the gnolls on the other side started firing at the illusion, we knew their positions and started shooting at them from the other side of the river.
The best part is, they kept failing their Will saves to disbelieve my illusion, so they thought a huge warrior was coming at them as fast as he could! So, naturally, they kept shooting at him, worried about what would happen when he finally crossed the river. We ended up getting through that potentially tough encounter with only a few scratches.
That's probably my favourite moment as a player, actually.
heh heh....
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Keep in mind that Bards have the same BAB bonus and can wear pretty much the same armor as Rogues - and I don't see anyone complaining about how much Rogues suck in combat and how they can get taken down in one hit. You can even play your bard like a rogue if you want - a bard I play right now has a much higher stealth score than the party's rogue, and while there's no sneak attack, she has a higher AC than anyone else in the party except the heavily armored Paladin.
What's funny is that's a case where she actually statistically is one of the better combatants in the group, but due to the fact she's a halfling and looks frail (and they way she acts doesn't help) the rest of the party all think she needs to be protected and do their best to shield her from danger.
Anyways, I'm all for taking the bard away from the "stand back and play lute while everyone else fights" stereotype. Bard bonuses last for several rounds after you stop performing, so sing your song/recite an epic poem/dance a jig/whatever and then charge into the fray!
I’d echo SmiloDan’s suggestions. My campaigns always had a lot of obscure or secret information, and the bard is the go-to guy for discovering it. In addition to Bardic Knowledge, the bard in my current campaign has gotten a lot of use out of Decipher Script, Gather Information and (once he reached 10th level) Legend Lore.
Another situation that worked well was having the party encounter potential allies. Diplomacy, Gather Information and Perform all got good use. (One of my favorite moments was the bard acing a Perform check at a feast in Gnome Vale, and being carried 3 feet off the ground in an impromptu mosh pit by wildly cheering gnomes… The PCs got all the help they wanted from the gnomes after that.)
In combat, he’s used the Crystal Echoblade from the Magic Item Compendium to good effect. (When using bardic music, add half your bard level as additional sonic damage on each attack.) He uses spells at a distance, but our monk uses a Ring of the Ram for ranged attacks and I think that might work well for a bard too.
Our bard also had the low hp problem, along with several others in the party. It seemed to be worse at 7th-9th level than 10th-11th where we are now, or maybe I just got better at picking monsters. I think it helps a little to have multiple opponents of lower level rather than one BBEG because they usually deal less damage. Besides that and the ubiquitous Amulet of Health, I’m not sure what else to suggest. I think our bard has more fun than anybody else, though, so it’s been working for us. Good luck!
Doug
I think the biggest issue with bards would probably be "baseline stats" seem so low since they have to spread their points around a lot in general...
They've got all the following they are supposed to do:
Secondary fighter (needs some STR and CON for that -- Con more than str)
Skill Monkey (needs INT and Dex for that)
Face (needs CHA for that)
Spell caster (needs Cha for that)
If a bard wants to have several deverse skills he has to have a good INT, if he want to not get hit in combat he needs DEX (also if he wants to use a ranged weapon) if he wants to survive being hit CON becomes a must, melee combat is of course easier with STR (not even 75% needed but still useful without stuff like sneak attack), and if the bard doesn't want to get fooled/ dominated some Wisdom is helpful.
All in all there isn't a stat the bard can really afford to dump.
However he also has some help with this -- His music helps him in combat (at higher levels he can use his songs as a self buff if he wants *Inspire Heroics or Greatness*) he does have several buffing spells if he so chooses, and several feats can help make up for a low str in melee damage (pathfinder arcane strike for example). Generally the bard isn't the first target of foes... up until he starts singing (playing whatever) most intelligent foes then want to stop the thing giving everyone +5 to hit and damage -- understandably.
No real point to this little rant other than that. Sorry.
Our bard also had the low hp problem, along with several others in the party. It seemed to be worse at 7th-9th level than 10th-11th where we are now, or maybe I just got better at picking monsters. I think it helps a little to have multiple opponents of lower level rather than one BBEG because they usually deal less damage. Besides that and the ubiquitous Amulet of Health, I’m not sure what else to suggest. I think our bard has more fun than anybody else, though, so it’s been working for us. Good luck!
Doug
Bards can use UMD to use wands of False Life, gaining at least 1d10+3 to 1d10+10 temp hit points.
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Bards make ideal characters to use Tanglefoot Bags and Alchemical Fire to pin down or immolate foes, at lower levels. They generally have a decent BAB and Dex modifier (unlike, say, a Wizard, who might have a good Dex but poor BAB, or a Cleric, who might have a good BAB, but poor Dex), and, unlike the Rogue, aren't pressed to be in the thick of it every round getting Sneak Attack dice off. With wands or other items (perhaps even one shot items like elixers) of spells like grease, glitterdust, etc. they make great crowd control sorts, and they can use their whip proficiency to focus on 'ranged' trip and disarm options as well, which can be quite powerful in specific situations (tough weapon-using melee opponents may prove to be significantly less powerful after disarming!), and other party members might not be as able to pull off.
Or you can take the feats and such to bump up Inspiration as much as possible, and then take Dragonfire Inspiration, from Dragon Magic (which requires the Bard to either be of a 'dragontouched' race, such as Kobold, or take another Feat, to have some sort of 'dragontouched heritage'), which allows you to take every +1 you would normally grant in Inspiration and convert it into a +1d6 fire damage 'buff' for melee attacks by group members.
Without any other tweakage, a 1st to 7th level Bard would be giving the party the equivalent of the Flaming property on all of their melee attacks. Using Inspirational Boost (1st level spell, swift action casting, Spell Compendium), this would increase by +1 (+1d6). Using the Song of the Heart feat (Eberron Campaign Setting), this would increase by +1 (+1d6). Stuff like Masterwork Instruments (Song and Silence, 3.0, squiffy at best) could increase this further, and Words of Creation (feat from Book of the Exalted, even squiffier than the instrument thing, *doubles* the base bonus).
I'd draw the line before Words of Creation, but *might* be persuaded to allow a Masterwork Instrument (but not allow it to stack with Song of the Heart and / or Inspirational Boost, since the 1st level Bard should *not* be able to give all of his allies +4d6 fire damage to their melee attacks!).
Note: I don't have Dragon Magic at hand. Dragonfire Inspiration might have a completely different name, and might affect missile attacks as well, so long as the ally is within 30 ft. of the Bard. I don't remember...
Even without Dragonfire Inspiration, a 2nd level bard with Inspirational Boost (Spell Compendium spell) and Song of the Heart (Eberron Campaign Setting feat) could be granting his allies a +3 moral bonus to attack and damage rolls (and saves vs. fear), which is nothing to sneeze at! He activates this on round one, and then fights normally for the rest of the combat, giving the allies 5 rounds of morale bonus for the cost of one action (three times the bonus of a bless spell, but lasting a much shorter time).
There are also Feats like Lingering Song and Extra Music, which would be good choices for this sort of Inspiration-focused Bard.
Bards can use UMD to use wands of False Life, gaining at least 1d10+3 to 1d10+10 temp hit points.Our bard also had the low hp problem, along with several others in the party. It seemed to be worse at 7th-9th level than 10th-11th where we are now, or maybe I just got better at picking monsters. I think it helps a little to have multiple opponents of lower level rather than one BBEG because they usually deal less damage. Besides that and the ubiquitous Amulet of Health, I’m not sure what else to suggest. I think our bard has more fun than anybody else, though, so it’s been working for us. Good luck!
Doug
That's a good idea. Our bard hasn't put ranks into UMD, though, so far.
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Three of the four games I’m currently running have a bard in the party. I’ll exclude the bard in the Legacy of Fire game for now, ‘cos we’ve only just started and are really one two encounters in, only one of them combat related.
I’ll concentrate on the bard in my homebrew game and the one in my Shackled City game.
Funnily enough, both of those bards have chosen to multi-class to pick up a few extra abilities; the bard in the homebrew game is I think a Bard 3 / Ranger 1, to get a bit of extra combat skill and also survival and Track (a lot of the game so far has been wilderness trek and either tracking people down or being hunted by foes). The bard in SC has a level of sorcerer (I think he’s Bard 5 / Sorcerer 1 or 2), mainly to pick up mage armour (he’s too weak to wear much in the way of conventional armour) and be able to use scrolls and wands from the wiz / sorcerer list.
The homebrew game has so far featured a lot of stuff that the group wouldn’t be able to beat in a stand up fight, so the bard has used a lot of diplomacy stuff, either to talk their way around enemies, or out of bad situations, or to say rally the locals to their side and stuff. In combat he usually focuses on inspiring the group with bardic music and/or taking out or inhibiting enemies with sleep and daze and such before going into melee (where, even with the level of ranger he plays second – or fourth – fiddle to the fighter, the swashbuckler and the shape-shifting druid). It’s a low magic game, so he doesn’t have any wands or scrolls or anything to use, but the player seems fairly satisfied with his role in the game. Outside of combat I impart a lot of campaign knowledge to the players through the bard’s various knowledge skills and bardic knowledge.
The SC bard concentrates much more on spells and wands and scrolls and stuff in combat (with a strength of 6 he’s useless in melee, he occasionally falls back on his crossbow if needs be). He uses buffs and illusions a bit, and is the party’s main source of Knowledge skills. As the only arcane caster in the group (currently) a lot of the arcane side of things falls on his shoulders. I think for a while the player was feeling a bit combat useless, but providing a few choice wands that he can use as treasure seemed to help with that. I also did a couple of side treks that were really all about diplomacy and performance and social skills, so he could really shine (since that AP is very combat focused in general).
So posit me, if you will, any cunning strategies or setups you as the dungeonmaster or as the player have witnessed to make the bard feel like a perky pup every once in a while. I did give him a ghostbusters gun style wand of lightning liberated from some serpentmen that he can bust caps in individuals wit' on accouta his use magical device, so....
I really feel like this is all my fault; any help is appreciated.
I've played a couple of Bards, as a player and as a GM (Cohorts and Bad Guys). You are right, the Bard class is not a front-line kind of guy, not without multi-classing. It is a very good support class. UMD gives great versatility.
My favorite bard moment was in my Rise of the Runelords campaign. They party is fighting a lot of Giants. The Bard really cannot stand up against a giant, but a well-timed Grease spell is very effective. There's just something endlessly amusing about a 15-foot tall creature with no balance check falling on its enormous posterior. Of course, while its prone, it gets pounded into the ground by the fighter-types.
Aww don' worry DM Heathy! I don't mind being a REMF! 'Sides I always pull out one good attack per encounter outta my 4th point of contact. And let's not forget my witty banter!
Dude; I didn't mean to air dirty laundry or nothin....;)
Has anyone ever tried teaming up a bard, dragon shaman, and marshall? Would all of those auras and buffs stack?
IDK....
a bard, a dragon shaman, and a marshall walked in to a bar....
bartender said, "can you wax and buff the floor?"IDK....bad joke.
LOL, I thought the same thing ...
..And they said, well, what's the point of doing both? We can either wax it, or buff it. No sense buffing it if you want it dead.
<rimshot>
Strums Lucille
Oh the life of a bard is a perilous thing,
Trying to help by a strum and a sing.
But my armor is ragged and my hit points are few,
So if you don't mind I'll stay right behind you!
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Has anyone ever tried teaming up a bard, dragon shaman, and marshall? Would all of those auras and buffs stack?
About 4 years ago, I had a bard and marshall in my Saltmarsh game- coincidentally for the OP.
Yes, a lot of those abilities do stack, and it can get pretty worrying.
So much so, I did it right back at them.
Has anyone ever tried teaming up a bard, dragon shaman, and marshall? Would all of those auras and buffs stack?About 4 years ago, I had a bard and marshall in my Saltmarsh game- coincidentally for the OP.
Yes, a lot of those abilities do stack, and it can get pretty worrying.
So much so, I did it right back at them.
~laughter~ That serves them right!
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Don't forget, that as DM, you can get far more bang for your Bard and Marshall buck.
A PC will be buffing maybe 4-5 of his friends, but there's nothing to stop you having an encounter with 20 goblins, all drilled in special maneuvres, and psyched up for dishing out payback.
And instead of being maybe +50% likely to succeed, they'd be more like 300-400%. Having the Str 20 half-orc get disarmed on round 2, and a goblin commoner with a polearm hook his greatsword and run off with it (truly a REMF, if ever there was one!) is the sort of scene we evil DMs live for!
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I’d echo SmiloDan’s suggestions. My campaigns always had a lot of obscure or secret information, and the bard is the go-to guy for discovering it. In addition to Bardic Knowledge, the bard in my current campaign has gotten a lot of use out of Decipher Script, Gather Information and (once he reached 10th level) Legend Lore.
While this is true, this aspect of the class tends to get sniffed at by many, as:
- it happens during down-time, rather than when the PCs lives are in danger,
- it helps the whole party, rather than shining glory on the bard specifically,
- a charismatic or well-read player can often get the benefits of high social/knowledge skills, by sweet-talking the DM with the player's own real-life skills, rather than his PC's, which he may not even have ranks in.
And the clincher, which is:
- that there's always a suspicion that the DM would have given out that info anyway, so he can get the PCs to the next part of that adventure he shelled $10 on, rather than everyone sit twiddling their thumbs, and going off to play on the X-Box, so the bard's player would have been better off playing 'Mongo the Moronic-but-Muscular', with 3 Int and 3 Cha, and at least he could have got stuck into the battle.
Bardic Knowledge (and Knowledge checks in general) can help in battle. They can provided clues to vulnerabilities and immunities of the opponents (like don't fireball red dragons, or splinterwaifs actually DR silver instead of DR cold iron like most fey).
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Bardic Knowledge (and Knowledge checks in general) can help in battle. They can provided clues to vulnerabilities and immunities of the opponents (like don't fireball red dragons, or splinterwaifs actually DR silver instead of DR cold iron like most fey).
While that is true, the same effect can (and often is) gained, by reading the Monster Manual (or, Lord help us, the adventure), and then browbeating the DM into accepting that such creature powers and vulnerabilities are common knowledge.
I'm not advocating this approach; I'm just pointing out why the Bard is unpopular with a certain type of player.
"Why should I play a class whose abilities I could just as easily get by flat-out cheating?"
I'm playing a Beta bard right now and I'm loving it. They could throw out every other change in PF, rename it "Complete Bard", and I'd still get it.
I'm the smart guy. Smart Alek thinks I'm showing off. We only have a sorcerer in the party, but even if we had a wizard, he'd have problems keeping pace. (This helps alot, because this is Runelords and I've run that AP as a GM, so I can incorporate a lot of GM knowledge as character knowledge, meaning I have to edit out less)
With enough dumb brutes around, I can make them fear my music and rhetoric.
I'm also good at buffing the party, and with harmonic spell (from the Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting and also Crown of Fangs), I can use bardic music and bardic magic at the same time (just costs two uses of bardic music). I'll also get Arcane Strike at the next opportunity, to help with my attacks (that feat was made for bards!).
He usually is a REMF, using a heavy crossbow (and crossbow mastery - again from the Campaign Setting, but it's also in the Curse of the Crimson Throne Player's Guide, which is free as PDF).
I really love playing that character, since he resembles me so much: Smart AND sexy.
Bardic Knowledge (and Knowledge checks in general) can help in battle. They can provided clues to vulnerabilities and immunities of the opponents (like don't fireball red dragons, or splinterwaifs actually DR silver instead of DR cold iron like most fey).While that is true, the same effect can (and often is) gained, by reading the Monster Manual (or, Lord help us, the adventure), and then browbeating the DM into accepting that such creature powers and vulnerabilities are common knowledge.
I'm not advocating this approach; I'm just pointing out why the Bard is unpopular with a certain type of player.
"Why should I play a class whose abilities I could just as easily get by flat-out cheating?"
Some of it I'll readily agree as GM. Others, not.
For example, it's common knowledge that trolls hate fire. It's not so common that they hate acid, too.
A red dragon that breathes fire is immune to fire, that's something you can easily discern without any formal training.
Specific abilities of exotic creatures? You're fresh out of luck. Get knowledge skills.
Bardic Knowledge (and Knowledge checks in general) can help in battle. They can provided clues to vulnerabilities and immunities of the opponents (like don't fireball red dragons, or splinterwaifs actually DR silver instead of DR cold iron like most fey).While that is true, the same effect can (and often is) gained, by reading the Monster Manual (or, Lord help us, the adventure), and then browbeating the DM into accepting that such creature powers and vulnerabilities are common knowledge.
I'm not advocating this approach; I'm just pointing out why the Bard is unpopular with a certain type of player.
"Why should I play a class whose abilities I could just as easily get by flat-out cheating?"
I guess I play in an unusual group. A lot of the players don't know a lot about the D&D monsters unless they've fought them before. And some have been playing for decades; others, about a year or so. Only a few have DMed, the rest are always players, so they don't see the need to read the DMG or MMs. Also, at least when I DM, there are often variations that are new or different. I've used minotaurs with the heads of pigs before (they gored with their tusks). I'm also pretty good at adding templates to critters, so they often have unusual abilities.