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I was trying to think up a unique character concept for a new PC and my brain took a leap a couple steps left of unique and came up with a bard that is somehow limited by a vow of silence.
I thought I might do something to get around this using metamagic, but I see that the silent spell feat is not availabe for bards. I was sort of going for a bard who didn't talk or sing, but played many types of music and maybe even made music through some strange magic that converted his somatic gestures into sound.
Does anybody have any ideas for a character build that could actually do something like this? Maybe some sort of monk/bard mix with some magic that helps him to partially get around this limitation?
Is there a way to have a vow of silence that doesn't totally ruin a bard? Perhaps some spells or items or feats I haven't considered, which might make this workable? It certainly would be unusual, and the limitation could at least generate some humor if it isn't totally crippling.
I hate to say it, but as I understand bard RAW you simply CAN'T be a Silent Bard.
Except maybe as a Mime, which is a Death Sentence on 12 Megaverses.
Have you danced with the devil by pale moonlight?
puffs stogey
Whatever works baby, whatever works. puff
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grin
And this is why we don't talk about magical mimes.
Perform (Dance) no sound required.
Perform (Juggling) no sound required.
Perform (Stage Magic) no sound required.Silent Spell feat. Metamagic Rods of Silence.
There's plenty of ways to go silent as a bard.
Fair enough on the performance aspects.
Certain bardic performances cannot be done silently (everything requiring an audible component/element).
My understanding of bard spells is that they *cannot* be done without a Verbal component.
CRB p133, Silent Spell (Metamagic) ... Special: Bard spells cannot be enhanced by this feat.
Unless a bard spell specifically does not have the V component, they all do, and you can't metamagic your way around it by feat and rod.
For the audible performances, any instrument should work. You don't have to use your voice.
As you say, your spellcasting would be pretty hard.
You could use this third party material. It an archetype-like mechanic, where you replace some class features (in this case spell casting) with something else.
The feat spellsong wouldn't actually allow you to cast silently, but it could theoretically allow you to cast using an instrument to provide the "verbal" component. At least that's my opinion, & I think it fits the theme you are going for.
If your spells require an instrument to be played they are not silent and do not need the silent spell feat. That does mean that all your spells will have an additional component. A silence spell shuts you down just as fast as anyone else without silent spell.
The big problem is going to be on language dependant spells. Those you will not be able to use.
Given bard spells cannot be silenced, the only think I can think of is maybe a house rule or house archetype where you can silence spells but instead cannot still them -- think an acrobatic bard (or, yes, a mime). And require all spells to have a somatic component, of course.
Perform (Dance) no sound required.
Perform (Juggling) no sound required.
Perform (Stage Magic) no sound required.Silent Spell feat. Metamagic Rods of Silence.
There's plenty of ways to go silent as a bard.
Just no good ones.