Inspire Courage seems to outclass Inspired Rage in every way (adds to finesse damage, more accuracy, Inspired Rage's damage only seems to match with a two weapon fighting, AC penalty) with only save bonus being the upside. The standard Bard's performance has a bunch of additional uses compared to the...5 songs the Skald gets. It's minor but the Bard gets two more skill points compared to the armor and weapons the Skald gets, and I've seen a bard dip fighter and handle the frontlines astonishingly well.
So am I missing a secret technique/archetype that gives it something to make it a true force? I've never seen rage powers in action so I don't know the significance of giving them to other party members, is that a huge deal? What about Spell Keening?
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Be a half orc, dip 1 level of bloodrager, trade your 1st level bloodline ability out with a bloodline familiar with the valet archetype, and get the Amplified Rage teamwork feat. Your valet familiar will share your teamwork feats and ignore prerequisites. You will have +8 str/con whenever you use raging song, and your familiar will have +6 str/con. Also, it's a morale bonus so it increases if you have a Courageous weapon.
You are now a heavy metal rockstar who smashes face alongside your band's goat mascot.
Sharing rage powers with your team is pretty awesome and not something a bard can do. Lesser Spirit Totem lets you grant an extra attack to all of your allies which scales off your charisma. Linnorm Death Curses, especially Tor, combo well with expendible summoned monsters, because they apply permanent curses to enemies whenever an ally with the rage power dies.
Spell kenning gives you access to several huge and useful spell lists on the fly, which is always amazing.
Greater Skald's Vigor grants your team fast healing. If you have a way to share teamwork feats (and thus Amplified Rage) with your allies, like through Cavalier 1 or Holy Tactician Paladin 3, the healing is massive.
Finally, the Fated Champion archetype is amazing. You get a huge boost to initiative for almost no cost, and the change to spell kenning doesn't hurt.
Skalds give out STR, CON, AC, Fast healing, pounce and Saving throw boosts if you wanted it to. The skald is less good for everyone, but really good for people trying to hit things hard. and super good with summons too. Or you can trade out some rage powers for totem skald and give out more stats or other tricks too.
There is also the fact that you can troll ally and enemy casters alike, just declare them allies and rage song, oops, now they cannot cast spells, sorry wizard friend.
Each of the allies choose each round to accept the song or not, and there's no fatigue afterwards so it actually doesn't stop spells.
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1) You share rage powers. Lots of potential here (e.g. nat armor, pounce, superstition).
2) You share your DR. Not much, but most melee don't get DR, so it helps.
3) You can spend 2 feats to grant fast healing to your allies (the first grants it to yourself).
4) MUCH better will bonus after a short while. Eventually a +6 to *all* will saves.
Also a big note: Since there's no fatigue cost, a Skald can rage-cycle earlier than a real barbarian, doing so at the cost of their swift action by 13th level.
So it starts looking like a poor Inspire Courage, but it eventually can end up as +6 AC, pounce, +6 str/con, +6 will saves, extra +7 versus spells, spell-likes, and SU, fast healing 6, DR 3/-, and +6 damage against nearly everything (anything with spells or spell-likes). Even a swashbuckler or an archer would have a hard time saying no to all that.
TL;DR - Starts slow, ends strong.
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Be a half orc, dip 1 level of bloodrager, trade your 1st level bloodline ability out with a bloodline familiar with the valet archetype, and get the Amplified Rage teamwork feat. Your valet familiar will share your teamwork feats and ignore prerequisites. You will have +8 str/con whenever you use raging song, and your familiar will have +6 str/con. Also, it's a morale bonus so it increases if you have a Courageous weapon.
You are now a heavy metal rockstar who smashes face alongside your band's goat mascot.
Sharing rage powers with your team is pretty awesome and not something a bard can do. Lesser Spirit Totem lets you grant an extra attack to all of your allies which scales off your charisma. Linnorm Death Curses, especially Tor, combo well with expendible summoned monsters, because they apply permanent curses to enemies whenever an ally with the rage power dies.
Spell kenning gives you access to several huge and useful spell lists on the fly, which is always amazing.
Greater Skald's Vigor grants your team fast healing. If you have a way to share teamwork feats (and thus Amplified Rage) with your allies, like through Cavalier 1 or Holy Tactician Paladin 3, the healing is massive.
Finally, the Fated Champion archetype is amazing. You get a huge boost to initiative for almost no cost, and the change to spell kenning doesn't hurt.
Ummm... NOTHING says the Valet familiar IGNORES PREREQUISITES for the teamwork feats... it still MUST meet the prerequisites (i.e. Be a half-orc for amplified rage)
Share rage powers, lets everyone spell sunder
Inspired Rage benefits from being a bonus to Strength rather than directly to attack, so it can stack advantageously with other buffs, since a lot of buffs boost attack more directly. Buffing Strength also means that it gives two-handed weapons an extra point of damage, since they use 1.5 x Strength to damage. And as others have mentioned, sharing rage powers can mean you're an incredible force multiplier, especially if your group runs Strength-martial-heavy. (And depending on your group composition, you don't even have to choose - Inspired Rage and Inspire Courage stack! The skald in my group took a bard cohort, and it can truly be a thing to behold.)
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Be a half orc, dip 1 level of bloodrager, trade your 1st level bloodline ability out with a bloodline familiar with the valet archetype, and get the Amplified Rage teamwork feat. Your valet familiar ...Ummm... NOTHING says the Valet familiar IGNORES PREREQUISITES for the teamwork feats... it still MUST meet the prerequisites (i.e. Be a half-orc for amplified rage)
I've never seen this come up before, so I checked out the valet familiar, and by my reading I think it would work,kinda.
Teammate says "A valet is considered to have all the teamwork feats its master has."
I can see two readings here. One is that it works as Castilonium says. The other way I read it is that it is considered to have the team work feats, but doesn't actually get them, so the master's teamwork feats are functional when the familiar is nearby, but the the familiar doesn't get the benefits.
And of course your interpretation, so 3 ways. Has there been any dev input on the valet familiar?
Inspired Rage benefits from being a bonus to Strength rather than directly to attack, so it can stack advantageously with other buffs, since a lot of buffs boost attack more directly. Buffing Strength also means that it gives two-handed weapons an extra point of damage, since they use 1.5 x Strength to damage. And as others have mentioned, sharing rage powers can mean you're an incredible force multiplier, especially if your group runs Strength-martial-heavy. (And depending on your group composition, you don't even have to choose - Inspired Rage and Inspire Courage stack! The skald in my group took a bard cohort, and it can truly be a thing to behold.)
Not only that, but the Inspired Rage bonuses are Morale Bonuses, whereas common buff or Polymorph spells and magic items give you an Enhancement Bonus or a Size Bonus, respectively, so it stacks with these as well.
Be a half orc, dip 1 level of bloodrager, trade your 1st level bloodline ability out with a bloodline familiar with the valet archetype, and get the Amplified Rage teamwork feat. Your valet familiar ...Ummm... NOTHING says the Valet familiar IGNORES PREREQUISITES for the teamwork feats... it still MUST meet the prerequisites (i.e. Be a half-orc for amplified rage)
I've never seen this come up before, so I checked out the valet familiar, and by my reading I think it would work,kinda.
Teammate says "A valet is considered to have all the teamwork feats its master has."
I can see two readings here. One is that it works as Castilonium says. The other way I read it is that it is considered to have the team work feats, but doesn't actually get them, so the master's teamwork feats are functional when the familiar is nearby, but the the familiar doesn't get the benefits.
And of course your interpretation, so 3 ways. Has there been any dev input on the valet familiar?
A simpler answer is in the Core Rulebook itself.
Prerequisites
Some feats have prerequisites. Your character must have the indicated ability score, class feature, feat, skill, base attack bonus, or other quality designated in order to select or use that feat. A character can gain a feat at the same level at which he gains the prerequisite.
A character can't use a feat if he loses a prerequisite, but he does not lose the feat itself. If, at a later time, he regains the lost prerequisite, he immediately regains full use of the feat that prerequisite enables.
The valet familiar's Teammate ability gives it all the teamwork feats its master has, but when it currently lacks the prerequisite for a feat, it cannot use that feat.
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I played a skald for a few levels in PFS. The only people that accepted the raging song were animal companions.
Most groups I played with had dex based martials, archers, and semi-casters or full casters.
In these groups, bard is vastly superior.
Especially in an environment like PFS where you don't keep the same group most of the time.
In a home game where you have the same party and the party with USE inspired rage, it can be a rip-roaring good time.
"A valet is considered to have all the teamwork feats its master has."
Is not the same as
"A valet has all the teamwork feats its master has."
The Valet doesn't actually possess teamwork feats it just is considered to have them much like the inquisitors solo tactics ability.
the inquisitor’s allies are treated as if they possessed the same teamwork feats as the inquisitor for the purpose of determining whether the inquisitor receives a bonus from her teamwork feats.
compare to the hunter's ability
the hunter automatically grants her teamwork feats to her animal companion.
It doesn't need to meet the prerequisites as it does not actually possess the feat it's just considered to have it. Which in conjunction with raging song would fulfill the requirements for the feat to activate
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Yes, I'd say the valet can't use the feats, but can count as an ally who has the feat for the purposes of you using the feat.
It's worth noting that while the inspire courage of two bards don't stack, inspire courage and raging song go together quite nicely.
Counterpoint to Inspiration allows a liiiiitle inspire courage stacking, but it's probably best that five fifth-level bards don't wade into combats with +10 to hit and damage each.
Archivist and Magician both have stuff that stack with normal bard and each other.
Skalds are more durable than bards. They get fast progression on fortitude saves instead of reflex saves. Most reflex saves simply reduce the amount of damage you take, where fortitude saves often keep you alive and functioning. Rage song also improves your CON giving you an even better fortitude save. They also get medium armor and martial weapons so they will have better AC and do more damage. A Skald using a greatsword and power attack is going to do a lot more damage than a bard with a rapier and weapon finesse.
The Skald is focused less on buffing others and more on himself. In a large group the bard is probably better because he is more of a force multiplier, but in a smaller group the skald does well because he can carry more of the load himself. Spell Kenning is very good for this because in a small group you may not have access to certain spells. Being able to cast spells from 3 different spell lists means you can often fill in for other casters. No cleric in the group and you can cast restoration to remove the negative levels.
There is also the fact that you can troll ally and enemy casters alike, just declare them allies and rage song, oops, now they cannot cast spells, sorry wizard friend.
the skald’s allies must decide whether to accept or refuse its effects.
when the skald begins a raging song and at the start of each ally’s turn in which they can hear the raging song, the skald’s allies must decide whether to accept or refuse its effects.
This is very important because it tells you that you can easily step in and out of benefitting from a raging song. This has 2 fairly important effects. First, when the skald starts the song, almost everyone should accept it. It's a free bonus to a few rolls and you aren't likely to cast spells before it becomes your turn anyway. Second, it means that someone like a combat cleric is free to not use it one round to cast a buff spell, but then free to take it the next round for a full attack, and then not take it again the next round to cast a heal spell. I would say, only the full arcane casters are expected to cast a spell every round, and even then only past the early levels.