Dominate Monster and Bards?

[Zuvik Ironbeard]

Hey all, I was looking through the bard spell list and was surprised to see dominate monster missing off it.

At first, I thought the logic could potentially be a 6th level spell caster shouldn't be powerful enough to cast it but after looking at the spell realized that summoners can cast it.

Is there something I'm missing as to why bards miss out on this spell? especially with their whole theme of being charmers etc.

I also find it odd that they can learn charm person & charm monster, but can only learn dominate person and not monster especially with them both being mind-affecting enchantment spells.

[MrCharisma]

Summoners aren't exactly the best class to compare to for "balance".

I think if you look through the summoner spell list you'll find a lot of spells that would be higher level on any other class spell list (the same can be said for bards actually, just not quite as much).

The short answer is: "It's a 9th level spell."

The long answer is: "Summoners have a focus on monsters while bards have a focus on interactions with other humanoids. This isn't 100% of their spells and abilities, but if you're building a class with a theme then that spell suits summoners better than it suits bards."

[Trekkie90909]

Summoners break every power metric. That said, it'd make sense for it to be a 6th level bard spell and I think many GMs could be convinced to include it. Anywho, since this doesn't seem to be a rules question, I've flagged it to be moved elsewhere.