Maybe.
A Bards best ability perhaps the best ability in the mid game, is Dirge of Doom.
Area effect 30ft emanation, no save, no timing out, frightened 1 on all enemies.
Why is it so good?
* Frightened 1 is -1 to all enemies attacks and -1 to all their defences. It is basically like giving everyone +2 to everything --- and people complain about fighters?
* In PF2 very few things are immune to fear. It is typically only Oozes and Mindless creatures. This is nice BTW as I am tired of large common categories of monsters being immune to illusions, or fire or fear like previous editions.
* It works with Lingering Composition so on a moderate roll plus a focus point it only cost 1 action and will last for 3 or 4 rounds.
Other Bard focus cantrips give a benefit of 1 not 2. You can Harmonise them to get a second cantrip for a net plus 2 but then you are spending 2 actions per turn. You can't do this and Linger them because of the metamagic and action restrictions. Yeah I think I'll just spend one action once thanks.
Likewise Inspire Heroics costs a focus point to get a larger bonus, but you can't also linger that.
Net result the Action Economy wins and Dirge of Doom is the best Bard cantrip in most common situations.
Then there is the knock on effect. Dread Striker which becomes worth multiclassing to get, not just for the Rogue.
Paizo should have a look at this situation and see if this is what they intended. but Dirge of Doom is so strong it is crowding out other Bard options.
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I'm fine with the bard as is. They are highly specialized and do a few simple things very well. You can live without a bard in the group and you're fine. People in my group rarely play bards because you get stuck in this repetitive support role. It's not super fun or spectacular, but if you enjoy that type of role the bard provides that class fantasy very well.
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* Frightened 1 is -1 to all enemies attacks and -1 to all their defences. It is basically like giving everyone +2 to everything --- and people complain about fighters?
While I agree it's good, it's a lot more like giving everyone a +1 to everything ... +1 to two things is still +1.
* Frightened 1 is -1 to all enemies attacks and -1 to all their defences. It is basically like giving everyone +2 to everything --- and people complain about fighters?While I agree it's good, it's a lot more like giving everyone a +1 to everything ... +1 to two things is still +1.
Yes it is different at the margins. They have been weakened not you strengthened, but the net relative difference shift is 2. It is like +1 to your attacks and -1 to your enemies attacks. It is similar in value to a +2 to your attacks, but correct it is not actually that.
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I'm fine with the bard as is. They are highly specialized and do a few simple things very well. You can live without a bard in the group and you're fine. People in my group rarely play bards because you get stuck in this repetitive support role. It's not super fun or spectacular, but if you enjoy that type of role the bard provides that class fantasy very well.
You were just complaining how you hated them chewing up all their actions with Harmonise.
1x+1y is still 1x1y and not 2xy
Nah, bards compositions are fine
I think the issue is lingering composition more than Dirge. The ability to keep that going without spending actions and not granting any kind of save is what makes it a much higher level ability than it was intended.
1x+1y is still 1x1y and not 2xy
Nah, bards compositions are fine
Lets assign value of x=1 and y=1.
I'm not saying it is 4, just that it is 2.
This is similar value to Inspire Heroics except it doesn't cost a focus point.
This is similar value to Harmonize except it doesn't cost two actions.
But you still can use Lingering Composition and not pay actions for the next few rounds.
It is much better normally.
Whether or not it is too strong is a separate question. But there is no doubt it is much better.
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Bard in general is fine, but I do think Dirge is so strong that it kinda stifles every other option for inflicting shaken. All the investment in the world into Demoralize will not feel as good or be as reliable as Bard just picking up this one focus spell.
IE, a creature with 15 AC and +5 to hit goes to 14 AC and +4 to hit when Frightened 1.
The PC going up against it only has a 5% improvement in either hitting or not being hit, not 10%.
False
The PC going up against it has a 5% improvement in hitting AND a 5% improvement in not being hit. Correct that is not 10% to hit. But it is around 10% to hit in value.
But we both know that +1 to hit is actually around +15% damage inflicted on your enemies. The actual amount varies based on relative target numbers.
So Dirge of Doom is +15% damage to your enemies, and -15% damage to you. That is similar in value to an effect that would give you about +30% damage ie +2 to hit.
It costs you one action and a focus point probably once.
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Against a frightened 1 enemy a PC essentially has +1 to AC and a +1 to hit. Not a +2 to anything.
And they do not get the bonus to damage that Inspire Courage provides.
Note also that Dirge of Doom is 30ft whereas Inspire Courage is 60ft. That makes a big difference in PF2 encounters. And Reach spells Bards are a thing.
I'm fine with the bard as is. They are highly specialized and do a few simple things very well. You can live without a bard in the group and you're fine. People in my group rarely play bards because you get stuck in this repetitive support role. It's not super fun or spectacular, but if you enjoy that type of role the bard provides that class fantasy very well.You were just complaining how you hated them chewing up all their actions with Harmonise.
I never did understand using Harmonize after One For All was released. You get so much more out of lingering courage/dirge and 1fA plus two open actions each turn than you do with being completely stationary for an extra AoE +1 and a few mediocre caster reactions (that you can still abandon the Aid to use if needed).
As great as dirge is though, it's just one piece of the excellent package that is the bard. Occult list, cha primary stat for skills and archetyping, lingering composition for action econ, courage/dirge for AoE and saveless math tinkering, heroics for funny burst turns with quickened synesthesia and true target, a spellbook for limited spell versatility, shortbow proficiency in case you ever need to shoot cold iron or silver, and more.
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I think the issue is lingering composition more than Dirge. The ability to keep that going without spending actions and not granting any kind of save is what makes it a much higher level ability than it was intended.
I do not think it was unintended :-)
Lingering composition costs a Focus point and allows a Bard to have 2 or 3 consecutive rounds when they can actually move and cast. I do not feel it is OP.
I am surprised few people mentioned Synesthesia. It is my understanding that this single spell could use a nerf. And that access to it in addition to the rest of the package is what pushes Bards a bit too high on the PF2 power scale.
Against a frightened 1 enemy a PC essentially has +1 to AC and a +1 to hit. Not a +2 to anything.And they do not get the bonus to damage that Inspire Courage provides.
Note also that Dirge of Doom is 30ft whereas Inspire Courage is 60ft. That makes a big difference in PF2 encounters. And Reach spells Bards are a thing.
The radius can matter. Though 30ft is enough for most many parties in offical adventre path encounters.
The +1 damage matters rarely. It is not nothing. But from around 6th level my players are dealing 15-40 damage per hit typically. 3 strikers in the current party of 5.
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Against a frightened 1 enemy a PC essentially has +1 to AC and a +1 to hit. Not a +2 to anything.And they do not get the bonus to damage that Inspire Courage provides.
Note also that Dirge of Doom is 30ft whereas Inspire Courage is 60ft. That makes a big difference in PF2 encounters. And Reach spells Bards are a thing.
The radius can matter. Though 30ft is enough for most many parties in offical adventre path encounters.
The +1 damage matters rarely. It is not nothing. But from around 6th level my players are dealing 15-40 damage per hit typically. 3 strikers in the current party of 5.
I think the bonus to damage was primarily referring to the bonus to attack rolls.
And in my experience, 30ft vs 60ft matters quite often even in official APs. Certainly enough for that to be a meaningful balance point, particularly for offensive option like dirge.
The Dirge of Doom + Dread Striker combo is one of the few truly overpowered things in 2e, so that could use some looking at. However, I don't equate that with the bard being overpowered in general. The overall bard chassis and most of the feats perform well, as they should. It's many of the other casters, particularly most of the 6HP ones that get robbed on the proficiency front. That's what should be looked at.
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A Bards best ability perhaps the best ability in the mid game, is Dirge of Doom.
Which Dirge of Doom? Because there are 2 spells depending on if you follow the rules strictly or not. I've seen a lot of people considering that getting out of the spell effect doesn't remove the Frightened condition, which is in direct contradiction with the rules about duration. If you consider that moving out of the area or that at the end of the spell the Frightened condition is removed then the spell is much more manageable. Most monsters can just move out of the area to get rid of the effects.
Yes it is different at the margins. They have been weakened not you strengthened, but the net relative difference shift is 2. It is like +1 to your attacks and -1 to your enemies attacks. It is similar in value to a +2 to your attacks, but correct it is not actually that.* Frightened 1 is -1 to all enemies attacks and -1 to all their defences. It is basically like giving everyone +2 to everything --- and people complain about fighters?While I agree it's good, it's a lot more like giving everyone a +1 to everything ... +1 to two things is still +1.
Two +1s is not the same as one +2.
Against a Frightened enemy you effectively have +1 to hit and +1 AC. However if you actually got a +2 to hit instead of fighting a Frightened enemy it would effect the combat in different ways.
I'm not saying this isn't good, just that calling it "effectively +2" is misleading. Especially since what you actually said was "like giving everyone +2 to everything". Giving an enemy -1 to everything is very much like giving the PCs +1 to everything, but it is emphatically NOT like giving a +2 to everything.
It may seem nit-picky but I'm trying not to mislead new players who might come here.
Against a frightened 1 enemy a PC essentially has +1 to AC and a +1 to hit. Not a +2 to anything.
IE, a creature with 15 AC and +5 to hit goes to 14 AC and +4 to hit when Frightened 1.
The PC going up against it only has a 5% improvement in either hitting or not being hit, not 10%.
OK now from the other side, this seems to be under-valuing the +1. Against a frightened enemy you have a +1 to hit. That gives you a 5% chance to get a hit that would have been a miss and a 5% chance to get a crit that would have been a hit. So it actually does give a 10% chance to improve the outcome of most rolls .
And they do not get the bonus to damage that Inspire Courage provides.
I would value a bonus to d20 rolls and DCs much higher than the same bonus to damage. As I said above the +1 to AC effectively has twice the chance of affecting the combat compared to what we're used to. A +1 damage has a ... well probably a much smaller chance of significantly effecting the combat . Obviously this depends on how big your hits are but I don't think it quite compares to the d20 rolls.
This is just straight up wrong and bad math.
* Frightened 1 is -1 to all enemies attacks and -1 to all their defences. It is basically like giving everyone +2 to everything --- and people complain about fighters?
It is a relative value statement not an equality. Which was clear from the very first post I said like not equal. The leaping to conclusions here is flat wrong.
But I question the validity of that critique because:
- worse conditions exist (e.g., sickened)
A status penalty to all checks and DCs - looks near enough the same to me. But you can't get rid of Dirge.
- weaker but effectively the same conditions exist (e.g., clumsy) that can be applied.
How many of them are single action, all enemies within 30ft, no save?
other effects
Yep I didn't ever say it was the be all and end all of everything. Just the strongest overall. Yes party tactics adjust. I'll note that it does stack with flat footed - circumstance penalty to AC. It does stack with status bonuses like heroism etc etc. Obviously the party mutually adjust and work it out after a while. If someone was going to cast Fear 3 most combats then yes you would think about different options.
A Bards best ability perhaps the best ability in the mid game, is Dirge of Doom.Which Dirge of Doom? Because there are 2 spells depending on if you follow the rules strictly or not. I've seen a lot of people considering that getting out of the spell effect doesn't remove the Frightened condition, which is in direct contradiction with the rules about duration. If you consider that moving out of the area or that at the end of the spell the Frightened condition is removed then the spell is much more manageable. Most monsters can just move out of the area to get rid of the effects.
Yes I can see the rules differences. It is real. But it won't affect my rating overall.
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Yes I can see the rules differences. It is real. But it won't affect my rating overall.A Bards best ability perhaps the best ability in the mid game, is Dirge of Doom.Which Dirge of Doom? Because there are 2 spells depending on if you follow the rules strictly or not. I've seen a lot of people considering that getting out of the spell effect doesn't remove the Frightened condition, which is in direct contradiction with the rules about duration. If you consider that moving out of the area or that at the end of the spell the Frightened condition is removed then the spell is much more manageable. Most monsters can just move out of the area to get rid of the effects.
I don't find Dirge of Doom as strong as you find it. For multiple reasons:
- The penalty is general and doesn't stack. So it's also a wide protection for enemies. If the Cleric casts Divine Smite, the monsters can ignore the Sickened penalty. At high level Scare to Death and Disturbing Knowledge are also nice abilities but they don't fully stack with Dirge of Doom.- The small range is dangerous at high level. High level enemies very often have AoOs and big reach. Having to be and stay 30ft away from them can be super dangerous for a caster.
- I fully agree that combining Dirge of Doom with Dread Striker (and other Frightened related abilities) is extremely strong. But isn't it the goal? If you come up with a combo you expect a strong impact. And there are a lot of other combos you can use in the game and all have quite some impact (like the Trip-based party Deriven loves).
Compared with Inspire Courage, Dirge of Doom has twice the impact overall. But Inspire Courage always work (no immunity), stacks with nearly everything (status bonus to hit and damage are very limited, so unless you are high level and have the ability to put the party under Heroism there shouldn't be much stacking issues), the area is enormous and it's available at level 1.
That's why I really see the difference in ruling as the biggest issue. As if you use what I consider the OP ruling then it's crazy strong, as it now lasts more than a round with the lingering Frightened conditions, the Bard doesn't have to stay at 30 ft from enemies but can just move 30 ft away from them to affect them, etc...
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The biggest problem with Dirge of Doom and Inspire Heroics is that they make the bard boring. They provide so much value that bards feel the need to use them every turn.
I think a nerf to the size of the emanations (30ft for inspire courage and 15ft for dirge of doom) would go a long way in toning down the bard's power while making it more interesting to play. On some turns, it might be beneficial to stride to set up the next turn's composition cantrip. Demoralize would be a useful alternative to Dirge of Doom when a target is more than 15ft away. Getting use out of Dirge of Doom would require the bard to expose itself to more melee threats. It would introduce meaningful choices for the bard's third action beyond just picking between dirge and heroics.
Full disclosure : my PFS Bard rately uses Dirge of Doom. To my big surprise, I am these days going back to Inspire Courage rather frequently.
And I do not use Harmonize because it eats too many of my actions.
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Not really, the Bard would just feel/need be forced to spend extra actions getting into position.
If you don’t want to use those, then don’t. Or don’t play a Bard.
The bard wouldn't really be forced to do anything. It would just have slightly weaker composition cantrips that would work like they currently do at shorter range but potentially require an extra action / incurring some risk to function for more distant targets. It would have to decide whether to incur those costs or to select a different option.
The problem is not that I don't want to use composition cantrips. Inasmuch as there is a problem (and I recognize that many people think there isn't), it's that the cantrips outperform most other buffs and debuffs in the game for such a low cost (1 action + 1 focus point for 3-4 turns at 30-60ft range). I think situationally increasing that cost (bard might have to stride, buff receiver might have to stride) makes other options look slightly better in comparison.
”I want to nerf your playstyle to make mine feel better” is not gonna work, is not gonna have the effect you hope for. It never does.
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For once, I agree with Rysky. I've been a proponent of Alchemist since the first days but I've never hid the massive issues of the class. I think that with the release of Treasure Vault the Alchemist is fine. Not fine as "as strong as a Fighter" but fine as "can contribute meaningfully without having to jump through too many hoops". There are still a few issues left (the level 13 abilities that are in no way equivalent to Master proficiency and more importantly the lack of reagents at low level that is crippling). If these issues are addressed with Player Core 2 I'd say that the Alchemist will become a very nice class in the proper hands (it stays a complicated class to play).
About this Bard discussion, I definitely agree that Bard is strong. "Too" strong is a complex question, as I also definitely think some casters are not meeting the expectations (Witch, Wizard, partly Oracle) and solving these issues would put them closer to the Bard and as such the Bard will be less strong in comparison. I also agree with Temperans when he points out that the issue with the Bard is not one composition, but the fact that it has tons of good features. The Bard is like the Fighter, its issue is not the +2 to hit, it's that + Heavy Armor + Armor Specialization + 2 Extra feats + Master Perception and extra Initiative + Bravery at level
3 + a lot of excellent feats available, etc...
Take the Cleric, replace the Font by the Bard compositions and you don't have anything imbalanced. Because the rest of the Cleric class is average or even subpar sometimes, unlike the Bard class.
I'm fine with the bard as is. They are highly specialized and do a few simple things very well. You can live without a bard in the group and you're fine. People in my group rarely play bards because you get stuck in this repetitive support role. It's not super fun or spectacular, but if you enjoy that type of role the bard provides that class fantasy very well.You were just complaining how you hated them chewing up all their actions with Harmonise.
My preference is not what others may care about. So why are you bringing it up? I find the fighter playstyle boring as well, doesn't mean the class has problems.
I already said that in another thread, but since this one is more specific, I'll repeat it.
For me the most OP thing about the bard is the focus spells Lingering Composition and Inspire Heroics have no risk. They are spells that neither have action costs nor consume any resources in case of failure, they just cannot be used in conjunction with other metamagic. This is something you don't see anywhere else in the game and designed in such a way that if you don't and have no other use for your focus points, you're basically wasting the opportunity to be more efficient for free!
Dirge of Doom is good, but I don't think so OP. It's a 3rd-level focus composition cantrip that takes an action and forces the bard to be in the frontline or next to it to be truly functional. For me, the fact that it gives -1 to everything on enemies is just a little better than giving +1 to hit for allies, and since it's one or the other, because both are composition spells, I think the -1 on everything on opponents even without tests, forcing the bard to be in a more risk position and having spent a feat to get a focus cantrip that cost you a 6th level feat, something well balanced even, within the universe of possibilities that the bard has.
Leaving the topic a little and talking about the alchemist. I agree with SuperBidi's point here. However, I still think that the alchemist still needs a true martial progression to get out of the "great class for the party, mediocre class for itself" position.
I don't find Dirge of Doom as strong as you find it. For multiple reasons:
- The penalty is general and doesn't stack.
It is not different to anything else. There is a whole category of things that now stack like Bless, and Herosim and the Marshalls aura. These don't stack with Inspire Courage. It is no worse than anything else with the exception that it gets almost anything so you notice it.
- The small range is dangerous at high level. High level enemies very often have AoOs and big reach. Having to be and stay 30ft away from them can be super dangerous for a caster.
Yes this comes out a bit in your comments. I don't play much at level 15+. I am aware there are some stronger combos at the very top end of town. I don't normally find 30ft of reach all that common. Versus bosses you might going for synesthesia first then inspire courage. But I do really like to knock his saving throw down first.
I do find your expectation that casters with 8 hitpoints and light armour proficiency are super soft as strange.
- I fully agree that combining Dirge of Doom with Dread Striker (and other Frightened related abilities) is extremely strong. But isn't it the goal? If you come up with a combo you expect a strong impact. And there are a lot of other combos you can use in the game and all have quite some impact (like the Trip-based party Deriven loves).
There is not all that many of them. If you know more please make a list.The thing is Dirge of Doom is very strong all by itself. Dread Striker is good anyway for say a Charisma Rogue
But Inspire Courage always work (no immunity)
There is only a little that is immune. I just did a quick count of the level 20 monsters and it about 15% even at that level. Much of that you can pick.
the area is enormous and it's available at level 1
I did start with Inspire Courage but haven't used it since I got Dirge of Doom. It does occasionally mean an extra move but mostly it is pure win.
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Okay, let's establish what the Bard has and compare it against their Spellcaster counterparts then since it seems like people aren't even on the same page here:
(Avatar-Picture-Formatting-Line-Break A-Go-Go)
Perception: Expert + normal scaling = The best Perception Training of all Spellcasters. All others are Trained + normal scaling
Saving Throws: Expert in Will/Trained in others + normal scaling = Tied with all others except Summoner and Magus who have Expert + normal scaling in Fortitude as well
Skills: 2 Automatic Skills Trained & 4 + Int Mod additional Trained = This provides at LEAST 3 additional Skills Trained assuming the same Int Mod over any other Spellcaster
Attacks: Simple + 7 additional Martial Weapons Trained = Better than all other Spellcasters except Magus (or a specialized Oracle), hands down. They even have more Weapon Training than Rogues who are an actual Martial Class. If specialized as a Warrior they also become Trained with ALL Martial Weapons.
Defenses: Trained Light Armor = Tied with all other Spellcasters other than Cleric, and Druid (though they only get non-metal Armor), and Magus (plus of course again, the specialist Oracle)
Slot-based Spellcasting: Full Spellcasting Training + normal scaling= Tied with all other full casters except Psychic and Magus
Spell Slots = 3/2 Slot progression = Tied with all others, beats Magus/Psychic, and is only surpassed by the Sorcerer
Spellcasting Tradition: Occult = The general consensus best offensive as well as support Tradition. They have nearly all of the best "attack" type spells, all of the best debuffs and nearly all of the best buffs or rough equivalents to them.
Focus Spells: They receive the MOST powerful Focus Spells in the game and also have the only "Cantrip" equiv Focus Spells in the system that they can, and frequently WILL use at least once every 5 Rounds (assuming you Critically succeed AND use Lingering Composition), or if not, will often use every round to every other Round if they happen to need the Action economy to do something else (which to be honest isn't likely as one of the most common newbie questions people grapple with is "what do I do with my 3rd action?!!"
This isn't even discussing the unquestionably powerful effectiveness of the various Composition Cantrips which are, in most situations, MUST CASTS and benefit most any party as they provide the best at-level even bonus for most things across the board at nearly the fastest scaling (not quite in some cases for singular buffed stats such as for only Will Saves or for JUST Strikes/Maneuvers, etc, all of which actually cost Spell Slots and most of which the Bard can ALSO cast as well as they are on the Occult list) of all other buff or debuff spells.
The only thing they DON'T outshine other Spellcasters at is Saving Throws and even then, they're simply tied for second place among all others beyond the Bounded Spellcasters which hardly seems like a fair comparison.
I love Bard, I'm glad they rock in PF2 but they were given way too much. It's crazy to me that people think the "easier" fix is to retweak dozens of Focus Spells provided to other Spellcasters in order to help bridge the gap because... well, unless EVERY other Spellcaster ends up getting "cantrip" Focus Spells like the Bard does then that won't even come CLOSE and that's not even discussing the other areas they are head and shoulders above the rest.
I brought up Synesthesia in the other thread and was trying not to thread bomb. I think a very minor change to the success effect so that it only does one of the three things instead of all three would significantly put it back in alignment with the rest of level 5 spells. Even if the caster got to choose which one, the problem with the spell is that any enemy that doesn’t critically succeed gets a 20% miss chance on all attacks, a 20% failure chance on all concentration actions, and a -3 to AC and reflex saves. For a fail or worse, these are fine effects, but there is no spell in the game that comes close to this level of debuffing on a successful save, not even level 9 spells. That makes it way too much of an automatic, must have spell in any boss fight, especially for a spell that only exists in one tradition.
And that to me is the real focus for looking at with errata, not where any class is too strong, but whether there are some choices that are not actually choices because they have a clear aura of “this is the right choice and all others are wrong choices.” picking Synesthesia as a spell when you are a spontaneous occult caster is an example of this. In my opinion, Lingering Composition is one as well because it is a free action focus spell that only costs a focus point when it works or critically fails, and gives the bard 3 to 4 additional actions per encounter. It is like a free haste ability that lets you use your bonus action anyway you want.
Again, I don’t have a fundamental problem with the ability, even with it being so powerful, I have a problem with the way that there is just never a reason not to use it, because as you will quickly find out playing a bard, options like harmonize basically lock your character out of being a character and turn you into a static buff beacon that really has almost no agency.
Now again, I don’t think the goal needs to be to weaken lingering composition so much as to to make it a touch more situational, and not the obvious first thing to do in every encounter. That is why my suggestion is to make it eat your reaction while it is active. Bards are not a reaction dependent class, so it is not a massive hit, but their given class reaction can be an encounter changer and making it more obvious that lingering composition locks you out of it will lead to a little more tactical decision making for bards, as well as making MC bard and grabbing lingering comp so attractive for every martial that has any cha.
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It's crazy to me that people think the "easier" fix
No one thinks that. No one claims that. You’re confusing “easy” with “best”.
Easy is irrelevant. What would be GOOD is for the underperforming options to be buffed up, for both satisfaction and health of the game.
It is not different to anything else. There is a whole category of things that now stack like Bless, and Herosim and the Marshalls aura. These don't stack with Inspire Courage. It is no worse than anything else with the exception that it gets almost anything so you notice it.
If you have a Bard, chances are high you won't have a Marshal. And Bless is meh at best, I've nearly never seen it being used and very often for a such small effect that the Bard could have cast Inspire Courage without really losing potency. Heroism is the biggest issue at high level when you can put the party under Heroism without losing too much resources. Still a high level problem.
Yes this comes out a bit in your comments. I don't play much at level 15+. I am aware there are some stronger combos at the very top end of town. I don't normally find 30ft of reach all that common. Versus bosses you might going for synesthesia first then inspire courage. But I do really like to knock his saving throw down first.
30ft. of reach is definitely extremly rare. But at high level, enemies tend to grow, AoOs tend to become more common (up to the point where they become extra common) and reach, auras and other bad things increases. The overall result being that 30ft. become a much bigger issue than just losing one action positioning oneself like at low level. Now I fully agree that there's a sweet spot between level 6 and 12 roughly where you are not really annoyed by the small range of Dirge of Doom.
I did start with Inspire Courage but haven't used it since I got Dirge of Doom. It does occasionally mean an extra move but mostly it is pure win.
Out of curiosity, what "version" of Dirge of Doom do you use?
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It's crazy to me that people think the "easier" fixNo one thinks that. No one claims that. You’re confusing “easy” with “best”.
Easy is irrelevant. What would be GOOD is for the underperforming options to be buffed up, for both satisfaction and health of the game.
I mostly agree with you, but I think there are times where bringing everything else up might not be in the best interest of the game. I think if all spells hit Synesthesia's level of power, especially on a successful save, then spell casting would probably be too over powered as a whole and suddenly all martials have to be raised as well to make up the difference. I think it is important for developers to have an intended ceiling and floor for their game design and to be capable of acknowledging both and adjusting as necessary when it is really the case that there is an outlier that is an outlier and not just tapping the top of that ceiling. I think the system of playtesting new classes does a pretty good job of keeping us in this range when we only have 1 or 2 classes to play test at a time, but I think there is some earlier stuff that is just slightly out of phase with where it needs to be, and I think that there are more creative ways to bring about that balance than making massive changes.
For example, The bard's proficiencies look "too good" on paper, but they don't really interfere with other players enjoyment of their characters.
Being good at the initiative proficiency helps the whole team. No one is getting jealous of the bard when the bard goes first because, very often, the most tactical decision for any other player to make is to wait until after the bard has gone. Making the Bard worse at initiative makes the whole party worse.
Their weapon proficiencies being good early on isn't really that big of a deal because they are so action starved. A bard that is going to be using a weapon isn't doing it as an extra action on top of casting a spell, they are going to be using it in place of casting a spell. By 7th level they have so many spells, and their ability to really effectively use weapons is going to make using weapons instead of spells a limiting factor for the class, not a power boosting feature.
Lingering composition is the thing that upsets this balance. It is a problem that the maestro bard has the better focus spell for enabling martial attacking than the warrior muse. Yes, any character that wants to be a skald style warrior bard will need some of both, but I think even just restricting reactions while Lingering Composition is active would make it less of an obvious necessity for a character that wants to use a shield, for example, and other options that don't take away your reactions become worth considering.
The only thing that makes the Occult list "over powered" is synesthesia. Not having innate access to electric arc is a massive penalty for a spell list at lower levels and taking feats to add it balances things out pretty well. Soothe is ok, but heal is so much better, especially if you are going to be fighting any undead, which you are almost certain to do in any published material. Again the limiting factor on Bards and spell casting is action economy. They, like clerics, end up with such large expectations on their shoulders for what kinds of spells they are going to be casting and what their role is in combat, that being a full caster is just not the same thing as it is for a character slotted into a blasting role in the party. It is very easy to underestimate the action economy strain of the bard class just looking at it on paper.
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The "best" way to do something often requires far, FAR more time, money, effort, and manpower than is actually available in the system that is handling the fix. It is also worth mentioning that the fictional "best way" that is huge and comprehensive includes a nearly infinite number of butterfly effect causations if the fix/change is a large-scale one that impacts multiple things that WOULD ripple and cause other issues and require additional QA and PROBABLY playtesting which Paizo already said they are not doing.
It is almost ALWAYS better to tweak the one outlier than to upend a whole system that is, in almost every measurable way, working very smoothly if something aberrant crops up. The fix for something being more powerful than EVERYTHING else is NOT to improve everything else, that's complete nonsense, especially since the Remaster is NOT intended to be a full-on new edition of PF2.
Buffing EVERYTHING else to bring it up to par or near par with the Bard would straight up be enough changes to at LEAST force Paizo to concede that the Remaster is a PF2.5 or even, a 3rd Edition which is explicitly NOT what they're going for.
One nerf to save thousands of manhours and tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars is a tiny price to pay, and frankly, the Bard can take the licks, they're the best class and some downward tweaks won't ruin them, just like how the Flickmace nerfs didn't ruin AoO Fighters.