Core bard optimization - caster vs. fighter

[jpreem]

I have been thinking about making a bard charatcter. Our Dm is not very keen on stuff outside of core. (And i dont have enough gold for lots of books either :smallsmile:).
So what are the options for making a core bard playable. I have not decided yet what I would like him to be - more of a caster type or more of melee/ranged= physical attack guy.
It would seem that being a scrawny wimpy guy a bard usually is somekind of magic.- support character would be easier to achieve - maybe just tripping disarming some weaker enemies with a whip. Providing aid another bonuses with my weapons would be a better route. But it would be cool to see if somebody could make a more combat oriented bard as well.
So a challenge build me a level 10 bard in core - made either a support character or even a combat bard if possible.

[dsmiles]

I have been thinking about making a bard charatcter. Our Dm is not very keen on stuff outside of core. (And i dont have enough gold for lots of books either :smallsmile:).
So what are the options for making a core bard playable. I have not decided yet what I would like him to be - more of a caster type or more of melee/ranged= physical attack guy.
It would seem that being a scrawny wimpy guy a bard usually is somekind of magic.- support character would be easier to achieve - maybe just tripping disarming some weaker enemies with a whip. Providing aid another bonuses with my weapons would be a better route. But it would be cool to see if somebody could make a more combat oriented bard as well.
So a challenge build me a level 10 bard in core - made either a support character or even a combat bard if possible.

I generally use bards as a support (read: buffer/debuffer) character. With lots of Charisma-based skills. I am AFB, and most people wouldn't consider me an "optimizer," since most of the games I play in/run are lower powered games, so you probably wouldn't want my input.

[Aharon]

What is specifically allowed/disallowed? You said your DM isn't keen on it - does he allow it occasionally, or is it just a big red neon sign: NO?

For example, the free SRD contains a lot of non-core options, which a lot of DMs allow.

Limited completely to core, I guess you will be less powerful than you could be otherwise.
If you're willing to have the music be mostly fluff, you could make a Bard/Barbarian (or something else)/Dragon Disciple. It's a rather strong option in NWN2, but I don't know how well it works in PnP.

[jpreem]

PHB, MM and DMM. I guess some of the srd stuff that is not in these three might be allowed. Also im not trying to get optimized over 9000 type of build :smallbiggrin: just hmm as I look a core bard looks like it could see a little hard time surviving.

[Optimator]

Yeah, core Bards don't get a lot of love... at all. Outside of core they explode with options (great options, too) but without splatbooks you are denied access to almost all the good melee feats, the ways to boost Inspire Courage, any good prestige classes, as well as the plethora of good spells in the Spell Compendium et al. Life inside core is pretty grim for Bards, which is a shame because Bards rock.

You are pretty much forced into a support role--I can't see any good way to make a combat Bard in core while remaining a "Bard". Depending on the group's power level, class make-up and the campaign structure this might not be so bad though. Bards get a lot of fun skills and and 6+ per level to boot. Their spells aren't so bad, especially if you're creative, but they get higher level spells quite late in their careers and not too many castings per day. Luckily, the way bonus spells from casting stats work will make it so you will have 1 or 2 bonus spells per spell level. This, of course, depends on your stats--which you didn't mention.

If going straight Bard, which appears to be your best bet, you will basically use Inspire Courage on round 1, maybe Inspire Greatness on the party frontliner in round 2, then sit back and fire off the occasional spell or plink away with a shortbow (marginally boosted by your Inspire Courage. Hurray!). Out of combat you will shine with your mad skillz, Bardic Knowledge, and occasional utility spell. Useful but you aren't going to steal the spotlight in combat, that's for sure. Hopefully you are the type of player who will find fun in playing the character without worrying about power. Luckily, Bards lend themselves to being fun characters to act (remember: Charisma is the stat that determines how cool your character is!)

[WarKitty]

Never underestimate Diplomacy. Never ever ever. You may not be the greatest fighter, but you can get some NPC schmucks to do it for you for pennies. Consider taking the leadership feat as well.

[Optimator]

Heheh, yeah. A level 10 Bard can have all the fighting capability of an 8th level fighter with only one feat and an experience penalty!

[Raging Gene Ray]

Heheh, yeah. A level 10 Bard can have all the fighting capability of an 8th level fighter with only one feat and an experience penalty!

Experience penalty? That's not how Leadership works. Maybe if your DM has a vendetta against Leadership.

Also, there's a book called "Heroes of Battle" with a feat called Improved Cohort. It means your cohort can be up to 1 level below you.

EDIT: Gee, I really should read the first post (or at least the entire title) before I mention non-core stuff like that.

I'd suggest for combat, go with Improved Disarm/Trip and a whip. Make the most out of that free Exotic Weapon Proficiency.

For spells....well, what about the rest of the party? Do they cooperate well? If so, just pick a few utility spells (grease, glibness, glitterdust are all good at any level). If the casters don't do Divination, then it falls to you to fill in that gap.

If the rogue is the sort to horde gold from the party, you might consider maxing your stealth skills to beat them at their own game.

I always thought of the bard as the kind with the skills that nobody takes seriously...until they're in a situation where they need those skills and rely on them.

What I'm trying to say is bards are support/utility characters. They are also social. They are not lone warriors/heroes. Work with your party and hope they work with you.

[Optimator]

I was under the impression that cohorts took a share of the earned exp.

[The Dark Fiddler]

I was under the impression that cohorts took a share of the earned exp.

If memory serves, they get an amount of exp equivalent to what they'd gain if the did take a share of the earned exp, but don't actually take it.

[El Dorado]

You might start off with bard at 1st level (for the skill points) and then jump over to fighter for a couple of levels. d10 hit die, +2 BAB, two bonus feats, +3 fort save, and proficiency with all martial weapons. This would let you grab weapon finesse a level early and get a good start on the ranged attack feat tree (assuming you go with ranged attacks). You lose a couple of 6th level spells and your inspire courage caps at +3 but I think you're a little sturdier at lower levels.

[Urpriest]

If memory serves, they get an amount of exp equivalent to what they'd gain if the did take a share of the earned exp, but don't actually take it.

I think in 3.0 they used to steal party XP, but yeah, now they just earn a bit slower but don't steal any.

[Ashiel]

Have your bard take item crafting feats; particularly Craft Wondrous Item, Craft Wand or Staff, and Craft Magic Arms and Armor. Put full ranks into Use Magic Device. Take advantage of the fact you can cast spells from a surprisingly large variety of spells plucked from different classes by buying partially charged wands or x/day wands.

At low levels you will probably prefer to be a buffer, and perhaps keep your stealth skills high. Masterwork boots (+2 move silently) and a masterwork cloak (+2 hide) would help here. In combat, try to stick with ranged weapons like slings, darts, and bows while using your inspire courage. If possible, see if your GM will allow you to take the the Wild Cohort feat found here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031118x). It's an official web-enhancement. This way you will have a loyal companion who can run interference for you - and your companion will also benefit from your music or multi-buff spells like haste. Also Handle Animal is a charisma based skill that can be used untrained.

Remember that you can have other people supply the spells for your item crafting feats, so if the spell isn't on your list have your party wizard, cleric, or even an NPC assist you in crafting your items. Once crafted, your spell-trigger items can allow you to pull off interesting surprises (especially if you enchant your weapons as wands for example). With your charisma synergy and maxed ranks in Use Magic Device, you should be able to pull off using such items with relative ease.

Consider multiclassing. A one level dip into barbarian can net you an HP boost, fortitude boost, BAB boost, speed boost, and if your GM will allow the Whirling Frenzy (see SRD) instead of rage allows you to get a bonus to your dexterity and +1 attack per round when you're raging (not something you'll want to do while casting but see below...), and all simple and martial weapons and medium armor proficiency (see medium armor as a bard, below). Combined with haste or similar effect can create a nice "death by a thousand cuts" combo.

If you want to melee, consider picking up some bardic staples like mirror image, displacement, and similar effects. Due to the way mirror image works, combining both mirror image and displacement or blur nets you up to a 1/8 chance of being hit with a 20-50% miss chance - plus all your illusions get the same 20-50% miss chance, allowing you to conserve your illusions more effectively (since they vanish when hit). This will often make you more frustrating to hit than heavy AC characters as even touch attacks will be difficult.

Consider crafting minor magic items that allow you to be flashy, showy, and likewise difficult to pin down. Boots of Striding and Springing are cheap to create and couple nicely with a barbarian-dip fast movement (granting a land speed of 50ft and a total of +13 to jump checks). If you have ranks in Tumble, this can make you exceptionally difficult to pin down as you can move almost 30ft while avoiding AoOs. Also allows you to move 25ft while hiding or 50ft with a -5 penalty - which is very nice.

For defenses, purchase a mithril chain shirt and mithril buckler (no check penalties and what-not) - and if you're a barbarian you can make it a medium armor since you'll try it as light for your bardic casting - and then enchant them with special abilities. Most of your defenses will come from miss % so invest in magical properties like Fortification (Light, Medium, or Heavy) and energy resistances (both 10pt and 20pt versions depending on level). This will help your survivability. Likewise invest in a cloak of resistance +1 to +5 depending on your level (you can craft and upgrade these). If you have odd ability scores (such as 13, 15, 17, etc), craft odd numbered ability enhancing items (+1, +3, +5, etc) to maximize your benefit for the lowest possible cost. Now you're fairly well rounded. Also at higher levels, attempt to get your armor permanently enchanted with death ward, which will add an extra +168,000 gp to the market price of your armor or shield but will protect against level drain and similar effects (and you can craft it at 1/2 the cost with the money you save getting the majority of your magic items at 1/2 market value).

Now if you really want to push the flashy flamboyancy of the Bard a bit further, you can really start cranking out UMD tricks. Start emulating alignments, classes, races, level and so forth. Craft a holy avenger and a pair of life drinker short swords. To determine the cost of the life-drinker or holy-avenger special qualities, simply subtrace the cost of the base weapon (the +2 cold iron longsword for the holy avenger and the +1 great-axe for the life-drinker) and replace with a weapon type of your choosing (such as rapier or glaive).

Emulate a Paladin of the highest level you can (your check result -20). If you can roll a 40 when you draw your holy avenger then you are effectively a 20th level Paladin for the purposes of determining the weapon's powers; and you can push it higher. By 20th level you can easily have a 30 charisma (starting with 15 base), +23 from ranks, for a +33 before counting magic items that grant competence bonuses (which you could craft up to a +10 magic item for). This will allow you to benefit from an exceptionally strong spell resistance and toss around CL 20 greater dispel magic each round.

Meanwhile, you can use your life-drinking weapon (or weapons) while you're in melee. Each attack will inflict weapon damage + 2 negative levels. Each negative level inflicts -5 hp, -1 to all attacks, saves, checks, and effective level for level based effects or abilities. Deal negative levels equal to your opponent's level and it dies instantly (destroy the body so it doesn't raise as a wight). This allows you to not only buff your allies but also debuff your opponents. Works wonderfully if you are currently in a whirling frenzy (more attacks = more debuff). However, life-drinkers inflict 1 negative level on their wearer per hit, which is another good reason to have death ward currently active.

If you fall behind the party because you've been crafting magic items, you will gain bonus XP each encounter as though you were fighting enemies that were +1 CR higher than the enemies you were encountering which allows you to catch up. Likewise, you can remain a level behind your friends but continue using the extra experience to craft more and more magic items (granting you and your friends more and more power, and thus offsetting the hurt of being a level behind). This is both highly optimal as well as being exceptionally party friendly (since you can make items for your friends who will likely appreciate it); and you're an exceptional party-wide buffer already.

Finally, you can function as out of combat medic. A single wand of cure light wounds takes 1 day to craft for 375gp and 30 XP. It heals an average of about 250 hit points worth of damage before burning out; allowing you to heal up yourself and your party between encounters or adventures with relative ease.

Pickup spells like remove curse for more party-wide utility. Also, consider crafting intelligent items for fun and profit (intelligent items can have some cool special abilities and depending on their strength can even talk telepathically). Somehow a bard with a talking sword just feels right.

With any extra experience and money, pickup or craft minor wondrous items like feather tokens, bags of tricks, portable holes, handy haversacks, and so forth. Craft an 5/day wand of summon nature's ally IV or a flute or something similar that uses a spell-trigger (and maybe a perform check, which reduces the market price by 10%) so you can summon unicorns with your music. Your unicorn can make for a fun ally for 7 rounds per summon, and also comes equipped with a lot of healing spells including 5d8+20 points worth of cure spells, as well as neutralize poison. This is a wonderful item for a bard.

All of this is available without touching splat-books or even heavily optimizing. None of this is exceptionally powerful in its own right but you'll feel powerful, you will contribute, and you will have a lot of fun tricks for all kinds of situations; and you will be a valuable member of your team.

[Aharon]

@Ashiel
I was under the impression that once you are in melee with somebody who relies on extensive illusions to get miss chances, you should close your eyes so you get a flat 50% miss chance?

Also, the Holy Avenger, RAW, gives SR to everybody adjacent to you - even your enemies. And crafting it takes over 60 days, so it may not be an option in a campaign with limited downtime. This is true for all crafting advice, unfortunately (Currently, I'm playing an artificer, and while he is Tier 1-2 due to starting at a high level, he will probably fall behind because of limited crafting time).

@all/JPreem
The advice to use diplomacy is solid, but, as written, it doesn't work very well, so if you use it too often/successful, your DM may limit it by houserules.

You already got solid advice on what to do if you are indeed limited to the 3 core books, so I will focus a bit on the SRD options - which you said might be allowed:

There are three variants of the Bard class in the SRD, mostly exchanging spells from the spell list. The bardic sage gets 1 more spell known per spell level, but that spell has to be a divination. Tradeoff: you lose 2 rounds duration on all of your songs. Useful if there aren't other casters in the group/the other casters don't focus on divination. The divine bard gets divided casting (Wis for highest level of spell known, cha for rest), but adds a few useful buffs/utility spells (protection from evil and restoration, for example). Useful if there's no cleric in the group. The savage bard gets a few spells from the druid list.

There's also the option of trading in the songs and lore for an animal companion and some of the minor druid abilities.

Finally, there's the prestige bard, which basically gets everything relevant the normal bard does, and better casting to boot (worse CL, better spell list). Downside is that it's a bit hard to enter (Perform as a prereq, which only normal bards, rogues and monks do have). Rogue 4/Wizard 1 seems to be the best way to enter on first glance.

For the Rogue levels, you might want to take the martial rogue variant, which gains bonus feats instead of sneak attack. For the Wizard, Domain Wizard if its allowed (it's a rather strong option), or perhaps one of the Specialist variants (keep in mind that you have to have access to illusion, enchantment and divination for prestige bard).

If you start at a higher level and the LA-Buyoff rules are used, take one of the +2 CHA races like aasimar or drow (I think both of them are in the MM).

Finally, the existing guide at the wizards boards may also be helpful, but you'll have to go through lots of non-core advice. It's found here (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19870498/The_Bards_Handbook).

Edit:
Oh, and depending on your DM, you might be able to make use of the 6th level bard ability a lot:

Suggestion (Sp)

A bard of 6th level or higher with 9 or more ranks in a Perform skill can make a suggestion (as the spell) to a creature that he has already fascinated. Using this ability does not break the bard’s concentration on the fascinate effect, nor does it allow a second saving throw against the fascinate effect.

Making a suggestion doesn’t count against a bard’s daily limit on bardic music performances. A Will saving throw (DC 10 + ½ bard’s level + bard’s Cha modifier) negates the effect. This ability affects only a single creature (but see mass suggestion, below). Suggestion is an enchantment (compulsion), mind-affecting, language dependent ability.

Obviously, if you meet many enemies who are immune to mind-affecting effects, this is moot, but if your DM includes groups of enemies who are susceptible to it, using it will be lots and lots of fun - fascinate a group of enemies and make 30 suggestions to each of them, to make sure they all fail their saving throw :smallbiggrin:

[Ashiel]

@Ashiel
I was under the impression that once you are in melee with somebody who relies on extensive illusions to get miss chances, you should close your eyes so you get a flat 50% miss chance?

Also, the Holy Avenger, RAW, gives SR to everybody adjacent to you - even your enemies. And crafting it takes over 60 days, so it may not be an option in a campaign with limited downtime. This is true for all crafting advice, unfortunately (Currently, I'm playing an artificer, and while he is Tier 1-2 due to starting at a high level, he will probably fall behind because of limited crafting time).

1) Unless you've got the Blind-Fight feat - which a lot of stuff won't - closing your eyes is a stupid, stupid idea. Closing your eyes means you're now blind, so you suffer all the penalties for being blind while you have your eyes closed (you move at 1/2 speed, loose dex to AC, attackers get a +2 bonus to hit you, rogues sneak attack you, etc, etc). While you gain an advantage against the bard's defenses (which still leaves the bard a 50/50 chance of avoiding the attack) you're now open to all kinds of retaliation.

Even if your DM rules that you can close your eyes and open them all during your turn - which I think is a bad ruling since a combat round is six seconds and you have to keep them closed long enough to make it mean something, especially if you're full attacking, it should be at least until your next turn - there are still readied actions.

2) Generally it is assumed that you can craft items with your item creation feats. Most of the time players can decide to take some time off, and down-time is expected. If your GM runs a game where you are constantly constrained by time then consider petitioning for shorter item creation times (perhaps measured in hours), use the Pathfinder rules for item creation (allow you to get half a day's work done on an item while adventuring, tinkering on it a little in the morning and night), or see if you can purchase items at 1/2 price in exhange for paying the XP cost of the items - or allow you to purchase items by trading your experience points on a 1XP = 5gp ratio (effectively allowing item crafting NPCs to bottle your essence for later use).

As to the Holy Avenger, yes it provides SR to adjacent creatures. That's a feature. Hug your party members. If you want, get it on a glaive or something instead so you can poke people (also annoys people with blind-fight or blindsight 5ft). The main thing that makes it cool is you're not a Paladin and you're wielding a Holy Avenger (making it funny), and the ability to spam greater dispel magic is good for a lot of things (even though you can't use the focus dispel).

[dsmiles]

I think in 3.0 they used to steal party XP, but yeah, now they just earn a bit slower but don't steal any.

Slower being 75% of what the character with Leadership actually earns. Which should equate to keeping them 2 levels behind you, unless you make a lot of magic items.

[Telonius]

Hm, Core combat Bard...

Bard12/Ranger1/Eldritch Knight7. Ends up as BAB +16, casting as a 18th-level Bard. It also lets you use any wands with spells on the Ranger list without UMD'ing them. You'll lose out a bit on Bardic Music and Lore progression.

[Flickerdart]

Remember that your bard song lasts for 5 rounds after you stop playing. Even if you take the first action in a combat to activate it, don't bother continuing to play. If it runs out, just start a new song, because you'll be drowning in uses of bardic music, and the best way to use that many isn't core. The bonus seems kind of small at first, and there are no ways in core to improve it, but even a +2 from an 8th level Bard translates into +6 to damage when the Fighter can Power Attack for more without reducing to-hit, or even more when that same Fighter makes his second attack.

[Kalaska'Agathas]

You may want to check out this: the Bard's Handbook (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8284.0). If you have access to Complete Arcane you might consider going into Sublime Chord, to get ninth level spells. And if you have Complete Mage you could pick up Melodic Casting, which will let you cast and buff via Bardic Music simultaneously. If your DM will let you, because of Sublime Chord's advanced casting, you can get ninth level spells and ten levels of Swiftblade (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327). That will give you some excellent combat abilities based off of Haste, including an Ex: Timestop. And if your DM will let you get Metamagic Song from Races of Stone you can have a mini-DMM to persist it* all day. I think the guide for that is here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=8595585). The Bard is one of my favorite classes, but it's true that without various sourcebooks, it doesn't really come into its own.

* Edit: It being Haste, sorry for the confusion!

[Skorj]

Short answer: caster with an emphasis on charms and buffs. Max out CHA for this, naturally. It's very hard to contribute much to battle in as a core bard by swinging a weapon around (assuming reasonable char-op in the party), but morale-based buffs stack well with other party buffs, and charmed monsters are often useful.

A bard can also be on OK skillmonkey. As others have said, high diplomacy + high CHA is more useful than you might expect. If the party doesn't have another skillmonkey, a bard can be a focal character, even if you never shove pointy sticks into monsters.

[Flickerdart]

You may want to check out this: the Bard's Handbook (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8284.0). If you have access to Complete Arcane you might consider going into Sublime Chord, to get ninth level spells. And if you have Complete Mage you could pick up Melodic Casting, which will let you cast and buff via Bardic Music simultaneously. If your DM will let you, because of Sublime Chord's advanced casting, you can get ninth level spells and ten levels of Swiftblade (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/prc/20070327). That will give you some excellent combat abilities based off of Haste, including an Ex: Timestop. And if your DM will let you get Metamagic Song from Races of Stone you can have a mini-DMM to persist it all day. I think the guide for that is here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=8595585). The Bard is one of my favorite classes, but it's true that without various sourcebooks, it doesn't really come into its own.
You can't persist Innervated Speed because it isn't a spell.

[Kalaska'Agathas]

You can, however, persist Haste, which is what I intended to have persisted, not Innervated Speed. Rather, I'd like to get the extra actions, miss chance, and other benefits I receive for being under the effect of my own haste, but persisted. The ability to move and full-attack in the same round should allow you to out fight the fighter. Also, if your DM allows it, you may use bounding assault and your bonus standard action together, getting three attacks at max BAB/max BAB/max BAB-5 which may be better than a full attack.

[ericgrau]

For bards I'm a fan of not being worse than other classes. Maybe you can't do everything they do, but you don't have to be worse at what you can do. So I'd say caster over fighter. The only thing you can do as well as a fighter is trip. As a caster there are plenty of low level spells that even high level casters like to cast. Take those. You can craft magic items as well as any caster. You can skillmonkey as well as a rogue, except you pick less skills. And if you want trapfinding, it only takes 1 rogue level. You can do between battle wand healing as well as a cleric. You can UMD better than a rogue. Besides tripping a whip is also good for disarming items like spell component pouches, holy symbols, wands, etc., as these are easy disarm checks.

There are also prcs to turn you into a broken buff-monkey. In core +X buffs (including songs) are weak and only good outside combat when you have nothing better to do.