Bardbarian how do I make one?

[King-Strawberry]

I've heard mention of bardbarians before, but haven't been able to find any sample builds. You guys must have a couple.

[Coidzor]

Well, one option is to make a warblade that captures the feel of the barbarian, and take 4 levels of bard and the feat song of the white raven and any and all inspire courage op (Endarire's Handbook on the subject (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=9830)) that you can, and you're gold. Also known as the Bardblade. A level or two of Barbarian in there can be fun as well.

Another is to be a barbarian type and then take a level of Warrior Skald/multiclass into Bard for about 4 levels and then progress through War Chanter. Using song twisting and either lingering song or a crystal echoblade, you can have the songs last for more than long enough even if you can't power the bardic music after going into a rage.

Even a dip of whirling frenzy barbarian with the lion spirit totem (spirit lion totem?) ACF for pounce on an otherwise pure bard character can, with or without the extra rage feat, be a pretty mean customer.

I can't think of any noteworthy sample builds I've seen on the subject though, sorry.

[Answerer]

The basic idea would seem to be to use various Barbarian ACFs that offer more attacks (plus the big one that offers Pounce so you can use them), and combining those with the Bard's various ways of getting bonus damage. The obvious is Inspire Courage, or, better, Dragonfire Inspiration. Silverbrow Human becomes the go-to choice here, as it often does for Bards, since they can take Dragonfire Inspiration at level 1 as a bonus feat. But there are also things like Crystal Echoblades or whatever, various items that boost IC.

A major question will become whether or not you want to go for Words of Creation. Since it doubles your IC bonuses, you need to be very sure that your group (or, perhaps more importantly, your DM) is ready to handle that. In some groups the feat is necessary just to keep up as a Bard; in other groups, it's terribly overpowering.


Oh, and Snowflake Wardance is awesome.