[3.5] Castery bard build advice needed!

[Jamhands]

Hello all, I've been lurking in these forums for some time, reading posts, learning what I can, and thanks to this board and other sources have come up with a preliminary build for a caster bard.

1-5 Bard
6-9 Lyric Thaumaturge (raising Bard)
10 Virtuoso (raising Bard)
11-12 Sublime Chord
13-20 Virtuoso (raising Sublime Chord)

I'll stop there, as while the game may go past lv20, it will be some time before we reach that point.

Feats are as follows:

Lvl 1: Melodic Casting, Extra Music, Chaos Music
Lvl 3: Song of the Heart
Lvl 6: Leadership
Lvl 7 (LT): Captivating Melody
Lvl 9: Haunting Melody
Lvl 12: Lyric Spell
Lvl 15: Doomspeak
Lvl 18: Versatile Spellcaster

Dragonfire Inspiration is off-limits as per the DM's guidelines. Words of Creation is a possible later-game addition if I take my character from Chaotic Neutral to Chaotic Good, which is the plan at this time. Other than that, all supplemental books for 3.5 and Dragon Magazines are acceptable source material.

My understanding is that taking Bard to lv5 with the Chaos Music feat will allow for Suggestion/Inspire Greatness.

Our DM is not into super-hardcore battle difficulty, and the rest of the party has damage pretty well handled. My goals are buffing and CC, along with creative solutions for avoiding battles altogether, and having a sneaky/covert flavor overall.

Hmm, this was quite a long post. So, the main questions are:

1. PrC's are pretty well set, unless there's a glaring issue I'm missing. I like having the extra spells from LT and don't mind not getting Virtuoso 10 until lv21. Are there any glaring issues that I'm missing?

2. Feats are somewhat set in that I like the ones I have listed but I am open to suggestions. Are familiars worth the feat cost (preferably from someone who has used them)? I also like the idea of Subsonics but don't know if it's worthwhile in real gameplay.

3. Useful skill tricks... some of them definitely look interesting. Are they worth getting (keeping in mind the high prerequisites of Sublime Chord by lv11)?

4. Spell selection is up in the air at this time, as I haven't looked closely at the lists yet. Given the preferences listed earlier in the post, are there any spells that should be no-doubters, and are there any that look better than they turn out to be? Also I'm looking for a few nice damage spells from the Sorc/Wiz list to incorporate at higher lvls. I've heard good things about Cone of Cold.

This is my first time playing 3.5 and after only the first session I am very excited to continue. Thanks in advance for everyone's replies and assistance!

-Jamhands

[Juntao112]

Leadership
Don't go there. That way lies madness. I strongly suggest you get rid of Leadership, and replace it with the very useful, but far less broken, feat Obtain Familiar.

While we're on the subject of feats, I'd swap Versatile Spellcaster and Doomspeak, if you're going to level up to 20. I think the benefit of VS outweighs that of DS.

Incidentally, DS requires 8 ranks in a cross-class skill - quite a hefty investment. Virtuoso grants it as a class skill, but requires 4 ranks. It is possible to gain Intimidate as a class skill via the Apprentice (http://dndtools.eu/feats/dungeon-masters-guide-ii--40/Apprentice--3265/) feat or buy it at normal cost via the Able Learner feat (http://dndtools.eu/feats/races-of-destiny--81/able-learner--16/). If you want to do this, lose Extra Music.

Actually, lose Extra Music anyways. Its benefits scale poorly with level.


2. Feats are somewhat set in that I like the ones I have listed but I am open to suggestions. Are familiars worth the feat cost (preferably from someone who has used them)?


Skills
For each skill in which either the master or the familiar has ranks, use either the normal skill ranks for an animal of that type or the master’s skill ranks, whichever are better. In either case, the familiar uses its own ability modifiers. Regardless of a familiar’s total skill modifiers, some skills may remain beyond the familiar’s ability to use.

Ravens can speak one language of their master's choice as a supernatural ability.

If you obtain a raven familiar, your party has another skillmonkey. Think of the possibilities.


4. Spell selection is up in the air at this time, as I haven't looked closely at the lists yet. Given the preferences listed earlier in the post, are there any spells that should be no-doubters, and are there any that look better than they turn out to be? Also I'm looking for a few nice damage spells from the Sorc/Wiz list to incorporate at higher lvls. I've heard good things about Cone of Cold.
Forget everything you have heard. The only blasting spells that exist in D&D as far as you are concerned are Orbs, Wings of Flurry, Streamers, Melf's Unicorn Arrow, Disintegrate, Enervation, Avasculate, and Maw of Chaos.

[Socratov]

don't forget the ultimate panic button: Wings of Cover (sorc only, but you get the list so you can use it)

for the rest, glibness is a must have, and for damage you'd like to look into shivering touch/shocking grasp (whichever was the dragonkiller).

About feats, no subsonics, it's a trap. get some form of metamagic or something.

As for skilltricks, fill in your prerequisites first, then select the Jack of all tradesBardic Knack ACF (no bardic knowledge, but half level in every skill as virtual ranks) and get skilltricks that are interesting:


Conceal spellcasting
false theurgy
magical appraisal
swift concentration
assume quirk
second impression
social recovery


the first few are great for spellcasting, the rest are great for social situations (and you are a bard, so you need stuff to help you be social)

optional is collector of stories if knowledges are your thing...

[Juntao112]

Bardic Knack works great with the Jack of All Trades (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#jackOfAllTrades) feat.

[Socratov]

Bardic Knack works great with the Jack of All Trades (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#jackOfAllTrades) feat.

Oops, I meant the bardic knack (brain derp, sorry)

[Jamhands]

Thanks for the quick replies! Heading to bed and will check them closely in the morning, but looks very helpful so far.

-J

[Jamhands]

Some great suggestions here. A few replies:

Leadership => Obtain Familiar... Having read up a bit more on the brokenness of Leadership I see what you're saying. Any additional feats I should spend on the familiar?

Bardic Knowledge => Bardic Knack with Jack of All Trades... I certainly see the benefit of skill points across the board, especially for skill tricks. This is more of a flavor issue with me, in that I like the idea of a bard having "bardic knowledge" about a situation. It may be worth it to switch despite that, but I am willing to accept a bit of weakness in that regard, as long as it's not a huge loss.

Doomsong => Versatile Performer... I must have missed the steep cost of Doomsong, this seems like a pretty clear choice.

I am planning to spec out of extra music fairly early, but it will be nice to get the extra attempts in the early lvls.

So it seems like I'll have some room for other feats, what are some good metamagic feats I could use?

-J

[Socratov]

Jack of alltrades and bardic knowledge: if you take the collector of stories trick and bardic knack with jack of all trades you can easily have the same results of bardic knowledge (result wise). What would be even better is to take Able learner instead of jack of all trades. Now you can consider every skill a class skill when it comes to spending points. Your level should be adequate for the obscure skills and you can spend all other skillpoints into skill you really need full, for prerequisites and for skilltricks. It does take a feat early on, but it goves so much in return...

[MirddinEmris]

Lyric Thaumaturge require for you to have 9 ranks in perform, therefore you can't take before taking 6 levels on bard