[3.5] A Bard's Best Spells

[Morgarion]

I'm thinking about building a bard and I wanted a little advice on picking spells. Since, as the SRD explicitly notes 'a bard's spell selection is extremely limited', I thought I might consider ahead of time what I would, ideally, be choosing for the selection at each spell level.

So, if you had a level 20 Bard, what spells would they know? What order would you have learned them in? Critically, should you take all the Cure Wounds spells at each level? If so, would you keep them permanently or swap them out as you get better ones?

[Psyren]

Nah, wands can handle the cure spells just fine, especially a wand of cure light wounds (the most healing per gold in core.)

Have you checked the Handbook? (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/08/bards-handbook.html) Great spell selections there.

[Vaz]

Glibness is about one of the best spells in the game.

*Guard catches up with a trouserless bard, with a willy in his hand, bloodied dagger in the other*
"Did you kill the queen, castrate the king and then waggle your naked bumcheeks at the ambassador?"
"No."
"Okay then. See you!"

[Invader]

Generally references to *edited* in any context aren't appreciated by a large part of the forums. :smalleek:

[TaiLiu]

Generally references to rape in any context aren't appreciated by a large part of the forums. :smalleek:
Hm? All I'm seeing is a typical part of the murderer-hobo lifestyle.

Wait, it was edited. My apologies.

[demigodus]

Glibness is about one of the best spells in the game.

*Guard catches up with a trouserless bard, with a willy in his hand, bloodied dagger in the other*
"Did you kill the queen, castrate the king and then waggle your naked bumcheeks at the ambassador?"
"No."
"Okay then. See you!"

Extremely unbelievable and the guard getting in serious trouble for letting you go would give you a -30 penalty.

So Glibness EXACTLY cancels out the circumstancial penalty from the circumstance described above.

Now if you also have bluff maximized and have a decent CHA, than yes your odds are VERY good of getting away with this.

[nyjastul69]

Inspirational Boost (CAd) is a good 1st level spell.

[Der_DWSage]

There's a handbook for this situation. (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8284)

For future reference, questions like this have generally already been shuffled away into handbooks like that one above. A quick google of '[Insert Class Here] Handbook' will generally get you a pretty good result.

Incidentally, I have some votes for Shadow Conjuration and Shadow Evocation, Glibness, Irresistible Dance, Glitterdust, and Modify Memory.

[Invader]

Hm? All I'm seeing is a typical part of the murderer-hobo lifestyle.

Wait, it was edited. My apologies.

It was edited out :smallwink:

[A_S]

If 3.0 material is allowed, Fanfare is pretty dang broken. 1d4 round AoE stun with no save, not mind-affecting.

*edit* It's from Song and Silence.

[Kennisiou]

Something the handbook doesn't mention is that sleep is a really powerful spell for the first level or two of the game. If you aren't going to be taking a lot of other early game spells that you plan to get rid of later with trade-ins and are starting at level one, sleep is a really solid spell.

[ArcturusV]

I'd go with Silent Image, Minor Image, Major Image, etc, myself.

Reason being: Illusions are something that's not exactly clear cut in how they work. A lot of more or less depends on "Does your DM like what you're doing?" I'll admit. Worst case scenario they are barely effective as a single turn concealment. Best case scenario a level 1 spell just bypassed or trivialized an entire encounter.

But what makes Bards better "Illusionists" (And not Shadow Casters or Invisible Stalkers) than other options is that the Bard does get all the "Face" skills right out of the box on top of being fairly Charisma SAD (Unlike the Beguiler's Int base). Makes for a good, easy way to convince you DM to let things work out a bit more in your favor. Illusion + Good Set up + Successful Bluff Check = Almost certain to have a DM roll with it.

[Killer Angel]

Glibness is about one of the best spells in the game.

*Guard catches up with a trouserless bard, with a willy in his hand, bloodied dagger in the other*
"Did you kill the queen, castrate the king and then waggle your naked bumcheeks at the ambassador?"
"No."
"Okay then. See you!"

Glibness is a great spell, and I would always take it, but "a successful Bluff check indicates that the target reacts as you wish, at least for a short time (usually 1 round or less) or believes something that you want it to believe".
Unless you're going into epic, a skill doesn't work as the suggestion spell.

[Socratov]

Something the handbook doesn't mention is that sleep is a really powerful spell for the first level or two of the game. If you aren't going to be taking a lot of other early game spells that you plan to get rid of later with trade-ins and are starting at level one, sleep is a really solid spell.
same goes for Tasha's Hideous Laughter. I have literally trivialized encounters with this spell at lvl 4 where we could just pick off the enemies one by one.

Edit: that is exactly what glibness does, it helps you achieve those epic DC's. Besides that, bluff requires you to tell a lie (the 'no' part) and have another person believe it. So pop glibness, get -30 for circumstances (they cancel each other out) and you still have HD+3 skillranks and at the least +4 Cha to beat hte guard's sense motive. And a guard shouldn't put his highest abilities in wisdom anyway so you'll be hard pressed to lose that bluff check.

[Saintheart]

Sirine's Grace + Fugue. First give yourself a +8 to your Perform checks, then mindblast the enemy with the results keying off your Perform check. :smallcool:

[ericgrau]

The best spells are the same as wizard spells mostly. Illusions, glitterdust, haste. The difference is the stuff bard gets early, like heroism, and bard only stuff, like glibness.

Single target enchantments are nice too with a ton of clever work and preparation: bringing a charmed friend to another fight, trickery, etc. But generally they're inferior in combat without preparation due to immunities, those passing saves and SR. Boosting direct damage from allies is usually faster and more reliable on average. Not saying they can't work in direct combat and that there aren't stories of lucky failed saves, but that there are better combat options. And the buffs, mass ones and no save ones are exceptions too.

[Fax Celestis]

Improvisation from Spell Compendium. 1st level. Get a floating pool of free +1s equal to twice your CL, burn these into boosts whenever you want for the duration of the spell, up to a maximum of half your CL in one burst. Pretty awesome.

[Vaz]

It was edited out :smallwink:

Does that not mean you should kindly do the same? Regarding the PM? :smallwink: