New to PF, building a Bard

[Protato]

I was going to be playing a Pathfinder campaign where the party is tasked by a Rahadoumian mercenary/treasure hunter named Phaeth Plutaern to destabilize a tyrannical government in Azir called the Covenant. The Covenant began as a thief guild but have sense grown in power, and we also have to figure out how they got their power. We start in Riddleport and will be travelling to Rahadoum through various means. My character's a Human Bard named Erik, a nobleman kicked out of his house by political enemies drumming up charges and assassinating his character as he enjoyed spending time away from politics. In an attempt to regain some standing (and have stories to tell...and meet lovers) he accepts the job. With a lot of pride, a rose between his teeth, and a weapon at his side, Erik looks to make history.

With setting out of the way comes build. We're using a 20 point buy and begin at level 1, and I allocated his stats as: 8 Str/16 Dex/14 Con/12 Int/8 Wis/16 Chr. Weapons are Rapier, Dagger, Sap, Club and a Sling (the last two because they're free and having multiple damage types could be useful). I took the Feats Weapon Finesse and Lingering Performance. Traits are Vain, Ancestral Weapon (on the Rapier), Prince, and Witty Repartee. For Skills I put 1 point into: Bluff, Knowledge Arcana, Knowledge History, Perform Guitar/Strings, Perform Oration, Stealth, and Use Magic Device. Spells include: Dancing Lights, Ghost Sound, Prestidigitation, Detect Magic, Saving Finale, and Silent Image. I didn't use any archetype. Also worth noting, only one other player has joined so far out of the five the DM wants so far, and they're playing a Ratfolk Poisoner Rouge.

Having not played any edition other than 5e, I know not how good my build is. I was mostly wondering, what archetypes might be worth taking and why, if my numbers and feats are good, and any other information I should consider while building my character before the game begins.

Edit on 10/24. Build has changed. The 8th post on this thread has the updated build information.

[Kurald Galain]

Your stats and traits are fine. For skills, at low level you basically want to put one point into everything that's a class skill (and possibly into anything dex- or cha-based that's trained-only, even if it's not a class skill) and then at moderate levels you pick your favorite skills and maximize those. Note that your Versatile Performance ability gives you diplomacy and sense motive for free. I suggest picking up one offensive spell (and note that you can buy extra L1 spells for 1000 gp each).

Archetypes are a lot about flavor, so look into a couple that match your background. For example, since you're a (former) noble, archetypes like Arbiter, Arcane Duelist, Court Bard, or Negotiator may be fitting. It also depends on whether you want to see your main role as a frontliner, or a ranged attacker, to buff and/or heal the party, or to lockdown enemies. HTH!

[Firest Kathon]

Be careful with your strength, though. With STR 8 your light load is 26lb. A chain shirt weighs 25lb, a rapier weights 2 lb, so you're already medium loaded. It will be some time before you can afford a mithril chain shirt, so your options are:

Wear armor with less protection (even leather armor weighs 15 lb)
Get some strength-enhancing items (e.g. masterwork backpack, muleback cords), but those aren't cheap either
Accept it (Reduced speed, -3 armor check penalty; the max dex +3 is not relevant to you yet)

[Geddy2112]

Looks really solid.

Run retraining by your DM. Unless you trade away versatile performance in an archetype you will eventually replace a lot of your skills with performances. However, you don't want to go half or more of the campaign without ranks in them. So when you get another versatile performance, see if your DM would be cool using the retraining rules to move skill ranks in those skills that are replaced either into said perform, or some other skill. Likewise, this might influence your trait choices a bit, so see if the trait bonus for diplomacy will carry for perform(oratory) or if you can retrain traits.

If you keep versatile performance, bracers of the glib entertainer are a really good item to boost your skill checks. Also glibness once a day as an SLA is very strong.

[Protato]

Be careful with your strength, though. With STR 8 your light load is 26lb. A chain shirt weighs 25lb, a rapier weights 2 lb, so you're already medium loaded. It will be some time before you can afford a mithril chain shirt, so your options are:

Wear armor with less protection (even leather armor weighs 15 lb)
Get some strength-enhancing items (e.g. masterwork backpack, muleback cords), but those aren't cheap either
Accept it (Reduced speed, -3 armor check penalty; the max dex +3 is not relevant to you yet)


Hm, I also have a -1 to melee damage and I want to be a melee bard. Would you say I can still be okay at that? If not, should I bump my Str using my racial and/or reduce my Int or something?

[Kurald Galain]

Hm, I also have a -1 to melee damage and I want to be a melee bard. Would you say I can still be okay at that?

Absolutely, for instance with the Dawnflower Dervish archetype.

[Protato]

Absolutely, for instance with the Dawnflower Dervish archetype.

Hm, the problem with that is it doesn't quite fit his flavor. Are there any other options? Also, how might a Bard go about getting Dex mod damage? Is Dex all that important? I believe his AC is 14 and while that's fairly low in 5e, I don't know if it is in PF.

[CharonsHelper]

Be careful with your strength, though. With STR 8 your light load is 26lb. A chain shirt weighs 25lb, a rapier weights 2 lb, so you're already medium loaded. It will be some time before you can afford a mithril chain shirt, so your options are:

Wear armor with less protection (even leather armor weighs 15 lb)
Get some strength-enhancing items (e.g. masterwork backpack, muleback cords), but those aren't cheap either
Accept it (Reduced speed, -3 armor check penalty; the max dex +3 is not relevant to you yet)


Or just take the Muscle of the Society trait. It makes you count as having a higher STR for carry capacity.


Hm, I also have a -1 to melee damage and I want to be a melee bard. Would you say I can still be okay at that? If not, should I bump my Str using my racial and/or reduce my Int or something?

I'd suggest just grabbing Fencing Grace ASAP. If you drop Lingering Performance for the time being and take Weapon Focus: Rapier, you can get Fencing Grace at level 3. That with a buckler and wade in.

If you want to focus upon melee/buffing - I would suggest dropping your CHA down to 14 to get your DEX up to 18. A 14 CHA is plenty if you aren't worrying about DCs very much.

With an 18 DEX, studded leather, and a buckler your level 1 AC will be a solid 18. (Halflings are actually probably the best melee bards due to stats & boosted to hit/ac/saves :belkar: but they can't get Fencing Grace until level 5 which can suck)

I'm actually not a big fan of bard archetypes generally. Some are solid - but they often give up what I consider core reasons to play a bard (such as Bardic Knowledge).

But - your base build is solid. It depends how much you want to optimize.

[Protato]

I was going to be playing a Pathfinder campaign where the party is tasked by a Rahadoumian mercenary/treasure hunter named Phaeth Plutaern to destabilize a tyrannical government in Azir called the Covenant. The Covenant began as a thief guild but have sense grown in power, and we also have to figure out how they got their power. We start in Riddleport and will be travelling to Rahadoum through various means. My character's a Human Bard named Erik, a nobleman kicked out of his house by political enemies drumming up charges and assassinating his character as he enjoyed spending time away from politics. In an attempt to regain some standing (and have stories to tell...and meet lovers) he accepts the job. With a lot of pride, a rose between his teeth, and a weapon at his side, Erik looks to make history.

With setting out of the way comes build. We're using a 20 point buy and begin at level 1, and I allocated his stats as: 8 Str/16 Dex/14 Con/12 Int/8 Wis/16 Chr. Weapons are Rapier, Dagger, Sap, Club and a Sling (the last two because they're free and having multiple damage types could be useful). I took the Feats Weapon Finesse and Lingering Performance. Traits are Vain, Ancestral Weapon (on the Rapier), Prince, and Witty Repartee. For Skills I put 1 point into: Bluff, Knowledge Arcana, Knowledge History, Perform Guitar/Strings, Perform Oration, Stealth, and Use Magic Device. Spells include: Dancing Lights, Ghost Sound, Prestidigitation, Detect Magic, Saving Finale, and Silent Image. I didn't use any archetype. Also worth noting, only one other player has joined so far out of the five the DM wants so far, and they're playing a Ratfolk Poisoner Rouge.

Having not played any edition other than 5e, I know not how good my build is. I was mostly wondering, what archetypes might be worth taking and why, if my numbers and feats are good, and any other information I should consider while building my character before the game begins.

I've since changed some things around with this. Stats are now: 12 Str/16 Dex/Con 12/11 Int/10 Wis/16+2 Chr. Traits are now Ancestral Weapon, Inspire and Two World Magic (Message). Feats are still the same. I might go Bard 2/Swashbuckler 1 for my third character level so I can get finesse/focus an take Slashing Grace. I think I'll be allowed to change my level one Finesse to Arcane Strike once I go Swashbuckler. I also changed my Perform Strings to Perform Comedy for more versatility. We also have more party members now. One is playing an owl-flavored Tengu (they don't know what class to be as there's a lot, but they might go Cleric) and another is going Undyne Swashbuckler. With all that in mind, is there anything else that can be done to improve my build?