Could use advice/inspiration on my bard character

[Throne12]

I got a half elf bard at lv 2 but we just leveled up and now I'm lv3 got to pick my collage. I don't know which collage to pick.

Extra info: party comp is aracokra battlemaster archer, fire genosi bladesinger wizard, custom race Rouge, dragonborn Paladin. We will be losing the dragonborn in a month or 2.

This character is a blank slate escape from a name backstory and 2lvs of bard. So can yall help me with a concept to where to take this character.

[Abracadangit]

What drove you to select Bard in the first place? I think that's a reasonable starting point.

Are you looking for mechanical advice on how to build, flavor/roleplaying advice for the character concept, or both?

[Pildion]

If your losing the paladin, then you really are playing the only face of the party. Probably want to concentrate on that aspect? But only if you like that. Play what ever subclass sounds the most fun is the best answer.

[Lavaeolus]

It can be a little hard to narrow things down: Bards are flexible and I don't know what character concepts most appeal to you. I think one good starting point would be to just skim through the colleges, see if any immediately grabs your interest, and roll with it.

You don't have to feel particularly obligated to fit the stereotypical minstrel mold, although you also don't have to buck it. To my mind, three big things about Bards compared to other classes:

1) They're skill-specialists. They get Expertise in a few skills of their choosing, and Jack of All Trades rounds them out.
2) Their spell list is varied, but shies away from direct damage. Magical Secrets gives some freedom to go outside the box, but Bard spells include enchantments, debuffs, buffs and illusions.
3) They're supportive. Exactly how much so depends on subclass and spell choice, but if nothing else they should be handing out Bardic Inspiration frequently.

So one character I played was a magical street detective. Expertise went in Investigation and Insight, I took the Urchin background and the Speak with Animals spell, and took a backseat in combat. Another Bard could be a historian: Expertise in History and Persuasion, roam the world gathering stories and determining their verifiability, use your high-Charisma to probe for information.

Some subclasses lean into a few obvious directions. Lore Bards are flexible mechanically -- three extra skills and two spells can be used to represent a lot of things -- but that historian could easily be a Lore Bard. A Valor Bard could have a history as some sort of army squad leader. Whisper Bards, meanwhile, could use their abilities to be spies, or perhaps could even try to use blackmail and extortion to start up a criminal network.

Feel free to try and think of odd, unexpected ways a Bard's abilities could be useful to different backgrounds, if that appeals.

[Nidgit]

Bard's got a lot of options. Swords Bard and Valor Bard are both melee-oriented, which could be good if your rogue doesn't hang out in melee much. Creation offers a companion, which helps out while keeping you safe. Glamour might be good since you're the only healer. Eloquence is an extremely efficient face, Whispers has a lot of interesting social abilities, and Lore is a classic. Whatever direction you want to take could work.

One option could be to plan on multiclassing Paladin down the road. Take Valor, Swords, or Whispers Bard now and focus on building your camaraderie with the paladin. Once they leave, you swear to continue on for them and pick up 2-3 Paladin levels, allowing you to Smite with your wealth of full caster slots.

[Throne12]

My stats are str10 dex14 con16 int13 wis13
cha16. I'm not new to 5e. I just have a concept for this character. My character backstory is her village was burnt to the ground she's the only survivor but lost her right arm to this attack. She was taken in by the leader of a dragon slaying group. Then he settled down open a inn and had a family and adopting me. I grew up in this inn listening to his adventures. Now it's her time to collect her own stories. So that's all I have for her and I just can't invision a build for her.

[Eldariel]

I got a half elf bard at lv 2 but we just leveled up and now I'm lv3 got to pick my collage. I don't know which collage to pick.

Extra info: party comp is aracokra battlemaster archer, fire genosi bladesinger wizard, custom race Rouge, dragonborn Paladin. We will be losing the dragonborn in a month or 2.

This character is a blank slate escape from a name backstory and 2lvs of bard. So can yall help me with a concept to where to take this character.

So this party has:
- Two competent frontliners (Bladesinger and Paladin)
- Competent secondary frontliner (Rogue)
- Competent third DPR (Battlemaster)
- A skill monkey

Meanwhile it has no support casting to speak of and the only offensive casting is on a character whose actions have rough competition in the martial inclinations of the subclass in the Bladesinger (and the Paladin but it's a half-caster with most of its resources devoted to Smiting so that's not gonna help you much). I think we've established the needs of the party pretty clearly; someone with good support casting and CC and revivification options. And the subclass that accomplishes most of this?

Well, unsurprisingly the best option for the job is the best Bard subclass period: Lore. Level 6 is much more attainable than level 10 and by level 6, having access to e.g. Conjure Animals and Revivify or Aura of Vitality and Revivify or whatever is gonna be heckuva lot better than what any other subclass can do. On top of that, on a frontline-heavy party, Cutting Words can bring tremendous value while the closest competitor, the Eloquence Bard, would mostly be boosting themself with the Unsettling Words (and it'd have to be proactive as opposed to reactive like Cutting Words, which makes CW more economic). You can also cover all the skills the Rogue doesn't; the party seems like it doesn't really have any Wis-skill specialists and Expertise in those could be nice (Perception and Insight particularly) and Cha-skill proficiencies and such would let you cover a lot of ground. Also, the party seems very stealth-capable, but doesn't have Pass without Trace; that might actually be one of my Magical Secrets.


Overall, I think the College of Lore is a very, very clear choice from party optimisation perspective when the main shortcoming of the party is shoring up the lack of restorative magic (Glamour is also okay but those extra spells, particularly Revivify and efficient downtime healing, just seem heckuva lot more important than a decent in-combat source of temporary HP, especially since you can, and probably should, just pick up Inspiring Leader on level 4 for temporary HP anyways).

[MarkVIIIMarc]

Lore is an EXCELLENT choice. It will keep you away from Melee things and let you have access to Magical Secrets early on. I have a Lore Bard character who even counterspelled our own party wizard saving the lives of all sorts of commoners.

Cutting Words is ridiculous fun also. Wait until you are all hanging in the back lines Counterspelling, giving inspiration, casting Healing Word on downed party members and then you get to use a reaction to stop some hit. Then on your turn you animate the silverware or a huge object like a house or a boat the giants are riding into shore on. OMG, the fun Animate Objects is combined with Dissonant Whispers.

Its a busy busy subclass that makes combat seem to go faster.

[Lavaeolus]

My stats are str10 dex14 con16 int13 wis13
cha16. I'm not new to 5e. I just have a concept for this character. My character backstory is her village was burnt to the ground she's the only survivor but lost her right arm to this attack. She was taken in by the leader of a dragon slaying group. Then he settled down open a inn and had a family and adopting me. I grew up in this inn listening to his adventures. Now it's her time to collect her own stories. So that's all I have for her and I just can't invision a build for her.

Question: how heavily do you want to commit to having one arm? I mean that both in terms of mechanics and flavour. I wouldn't object, were I DM, to just handwaving various limitations if this is mainly for RP, but logically it's something that would have an impact. Bows, two-handed weapons, shields: all useful things for a dragonslayer or upcoming hero, and all things that would be much harder for you to use in the heat of battle.

There are a few ways you could still justify using them, ranging from "possible" to "kinda silly, but might work in a pulp story". You could just have a prosthetic. Possibly an Artificer NPC -- perhaps a friend of your adoptive father -- could've given you a crossbow with the Repeating Shot infusion. Or you can always go the Evil Dead route, and actually be using a weapon as an impromptu prosthetic.

All Bards can use a rapier, and Swords Bards will get to use it as a spellcasting focus. Of course, you are a Bard. You can just hold a regular focus and attack with your magic, if it comes down to it. Hypothetically, if you can get shield proficiency (feat, multiclass, College of Valor), you could equip that as you attack with magic. (War Caster could be useful there, if you don't want to just handwave away somatic components.)

With that said, here are some thoughts for how a few colleges might tie in:

* Swords and Valor Bard: Both more martial-oriented Bards, and when I think dragonslayer I do think of your classic knight, although I'm sure there are smarter ways to take down a flying, fire-breathing beast. Perhaps you've yearned for adventure or felt the need to prevent any future village-destroying tragedies, but one thing's for sure: dressed in armour and sword or shield in hand, you're ready to start applying what magic you know.

* Lore Bard: You've oft-admired your father, but while you've always wanted to follow in the footsteps of him and his friends, the methods they can use and the methods you have to use are decidedly different. Adopting what martial techniques you could, you spent your free time devouring stories from visitors and reading whatever books about other heroes and dragonslayers you could get your hands on, then trying to apply that knowledge. You've picked up quite the eclectic skillset: let's hope what works in books and drunkard's tall tales works as well in reality.

* Spirits: Perhaps you never quite got over the loss of your village, but one thing's for sure: until you can finally tell them the story of how you slew their draconic killer, you're still calling on them for advice. I'll let you decide how a dragonslayer feels about your messages to the dead.

[Throne12]

Question: how heavily do you want to commit to having one arm? I mean that both in terms of mechanics and flavour. I wouldn't object, were I DM, to just handwaving various limitations if this is mainly for RP, but logically it's something that would have an impact. Bows, two-handed weapons, shields: all useful things for a dragonslayer or upcoming hero, and all things that would be much harder for you to use in the heat of battle.

There are a few ways you could still justify using them, ranging from "possible" to "kinda silly, but might work in a pulp story". You could just have a prosthetic. Possibly an Artificer NPC -- perhaps a friend of your adoptive father -- could've given you a crossbow with the Repeating Shot infusion. Or you can always go the Evil Dead route, and actually be using a weapon as an impromptu prosthetic.

All Bards can use a rapier, and Swords Bards will get to use it as a spellcasting focus. Of course, you are a Bard. You can just hold a regular focus and attack with your magic, if it comes down to it. Hypothetically, if you can get shield proficiency (feat, multiclass, College of Valor), you could equip that as you attack with magic. (War Caster could be useful there, if you don't want to just handwave away somatic components.)

With that said, here are some thoughts for how a few colleges might tie in:

* Swords and Valor Bard: Both more martial-oriented Bards, and when I think dragonslayer I do think of your classic knight, although I'm sure there are smarter ways to take down a flying, fire-breathing beast. Perhaps you've yearned for adventure or felt the need to prevent any future village-destroying tragedies, but one thing's for sure: dressed in armour and sword or shield in hand, you're ready to start applying what magic you know.

* Lore Bard: You've oft-admired your father, but while you've always wanted to follow in the footsteps of him and his friends, the methods they can use and the methods you have to use are decidedly different. Adopting what martial techniques you could, you spent your free time devouring stories from visitors and reading whatever books about other heroes and dragonslayers you could get your hands on, then trying to apply that knowledge. You've picked up quite the eclectic skillset: let's hope what works in books and drunkard's tall tales works as well in reality.

* Spirits: Perhaps you never quite got over the loss of your village, but one thing's for sure: until you can finally tell them the story of how you slew their draconic killer, you're still calling on them for advice. I'll let you decide how a dragonslayer feels about your messages to the dead.


Sorry I should of put this in. I do have a prosthetic arm. It's made out of water. My adopted father party members made it for her. They are all water based races including my father who's a sea elf. So a water arm seemed on Theme. DM was giving out special magic items or boon so I took a prosthetic arm.

[MrCharlie]

My stats are str10 dex14 con16 int13 wis13
cha16. I'm not new to 5e. I just have a concept for this character. My character backstory is her village was burnt to the ground she's the only survivor but lost her right arm to this attack. She was taken in by the leader of a dragon slaying group. Then he settled down open a inn and had a family and adopting me. I grew up in this inn listening to his adventures. Now it's her time to collect her own stories. So that's all I have for her and I just can't invision a build for her.
First, let's look at theme. The martial bard archetypes make some sense if you want to go vengeance motivated, but I don't particularly feel that. Ditto for Whispers and Glamour, neither one quite fits. Eloquence is not a real thematically appropriate archetype, even if it's the strongest Bard overall. Creation does not seem to fit either. Spirits is a wonderful pathos choice-your tragic backstory leads to you listen to not merely the stories of the living but the stories of the dead as well. Lore is a good choice if you don't want to go that route, as you are a story collector, and this is precisely what Lore bards do.

Now, from the party comp, you will have two main issues in the next two months.

First, you will lose out of one of the frontliners, and the one most likely to actually survive. The Rogue is likely going to be jumping in and out of combat, leaving a bladesinger as the only one who gets into melee and stays there, which isn't a great place for them to be. They can get away with that for a while, but not forever. It's very likely that most combats will become kite fests, leading to wasted actions as people disengage, run, or go down.

Two, you need a party face. This is really a non-issue, as any bard can do this (and will excel at it).

Being a frontliner yourself is a terrible option, before even getting into what lacking a shield does to your AC (one armed). So we ideally want a Bard archetype that can help in some other way. Summoning something is a good solution, as you do have a frontline, it's just potentially squishy. Having the option to add creatures to it when needed is a good middle ground.

Of the Bards, four archetypes have solutions to these problems.

Creation: You don't really help the frontline much at level 3, but the mote of creation on saving throws does a little bit. Once you hit level 6, you can add an animated object to the frontline, which is very helpful. Nothing really helps you act as a face.

Eloquence: Your the best damned face in the game. The only way you help the frontline is by disabling enemies with spells. Your party might have issues with disabling enemies if the bladesinger decides to go full martial instead of doing typical wizard things, but I don't anticipate this being a major problem for you in most games. Strong as Eloquence is, it doesn't really help you here that much.

Lore: Cutting words helps the frontline in the immediate short turn, although it's not a great ability to spam. If an ally is on minimal HP, this can help them avoid a killing blow. Extra spells from any school can be used to learn summoning spells, which can help pad out the parties frontline and give the rogue something to sneak attack off. Finally, extra proficiencies help you act as a face. Lore does everything you want.

Spirits: At level 3 you get few abilities that help with the frontline, but you do get a few. 2/6 of the starting spirits add temp HP, and one of the remaining ones is a good escape option. At low level using inspiration dice to get pseudo-spells is probably the best use of them given how limited your use of them is. At level 5 you get another good frontline support option from the spirits when you roll your inspiration dice (invisibility is disadvantage to being hit at the very least). Once you get level 6 you can learn summon undead or animate dead, and become a passable necromancer to pad out the frontline. Overall, it has a couple okay buffs to your frontline, probably par with Lore early but worse later.

Holistically, Lore and Spirits are both good choices. I'd pick based on if you want to go down a darker character theme or not; Spirits is pretty creepy and uses necromancy, Lore doesen't need to go down that path at all.

[Eldariel]

Eloquence is not a real thematically appropriate archetype, even if it's the strongest Bard overall.

I'd argue that for most parties, Lore is quite comfortably stronger. Getting Animate Dead/Conjure Animal/Counterspell-level Magical Secrets on tier 2 is really, really hard to compete with even with how good Unsettling Words + CC is, and Cutting Words is really good too (if something to be more used in synergies than plain CC hammering), even if slightly weaker than Unsettling Words. Unfailing Inspiration is nice but not all that powerful, and while Silver Tongue is quite strong, on a class with Enhance Ability available it's not that game-defining (Enhance Ability: Cha means you're only 20% to benefit of Silver Tongue).

[KorvinStarmast]

My stats are str10 dex14 con16 int13 wis13 cha16.
Lore is hard to beat. (I'd swap dex and con since not getting hit is nice, but YMMV).
The only thing I'd suggest is that after you get your Cha to 18 get either warcaster or resilient CON. (I have both, but then, I'm level 19 at the moment). Your party optimization and theme of a supporting caster (you are missing an arm) is a great path forward. Eldariel nailed it.
Suggest you take Cha +2 at level 4 and Warcaster at level 8. Not sure how many levels your campaign will last.

I think we've established the needs of the party pretty clearly; someone with good support casting and CC and revivification options. And the subclass that accomplishes most of this?

Well, unsurprisingly the best option for the job is the best Bard subclass period: Lore. What I'd have said.

Level 6 is much more attainable than level 10 and by level 6, having access to e.g. Conjure Animals and Revivify or Aura of Vitality and Revivify or whatever is gonna be heckuva lot better than what any other subclass can do. This, many times over, this. Revivify or counterspell are both fine choices. Conjure animals is a spell I used from level 6 to level 16 with considerable frequency. My default was two dire wolves, and in water two giant octopus. Occasionally giant eagles to fly around on or for scouting above ground. Now and again a giant constrictor snake to try and hold down a big critter.


On top of that, on a frontline-heavy party, Cutting Words can bring tremendous value
It is a fine damage avoidance with a short rest recharge.

Overall, I think the College of Lore is a very, very clear choice from party optimisation perspective when the main shortcoming of the party is shoring up the lack of restorative magic Keeping Lesser Restoration, Revivify (secret) and greater restoration (received at level 9) on tap is very useful for the party.

Lore is an EXCELLENT choice. It will keep you away from Melee things and let you have access to Magical Secrets early on. I have a Lore Bard character who even counterspelled our own party wizard saving the lives of all sorts of commoners.

Cutting Words is ridiculous fun also. :) Love your style. :smallsmile:

Sorry I should of put this in. I do have a prosthetic arm. It's made out of water. My adopted father party members made it for her. They are all water based races including my father who's a sea elf. So a water arm seemed on Theme. DM was giving out special magic items or boon so I took a prosthetic arm. Have you considered taking a level in Warlock, Fathomless, to go along with this? You don't need to, but thematically it seems to fit your approach.

[Sorinth]

Assuming you adoptive father was a martial it would make the most sense to go either Valor or Swords. Since you mentioned the paladin was going to leave the group I'd probably go with Valor. A bladesinger as the only frontliner isn't the greatest but Valor's Combat Inspiration boost to AC can really help there. You also get a better AC then Swords since you can use a shield so you can better step up when the paladin eventually leaves.

It's not the strongest build you could possibly make but I'd go Valor bard with Rapier + Shield and the best Medium Armor you can get. Focus a bit more on spellcasting, especially useful in melee spells. Dissonant Whispers, Thunderwave, Hold Person and Heat Metal are all good.

[Angelalex242]

Eloquence is for those who miss 3.5 diplomancers, and want to, "And then I talked to king into doing the naked funky chicken in the middle of the court advisors in preparation for war. Hilarious."

[MrCharlie]

I'd argue that for most parties, Lore is quite comfortably stronger. Getting Animate Dead/Conjure Animal/Counterspell-level Magical Secrets on tier 2 is really, really hard to compete with even with how good Unsettling Words + CC is, and Cutting Words is really good too (if something to be more used in synergies than plain CC hammering), even if slightly weaker than Unsettling Words. Unfailing Inspiration is nice but not all that powerful, and while Silver Tongue is quite strong, on a class with Enhance Ability available it's not that game-defining (Enhance Ability: Cha means you're only 20% to benefit of Silver Tongue).
Oh, Lore isn't as good as eloquennce-if the party is big.

Silver Tongue is often an auto-success, which means it eliminates risk. Risk elimination is much more impactful than it seems.

Unsettling words+CC isn't good, it's nearly gamebreaking. It shatters bounded accuracy. Cutting words is significantly worse than unsettling words and is too expensive for the impact outside of specific situations.1 Unfailing inspiration also has a disproportionate impact because you can use inspiration on every check that it applies to, instead of waiting for a "near" success, as wasting it is impossible. You might save it, but you are never going to choose to sleep on it because it's unlikely to work. A normal inspiration dice effectively gets maybe 30% worse because you don't want to use it until you have at least 50-50 odds, maybe even 60-40 odds.

Lore, meanwhile, gets skills that it doesn't need, and spells known picks that it already has a ton of. Sure, Bard has a few key gaps in 3rd level spells, but it has enough great options with key CC spells. Magical secrets is better here because the party is low on casters, so we need to fill gaps. Bard actually has a good number of spells known, and the gaps in their casting are situational spells. Counterspell as an example is situationally OP, but only situationally OP. Hypnotic pattern works against almost any combat.

Again-not relevant to this debate, really. In this situation, with a small, caster poor party, Lore is better.

1Cutting words is actually very good if it causes an enemy to fail the right ability check. Damage rolls are almost pointless and attack rolls are costly to use inspiration on, although it's a valid option in the right circumstance.

[KorvinStarmast]

1Cutting words is actually very good if it causes an enemy to fail the right ability check. Damage rolls are almost pointless and attack rolls are costly to use inspiration on, although it's a valid option in the right circumstance. There is no saving throw against an giant's club or axe attack. There is no saving throw against a T Rex's bite.

Stopping an attack (it can't stop crits) prevents damage - if it prevents 2d10 +6 that's a bunch of damage nobody needs to heal. As but one example for how hard enemies hit in tiers 2 and 3, Hill Giant boulders do 3d10 + 5. Hill Giants are CR 5. They throw rocks. Bigger giants throw them harder, and fire giant attacks do 6d6 + STR when using their great swords. (The list of big, hard, hits is long and distinguished).

As you go up in tiers, damage begins to have 2d8 and 3d10 and 6d6 and such.
CW causing a failed attack stops concentration checks being needed when the attack doesn't land instead of landing. I used it heavily from levels 4-15. (It has tapered off lately due to how hard INT saves are to make, and how often I lay out inspiration to party mates to help mitigate that.)

I think that you belittle CW overly much. Yes, it's an opportunity cost, but it's one of the few tools that my lore bard could occasionally use to prevent a hit on her own precious hide while she was concentrating on a buff spell. Archers like to shoot spell casters. They teach that in Mook School 101. :smalltongue:


Hypnotic pattern works against almost any combat. Until it doesn't. As you go up in level the number of charm immune enemies seems to increase. But yeah, I used the heck out of that spell. :smallsmile:

[MrCharlie]

There is no saving throw against an giant's club or axe attack. There is no saving throw against a T Rex's bite.

Stopping an attack (it can't stop crits) prevents damage - if it prevents 2d10 +6 that's a bunch of damage nobody needs to heal. As but one example for how hard enemies hit in tiers 2 and 3, Hill Giant boulders do 3d10 + 5. Hill Giants are CR 5. They throw rocks. Bigger giants throw them harder, and fire giant attacks do 6d6 + STR when using their great swords. (The list of big, hard, hits is long and distinguished).

As you go up in tiers, damage begins to have 2d8 and 3d10 and 6d6 and such.
CW causing a failed attack stops concentration checks being needed when the attack doesn't land instead of landing. I used it heavily from levels 4-15. (It has tapered off lately due to how hard INT saves are to make, and how often I lay out inspiration to party mates to help mitigate that.)

I think that you belittle CW overly much. Yes, it's an opportunity cost, but it's one of the few tools that my lore bard could occasionally use to prevent a hit on her own precious hide while she was concentrating on a buff spell. Archers like to shoot spell casters. They teach that in Mook School 101. :smalltongue:

Until it doesn't. As you go up in level the number of charm immune enemies seems to increase. But yeah, I used the heck out of that spell. :smallsmile:
Damage doesn't disable characters until the last HP. Saving throws do.

It's possible to kill people outright with HP damage, but not easy, even for a very strong enemy. Even those that are capable of it usually do it through a combination of multiple attacks and saving throws. In contrast, a single AOE save can instantly incapacitate the entire party or completely neutralize a party member without high level magic. In the math of combat, a 1 minute stun is the same as doing their entire hit point pool of damage.

Also, recovering from damage is fixable with 1st level spells and bonus actions. Recovering from conditions can require up to 6th level magic, some states have no recovery mechanism, and it's almost universally an action to cast those spells.

The only reason cutting words should ever see use is because some enemies, like T-Rexes, deal obscene quantities of damage with only one attack (maximized value), and some monsters don't trigger saving throws. But, in truth, those enemies are almost universally road bumps. And in the T-Rexes case, specifically, I could unsettling words its +1 wis save down to, on average, a -3, then hit it with a hypnotic pattern that has between a 0-10% failure chance now. It isn't doing any damage once that happens.

Otherwise, giving out the dice used to cutting words as inspiration before combat is a better use of the dice and your actions.

(There is also a smaller sub-suite of monsters that attack, then trigger some godawful saving throw as a rider-blocking the attack is obviously preferable).

[Eldariel]

It is a fine damage avoidance with a short rest recharge.

It's also a superb Grapple-ensurer, a fine anti-Counterspell/Dispel, a solid illusion booster, a great Telekinesis/Bigby's enhancer, etc. You can build around it by playing into effects that require ability checks from the enemy quite efficiently. In this party, grapple/prone is obviously the most likely use. And the more of those DMG maneuvers like disarm and such are used, the better of course.


Oh, Lore isn't as good as eloquennce-if the party is big.

Silver Tongue is often an auto-success, which means it eliminates risk. Risk elimination is much more impactful than it seems.

Unsettling words+CC isn't good, it's nearly gamebreaking. It shatters bounded accuracy. Cutting words is significantly worse than unsettling words and is too expensive for the impact outside of specific situations.1 Unfailing inspiration also has a disproportionate impact because you can use inspiration on every check that it applies to, instead of waiting for a "near" success, as wasting it is impossible. You might save it, but you are never going to choose to sleep on it because it's unlikely to work. A normal inspiration dice effectively gets maybe 30% worse because you don't want to use it until you have at least 50-50 odds, maybe even 60-40 odds.

Well, Unsettling Words adds a good bunch to spell reliability, which is great, but ultimately those spells are still plenty reliable and you generally still want to multitarget them regardless of whether you use Unsettling Words or not, which cuts to its practical value somewhat (you still get the biggest guy of course). But don't get me wrong, it's great, I just think it's much more great to get minionmancy on a Bard on level 6 (y'know, the best thing on the game?) while Unsettling Words is "only" supergood. Though on 3-5 I would obviously rate Eloquence over Lore. But on 6-9? Lore all the way. Nothing quite like getting a ton of extra actions and disposable bodies on the field taking hits for you and either doing damage or CCing enemies.

[MrCharlie]

Well, Unsettling Words adds a good bunch to spell reliability, which is great, but ultimately those spells are still plenty reliable and you generally still want to multitarget them regardless of whether you use Unsettling Words or not, which cuts to its practical value somewhat (you still get the biggest guy of course). But don't get me wrong, it's great, I just think it's much more great to get minionmancy on a Bard on level 6 (y'know, the best thing on the game?) while Unsettling Words is "only" supergood. Though on 3-5 I would obviously rate Eloquence over Lore. But on 6-9? Lore all the way. Nothing quite like getting a ton of extra actions and disposable bodies on the field taking hits for you and either doing damage or CCing enemies.
If minionmancy truly were the strongest thing in the game, creation bard would be better than either. Lore picks spells that let them make minions, creation makes minions directly.

What makes minionmancy not that great is that A. Some minions are weak enough that their actions don't matter (Zombies for instance-they are great for holding space, but they aren't good for their attacks) and B. Most good minions take concentration, and that means you aren't doing something else with your own action.

Creation is actually a good archetype because it fixes B, but mediocre because its other features are situational (but great if they do matter). Lore doesn't, and because Bard can already use CC with its concentration (the actual best thing in the game), it's a wash. Again, in this situation, minionmancy is great. Otherwise-you're better going in on what makes Bard good instead of adding more options.

[KorvinStarmast]

Damage doesn't disable characters until the last HP. Saving throws do. Not being hit is better than being hit, sometimes. Your all or nothing assumption is false. Each combat is not the same.
Example.
I have three other party members with bardic inspiration and I have a buff spell on them that requires concentration, or slow on the enemy that needs concentration. Using CW to not get hit means my buff of debuff stays up. That is but one example of many. After level 5, it recharges on a short rest. Your blinders are on. Might want to adjust them.

@Eldariel: when BI is up on an ally, yeah, it can help a grapple or to defeat a grapple. Does nothing for my lore bard, though, until level 14. :smallwink:

[Eldariel]

@Eldariel: when BI is up on an ally, yeah, it can help a grapple or to defeat a grapple. Does nothing for my lore bard, though, until level 14. :smallwink:

You can Cutting Words an opponent's resist vs. an ally's check.

[KorvinStarmast]

You can Cutting Words an opponent's resist vs. an ally's check. True. :smallsmile: I only recall having done that once ever. I am glad you mentioned that, as I have a lore bard player who likes tips for how to use BI. I'll pass this along to him since I do not recall discussing that with him previously, and there may be some intimidation checks in the near future once we start back up in that campaign.