Quote Originally Posted by Draz74 View Post
If they do a "Warlord" class right, I actually think the class it will overlap with dangerously isn't the Fighter or the Cleric -- it's the Bard. The Bard's the one who's always had the schtick of "I radiate some kind of aura (not a spell) that makes my allies more effective."

I actually wouldn't mind if they basically just made the Bard a Theme/Background combination based on the Warlord class. But I don't think they'll do that, since Bard is more "iconic."
The bard's overlap is going to be with the rogue. They both tend to be the jack-of-all-trades type character. If a warlord has an aura, it's going to have a different feeling. The warlord, if done right (and I have been convinced it can be), would be best served as support - sacrificing his own actions to give the rest of the party extra actions or buffs. His flavor will be pointing out weaknesses in enemy lines and things like that which make other characters more effective. Some builds will be more hands-on, while others will be the "lazy warlord" build. They could do something like "Make an attack with disadvantage. If it hits, an ally adjacent to the creature can make an attack with advantage." Or they spend their action to let others attack on their turn. Or they spend action to give their allies advantage next turn. Any healing they do should be built around the current system, though. Instead of the cleric's CLW/HW, they should allow characters to spend hit dice while still in combat. Fits with the feel of the warlord being a non-magical healer and leader.

A bard, on the other hand, should focus on the other side of combat - debuffing enemies. Using an illusion spell to distract enemies giving them disadvantage on attacks. Using a performance aura that as a bit of range to it (20ft or 30ft) that gives +1 to hit or +1 damage or something like that. Immobilize and trip up and distract enemies. 4e was one of the only editions to make bards an actual playable useful class that made sense, and they should build on that success. Give the bard a definable role. Where they're going to overlap is with rogues and illusionists, though. They should have a lot of out-of-combat usefulness as that sort of jack of all trades, especially in social situations (which can step on a lot of rogue builds).

Both of these classes, though, should be in a sourcebook. Their usefulness is solely as support classes. They're never going to be on the front lines of a fight and it's even more true with the warlord that they're rarely going to take front and center in a story (bards at least can dominate social encounters). They're going to be best in large groups, with 6 or 8 players like the old school games used to be sometimes. When you've got more players than your one cleric can keep up with, when there's a lot of tactical options, when your wizard's a blaster build rather than a controller build or the one controller can't keep up with the hordes. Somewhere that one character frequently giving out advantage and disadvantage isn't going to completely break the game, but at the same time is going to be able to do it in critical spots to turn the tide of a battle.