Need advice for playing a bard

[Da Beast]

I'm making a third level bard for a new campaign but I'm having trouble deciding on feats, spells, and maybe a prestige class. I've never played a bard before and if anyone has some advice it'd be appreciated.

Edit: I've already decided on song of the heart from the Eberron Campaign Setting and I was probably going to take the bardic knack variant from PHB2.

[kpenguin]

What bards are best at is being the party face.

Max out your Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Sense Motive, etc.

[Chronicled]

Bards can be good at whatever you want them to be. If you want to focus on bardic song, Warchanter and Virtuoso are good PrCs, while Song of the Heart (ECS) and Versatile Performer are great feats. If you'd like to focus on spells, look into the Sublime Chord from Complete Arcane. There's all sorts of bard melee builds, depending on your taste. Regardless, wait for Ocato to chip in; he's the resident bard expert.

[Da Beast]

I've already got those down except for intimidate. Bardic knack gives up bardic knowledge to treat any skill (still need at least one rank for trained skills) as if it had at least half your level rounded up in ranks so spending points in cross class skills is kind of pointless. I've got an 18 in intelligence (rolled very well) and we play with a house rule that gives half elves bonus skills like a human so lots of points to spend.

[Townopolis]

There's a feat in Cmage that lets you use perform in place of concentration and allows you to cast spells without interrupting your bard song: Melodic Casting

If you want to be melee, look for Snowflake Wardance in Frostburn or possibly Battle Dancer in PHBII, but battle dancer isn't that great. Also good for melee, between wardance and battle dancer, is Arcane Strikein the Cwarrior, but that's probably better later on.

If you dip into a class that gives medium armor proficiency, my recommendation for this would be barbarian or warblade, you can take Battle Caster from Carcane to give you spellcasting in breastplate and later, and much more enticingly, mithril full plate.

If you want to focus on spells, the Lyric Thaumaturge PRC from Cmage is a nice blaster, Fochlucan Lyrist from Carcane (I think) blends druidic and bardic abilities nicely.

For a nice edge, check out Cscoundrel for nice utility feats like Sound of Silence. And, of course, you can't forget Extra Music, not sure what book that's from.

That's all I have for now.

[Totally Guy]

Write poems featuring concepts of the campaign.

The dark lord has a mechanical army, write about how the villagers fear it. A human army, write them a drinking song that you might have overheard.

Give yourself a rhyming backstory or summation of the previous session. Rhyme your current plan, "once we get the legendary macguffin, the dark lords plans will fall to nothing"

You get bonus points if you can find a natural roleplaying reason to burst into song. A companion questions the point of the adventure and needs plot exposition. A new member joins the party and needs introduction.

Of course you'd want to get bonus XP for this. So see if you can set a precedent with the DM. Songs are usually good for the campaign in a suspension of disbelief kind of way.

[nerulean]

Melodic casting is probably the most useful feat a bard can take if you want to do anything in combat other than say, "I keep singing".

The most useful spell I've encountered when playing a bard is Miser's envy. It's a second level spell in the spell compendium, and will make one enemy of your choice attack another enemy of your choice. Don't forget Inspirational boost to up your inspire courage.

[marjan]

If you're taking bardic knack you should consider Jack Of All Trades from CAd. It will let you treat all trained-only skills as if they had 0.5 ranks in it. Though with your int you could just put 0.5 ranks in them and save the feat.

[Sucrose]

If you have an 18 in Intelligence, I'm guessing that you have lesser physical ability scores. While a Bard can do melee, he has to have the stats for it, so if you lack those, expect to hit a fair amount less than your allies, and get knocked out more frequently.

If your party lacks another skillmonkey, getting good Hide and Move Silently scores might be in your best interests.

A Wand of Cure Light Wounds will let you serve as backup healer in a pinch, and take some of the pressure off of your divine caster, allowing him to prep more fun spells.

The Warchanter from Complete Warrior is pretty strong in physical combat, if you don't care at all about spells.

Oh, and use bardic music at every opportunity. Both Inspire Courage and Suggestion (when you get it in a few levels) are very useful.

Power Attack is a good feat for combat bards. I've always thought that an elven bard could do good damage as an archer, if you prefer that route. In that case, Point Blank, Precise, and Rapid Shots are a must.

[Zenos]

Get a whip and masterwork manacles

Now, seriously, use your illusions to some effect, imitate you summoning rful creatures so the monsters think you're a powerful battle sorcerer or something.

Just my suggestions.

But get whip and manacles.

[Da Beast]

The party is made up of a shape shift variant druid, a knight and me so I'm trying to focus more on skills and spell casting than combat. My stats are str 10 dex 16 con 14 int 18 wis 13 cha 18 so I don't have much to work with for melee combat. Jack of all trades is a good idea, that will free up the skill points I need for spell craft to take melodic casting which will free up even more skill points.

[CactusAir]

SUBLIME CHORD. It makes bards awesome. No longer do you have to agonize over the pathetically few 6th levels pells you get... now you can have Irresistable Dance, Dirge, Heroes Feast, Project Image, Greater Scrying and Veil.. no more pick and choose.

Bard9/virtuoso1/Sublime chord2/Virtuoso+8 is a basic build.

If you want more bells/whistles, i like

Bard6/Paladin of Freedom2/Virtuoso2/Sublime chord2/Virtuoso+8.

[Miles Invictus]

Melodic casting is probably the most useful feat a bard can take if you want to do anything in combat other than say, "I keep singing".

Lingering Song causes the effects of Inspire Courage/Greatness/Heroics to last for a minute after you stop singing. It's not as strong as Melodic Casting, but it permits a wider range of actions.

[cupkeyk]

Intimidate is not on your skill list but you can get Martial Study(any devoted spirit maneuver) from TOB to put it there. I prefer Vanguard Strike. You hit the opponent in melee and all allies get +4 to hit against said foe. Fits the buffer theme well. Why have intimidate? You need 8 ranks to get Doomspeak which lets you burn a use of bardic music and give a baddie a -10 to all rolls for one round. It's not mind affecting which greatly expands your repertoire. Demoralizing foes is also a good idea; the skill trick Never Outnumbered from CSc lets you do this to all foes you threaten once per encounter. If you are holding a whip, that's a lot of people.

[nerulean]

Lingering Song causes the effects of Inspire Courage/Greatness/Heroics to last for a minute after you stop singing. It's not as strong as Melodic Casting, but it permits a wider range of actions.

Even while using bardic music that doesn’t require concentration, a bard cannot cast spells, activate magic items by spell completion (such as scrolls), or activate magic items by magic word (such as wands).

Those are the only restrictions made on what you can't do while you've got a bardic music ability up. You can still attack and do whatever else as normal. Melodic Casting specifically allows you to cast spells and activate magic items by both spell completion or command word, so it's got it all covered. The only situation I've ever come across where I would rather have had Lingering Song than Melodic Casting is when I wanted to sing, then go invisible while still providing the benefits around someone with a high listen check. It's a fairly situational weakness to what is otherwise a very fine feat.