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I am new to 4e and looking for help to optimize a bard in a party composed of a human wizard, shifter rogue, and goliath warden. I was planning on creating a human cunning bard. I particularly like the unlimited multiclassing available for bards and wanted to exploit that to its fullest potential. It seems to me that such multiclassing can greatly expand the roles with which this bard can fill.
Mechanically I am looking for versatility w/o futility. In other words, I want the character to be able to fill different roles but not so poorly that his filling them is pointless.
First I am torn between human, half elf, and gnome. The half-elven paragon feat converting his multiclassed at-will encounter power to an at-will power seems amazing. The gnomish feat that gives +1 to attack and dmg with charm powers equally seems REALLY good. Of course, the human extra feat allows that many more multiclassing feats.
Mechanical suggestions would be most appreciated.
Current stats: 13,13,13,14,17,18 (arrange as desired - I actually rolled these!)
The other aspect is the image of the character. If you remember Hauer from Fatal Fury, that is the personality I am going for - 'over the top full of himself'. Not sure if there is a way to tie that in to your suggestions.
I was going to say that it is actually quite costly for a bard to have many multiclasses because of the attribute prerequisites, but rolling - and rolling as you have - that is not a problem.
Actually going deep into a class does not really seem worthwhile. Picking up one multiclass feat in each of many different classes is lovely tough - basically each of those feats is worth two regular feats. So its more a matter of skimming many classes than diving deep into any one class.
Not that taking the power-swap feats as a bard presumably allows you to swap into a power from any of your multiclasses, but you can only pick each power-swap feat once, meaning you can only ever swap 3 powers.
__________________ Carl Cramér
Member of the Netbook of Feats review board.
I'd put the 18 into charisma and the 17 into int. The 14 might be a good idea to put into con for the extra healing surge and +1 to your fort.
I'm afraid I'm not familiar with Hauer from Fatal Fury so I'm not quite sure what you're going for.
A wand will give you a few options as far as multiclass powers go so you won't have to switch implements every time you cast something from a different class. You can also take a feat (I forget what it's called, it's in arcane power) to use your charisma for to hit on all MC powers.
Picking up a few other leader multiclasses will give you extra daily heals. Always nice to have extra in a pinch and you're party will love you for it.
If you decide to go mostly ranged think about getting a shield for your off hand. +2 to AC and reflex that you can take off when you need to make a skill check will help keep you alive to keep healing.
If you go melee or at least pick up a few melee powers your rogue will have a much easier time doing way more damage. Talk to him about how able he'll be to get combat advantage.
Once you hit paragon I'd have the warden or rogue pick up agile opportunist to get the most out of you Cunning class feature.
I'd put the 18 into charisma and the 17 into int. The 14 might be a good idea to put into con for the extra healing surge and +1 to your fort.
So I was looking into this and it seemed to me that Int for a cunning bard just wasn't that important. The core ability of the cunning bard is why I chose that option. However, its merely the range of the ability affected by Int and having now played 4e, it never seems like battle maps are large enough that the increased range would matter. Moreover, the cunning encounter powers don't actually seem as good as other bard powers (further making int less useful). Finally, the benefits gained from a high int don't come close to having a high con when you I can take a feat to give me scale male armor.
So I was looking into this and it seemed to me that Int for a cunning bard just wasn't that important. The core ability of the cunning bard is why I chose that option. However, its merely the range of the ability affected by Int and having now played 4e, it never seems like battle maps are large enough that the increased range would matter. Moreover, the cunning encounter powers don't actually seem as good as other bard powers (further making int less useful). Finally, the benefits gained from a high int don't come close to having a high con when you I can take a feat to give me scale male armor.
Several powers reward a high Int, such as blunder at first level (which is, in my experience, an absolutely excellect power since it grants an ally an attack which is almost sure to hit). The additional range is nice, but not critical. The wand of Vicious mockery mastery is absolutely terrifying in the hands of a character with high int.
You don't want to waste feats on chainmail + scale armor proficiencies, there are way to many actually neat feats to pick instead. So, keeping Int high means you have a good AC.
By contrast, you're not winning much by going Con without playing a valbard (a very decent option for a half-elf, btw). If you have your heart set on a cunning bard, I'd stick to Int+Cha. It saves feats, and has a few nice side effects, and I'm not seeing the advantage any other stat has.
__________________
4e balanced random loot system
- Think item wishlists are devilspawn?
- Dislike the impact of a few bad item picks by the DM on the party?
- Or find it ludicrous that PC's constantly just "happen" to find magic items tailored to their needs?
Try: A simpler treasure system for (mostly) random loot.
3.5 death&dying variant
- Tired of players that won't cure their mortally wounded allies 'cause "he's only at -2"?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which uses anachronistic d10's?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which never kicks into action for high level characters, which tend to go from alive and kicking to instant death before anyone can intervene?
- Tired of horribly complex house rules?
Try: Death & Dying - a better (and simple!) system
you get chain for free, but still if you want to multiclass a lot, int is better, because your paragon path student of seven is int based
Only Compensatory Insight is Int based and it only effects multiclassed powers. I was thinking of multiclassing with warlock, wizard, and invoker to gain eyebite, thunderwave, and grasping shards, respectively. Even if I also take the power swap feats, is the befit I'll get in dmg from these powers worth it?
Only Compensatory Insight is Int based and it only effects multiclassed powers. I was thinking of multiclassing with warlock, wizard, and invoker to gain eyebite, thunderwave, and grasping shards, respectively. Even if I also take the power swap feats, is the befit I'll get in dmg from these powers worth it?
If you take combat virtuoso and have compensoratory insight you can have normal bard attack bonus and you squeeze out a lot of damage from them.
with at least 14 in all stats and 20 int and 23 charisma by level 11 your multiclass powers deal more damage than your class powers, especially if they are int based
edit: or even more if they are charisma based
Vicious mockery is quite a solid at-will which imposes a -2 penalty to attacks on a hit target. With the "master's wand of vicious mockery", you additionally get to apply your int modifier as penalty to a second target. With psychic lock, that means whenever you hit you'll be handing out at least a -4 penalty to two creatures, which is enough to seriously hamper them. If you have a high Int, you'll be rendering one creature almost completely harmless for a round - there's not much even an overlevelled solo is going to be doing when he's got a -7 to hit. And you can do that every round you hit with vicious mockery...
__________________
4e balanced random loot system
- Think item wishlists are devilspawn?
- Dislike the impact of a few bad item picks by the DM on the party?
- Or find it ludicrous that PC's constantly just "happen" to find magic items tailored to their needs?
Try: A simpler treasure system for (mostly) random loot.
3.5 death&dying variant
- Tired of players that won't cure their mortally wounded allies 'cause "he's only at -2"?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which uses anachronistic d10's?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which never kicks into action for high level characters, which tend to go from alive and kicking to instant death before anyone can intervene?
- Tired of horribly complex house rules?
Try: Death & Dying - a better (and simple!) system
Human Cunning Bard
Str 13, Dex 13, Con 13, Int 17, Wis 14, Chr 20
Feats: Combat Virtuoso, Acolyte of Divine Secrets (Grasping Shards), Initiate of the Old Faith (Swarming Locusts), Ritual Caster
At-Will Powers: Vicious Mockery, Misdirected Mark, Guiding Strike
Encounter Powers: Blunder, Grasping Shards, Swarming Locusts
Daily Power: Stirring Shout
Utiliy Power: Cannon of Avoidance
Skill Training: Arcana, Bluff, Dungeoneering, History, Insight, Nature, Perception, Religion.
Future multiclass feats will include: Sneak of Shadows, Warrior of the Wild, Berserker Fury, Soldier of Faith, Pact Initiate, Divine Channeler, and Hero of Faith.
So I was looking into this and it seemed to me that Int for a cunning bard just wasn't that important. The core ability of the cunning bard is why I chose that option. However, its merely the range of the ability affected by Int and having now played 4e, it never seems like battle maps are large enough that the increased range would matter. Moreover, the cunning encounter powers don't actually seem as good as other bard powers (further making int less useful). Finally, the benefits gained from a high int don't come close to having a high con when you I can take a feat to give me scale male armor.
Counterpoints welcome.
1) Having a High Int means never having to take a feat to take scale armor.
2) Having a high Int means never having to put points into strength (which doesn't help any bard, really) in order to take scale armor.
3) Having a high Int means rocking skill challenges, which is one of your strengths as a bard.
4) Cunning powers have -awesome- debuffs. Reducing one monster for a turn is often more powerful than increasing one player for a turn, so long as you're coordinated fire on that monster.
This is a thought experiment PC I did once. At the time he was a member of every class in the game at 30th, though there have been more classes added since then. I think it actually gives you a decent, playable PC, though picking powers and feats a little more carefully for actual play would be a good idea:
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
Jack, level 30
Half-Elf, Bard, Resourceful Magician, Eternal Seeker
Bardic Virtue: Virtue of Valor
Pact Initiate: Pact Initiate (dark pact)
Eldritch Blast: Eldritch Blast Charisma
Student of the Sword: Student of One-Handed Weapons
Seeking Destiny: Keeper's Prescience
FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 13, Con 22, Dex 13, Int 16, Wis 14, Cha 26.
STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 14, Dex 11, Int 13, Wis 12, Cha 16.
Resourceful Magician is awesome because its level 16 power is basically the best part of Eternal Seeker. So you take RM specifically so you don't need to take ES.
You can take a cool Epic Destiny instead.
Cheers, -- N
__________________
Brevity is the soul of wit, so trim your sig or look dumb.
Resourceful Magician brings up a good question: What is the best paragon path to take? I have the option of pretty much any paragon path I want with multiclassing.
Resourceful Magician is awesome because its level 16 power is basically the best part of Eternal Seeker. So you take RM specifically so you don't need to take ES.
Yeah, I realized that after the fact, but never went back and fixed him (it's in another variant I made where I tried to do a better job with level by level choices, but I never finished).
__________________ "I took a risk... and I ended up in the bag of holding" -the player of Ian Whitefire (deceased)
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