fifteenkeys
First Post
[dusts off ENWorld login after many many years of having it, but still just lurking....hey, it still works!]
Like most of us, I've enjoyed reading the weekly class archetype Unearthed Arcanas. They've been all over the place, but interesting. Maybe it is because I've been playing them lately, but I've been thinking about Bards and their archetypes. Both of the PHB archetypes are really good, so any new ones has to be something that people will want rather than those.
With different archetypes for classes, I think the main focus should be to add things that there is a need for or cannot reliably be represented with other archetypes or classes. So, basically, not making things just to make them (no undead hunters or feywild influenced archetypes for every class for reasons of “just because”). I also don't think there needs to be things that fill in every gap (ironic, seeing my last one below), but instead fills in where there is a need or a want that is different enough from other options.
I wasn't a big fan of the Unearthed Arcana for Bard archetypes. I didn't like the Feywild Bard for the theme or the implementation, and the evil spy Bard also fell flat. I decided to make my own.
First, I looked over the PHB Bards and came up with a general template for each archetype based on the Lore and Valor Bard options and came up with this template:
General Bard College preexisting design:
-3rd level: Bonus Proficiencies (Lore: 3 skills; Valor: Medium armor, shields, Martial Weapons).
-3rd level: New use of inspiration (L: cutting word; V: Combat inspiration)
-6th level: Abilities like other classes (L: more magical secrets; V: extra attack)
-14th level: Extra flexibility of existing thing (L: more use of inspiration; V: fighting and casting)
Bards are easier for this exercise because much of their powers or abilities are baked into the class and they really only have 4 things to change per College. Let's see if we can keep these in-line with this template and make each archetype interesting enough and powerful enough for someone to want to play it, without it being overpowered.
I started thinking of a type of Bard I would like to play, and one I have tried to emulate using the Lore Bard archetype: the non-music-obligate Bard. While many play the Bard as a user of music for magical means, even in the PHB they talk about using speech and words rather than music itself. My first idea was to make a Bard who, while possibly using music for magic, instead sees themself more as a manipulator of the rhythms of the weave of magic.
Bard College of the Arcane
These bards study the weave and, not necessarily music, but the vibrations of the weave. As such, they learn more about the arcane itself and see themselves as scholar of magic just as much as Wizards.
-3rd level: Broadly Trained Scholar of the Arcane: When you join the College of the Arcane, you learn more practical magical skills than other Bards. Pick 2 additional cantrips from the Bard, Sorcerer, or Wizard list (the 2 do not have to be from the same list). These cantrips chosen cannot be the type that cause damage. Additionally, the Arcane Bard may use an arcane focus like a Sorcerer, in addition to being able to us an instrument.
-3rd level: Inspiring Vulnerability. The Arcane Bard has studied the weave enough to be able to help optimize a spell's effectiveness. When the Bard or another spellcaster casts a spell that requires a saving throw, the Arcane Bard may use their reaction to expend one inspiration die and subtract that number from the saving throw roll. The target must be no more than 60 feet away and must be visible to the Arcane Bard. You can choose to use this feature after the target makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the roll succeeds or not.
-6th level: Ritual Secrets. The bard picks 4 spells with the ritual tag from any spell list (just like magical secrets) and adds them to their spell list, and cast them as Bard spells (these spells have to be from a level that the Bard can cast). However, the Bard can only cast these chosen spells as rituals.
-14th level: Inspired Spell Recovery. As a bonus action, you may expend any number of Inspiration Dice and recover spell slots of that many spell levels (e.g., you expend 3 dice and can gain three 1st level spells; or one 1st level and one 2nd level spell; or one 3rd level spells). You can't gain more spell slots than what you start with.
The next type of Bard I considered was one that was more into music than the regular Bard. One in which the music comes first and the magic flows from that. While the previous archetype was a Bard who was more magic focused, this archetype is more music focused.
Bard College of Performance
-3rd level: Classically Trained: When you join the College of Performance, you immerse yourself in music. The bard is now proficient in every musical instrument and all performance checks are made at advantage.
-3rd level: Master of Sound: The bard has come to understand the rhythm of sounds that, through music, are common to all living creatures. The bard may use their bonus action and expend an Inspiration Die to use music to be able to verbally communicate with other sentient creatures. For 10 minutes, the Bard can effectively communicate in one chosen language of a visible and speaking target (except construct or undead). The Bard can understand and speak that language for the entire duration, even to creatures other than the one target.
-6th level: Captivating Performer: The bard may, as an action, use one of their inspiration dice to perform an outstanding piece of music. For the next 10 minutes, all creatures that hear this performance have disadvantage on enchantment spells cast by the bard. Additionally, any charisma ability check (including skills) by the bard when interacting with those that heard the performance is done with advantage.
-14th level: Trained ear. Your training has sharpened your hearing and allows you to hear the subtleties that others miss. When dealing with invisible creatures, you do not get disadvantage on attack rolls against them due to them being invisibility/hidden. Additionally, any perception check that involves hearing is done with advantage.
The next Bard archetype was inspired by my youth playing 1st edition. I desperately wanted to play a Bard, but the stat rolls were just impossible, not to mention how long it would take to even get there. I never got to play one, but I can make a sem-passable version for a 5E archetype! So here is my attempt to make a Bard Archetype that alludes back to the 1st edition Druidic-style Bard.
Bard College of Mistletoe
-3rd level: Woodland Training: When you join the College of Mistletoe, you are inducted into the ways of Druidic Training. The Mistletoe Bard gains Druidcraft as an additional cantrip, plus Animal Friendship and Speak with Animals as an additional (free) known spell. Also, the Bard gains the ability to speak the Druidic language and may use a Druidic focus like a Druid, in addition to be able to use an instrument.
-3rd level: Wilderness Inspiration: As an action, the Bard may expand one inspiration die to give one individual (including the Bard themself) proficiency in both Nature and Survival for 1 hour.
-6th level: Druidic Magical Secrets. The Bard gains 3 additional Magical Secrets spells, but can only choose from the Druid list.
-14th level: Natural Weave Attunement. The Bard cannot be charmed or frightened by elementals or fey, and any elemental, fey, or beast has disadvantage on saving throws for any enchantment spell you cast.
The final Bard archetype was one that is probably the least inspired, as it basically is “like the Druid one above, but for Cleric!” That said, there is a strong tradition in many religious institutions of having music for inspiration and as worship. These Bards are clergy followers of a specific deity, and use their music, chants, songs, and hymns in exalting the god that they worship.
Bard College of Worship
-3rd level: Ecclesiastical training: When you join the College of Worship, you learn the ways of the priesthood of your deity. The Bard gains Thaumaturgy as an additional cantrip, plus Detect Evil and Good and Protection from Evil and Good as an additional (free) known spell. Also, the Bard gains the ability to use a holy symbol of their deity as a spellcasting focus, in addition to being able to use an instrument.
-3rd level: Inspirational Healing: As a reaction, the Bard may spend one of their Inspiration Dice to augment a cast healing spell, adding the roll to the amount healed for a single creature affected by the spell. This may be for a spell cast by the bard or another character within 60 feet of the Bard, and the decision to use this may wait until after any die is rolled for hit points healed.
-6th level: Divine Magical Secrets. The Bard gains 3 additional Magical Secrets, but can only choose from the Cleric list.
-14th level: Bardic Channeling: As an action, the Bard may spend 2 inspiration dice to Channel Divinity: Turn Undead as a Cleric of the same level. The Bard does gain any other Channel Divinity abilities from this power.
Like most of us, I've enjoyed reading the weekly class archetype Unearthed Arcanas. They've been all over the place, but interesting. Maybe it is because I've been playing them lately, but I've been thinking about Bards and their archetypes. Both of the PHB archetypes are really good, so any new ones has to be something that people will want rather than those.
With different archetypes for classes, I think the main focus should be to add things that there is a need for or cannot reliably be represented with other archetypes or classes. So, basically, not making things just to make them (no undead hunters or feywild influenced archetypes for every class for reasons of “just because”). I also don't think there needs to be things that fill in every gap (ironic, seeing my last one below), but instead fills in where there is a need or a want that is different enough from other options.
I wasn't a big fan of the Unearthed Arcana for Bard archetypes. I didn't like the Feywild Bard for the theme or the implementation, and the evil spy Bard also fell flat. I decided to make my own.
First, I looked over the PHB Bards and came up with a general template for each archetype based on the Lore and Valor Bard options and came up with this template:
General Bard College preexisting design:
-3rd level: Bonus Proficiencies (Lore: 3 skills; Valor: Medium armor, shields, Martial Weapons).
-3rd level: New use of inspiration (L: cutting word; V: Combat inspiration)
-6th level: Abilities like other classes (L: more magical secrets; V: extra attack)
-14th level: Extra flexibility of existing thing (L: more use of inspiration; V: fighting and casting)
Bards are easier for this exercise because much of their powers or abilities are baked into the class and they really only have 4 things to change per College. Let's see if we can keep these in-line with this template and make each archetype interesting enough and powerful enough for someone to want to play it, without it being overpowered.
I started thinking of a type of Bard I would like to play, and one I have tried to emulate using the Lore Bard archetype: the non-music-obligate Bard. While many play the Bard as a user of music for magical means, even in the PHB they talk about using speech and words rather than music itself. My first idea was to make a Bard who, while possibly using music for magic, instead sees themself more as a manipulator of the rhythms of the weave of magic.
Bard College of the Arcane
These bards study the weave and, not necessarily music, but the vibrations of the weave. As such, they learn more about the arcane itself and see themselves as scholar of magic just as much as Wizards.
-3rd level: Broadly Trained Scholar of the Arcane: When you join the College of the Arcane, you learn more practical magical skills than other Bards. Pick 2 additional cantrips from the Bard, Sorcerer, or Wizard list (the 2 do not have to be from the same list). These cantrips chosen cannot be the type that cause damage. Additionally, the Arcane Bard may use an arcane focus like a Sorcerer, in addition to being able to us an instrument.
-3rd level: Inspiring Vulnerability. The Arcane Bard has studied the weave enough to be able to help optimize a spell's effectiveness. When the Bard or another spellcaster casts a spell that requires a saving throw, the Arcane Bard may use their reaction to expend one inspiration die and subtract that number from the saving throw roll. The target must be no more than 60 feet away and must be visible to the Arcane Bard. You can choose to use this feature after the target makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the roll succeeds or not.
-6th level: Ritual Secrets. The bard picks 4 spells with the ritual tag from any spell list (just like magical secrets) and adds them to their spell list, and cast them as Bard spells (these spells have to be from a level that the Bard can cast). However, the Bard can only cast these chosen spells as rituals.
-14th level: Inspired Spell Recovery. As a bonus action, you may expend any number of Inspiration Dice and recover spell slots of that many spell levels (e.g., you expend 3 dice and can gain three 1st level spells; or one 1st level and one 2nd level spell; or one 3rd level spells). You can't gain more spell slots than what you start with.
The next type of Bard I considered was one that was more into music than the regular Bard. One in which the music comes first and the magic flows from that. While the previous archetype was a Bard who was more magic focused, this archetype is more music focused.
Bard College of Performance
-3rd level: Classically Trained: When you join the College of Performance, you immerse yourself in music. The bard is now proficient in every musical instrument and all performance checks are made at advantage.
-3rd level: Master of Sound: The bard has come to understand the rhythm of sounds that, through music, are common to all living creatures. The bard may use their bonus action and expend an Inspiration Die to use music to be able to verbally communicate with other sentient creatures. For 10 minutes, the Bard can effectively communicate in one chosen language of a visible and speaking target (except construct or undead). The Bard can understand and speak that language for the entire duration, even to creatures other than the one target.
-6th level: Captivating Performer: The bard may, as an action, use one of their inspiration dice to perform an outstanding piece of music. For the next 10 minutes, all creatures that hear this performance have disadvantage on enchantment spells cast by the bard. Additionally, any charisma ability check (including skills) by the bard when interacting with those that heard the performance is done with advantage.
-14th level: Trained ear. Your training has sharpened your hearing and allows you to hear the subtleties that others miss. When dealing with invisible creatures, you do not get disadvantage on attack rolls against them due to them being invisibility/hidden. Additionally, any perception check that involves hearing is done with advantage.
The next Bard archetype was inspired by my youth playing 1st edition. I desperately wanted to play a Bard, but the stat rolls were just impossible, not to mention how long it would take to even get there. I never got to play one, but I can make a sem-passable version for a 5E archetype! So here is my attempt to make a Bard Archetype that alludes back to the 1st edition Druidic-style Bard.
Bard College of Mistletoe
-3rd level: Woodland Training: When you join the College of Mistletoe, you are inducted into the ways of Druidic Training. The Mistletoe Bard gains Druidcraft as an additional cantrip, plus Animal Friendship and Speak with Animals as an additional (free) known spell. Also, the Bard gains the ability to speak the Druidic language and may use a Druidic focus like a Druid, in addition to be able to use an instrument.
-3rd level: Wilderness Inspiration: As an action, the Bard may expand one inspiration die to give one individual (including the Bard themself) proficiency in both Nature and Survival for 1 hour.
-6th level: Druidic Magical Secrets. The Bard gains 3 additional Magical Secrets spells, but can only choose from the Druid list.
-14th level: Natural Weave Attunement. The Bard cannot be charmed or frightened by elementals or fey, and any elemental, fey, or beast has disadvantage on saving throws for any enchantment spell you cast.
The final Bard archetype was one that is probably the least inspired, as it basically is “like the Druid one above, but for Cleric!” That said, there is a strong tradition in many religious institutions of having music for inspiration and as worship. These Bards are clergy followers of a specific deity, and use their music, chants, songs, and hymns in exalting the god that they worship.
Bard College of Worship
-3rd level: Ecclesiastical training: When you join the College of Worship, you learn the ways of the priesthood of your deity. The Bard gains Thaumaturgy as an additional cantrip, plus Detect Evil and Good and Protection from Evil and Good as an additional (free) known spell. Also, the Bard gains the ability to use a holy symbol of their deity as a spellcasting focus, in addition to being able to use an instrument.
-3rd level: Inspirational Healing: As a reaction, the Bard may spend one of their Inspiration Dice to augment a cast healing spell, adding the roll to the amount healed for a single creature affected by the spell. This may be for a spell cast by the bard or another character within 60 feet of the Bard, and the decision to use this may wait until after any die is rolled for hit points healed.
-6th level: Divine Magical Secrets. The Bard gains 3 additional Magical Secrets, but can only choose from the Cleric list.
-14th level: Bardic Channeling: As an action, the Bard may spend 2 inspiration dice to Channel Divinity: Turn Undead as a Cleric of the same level. The Bard does gain any other Channel Divinity abilities from this power.
