The Bard (UPDATED 6-3-08; now to level 10)

[Nifft]

Dude, how can you be so reasonable half the time and such a pain in the ass the other half?

My "free" advice clearly comes at the cost of your sanity. Keep reading; I'm hungry.

I never meant to imply that bards were alone in the ability to buff the entire party -- what I meant was that it was their forte, that the way many played them was to stand back and sing out buffs while others attacked. And as you well know, the wizard usually started off with a haste but then started blasting, and the paladin could radiate a buff while attacking at the same time.

Bards were more likely to spend rounds not directly attacking.

My experience differs. I've never seen a player -- including myself -- take a character that could only help, never hit. In my experience, the Bard would spend a round kicking off his song, then he'd be acting as an archer. He'd also throw spells when possible (hoping the fight didn't last more than 5 rounds after the first spell).

The healer-cleric, of course, also took that role, and it's true that in 4E the healer-cleric isn't just standing around healing people any longer . . . perhaps that's a shame, that it's not even an *option* for the poor souls who actually liked that kind of thing.

Warlord. He has an at-will power that may as well be called, "YOU! HIT HIM AGAIN!". It gives any of your allies an immediate Basic attack, with a damage bonus equal to your Intelligence modifier. It's totally sweet for those who want to contribute through personal nonviolence.

BUT . . . from a role-playing perspective, you can't argue that there are some who conceive of their character's role as standing in the back, shouting encouragement and protecting/inspiring their allies in whatever way the situation calls for, without having to deal with the oddity of only being able to do that by making what seems to be an entirely-unrelated-to-the-purpose attack roll against some target.

Warlord does all that, but from the front. You can be nonviolent, but you can't also be chicken.

Paladins have some nice interrupt powers, too, which allow them to shield allies. However, it's a "hit me instead" kind of shielding, which would result in crispy Bard if ported over to 3e.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Forrester]

Precedence for one-half ability score bumps . . .

Not too many in there, but there are a couple, and they're not going to be rarely used -- the Warlord gives folks a bonus to half his intelligence bonus to attacks when they use an action point to attack, and the Fighter "Sweeping Blow" exploit adds half his strength modifier to the attack roll if he is wielding an axe, flail, heavy blade, or pick.

Given this, I don't think it'd be too clumsy to give the bard's inspiration-to-skill-checks ability the bonus of one-half his charisma bonus if nothing else really seems appropriate. Most references to one-half are to level, though.

Re the regain-second-wind power, clerics have it -- and as a daily -- at 6th level, but it's a minor action -- big difference between a minor and a standard. On a similar note, clerics level 6 utility that allows the target to spend a healing surge, adding the cleric's charisma bonus. (And because it's healing, I think he'd get to add the cleric's wisdom bonus as well, right?) It's a minor action.

I bring this up because it's obvious to me that we (or at least I!) want to give the bard the ability to sing a little healin' song as a standard that allows an ally to spend a healing surge as a free action (not burning 2nd wind) -- similarly, a little song to rejuvenate everyone's second wind. It may be heresy, but I don't think it'd be broken to give the Bard access to this ability in his first couple levels.

It's like comparing quickened spells to regular -- I can't imagine that it wouldn't bump down the level requirement by at least 3 or 4.

I hope we can find an example of one class getting a certain ability as a minor action, and another getting something similar as a standard, so we can see what the level difference looks like.

EDIT: Just noticed Warlords have a 2nd level standard action utility, range touch, that has exactly the "go ahead and burn a healing surge" ability I was looking for. Bards getting an ability like that at range at 2nd or 3rd level seems reasonable to me.

 

[djdaidouji]

Okay, so I should totally be reading the whole thread here, but I'm not, and I hate myself for it. I'll just assume all previous posts are reflected in the main post.

Bardic Knowledge: I think the language should read differently. The reason is that I usually give my players some kind of knowledge, even on a poor roll. They might not get anything more then "their claws are sharp," but it would still not constitute a "fail" per se. I'm just not sure you can fail a knowledge check, and even if you do, you wouldn't know it, especially if the DM wants to roll the dice behind the screen. Even if you were to say "The bard can reroll a knowledge skill to gain more knowledge on something," it would be impossible to use the "must take the lower roll" language, as they would already know everything up to their roll.

Message: You should specify if this makes any sound or not. The 3e spell had you whisper, right?

Summon Instrument: Perhaps add to the effect of "You can only have one summoned instrument at one time and you must be the one playing it."

Sorry if this is an intrusion~!