D&D 5E Are Bards the most flexible class?

[Satyrn]

A fight last night consisted of:

(a) the wizard fireballing the goblins;
(b) the goblin shaman sleeping the wizard;
(c) the bard (me) viciously mocking the wizard to wake him up;
(d) the wizard fireballing the goblins again;
(e) there is no e, the goblins are all dead.

Best use of vicious mockery I've read here, ever.

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

If you are OK with being second or third best at everything in most parties... yes.

 

[MechaTarrasque]

Bard is good if you are building towards a specific magical combo that can't be built inside another class. You pay for that by having to have a lot of patience to wait until you have enough magical secrets to make the combo (and you are largely support until that happens). I have noticed that makes the bard a popular replacement class ("my 10th level PC died, time to whip up a 10th level bard"), and only a rare "start from level 1" class.

 

[WarpedAcorn]

Every time someone plays a Bard I die a Little inside. Silliest class in the world. If I was being attacked by Orcs and some dude pulled out a lute and started singing I would kick his A*s after the battle. Just a silly concept LOL

Honestly, in my opinion, the Bard is the archetypical "adventurer". They represent the person that travels around, picking up useful skills. They can fight, they can use skills, they can socialize, they can cast healing spells as well as defensive and control...I mean they can pretty much do everything. The downside is...they're BARDS! =(

I swear, reskin them and take out the musical instruments and you would have the most popular class. And yes, also the most versatile.

 

[Zardnaar]

Clerics beat 5 them imho.

Bard damage is weak except for a narrow lore bard build picking up eldritch blast via feat and hex+fireball at level 6 and then devastating wave at 10.