Bardic Rant

[Hikaru]

Bards can buff competitively with clerics you if you add the bardsong to any spells they care to cast, although a cleric who decides to only carry buffs will outpace them quickly.

They have so many more spells than bards that they can carry as many buffs than the bards have spells + bard songs total and still have slots left.

They will never heal like like a cleric, however.
Bards will never spell-nuke like clerics, but a cleric will never throw enchantments or charms like a bard does (unless they take the charm domain). Which is worse, Flame Strike or Dominate Monster? I'd say they're even, on the average, though the Dominate Monster is an all or nothing spell and the flame strike can be save against. A bard with a emphasis on magical power can be pretty scary.

Dominate Monster is a 9th-lvl. wiz/sor spell, not a bard spell.

Clerics are better spellcasters, by a large margin. At level 17, a Cleric cast Miracle, which allows him to cast any of the bard spells without an XP cost. At level 17, Clerics can cast 2 9th-lvl. spells and the bard 1 6th-level spell. Bards are completely outclassed here too.

Bards do fight better than clerics because they have a better weapon selection (unless the cleric has the War Domain, which puts the advantage squarely in his court.)

Clerics have better armor, and can use a martial weapon at the cost of one feat. They also can buff themselves to the teeth. Divine Power is scary: full BAB, 1 more HP per level, and +6 to Strength. The Bard is utterly crushed, once more.

The saves are even, as noted.

Right. A bit better for the Cleric, because Will depends from Wisdom, which is his main attribute. No save depends from Charisma.

Bards have a lot better skills however: more points and more in class skills. That is a big compensation.

Nothing to spit upon, but not big enough to fill the gap, by a long stretch.

Sum up, bards are on par with clerics in a lot of things, but much better in skills.

You'll have a hard time convincing anyone on those boards than Bards are on par with Clerics in most respects, but in skills in which they are better.

 

[Apok]

Sum up, bards are on par with clerics in a lot of things, but much better in skills.

Better in skills? Yes. Abso-fraggin'-lutely. Agree 100%. No arguments here. The Bard is second only to the Rogue in terms of points and class skill selection.

However, on the fact that Bards are on par with Clerics, I have a minor point of contention. Lets do a quick comarison, shall we?

Raw Combat Ability
Equal BAB. The Bard does have a better weapon selection, but the Cleric has access to Medium and Heavy armor with no ASF, so that evens out. The Cleric has slightly better hit points than the Bard, and with the War Domain they can get access to a martial weapon with free Weapon Focus, I might add. All that taken into consideration gives the Cleric an edge in combat.

Spellcasting
Bards have a slower progression, their DC's don't match up because their highest spell level is 6th, and their repetoir of spells is rather limited in scope. Clerics, by contrast, have full 9th level progression plus Domain spells, can prepare any spell on their list at the beginning of each day, and their spells cover a wide range of uses such as healing, buffing, blasting, and general utility. Cleric wins this one, hands down.

Buffing Ability
This category covers both party-buffs and self buffs. The Bard has limited access to the stat-buffing spells (namely, Cat's Grace, Eagle's Splendor, and Fox's Cunning) while the Cleric has full access to the others (Bull's Strength, Bear's Endurance, and Owl's Wisdom). I think it's pretty obvious that the Cleric got the better combat buffs. Beyond that, all a Bard has is his Bardic Music, which I think is acutally better for aiding the entire party. However, in terms of self-buffing, nobody can beat the Clerics list of awesome self-buffing spells. Bless, Aid, Divine Power, Righteous Might, Divine Favor, Magic Vestment, and I'm sure I could go on. With these spells, the Cleric can turn himself into a combat-monster powerhouse. The Bard has nothing that can seriously compete. So, in conclusion, the Bard comes off a little better at ally-buffing but looses out big time on the self-help arena. The changes to the Bard's spell list in 3.5 really hurt his ability to enhance his combative skill.

Healing Ability
Cleric wins here, no contest. The Bard makes for a good backup healer, no doubt, but he's definitely not as good as the Cleric.

So, I'd have to say that your assertation of the Bard being "on par" with the Cleric is just incorrect.

His skills are better, though.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Where is this info coming from?

 

[Apok]

Where is this info coming from?

To what info are you referring to?

 

[Victim]

Bless, Prayer, Hero's feast, Recitation, that one DotF mass Str buffing and temp HP adding spell can give a cleric group buffing ability comparable to a bard. Also, a cleric has many more spell slots than a bard, so he can buff several characters effectively. That's group buffing right there.

The main cleric weapon is the heavy mace. It does the same base damage as the big three 1 handed martial weapons and suffers only in critical effect. A bard with martial weapons has a rather small advantage over a cleric with a heavy mace. The cleric's superior HD and heavy armor more than balance out the inferior critical effects of his weapons.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

At the WotC boards, people have been listing songs as well as spell lists. I know Shadowstar or Roytheodd released the spells, but about the songs?

 

[Apok]

At the WotC boards, people have been listing songs as well as spell lists. I know Shadowstar or Roytheodd released the spells, but about the songs?

Yep, they mentioned them. IIRC, they are up on the Comiled 3.5e Changes thread. They improved on a couple of the existing songs (notably Inspire Courage) and added in a few others.

 

[Apok]

Bless, Prayer, Hero's feast, Recitation, that one DotF mass Str buffing and temp HP adding spell can give a cleric group buffing ability comparable to a bard. Also, a cleric has many more spell slots than a bard, so he can buff several characters effectively. That's group buffing right there.

Man, I totally forgot about Recitation. That one is nice. However, Bless, Prayer, and Aid are about on par with the 3.5 Bard's new spellsongs (Inspire Courage gets better w/ level, and there's another one that boosts damage and AC) and a Bard can cast Hero's Feast also. I deliberately stayed away from non-core spells, as there are many 3rd party Bard spells out there that are very nice.

The Cleric does indeed have more spell slots, and with the advent of the Mass stat buffing spells, buffing multiple allies in one go is much easier. Forgot about that, too.

Okay, so the Cleric is even better than the Bard at ally-buffing. Looks like he wins out in every case (except skills, of course ).

 

[ForceUser]

To the original poster, I have but one question: how long have you played EverQuest?

D&D is not EQ. It's not all about combat, though they do okay there too. We have two bards in one game in which I play, one of them usually sings and the other does nasty stuff like nail the bad guys with blindness spells. And they both know a ton of stuff about what's really going on in the campaign world. Meanwhile, the fighters walk around in a perpetual state of anal-cranal inversion just looking for the next big thing the bards tell them to kill.

If anyone truly thinks the bard is useless, I am here to tell you: it's not the class, it's your DM.

 

[Malin Genie]

I'm currently playing a high-level Bard in a PbP.

As well as being the information-moster (Gather Information, Knowledge(any), Scry, Greaetr Scry, Legend Lore.....) I am the diplomat (Diplomacy, Sense Motive)

In combat, I can not only support the party (through mass haste, songs, greater dispelling, break enchantment etc) but hold my own in spellcasting - dropping a confusion on a group of enemies is often more effective than a meteor swarm in eliminating threats; great shout can splinter weapons and shields as well as stunning, deafening and inflicting damage, and mass suggestion can be an amazing combat spell if used creatively.

In terms of dealing hp damage, Bard is one of the worst, if not the worst, classes. In terms of eliminating threats in combat, she can be very effective if used well.