Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="two" data-source="post: 2329671" data-attributes="member: 9002">Well you are right in a way.  A maximized archer-fighter or archer-ranger is going to be better at range than a maximized archer-bard (by a little, in pure archery damage).A maximized sorcerer enchanter is going to be better at enchantments than the bard, by a fair degree.A maximized buffer-cleric is going to be a better party buffer than a maximized buffing bard.But that sort of maximization has its drawbacks.  Take, for example, the maximized fighter-archer vs. the maximized bard archer.  At low levels the bard is just as good at hitting/damaging due to the bard song effecting his own arrows.  At higher levels it takes more work, particularly using Inspire Greatness etc. on oneself and etc.  By level 15 the fighter-archer is probably doing on average 4-5 more points of damage per arrow.  The fighter has "won" the battle vs. the archer bard. But what has the fighter given up?  From the bard's perspective, full caster progression, a decent arcane spellcasting list, skills, will save, etc. etc.  In other words, a maximized bard archer is about 80% of a maximized fighter archer PLUS he's a solid 2nd line caster and has better survivability due to buffing spells, saves, and what-have-you.You can play the same gave with an enchanter bard.  Yes, an enchanter bard is always gonna have fewer spells than the sorcerer; perhaps the enchanter bard is 60% as effetive as the sorcerer enchanter.  But in cases where enchantments don't cut it (lots of situations) a sorcerer enchanter is kinda hosed.  The bard can still attack, buff party using non-spells, has better hit points & survavability, etc.In my view, the question is this:Would you like to have an archer 75% as good as a fighter-archer who's also able to cast 6th level spells eventually?Would you like an enchanter that's 60% as good as a sorcerer enchanter but also able to escape grapples occasionally/fight/ranged combat and is slightly more robust in hit points and saves and AC?That's the real question.  If you look at a Bard20 vs. a Fighter20, I know what I'd pick in a heartbeat.  Yeah, the fighter does 25 more points of damage via arrows during a full attack sequence, but the bard can still pump out very solid ranged damage, plus...shadow walk, dimension door, dominate, alter self, mirror image, irresistable dance, improved invis, greater dispel magic, silence, etc. etc.  That's just juicy.I think the whole "general is worse than specialized" or "specialized is better than general" thing misses the point, which is this:  a well-build bard isn't lagging that much behind other builds (archer, enchanter for example), and gets a great host of benefits/spells to make up for the small lag.  I view it more as spreading power around than indicating a weakness in being a "generalist".   *also worth noting, with nothing more than the "silence" spell known, a bard can be a 95% effective counterspeller anytime the party is faced with a powerful enemy caster.  That's a type of "general effectiveness" that comes with nearly no downside.  It's a spell known, granted, but silence also has a lot of other utility uses.  Bards have a lot of these kinds of abilities, none of which a fighter-type can achieve (easily)**also also worth noting, sorcerers almost always end the day with spells unused, usually a lot of them.  In some cases (I wonder how often?  30% of the time?) the smaller number of bard spells is sufficient for the day, simply because there are only one or two encounters).</blockquote>

Verification