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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rodrigo Istalindir" data-source="post: 2891714" data-attributes="member: 2810">Sure, but while Odysseus was a good fighter, he wasn't as good as Achilles.  Bragi wasn't as good as Thor.  In terms of straight-up fighting prowess, bards are the same as clerics, rogues or druids. (The real problem here is clerics and druids getting better BAB than they should. Especially druids.)  A combat-focused bard can be reasonably effective in melee combat, but not as good as a fighter.  If they want more, multi-class.vs Uh, yeah, cause they multi-classed.  Try the Fochlucan Lyricist, too.Stick to your original assertion -- that rogues and sorcerers can beat a bard at 'Bluff and Diplomacy'.  Very hard for a sorc to come close -- he'd have to spend nearly all his skill points to the exclusion of everything else, and burn a feat to get Diplomacy as a class skill, spend limited spell slots on equivalent spells, and still wouldn't have fascinate/suggestion.  And there is no way he'd compete if he tried to play at the other 'face' skills -- Gather Information, Intimidate, Sense Motive.  A focused rogue could come close, but have no supplemental spells or fascinate/suggestion.  But rogues are the skill-monkeys -- that's their forte.  And sneak attack doesn't make rogues *better* at bluffing, it just benefits them more in a combat sense.  But that has nothing to do with how well the bard can bluff.A wild-shaped druid or Tenser'd mage can beat a fighter at their own game in certain circumstances.  Does that mean the fighter sucks?  A rogue with a high UMD and a butt-load of wands could out-blast a sorceror for a while, too.Huh? You're seriously suggesting a bard -- the class that epitomizes 'I'm a lover, not a fighter' should have the same hit die as a ranger?  And an average of 20pts less at 20th level is trivial, anyway.You want guarantees, take 'Knowledge (Whatever)' which is a class skill, and even that is subject to DM arbitration in most cases.   The point of Bardic Knowledge is that its a random accumulation of trivia, rumour, and speculation.  It's a supplement to knowledge skills, not a replacement. And it does let you know a little about magic items.  Lots of things are less useful if the DM doesn't make an effort to include them -- favored enemies, for example, or turn undead.I disagree with your conclusion.  A bard and rogue will end up pretty even skill wise.  Assuming identical stats, they'll both have the same Diplomacy, Bluff, Sense Motive, and Gather Information.  A rogue gains the edge in Intimidate; a bard has better language and Knowledge skills, plus Perform to influence crowds, magic buffs and fascinate/suggestion.  The bard ends up being good at the things you think a bard should be good at, and the rogue is almost as good at being a half-bard, and isn't as good at being a rogue because he had to sacrifice stats and some rogue-ly skills to get there.And I'm sure the Paladin would like to have something that's more useful than 'Cure Disease'.  A lot of wizards and sorcerors would gladly exchange their familiars for something with more bang.  Not all cleric domain abilities are created equal.  The countersong is certainly in keeping with the flavor, even if it isn't the most useful thing around. Huh?  A character with a crappy stat in it's primary area is going to be sub-optimal.  Wow.  The point is from a pure skill perspective, that CHA doesn't matter that much or, rather, that a low CHA can be compensated for such that by high levels it doesn't matter as much.  A 1st level half-orc bard with an 8 CHA is going to be at +3 on Diplomacy, with a 16 CHA he's at +7.  The latter is more than twice as good as the former (although the variability of the die roll is much more important than either).  At 20th level, he's at +25 with a 12 CHA, or +29 with a 20 CHA.  From a 133% difference to less than 25% -- the stat matters much less, and at this point the die roll under normal circumstances is a wash.  The right feats can reduce that even further.This is an aspect of the skill system, and is totally irrelevant to bardliness.  It affects rogues a lot more.  The lower CHA character still loses out on a ton of spells, and those he has are less effective.   That's a big deal, especially since there are diminishing returns on absurdly high skill totals.  Spells will be much more useful in a wide variety of situations.You're not going to see a lot of arcane spells that a wizard doesn't have too.  That'd be stepping on the wizard's role as master of all things arcane.  And with third-party sources, the bard spell list doest gain some distinction.  The ones who get the short end of that stick are sorcerors.So, lets see if I've got this right.  Bards suck because:* a single-classed bard isn't as good a fighter as a multi-classed fighter/bard* a heavily-focused rogue/sorceror multi-class can compete in some areas at the expense of others * a rogue optimized for face-work can match them at some skills but not others while sacrificing a lot of rogue abilities and still losing out on the spell casting, bardic music and knowledge* like all classes, they have some features that aren't universally useful or uber-powerful.* like many classes, they have some features that require DM cooperation to take full advantage of.Sorry, I disagree.  Bards do not suck.  They might not be everybody's cup of tea, or be a class that everyone can play well.  They might not be a class that is terribly useful in hack-n-slash oriented campaigns (althought the bardic music is very nice in those).  But a druid or ranger in an urban campaign is a fish out of water,  a barbarian in a royal intrigue game is hurting, and rogues take a nice dive in undead-heavy settings.  Not all classes are going to be as useful in all game types.</blockquote>

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