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<blockquote data-quote="DarkKestral" data-source="post: 2977302" data-attributes="member: 40100">I love the CONCEPT of the bard; someone who inspires I like the bard spell list, bardic knowledge, and ability to cast arcane spells in light armor without problems. I also like that it's an arcane caster with reasonable BAB, and a few martial weapon proficiencies.I dislike bardic music. It seems poor as a mechanic, ties up relatively valuable skillpoints that could be used elsewhere to make the bard more effective as a 'face man' or as a caster, and often relegates the bard to being a buffbot/healbot that is considered to have no place in active combat.I hate the fact that the rogue's higher level abilities and massive skillpoints make him better in the roles the bard is suited to playing better than the bard, save for buff-bot/heal-bot. Even there, a cleric is as good as a bard is in that role, can have spontaneous conversion to healing spells, rendering the main advantage of the bard vs. a wizard or sorceror useless, and can cast in heavier armor w/o any ASF.In short, my biggest argument against the bard is that they have no easily definable role in combat, nor do they have one outside of combat, save for that from their music, which means they largely 'delegate' their actions, in the sense that they pre-buff the party before combats, and stay out of fights whenever possible. Like the idea of cleric as heal-bot, this makes an otherwise interesting archetype boring to play.In fact, one of my biggest preferences for a variant bard involves removal of their bardic music entirely and replacing it with either reduced sneak attack damage/trapfinding/poison use to make it akin to a less-skillful rogue w/lmited arcane spellcasting.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="DarkKestral, post: 2977302, member: 40100"] I love the CONCEPT of the bard; someone who inspires I like the bard spell list, bardic knowledge, and ability to cast arcane spells in light armor without problems. I also like that it's an arcane caster with reasonable BAB, and a few martial weapon proficiencies. I dislike bardic music. It seems poor as a mechanic, ties up relatively valuable skillpoints that could be used elsewhere to make the bard more effective as a 'face man' or as a caster, and often relegates the bard to being a buffbot/healbot that is considered to have no place in active combat. I hate the fact that the rogue's higher level abilities and massive skillpoints make him better in the roles the bard is suited to playing better than the bard, save for buff-bot/heal-bot. Even there, a cleric is as good as a bard is in that role, can have spontaneous conversion to healing spells, rendering the main advantage of the bard vs. a wizard or sorceror useless, and can cast in heavier armor w/o any ASF. In short, my biggest argument against the bard is that they have no easily definable role in combat, nor do they have one outside of combat, save for that from their music, which means they largely 'delegate' their actions, in the sense that they pre-buff the party before combats, and stay out of fights whenever possible. Like the idea of cleric as heal-bot, this makes an otherwise interesting archetype boring to play. In fact, one of my biggest preferences for a variant bard involves removal of their bardic music entirely and replacing it with either reduced sneak attack damage/trapfinding/poison use to make it akin to a less-skillful rogue w/lmited arcane spellcasting. [/QUOTE]

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