So now I'm mulling Bards.
Is the bard as written in 3 & 5 pretty much a D&Dism in terms of their powers/skill-set? Did the Celtic inspiration even do spells in the stories? Does it almost have more (seeming) influence as how it's written up now from the characters in the Kalevala (and de Camp and Pratt's Shea visiting there) and medieval troubadours?
And so, thinking through what the most important niches a bard fits, Is it the music based magic? The lore seeking? Being a psuedo thief-version-of-a-Gish? Is it satisfying that D&Dism? Is it having the outlet for the charisma based caster who wants to be charming?
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In terms of spells, the limited known spells in 5e (fitting with oral historians, as opposed to a wizard studying each day) doesn't seem to fit with being the adventurous knowledge seekers in a world literate enough to have magic books for the wizards and religious texts (and in many settings libraries and the like). Is it just that bardic songs are so supernatural they can't be written down?
It has me wondering if I should have one version of bard that works like incanter-Wizard types with their books (so the bard who takes physical notes of things and can restudy the details on a long rest and change up) and the ones that work with the smaller known list like the scion/warlock I'm picturing (so the bard with the vast store of mundane knowledge who has stretched to also hold the magic songs just in their head and can do it a bit more).
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Tangential to bards... I get caught up wondering some times why any of the full casters have the d8 combat and semi-decent skill set that the Cleric, Druid, and Bard have, but the Wizard doesn't. Should the ones dedicating themselves that much to spells be passing up on the combat? Or do those classes just not have the cool big spells the Wizards do and so need the extra for balance purposes? Should the classic cleric, druid, and bard all be half casters? Or should they all just get variants with less combat/skills and more spells too? Or is there no reason to think that all the casters need to match that way from one to the other?
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What if the druid and ranger magic (connecting with nature) was powered by song. Does it change them and the bard too much to have druid = full caster, bard = 1/2 caster, ranger = splash? Is the thing it hurts most wanting the bards to have animal companions to fit the motif? Or does it actually open the druid and ranger up more more to let them not always do those things (thus giving the all three classes more options)? Is the only thing it hurts then making the bard not really fit in courtly setting since they would be more nature connected? How big of a loss is that?
