D&D 5E Bards. They are silly. Is there a way to make them NOT silly?

[Fauchard1520]

First of all, relevant comic.

Secondly, I love the heck out of bards. Mechanically, I think they knock it out of the ballpark. Conceptually, I even think that a jack of all trades character is a cool conceit. Bards conjure up images of Kvothe Kingkiller, Thomdril Merrilin, and even historical figures like Sir Richard Francis Burton. Unfortunately, it never goes like that in game. Bards have an image problem, and your badass character concept never survives contact with a sniggering table full of gamers singing "Brave Sir Robin."

My question is this: How do you play a bard seriously? It's admittedly silly to imagine someone breaking out the tambourine and "inspiring you with the dance of my people" during an orc attack. So what do you do instead? How do you dispel all those goofy heavy metal, El Kabong, glam rocker, nerdy dude in tights tropes and create a bard character that actually belongs in a heroic fantasy? And more importantly, how do you convince the rest of the table to take your bard seriously?

 

[Mallus]

Considering my last Bard PC, technically a 4e Paladin/Bard multiclass, was known for his pornographic, vaguely Marxist slam poetry -- I assure you there were very good in-character reasons for this -- I've got nothing at the moment. I'll give it some thought...

Though my gut tells me the Bard's roots in certain kinds of folklore will always be at odds with the sort of... hmmmm... highly systematized high fantasy that typical D&D represents. D&D people tend to like magic as physics, not myth. This could just be my biases talking, tho.

 

[Jester David]

Every class is as silly as you present them to be.

Monks are a giant walking badly dubbed Chopsocky film.
Wizards run around in a bathrobe chanting jibberish.
Druids are hippies that turn into animals so they can literally crap in the woods.
Rangers are bucktoothed hillbillies a banjo song away from making someone squeal like a pig.

If you don't make the bard character a joke, they'll eventually stop being a joke.
Maybe switch away from instruments to speeches. Or diplomacy. I ran a bard diplomat once that was fun. Or trade up the lute for a Viking warhorn.

 

[Eltab]

Find the 3e Truenamer material and pass it around. Your Bard does THAT: he speaks a different language altogether and when he does so, the very world changes as your friends watch.
But you're a bit more subtle (some would say 'inexperienced'). You tend to alter the chances, make good things more likely and bad things less likely.
You buried your powers in music so it isn't so scary or obvious to the uneducated masses. They can hear you sing and enjoy your presence, not automatically run away, only to return bearing pitchforks.

 

[Aldarc]

Isn't the entire point of "Brave Sir Robin" that the fighter Sir Robin is the joke and not the minstrels/bards?

 

[Sacrosanct]

Skalds are also bards. And they are not silly at all. At least never say that to their face So playing a bard like a viking skald would be one way to avoid people thinking you're silly.

 

[Gardens & Goblins]

Re-brand them as, 'motivational speakers'.

YOU CAN ACHIEVE SUCCESS IN A DUNGEON - BELIEVE!

 

[Mallus]

Every class is as silly as you present them to be.

Monks are a giant walking badly dubbed Chopsocky film.

I kinda think every (almost?) monk should have little bit of poorly-dubbed Shaw Brothers movie in them.

Actually, I also think films like those offer a useful guide for most D&D campaigns, in that they often mix action, drama/melodrama, broad comedy, including slapstick, and frequent violent absurdity together into a pleasing whole.

i.e., those older kung-fu movies aren't tonally consistent. Just like D&D! (well, the stuff I've seen).

 

[Helldritch]

Bards can be cool and menacing.
Especially if you add some visual effects from their castings.
Our lore bard makes all his spell comes out of his lute/flute or whatever instrument she has on. She took magic initiate to have eldritch blast and hex. It is quite impressive when she cast that cantrip with eldritch blasts looking like boltish sound waves coming out of the instrument. Or a Fireball getting out the flute and hurling itself at the enemy.

The valor bard was throwing out his spell with his songs. That player was quite good with improvised rhymes. Again some visual narration with semi transparent sound wave like rings around the victims of hold persons. Vicious mockery was like a red semi transparent strand going from the bard's mouth going to the victim's head. Yep, bards can be cool.

 

[guachi]

Are you trying to say that my bard, Sir Giggles von Laffs-a-lot is silly? That only using "Your Mama..." jokes for Cutting Words and Vicious Mockery is silly? That only casting Tasha's Hideous Laughter with a verbal component punchline of "If this is a Consular ship where is the ambassador" while actually waving tiny tarts and a feather at the table is silly?

Yeah, I guess I can see that.