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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tobold Hornblower" data-source="post: 165180" data-attributes="member: 395">You can pretty well focus on two things as a Bard.  My Halfling Bard is focused on diplomacy and front line fighting.  Breast Plate, loot spent for a magic shield, and good dex mean she can stand toe to toe with the bad guys.  Her short sword doesn't do much damage, but inspiring courage while holding the front line are enough.  The poorly armored Rogue/Ranger does the damage reaching over the top of her with his pole arm.Wearing armor means the spells without semantic components are best: Flare, Deafness/blindness.  The Still Spell feat helps here too.At third level her Diplomacy is already terrific, but that meant not only maxing diplomacy, but getting 5 ranks each in bluff and sense motive for another +4 on diplomacy.  At only third level, by the influencing NPC chart on DMG 149, she can automatically make the unfriendly city guard indifferent, and with only rolling a ten make him helpful.  By fifth level, she will have a ten percent chance of turning an NPC that wants to kill us into a friend who will do us favors.  Tongues is an important spell to increase her usefulness here.If your DM is the sort who figures bad guys always attack and you never get a chance to talk your way out of it, forget the Diplomacy altogether though.Alternatively, you may want to focus on something else. But still, you can pretty much be good at only two things.  Sneaky scout--fits a halfling wellRanged specialist--good for low HPs, For a halfling, using darts w/ point blank shot, precise shot, far shot, and rapid shot.  Carry grenade like weapons.Healer--Heal skill and Cure spells (this is probably good in your situation)Knowledge--like diplomacy, only if your DM is the type to facilitate it, otherwise it is useless (seems like most DMs just give the party all the knowledge there is to get without any skill check, so why waste points on it?)Administrator--You might want to take Profession(school organizer or some such).  Use your loot for lots of hirelings for your Learning Tree network.  Take leadership asap and more than once.  This style is extra good if you've maxed your diplomacy.In addition, for spell selection, stick to spells that you will use often.  You don't get enough spells to take something that is great, but only once in a while.  Buy scrolls to expand your repertoire. (Definitely buy scrolls, scribe scroll is not good for bards, as their caster level must be higher and that makes them more expensive.)If you have the intelligence and extra skill, you might go for the Use Magic Device.  It really isn't useful until you get about 20 ranks, but you don't get enough skill points to bring it up later, so keep it maxed all along.  Don't waste the points on it if you don't eventually hope to play at higher levels.As stated before, Bards aren't a good Jack-of-all-trades.  Rogue 7/ Ranger 1 /Wizard 1 / Bard 1 is a good Jack-of-all-trades.  Oh well, sorry if this is too long of a ramble, I love Bards and have spent many hours min/maxing them.Sounds like a front line healer is what your party needs.  You could focus on those, and the Bardic Knowledge ability is enough to facility your educator role-playing without the Knowledge skills.</blockquote>

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