How would you balance the Bard & the Cleric?

[Darklone]

Actually I was pretty often surprised when I compared the druid and the cleric spell list... druids don't have many nature related spells that clerics get. Of course, wild shape makes up for that... but still...

 

[der_kluge]

Did you see my post at all? Its like the second one...

I really liked the idea about making the bard into a rogue progression. Just like the monk or ranger, the rogue could take a charisma path or dexterity path as they gain levels or something. The dex path would include adding core skills like hide, move silent etc. The charisma path would add diplomacy, intimidate, gather info.

What I really think would be neat, instead of making the bard a part of a rogues "tree", make a tree for the bard. Either the Charisma/Performer path or the Sage/Knowledge gathering class. Choosing the Charisma/Performer path, the bard would gain more songs, and stronger songs. The Sage/Knowledge gatherer would recieve bardic knowledge and access to more spells/more per day, etc. I think that would be interesting for bards.

I like the idea of creating a couple of different varieties of Bard. Right now, the Bard is just a one-trick pony. It's no longer the jack-of-all-trades that it once was.

I see a lot of people on here claiming that their Bard's are great diplomats, and every party should have one. Pfeh, give me a high charisma sorcerer with ranks in diplomacy, and they could outshine a bard in that department any day. There's really nothing unique about the bard that a sorcerer and a rogue can't already replace just as easily.

I don't know if you could do that with a single class or not. I think it might take a couple of different classes to do that.

 

[jmucchiello]

In Character Customization, I made the suggestion that the Cleric should not get both domain feats at first level, delaying the second until 3rd level.

For the bard, I rewrote the bard's class table with a set of bonus bard feats and then expanded the types of songs the bard knows. So if you don't want suggestion for your bard, you didn't have to have it. Take a different song. The list of feats available in that book:

Antimagic Song      18+ ranks in Perform, Suppress Spell
Bliss               12+ ranks in Perform, Fascinate
Countersong          3+ ranks of Perform
Counterspell         9+ ranks of Perform, Countersong
Dream               16+ ranks in Perform
Fascinate            3+ ranks of Perform
Inspire Competence   6+ ranks of Perform
Inspire Courage      3+ ranks of Perform
Inspire Greatness   12+ ranks of Perform, Inspire Courage
Inspire Heroics     15+ ranks of Perform, Inspire Courage
Inspire Legends     20+ ranks of Perform, Inspire Greatness or Inspire Heroics
Inspire Mastery     15+ ranks of Perform, Inspire Competence
Mass Suggestion      6+ ranks of Perform, Suggestion
Relieve Fatigue      8+ ranks of Perform
Reveal Illusion     12+ ranks in Perform
Reveal Invisibility  6+ ranks in Perform
Reveal Magic         3+ ranks in Perform
Song of Freedom     12+ ranks in Perform
Suggestion           9+ ranks of Perform, Fascinate
Suppress Spell       6+ ranks of Perform and one or more of Reveal Illusion, Reveal Invisibility or Reveal Magic

 

[James Heard]

I think the trick would be to make sure that a bard really is the CHA monger of the party bar none, that another class just wouldn't be able to compete with a Bard because I think that's the Bard's niche. If nothing else it's really the only niche left. I'm not sure how you'd manage "socially scary" in absolute terms, but I think a good bard should be able to do things just with a little conversation that other classes would need high level spells and combat to accomplish.

 

[TracerBullet42]

I see a lot of people on here claiming that their Bard's are great diplomats, and every party should have one. Pfeh, give me a high charisma sorcerer with ranks in diplomacy, and they could outshine a bard in that department any day. There's really nothing unique about the bard that a sorcerer and a rogue can't already replace just as easily.

Wow...had a bad experience with a bard, have we?

Sure, you could create a sorceror or rogue that has a better diplomacy score, but then you'd be taking away from their other abilities.

Take for instance a spoon. You could put prongs on the end of it, making it able to poke at food and pick it up. (aka, a "spork") And it would still be able to ladel up soup, too. And you know what, it would work.

However, now imagine that that "spork" had instead been a normal spoon of the same size with a ladel all the way out to the edge. How much more soup could you then contain in every scoop? See how that works?

And yes, I am kinda hungry and could go for a bowl of soup right now...

And thus ends my strange analogy for today...

 

[tarchon]

I see a lot of people on here claiming that their Bard's are great diplomats, and every party should have one. Pfeh, give me a high charisma sorcerer with ranks in diplomacy, and they could outshine a bard in that department any day. There's really nothing unique about the bard that a sorcerer and a rogue can't already replace just as easily.

Sorcerers don't get Diplomacy as a class skill and they only get 2 skill points too, so you'd have to do a multiclass. I think Rogue is the only class that has the points and class skills to realistically compete in that arena.

 

[der_kluge]

Here is the Archaeologist I posted in House Rules a while back:

http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=82464

Nifft also has a different version as well. Some people here might find this to be an alternative to a Bard. It's sort of a rogue/wizard build.

 

[Will]

I don't think anyone mentioned the big area where bards beat just about everybody, hands down...

magic items.

A bard has a relatively broad spell list, that includes a mixture of cleric-like and wizard/sorcerer-like spells. A bard can use a wand of Web, a Staff of Evocation (I think), and a wand of cure light wounds.

In addition, with Use Magic Device, the bard has a good chance of using, oh, druid items and the like. A cleric with Magic domain has some advantages with magic item, but the lack of UMD class skill still limits them.

Expendable and one-shot magic items seem to be a realm that most players typically avoid, but there is a huge amount of potential power here.

Other areas of bardic power... Glibness is a biggie.

Esthetically, I agree with previous posters. I think bardic singing should have been integrated with spells, so that verbal components are singing, with somatic either being dance or playing an instrument. Bards would then, oh, require both hands for somatic components, and are required to have a verbal or somatic component for all spells. A bard with Still and Silent spell could apply one, but not both, to a spell with V and S components.

That isn't a matter of power, though.

Another problem with bards is that some abilities (I'm looking at you, bardic knowledge) often become all or nothing... but then I have that problem with knowledge skills, too..


As for clerics, I'm not sure what I'd do. They are powerful and versatile. A player interested in creating a warrior might be tempted to go the war cleric route. On the other hand, the power of feats is also tempting for pure fighter, and so forth.

 

[dwarfdorn]

Other Bard Powers

Like I said before... More songs per day for the bard. Lets say Level + Cha Mod. They would get a decent boost at 1st level, but not be too powerful at higher levels.

Another thing I might do for a bard is give them a choice at 1st level to pick up one of a list of abilities. They get a choice of 1 from the following list:

Sneak Attack +1d6 (it never improves)
Trapfinding
Bonus Feat
Secrets from the Loremaster PrC.

This is just a rough idea.

People also overlook the power of the bard songs in combat. ONe round to start singing and then they can get into the hairball. Bards should be using ranged weapons and only fighting toe to toe in extreame situations.

The other ting that I do for bards in my campaigns is give them a reputation bonus. I keep track of reputation, but I give bards a natural advantage in most social situations. Bards are famous and word of them spreads. Inn keepers love them because they draw crowds to buy their watered down ale. People like them because they add some color to an otherwise dull life.

As for Clerics... Yeah Battle Clerics can be pretty fierce, but they can't stand toe to toe against any of the pure fighters (Barbarian, Fighter, Paladin), monks or melee oriented rangers. Sure the cleric can buff themselves up, but while they are doing that the fighter is playing stabby-stabby.

I have heard people argue that many classes are overpowered. THe monk was once on the list until I had the guy who complained about it create a monk and I created a fighter uising the same base stats. I whipped his butt all over the place. If a class is too powerful in a given campaign, then it is usually due to the DM letting the players metagame and min/max without any real logic and reason. I feel fortunate, my current players tend to underpower their characters to make them a bit more real.