Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="ThoughtBubble" data-source="post: 1087627" data-attributes="member: 9723">I'm currently playing a bard in a game. It goes from being very fun to stupidly miserable.My bard is Rellin Westgate, a human.Rellin Westgate acts like a groundless vagabond, interested in only his old enjoyment. He uses his magic in a sort of understated manner, drawing more attention to him, than the spell itself. He also uses it to make his life a bit more enjoyable, adding flavor to dry trail rations and such. He also feigns a weakness for wine and women, just to keep people from thinking too much of him. He also professes a dislike for hard work, just to keep people from asking it of him.Little has come out of his history. He makes a point of brushing it off whenever the group asks. When he does talk about himself, the stories never quite match up. Did his parents abandon him, or die to fire? Is he self taught, or did he have a mentor?In actuality, he's part of a noble family from a town a long distance from where the campaign takes place. They were involved in underhanded dealings throughout the area. He was the youngest, spoiled son who doesn't care about the family business. However, he refused to cooperate with his eldest brother, and left in the middle of the night. He's kept on the move, because his family is still looking for him, and he's run into some trouble because of it. I've always been drawn to bards because they've got an interesting combination of magical aptitude, combat skill, and style. However, being the only perosn around willing to DM, I've never got a chance to play. I was bouncing between a paladin, or a bard. I was asked to poay a bard simply because no one else had seen one.Rell is the active leader of the party, which is odd, since he's not very fond of any of them, and at least two of them profess a great dislike for him. Howver, his tendancy to get information, make decisions, and be polite has everyone following behind him. Though they typically follow with a complaint or two, or five, or ten.How well he does in combat situations depends directly on where we are. In fairly open areas, he does fine. However, as an archer, when we're in dungeons (typically 5 foot corridors everywhere) I never have a clean shot. 3E is rough, with ASF, and a troubling spell list. The small range of non simple weapons also hurts. And with 7 skill points a level (4 +int bonus + race bonus), I still am spreading myself out very thin.Unfortunately, a great many of the Bard's abilities come down to DM fiat. Bardic knowledge is one such thing, it plays whatever role the DM wants it to when he wants it to. Likewise, I have a tendancy to get ripped off on social skills. "Dude, I just got a 25! What do you mean he won't schedule me for an appointment?" or "How did I do another bad performance? You realize that I've got a +9 to perform, right?"The most important thing about playing as a bard is making sure you're not in a group with jerks. I've got one particular one in my group who doesn't let things by, and it really brings down the expierence for me. This is the guy who complains when I use bardic music during combat because someone might hear.Provided the DM is being fair and consistant about things, the bard is the master of social situations. Everywhere else, the bard is like a spare tire, useful for fixing a flat, but normally not of high use.In short, the bard is fun, but there are very good reasons that you don't see so many. I'm not likely to play another unless I really trust my DM.</blockquote>

Verification