D&D 5E The Bard: A missed opportunity.

[ppaladin123]

The new bard is a lot like the 3.5e beguiler. And I like that!

 

[Fion]

I think one of the larger problems with the 5e bard has nothing to do with mechanics but with flavor. They only have one 'song' class feature and their 4 unique spells should be flavored as music.

'Font of Restoration' should be Song of Restoration. Mechanically identical but thematically more bardic.

'Bardic Inspiration' should be named Inspiring Harmony, again more bardic.

'Cutting Words' from the College of Lore should be renamed to 'Litany of Curses'

'Combat Inspiration' becomes 'Battle Hymn'

The classes unique spells should likewise be renamed. Compulsion becomes 'Disorienting Ditty' to borrow from 4e.

I like a great many things about 5e but the classes seem largely designed with mechanics in mind and little in the way of flavor. Maybe they wanted to save that for campaign books and such, but there's just something wrong if your Bard has no 'songs', especially when it's so easy to re-flavor their existing stuff.

 

[Boarstorm]

But what if I want my bard to be a poet? Or a juggler?

Keeping the names generic allows us to refluff them to suit or concept without being locked into generic lute bard #57.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

5E bard is the realization (ok, 4E did it first) that the second best at everything is not an incredibly popular character concept. Either they could have placed the bard in equal footing with the rogue as a damage dealer, and that would be really weird, or they could raise it to cleric/druid level in combat support, the choice they ended up making.

That said, it would certainly be possible to create an entirely new mechanic for the bard, based in the ability to sing songs instead of casting spells, but that would be awkward, in my opinion. I enjoy the fact that classes such as bard, ranger and paladin use spell slots to power special abilities and you can pretty much ignore that they are spells if you want to. A smite or hunter's mark don't need to be a spell if you don't want them to be, and the same is true of a bard's healing word. If their choice had been to create a specific song mechanic (or a smite/hunter's mark mechanic, for that matter), additional effort would be needed to balance it. Not worth the resources, if you ask me. I can easily pick my instrument as focus and consider that the spell descriptions are the supernatural effects of my songs.

 

[jrowland]

Just houserule it isn't the answer I'm looking for.

Unfortunately the PHB is printed and released. That is the only answer you can have at this point. Maybe in a year or two you might get an errata, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

 

[TwoSix]

Just houserule it isn't the answer I'm looking for.

Well, I think recalling the books and remaking the bard to be more to your liking isn't going to be the answer you get.

I do think a new bard subclass could work for this concept. Maybe sacrifice spell slots, like a paladin's divine smite, to grant a buff to the party that can be maintained by Perform or Cha (musical instrument) checks, rather than Con checks.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

One of the issues with Inspire Courage was it forced the expectation from the party that you had to use it all the time, even if your Bard could do a million other things. And you always had to remind the other players they got a bonus.

So I don't think its absence in 5e is that big of a deal, and if the problem is lack of party buffs in magic, well that can easily be fixed by adding more bard spells that buff the party.

 

[DMZ2112]

As always, I don't see bard song as an end, but rather a means to an end, the end being the gathering of ancient knowledge in an oral tradition. Bards need to be charismatic performers but they also need to be spellcasters. I don't mind the lack of focus on musical or even performing abilities.

Best bard I've ever played in D&D was a D&D5 illusionist with the minstrel background and the loremaster feat.

 

[SkidAce]

1) You forgot the other stuff that doesn't need spells, like Expertise, free choice of skill proficiencies and high CHA.

2) And even with the spells, how are other people even going to know that you're casting spells? For all they know, your verbal components are poetry and honeyed words, your somatic components are a few dramatic hand flourishes and your material components are a few notes on your instrument. And none of those spells I mentioned have a physical effect or manifestation, like Fireball or something, so they're not going to know you're using magic from that, either.

If I let the bard cast a spell like that, the wizard is going to say the same thing ("its either spellcastin or it isn't!!!!!") and then drop said fireball (or charm) on the king.

 

[Ryujin]

5E bard is the realization (ok, 4E did it first) that the second best at everything is not an incredibly popular character concept. Either they could have placed the bard in equal footing with the rogue as a damage dealer, and that would be really weird, or they could raise it to cleric/druid level in combat support, the choice they ended up making.

That said, it would certainly be possible to create an entirely new mechanic for the bard, based in the ability to sing songs instead of casting spells, but that would be awkward, in my opinion. I enjoy the fact that classes such as bard, ranger and paladin use spell slots to power special abilities and you can pretty much ignore that they are spells if you want to. A smite or hunter's mark don't need to be a spell if you don't want them to be, and the same is true of a bard's healing word. If their choice had been to create a specific song mechanic (or a smite/hunter's mark mechanic, for that matter), additional effort would be needed to balance it. Not worth the resources, if you ask me. I can easily pick my instrument as focus and consider that the spell descriptions are the supernatural effects of my songs.

One of the things that I've always liked about previous Bard incarnations was that while they weren't spectacular at anything, they were pretty darned good at a bunch of things. Sort of the Swiss Army Knife of D&D classes. I quite enjoy playing a character like that because, if nothing else, it means that I'm involved in almost everything that's going on in some way. There's nothing wrong with being competent at many things, rather than narrowly focused.

But, then again, I'm not a min-maxing type.