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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jer" data-source="post: 3512256" data-attributes="member: 19857">From a gaming perspective, the major problem I've seen with the 3e Bard is that it's like playing a Cleric but worse.  Both mainly support other characters in combat without really getting to do much themselves (the Bard through songs, the Cleric through being the walking roll of bandages), and they both have specialties where they should be able to shine but the abilities themselves are kind of less-than-dramatic and only show up at the DM's discretion (the Bard in Knowledge and Interaction checks, the Cleric with their Turn Undead ability).The Bard is arguably worse off because at least the Cleric's special ability allows for him to do something in combat -- even if it is dependent on the DM to throw some undead at the party every once in a while.  Chances for interaction tend to show up sporadically in dungeon crawls, and if you're running a more interaction-heavy campaign, the other players will want to get in on the role-playing action too, and having multiple players doing interaction is harder than having multiple players acting in combat.As for a major fix for the Bard, I'd move their song abilities to less "buff allies" and more "confuse and beguile enemies".  I'd give them more offensive song abilities (cause fear, confusion, charms, hold person, etc.), and make their spellcasting ability more limited and like the factotum from Dungeonscape -- maybe basing it around their Bardic Knowledge ability so that they can cast a spell here or there but they aren't really a "spellcasting class" -- their major role would still be support, but more in the sense of keeping monsters off of the other character's backs until they're ready to deal with them instead of buffing other characters.</blockquote>

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