Thoughts on using a bard

[amills1]

I've played through the original IWD a couple of times but I'm on my first EE run through. I'm still kind of undecided on using a bard, specifically using the bard song in combat. Using it provides a bonus to all characters, but it means the bard has to stand out of the way and not do anything else in combat. I'm playing with a skald so it is a nice bonus to THAC0 and damage. I can't help wonder if I would have been better with someone a bit more hands on though.

[DnD Detective]

Skald can be good especially if you use summons. Later into the game you can even have your bard cast Mislead and have the image singing instead of your bard.

[Fell]

Skalds get none of the standard bardsongs, thus have no options but one when facing different enemies.
They miss out on stuff like "War Chant of the Sith";
All allies within 30 ft. gain a +2 bonus to Armor Class, +10% resistance to slashing, piercing, crushing, and missile damage, and the ability to regenerate 2 Hit Point per round.

Instead they get their own;
1st level: Grants allies a +2 to hit and damage rolls, and a +2 bonus to AC.
15th: Grants allies a +4 to hit and damage rolls, a +4 bonus to AC, and immunity to fear.
20th: Grants allies a +4 to hit and damage rolls, a +4 bonus to AC, and immunity to fear, stun, and confusion.

Bards typically get wrecked if they are in the frontlines (even Blades), you want to use them as a ranged chant battery basically, tossing spells now and then. Summons are fun in the lower levels, but are nothing more than quick cannon fodder later in the game, like HoF. But maybe they scale well with HoF in EE...? Can't recall tbh.
If you don't care much about the actual bard songs, you have a crappy castrated rogue that wants to be a fighter but suck at it.

Fighter/Mages are miles ahead of Bards in usefullness, imo. As are Fighter/Rogues. And Rogue/Mages. And Fighter/Clerics. And so on. But some swear by Bards, this is just my opinion.
Imagine a Bard singing. He buffs the party abit. Now imagine what a Cleric or Mage can unleash in his place. Compare.

(Esp in HoF)

[Gabe the Destroyer]

Let me start by saying that I love bards. That out of the way, a bard is basically just a gimped F/M/T. The only unique thing they offer is their bard song, which i've never actually found the need for in IWD.

[veowar]

You can get a good damage resist combo with that last bard song and a dwarf defender.

[Fell]

Originally posted by veowar:

You can get a good damage resist combo with that last bard song and a dwarf defender.

Why would you use a D Defender over a standard Fighter, or Berserker? Slightly more health, a little resistance but only 4 pips in axes and crap at all other weapons, with a short buff outperformed by tons of spells...?
I prefer Grand Mastery, and not being forced to use axes. Also a dwarven fighter/cleric is a much more formidable tank - and does more forms of damage.

[veowar]

I use the DD as an pure damage spong drawing nearly every attack try to go through the pack to get even the rear enemies to go after the DD as well. Its all about stacking damage resist DD base damage reduction + DD special + Bard song usually 70% when you first get the song + then add any damage reduction equipment. While enemies are targeting the DD just pick them off with your rouge , archer , barb , kensi pretty much any of the high damage low ac/hp characters hardly need to cast spells, heal or rest since the enemy damage is usually on the DD which is lowered and your slowly recovering hp with the bard song.

[Brand]

I did a HoW playthrough with a pure bard+skald combo to great effect when paired with a heavy melee/summon focus party. By the time I had gotten to level 15 I had warchant of sith stacking with the improved skald song for something a long the lines of -6 party wide armor, +4 on damage and hit, and regeneration.

[Fell]

Originally posted by Ñøø§€:

I did a HoW playthrough with a pure bard+skald combo to great effect when paired with a heavy melee/summon focus party. By the time I had gotten to level 15 I had warchant of sith stacking with the improved skald song for something a long the lines of -6 party wide armor, +4 on damage and hit, and regeneration.

For the normal game any class is fine. Soling with a sincgle class is fine even. You can beat it with whatever team you wish, even on Core rules, and harder settings.
I've been talking about HoF, the only mode I play. You dont want a bard taking up a team slot in HoF. :P
With TWO bards it's even worse. You give up 2 characters, since they only chant some buffs other classes can rival via spells, while doing other things like fighting, healing, damage spells, etc etc.
Not saying every team member needs to be a Fighter/Mage/Cleric and one Fighter/Mage/Thief, but.... yeah. HoF.

[A New Player]

I've found that a bard is a great support class, using spells like courage and mass invisibility to really help the group out, as well as using their bard song. They also can be a group summoner, summoning cannon fodder to stop your enemies and hopefully keep them in a web effect long enough to be held for your archers/mages to pick them off.

[Fell]

Originally posted by A New Player:

I've found that a bard is a great support class, using spells like courage and mass invisibility to really help the group out, as well as using their bard song. They also can be a group summoner, summoning cannon fodder to stop your enemies and hopefully keep them in a web effect long enough to be held for your archers/mages to pick them off.

Bards only have mage spells, and real Mages dominate them in that field. Hard. And the effects of their bardsong can be mimicked with spells, should you need it. The Songs are not exactly The One Buff, even from Project/Simulacrum (and those clones should be doing other thigns than singing).
Everytime a bard sings he is wasting his potential, unless he is all out of spells and healing pots and gravely injured, having escaped to the far back.

Dual/Multi classes can do all that you talked about for bards, only much better. Mage/Cleric is a support god. A single class mage can do a better job than a Bard, even. Much better. Even has a pet to pick pockets with, should that be important. Or you go Rogue/Mage, dualclass at 7ish, or multiclass one, and you have a character with actual strong arcane prowess, and who can not only pick pockets but also deal with traps and such.

Bards are and forever will be pointless in 2 Ed, apart from RP reasons.

[Lerajie]

Pointless? War Chant of the Sith makes the bard a welcome addition. Suddenly your cleric's don't need to stack any healing spells.

Infact, if we are talking about pointless then what's the point in running anything other then elf f/m/t and half elf f/m/c? The fact you can reach level 30 in each multi, makes every other combination and race pointless indeed, power gaming for everyone! <_<

[Joatman]

Originally posted by Lerajie:

Pointless? War Chant of the Sith makes the bard a welcome addition. Suddenly your cleric's don't need to stack any healing spells.

Infact, if we are talking about pointless then what's the point in running anything other then elf f/m/t and half elf f/m/c? The fact you can reach level 30 in each multi, makes every other combination and race pointless indeed, power gaming for everyone! <_<

Exactly. (Disclaimer I really don't care for bards much so this is not for them lol) OK look folks...I see the battle going on here between the 2 most prevalent types of RPG'ers. I'm a content guy, I play for the experience of playing the game (in the case of IWD/BG etc. more nostalgia than anything else). I like to play through with different party combos to experience the game in different ways, mainly from a tabletop perspective (as much as I can). I may have weak links in the party, or use gear combos that may be inefficient, but because I like them. I pay attention to the story and character development (if there is any). If that means I play as a bard and get my ass handed to me every fight, then so be it...im still having fun. Then there's the power gamer, who lives to crunch numbers, and in MMOs to have the contest of the pi$$ing. I don't need a game to do that, a calculator and a line on ground will work fine. Obviously this is just my opinion, but I just don't see the fun in playing through with a party of elven F/M/Ts and F/M/Cs just because I can exploit the game mechanics in doing so and squeeze out a few more hits/spells/etc. So to answer your question, if you want to play a bard to see what it's like, then do it because that's what you want to do, not because it may be "better" or "worse" than some other class combo. As far as Bards in IWD specifically, there are actually a good number of exclusive items that can offset some of the arguments above, when combined with songs and the right equipment and spells. Play smart, but play fun. K done ranting.

[Soteria]

^^ Exactly. If you want to be optimal, wouldn't you take a F/M/T and 5 F/M/C's?

From a purely "I want to enjoy the game without a lot of pausing and resting" standpoint, I find bards useful. War Chant of the Sith means you never need to heal and take less damage. At the beginning of the fight you can cast spells, then sing later. You can pick up the buffs and let the mage do the attacking, or you can pick up the offensive spells and let a fighter/mage do the buffing and fighting.

[BrutalGlory]

The problem with bards is you have to assume their songs could ever be as useful as one characters base damage is. Which means unfortunately any mage or cleric with buff spells to stack will also benefit from their own buffs while being given free action - bard have to such ability as they must sing. This makes them scale very, very poorly.

you can have a bard buff your physical attackers so they do competent damage, or you can have a real mage slaughter everything before you can worry about your physicals "not doing damage fast enough" To that end another druid or cleric still brings more utility than any Bard.

Hell a basic Fighter brings more damage by himself than a bards song.

[Mulqueeny]

My Skald when he has cats Grace cast on him has -9 AC then I cast Stone skin to make him immune to damage and Mirror image, get him to steer the ire of the enemies towards him and play the song raising his AC to -13, he's basically untouchable then with the Added AC to hit and DMG the rest of the party just slay anything at a range.