Bard build?

[RamblerTeo]

So, I could use some help in building a pure bard(or with minimal multiclassing).
I just need general tips and if someone could be kind enough to guide me from level to level on which feats to take, where to allocate skill points, what kind of armor to use, which gifts to take etc.
Thank you in advance!

[The Rambling Midget]

Is this Bard going to be STR or DEX based?

Whether or not you should take gifts really depends on how fast you want the character to level. +2 to a stat makes almost no difference at low to mid levels, unless you need it to fulfill the requirements for a feat.

For armor, your best option is a Greensteel Chain Shirt, because you can cancel out the movement penalty with Fighter levels. 25Bard/5Fighter is a good combination. If you take 4 pre-epic, you get 4 APR instead of 3, and your 5th will give you Epic Weapon Specialization.

Max out Tumble, Perform, and Discipline, and get 15 UMD to use wands and scrolls. If you can take Heal and Spellcraft as well, both are great to have.

Take Curse Song and Lasting Inspiration as early as you can. Bard Song and Curse Song put together give you an effective +7AC/+7AB at level 16.

[RamblerTeo]

Strength based bard, planning to probably mc it with a Blackguard since it's a rather popular build choice, too. Also, won't I get bad saves as a Fighter?

[Yellena]

Pm me everything about the character concept (personality, inteligence, tatics, fighting style etc adn I can make proposals). I really love bards and pure bards have a LOT of potential. You may however, want to drop 3~4 levels into another class as reaching 100 perform requires more investment than every other class (even harder than 30 wis for dragon shapers).

[RamblerTeo]

Pm me everything about the character concept (personality, inteligence, tatics, fighting style etc adn I can make proposals). I really love bards and pure bards have a LOT of potential. You may however, want to drop 3~4 levels into another class as reaching 100 perform requires more investment than every other class (even harder than 30 wis for dragon shapers).

Jolly good. Sent you a PM.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

Mechanically speaking, I actually object to TRM's suggestion to get Lasting Inspiration. Curse song, yes, but because of curse song, no to lasting inspiration, and DEFINITELY no to its epic version that makes your songs last forever.

Curse song results in saveless damage to any enemy in range that isn't deafened or in a zone of silence. At higher levels, and especially across larger groups, this damage can actually add up.

The catch is this: Curse song cannot be used to apply damage a second time, until the effects of the first song have worn off.

If you're planning to have 20+ levels of bard, odds are you'll have plenty of singing even without the extra duration- so even if you find a single application of the damage every 10 rounds to be unworthy of note, consider that bards don't exactly have a plethora of feats to spare in their own right and you may find it worth it to save the feat for something else.

[Jack Oat]

Mechanically speaking, I actually object to TRM's suggestion to get Lasting Inspiration. Curse song, yes, but because of curse song, no to lasting inspiration, and DEFINITELY no to its epic version that makes your songs last forever.

Curse song results in saveless damage to any enemy in range that isn't deafened or in a zone of silence. At higher levels, and especially across larger groups, this damage can actually add up.

The catch is this: Curse song cannot be used to apply damage a second time, until the effects of the first song have worn off.

If you're planning to have 20+ levels of bard, odds are you'll have plenty of singing even without the extra duration- so even if you find a single application of the damage every 10 rounds to be unworthy of note, consider that bards don't exactly have a plethora of feats to spare in their own right and you may find it worth it to save the feat for something else.

A point of clarification: Lasting Inspiration is the Epic feat, and is the only one needed to get the 100 round Bard Song.

Base Bard Song is ten rounds, which is one turn, or one RL minute. Most fights last way longer than that, so even if he has 20 or 25 Bard Songs, those will dwindle rapidly in any sort of PvE situation. Not needing to use a round to drop Bard Song after the last one expires is far more useful than the additional 28-48 damage he could do with a Curse Song if only due to the fact that he can still do damage that round with his weapon.

The damage from Curse Song is also mitigable by any sort of energy resistance spell since its sonic damage, and the entirety of Curse Song can be dismissed in PvP with the use of a Silence wand.



As for a build, I'd go with what TRM said. Either 25 Bard/5 Fighter or 20 Bard/6 Fighter/4 Blackguard. If you'd like the full layout of either build, I can either post it here or send it to you in a PM, just let me know.

Either way, if you plan to Multiclass I'd recommend doing it into a class with full BAB for at least four levels pre-epic for the extra attack per round.

[Lorkas]

*stuffs wads of wax in his ears*
-deaf

No need for silence wands.

[P Three]

Stuff...

All this.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

A point of clarification: Lasting Inspiration is the Epic feat, and is the only one needed to get the 100 round Bard Song.

My bad. You're right, I was confusing this with Lingering Song. However-

Base Bard Song is ten rounds, which is one turn, or one RL minute. Most fights last way longer than that, so even if he has 20 or 25 Bard Songs, those will dwindle rapidly in any sort of PvE situation. Not needing to use a round to drop Bard Song after the last one expires is far more useful than the additional 28-48 damage he could do with a Curse Song if only due to the fact that he can still do damage that round with his weapon.

It is my experience that in an efficiently functioning group an average 'mob group' takes far less than the minute-long duration of a single bard song- so long as you aren't practically committing suicide just by hunting there. For most of these mobs you won't need the curse song and the bard song stacked- you can save that for the champion mobs and the boss fights. This means that if you have to go through 20 different fights, with 4 of them being champion fights and 1 of them being a boss fight, you can sing in every single one of them before you have to rest, without spending an epic feat.

I will admit it would be -convenient- to only have to use one bard song for 10 minutes of adventuring and just spam curse song where desired, but I don't think it's worth an epic feat with a mix of classes that while potent are both typically feat-starved individually and more-so together (multi-classing into bg will give some awesome boosts but it will also deprive you of epic bonus feats as a bard).

With regards to being able to swing a weapon, it comes down to this- how many times will the weapon swing against one monster, and how many monsters are there? If there are ten enemies on-screen (I have definitely been in zones where the number is higher than that) that 42 damages becomes 420, minus whatever energy resistances exist across the crowd.

]The damage from Curse Song is also mitigable by any sort of energy resistance spell since its sonic damage, and the entirety of Curse Song can be dismissed in PvP with the use of a Silence wand.


As for a build, I'd go with what TRM said. Either 25 Bard/5 Fighter or 20 Bard/6 Fighter/4 Blackguard. If you'd like the full layout of either build, I can either post it here or send it to you in a PM, just let me know.

Either way, if you plan to Multiclass I'd recommend doing it into a class with full BAB for at least four levels pre-epic for the extra attack per round.

All true and I agree- but since they want minimal multiclassing, I'd recommend 26 bard/4 blackguard, with all 4 blackguard levels pre-epic to get 4 APR, divine might, and divine shield.

You're going to have to separate bg 3 and bg 4 across two feat gains, so I recommend 1-12 bard, 13-15 blackguard, giving you 3 consecutive levels of bg to follow the rule and the ability to take divine might, then take your 4th level of blackguard at level 18 and snag divine shield.

[Peppermint]

To be honest, there isn't much point in going pure bard. You get one more point of AC on the song than you would at level 25, but you give up being able to do basically anything else. If you're concerned about optimization, I wouldn't do it. If, on the other hand, you simply like the concept of a pure bard, then by all means, go for it.

Perhaps the most straightforward (though not necessarily the strongest) multiclassed bard is a bard/fighter hybrid. Bard 25/Fighter 5 is a fairly solid split. Ensure you take four of those fighter levels pre-epic for a fourth attack. Stop boosting charisma at 16 (or even 15, if you don't care for the sixth level spells). Focus on strength. Grab a one-hander and a shield (with scimitar or rapier being the most optimal) and go stab things in the face between songs.

One can make an argument that lasting inspiration isn't all the crucial for pure bards, or bard/fighters. That said, neither is particularly feat-starved, and the damage dealt by reapplying the song is fairly minimal. It may look like a lot if you total it across half a dozen (or more) enemies, but the fact is, solid, concentrated damage is far more important than damage spread out. You don't want to tickle your enemies; you want to kill them to prevent them from killing you back. It's the same reason high level mages don't bother casting fireball.

One could almost make a better argument for foregoing lasting inspiration on a bard/paladin or bard/blackguard, as those builds tend to be more feat-starved. However, those builds also tend to reapply divine might and divine shield during difficult fights. Taking lasting inspiration reduces the number of buffs they need frequently reapply in a fight from four to two, which is a veritable godsend for a build that might otherwise be mired in action fatigue.

In short? You could forego lasting inspiration on a pure bard or bard/fighter, but there's not much point. And while foregoing the feat seems more attractive to a bard/paladin or bard/blackguard at first blush, the fact is, it's also far more useful to them -- almost a necessity. I wouldn't pass the feat up ever.

[Scurvy Cur]

One could almost make a better argument for foregoing lasting inspiration on a bard/paladin or bard/blackguard, as those builds tend to be more feat-starved. However, those builds also tend to reapply divine might and divine shield during difficult fights. Taking lasting inspiration reduces the number of buffs they need frequently reapply in a fight from four to two, which is a veritable godsend for a build that might otherwise be mired in action fatigue.

In short? You could forego lasting inspiration on a pure bard or bard/fighter, but there's not much point. And while foregoing the feat seems more attractive to a bard/paladin or bard/blackguard at first blush, the fact is, it's also far more useful to them -- almost a necessity. I wouldn't pass the feat up ever.

To add to this, even with just a rough back-of-the-envelope bard/bg build (the most feat starved of the bunch), I had a couple of feats left over after taking everything that's really great. You have to prioritize some mediocre feats over lasting inspiration to really run out.

The forever song is pretty much the best feat you're going to get outside of curse song on a 20+ bard. Don't skip it.

[Seven Sons of Sin]

Lasting Inspiration single handedly is the best buff in the game (or maybe it used to be, before Weave Masters).

There's nothing that beats a constant buff that can suddenly empower everyone in your party, across the board. It can turn a bunch of low level characters into something more challenging.

In my opinion, as someone who played a bard with Lasting Inspiration, it was invaluable. It's also dispellable, which is a plus. Your party will show you love.

(Harm and curse song combos are also hilarious- or were. Also, curse song in PvP can be gnarly with lasting inspiration. Especially on those "drawn out" encounters.)

[Urch]

While not as combat orientated, you could try a bard 25/rogue 5. With open lock, disable trap, search, bard song, and other nifty skills like appraise (for selling the party loot), you can be essentially the ultimate support, dealing with traps, locks, buffing and social skills.