Class Acts: Bard

You know the drill: more spells, a couple feats, and a trio of magical instruments. A lot of the spells seem to add in various controller effects such as forced movement, or “encouraging” a monster to move in a specific manner. Almost all of them are linked to instruments, which is a shame since after so many lame-ass bards in past editions I like my bards wading into battle hacking things apart with vibro-swords.

Staggering note is a new at-will attack that deals a minor amount of damage, but lets you push a target while allowing an ally to make an attack with a bonus at any point during the forced movement.

Strike up the dance is a level 15 spell really plays up a controller theme by letting you slam up to three targets with some psychic damage, negating their movement, and sliding them either at the start or end of their turn. The best part is thats it only ends on a save, so you get at least one shot at essentially moving up to three monsters wherever the fuck you want and locking them down. If they have shitty luck, well…

Cherub’s song is a level 22 spell that lets you fly and creates a zone on you that lets your allies fly. As an added bonus, you get to add your Con modifier to the speed.

As for feats, one gives you a bonus on all untrained skills, while the other grants save bonuses to allies affected by majestic word. Not bad, I suppose.

The magic items follow a similar pattern as the rest of the bardic instruments: they each have a set enhancement modifier and some form of nifty effect that you can trigger while resting to give your allies a bonus. One lets you ramp up defenses against mind-affecting shit like charm, psychic, and fear attacks, another lets you give all allies temp hp, and the war drum (my favorite) gives a speed bonus in addition to letting them reduce forced movement effects.

Decent addition for instrument-themed bards. Despite my preference for weapons, I’d certainly take some of the spells, especially cherub’s song since allowing everyone to fly is too damned cool. I doubt I’d pick any of the feats, though Saving Breath is somewhat tempting (especially if I were to play a goliath bard).

Katho, Goliath Bard

Katho, level 1
Goliath, Bard
Bardic Virtue: Virtue of Valor
Background: Geography – Mountains (+2 to Athletics)

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 13, Con 16, Dex 15, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 11, Con 14, Dex 15, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.

AC: 15 Fort: 13 Reflex: 13 Will: 15
HP: 28 Surges: 10 Surge Value: 7

TRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +4, Diplomacy +8, Insight +5, Athletics +9, History +4

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +2, Bluff +4, Dungeoneering +1, Endurance +3, Heal +1, Intimidate +4, Nature +3, Perception +1, Religion, Stealth +2, Streetwise +4, Thievery +2

FEATS
Bard: Ritual Caster
Level 1: Goliath Greatweapon Prowess

POWERS
Bard at-will 1: War Song Strike
Bard at-will 1: Guiding Strike
Bard encounter 1: Shout of Triumph
Bard daily 1: Slayer’s Song

ITEMS
Ritual Book, Hide Armor, Greatsword, Adventurer’s Kit

Character Concepts: Kara, Kenku Rogue/Bard

A friend asked about making a good multiclassed rogue/bard, or bard/rogue, whichever works. I think that they can both work extremely well since both classes use Charisma in some capacity. Rogues can get a lot of mileage out of it with the Artful Dodger class feature, and bards are entirely dependent on it, so there’s a lot of room for synergy.

I was considering what race to use, and wanted to default to the half-elf since they are great iconic rogues and bards, not to mention their multiclassing affinity. That seemed waaaaaaaaaay too easy and I dont really care for half-elves, so I quickly discarded it in favor of a more…unique race: the kenku.

Kenku made their debut in Monster Manual 2, and was something I was going to kick around as a Charisma-based paladin of the Raven Queen in an “oriental setting” part of my Points of Light campaign, where I called the Raven Queen something else entirely. However, thats neither here nor there, so for now I’ll just stick to the plan.

I decided to start out with the rogue as a good foundation, since my friend wanted to have the built excel at melee stuff. This works out well since the bard has plenty of brutal melee spells at its disposal, but being as we only get one feat at level 1 to play with, we wont be seeing any of that at the start.

It was a simple matter of immediately slapping 16’s in both Dex and Cha. I need Cha anyway for Artful Dodger, and once I actually get around to learning bard spells it’ll be doubly useful. I put some pips into Strength, since I wanted to reflect a rough upbringing on the mean ol’ streets as viewed through the eyes of China Mieville. I almost never seem to put Con at 8, so I did just for that reason, chalking it up to chronic malnourishment while growing up.

At any rate, here is the finished level 1 product.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======
Kara, level 1
Kenku, Rogue
Rogue Tactics: Artful Dodger

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 13, Con 8, Dex 18, Int 10, Wis 11, Cha 18.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 13, Con 8, Dex 16, Int 10, Wis 11, Cha 16.

AC: 16 Fort: 11 Reflex: 16 Will: 14
HP: 20 Surges: 5 Surge Value: 5

TRAINED SKILLS
Stealth +11, Thievery +9, Acrobatics +9, Intimidate +9, Bluff +11, Streetwise +11, Diplomacy +9

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Arcana, Dungeoneering, Endurance -1, Heal, History, Insight, Nature, Perception, Religion, Athletics +1

FEATS
Level 1: Bardic Dilettante

POWERS
Rogue at-will 1: Sly Flourish
Rogue at-will 1: Piercing Strike
Rogue daily 1: Handspring Assault
Rogue encounter 1: Fox’s Gambit

ITEMS
Leather Armor, Adventurer’s Kit, Dagger, Short sword, Shuriken
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======

I prefer to advance a character in a more organic fashion (ie, actual play), but I advanced Kara up to level 10 to see how well she plays with groups. Basically it ended up with me taking a bard attack and utility, which was easy since bards are leaders and thats their thing: work with the group.

Speaking of bards, lets see how she looks as a bard-multiclassed-rogue.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======
Karasu, level 1
Kenku, Bard
Bardic Virtue: Virtue of Cunning

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 8, Dex 18, Int 13, Wis 11, Cha 18.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 8, Dex 16, Int 13, Wis 11, Cha 16.

AC: 17 Fort: 10 Reflex: 15 Will: 15
HP: 20 Surges: 6 Surge Value: 5

TRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +6, Diplomacy +9, Acrobatics +8, Bluff +11, Streetwise +11, Thievery +8

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Dungeoneering +1, Endurance -1, Heal +1, History +2, Insight +1, Intimidate +5, Nature +1, Perception +1, Religion +2, Stealth +6, Athletics

FEATS
Bard: Ritual Caster
Level 1: Sneak of Shadows

POWERS
Bard at-will 1: War Song Strike
Bard at-will 1: Guiding Strike
Bard daily 1: Slayer’s Song
Bard encounter 1: Inspiring Refrain

ITEMS
Ritual Book, Hide Armor, Short sword, Spiked gauntlet, Adventurer’s Kit
RITUALS
Glib Limerick, Silence
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======

I think that this build better compliments the flock mentality that kenku emphasize. The problem I ran into is that none of the bard virtues rely on Dexterity, where the rogue/bard combination readily uses both high ability scores. In this case, the Int of 13 ensures that Virtue of Cunning gets something, but not much. On the chance that most melee powers synch up to Virtue of Valor, its a simple manner of swapping Int with Con. In the end, its a minor benefit at best, at least until paragon tier.
Now, you could drop Dex a bit and take the bard multiclass feat that causes all multiclass powers to rely on Charisma. This basically sidesteps most of the mess and lets you get away with having a Dex of 16 and an Int of 14-15. Your damage is slightly lower (by one whole point, yawn), but I think its a worthy tradeoff.

Both builds work out very well and are thematic in their own way, and this actually makes me want to run an all kenku urban campaign…

Class Acts: The Bard

This is a sweet-and-short article that describes four paragon paths that work for bards who like to heavily invest in multiclass feats from a specific power source. You get one for divine, martial, primal, and arcane.

The blessed psalmist learns songs of the Astral Sea, such as angelic choruses and demonic chants. Features let you gain the Channel Divinity power specific to the class you multiclassed into, can use a bardic instrument in place of another implement for those powers, regain uses of majestic word when you burn action points, and you can expend words of friendship in order to deal radiant damage and apply radiant vulnerability.
The powers deal bonus radiant damage, create a zone that grants necrotic resistance anda saving throw bonus against ongoing damage, and a close burst 10 effect that forces an enemy to choose to become dominated or stunned (save ends). Allies caught in the burst gain temp hp.
I like that this paragon path lets you use your other implements in place of whichever divine class you happen to be using. It really lets you work music into the mix.

Daring blades blend song and sword, using dance as a medium for their powers. Their powers are martial, so its not technically magic, I suppose. I dunno. Anywho, the features let you use Charisma in place of whatever else you would use when making basic attacks, mark nearby enemies by spending an action point (and gaining temp hp to boot), and Bluff as a minor action to gain combat advantage (except that it can persist for quite a bit longer than normal).
The powers let you make an attack with combat advantage and causing the target to likewise grant combat advantage to your allies, gain a power bonus to AC and Reflex in addition to granting your allies a power bonus to attack, and shift your speed, gain an Intimidate bonus, deal quad damage, and slide the target next to another ally, who gains a free attack. Whew.
This class has a very solid feel of a bard/rogue, allowing for a dashing swashbuckler concept. Since the bard already has plenty of weapon spells, its pretty easy to pull off. The accompanying sidebar adds a magic item property for heavy/light blades that lets you use it in place of an implement for bard and daring blade powers. Neat!

Next on the list is the mythic skald. This is a concept that I’ve often considered in the past to use with orcs, dwarves, and “viking”-esque cultures, but never did since bards sucked ass. This paragon path lets you take that concept and really roll with it. The features let you give another ally a bonus to attack/damage when another ally bloodies a target, burn an action point to grant allies temp hp, and grant an attack bonus when you use majestic word on an ally. Primal virtue indeed.
The powers let you grant another ally a free attack with a hefty bonus (and push effect, jebus), keep an ally walking even at negative hp (you make death saves still, and can die if you fail three), and finally grant an ally a free attack with quite a few bonuses that last until the end of the encounter.
I really like this paragon path. Its my favorite out of all four, and would fit really well in Songs of Erui. Great if you want to play a bard from a “primitive” race, or whatnot.

Finally, the resourceful magician. This is the most complicated of the four, since the 11th-level class feature gives you a benefit based on a specific arcane multiclass feat that you had to take to qualify. You could gain some wizard cantrips, a sorcerers variable resistance, swordbond (yawn), or eldritch blast as an at-will (glee). The other features let you make another attack against something else if your attack(s) miss, and you can choose a power from either your bard class or your multiclassed-class at any point in time that you gain a power. Any time. No limits.
The powers let you recall and immediately recast an encounter power that you just used, grant yourself and an ally a move action as a minor action, and a range 20 daily that hits two targets and one of four effects that you pick each time you cast it. Nifty.
This one seems to be the most conceptually flexible of the four, since Greater Study focuses on whatever you took as your multiclass instead of giving a static benefit. That, and Diverse Study lets you do a LOT of multiclassing, so…yeah.

I like this article only because I actually play bards now. If this were 3rd Edition, I wouldnt give a crap. Now? I have a level 6 bard, and wouldnt mind giving another one a shot. I am thinking half-orc bard/mythic skald, which would be the first half-orc I’ve ever played. Hell, I could go for a kenku bard that works with dark pact warlock. Time to fire up Character Builder. Again.