Comparing D&D Editions and CRPG Discussion

[Yehudah]

I play a bard in 3.5e (the kobold bard of my profile picture ) and they can perform there really well (they have a buff there which grant them +30 bluff...). But as LordEntrails said, a bard might not work well depending on how one skills them. A bard (in 3.5e) is therefore not a class I would suggest for a new player, it takes some knowledge to play them. When one knows how to play them, then they can be really fun to play (e.g. there are builds to make them very strong in melee combat)

EDIT: and in a good group one can have nice combinations of actions. Like using fascinate just to give the rogue an opportunity to backstab the NPC. The bard can also be really useful in many other roleplaying aspects and supportive ways

@Kelrugem
Would you mind talking a bit about builds which make bards good in melee?

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Something else I wanted to discuss was multiclassing in the different editions. I am not a big fan of "dual classing" especially in 3.x (possibly 5e and 4e as well). I REALLY like how it works in Baldur's Gate... multi-classing, that is. It's all about MinMax in NWN using 3.0. I'm not a fan of that kind of tedium for the most part. in Baldur's Gate (ADnD), you are both classes simultaneously. You do not level them up separately. How does it work in 4e and 5e? If it's the same as 3.x, are there any good house rules people have designed to have it like it is in ADnD?
I thought Mage/Swashbuckler (Thief subclass) might be a good combination. Let's say you have a two-man party. I'll be a Cleric/Fighter, my friend Mage/Swashbuckler. I did that in Ravenloft: Stone Prophet (it was Mage/Thief as subclasses aren't an option), and I mostly maxed out both characters stats without rolling. I know this is cheesing it. But those ancient games are extremely difficult and cumbersome to navigate so I felt it was necessary to make my two character party more durable when I need to deal with the extreme clunkiness of such an ancient game.

[Kelrugem]

@Kelrugem
Would you mind talking a bit about builds which make bards good in melee?

okay, let me think; my bard is just some little nice and cute kobold who doesn't fight a lot (I play him as the DM to motivate the group in their roleplay; he is more the mascot of the group ) But funnily there is some nice build for such kobold bards, or more general for bards with a draconic background (either kobold, dragonborn, spellscale or anyone else with feats like draconic heritage). The following is just out of my head, not a complete guideline:

1. Take the feat Draconic Inspiration (Races of Dragon), this gives you an additional which works like Inspire Courage (and it improves like that, too) but it gives instead Xd6 fire damage (X is the bonus of inspire courage; so, when you have inspire courage +2 then you have an additional song giving you and your allies 2d6 fire damage). The type of the energy damage can be changed if you have other draconic backgrounds (a sonic one would fit to a bard and there are not really many creatures with any resistances against that). And that ability improves also later when inspire courage improves
2. The feat Snowflake Wardance (Frostburn) gives you another song allowing you to add your CHA modifier to attack and damage (additional to strength or dexterity!). This also means that one can concentrate more on Dexterity for defenses while strength is then not so important anymore.
3. Due to the bigger amount of songs then, one should later take also at least once a feat giving four additional uses of Bardic Music per day (extra music feat in Complete Adventurer). Maybe also Lingering Song later such that your songs take 10 rounds to expire instead of 5 after you stop singing/playing etc..
4. There is some feat making your inspire courage better by +1 (and so also the dragonfire mentioned above), Heartsong or something like that.
5. There is a spell, Inspirational boost, which improves your inspire courage again by +1 (and again also your dragonfire inspiration) and the casting time is just a swift action

So assume a lvl 9 bard having these and having a CHA = 18 (by having a +2 CHA item for example), then you get the following additional bonusses after your songs (Snowflake + Inspire Courage + Dragonfire (for damage)):
additional attack bonus: 4 + 4 = 8
additional damage bonus: 4 + 4 + (4d6 fire) = 8 + (4d6 fire)

Except of the snowflake effect, your allies get these bonusses, too There is also a way to push these bonusses even further (such that inspire courage and dragonfire would be +10 each for a lvl 9 bard, but this involves a relic and an Exalted Feat, so this strongly depends on your DM and the campaign).

When your race is indeed something like a kobold you can push this still. All these effects are per attack and not just once. A kobold gets his claws and his bite as natural attack (and was there not a feat that allows a kobold to use his tail, too? or also wings (yeah, there are some Dragonwrought kobolds with wings; but, again, this depends on your DM if he allows you such a kobold)). So, when one claw wears a longsword you can use the other claw and the bite as additional secondary natural attacks (just once -5 on their attack). Thus, the lvl 9 bard would have in total 4 attacks (2 of the longsword, one claw and one bite) which all trigger the effects mentioned above. A standard lvl 9 bard would have only 2 attacks by the longsword. Then casting haste, one additional attack... You see the principle behind that Of course one should care about his defence, too. But there are of course inspire greatness, magic items and so on; I now only just focused on the offense to motivate the build a bit (as I said, not a complete guideline now)

There are also some other melee builds, also especiall some with Elven background like the Bladesinger in Races of Faerûn. But it is too long ago when I read them in my books.

[Yehudah]

@Kelrugem
That's pretty helpful.
I also read the Player's Handbook chapter on Bards today. On that data alone, Bards are very powerful. They can even increase their ability scores.
Also, it barely occurs to me to make characters of unusual racial backgrounds. I did find the crusader army in Baldur's Gate Siege of Dragonspear having Gnolls, Ogres, Trolls, and other monsters to be rather strange. I don't know if anyone has comments on that.