Hello all,

Back at BG after a good long half year break. I'm already solo'ing away with a new neat Blade. My issues are mostly minted on high levels and have not come to light yet.
I remember the agony of the Bards having their spell progression slaugthered at higher levels. For some reason the Bards have a 6th level cap on making them stand almost still for several millions of XP. Thus I had to rely on even more cheese and traps to get by and I found that a little.. out of character for lack of better terms.
In core AD&D rules Bards have an 8th spell level cap. I know the basic rulebooks only cover spell progression till level 6, but there is a supplement that covers level 21-30 for all classes where you can get this information. This supplement cannot be completely unknown to Black Isle as it also covers elements such as HLAs and the Priest/Wizard "10th" level dweomer spells. So I am a bit baffled as to why they opt'ed to offer traps to bards instead of having them get more spells.
I am not saying I am being short handed per se. Jeez, Time Stop trap and offensive spin will get rid of more or less everything. I am just feeling a bit out of character.
I am also thinking that I cannot possibly be the only one with this feeling and knowlegde. Unless TSR's high level material was a really bad seller. Based on that I believe there must be a Bard rebalance out there somewhere I haven't found yet. Is there such a thing and if so where can it be found? If not I presume it would be possible to tamper a bit myself. Would there be any frowning at this? As I see it the trade-off between spells and traps is entirely fair in terms of magnitude. After all this is how Bard where meant to be at high levels according to TSR.

[ 04-10-2005, 03:37 AM: Message edited by: mad=dog ]

aVENGER's Rogue Rebalancing mod and Weimer's Ease-of-Use both work along the lines you suggest, but in different ways.

Rogue Rebalancing makes Thieves more Thiefy, Bards more Bardy, and Rogues in general more useful to the party, where before they tended to be eclipsed by the Warriors and Wizards. It makes several changes to the Bard kits, most notably making the standard Bard Song actually do something (it was apparently never implemented properly before), removing all of their Trap HLAs and replacing them with spell-like abilities that fit well with the Bard's Ethos, each Bard kit has a different version of Enhanced Bard Song except the Blade, who gets a Weapons Display ability instead.

Ease-of-Use contains a component that "corrects" the way that the arcane spellcasting tables were "nerfed" by BioWare. Install it and Haer'Dalis will cast spells like Nalia, Nalia will cast spells like Edwin, and Edwin....don't ask. This happens because (I believe) the charts you mention are meant for 3rd Edition D&D. The game itself is based on 2nd Edition rules, with a few exceptions that didn't come along until 3rd Ed, such as Monks and Sorcerers. Weimer ascribes to the belief that bigger is better, which is probably why your party of 2nd Ed Warriors can't kill a 3rd Ed Improved Pit Fiend.

Thanks for the response there 6oSpades (o omnipotent master of BG lore :D ). Somehow knew there would be something like this.
The rules I am talking about is from 2nd Ed AD&D. It was published seperately from the base sets which I presume is why it is so seldom heard of. I have not seen the 3rd Ed. rules yet, but if there is anything similar to HLAs and dweomers you'll now know where that originated.
Black Isles nerfed all spell tables regarding the number of spells pr. spell level. The base max in core rules is 9 pr. level (10 for specialists) which would indeed make Edwin a walking demi-god. I am not looking for that per se. I think the cut to 5 Sp/SpLvl is in order as sleeping is far easier and spell exchanges are generally faster than in PnP. However bards is the only class to have the spell levels themselves slashed, namely from 8 to 6. Throughout basic SoA it's okay as you don't hit the levels where you should have 7th level spells, at least not until the very end (it's either lvl 21 or 23). Your Misleads and melee buffs makes you able to cope with many things (anything, really). However in ToB you can really see they need those 7th and 8th level spells.
I made some regressions of spell casting in XL when I played six months ago and bards are really shorthanded in this department compared to other classes.
I think it's a shame as to me the bard is the ICON of solo playing. The lone troubadur. The jack-o-trades.

I may be looking for something between the two you suggest. I'll check them out soonish, but may wind up attempting to make something myself. In case of the later I hope I can return for/with input.

Bards with 7/8 level spells would be nasty. Think fighter/mage, but with higher levels and pick-pocketing.

Thats exactly what I am thinking and that is also what believe the Bards role is at these extreme XP ranges. Surely you would expect bards who accumulate 4 million XP to at least explore some of the potentials of their magics.
They will never actually be figther/mages and nor should they be. The extreme powers of Wish, Imp. alacrity, Time Stop, Planetars and similar should not be at their whim. Nor will they ever be able to specialize in any weaponry except what their kit/class dictates. It is the fusion between the fighting, magical and rogueish elements that gives them their egde.
Nasty is the word, but you would expect that from a multimillion XP bard. They won't be a C/R, C/M or K->M juggernaut, but they will certainly hold their own.

In the next release of the Song and Silence mod from G3 we are thinking about implementing the extended bard spell progression up to level 40. That gives them level 7 spells, and some more of the lower levels.

It'll also probably be packaged, along with extended tables for Mages and Priests, in the G3 Tweak Pack.

Definately sounds promising. Quite thrilled someone is working at it. It presume the traps are being phased out too? Please consider a very substantial increase in spells between level 39 and 40. It's a long haul in XP and you get practically nothing for it as it is.
I had allready started looking into it. I'd have to modify mxsplbrd.2da and I had no problem there. Except that leads to another problem being too powerful with the traps and such so I need to modify lubaX.2da as well, where X denote plain/kit classes. Not really a problem either, but only allows me to remove/insert existing HLAs. Thus and finally I'd have to modify spcl91X.spl, where X denotes the HLA in question, and frankly I haven't got the faitest clue on how to do that. I suppose I could use a hex editor, but I think there must be a tool out there for the purpose. I'd like a friendly finger pointing in the right direction in that case.

In any event it might not be needed. However I would like to see it in a patch form (it IS a patch that fixes a serious oversight and lack of thorough research).

The supplement to 2ed AD&D rules that deals with 21-30 level character is called "Dungeon Masters Options - High-level Campaigns". I don't think it is in print anymore, but it should be possible to find it in PDF form on RPGNow.com or similar sites. One look in there and you can quickly see just how much bards are shorthanded in this department compared to others. Form clarity I must admit I have never had high-level bard players in PnP. However being one of the geeky types that wasted my youth on RPG'ing three times a week I have of course had players above level 20, which is the reason why I know all this.

My subconsciousness is working at this. Here's some ideas for replacement HLAs.
Battle Chant - "By repeating this mantra chant in his mind the bard can focus completely on the enemies weakness' giving him a -6 on THAC0 for the next 4 rounds"
Hymn of the Spirit - "While reciting this envigorating hymn the bard will regain his strength by regenerating 8 hitpoint per round for the next 4 rounds"
The Elusive Ballad - "This confusing short ballad will make it impossible for anyone but the keenest foe to discern the bard amongst the fog of battle. The bard will recieve Improved Invisibility and Immunity to Divination for 10 rounds allowing him to retreat from battle"

Definately not uber, but that is not the intention. The idea is to replace the traps with something more bard-like and restore the spell progression in the process.

I repeat my request - any help with making .spl files will be greatly appreciated.

Personally, what I'd like to see is the Bard be able to change the effects of his Song (right-clicking the Bard Song button lets you choose which songs to sing, with effects like area-of-effect healing, combat bonuses, resistance to spells, etc) whenever he wants to. Each Song would improve with respect to the Bard's level, and the different kits would have their skills in certain Songs capped at a certain amount, or restricted entirely.

Right-clicking the button isn't supported by the engine as far as I'm aware. It'd probably have to be done by innates, which is kinda pants. (Although it's also possible that a Spell Immunity-type menu could be brought up when you click the button normally, but it'd be awkward to stop it reappearing each round-- not to mention the annoyance of having to navigate through sub-menus each time you activate the song.)

[ 04-16-2005, 05:49 AM: Message edited by: SimDing0 ]

i agree with six of spades here, it would be good, maybe it could be made a innate ability, so you can choose the right song for the occasion. i generally dont use pickpocket, seems a wast of time. but im not bery uber h4x00r

Pickpocket is excellent for recharging wands and you really do need wands as bard. 50 cloudkills and 50 fireballs in the backpack is a nice aide. Not to mention the semi-cheesy wand of paralysis that stuns for 10! rounds with a -4! to saving throw stackable with malison. It has 100 charges so there is plenty to go around. Makes fighting demons a breeze. Also the rod of absorption with only 10 charges needs frequent recharging not to mention the greenstone amulet. Or the amulet of shielding for kensais. Since your pickpocket is so high you can essentially do this for free so why not?

Many quests rewards can be pickpocketed and some even douplicated though that is cheesy. You can also occationally pickpocket the weapons of someone you suspect will turn hostile forcing them to fight with their hands.

To the topic at hand - YES! It would definately be a boon if the songs and chants themselves got expanded as per the suggestions I gave previously. The party slowly regaining hitpoints to the tunes of the bard makes sense to me.

With regards to bards and trap HLAs: Yes, they would definitely be removed.

With regards to different bard songs, yeah, a selection of songs is something I'd like to do. [img]smile.gif[/img] Probably via a Spell Immunity-type submenu, as Sim suggested.

Ideas for the submenu.

Chant of Combat: The regular bardsong.
Chant of Confusion: The regular bardsong for Jesters.
Chant of Vigor: Regain HP while the bard plays.
Chant of Freedom: Free Action on all members while the bard plays.
Chant of Eversight: Truesight while the bard plays.
Chant of Magebane: Dispel Magic at bards level/3 every round centered on the bard while playing.

The posibilities are endless. Hope something comes out of it.

Dispel at level divided by 3? Will never work on anyone.

Personally I think that a good boost to hit and damage, will be a good enough bonus for the bard, since Energy Blades from pure spellcasters benefits so much from that kind of bonus.

I don't want to duplicate the Jester's unique song for kitless Bards. The rest are nice ideas, though Free Action and True Sight may be a bit powerful. The Dispel one I might tone down to a Magic Resistance boost.

i think the jesters song should stay as a jesters song

That was also my intention. It should merely have a different name. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

I was under the impression that there was such an effect as Change Bard Song Effect, in which case a Special Ability, which opens a Spell-Immunity-like menu, would be enough to change the Song indefinitely, until the Bard chooses a different song.

A few Songs I came up with (power of each Song varies with Bard's level):
</font>

• Tarentella: Gives allies within X distance from the Bard bonuses to hit, damage, and attacks per round.</font>
• Ritard: Gives allies within X distance bonuses to AC, Saving Throws, and elemental/physical resistances.</font>
• Dance of Chaos: All enemies within X distance must Save vs. Spell to avoid Confusion.</font>
• Soothing Lullaby: Enemies within X distance must Save vs. Spell or fall asleep, creatures that are immune to Sleep will be Slowed.</font>
• Lament for the Damned: All allies within X distance are Protected from Evil, and recieve combat bonuses against Demons and Undead.</font>
• Melody of the Nightingale: Allies within X distance, including the Bard himself, regenerate lost hitpoints.</font>
• Fortissimo: All creatures in range must Save or be Deafened, which causes 50% Spell Failure.</font>
• Steadfast Vigilance: All allies within range will attempt to Detect Traps and Illusions, even while they are performing other actions.</font>
• Loyalty to the Cause: Allies within range become immune to mind-affecting spells & abilities, including Charm, Confusion, Feeblemind & Stun.</font>
• Enchanter's Waltz: Enemies within range must Save or be Charmed. Charmed enemies will remain Charmed after the Bard stops singing.</font>
• My Heart Will Go On: All enemies within range, provided they are not Deaf, must Save vs. Spells or flee from the Bard as fast as they can. Those who make their Save will try to kill the Bard as quickly as possible.</font>

I see no reason that other Bards should not be able to sing the Jester's Song, provided that the Jester can sing it much better than they can. The different musical instruments in the game (Harps, Horns, Magic Flute) might also be Usable to cast Change Bard Song Effect, with perhaps different instruments being restricted from different Bard kits.

i havent come across any instuments in the game, but that doesnt mean ther arnt any. the only ones i found were used in chapter 7.

Just for a lark, some Jester Songs

</font>

1. Cacophony of Combustion: All enemies within 30' of the Jester must Save vs Spells every round or suffer a spontaneous combustion of 1d12 Fire Damage. If a save is successfully made, the enemies' hair merely lights up and they suffer 1d2 Fire Damage.</font>
2. Psychedelic Trance: Without exception, everyone within 30' of the Jester, except the Jester, must Save vs Spells every round or go into a hallucigenic state where everything suddenly makes sense and pigs do fly. Those affected are stricken with Chaos for 1 turn.</font>
3. Delusion of Paranoia: Scrying into his enemies' minds within 30' with this tune, the Jester sings a song of his enemies' worst fears. If the affected is Level 12 and below, it must Save vs Spells or enter a state of Emotion:Hopelessness for 1 turn. For those above Level 12, they must Save vs Spells or be stricken with Fear for 1 turn.</font>
4. The Cows Come Home: Whipping out a banjo, the Jester starts to sing of cows and old man McDonald. For every round of this song, a random target from everybody within 30', INCLUDING the Jester, will get hit from a cow dropped from the sky. It is unknown where the cows come from.</font>

Tainted Love: All romances are immediately broken.

Sounds of Silence: Enemies in a 30' radius must save vs death at -2 or be afflicted by Chaos.

Pan-Amnnish Idol: 20 + 1d10 level 1 fighters are summoned around the bard.

[ 04-20-2005, 05:00 PM: Message edited by: K2Grey ]

PMSL! I have to agree, that song should clear a room in no time flat.

That would be awesome!

Horn of Silence
Horn of Blasting
Iron / Bronze / Silver Horns of Valhalla
Magic Flute (ToB)
Harp of Discord
Methild's Harp
Harp of Pandemonium

Perhaps it's worth mentioning that only the harps and flute are exclusive to bards. Also the harp of pandemonium is only available through the bonus merchant Deidre.
However they function like rods/wands. I don't think there are any instruments that augment or alter your bard song.

Not yet there aren't, but they could be made to alter it. It would have to be a Usable Ability, though, as things that go in the Quickslots (and Ammo slots) cannot have Equipping Effects. It actually wouldn't matter that the Horns are usable by the other classes, since an effect that changes Bard Song would be irrelevant to anyone but Bards.

The Rogue Rebalancing mod includes a Harp called the Lyre of Progression, which goes in the Shield slot and adds a couple of spellslots.

I think it is worthwhile to mention that the following message is extremely technical. You have been warned.

I have (for other reasons) retrieved my collection of AD&D 2ed rulebooks and am now able to provide a more indepth analysis. My goal is to compare the spellcasting ability of bards with that of mages.

Let us first examine the core rules. These are rules made through a decade of playing, balancing and feedback. It is safe to say that they are as well-balanced as possible given the nature of the system. To assist us we will compute a value I have chosen to call Spell Mastery (SM). Spell Mastery is the total sum of spell levels a spellcaster is able to cast at a given level of progression. If a spellcaster can cast 3 1st level spells, 2 2nd level spells and 1 3rd level spell he would have an SM of 10 (3*1+2*2+1*3=10).
If we compute the SM of Bards and Wizards and plot it against their XP we get the following graph

http://www.dsr.kvl.dk/~maddog/bg/core.jpg
(Source: Players Handbook, DM's Option - High-Level Campaigns)

Pretty striking isn't it? For those familiar with statistics let me say that the Pearson square values of the regressions are above 0.99. It is a perfect linear fit and certainly not a coincidence.

Please note that the slope is IDENTICAL. Everytime a bard and a wizard earns the same amount of XP they get the same amount of spell levels to cast! This cannot be overlooked. The principal differences are

1) The wizard always have 30 spell levels more. This advantage is earned during the first 10 levels where the bard is expanding his pickpocket and fighting ability the most.

2) There is a difference in the potency of the spells they can command. A wizard earns his first 7th level spell at 1.5M XP where the bard gets them at 2.4M. 8th level is at 2.5M for wizards and a whoping 4.2M for bards. Bards don't get 9th level spells. So the wizard actually have fewer, but better spells. This is due to mentality. The wizard will get bored at low level spells and continually expand the boundaries of his art, whereas the spontanious and adaptionalist behaviour of the bard will lead him to deploy more, but less potent spells.

Now we turn our eyes on BG2. How well has it adapted the guidelines of the core rules? Do they abide by the fundamentals above or do they blow it completely? Lets have a look and make a similar plot

http://www.dsr.kvl.dk/~maddog/bg/bg2_edit.jpg
(Source: Throne of Bhaal manual)

This is a prime example of what happens when you don't have time to do the homework and rush a game to the market. The first thing we notice is that wizards are perfectly linear until level 20. They simply copied the PH spell table. We also notice everything else is royally screwed up. Black Isle seems to have made guesswork rather than pick up the phone and actually ask the ones who made AD&D how spell tables work.

Now this makes me angry. I paid good money for the game and actually did so twice to get ToB. Why didn't they examine what they where working with properly? In effect they could have pulled the rediculous 8M XP off, but there is no real need to do that. 6M would work just as fine if they don't want anything to happen between 6 and 8M XP anyhow.

The marked area are spells the Bard class have been shorthanded. Quite significant. As an assistance I have inserted a black vertical line where the Bard SHOULD have 7th level spells. Coincidence? The red vertical line is where they should have 8th level spells.

Is this something that the "un-nerfed spell progression" thing from Ease of Use (I think..) fixes?

I wouldn't know, because I have yet to install such a mod. I am thinking about it though.

Now I realise someone is going to jump out of their chair and ask the question; why should bards get similar spell mastery as wizards at high levels and how did that ever become such a fundamental part of game balance. Let us examine four hypothetical characters - a fighter, a thief, a bard and a mage.
During the first 12 levels the figther will start to gain proficiencies in Bastard Swords. He will become vastly more deadly with that weapon as a result thereof, perhaps double to triple or more. Moreover his THAC0 improves at a steady and rapid pace. This trend will not stop. He will at a certain point stop his THAC0 progression, but expand the weaponry and mastery becoming the fighting machine he is [1].
Let us as part of our little mindplay say the thief starts with a flat 20 in his scores. Initially he will concentrate on sneak and hide to enable him to overcome otherwise more powerful foes. His increasing backstab adds to this effect. He will quintuple his potency in this field as a result thereof. In his teens he has an intermezo where equipment becomes rare and dear and he needs to setup a guild so he concentrates on pickpocket also quintupling his skill. In his mid- to late teens he will start to encounter more deadly wizards and starts to work on his detect illusion and again (you guessed it) five double his effectiveness. As he is becoming a truely masterful thief he can still work on a 5 double on the remaining skills (read magic, set traps etc.).
Now we look at the mage. During his first 12 levels he is perhaps the one who gains the most, but he IS really pitiful to begin with. He will vastly increase his Spell Mastery. From 12 and onwards he will gain at a steady pace, but wield more powerful spells.
Then we look at the bard. During his first 12 levels he does the full works. He will gain a single proficiency mark in his preferred weapons and gain some THAC0. He will 6 double his pickpocket and he will gain a bit of spells. However if we look after level 12 he will only double his allready effective pickpocket until level 24. His THAC0 is almost maxed and he cannot put more than one proficiency mark so there is a great limitation on him there (equal to a mage who also have a one mark limit). The only place where he really DOES expand is in spellcasting and the only way he can remain equal to the others is if he gains this at a pace equal to a mage. If he doesn't we all know what happens, because we have seen it in ToB - he will simply stand completely still for millions for XP.

You cannot EXPAND the rules if you do not UNDERSTAND the rules and their fundamental idea. Why Black Isle failed so miserably I cannot say, but anyone with PnP experience would be able to point that out. You cannot make new rules at random and expect it to work with the rest of the game.

[1] This assumes core rules mastery. Something that might actually work if the game wasn't a magic item giftshop.

In PnP rules, Bards also had the ability to climb walls, read languages, ect.

This opens up some possibilities, though not really in this game. They really have no option to be used.

And yes, without spell casting, Bards would be a very nerfed class. They would be inprofficient (sp?) in everything they do, and would be a very little played.

A PnP bard would be a great addition.

Oh, and about the "Lyre of Proggression", That was from IceWind Dale, wasn't it?

[ 05-25-2005, 10:43 PM: Message edited by: Kyrvias ]

Yes. Rogue Rebalancing, among other things, adds a store that includes new (and borrowed from other games) items for Bards and Thieves (and, to a small extent, Druids), and also reintroduces some BG1 items that weren't carried over into BG2, such as the Dagger of Venom.

Ahh... the Dagger of Venom... good times.