Class faq 2(bard)

[Maidros]

Bard:
General Information:

The Bard is also a rogue, but he is very different from the thief. His
strength is his pleasant and charming personality. With it and his wits he
makes his way through the world. A Bard is a talented musician and a
walking storehouse of gossip, tall tales and lore. He learns a little bit
about everything that crosses his path; he is a jack-of-all-trades but
master of none. While many bards are scoundrels, their stories and songs
are welcome almost everywhere.

Advantages:
Picks Pockets
Bard Song (improves party morale and luck). Morale determines when
characters "run away." Each character has a set morale, and when it
drops, they flee, or go berserk. Luck simply improves all rolls.
Mage Spells up to 6th level
High Lore ability. The Bard gets 10 Lore points per level.

ToB:

Improved Bard Song
Thieving High End abilities

Disadvantages:
Must be human or half-elf
Must have "neutral" somewhere in the alignment.
Can't wear armour heavier than chain-mail.
Can't use shields larger than a buckler.

This is one of the most fun classes in BG. The bard is a little bit of everything - part fighter, since there are no weapons restrictions, part mage, since it is possible to cast spells up to sixth level spells, and part thief, since it is possible to pick pockets and set traps (with ToB abilities). The all round abilities means that the bard can back up any one of the three classes when necessary and is not hampered by being specialised like other classes.

Analysing the class, the first question to be asked of oneself is what race should the bard be. While humans are eminently playable, it is, in my opinion better to choose, half elf since they get the advantages of infravision, ten extra points additional in pick pocketing, and finally some resistance to charm/sleep spells. Since there is absolutely no downside to picking a half-elf as the race (all racial scores, and gameplay issues) are the same for both humans and half elves.

NB: For some reason, the charm/sleep resistance which was coded in BG does not work correctly. Therefore, it is recommended that the players download aVENGER's elven/charm sleep resistance fix from http://unforgottenrealms.net/downloads2 ... le&id=252.

Now let us consider what attributes are necessary for the bard class. A dexterity score of 18 is greatly desirable, since for pick pockets score increases with increasing dexterity and improves AC by 4 - bard had better not be hit by anything until he/she gets stoneskin spell. On the other hand, it can be argued that the 18 dexterity is not essential for the plain bard since vanilla bards naturally start BG2 at level 8 (which means that they have a pick pocket score of 80) and the bard class runs on the thief table and bards will soon have more than sufficient points for any pick pocketing. An intelligence score of 18 is again very, very desirable. This is because it would help the bard learn 18 spells at each level (upto level 6) and also give a bonus to lore. But there are sufficient arguments against this being essential. Potions of mind focusing/potions of genius can help overcome any problem with the number of spells that can be memorised. Just save up all the scrolls until you have a few scrolls to learn from, drink the potion of genius/mind focusing and then learn the spells. However, it is of essence to ensure that your initial intelligence is not below 15 or 15 - this would be troublesome, since you would have to drink multiple potions of genius/potions of mind focusing to be able to memorise all spells. This should suffice. As for the loss of the lore rating, the bard naturally has 80 lore to start the game and racks enough points identify anything be early/mid game. There is no bonus for having a lore of more than 100 - if you have lore of 100, you will be able to identify everything. So it can easily be seen that an intelligence score of 15 should be enough for most cases. As for constitution, it is ideal to ensure that the bard has a constitution score of 17 - this is the best score and there is no bonus for having a greater constitution score (non fighter classes get no bonus HP for having a constitution score of greater than 17). As for wisdom and strength, it is enough to ensure the bard suffers no penalties for low scores (for wisdom and strength, it is 11 and 9, respectively, I think). Strength is the most easily improved stat in the game and bards do not need a high wisdom. As for charisma, the game enforces that bards have a charisma of at least 15. This level should be sufficient for all practical purposes.

What alignment should a bard be? The bard has to have 'neutral' somewhere in the alignment and my suggestion is to pick up one of the 'neutral' alignments - i.e., lawful neutral, true neutral or chaotic neutral. The advantage is that the bard will be able to ignore the effects of unholy blight/unholy word, etc. These spells are tailored against 'good' creatures. 'Unholy blight' causes magic damage and 'unholy word' causes stun effects at low levels and spell failure at higher levels. To be able to avoid this is a very good ability (this is especially marked if you have Tactics mod/Rogue Re-balancing mods - too many characters cast these spells and to avoid them is a great help). The price paid is 1 reputation at the beginning of the game, but this is easy to remedy since reputation is very easily raised in the game (you will more often be worrying about the effects of 'high' reputation than the effects of low reputation). This means that you will have to delay your shopping sprees a little (reputation affects the discounts you get in the game - refer to the table in the manual for the exact figures), but this seems a small enough price for the advantages I have enumerated.

Now we come to one of the most curious points in the game - what weapon style should the bard choose? This is a rather involved problem, so kindly bear with me if I seem to stray from the discussion a little.
Spoilers:
The bard runs on the thief table, which means that he is going to have his THAC0 decrease by 1 for every two levels - THAC0 decrease happens at odd levels until level 19 and the base THAC0 gets struck at 10 after that. Now most people will know that this is absolutely insufficient for hitting most high level enemies, so the bard will have to do one of the two things. Either pick up a ranged weapon and stay back, throwing objects at the enemy, or else try to whittle down the problems of the bad THAC0.

If the former is the choice, then I should recommend that the bard pick up proficiency in the short bow if you have only SoA or the cross bow/dart if you have ToB. The reason why I do not suggest that the bard pick up the short bow proficiency with ToB is that there are too many characters in the game that are fighting for the few good short bows (Mazzy, Yoshimo, Imoen, Nalia all have proficiency points in the short bow, so they need the short bows). On the other hand, there is absolutely no one to to use a dart (no one starts with proficiency in darts except Imoen and Imoen is not around for the whole of chapters 2 and 3) and the only ones who can use a cross bow are those that would probably never use it (Keldorn and Sarevok). There is an excellent cross bow (firetooth +4, unlimited +2 fire arrows) which you can buy from Sister Garlena in the WK; so even if you are not going to enter the Keep, you can still buy the bow form her. In the very first level of the Keep, you find the crimson dart (+3 dart which returns when thrown) and a quiver of plenty (unlimited +1 arrows). Between these, they will supply your needs for the entire game. There is only one short bow (Tansheron's bow, unlimited +3 arrows) which has unlimited ammo and you have the option of creating another bow with unlimited ammo using the quiver of plenty (for the few times you need arrows of better enchantment, you can use other arrows).

The choice becomes even more intricate if you choose to whittle down the problems of the THAC0. The best method of reducing THAC0 in the first half of the game (until you lose the Bhaalspawn powers) is to use bracers of weapons skill (decreases THAC0 by 1) and a strength enhancing item (girdle of hill giant strength, the strength enhancing mace you can buy in the Copper Coronet, etc) followed by draw upon holy might. This does solve the problem of THAC0, but still leaves open the problem of number of attacks. The vanilla bard cannot dual wield (we shall return to this problem later), so you are left with the choice of single weapon style or two handed weapon style. If the option is between two handed weapon style and two handed style, I should recommend single weapon style - for the katana.

So what should the poor bard do? Is it possible for a bard to effectively dual wield? This is the question that confronts us. The answer is both yes and no. Early in the game, when the PC has few item based modifiers, it is very difficult to dual wield. The bard can place one point in the two weapon style, so the modifiers will be a penalty of 2 to the main hand and 6 to the off hand. Since the bard's THAC0 is already none too good, a penalty of 2 to the main hand is a really serious downside. However, there are ways to modify it as the game progresses. Firstly, give your bard a bracers of weapons skill and a strength enhancing item (preferably the girdle of hill giant strength). This will reduce the THAC0 by 5 (overall, from the base THAC0). Then give your bard the pale green ioun stone (found in the Pai Na lair in the Graveyard) - This reduces the THAC0 by one, gives the bard a 10% bonus to HP. Finally, cast 'draw upon holy might' - this will give a bonus to THAC0 by 1 for every 3 levels of the bard upto a max of 25 in strength. (Note, if you do not have the girdle of hill giant strength, you could make do with the 'strength' - a 2nd level mage spell, which lasts a very long time). With these modifiers, the bard could effectively be a fighter (note these enhancements make the bard comparable with the other fighters in the party, not with a PC fighter or barbarian, who will be far more effective than any of these). Once you reach ToB, replace the gaunlets of weapons skill with the gauntlets of extraordinary specialisation (gives a +2 to damage and +1/2 attack every round, in addition to the THAC0 bonus), and give yourself the Montolio's cloak (bonus 1 to AC and +2 bonus to THAC0 on the off hand, and gives a bonus of +1 to all saving throws). This will make the bard a more viable fighter. Note, however, the penalty of 6 (without Montolio's cloak) and 4 (with Montolio's cloak) to the off hand and penalty of 2 to the main hand still remain, to remind you why the bard is a bard and not a fighter. But still, instead of 'wasting' the off hand, this might be a better solution.

What weapons to choose - best to choose proficiency of katanas since the Dakkon Zerth blade (which gives bonus spells at levels 1-4) is a katana and this is one of the most useful weapons for the bard. Later on, the bard can use the katanas Celestial fury and Hindo's Doom (note the immunity to death magic provided by Hindo's doom is exceptionally useful since it goes a long way in covering the bard's one real weakness - poor death saving throws - we shall return to this later).

Now that we have chosen the attributes for the bard, let us go ahead and examine the advantages and disadvantages of this class.

Advantages of the bard class:
1) Pick pockets - an obvious advantage - it is useful to flick stuff from shops and people.
spoiler:
Notable people to pick pocket :
I am not going into stealing from shops - you can do it, in general, to various shopkeepers with the exception of Ribald.
Ribald - although you cannot pick pocket from the shop, you can pick pocket the man himself (you get a ring of regeneration).

Tolgerias (ring of the ram)

Kangaxx (ring of Gaxx) - you have to be quick to do this. At the moment he appears, pause the game, pick his pocket, get the ring of Gaxx and run away - this way you get two rings of Gaxx (note you cannot do this with the Baldurdash fixpack).

Ihtafeer and Valygar - you can pickpocket their head and body off them respectively. This is good for a laugh if you are so inclined. In the case of Valygar, there were more substantial rewards - you could get the ring of ram thrice. Pick pocket Tolgerias, tell Valygar to go to his house in dock district when you meet him, pick pocket his body off him and sell it to Tolgerias and get the ring of the ram again and finally, get the real Valygar from his house in the Docks district, get into the planar sphere and kill Tolgerias to get the Ring of the ram the third time.(note you cannot do either with the Baldurdash fixpack).

Elminster - you could pick pocket him for a ring of protection +2 - note you can do this infinitely and get infinite rings of protection +2. The guy seems to have an endless supply.

You can also pick pocket the noblemen (and noblewomen) in the Government district. You have a random chance of pick pocketing a high level spell off them (also Lady Delicia in the D' Arnise Hold).

The pick pocket ability allows you to free up the thief to put points in other skills and has no necessity to put points in pick pockets ability. The obvious counter argument to this would be that there is no necessity for a thief to put points in the pick pockets ability at all. All your thief needs is to drink a couple of draughts of the inexpensive 'potion of master thievery' and you will be able to pick pocket almost anyone. Also, pick pockets is the least useful of all the thief abilities in the game; there are far more locked doors and traps than people from whom you can steal stuff. This ability does not seem to have any real use at all since it does nothing that a regular thief with no points in the pick pockets ability cannot do. So the pick pockets ability is a useful ability to have, but hardly necessary for this game.

The second ability is the bard song - this is a very useful ability. It effectively improves the luck factor of the members of the party. It is similar to having the second level spell - 'luck' cast on every one in the party. This is replaced by the 'improved bard song' in ToB which has some very good bonuses - gives a bonus of 10 to the bards AC (even in ToB, this bonus is supremely effective. With proper enchantment and armours, the bard's AC can be brought down to -25. This is awesome and even 'boss characters' like Melissan and Abazigal have trouble hitting this low AC. The other bonuses of THAC0 improvement and magic resistance are the icing on the cake. Another marvellous advantage of the bard song is the immunity to fear, stun and confusion. But the downside is that by the time you are in ToB, not many will need the immunities, since the saving throws themselves will be usually decent enough and sufficient to make the save. However, it is something to be borne in mind.
The bard song is exclusive - i.e., nothing else can be done when the bard is singing the bard song.

Cheesy trick: You can order the bard to attack someone, switch off the AI and then order the bard to sing the bard song. Now the bard will attack and sing the bard song! But it requires you to switch off the AI - so if you like the AI to control your characters, this is not a good idea. I never use any AI script - I always control my characters myself, so it works well for me.

The mage spells for this class make the bard a magnificently viable class. This is where the real power of the bard lies. I have long heard complaints about the limitation to level 6, but this is a non issue. If you are looking to use your bard as a blaster (i.e., if you want your bard to cast tons of cones of cold, horrid wilting, finger of death, etc, it is true that the bard is not too good at these things). But my suggestion is to use the bard defensively i.e., have the bard cast fireshields and stoneskin before engaging the enemy in combat. With spell immunity, stoneskin, fireshields, spell shield, and protection from magical weapons, the bard has all the defencive power necessary. So utilise that to your advantage.

The bard has other advantages of being able to dispel enemy protections, and caste debilitating spells (slow, domination, chaos, etc) and since the bard moves on the thief class, it is pretty useful and the bard levels up very fast. So the mage abilities make the bard a very powerful class, if you know how to take advantage of them. The bard can also be used to back up a mage for most practical purposes.

The bard can be used as a baited gambit - send a fully buffed bard with protection from magical weapons, stoneskin, fireshields, and spell shield into a fight in front, and have him sing the bard song. All enemies will smash themselves on the shields without doing a scrap of damage. Personally, I think that the bard is the single most useful character to bring off a successful defencive-offencive strategy - a baited gambit, where you blunt the enemy's sword on your shield before striking at him yourself. The bard's lack of weapons restrictions (this is further helped by 'use any item' later) makes him more powerful than a mage in this regard. There is not much that is more amusing than seeing a powerful dragon wasting all his attacks on your bard, doing not a scrap of damage for all his efforts. This has the further advantage of freeing other characters to smash the enemy, while the enemy concentrates on the bard uselessly. This is, however, not a popular strategy among many players (they see it as too passive) since it involves surrendering the initiative to the enemy and luring him into a false position. However, it is a supremely effective strategy and often gives the best chance of victory in a fight. The downside is that if requires a deep tactical knowledge of BG and it requires very careful planning and even more careful execution. If you like just rushing into the thick of things, this strategy may not be for you.

Finally, the high level thief traps are an awesome bonus for this class (the exact characteristics of the high end thief traps will be dealt with in the thief section). This gives the bard to take out very high level enemies in a matter of seconds (like Draconis, Demogorgon, etc).

Finally the lore ability allows you to save up buying the glass of identification (or keep identify memorised). This is a useful ability, but hardly something that greatly affects gameplay. Besides, once you go over 100 in lore ability, the other points are a waste. A thief with good intelligence and wisdom can do just as well for most practical purposes. This ability is nifty, but hardly a super ability.

Disadvantages of this class:
The bard is often hauled over the coals by comparing him with a fighter/mage or a
fighter->mage and his lack of advantages are cited. But the bard is a perfectly viable class since he can do things no fighter mage could ever hope to do. This is especially if you have ToB.

The bard requires a lot of tactical knowledge of BG before he can be used effectively.

The bard cannot dual class, but this is not really a disadvantage for this class. The only class with which a bard could be effectively dual classed to (or dual classed from) is the fighter. But the bard is quite okay with it.

The bard is a very weak fighter, near useless thief, and can be barely called a mage. True, but it is the combination of these three that yields something that is perfectly viable. If you compare individually, the abilities of the bard are poor in the particular class of the compared class, but the bard has other advantages which no other class can conceivably have.

The bard is quite redundant from the gameplay point of view. You need fighter types (usually - I am not talking about solo attempts. People who can complete the game solo do not need this guide), you need mage types, you need thief types, and you need healer types, but there is no reason to need a bard type. This, I think, is the reason behind the unpopularity of the bard.

A very subtle thing is that the bard has no weaknesses, but neither has the bard any particular strengths. Therefore, to play a bard effectively, the player has to be good at all the three classes - fighter, mage and to an extent thief. This is a rather exacting demand on the player. Besides, since the bard has no real strengths, if you make a mistake, it is going to be difficult to redeem the situation. The fighter can use his superior fighting skills to retrieve things, the mage will cast spells, and the thief will set traps/back stab. But there is nothing that way a bard could do to single handedly make a difference.

Bards have pathetic death saving throws - this makes them particularly vulnerable to death magic, paralysis attacks (ghasts) and poison. This is a very serious disability and care should be taken to reduce this saving throws. Apart from rihgs, use the cloak of displacement and similar stuff to overcome it.

The conclusion would be - the bard is a unique character, which has something of everything and everything of nothing. The bard is not a great character individually, but is a great member of a team. Since BG is a team game (you have 6 characters in your party), bard does hold his own against any other class.

[Assassin]

You might want to keep them all in one thread instead of posting them all in separate ones.

[Shadow015]

Nice, but I saw two mistakes in there.

1) You state that non-warrior classes get no bonus further CON bonus after 17. It's actually 16, with +2 hp per level for the first 9 or 10 levels. 17 CON provides nothing for the bard that 16 doesn't.

2) You also state that Tansheron's Bow is the only short bow with unlimited ammo. Gesen's Bow also provides unlimited ammo, and can strike every enemy in the game, to boot.

[theGrimm]

Nice reading...

You might want to be careful, there are a few very big ToB spoilers in there (ToB boss names, for example).

[Harkoliar]

you should put warning: spoils ahead... other than that.. good stuff actually. thanks

[JayS]

Originally posted by Maidros: NB: For some reason, the charm/sleep resistance which was coded in BG does not work correctly. Therefore, it is recommended that the players download aVENGER's elven/charm sleep resistance fix from http://unforgottenrealms.net/downloads2 ... le&id=252.

That link seems to be cut. What does the ... stand for?

Alternate link: http://www.gamesector.co.yu/avenger/

Also, I would disagree that a source of infinite ammo is needed or even useful, because there are so many arrows in the game that you can use. Early on, you can rob the fletcher store in Waukeen's Promenade, and from then on you will never be wanting of arrows. For example, I have >1000 +1 arrows, 700 acid arrows, 400 +2 arrows, and 200 arrows of piercing (which I use most of the time). I use the stacking ammo component of the ease-of-use mod to allow me to carry this much ammo with me, but I believe there is an ammo belt early on in WK which the bard could use too.

For inf. ammo bows like the gesen bow, shooting actual arrows increases the damage delt, so the bard should not rely on the inf. ammo capabilities of the bow.

[Harkoliar]

for realistically purposes though. i dont think having 1000 arrows is possible lugging around. . but its just me.

[Maidros]

Originally posted by Assassin: You might want to keep them all in one thread instead of posting them all in separate ones.

Only trouble is that it would become too long. But I see your point.
Regards,
Maidros

[Maidros]

Originally posted by Shadow015: Nice, but I saw two mistakes in there. 1) You state that non-warrior classes get no bonus further CON bonus after 17. It's actually 16, with +2 hp per level for the first 9 or 10 levels. 17 CON provides nothing for the bard that 16 doesn't.

You are right. The correction is made. Thanks for pointing it out.

2) You also state that Tansheron's Bow is the only short bow with unlimited ammo. Gesen's Bow also provides unlimited ammo, and can strike every enemy in the game, to boot.

The Gesen bow comes into play only in Chapter 6, by which time most of the quests are over. It is possible to do most of the quests in Chapter 6, it is true, but even then more than half of the game would be over. I am not sure it is worthwhile to have a character specialise in a weapon that you get only after you have finished more than half of the game. The question would then be - what should the poor character do until you get the weapon. By the way, it is possible to get another Tansheron bow by killing Drizzt and Co. (you get it, if I remember correctly, from Cattie Brie). But this has the same problems as Gesen bow - so I have not mentioned either the Gesen bow or the second Tansheron's bow.
Regards,
Maidros

[Maidros]

Originally posted by theGrimm: Nice reading... You might want to be careful, there are a few very big ToB spoilers in there (ToB boss names, for example).

Will do. Thanks for commenting.
Regards,
Maidros