Blast to My EverCrack Past: WotC Unveils The Bard
For subscribers to D&D Insider (yeah, I caved), the new Ampersand article has a sneak peek of the Bard class.
Those who took the time to read my About Me page know that I have a sordid past involving a rather serious addiction to crack.
EverCrack, that is. Oh, I mean, EverQUEST. Ever…QUEST. Riiight. Quest. I always forget that.
Reading over the new bard class for 4th edition really brought back some memories about playing a bard in EQ. I hope you’ll indulge me…
Jack of All Classes… Master of None
The EverQuest Bard
Part of the fun of being a bard was that you could pretty much be whatever you wanted on any given day. Party’s healer gone linkdead? Sure, the bard can heal! What, you can’t see your health bar moving? I never claimed to be a cleric! Don’t have an enchanter for crowd control? No problemo – the bard has tunes to soothe the savage zombie! Just don’t distract her while she’s twisting if you want to stay alive. Cazic Thule called the name of everybody else in your Plane of Fear raid and the only one left tanking is the one in the fruity colored armor? Never fear, the bard’s deftdance can save the day – and the raid!
The 4e Bard
The 4e bard continues with the Jack of All Trades theme with his Multiclass Versitility. This could make for some interesting builds for folks willing to spend some time pondering the possibilities. Half-elves are the recommended class for bards since they already have the Dilettante racial trait. Bards also get a bonus to untrained skill checks, because seriously, they’ve probably sung a song about lockpicking at some point in their life.
Who Works During Everybody Else’s Downtime? The Bard Does!
The EverQuest Bard
Everybody else gets to sit and heal up and regain their mana between fights. They get to go AFK and have a smoke or a pee break. They get to refresh their beverage and grab more munchies. What’s the bard doing? Oh yeah, the bard is twisting songs so you get health AND mana at the maximum rate possible. Sure, there are songs that do both simultaneously, but they’re not as good as the separate songs. Let me twist those for you. No prob! I’M SORRY MR. WIZARD, BUT THE REASON YOU’RE NOT GETTING THE DAMN MANA SONG IS BECAUSE YOU’RE SITTING ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE ROOM! *cough* I’m not bitter.
The 4e Bard
The 4e Bard has a lot of healing power, as Dave mentioned in his write-up. The class feature Song of Rest allows party members who listen to the bard’s music during a rest to regain more hit points when they use their healing surges at the end of the rest. This begs the question – is the bard considered to be RESTING during a short rest if he has to sing or play his lute?
Good Bards ROCK, Bad Bards Suck
The EverQuest Bard
A good bard in EQ was hard to find, mainly because there were so many other classes that did more DPS and were easier to play. Playing a bard well involved skill, fast fingers, and a heaping amount of luck. Those who were crazy enough to take on the challenge could win a duel against any other class, solo kite herds of monsters, and fill the place of just about any class in a dungeon. (Except the healer. We weren’t that cocky!)
Bad bards were the norm, however, which made life hard for the rest of us who had to hear these insults hurled at us:
- “Ew, no, we don’t need a BARD in our party.“
- “Just play the mana song, okay?”
- “We don’t need a bard. We have 5 warriors and a cleric.”
- “Just play the running song and get us there and we’ll give you a couple plat. We don’t need any help once we’re there.”
- “Why give the bard a weapon that a rogue could use?”
- “The enchanter is down – OMG, what do we DOOOOOO?”
Also to be added to the list of “bad bards” are bard NPCs, other than the ones in the bard training houses. You can find the bard NPCs by listening for the screams of death coming from the local inn. Go on, walk in. You’ll see the dead bard, lute in hand, and an ugly troll sitting in the corner waiting for her to respawn. All an NPC bard could do was melee with a lute for a bludgeoning weapon. A tragedy indeed.
The 4e Bard
I’m looking forward to reading up on the playtests of the 4e bard because I can see how promising the class can be in the right hands! A good bard can fill in any of the missing skills in her party and really round out their list of strengths.
The bard has a lot of powers that can “save the day” – but I guess you’ll have to read the D&D Insider article to see them all.
Random Shout-Out
…because how funny would it be?
I’d like to give a shout out to anybody who played on Druzzil Ro between 2000 and 2004(ish). My original wood elf bard was Gaeerina Dua’Mustela and was part of the guilds Justice Knights, Crusaders of Mystic Ro, Bushido, and L’Malla. After quitting and subsequently relapsing, my second bard I acquired from a L’Malla guildie. Her name was Markessa Riknueth. If you happen to be one of my old servermates or guildmates, drop me a line to say howdy!
All of the hub-bub about the Bard preview actually has me considering caving and getting the Insider subscription.
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@ Oz – Do eeeeeeet.
What happened to the 4e stress on roles so that one class can’t fill one role like 3.5.
What do you mean?
The Bard is squarely in the Leader role.
The difference is that, while the Warlord can pull off a bit of Defender, the Cleric can be a minor Controller, the Fighter has a bit of Striker in him, and the Paladin can help as a sometimes-Leader, the Bard can to a smaller bit of whatever secondary role he wants (or even a couple of them). These are only secondary roles, however, and the focus is still on Leader.
Though, really, the only thing that even lets him do that is the fact that he can take as many multiclass feats as he wants. On its own, the Bard is a solid Leader with small hints of Controller. The Bard’s main versatility comes from his skill choices (everything but Endurance, Stealth, and Thievery).
Graham´s last blog post..Meet the Aghar
Oh, and it seems as though the Bard has some powers that can fill in for or assist other roles, too.
One of the at-will powers, for instance, marks the target. But instead of marking them for yourself, you mark them for an ally. So you can mark an enemy for the Fighter, thus giving a -2 to hit anyone but the Fighter.
I think they can grant combat advantage, too, though I don’t remember for sure.
In any case, both of these still fall under the Leader style of powers.
Graham´s last blog post..Meet the Aghar
My last 3.5 character was a Bard, and I think it was the first time ANY of my friends had ever played or played with a Bard who was actually effective at a lot of things. I had a blast playing it, and can’t wait to try one out in 4e!
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This ability to dabble in other classes seems a lot along the line of what I was thinking for a 4e Bard. I’ve been able to get away without an actual Bard class in my current campaign just because neither of my players in that game are running one, and I can fake it close enough for the odd occasion a recurring NPC that is supposed to be a bard is around for a fight.
I’m also curious how the official 4e Bard compares to the Forgotten Heroes and Advanced Player’s Guide versions.
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@ Oz – Dave answers that question in the Critical Hits post on the bard.
@Oz
From what I have read of all three, the WotC version does a better job of catching the flavour of the Bard than the other two. It’s also the first of the three that makes me excited about playing a 4e version of a Bard.
The at-will powers alone have me going “WantwantwantwantwantWANT!!!!”
They had better bring the druid back as well, but then again, I agreed with the reason for exclusion they mentioned in “Classes & Races” – I think that is the title. Didn’t buy it, just check it out at B&N once in a while…
I would like to have seen the bard as a paragon tier for the rogue. That’s a bit of how the original bard was. You had to multi-class fighter, thief, and druid (5-7/3-5/3-5 levels, IIRC). Then you got to be a bard, after getting all that multi-class experience you get to sing about.
Again, not knocking WotC, but I think they needed a way to make PHB2 more of a must-have…
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This is the first version of the Bard since AD&D that I’ve been interested in playing. I have to hand it to the crew at WOTC, I didn’t think they would get me to invest in the PHB2 but they might have just clinched it with this preview (unlike adventurers vault). Let’s hope they keep the gaming goodness flowing.
Well written article.
And man do I miss my days (AND NIGHTS) playing EQ.
5 long years as a Guildleader on F.V.
Thanks for the reminder. Man, I miss my bard friend, Namae.
@ PinkRose – I remember a few nights when I would realize at 2 am that I hadn’t eaten since lunch…