Bards are reknown as being jacks of all trades. It's their calling card. I've got a hexbard in a party of THREE that I could use some advice with re: colleges, Eloquence, Lore, or something else. Here's the sitch:
Party of three running Waterdeep Heist. Player one is a Conquest paladin, pretty experienced. He's our frontliner, has some healing, Player two is a homebrew wizard subclass, kind of a mishmash between a generic wizard and a hexblood type, some experience. She's our blaster, a little bit of crowd control, and her familiar is our scout. I'm playing a changeling bard, decently experienced. After barely surviving level 1 (our pally went down a bunch of times), I opted to take a level of hexblade so my character could more properly assist on the front lines, as needed.
My character is the face. And the sneak. And the healer. And the buffer. And the lockpick. And a blaster. And a frontliner. And, of course, the skill monkey. Currently bard 2/hexblade 1. I'm thinking ahead to which College to join at 3 and I think I'd like to hear some suggestions, given how many different roles my dude is playing.
My current thinking: the level of hexblade precludes the need to go valor or swords, he's already got what he needs to wade into melee. Eloquence suits my character's personality (he hasn't pulled out his harmonica once, to date), with Lore a close second- and Creation's the dark horse contender. If you'll forgive the self-flattery, I think I'm experienced enough and creative enough to make Creation work, in the same way that I've made illusionists work.
If you'd be so kind to suggest which college you'd pick in my shoes (and more importantly, why), I'd be grateful to hear your thoughts.
Happy to fill in any blanks that might be required and there's a poll below! Thx!
I think I would go Lore. It is probably the most flexible of the Colleges. Magical Secrets has the possibility of drastically changing a Bard's playstyle and Lore Bards get extra Magical Secrets at a early enough level that it makes a difference in most games. The extra Skill proficiencies will make you that much more of an all around skill monkey and Cutting Words is a great defensive tool. I think Lore is the most Jack of All Trades of the Colleges, giving you the opportunity to customize your playstyle in response to the story.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I love a Hexblade mix with Sword. The Flourish make you pretty good when you need to get up close as the Defensive one will let you have a good ac. If you mix in Mobility feat you become very good at stick and move as you can move attack with Flourish (any) your move for the round is 50 allowing you yo move in attack and move back out. If you have booming blade you can move in hit and move out when flourish is used up. With the second level of Hex you can use eldritch blast to push them also so you can hit close and far.
You will also get Extra attack this way later. I just wish they could sub a attack for a cantrip.
I appreciate your thoughts on Swords but it’s a hard no. Two reasons. First, with a small party I have an intuitive issue with the redundant skills between hexblade and swords; second, in this small a party I have a tough time justifying using bardic, currently refreshable on a long rest only, for strictly damage purposes and not buffing my other party members.
Lore v. Eloquence is trickier. Buff versus debuff. More skills versus a virtual guarantee to never fail a deception or persuasion check again. I’ll mention again that we’re playing Heist, an urban adventure, which means social interactions are high…
Lore v. Eloquence is trickier. Buff versus debuff. More skills versus a virtual guarantee to never fail a deception or persuasion check again. I’ll mention again that we’re playing Heist, an urban adventure, which means social interactions are high…
Hmm….
Honestly I think that is a mark against Eloquence. It makes social checks easy mode and I think that would get boring. It's not like Lore Bards are bad at social skills, either.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Hmm, Lore is the classic, and a lot of fun (Cutting Words is also just an all-round great ability). My last Bard was a Lore Bard with one level in Rogue (for even more Expertise), you might also keep Skill Expert in mind if you want more without multiclassing; it was a lot of fun, and he was in fact playing in Dragon Heist which was a blast for a social oriented character with it being set around Waterdeep. Unfortunately we then we went on to Curse of Strahd which our DM has been running as extra bleak, so I wasn't having as much fun with the character, and swapped out for another; I think maybe if I'd built him more fully as a support character then it wouldn't have been a problem.
Eloquence does feel a bit like easy mode on social checks, though it's no different to what you could build using a high Charisma Rogue, so it may depend on your DM, i.e- just because you can't completely fluff a social check doesn't mean you'll get the best possible outcome, so if your DM is good at handling degrees of success then this could still be fun to play. In other words, it removes the risk of total failure, but you might still not get quite what you wanted and still have to work around the things you failed to get. Eloquence is also a really good support Bard due to inspiration not being lost if it doesn't result in a success.
Glamour is one I like a lot thematically, it can grant the party a modest temporary HP buffer (similar to a low level False Life) and a free move, so good for closing distance or making an escape. Enthralling Performance needs a bit of DM buy-in to really make the most of, but could be a lot of fun if you get opportunities to make use of it. Mantle of Majesty is just a fantastic feature. I also feel like Glamour is a good fit mechanically for a Bardlock, even if you don't have the Archfey patron.
I'd consider Spirits because ranged Guidance is just a great thing to have for a bit of support, and while the Tales From Beyond are random you should usually be able to find a use for them. This is another one that thematically fits a Bardlock if you consider the spirits an extension of your patron.
Whispers is another that I feel like fits Bardlock well thematically, and the Psychic Blades feature is pretty good if you want to be a bit more Rogue-like, specifically more Assassin I think. Quite a few of its other features though can be quite situational, so it's a "work with your DM sub-class" if you want to get the most out of it.
Swords and Valor will both pair well with a Hexblade Bardlock; Swords if you want a personal combat boost, Valor if you want to boost your allies?
My own short list would be Eloquence, Glamour or Lore, probably leaning towards Glamour but that's partly because I haven't really played it yet.
Bards are reknown as being jacks of all trades. It's their calling card. I've got a hexbard in a party of THREE that I could use some advice with re: colleges, Eloquence, Lore, or something else. Here's the sitch:
Party of three running Waterdeep Heist. Player one is a Conquest paladin, pretty experienced. He's our frontliner, has some healing, Player two is a homebrew wizard subclass, kind of a mishmash between a generic wizard and a hexblood type, some experience. She's our blaster, a little bit of crowd control, and her familiar is our scout. I'm playing a changeling bard, decently experienced. After barely surviving level 1 (our pally went down a bunch of times), I opted to take a level of hexblade so my character could more properly assist on the front lines, as needed.
My character is the face. And the sneak. And the healer. And the buffer. And the lockpick. And a blaster. And a frontliner. And, of course, the skill monkey. Currently bard 2/hexblade 1. I'm thinking ahead to which College to join at 3 and I think I'd like to hear some suggestions, given how many different roles my dude is playing.
My current thinking: the level of hexblade precludes the need to go valor or swords, he's already got what he needs to wade into melee. Eloquence suits my character's personality (he hasn't pulled out his harmonica once, to date), with Lore a close second- and Creation's the dark horse contender. If you'll forgive the self-flattery, I think I'm experienced enough and creative enough to make Creation work, in the same way that I've made illusionists work.
If you'd be so kind to suggest which college you'd pick in my shoes (and more importantly, why), I'd be grateful to hear your thoughts.
Happy to fill in any blanks that might be required and there's a poll below! Thx!
I think I would go Lore. It is probably the most flexible of the Colleges. Magical Secrets has the possibility of drastically changing a Bard's playstyle and Lore Bards get extra Magical Secrets at a early enough level that it makes a difference in most games. The extra Skill proficiencies will make you that much more of an all around skill monkey and Cutting Words is a great defensive tool. I think Lore is the most Jack of All Trades of the Colleges, giving you the opportunity to customize your playstyle in response to the story.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I love a Hexblade mix with Sword. The Flourish make you pretty good when you need to get up close as the Defensive one will let you have a good ac. If you mix in Mobility feat you become very good at stick and move as you can move attack with Flourish (any) your move for the round is 50 allowing you yo move in attack and move back out. If you have booming blade you can move in hit and move out when flourish is used up. With the second level of Hex you can use eldritch blast to push them also so you can hit close and far.
You will also get Extra attack this way later. I just wish they could sub a attack for a cantrip.
I feel this is the most fun combo to play.
I spell Goodly.
Thanks for the input, gents.
I appreciate your thoughts on Swords but it’s a hard no. Two reasons. First, with a small party I have an intuitive issue with the redundant skills between hexblade and swords; second, in this small a party I have a tough time justifying using bardic, currently refreshable on a long rest only, for strictly damage purposes and not buffing my other party members.
Lore v. Eloquence is trickier. Buff versus debuff. More skills versus a virtual guarantee to never fail a deception or persuasion check again. I’ll mention again that we’re playing Heist, an urban adventure, which means social interactions are high…
Hmm….
Honestly I think that is a mark against Eloquence. It makes social checks easy mode and I think that would get boring. It's not like Lore Bards are bad at social skills, either.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Hmm, Lore is the classic, and a lot of fun (Cutting Words is also just an all-round great ability). My last Bard was a Lore Bard with one level in Rogue (for even more Expertise), you might also keep Skill Expert in mind if you want more without multiclassing; it was a lot of fun, and he was in fact playing in Dragon Heist which was a blast for a social oriented character with it being set around Waterdeep. Unfortunately we then we went on to Curse of Strahd which our DM has been running as extra bleak, so I wasn't having as much fun with the character, and swapped out for another; I think maybe if I'd built him more fully as a support character then it wouldn't have been a problem.
Eloquence does feel a bit like easy mode on social checks, though it's no different to what you could build using a high Charisma Rogue, so it may depend on your DM, i.e- just because you can't completely fluff a social check doesn't mean you'll get the best possible outcome, so if your DM is good at handling degrees of success then this could still be fun to play. In other words, it removes the risk of total failure, but you might still not get quite what you wanted and still have to work around the things you failed to get. Eloquence is also a really good support Bard due to inspiration not being lost if it doesn't result in a success.
Glamour is one I like a lot thematically, it can grant the party a modest temporary HP buffer (similar to a low level False Life) and a free move, so good for closing distance or making an escape. Enthralling Performance needs a bit of DM buy-in to really make the most of, but could be a lot of fun if you get opportunities to make use of it. Mantle of Majesty is just a fantastic feature. I also feel like Glamour is a good fit mechanically for a Bardlock, even if you don't have the Archfey patron.
I'd consider Spirits because ranged Guidance is just a great thing to have for a bit of support, and while the Tales From Beyond are random you should usually be able to find a use for them. This is another one that thematically fits a Bardlock if you consider the spirits an extension of your patron.
Whispers is another that I feel like fits Bardlock well thematically, and the Psychic Blades feature is pretty good if you want to be a bit more Rogue-like, specifically more Assassin I think. Quite a few of its other features though can be quite situational, so it's a "work with your DM sub-class" if you want to get the most out of it.
Swords and Valor will both pair well with a Hexblade Bardlock; Swords if you want a personal combat boost, Valor if you want to boost your allies?
My own short list would be Eloquence, Glamour or Lore, probably leaning towards Glamour but that's partly because I haven't really played it yet.
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