Come on, come all and witness - Bard

That makes wordplay their combat art

With witty puns and clever words

They cut deeper than all swords

The rhyme and rhythm is their power

That makes their foes afraid and cower

For when a bard begins to speak

One can do nothing but to shriek

Rhyming Ruckus

By level three, if thee are bard

You learn the cunning wordplay art

By witty word, by clever pun

Your enemies attacks made none

You allies will be hitting more

With words to aid in their galore

---

 At level three, when you choose this subclass, you learn to use cunning wordplay to distract your enemies and aid your allies during combat. As a bonus action on your turn, you may expend a charge of your bardic inspiration to enter "The Flow" state. While in this "Flow" state, when a creature that you can see makes an attack roll, you may use your reaction to impose a penalty or a bonus to that attack roll. To do so you must, in character, speak out a short poetic message, the more originative and relevant to the situation the better. Your DM determines what bonus or penalty the attack gets as the result of your intervention, but it cant be higher than your Charisma Modifier and lower than 0.

An example of a pun that would give a penalty to your attacker could be:

---

 I duck, I weave, I dodge, evade

You miss again, you rusted blade

---

 And a bonus to an attack for your ally could be:

---

 My words will aid you, shoot your arrow

May it fly swift just like a sparrow

---

 The more on the nose and witty the wordplay you use is, the higher the bonus or penalty the attack receives. An emphasizing your pun descriptive roleplay (for example of how your character points its index finger at an enemy and shouts FOOL! as part of it) may also increase the penalty or bonus you impose.

Magic Mouth

That's an issue.

Metamagic will fix it.

Bard is succesfull.

(Unknown Bardshō, ca 1685)

---

 At level 6, you learn to weave cunning wordplay in the spellcasting components of your spells to alter their effects: when you gain this feature choose 2 metamagic options from the Sorcerer's Metamagic classfeat. Whenever you cast a spell with verbal components, you may attempt to apply metamagic to it by speaking an on the nose short poem about the situation and your application of metamagic, after which, the GM assigns you to make a performance (charisma) check with DC for it dependant on the likeness of your speech. On Success, you may apply the metamagic to your spell. On failure, the spell is cast without metamagic. You gain two more metamagic options when you reach bard level 14.

You may attempt to apply metamagic to your spells an amount of times equal to your proficiency bonus and restore all uses of this feature after you finish a long rest.

An example of applying a quickened spell metamagic could be:

---

I spit the rhymes like from a gatling

My spells are swift, you ugly duckling

---

While a subtle spell metamagic could instead ve used by disguising verbal components of a spell behind a one off joke:

---

 You think you won, Ill take the heel?

To hells with this, I say thee KNEEL!

(in this example Kneel is verbal component for Command spell.)

---

 

Careful Spell

When you cast a spell that forces other creatures to make a saving throw, you can protect some of those creatures from the spell’s full force. To do so, you choose a number of those creatures up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one creature). A chosen creature automatically succeeds on its saving throw against the spell, and it takes no damage if it would normally take half damage on a successful save.

Distant Spell

When you cast a spell that has a range of at least 5 feet, you can double the spell’s range. When you cast a spell that has a range of Touch, you can make the range of the spell 30 feet.

Empowered Spell

When you roll damage for a spell, you can reroll a number of the damage dice up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one), and you must use the new rolls. You can use Empowered Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell.

Extended Spell

When you cast a spell that has a duration of 1 minute or longer, you can double its duration, to a maximum duration of 24 hours. If the affected spell requires Concentration, you have Advantage on any saving throw you make to maintain that Concentration.

Heightened Spell

When you cast a spell that forces a creature to make a saving throw, you can give one target of the spell Disadvantage on saves against the spell.

Quickened Spell

When you cast a spell that has a casting time of an action, you can change the casting time to a Bonus Action for this casting. You can’t modify a spell in this way if you’ve already cast a spell of level 1 or higher on the current turn, nor can you cast a spell of level 1 or higher on this turn after modifying a spell in this way.

Seeking Spell

If you make an attack roll for a spell and miss, you can reroll the d20, and you must use the new roll. You can use Seeking Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell.

Subtle Spell

When you cast a spell, you can spend cast it by disguising Verbal and omitting, Somatic, or Material components, except Material components that are consumed by the spell or that have a cost specified in the spell.

Transmuted Spell

When you cast a spell that deals a type of damage from the following list, you can change that damage type to one of the other listed types: Acid, Cold, Fire, Lightning, Poison, Thunder.

Twinned Spell

When you cast a spell, such as Charm Person or Hold Person, that can be cast with a higher-level spell slot to target an additional creature, you can spend increase the spell’s effective level by 1.

Hater's Manifesto

I hate the way that you walk

The way that you talk

I hate the way that you cast

I hate the way that you sneak past

(Kendrick Bardmar, to a Magical Trickster rogue, ca 2024)

---

 At level 14, you learn to channel your worldplay in a way that would directly harm your foes - Disses. As a bonus action on your turn, you may choose a creature within 60 ft of you that can hear you and force them to make an intelligence saving throw by speaking a particularly disrespectful rhymed verse about them. The creature automatically succeeds on a saving throw if it cant understand you or is incapable of speech. On failure, the creature joins a world battle against you and must come up with a witty rhymed response to you until the start of its next turn. If your GM determines that the response was equal or stronger, the turn passes to you and until the start of your next turn you are to come up with a response. If a creature fails to come up with a response, or the GM determines that the response was too 'weak', the creature that lost the worldpay battle takes 8d10 psychic damage and is incapacitated until the end of its next turn, or until its opponent or their ally damages them, whichever happens first. Psychic damage dealt by this feature cannot be resisted or ignored by any means. You cannot begin a new wordplay battle while you are already in a wordplay battle and after you use this feature, you cant use it again until you finish a long rest or use a bardic inspiration to restore a use of it.

---

 Optional Rule: If your GM does not wish to engage in worldpay battles with you, they may let you bypass the battle aspect of this feature and let you force a creature to make an intelligence saving throw, the DC for which is determined by them, depending on the wittiness of your diss that accompanied the use of this feature, dealing them psychic damage and incapacitating them until the end of their next turn on failure. The amount of psychic damage dealt to a creature on failure is likewise determined by your GM depending on the wittiness of your diss.