Bard Known Spells

[SunrypeSlim]

Since there's so many new, awesome spells lately, I thought it might be a good idea to revisit the Bard.

I've learned that the Bard quite dangerous as a multiclass with any number of classes. It must be difficult to balance one of Pure/Multiclass Bards without influencing the other.

In my heart of hearts, a Bard should always be just a crappy Rogue with jokes for magic. With that in mind, I submit my suggestion:

Increase Pure Bard's known spells per circle by 1, and add non-combat utility spells to their available choices.

Utility spells that would work well on a Bard might be: Jump, Regroup, Insight, or even Ward Area

[Tala]

I also thought it would be cool to increase their spells known per circle but it would just end up with PCs still choosing the best and most useful ones. You already can't have all the goodies and need to sacrifice one way or the other.
If that extra spell would HAVE to be one of the weak/thematic/rarely used ones through some scripted system it would be more ideal.

Just increasing the known spells is unlikely to happen.

[The Red Queen]

Is there a way to make it where perks could give spells maybe by token, that are thematic to the perk/class?

[Egon the Monkey]

I think Tokens would be a great idea. They could be matched to the Bard Perks and contain some of the niche spells like Remove Disease, Invisibility Sphere, Bestow/Remove Curse, etc. Things that would be cool to see, but are just not worth spending a known spell on.

I'm planning a pure bard next, and noticed similar things.  The revisit to a few of the less-used bard spells (Hello there Sound Burst) mean I'll be having a go with them, which is good.  But picking a niche spell is a big sacrifice when you use spontaneous casting and get few casts a day. Especially something like Hearthfire, which is mostly "save 7gp sometimes". It's just less fun to play with than something you can use all the time.  For example Displacement, which is now powerful and entertaining, because hey, backup singer clone! Everything doesn't need to be perfectly balanced, but some spells are just a massive disappointment. Ironically, the less-used spells are best on a multiclass bard, because they're not so caster level dependent. Hearthfire, Scare, Balagarn's and Whisphering Wind work the same at any caster level.

A lot of the reason people focus on the same spells is probably that bards don't get many spells per day, and some schools lack for spells to even use. For example GSF Evocation gives you fun every time you cast a spell with a save. A Sorcerer will get a lot of fun spamming Fireballs multiple times a quest and watching enemies ignite. A Bard might be able to drop a Gust of Wind once and a Cloud once, plus they don't have elemental spells other than Flare to trigger the side bonus.Wounding Whispher benefits are cool, but with the D6 HP and no Stoneskin of a Bard, you want to not get hit full stop anyway.

There's also some indirect ways to boost underused spells.  Wounding Whisphers has some super cool benefits now, for example, if you can afford GSF. These could be for all Bards, or associated with some of the otherwise less useful perks.

• If Bards had an automatic +1 to Summon level, summons could be worth using. As it is, Bards have low numbers of casts, and a low Summon spell level for their caster level.  So even buffing your minions with Song doesn't make up for it. This would be a good one for Piper. Especially if it also gave increased summon duration and Points like Cultist does.
• Scripting Cure Light, Moderate and Serious to have a large power level increase when cast by a Bard, in the same way that Sound Burst does.  Cure Serious isn't just less optimal than Haste, it's less cool.  Healing is super common, but Haste is dramatic and rare off items. Since Bards get a lot of removals and counter magic, the upgrade could be something like:
  
  
  
  • Cure Light removes Fear and Confusion .
  • Cure Moderate also removes Stun and Paralysis
  • Cure Serious also removes Blindness, Deafness and Ability Damage.
  Which takes it from "only useful to brew CSW potions" to "useful for stopping your mate getting stun-locked to death". The main trick is the debuff removal, the healing is a nice bonus. As it is, the remove Curse/Disease etc spells are so common as potions or so rarely used that it's a waste of a slot. Giving them this would mean they don't have the AOE cure effect of Remove Fear etc, but they can fix individuals.
• Cloud of Bewilderment and Gust of Wind are strong spells, especially as Gust is one of the few ways to stun undead. However I see no bards using them, because to make them effective means buying 2 feats just to pump up the DC on spells you can only cast a couple of times a day. If one of the Perks (say, Skald) came with SF: Evocation, that would help you fit in the feats needed to make these useful.
• Much like Bards get Fear, Charm Monster and Confusion at L3, they could get a few of the Custom L4 spells there too. It wouldn't be game breaking to give them Horizakaul's Shout when you compare it to the enemy-only damage from GSF Evocation on Wounding Whisphers.  Same for Mass Ultravision, especially as Bards get Darkness and it's one of the few spells without armour spellfail.