Shattered Kingdoms

Okay so everyone that has played a bard knows just how squishy they can be. Of course, with good armor and whatnot, they can actually take a decent amount of abuse while super buffed, but just about anything can with that.

The first thing I ask is why bards don't have shield block. I mean, to me this makes no sense. I know they can use scrolls and whatnot, but even priests have shield block. Rogues, and even Scouts I think. Just about every adventuring class knows how to utilize one, except a bard. Why is that? I think bards should really have access to shields, even if that means losing parry. (How many bards use one handed swords / daggers anyways? Most tend to use whips..) What do you guys think? And why or why not do you agree or disagree?

The second thing is persuade. This skill is absolutely infuriating to use at times. It's a wonderful skill, but it's incredibly limited in it's uses. Trying to persuade an Player is like pulling teeth as well. If they have even a sliver of willpower, they'll resist multiple persuades. It's not that that I have issue with, but more or less the aggressiveness of the action. Why is persuade aggressive? It completely kills 90% of it's utility as using it in a lawful area can and will get you reported and then outlawed. I understand that the bard uses mental energy to do that, but the act itself isn't harmful and doesn't cause any harm unless you're persuading someone to kill or attack someone else. Even then, a player paying attention can attack you over the persuade attempt if need be.
Edit: I feel it shouldn't be aggressive towards NPC's or Players imo. Just my 2 cents.

What reason is there for it to be aggressive?

Another one is that there are so many useless songs. Songs of Antimagic, Songs of Dancing, and to a lesser extent protection and war can't really compare to songs of sleep. In every party I've had my bard in, everyone wants songs of sleep because it's simply the superior choice (Even though Songs of protection, when stacked with armor and like buffs gives a rather significant armor boost in my testing..). Songs of Antimagic are useless because the concentration hit from dancing is insignificant. YOu can't even notice it unless you're stretched your concentration to it's limits.

Dancing songs are so easy to resist, that even a max cha half elf bard with max art (yes, i built my bard really weird) it takes 7+ lines just to affect a person with a low amount of willpower. If they have any enchanted for it, forget about it. I know it's powerful, but some of the songs are just easily resisted. That's really just my beef with the class. I'd like to be able to do more than just sit in a group and sing songs of sleep for hours on end..Switching to songs of healing and then running out of mana every 5 mins and having to rest for 20 because of lack of meditation. Sorry for the rant.

/end rant.

I agree that bards should get shield block. Persuade could also be looked at, and perhaps made a little harder to resist. Right now its pretty useless, with the exception of getting low level spells. I do not think their songs need to be changed, just because a few of them are dumb, doesn't change that songs of sleep are awesome.

I would like to see bards get meditation. However if you train some mana you will regen mana faster! But bards need what, dex cha wis int and str? con with any luck, so training mana and art seems like a chore. All these combo classes are really hard to plan for stat wise, unless you are a griffon!!! RPwise alot of the songs are rich in it! Dancing has its uses, songs of silence even has some uses! I have seen songs of silence put to use and be really really really useful!

Songs of silence certainly has it's useless, but as it stands now the only 3 useful songs are sleep, silence and healing for the mana regen.

While I agree that they should get meditation, there are some bard regen items out there that help with the mana problem, so really it's not -too- big a deal. The main part is survivability imo and variety.

Songs of sleep need to be nerfed. It's irresistible as far as I've seen and needs to have some kind of save like Silence songs have. The save however for songs of dancing is simply too easy to save against so dancing songs are quite useless in their own right, though their main goal is to give bards a chance of survivability. (Disabling bash anyone?) which you can't do when it takes 7+ lines to affect someone that's veteran level. Gm's, you can forget about it. You'll be dead long before it affects them at all.

Persuade simply needs to not be aggressive so it can be used anywhere, other than just lawless areas and whatnot.

I think this is an incomplete analysis of the class. Back when I played Ralina, she was great friends with Tyna and persuade got a lot of nifty buffs that I could not otherwise get. There was also a time I was playing Arsilan where we walked in a room with a necromancer and Sithara persuaded the necromancer to disband his group. Songs can also be used in non-magic vectors where magic cannot be used. There are also some situations where songs of sleep is useless, and another song like songs of war becomes useful.

I don't think shield block would really be all that useful to the class anyway. Not having shield block doesn't prevent the character from wearing a shield and gaining the protection bonus, yet people seem to think that lacking the skill means that they are unable to utilise a shield at all. That and you don't even mention tumble, one of the best defensive skills in the game that only bards get.

I've played my bard for near 1200 hours now. Tumble is nice, but if you're front row, unless you're buffed all to hell you're dead. The first bash lands and it's easy to drop a bard in 3 rounds. Parry isn't all that useful because, how many bards actually carry swords?

I didn't mention those because they're fine. I mentioned the area where bards are lacking, namely persuade and song variation. How often do you see songs of antimagic used? Orr songs of war? Or protection? In what instance is sleep songs ever useless except when you're opponent is deafened?

Having the bonuses is completely different from preventing damage. While the AC bonus from shields is nice, being able to actually utilize the blocking aspect would give them more time to survive to actually tumble behind something.

Also, Tyna was a Sprite bard. High dex makes it so they're a bit more sturdy because they don't require haste to reach 25 dex. The point you made with Sithara, while somewhat credible, won't happen very often nowadays because anyone with a sliver of willpower can shrug off multiple persuades without a problem. That and you get outlawed for using it because it's an aggressive skill, which makes no sense.

It is a watered down version of charm person, you are making someone do something against their wishes. You do not think that is an aggressive action? I only think it should be reportable if you manage to pull it off.

Persuade is the ultimate skill of a bard, the fusion of his fast talking
ability with a magical tongue. It allows him to talk someone into committing
a single action that may not be in their best interest. In practice, persuade
works much like the order command but without any charm affect taking place.

There's no charm affect taking place. Persuasion is like the jedi mind trick if you will. It makes a person want to do something for you, but without being aggressive. It's not charm person in which it bends the person to your will, you merely convince them to do so with a bit of magical influence. It shouldn't be aggressive.

Also, persuade is super limited in what you can do vs charm. You can't make them remove things, wear things, and other such that charm can do.

OK OK you got me, when I said it was EXACTLY like charm person . You still think it should not be an aggressive action? You can make them cast spells, kill people, drink, eat, disband, release, quaff things among other things.

I did a lot of PvE and PvP with Sithara and completely ruled the mud back in those days. I can't remember many instances where she didn't get to pull of a tumble, in fact the only one that I can think of is when she was hit with a critical cleave from a NPC when we were clearing out the Iron Citadel the first time after jerin changed everything.

The point I made with Sithara won't happen these days because the halfwits that play bards don't have any imagination and don't even try to do crap like that. Chances are you didn't even think of that as a possibility before I mentioned it, and probably won't even try it.

You're right about songs of sleep though. That [REDACTED] needs wimped, and that should be the only thing you get.