Shattered Kingdoms

The problem is that on paper a bard look strong. They have recite, persuade, song of sleep. In practice they can not use any of these things together the lag between them makes for a quick death. Which a bard is singing they can not quaff or eat herbs, fighting any warrior who has healing they have zero chance in 1 v 1, so given equal prep time for scroll buffs persuade buffs any other buff you want for a bard. A warrior with 10 heals should have no problem killing them if they do a word of recall stops them from being PKed. Enough said about 1 V 1 and the song of sleep. Bards are built for group combat the question is how often do you see large groups V large groups its normal 5 v 3 at best. A bard wont really help either group that much in that situation.

A bard did help us win a 6 v 3 situation...

Actually we fled the 3v6, we won the 4v6. Important note is that they were wearing utter crap for the most part while our 3 warriors were wearing mithril/ada.

I would take the half power saving throw scenario. It does make sense since you are still forced to listen to the words.

But for it to have a full effect everytime is just overpowered.

If something like that happened, you'd have to figure out when the saving throw was made. Do you have it happen again and again for each line of they lyric that the bard sings, or do you only get one save when you first hear the song which applies to your character until you stop hearing that particular song?

Personally, I favor the second.

Hrm or it checks every line but if you fail once when you stay failed..., and I think that art should figure into songs if that goes in...

I think that goes without saying whenever you're talking about saving throws on SK.

Juuust making sure since art doesn't really affect songs atm...

The problem is that there is no distinction between the effects when the bard is singing and when the bard is singing and dancing.

Both of them state that you "feel very drowsy". You shouldn't even feel very drowsy until the bard starts dancing. It is stating that an even more severe affect than just feeling drowsy is happening.

Songs of silence checks for the full silence effect on every verse as well. Personally I feel the the effects are overpowering themselves but a reduction of those effects through a saving throw could help to alleviate some of that. What good is it to go and have a kit enchanted when a group can roll up with a bard, have them sing songs of sleep and completely negate all of that work you put into it within the matter of about 10 seconds? PK generally doesn't last very long, and these songs have the ability to invalidate anybody's work. How awesome is that?

I know that if I'm facing a bunch of melee characters that all I have to do is have my bard sing songs of sleep to destroy the only thing they're good at: fighting. A group engaging another group that has a bard who sings songs of sleep will lose provided that they are not deafened. How challenging is it to just completely roll over your enemies?

Bards are not by design meant to engage in melee combat. They're a support class. A lot of you need to get the superhero complex of taking on everything out of your head. If you want to be a hero, there will always be an experienced player that will laugh at your attempts and grind your face into the dirt. Your bard is not superman, they're designed to aid and augment other classes and groups.

There will never be a replacement for a melee class other than those 3 classes that were *designed* to do those things, just like there will never be a class that will do spellcasting things better than the 3 spellcasting classes. Just as I would not expect a sorcerer to defeat a barbarian in straight out melee combat, I would not expect a bard to either. They have their place, it just isn't as being a god.

There's no distinction evident to the player, since the message is identical. I'll give you that. I'm almost 100% sure that there is a significant bonus to the song affect when the bard starts to dance, plus the added affect of putting to sleep anyone not in melee combat (such as back row casters and observers).