Author Topic: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?  (Read 2550 times)

Offline Basket Burner

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What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« on: March 01, 2012, 08:55:48 AM »
Just like the title says. I'm referring to both power and availability here.

If something costs 1 Turn Undead attempt, what would be the closest Divine Bard equivalent cost?

Offline sirpercival

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #1 on: March 01, 2012, 09:02:41 AM »
I would say waving arms around in a dramatic fashion (as a free action) is pretty equivalent to turning undead, right?  Right?  0:)


Seriously, the main contender would be bardic music, but I agree with the assertion that they aren't exactly equivalent... a low-level bard will likely have fewer music uses than an equivalent-level cleric's turn attempts (assuming the same charisma), while a high-level one will have more.  The bardic music uses are more useful in their original intent... both can be used to grant free metamagic with a feat, though Metamagic Song is capped at your normal highest spell level and DMM is not.

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Offline Mooncrow

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #2 on: March 01, 2012, 09:03:44 AM »
Are we accounting for DMM use here?  If so - Bardic Music as a whole.  If just Turn Undead itself, then probably fascinate

Offline Basket Burner

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #3 on: March 01, 2012, 09:06:57 AM »
And that there are more things that add extra turns than extra songs. Which is why DMM is amazing and Metamagic Song is terrible.

As in just if something costs one use of Turn Undead, what would be the closest equivalent that a Divine Bard could pay? Specifically referring to RKV's "Use a Turn attempt, regain expended maneuver" ability. It could also refer to the other two abilities along the same lines but one will likely not be available during the course of the campaign and one definitely won't.

Offline Mooncrow

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #4 on: March 01, 2012, 09:37:11 AM »
Hrm.  One one hand, as you say, there are more ways to get extra turning attempts than extra music; but by the time you're launching into RKV, the base song total is quite a bit higher...

Idk, I would probably say that a music use is close enough to an equivalent, possibly two per use, but that seems a little too high to me. 

Offline Basket Burner

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #5 on: March 01, 2012, 10:09:35 AM »
Hrm.  One one hand, as you say, there are more ways to get extra turning attempts than extra music; but by the time you're launching into RKV, the base song total is quite a bit higher...

Idk, I would probably say that a music use is close enough to an equivalent, possibly two per use, but that seems a little too high to me.

Actually come to think of it you'd only have around what? 6 songs? And that's if you got 1 at all levels, including the non Bard levels. With turns you have at least 5 + Cha before spending any money at all.

Offline Mooncrow

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #6 on: March 01, 2012, 10:32:31 AM »
Ah, for some reason I was thinking there was a spell level req. on RKV, which would have put the entry several levels higher.  So yeah, with that corrected, it seems like 1 song = 1 turn would be more than fair. 

Offline Basket Burner

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Re: What Divine Bard feature is most equivilent to Turn Undead?
« Reply #7 on: March 01, 2012, 11:02:21 AM »
Now that I think about it I'm going to just go with that. A song is more of a cost, but then it also means turn undead is no longer needed as a requirement making it easier to get into.