Author Topic: Critique for a Bardblade  (Read 7819 times)

Offline Tonymitsu

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Critique for a Bardblade
« on: February 26, 2014, 11:47:12 AM »
I've been looking to try a DFI build for a while now and I found a neat stub on giantitp.com.
I expanded it to 20 levels and cleaned up the maneuver progression a little bit (some of the choices weren't legal) and was hoping to get some opinions.

Silverbrow Human Bard 4/Warblade 16
(32 pt buy, all points to CHA) Str 14, Dex 15, Con 14, Int 10, Wis, 10, Cha 15

Feats: Dragonfire Inspiration (1st), Two-Weapon Fighting (Human), Song of the Heart (3rd), Song of the White Raven (6th), Improved TWF (Gloves of Balanced Hands)*, Snowflake Wardance (9th), Improved Initiative (Warblade 5 bonus), Greater TWF (12th)*, Blade Meditation (Tiger Claw) (Warblade 9 bonus), White Raven Defense (15th), Clarion Commander (Warblade 13 bonus), Lingering Song (18th)

*Note: This assumes I can get the feat from the gloves and get a +4 Dex item to meet the dex requirement by this level.


Skills (at 20): Balance 5, Bluff 5, Concentration 12, Diplomacy 17, Intimidate 11, Perform (singing) 23, Perform (dance) 10, Tumble 5

(click to show/hide)

Equipment:
Still in progress, what I want so far though is
- Gloves of the balanced hand and +4 dex is required for feats.
- +1 Greater Dispelling Sudden Stunning Whip with Crystal of least Return
- +1 Flaming Kurkri (dual wield these, what else can I put on them?)
- slippers of battledancing or boots of agile leaping
- Belt of battle
- badge of valor
- vest of legends
- Fearsome mithril breastplate
- circlet of persuasion
- Ring of evasion?

Any suggestions are welcome.
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Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #1 on: February 26, 2014, 12:16:08 PM »
Add Sudden Stunning to one weapon
Harmonizing is a decent weapon mod for bards also
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Offline DaCraw

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #2 on: February 26, 2014, 09:49:57 PM »
Wounding costs +2 and makes your weapon do 1 Con damage on a hit. It's not multiplied on a crit, but with the sheer number of attacks you'll be putting out it can really add up.

[Edit]: I'm assuming that BoED is banned in your campaign. If not, you really should find a way to fit Words of Creation in. It will double your DFI bonus at the cost of taking 3d4 nonlethal damage (which should be pretty negligible).
« Last Edit: February 26, 2014, 10:23:01 PM by DaCraw »

Offline Iainuki

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #3 on: February 28, 2014, 12:04:21 PM »
The basics of your build (Dragonfire Inspiration, Song of the White Raven, TWF, Snowflake Wardance, etc.) are fine so I'm going to focus on the other elements.

What level are you starting at?  Song of the White Raven is a bit late if you're starting below 6th given how important it is.  Why you are taking four levels of bard right at the start?  You might want two for sure for inspirational boost (note that you can't use a swift action to activate inspire courage with Song of the White Raven and benefit from inspirational boost), but it's not clear to me that you want more bard levels right then, and taking bard 2/warblade 1 would let you get Song of the White Raven with your 3rd-level feat. I support the idea of taking more bard levels in general, bard has a much better skill list than warblade and spellcasting so will improve your out-of-combat utility a lot, and you may even want more than four levels in the long run, depending on what level you expect the campaign to end at.

Who else is in your party?  Should you be focusing more on maneuvers that increase your allies' damage?  I can't figure out from your choices whether you do or don't have a lot of melee allies who would benefit from White Raven maneuvers.  You have quite a few White Raven maneuvers, but your choices aren't optimized for supporting a melee party.  You're also ignoring the extremely powerful high-level maneuvers that Diamond Mind gets.  Time stands still, stance of alacrity, quicksilver motion, and moment of alacrity (if you're breaking the action economy, which you are, a lot) are all very strong.  I would rebalance your lower-level choices so you have the ability to pick up those and look again at some of the higher-level Iron Heart choices.

For specific maneuvers, I think you can make some better choices in general.  There's no reason for anyone with TWF and Tiger Claw not to take wolf fang strike as their zero-prerequisite Tiger Claw maneuver, the ability to move and still attack with both weapons is invaluable. You can swap it out later when you need more than two attacks if you're allowed.  You should grab mountain hammer at some point for carving through walls and similar, probably instead of tactical strike or douse the flames.  Fountain of blood is not very good in general, and you don't have enough of a fear focus to make it worthwhile.  (I question whether it's useful even for fear-focused characters.) Lion's roar would be better, and it's not great unless you have allies that benefit.  There are lots of other better choices, in particular lightning recovery, wall of blades, or any of the Diamond Mind counters that replace saves with Concentration checks.  Covering strike is very underwhelming for its level, if you need another White Raven maneuver for prerequisite purposes, lion's roar is also underwhelming but you can take it earlier so you can take a higher-level maneuver from another discipline at 13th level.  Better yet, consider taking a White Raven stance (see below).  You shouldn't trade out sudden leap at any level, there is never a point where the ability to move as a swift action isn't amazing for melee characters. Warmaster's charge and mountain tombstone strike aren't terrible choices, but I think that the Diamond Mind, Iron Heart, and Tiger Claw 9th-level strikes are better.

For stances, punishing stance is a bad choice for a 1st-level stance because 1d6 doesn't matter much in the long run.  Absolute steel is a bad choice because it can be replaced with a 5.5 kgp core magic item. Press the advantage is underpowered for its level, an extra 5' step simply isn't that valuable in general, and likewise so is swarm tactics, as by the time you get it, tactics of the wolf will probably do more for you.  The 1st-level stances warblade gets mostly don't age well except for hunter's sense, which is also a decent out-of-combat stance.  I'd take that over punishing stance.  If you do have melee allies, leading the charge is also a reasonable choice.  Tactics of the wolf is one of the top stances for damage and much better than punishing stance provided you have anyone to flank with, even animal companions or summons.  If you think you won't be able to get flanking, maybe pearl of black doubt?  Tactics of the wolf is really quite good, though.  For 5th-level stances, there are fewer compelling options, though hearing the air and dancing blade form are both reasonable.  The warblade's best 8th-level stance is stance of alacrity, though wolf pack tactics isn't terrible.  None of the others compare.

For feats, everything looks good, up to the order you take them in, until 12th level.  You might be able to get your hit chance high enough to make Greater TWF useful, but if you aren't hitting 50% or better with -10 to attack, it's probably not worth it.  White Raven Defense and Clarion Commander are not good feats, I'd rather dump the warblade bonus feats into Blind-Fight, the save feats, or Quick Draw, none of which are particularly compelling for your character.  Blade Meditation is also an okay choice, and you have that.  Lingering Song is bad in general for bardblades, once you activate inspire courage you don't have any reason to stop singing, and particularly useless at 18th level since by then combats will be so short.  Look at Martial Study and Stance, those feats taken at high levels on TB characters will do more than almost any other feat because high-level maneuvers are better than almost all feats.  The only other feat I'd look at taking early is Weapon Finesse, because it would let you drop Str to 10, so you could then swap the 14 to Int to use your warblade features and get some more skills, and focus all your money and level-based boosts on Dex, getting higher AC and initiative.  Edited to add: I didn't realize this was point-buy, that makes Weapon Finesse a stronger choice since you can reallocate your initial point distribution to get a high Dex.

For itemization, you have a big damage bonus from Dragonfire Inspiration, and tactics of the wolf if you take that, so you want to boost your attack bonus to compensate.  Thus, you want straight pluses on your weapons and the martial discipline mod for whatever stance you expect you'll spend most of your time in.  Your other items mostly look fine, assuming you're spending the rest of your money on the standard bonuses to stats.  The only comments I'd make are that you should ditch fearsome, you're not a fear-focused character, and make sure to pick up boots of speed at some point.  Slippers of battledancing are really not that good for most characters, they only work if you move 10' with a move action, and the only way your character can take advantage of them is with quicksilver motion, which will be very very late.
« Last Edit: February 28, 2014, 08:46:46 PM by Iainuki »

Offline StreamOfTheSky

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #4 on: February 28, 2014, 12:40:13 PM »
The best weapon enhancements for a melee bard are harmonizing (only need it on 1 weapon) and stunning surge (only need it on 1 weapon).  Ideally, at least one of your weapons is a crystal echoblade, if possible.

I would drop Blade Meditation and instead grab WR Defense w/ your bonus feat, and basically move all the other feats to earlier in the progression.  It's really not a good feat...  You should also consider Stormguard Warrior, it's just...good for any melee.  Best for reach weapon users, but still decent for TWF.  Lingering Song isn't necessary, especially if you get a crystal echoblade.  You might want Somatic Weaponry, so you can cast spells while holding both weapons, though I guess you won't have many spells.  There's other bardic staples like Requiem (to inspire undead, if the party has any) and Subsonics.

Offline Iainuki

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #5 on: February 28, 2014, 05:05:37 PM »
Harmonizing is one possible option for melee bards that expect to cast during combat, but bardblades with minimal bard levels don't really want to do that.  You can do everything but cast spells and activate magic items while using bardic music, including use maneuvers, so it's easy to activate inspire courage at the beginning of an encounter and sustain it until the end.  Even if you have to stop, the effect still lasts for 5 rounds after you stop, which is about the length of a typical encounter.  Eventually, at high levels, particularly if you have access to swift-activation magic items from the MIC, you may want harmonizing, but it's a low priority.  A crystal echoblade is a solid choice for bards, I agree.

Stormguard Warrior is not really as good as many people think it is.  Trading damage now for damage in future turns is usually not good because there's not going to be any guarantee you'll be able to make attacks in subsequent turns, given SoDs, teleportation, battlefield control, etc. etc.  Fight the horde can be useful when you want to fight defensively, which is unusual but does happen.  The best use of combat rhythm is if you have iteratives or other attacks that have a very low chance of hitting, but it's better to raise your attack bonus so those attacks land in the first place.  For these options of dubious value, you have to take the near-useless Ironheart Aura and Stormguard Warrior itself.  Nothing Stormguard Warrior does is worth two feats, not even if you get Ironheart Aura from warblade, though at least Stormguard Warrior has plausible uses, unlike some of the other discipline-oriented feats in ToB.  You'll get more use from Martial Study or Stance, particularly as a warblade.

On skills, why is your Perform so high and why do you have two different Perform skills?   You don't need more than Perform (dance) 6 for Snowflake Wardance, and if your DM won't let you use Perform (dance) on inspire courage in combat, you only need another Perform 3 to use it, or 6 if for some reason you want to use inspire competence.  I might be misremembering a prerequisite here, but you can save a lot of skill points there.  I don't know what you envision this character doing out of combat, but if you want to be actually good at manipulating NPCs, you should have more Bluff and Sense Motive in addition to Diplomacy.  Intimidate is the least valuable social skill, and you're not set up to use it in combat.  What do you need Concentration for?  If you're taking the Diamond Mind maneuvers that require it, okay, but otherwise you won't need it.  Is there a good reason not to max Tumble on a character wearing light armor with the skill always in-class?

Offline Tonymitsu

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #6 on: February 28, 2014, 08:34:39 PM »
Quote
On character insipration:
He is supposed to be a field marshall, the kind of front-line general that leads his troopers personally, hence the focus on White Raven.
No idea about the rest of the party, but I would expect mostly melee's, and maybe a dread necro druid. The idea of a horde of summons or skeletons benefiting from Warmaster's Charge made me drool.

Quote
On level progression:
Bard 3 is required for Song of the Heart (IMHO, far more important than Song of the White Raven).  Bard 4 then gets me a point of BAB, and a point in Will and Reflex saves and second level spells. Just seemed to make sense to take it right away rather than put it off.  We will probably be starting around level 4 or 5.

Quote
On the subject of skills:
Snowflake Wardance only lasts for a number of rounds equal to your ranks in Perform (dance).  I chose to err on the side of caution with one minute because in the event that it ends before combat is over I am fatigued for 10 minutes.
Intimidate was an afterthought since Clarion Commander uses it.  When I read that I interpreted it as allowing you to treat an enemy as flanked even if he could not normally be flanked.
I wanted more than one type of perform so I could inspire if I was otherwise impaired. As for having it maxed out...
I dunno, don't you want at least one at max ranks? Or does that only matter if you have more bard levels?

Quote
On the subject of feats:
Snowflake Wardance requires you to be wielding one-handed slashing weapons, and Blade Meditation requires weapons of the chosen discipline to work. Kukri's were the only one that qualified for both of them. I skipped Weapon Finesse simply because I'd be relying so much on Charisma to hit things.
The main purpose of Song of the White Raven is to make Warblade and Bard levels stack for IC, I'll likely not be using the swift action activation of IC, since I'll only get 4 songs per day and I'll be saving them for encounters that really matter.
Words of Creation is okay, but the mental score requirements are obscene.  I doubt I could work it into this build. I also don't agree with the usual "Doubles your IC bonus" interpretation, since it seems pretty clear to me with the handy little progression in the description that it's your base IC bonus that gets doubled, and then things like Inspirational Boost, Badge of Valor, etc, are added after that.
A good point too about Martial Study for feats. Going to have drop Blade Meditation it seems since I just realized the tactical feats are NOT on the warblade bonus list.

Quote
On martial maneuvers:
I don't see how Punishing Stance is bad for a TWF build while Assassin's Stance is good, given that the latter is 2d6 precision damage, and the former is 1d6 against anything any old time you want, but good point on Leading the Charge.
I got rid of Sudden Leap because I couldn't afford to spend the skill points to make it worthwhile, but if I move the stuff out of Perform, then I could pick it back up and drop Dancing Mongoose instead.
Wolf Fang Strike only out-performs Rabid Wolf when I am singing AND using Inspirational Boost (or badge of valor).  Thus I picked it under the pretense that I will only be inspiring during the combats that matter.
The Diamond Mind counters seemed largely irrelevant when I can just IHS effects away, especially with the Warblade's superior recovery mechanic.
Tactics of the Wolf is pretty boss though, I'll have to look at shuffling things around to see when I can get it.

Quote
On equipment:
I'm not sure I understand the love for the cyrstal echoblade.  It's great for a straight bard, no doubt, but extra damage equal to half your bard level means for this character I'd get an extra +2 damage per hit. I mean, whoop-de-crap.
Harmonizing is pretty awesome though, so it seems a gimmie that one weapon gets that and another gets Stunning Surge(targets Fort) or Sudden Stunning(targets Reflex) from DMG II. Which of those is better?
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Offline Iainuki

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #7 on: March 01, 2014, 10:48:15 PM »
Now that you've clarified that your party does have more melee characters, plus possibly summons or undead, I have some more comments on maneuver and stance choices.  One cautionary note is that undead and plants are immune to morale effects so won't benefit from inspire courage and some White Raven maneuvers.  Having allies who benefit makes tactics of the wolf that much better.  Leading the charge is also a good stance for some parties.  Does your DM allow White Raven maneuvers that apply only to "allies" to affect you?  Tactics of the wolf definitely increases your own damage, but leading the charge only refers to allies.  The best maneuvers for boosting your allies' damage are flanking maneuver, swarming assault, and war master's charge. Clarion call can also be useful but is situational.  Leading the attack and lion's roar both have the problem that they're morale bonuses and don't stack with inspire courage, but at low levels leading the attack might still be worthwhile.  I'd move the best of those up above some of the other maneuvers you have and the others you mentioned.

I'm not convinced that assassin's stance is that great in the grand scheme of things.  There's a fair argument that it's one of the better stances available to a swordsage, or a character dipping swordsage, but you're a warblade and have better options.  You should be inspiring in every battle (see below), so wolf fang strike ought to be better than rabid wolf strike, especially once you get tactics of the wolf.  I don't know how your DM handles iron heart surge, but it takes a standard action to initiate and there are an awful lot of conditions that don't allow you to take a standard action after you fail a save against them.  The ability to preempt SoDs is better than the ability to recover from them.

The swift action activation of inspire courage from Song of the White Raven is the best feature of the feat.  Why wouldn't you use it?  What does that have to do with the number of uses of bardic music you get? The bonus from inspirational boost is not a worth a standard action.  Anyway, only having four uses of bardic music is a problem that I noticed but didn't address in my last post.  You really need more.  I'd aim for eight a day so you can use inspire courage and Snowflake Wardance in all encounters in a typical day.  You could get those from taking Extra Music once or taking more bard levels.  Are you playing in Eberron?  Song of the Heart is in ECS, and there's also a rule (34) that lets you take it instead of a bardic music ability.  Does your DM allow that?  This might be another reason to take more bard levels.  Weapon Finesse could still be useful for your character, there's no such thing as having too high an attack bonus, AC, or initiative in general.

There's no reason to max Perform unless you're taking more bard levels, or you have some other ability that depends on Perform.  I can see the argument for taking 10 ranks in Perform (dance) for Snowflake, but there's really no reason to have multiple Perform skills.  You should definitely put enough points in Jump to make sudden leap useful.

Offline StreamOfTheSky

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #8 on: March 01, 2014, 11:04:01 PM »
Maybe this is a good place to clear this up.  I keep seeing posts that Song of the White Ravens doesn't play nice / work at all with Inspirational Boost, and...I'm just not seeing it.

http://dndtools.eu/spells/spell-compendium--86/inspirational-boost--3914/

Quote
While this spell is in effect, the morale bonus granted by your inspire courage bardic music increases by 1. The effect lasts until your inspire courage effect ends. If you don't begin to use your inspire courage ability before the beginning of your next turn, the spell's effect ends.

I've ALWAYS interpreted and played the spell + SotWR as this:
Round 1: Inspire as a swift, via SotWR; do whatever
Round 2: Cast Inspirational Boost; profit

It seems like people on every forum think that IB only affects inspire courage's bonus if it's cast BEFORE you have started the performance, but the spell text doesn't say that at all.  The last sentence seems to intend to mean "if you don't have IC going before this point, the spell's wasted" and assumes you haven't started it yet.  There is also the whole no casting while performing thing, but I've never seen nor played a bard w/o Melodic Casting or a Harmonizing weapon.

...Or is this a case of, "herp derp, combats never go past 3 rounds anyway, so waiting till round 2's a waste!"?

Offline Keldar

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #9 on: March 01, 2014, 11:18:01 PM »
You have 4 uses of Bardic Music a day and have Snowflake Wardance and Dragonfire Inspiration both competing for them.    :o  And you're relying on SfW for accuracy? :twitch

The only reason you have a Charisma of more than 12 is for Snowflake Wardance.  Drop that load and up Strength instead, which is usable all the time rather than when you can afford to spend a highly limited resource.  You can even spend that feat on Extra Music and DFI in every fight if you want.  This also frees 10 ranks of Perform for something more useful.  Then you can use Perform (Swearing) instead.   :lol

If you really want Snowflake Wardance, you really need more than 4 Bardic Musics a day.  Find something else to cut for Extra Music.



Maybe this is a good place to clear this up.  I keep seeing posts that Song of the White Ravens doesn't play nice / work at all with Inspirational Boost, and...I'm just not seeing it.

http://dndtools.eu/spells/spell-compendium--86/inspirational-boost--3914/

Quote
While this spell is in effect, the morale bonus granted by your inspire courage bardic music increases by 1. The effect lasts until your inspire courage effect ends. If you don't begin to use your inspire courage ability before the beginning of your next turn, the spell's effect ends.



...Or is this a case of, "herp derp, combats never go past 3 rounds anyway, so waiting till round 2's a waste!"?
Counterpoint: note the use of the word begin.  As in, to begin to use it to gain the benefit, not be using it.  DM mileage may vary.

Offline Tonymitsu

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #10 on: March 02, 2014, 11:02:08 AM »
<Inspirational Boost>
Hm, interesting.
It's thanks to the wonky wording that there's nothing actually preventing you from casting it after you have already started performing.  Which means you can start performing in the surprise round, and then cast Boost in the first round of combat.  Of course in defense of the writers it's likely they didn't play too many bards with Melodic Casting or a Harmonizing Weapon either.
I can see the RAW but intent is pretty clear to me too.

The ability to preempt SoDs is better than the ability to recover from them.
That's... a very good point.  :-\
Although it seems extraordinarily silly to me to rule that a condition can prevent you from using a standard action to use IHS when the intent is clearly to spend your standard action for the round removing it.

Song of the Heart is in ECS, and there's also a rule (34) that lets you take it instead of a bardic music ability.
Yeah I noticed that, but since Song of the Heart requires inspire competence ( :shakefist), the earliest I could do it would be Bard 6.  Which would require taking Bard 6.
...which, I guess isn't so bad: more music, better saves, and I'd still get 9th level maneuvers just not until 20.

If you really want Snowflake Wardance, you really need more than 4 Bardic Musics a day.  Find something else to cut for Extra Music.
:witsend
I do want it.


...OK then, how about this?

Bard 2/Warblade 1/Bard 4/Warblade 13:

Dragonfire Inspiration (Human)
Two-Weapon Fighting (1st)
Song of the White Raven (3rd)
Extra Music (6th)
Song of the Heart (Bard 6)
Snowflake Wardance (9th)
Improved TWF (Gloves)
Greater TWF (12th)
Improved Initiative (Warblade 5)
Martial Study (something relevant*)(15th)
White Raven Defense (Warblade 9)
Clarion Commander (18th)

*IL of 14, so I could use it for Swarming Assault, or Quicksilver Motion if I go more into Diamond Mind. And it would make up for the known maneuver lost by not getting Warblade 16.
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Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #11 on: March 02, 2014, 11:06:21 AM »
The ability to preempt SoDs is better than the ability to recover from them.
That's... a very good point.  :-\
It's also an immediate action to counter them, instead of a standard. I greatly prefer the counters to IHS. Of course having both is nice, but that's a lot of maneuvers devoted to defense... although on an IC bard, that might be the best use for your maneuvers, since you have plenty of offensive power just by full attacking.

Quote
Song of the Heart is in ECS, and there's also a rule (34) that lets you take it instead of a bardic music ability.
Yeah I noticed that, but since Song of the Heart requires inspire competence ( :shakefist)
I think RAI is that if you use it to replace Inspire Competence then you can ignore that prereq. Otherwise, it doesn't make sense at all.
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Offline Tonymitsu

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #12 on: March 02, 2014, 02:16:37 PM »
Quote
Song of the Heart is in ECS, and there's also a rule (34) that lets you take it instead of a bardic music ability.
Yeah I noticed that, but since Song of the Heart requires inspire competence ( :shakefist)
I think RAI is that if you use it to replace Inspire Competence then you can ignore that prereq. Otherwise, it doesn't make sense at all.

How do you get that?  I could see that interpretation if all the feats on the list had inspire competence as a prereq, but Song of the Heart is the only one.
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Offline phaedrusxy

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #13 on: March 02, 2014, 02:21:10 PM »
If it replaces something, then that something can't be a prereq for it... I've allowed it in games to replace Inspire Competence, and have played PCs in games where other DMs allowed it. I'm just saying you should ask your DM what they think about it.
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Offline Tonymitsu

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Re: Critique for a Bardblade
« Reply #14 on: March 02, 2014, 03:48:23 PM »
You mean treating it like an alternate class feature?  I can see that.

Then I guess I'd be back to Bard 4/Warblade 16.  Same feat progression as before except picking up Extra Music with third level feat and taking Song of the Heart at Bard 3, and then either Clarion Commander or Martial Study at 15 and the other at 18.
I'll try to redo maneuver progression a little bit tonight too.
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