CO help, how do you make a bard good?

[SorO_Lost]

Look here.

Also, in the Player's Handbook 177, in the part under "Voluntarily Giving Up a Saving Throw," an Elf can willingly suppress his racial immunity to metaphysical sleep effects.  Ask your GM if you can have your summonlings ignore their morale immunity upon your command.

Oooh nice consideration. Frees up the need for Green Ear so you really could be one heck of a Bard based Summoner easy enough. The Druid may have some competition now...

[gorfnab]

Bard 8/ Virtuoso 2/ Sublime Chord 2/ Virtuoso 8 - 9th level spells, nearly full Inspire Courage (Vest of Legends can make that full) and some neat abilities from Virtuoso, Song of Arcane Power is nifty as well.

Bard 20
Silverbrow Human
Swap Bardic Knowledge for Bardic Knack.
Swap Countersong for Spellbreaker Song.
Swap Fascinate for Hymn of Healing
Swap Suggestion for Song of the Heart (Feat, eberron ACF,)
1. Jack-of-All-Trades, Dragonfire Inspiration
3. Melodic Casting
6. Snowflake Wardance
9. Martial Study (Devoted Spirit maneuver)
12.Words of Creation
15. Doomspeak
18. Lyric Spell

Spells:
Inspirational Boost
Creaking Cacaphony

Gear:
Harmonising Weapon Enhancement +Crystal Echoblade
Vest of Legends
Badge of Valor
Admiral's Bicorne

[SorO_Lost]

I prefer Metamagic Song over Lyric Spell, it pays of metamagic rather than more spells per day.
Melodic Casting main feature is ultimately replaced by persistive effects and Concentration checks are pretty easy.
Martial Study looks like you wanted to go Song of the White Raven, however you lack it and that Feat requires a stance.
Lastly, Virtuoso 2 starts the casting advancement. Most DMs won't let you swap the Bard advancing choice to Sublime (its aking to swapping specialist for wizard or psion) so you should probably delay it until after Sublime.

So as a suggested revision, drop a level of Viruoso for Crusader. The 8th of Virtuoso is kind of dead anyway.
Bard 8 / Crusader 1 / Virtuoso  1 / Sublime Chord 2 / Virtuoso 7
Replace Martial Study with Song of the White Raven.
Replace Lyric Spell with Metamagic Spell.
Replace Melodic Casting with Extend Spell.
Buy Metamagic Storm (DMGII, magical location, 18k) to pick up Persist Spell.
Same spellcasting, able to Persist any Personal buff, and you also get five 3rd level maneuvers which means White Raven Tactics ^_^

You can make up the "loss" of spells per day from losing Lyric Spell by boosting your Charisma. Runestaff up access to Devil's Ego and Persist Nixie's Grace & a Runestaffed Greater Visage of the Deity. It's a quick +10 to use.

[sirpercival]

Most DMs won't let you swap the Bard advancing choice to Sublime (its aking to swapping specialist for wizard or psion) so you should probably delay it until after Sublime.

??? Any DM who would make that ruling (which is kind of ridiculous) would force you to have more than one casting class before entering Virtuoso, since it relies on the sentence "If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso..." (emphasis mine).  But that wording in general doesn't take into account discontinuous PrC leveling, and I've never seen a DM who ruled the way you're implying.

[beargryllz]

You need to know the spell inspirational boost as soon as you get 1st level spells.  I recommend invisibility and haste as well.

You also need the feat lyric spell

With these things, any bard is really, really good.  This also leaves a ton of flexibility because bards really only need one feat, which you take at lvl 6

If you are dragonblooded, you can take dragonfire inspiration for huge damage

If you want 9th lvl spells, take the sublime chord prestige class

[SorO_Lost]

??? Any DM who would make that ruling (which is kind of ridiculous) would force you to have more than one casting class before entering Virtuoso, since it relies on the sentence "If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso..." (emphasis mine).  But that wording in general doesn't take into account discontinuous PrC leveling, and I've never seen a DM who ruled the way you're implying.

Really? I've never seen one that would let you swap thing out, essentially the entire purpose of the last paragraph is you choose one class to advance, not pick and choose every level how you wish or want or IE Virtuoso(bard) 2 & Virtuoso(sublime) 6.

Paying less attention to the whole become X PrC in favor of those rules don't apply until you take the level granting them may not necessarily be 100% RAW, but it's a thousand times better than disregarding an entire paragraph. Which is probably why gish oriented builds have been using this set up long before I even signed up at WotC's forums.

[sirpercival]

But it says you can choose which class to apply each level to, not all levels.  You can pick and choose what to advance by RAW either way, the question is whether you can apply the levels to advance classes which you took after you entered the PrC.

[SorO_Lost]

But it says you can choose which class to apply each level to, not all levels.  You can pick and choose what to advance by RAW either way, the question is whether you can apply the levels to advance classes which you took after you entered the PrC.

If this were real I'd ask you to tell me the rules out loud, without looking at the book. Unfortunately, it's not and once seen it cannot be unseen.

Best I can say is to take off the biaist goggles for a moment, you can't have them on to see this.

Spells per day/Spells Know: Beginning at 2nd level, a virtuoso gains new spells per day (and spells know, if applicable) as if he had also gained a level in an arcane spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class level. He does not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained. If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known.

Let's look at the part that matters.
"which class to add each [virtuoso] level"

Let me reword this thing.
"which class to add for each [virtuoso] level"
Is that what you're wanting?

"which class to add at each [virtuoso] level"
How about that one?

"which class to add to each [virtuoso] level"
Maybe this one?

Because the rules aren't either of those.
I'm not saying I can't see how you mistook it for being read that way, only that for it work the way you say the sentence isn't grammatically correct and needs an additional word to be complete.

However, if you read it as you choose one class and one class only. "he must decide to which class".
Then each, and every single one, of the PrC's levels applies to it. "to add each [virtuoso] level ~applies to in blah blah way~"
No word alterations are needed.

Mull it around a bit before posting a reply. It simply reads better the way I'm saying it does.

[sirpercival]

No, that's not how I'm parsing it at all.  Adding more words in the middle only obfuscates the meaning -- instead, let's try changing the order slightly.

Original:
"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known."

Slight re-ordering (ignoring the "no ending with a preposition" rule):
"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide which class to add each level to for the purpose of blah blah."

Take each level, decide to which class to add it.

[Unbeliever]

Sorry, Sor_0, SirPercival is correct. 

I cannot possibly see how you would read it any other way than you pick each level.  The only restriction seems to be that it be "an arcane spellcasting class to which he belonged to before adding the prestige class level."  Note that last word, "level."  You're doing this level by level.

That means that if you were playing a Wizard 5/Sorcerer 5 and then took 4 levels of Virtuoso, you could have Wizard 7/Sorcerer 6 casting.  To read it so that you would somehow be forbidden to mix and match caster levels would involve deleting the last word of the sentence.  I see no justification for doing so. 

Furthermore, all this stuff is boilerplate.  It's copy/pasted throughout the books.  The Archmage one, for example, reads like this: 

Spells per Day/Spells Known
When a new archmage level is gained, the character gains new spells per day (and spells known, if applicable) as if he had also gained a level in whatever arcane spellcasting class in which he could cast 7th-level spells before he added the prestige class level. He does not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained. If a character had more than one arcane spellcasting class in which he could cast 7th-level spells before he became an archmage, he must decide to which class he adds each level of archmage for the purpose of determining spells per day.

Note that the last sentence is the same as the Virtuoso.  Unsurprising since it's boilerplate.  So, either (a) every single spellcasting prestige class has this limitation.  Or, (b) you're reading in a major limitation based on a sentence that is meant to augment and clarify the previous sentence.  I think it's clearly (b) as I've literally never heard of anyone using this limitation and b/c it involves negating the sentence before it, which is bad interpretive practice. 

Also, your prepositions do not help your argument at all.  They literally add nothing to the meaning of the sentence.  And, "if" is a conditional.  If its antecedent is not true (i.e., if the character does not have multiple spellcasting classes before becoming a Virtuoso) then it does not apply. 

[darqueseid]

Best I can say is to take off the biaist goggles for a moment, you can't have them on to see this.

Spells per day/Spells Know: Beginning at 2nd level, a virtuoso gains new spells per day (and spells know, if applicable) as if he had also gained a level in an arcane spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class level. He does not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained. If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known.

simple question,

Soro if it worked the way your saying why wouldn't the boilerplate say;

"if he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add all levels for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known"

?


I believe Sirpercival is correct.  I can't think of any build that would ever voluntarily do this as being ok at two classes is generally worse than being good at one... but it is viable.

[sirpercival]

The reason to do it is for example in the case of discontinuous PrC leveling, where you later get a prc with a faster progression.

[Cagemarrow]

What would you suggest to maximize a crusader bard for E6? Or would straight bard be better?

[SorO_Lost]

No, that's not how I'm parsing it at all.  Adding more words in the middle only obfuscates the meaning -- instead, let's try changing the order slightly.

Original:
"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known."

Slight re-ordering (ignoring the "no ending with a preposition" rule):
"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide which class to add each level to for the purpose of blah blah."

Take each level, decide to which class to add it.

Recall how I mentioned I wanted to ask you in real so you'd say something like for each just so I could point it out to you?

You just did it in text form.
After knowing what to look for too.

"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide which class to add each level to for the purpose of blah blah."

Had you empathized "which class to add each level" you would have backed you're point. Instead you goofed up and you included the to there. You literally empathized choosing which previously-obtained class to add each Virtuoso level to. I mean, I can't really explain it beyond that. I mean "which class" is singular, not its plural form "classes", meaning you choose one class. You add each level of Virtuoso to it. Kind of plain English there.

As I said, mull it around.

***

It honestly sounds extremely odd even attempting to read it the way you do when you look at other PrC entries. I mean, take Unbe's boiler plate comment. Each PrC is essentially written the same, except the Archmage's text is a bit more clear than Virtuoso's: If a character had more than one arcane spellcasting class in which he could cast 7th-level spells before he became an archmage, he must decide to which class he adds each level of archmage for the purpose of determining spells per day. The entry's differences are it specifies which class you can choose rather than any, "level" is clearly indicated to mean Archmage, and it uses "adds".

"which class to adds each level" just doesn't have a ring to it when attempting to read it your way does it?

[kitcik]

Not that anyone cares but...

99.9% of the time (i.e. before now, 100% of the time) I agree with Soro, but I read it the other way.

[sirpercival]

No, I still disagree with you.  You can't add a particular level to more than one class (in the case of a single-prog like Virtuoso or Archmage) so "classes" wouldn't make any sense.  The relevant word is "each" -- you're taking "each level" as a separate unit.  Your way would have much more justification if it said "all levels" or "your virtuoso levels" or some other wording which implied you were taking the levels in aggregate instead of one by one.

[darqueseid]

No, I still disagree with you.  You can't add a particular level to more than one class (in the case of a single-prog like Virtuoso or Archmage) so "classes" wouldn't make any sense.  The relevant word is "each" -- you're taking "each level" as a separate unit.  Your way would have much more justification if it said "all levels" or "your virtuoso levels" or some other wording which implied you were taking the levels in aggregate instead of one by one.

Exactly right

Answer the question:

(click to show/hide)

Best I can say is to take off the biaist goggles for a moment, you can't have them on to see this.

Spells per day/Spells Know: Beginning at 2nd level, a virtuoso gains new spells per day (and spells know, if applicable) as if he had also gained a level in an arcane spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class level. He does not, however, gain any other benefit a character of that class would have gained. If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known.

simple question,

Soro if it worked the way your saying why wouldn't the boilerplate say;

if he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add all levels for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known

?

Your reading is incorrect Soro; you're concatenating two different parts of the sentence:

"If he had more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtuoso, he must decide to which class to add each level for the purpose of determining spells per day and spells known"

it is a logical if/then statement:

IF character has more than one arcane spellcasting class before becoming a virtouso (P)
THEN character must choose which class to add each level (Q)

They are two materially different things:
The IF statement is the antecedent, if it is true, the THEN statement is the consequent.  if P then Q

Also relevant but not discussed is

"Beginning at 2nd level, a virtuoso gains new spells per day (and spells know, if applicable) as if he had also gained a level in an arcane spellcasting class he belonged to before adding the prestige class level."

not,only one.

an is an indefinate article referring to "arcane spellcasting class"

by definition:
An indefinite article indicates that its noun is not a particular one (or ones)

so that sentence also provides some anecdotal evidence that the writers weren't referring to only one arcane spellcasting class.  It may be reading a bit more thought into the writers than we can give them credit for, but there it is.

that said I agree with you Soro most of the time too, I just think you're a misreading it this time... not everyone can be right 100% of the time, EVEN the mighty SORO   

[SorO_Lost]

99.9% of the time (i.e. before now, 100% of the time) I agree with Soro, but I read it the other way.

+

that said I agree with you Soro most of the time too, I just think you're a misreading it this time... not everyone can be right 100% of the time, EVEN the mighty SORO   

I got fans ^_^

No, I still disagree with you.

Then you'll just have to.

"he must decide to which class to add each level of X for the purpose of Y" Is how I will always read it.

Not: "he must decide to which class to add each level of X for the purpose of Y" where you actually lose the concept of what you're actually adding for each level due speaking broken English. Or worse, is misleading enough to hint that you should add 'Bard' to 'Virtuoso'.

[sirpercival]

No, I read both of your colored sentences the same way.

Here's an analogy.  I have a sack of 10 apples, and three baskets that I want to put apples in.  Since I have more than one basket, I have to decide to which basket to add each apple for the purposes of determining how many apples are in the baskets.  Are you really saying that I have to add all the apples to one basket?

The confusion is coming from:

each  (ch)
adj.
Being one of two or more considered individually; every: Each person cast a vote. My technique improved with each lesson.
pron.
Every one of a group considered individually; each one.

You're reading "each" as an adjective, I'm reading it as a pronoun.  I think my way is correct, but I see where the problem is.

[Unbeliever]

Can we move on from this pseudo-linguistic debate, then?