@@ebertgameandstuff Initiative is a skill check and can be debuffed. That being said it only works on one creature. So you need to be aware of that or talk to your DM about how to adjudicate that ruling
Omg thank you! Almost too late, as I'm playing CoS with my lore Bard and next session is the final battle. Any guesses as to what I'm going to do to Strahd at the start of the session?
Speaking of initiative, consider a dip in divine soul sorcerer. I never multi class a full caster early in a campaign because of the slowed progression, but in adventure league, worth considering. Timing it is not always possible, but casting Guidance cantrip on a board controller or rogue gives them a d4 to add to their initiative. Then use cutting word on an enemy that rolled high. On top of that, I took sacred flame and toll dead for damage, and of course mind sliver because it should be a Bard cantrip (pairing this with Bane is a heck of a debuff), plus shield and absorb elements for spells. I prefer that dip over hexblade for a Lore Bard
Regarding Lore, you might have undervalued cutting word. I use it a lot on initiative if I know the target is not immune to charm. It prevented a lot of powerful enemies from going first, which is invaluable. Also great on an AoE as it's a reaction after the rolls. Cutting fireball damage from average of 27 to an average of 22 (assuming d8) before resistances, saving throws and reactions, like absorb elements, is incredible. It is inconsistent though as you can roll 1, but when you roll max, your teammates are cheering and thanking you. I know it competes with other reaction uses, but the above are great options when needed
Love the AoE Cutting Words when it comes up. Reducing a Cone of Cold damage by 18 after 2 save and 2 fail because you rolled a 6 is a great use for Inspiration.
I think it's hard to argue against College of Lore being an A tier subclass. I understand what you're saying about cutting words being unreliable, particularly at lower levels. but being able to see the roll before applying the debuff means that you're going to be able to play the averages and come out ahead way more often than not. Your video also didn't seem to take into account non direct damage applications of cutting words; like forcing an enemy to fail a key grapple or counterspell, or altering the BBEG's initiative so your team can nova it down before it even has a chance to act. I also think you undersold the level 6 magical secret, despite the praise it was given. Giving a full caster access to two third level spells from any class list is incredibly powerful; not only does it allow you to address individual shortcomings, but allows you to plug capability gaps in your party. No cleric in your party to raise the dead? Revivify! No druid to use summons for action economy? Conjure animals! Third level spellcasting represents such a big power spike for most caster classes, being able to pick and choose among them at 6th level almost makes this an A tier subclass on its own. As always, appreciate the work and discussion from your videos and am looking forward to the next round of cleric
The other thing about Level 6 is it's not Magical Secrets but Additional Magical Secrets. The difference, the spells gained from Additional Magical Secrets don't count against the number of bard spells known, meaning they will have two more spells known then any other bard. As a spellcaster, you really like having more spells to play with.
The magical secrets also allows the lore bard to gain more defensive capability. Mage armor, shield, armor of agathys, these are all great defense spells, that the lore bard can take.
Cutting words was way undersold. Reducing ability checks and damage rolls goes quite a bit beyond just negating attacks. And the criticism based on die rolls is a head scratcher as it applies to any use of bardic inspiration. Any other application depends on party members not using it like idiots, something you can better control in using your own reaction for likely utility.
Bards are one the best classes in the game, as they can reliably shine in any scenario. The trick with subclasses is that what one of them doesn't give, you could easily get through multiclassing or via feats, so in the long run, most fell in the same place, a really good one indeed.
Bard is pretty much one of my favorite classes. I would say their base class damage output suffers a tad when they really have to kill something. I'm interested in using creation for animating a canon, though.
Bards aren't really meant to kill things. They're meant to make sure that their companions are actually able to kill things and live to tell the tale. ;-)
Well, upcasting animate objects and spiritual weapon can give you some nice sustained damage while doing other stuff. You could hack/fire at your enemies or cast some damage spells. Someone on Reddit claimed, Whispers bards could actually deal the most single class DPR at around level 10, this way. I have only looked at its performance when multiclassed but bard only should still be quite good. Haste and Greater Invis also give you some nice options. That said, I think (physical damage) bards really shine when getting Paladin smites and a Hexblade dip. Alternatively, mixing it with Swashbuckler for sustained DPR or maybe Fighter if you wanted to go max burst is also viable.
Wasn't mentioned, but one of the best parts about Glamour is that when creatures gain the temp HP, they can then use a reaction to move without provoking opportunity attacks. This is very useful for battlefield control, almost on par with the 6th level spell Scatter, but they can do it multiple times starting from 3rd level. Having seen Glamour in action, I'm surprised it wasn't an A.
I did mention it, but you're correct I should have discussed the value of that more. Was just playing a couple weeks ago where the glamor bard gave the party a chance to move out of a blade barrier before taking damage. You can also provide movement to someone in a web before they make their saving throw for entanglement.
I did this in a recent one shot. We were in a bad situation, our melee were all out of range and the NPC we were supposed to protect was surrounded. I used this and the battlefield suddenly shifted to our advantage immediately. No one actually needed those temporary hit points.
Friendly heads up that College of Creation can use Performance of Creation to make costly spell components, with no limit by level 14. This makes expensive spells like heroes feast, simulacrum, and all of the resurrection spells COMPLETELY FREE. You also essentially get non-concentration flight by level 6, and that flying object can deal damage and reduce movement speed. It pairs amazing with the "slow" spell, which was added to the bard spell list in Tashas. There are also the more mundane benefits of Performance of creation. Creating walls out of nowhere, up to huge size by level 14 (and at level 14 this can be an adamantine wall, since you don't have a price limit). you can block off doorways, create full cover, or use it as a poor man's baby wall of force. Handy in a fight or a getaway. Performance of creation also creates handy adventuring gear, siege weapons, or impromptu vehicles. Slap a chariot on your paladin's "find steed". Cross a moat in style with your handy portable boat. etc. College of creation has quickly risen to become my favorite bard subclass for these reasons. I highly encourage playing one when you get the chance.
I can agree that Spirits isn't the best bard from an optimization standpoint. But it's such an interesting subclass to bring to the table. Tales from Beyond is practically always useful and feels like you're turning your Inspiration points into 1/2nd level spells. And sitting your friends down to do a divination séance will always be dope. Call it a C-tier for power, but it's an S-Rank for fun and flavor.
I believe I've seen builds that go paladin 2-6, Whispers Bard X before. Expending a bardic inspiration die on a crit will be a rare but potent effect to stack with a smite.
Think it's really cool that the Valor and Lore bards, the PHB ones, are tied. Pretty good balancing of the Bard's inherent weaknesses, either through proficiencies or extra spells.
I think a nice choice for College of Swords would be to add the thrown weapon style from Tashas. I don't know that it's a better/more powerful choice, but I do think it's on theme for the subclass. Gotta throw those knives at the beautiful creature assistant tied to a wheel, after all.
Chris, if you have dared to rate the classes, you may want to stick your ratings to the left of the grades, but still visible. I think it would give some depth to your subclass rankings and allow for an increased idea of what the subclasses add or subtract from the base classes, from your opinion. Great job. Can’t wait to see the rest. Thank you.
@@kel8923 I actually kind of like their "silly" flavor of singing or in a broader term performing to boost the morale of their allies. More importantly, though, I just really like their playstyle of being the ultimate supporter and one of the best "Buffers" in the game. In addition to that they're the best Skill Users, esspecially when it comes to "Social Skills". On a more personal note the class helped me discover that I'm not the introvert I believed myself to be but actually an extrovert.
@@kel8923 I usually re-flavor my bards for the same reason you mention - don't feel the guitar magic stuff either. BUT, one of my favorite characters was a bard that I called a shaman / witch doctor. So, she did chants and such instead of singing in bars or whatever.
I believe your description of the Mantle of Inspiration as "solid" undersells the feature quite a bit. In my opinion it is exceptional. The temp hit points are very nice but the key feature is the ability to move your allies around the battlemap without provoking opportunity attacks. On multiple occasions I've been able to completely rearrange the battle layout with this feature, allowing the squishier party members, or those about to die, to move out of harm's way and putting the beefier party members right in the thick of the battle. With this, being ambushed by enemies is not nearly as dangerous as without. This feature has often turned very tricky battles into ones that are much more manageable. There's not a general in the entire history of war who wouldn't have loved to have had this ability to effect the field of battle.
I think that you grossly underestimated how strong the College of Spirits is. Automatically gaining guidance allows the bard to increase all around support; and is the only one that can cast it at range. The Tales table isn't really strong for damage, but the utility and support it provides is vast and diverse. Plus, it's options and dice scale with level, which is huge. 3d12 damage/healing with inspiration on demand is great. Getting to pull any divination or necromancy spell up to level 6, including cantrips, is huge! In addition to summoning and debuffing, this also allows you to grab any of the divination ritual spells. Why do people sleep on how insanely strong and useful this subclass is?!
I pretty much agree with your overall ranking of the bards, including lore bard, but I would point out a few things: - For all bards, defense is a little less of a problem after tasha's. Fey touched feat, race-choice flexibility, added spells (mirror image!), mean that the bard has better defensive options. Of course there are opportunity costs to any of those options, but still - that is a lot more flexibility. Defense is still an issue for non-valor bards, but it is easier for a bard to get by now, at least for a while, without medium armor + shield proficiency. - Cutting words is pretty nice to help out with defense at early levels, and when that aspect of it stops being good, you can still nerf the most dangerous enemy's initiative without any save. It can also be paired with some interesting spell options later. Telekinesis + cutting words, for example (note: skill checks bypass legendary resistance) - and that all blends nicely with jack of all trades, as well as (eventually) peerless skill. - I mentioned this in a reply below, but not all tables are composed of very tactical players who are going to make great use of the bardic inspiration you give them. Sometimes cutting words will be your most practically effective use of BI, simply for that reason. Not sure that all of this makes lore bard greater than B tier... Maybe B+ / A- ? I agree with your overall assessment that lore bard is very good, and also overrated at the same time. (I have seen many people argue it is the best / in the top 5 subclasses, which is definitely an exaggeration.)
Lore is the most bard-y bard than most other subclasses, except Eloquence. Whereas other subclasses aim for more versatility - usually more melee-friendly. But if you're going for that classic non-combat gets-by-on-their-wits bard Lore was your best choice until Tasha's.
@@cultivatedjerk5574 How about one Hexblade for the CHA-based weapon use (or perhaps two for some Invocations), and two paladin to gain Smite? I realize this means you're going to lose a feat or ability increase, but it would also mean you only really need to increase CHA ... even for melee combat. And I really, really like the idea of that one particular warlock cantrip for my bard who's got essentially nothing for ranged attacks otherwise ...
@@cultivatedjerk5574 while I certainly don't think it sounds like a bad idea, I do wonder what makes it such a powerful option. Obviously lock makes it possible to attack with cha, but you're still gonna want that dex for AC.. Paladin makes more sense to me due to divine smites being an option.
@@flimpeenflarmpoon1353 Yes, but so what? If you're going to use heavy armor, you can basically turn DEX into a dump stat. In fact, you'll probably need to in order to *WEAR* heavy armor in the first place (minimum STR for plate mail is 15) ... unless your bard/paladin/warlock character is a dwarf ...
I didn't expect Eloquence to be S, just because Treantmonk's definition of S-tier subclasses are subclasses that actually break the game, where the DM might need to tell their player not to play a subclass, or reign in the use of some of their features. I can't really see a DM actually banning or reigning in the power level of an Eloquence bard (unless they're banning/reigning in the power level of a lot of other subclasses too).
That is why I thought creation would be S tier. He assumes the DM will take care of it, but not for the clerics? That seems odd to me, as animating enemy armor and creating free spell components for glyph of warding or heroes feast are less broken then the peace cleric teleport thing.
Cutting words is an amazing ability. Even if you only use your 5 bardics to make 5 attacks miss, thats 5 reaction misses you caused. I cant tell you how many times ive kept allies up because I had access to cutting words.
Can we just point out for a moment that with the Spirits subclass you have a 1 in 8 chance to automatically incap a target (provided they suck at wisdom saves)? The odds aren't great but the fact that there's a chance for that to happen is kinda spooky.
About the Glamour bard being underused (and other subclasses like it, such as archfey warlock and enchantment wizard) I feel like a lot of it has to do with the community in general undervaluing charming and enchantment as a valid defensive option. Which isn't to say it's perfect, but it's a lot more useful than what most optimization circles seem to let on.
I played a Glamour Bard for a long while, and never found the charming abilities particularly useful. What WAS insanely useful was the bonus action "all my allies can move without getting attacked and get a big chunk of THP" five times per short rest.
@@shanebernier2483 command not so much, but if you’re in a diplomacy situation and your bard is allowed to play a little ‘background’ music, enthralling performance can really pay dividends.
Glamour Bard has always seemed like the best subclass for a Bard-barian. As the Mantle can affect yourself and be used while raging. Plus Enthalling Performance is great utility and thematic.
lore bard: "at level 14, we get...an okay ability." I'm slightly triggered by this. Peerless skill is VERY powerful. Win initiative (probably)? check. Counterspell/dispel pretty much anything with a 3rd level spell slot and an insp. die? check. Practically guarantee a skill check succeeds? check. The only issue with the ability is that you don't have enough inspiration dice to go around once you get it, because the situations in which peerless skill is incredible happen ALL THE TIME. Better hope for short rests. I would argue that it's one of the best lvl 14 abilities for bard behind eloquence, glamour's is also quite good. Let's compare it to valor's battle magic for example: valor gets to do like...1d8+4 with a bonus action after casting a spell...at level 14. One of these abilities is very very good, the other is...kinda bad. I picked on valor a bit here because IMO their 14th level ability is the worst of any bard subclass (maaaaybe whispers is worse because it's rather narrow?). But I do think Valor is still a very good subclass, mainly single classed at low-mid levels. I'm honestly just trying to give peerless skill the shine it deserves as it's also a "banger" IMO. Not trying to be adversarial here, just wanted to express my opinion in the form of a very wordy youtube comment lol, cheers. FWIW, I found my lore bard to be quite weak early on, one of the weakest characters I've ever played from 1-5(sleep helps early on), but gets much better at 6...like much much stronger. Just having 2 extra spells known ends up being massive in giving you flexibility as a caster. As you get more and more spell slots the difference feels very pronounced.
The level 14 lore bard ability basically lets you use a bardic inspiration die on yourself (except not on your saving throws or attack rolls). It's really good if nobody else in the party has initiative as important as yours. It's really good if nobody else in the party has counterspell. But if you do have good party members, party members with counterspell, party members that would benefit from a bonus to initiative rolls, you can just hand out your bardic inspiration dice to them, and you're not losing too much if you don't have the lore bard level 14 ability. The bardic inspiration dice will still get plenty of value.
@@KaitlynBurnellMath One thing that is easy for tactical players to overlook is that bardic inspiration requires that your teammates are approaching the game with the same level of tactical tactical awareness. I don't mean for that to sound arrogant or snotty; there's nothing wrong with playing less tactically. But I have played a bard at tables where players would forget to use inspiration (even with gentle reminders) or - even worse - would squander them. So, having ways fully within your power to use bardic inspiration (cutting words, peerless skill) can be nice for that reason, as well.
Title says subclasses ranked but it feels more like classes ranked with subclasses applying a small variance. If the base class is good it will get a high ranking regardless of subclass. A low ranking class will get a relatively low ranking regardless of subclass. Don't get me wrong it's still super informative. And it does give you a picture of the quality of the different classes.
He talked about how since the dungeon dudes analyzed subclasses without the classes, he wanted to analyze the subclasses with the classes as part of them.
@@Johnrobertx Good to know. I do like seeing the overall comparison. I suppose I'm just nitpicking to be honest. I don't want to come off as someone trolling. Having said that, it would make more sense to be titled. Bard class/subclasses rankings.
The College of Eloquence is an S Tier subclass, meaning that, yes, it is over-powered! Silver Tongue: You simply cannot fail any attempts at Persuasion or Deception. The whole point of rolling in this game is randomness. Taking the randomness out of it breaks the Social pillar of the game. It's exploitable. This is a power that should only ever be granted in the 3rd tier of play. Rogues receive Reliable Talent at level 11. Silver Tongue is a feature that should be given to the Eloquence Bard at level 14. It's a topper feature. Giving it at level 3... over-powered. Unsettling Words: None of your enemies will save v your spells or features up to the number of Bardic Inspirations that you have. Far too strong because of the scaling Bardic Inspiration dice. It's an ultra powerful bane that doesn't cost a spell slot. Unfailing Inspiration: If you have any left from not using Unsettling Words, your inspiration can't be wasted. Very powerful but not over-powered by itself. Universal Speech: Not over powered by itself obviously but no other Bard gets 2 features at level 6. In fact, I'd say that Universal Speech should be the lvl 3 feature instead of Silver Tongue. Infectious Inspiration: This feature is a very good and wouldn't be over-powered as a level 14 topper feature if it wasn't combined with Unfailing Inspiration. Allies can't lose their BI when it doesn't succeed but when it does work, now another ally has BI. It's unending inspiration that just gets transferred so now you can focus more on Unsettling Words. Any one of Silver Tongue, Unsettling Words, Unfailing Inspiration, or Infectious Inspiration qualifies as a major major powerful feature. Each one of these could be a level 14 feature to a different Bardic College. Giving them all together to one subclass in Eloquence creates a monster.
We're comparing this to stuff like Chronurgist Wizard, Twilight Cleric, and Moon Druid. It is really really good for sure, but it doesn't even compare in the gamebreaking department to those subclasses. Also, Silver Tongue only breaks Social pillar if your DM lets you. Persuasion isn't mind control. It's a powerful feature, and probably too powerful for the level, but it really isn't gamebreaking.
Remember that you only roll when you have a chance to succeed or to fail --- and when you do succeed, it doesn't necessarily mean you get exactly what you want. Rolling high after trying to convince a king to abdicate his crown only means he'll laugh it off as a great joke instead of executing you.
@@eshansingh1 your argument is that it doesn't break the social pillar because it can't affect things outside of the social pillar. You see the problem. Bounded Accuracy DCs mean expertise often breaks them, bardic inspiration makes it worse and this just guarantee a that normal hard and very hard DCs are pointless. We all know that the social pillar has limits. That doesn't change the fact that if I try to make it important, there is no tension because it's automatic for this bard. But the true answer is don't bother using 5e for this. Go play a game designed around intrigue and social situations like Burning Wheel.
@@BreakingStarGames And yet everyone is playing 5E so we have to have a system where the Social Pillar functions properly and cannot be exploited by a single subclass.
I hadn't really played a Bard yet, but I think Eloquence would make a fun LE scuzzy lawyer type character (probably with the Criminal Background) having to bail the party out of trouble with his quick wit, sharp tongue, and perhaps a few creative interpretations of the truth. The kind of guy who had sold out any kind of ethics long ago, and hires his talents out to the highest bidder - the kind of people with vast fortunes in ill gotten gains and in need of his unique services to protect them.
rpgbot made an excellent point that instead of taking valor bard you could just dip a single level as hex warlock and using booming blade would outscale the two attacks
It would be greatly appreciated if you could put the abilities that you don’t talk about on screen while you gloss them over. I always feel obligated to check the abilities you ignore.
Indestructoboy did a great analysis of the eloquence bard. I kind of agree with his assessment. The subclass breaks the social pillar of play and suffers from feature bloat. Thoughts?
Eloquence breaks saving throws, buffs one of the strongest baseline features in the game, and breaks the social pillar to pieces at a shockingly low level. I'd bump all the bards he ranked up a tier and flip valor and lore, and put Eloquence in a well deserved S ranking. It's the bottom of the S tier, which honestly shocks me, but it's there.
I personally love college of lore. Fixes pretty much all the problems with bards by giving magical secrets both earlier and more often than other bards.
Lore's definitely a tier. If you can "dip" into magical secrets you can do amazing things. Like a ranged fighter that can shoot 4 times with swift quiver at level 10 and with sharpshooter you annihilate, all at level 10.
I have to say I disagree heartily on your assessment of Valor vs. Sword bard. I apologize in advance for the long comment... The whole argument for Valor bard is they get a shield, so +2 AC assuming they're doing some form of Sword + Board. But, unlike College of Swords, they can't use their weapon as a spellcasting focus, so any time they want to cast something with an Material component they'd need to drop their sword and grab their component pouch. Almost no instruments could reasonably be played with a Shield in the other hand. Should you be lucky enough to get an Instrument of the Bards item, you will never be able to use it with your Shield equipped. Even the Warcaster feat doesn't fix this situation. And unlike a weapon, a Shield take a full action to drop, so any time you have to cast a Material spell you are forced to leave yourself unarmed. In exchange for that clunky use of a Shield for +2 AC, the College of Swords bard gets: - The ability to use any weapon you're armed with as a spellcasting focus, making that a lot smoother. - A fighting style (something no melee character should be without) - A MINIMUM of twice the expanded use of their Bardic Inspiration (the Valor Bard adds to damage OR AC vs just one attack, the Sword bard with defensive flourish adds that damage to the attack AND AC for the whole round). - The Mobile Flourish ability for battlefield control. 6-17ft of forced movement may not seem like much, but you can use it to break an enemy's Grapple on yourself or another part member. - A pool of up to 5 dice you can use on any melee or ranged (would be better if they had the Archery fighting style) weapon crit. - A MUCH MUCH better level 14 subclass capstone. I mean yeah, that's a little late in the game, but level 14 is at least achievable. - Significantly better multi-class synergy with the Paladin and Hexblade - The ability to take the Dueling Fighting style so you can wield a Rapier in one hand and your Instrument of the Bards in the other (if you're lucky enough to get one) - The ability to effectively dish out two bardic inspiration in your turn by using one as a Flourish and the other as a Bonus Action (can be useful in a clutch situation) To answer your question of "Is this worth a Feat?", I would absolutely without question take a feat for what the Sword bard gets over what the Valor bard gets. Do you really think just a clunky +2 ac is worth ALL that? And to that point, at least any other bard CAN take a feat to get what the Valor bard gets. There is no feat a Valor bard can take to replicate the benefits of any other bard subclass. That's like arguing that the Champion Fighter would be king if there were a Feat to give +1 Str/Dex and a crit on 19. I get that Feats Aren't Free but if everything that makes your subclass special can be summed up in a single Feat, doesn't that say something? Anyway, that's my College of TEDTalk. Thanks for the video!
Valor bard is better because it supports the party with its abilities. Sword bard does not support, and is generally very selfish with its abilities in order to be somewhat viable. This is why Valor is better.
@@brannenpfister2579 All bards have the capacity to support the team. Yet, the Sword bard can do *almost* everything the Valor Bard can do. The expanded uses of Bardic Inspiration the Valor Bard gets aren't great. Even if the Sword Bard uses all it's inspiration to buff teammates, like a Valor Bard does, it still has better features. The combined power of the fighting style, using the weapon as a focus, and extra movement on the Attack Action are better than a Shield Proficiency. At a minimum, a Blade Flourish inspiration is *less* wasted than a Valor Bard's Combat Inspiration because they can be used simultaneously for both effects. You can't say a subclass is objectively worse just because you're assuming people will use it poorly.
@@adriangoetz5108 a sword bard can’t effectively make it through an adventuring day by both supporting the party and enhancing itself, unless your DM is lenient with short rests or the stakes are never high enough for it to matter. Sword doesn’t support the party better than any other bard. In fact it’s one of the worst. A paladin or Hexblade or hell even blade singer would be a better choice than swords because they all do things better. Sword just doesn’t really serve that role better than others. The valor bard isn’t much better in my opinion, but it can still least give the party the option to know a variation of what is essentially the shield spell - which can help survivability in a way no other bard or caster can. That, is the difference. Again you are welcome to disagree - I am just providing you with information as to why Valor is widely considered better. That’s all. 👍🏻
@@brannenpfister2579 I do disagree with the general consensus on this one, I just don't think the math adds up. But I appreciate you taking the time to compare, so thanks!
@Adrian Goetz The Valor Bard essentially has an extra Feat over the Swords Bard. It's up to you to evaluate how much that is worth? These classes also play differently. The Sword Bard is not everything the Valor Bard is and more. No. A Swords Bard grants weapon focus at the expense of defense and team support. Consider: What is the Swords Bard focusing on for stats given the subclass features? I would say DEX and perhaps a more self focused spell set. Less DC spells because DEX is favored over CHA. By contrast, Valor Bard does not change its mode from favoring CHA because it's not incentivized to do so. It's focus should always be spellcasting. Valor Bards also get ranged martial weapon proficiency which means they don't have to engage, which is optimal martial mode in the game, IMO. And so, the Valor Bard can switch from melee and range, helps teammates more, while the Sword Bard focuses on the self and its DEX. They're really not the same.
My favorite was a lw 6 eloquence bard/ lw 7-14 fire genie warlock. Start with lw1 bard - then lw7 warlock - then lw6 bard - then rest warlock (Face/Infiltration) Have actor feat + mask of many faces + misty visions to be high class illusionist and manipulator + eloquence bard + expertise in Deception and perception ( Rank S) (Scouting ) Pact of the chain imp to scout situation + high perception from expertise (Rank A) (Utility)-Even you your skills are not in History or arcane or religion you do have useful skills (Comp Languages, Detect magic, Identify) And jack of all trades for a little boost (Rank B) (Dps) Fireball for low lw crowds(Slots from bard and Warlock) + Concentrated damage from Eldritch blast and summon aberration while flying (Rank A) (Control) Class has good combo ,Unsettling Words + Silvery barbs + Hold person/ Raulothim's Psychic Lance to almost guarantee a success on a boss. (Rank A) (Survivability) You are not a tank but you do have Armor of agahtis + fly from genie + Misty step to avoid damage (Rank B) (Support) Class does not have good support but you can give healing potions if if party has goodberry to imp for easy heals for dropped players and bardic inspiration (Rank C)
You didnt mention that at lv 6 Spirit bard gets to add 1d6 to any damage or healing they put out. For the Seance spell, if you cant afford another concentration spell in summon undead, taking Toll the Dead off the seance is a great way to get a consistent ranged damage option without much cost.
I have been screaming about how underrated the glamour bard is. I have been playing a tabaxi glamour bard for the past year and my guy has been the most powerful support character I have ever seen at a table
If multiclassing is allowed the college of whispers mixes well with a hexblade It works out like a psychic smite short rest monster with at least 5/5 levels
Ooooh, I love Bards! Honestly, I think they might be the best class in DnD. Although I do think some of the subclasses for other strong classes are better than the best bard subclasses. That said, I think Bard is a better multiclass than most of those. I pretty much agree with your rankings, although I do think Glamour is actually better, and probably A tier, if for no other reason than granting that reaction movement without provoking opportunity attacks. So useful for getting people out of sticky situations, or letting the tank block off a doorway or something. Really, I could see Glamour, Lore, and Valour all being A with Eloquence. I'd probably also put Whispers above Spirits, but I haven't played with Spirits so I can't really say.
I think there's a bit of inconsistency when considering multi-classing. It was only really mentioned for College of Sword, where it is ofc a notable addition, but I would say that College of Whispers pairs really well with a 3 level dip in Rogue, especially Assassin; you're getting additional expertise, sneak attack die, thieves cant, cunning action and your assassinate ability. This not only compliments some of the mechanical strengths of Bards (utility, proficiencies, etc), but also leans into the thematic strength of the subclass, which is (I think) very rogue adjacent. Moreover, they blend together nicely, with a mix of sneak attack and psychic blades keeping pace nicely with a rogues actual sneak attack progression. Is it finite unlike sneak attack? Sure. But is it a worthwhile trade off to be a full caster? I would say so, especially considering you're getting to match the damage output of a full rogue of similar level for only a 3 level investment while being a full caster that can make up for many of the other rogue abilities with levels and levels of magic. This allows you to fight like a Rogue when you want to, and hang back and be a support caster the rest of the time without really compromising too much on either. Not played the built yet, but I have one statted out and I reckon it's pretty solid 😊
I really like Cutting Words for its ability to target enemy Ability Checks. It's already been mentioned that you can target an enemy's Initiative check, but it's also good for enemies caught in certain spells. If someone in your party has Web, Phantasmal Force, Bones of the Earth, or some other spells, you can help make the spells more reliable for your team.
You also want to improve your concentration saving throws. Aside from that, bards are versatile so it is hard to say. If you want to focus more on support / buffing and don’t mind an early single level MC, a very simple but effective approach would be starting as Divine Soul sorcerer (take bless, shield, and absorb elements) then go bard. You will be one level behind, but you’ll have full spell slot progression, so make sure to take some spells that, like bless, upcast well (aid is a must, but also consider invisibility, etc.) Mountain dwarf or Tortle would set you up for decent AC and 17 Cha, so you can take fey touched at character level 5 (pick up gift of alacrity if your DM allows it), and then maxing charisma at level 9. Upsides: good utility with lots of cantrips from three spell lists, good concentration saves, lots of defensive spells and abilities, and a bunch of ways to support your party. Obvious downside that you will be one level behind on high level spell selection and bard class features. Also, you will be less effective if your party already includes a lot of ways to generate temporary HP (if that’s the case I would suggest going with a different bard subclass)
Personally I find Mantle of inspiration to be the glamour bard’s best feature, so synergizing with that is my top priority. You can reposition allies (or yourself) in combat without provoking opportunity attacks (but at the cost of your allies’ reactions). This makes you a little better at control than other bards as you can get your allies out of the way for a hypnotic pattern or move them up to priority targets after casting it. So you can potentially get optimal use of big control spells more easily. The Alert feat couples well with this ability (though your allies won’t be able to use reactions if surprised), as you’ll always be able to use the ability early. The Fey-touched feat (taking Gift of Alacrity) is a great option as well for optimal positioning, as you can boost your initiative, maneuverability (with a free misty step), and charisma at the same time (Charisma also affects how many allies you can target with the Mantle). Because of your awesome positioning abilities, you can potentially neglect your AC a bit more than other bards, but I’d recommend getting a 16 in dex to start, if possible. This will help your AC as well as your initiative, obviously. A single dip in hexblade at level 6 or so will solve AC problems, as well. Also, the Glamour bard from a role play perspective is very alluring and charming, so you might want to take spells to boost that. Suggestion, disguise self, charm person and enhance ability really help to get away with all kinds of social mischievousness, and really make this bard fun to play. I personally went with changeling, and the cons and schemes are out of control (in a good way). Also, the Aid spell can stack with your mantle of inspiration to create a wall of hit points on your team. Inspiring Leader does not, however, so you will want to skip that feat. For magical secrets, control spells like wall of force/thorns/find greater steed all will help with positioning/control (and a Pegasus can help influence a lot of people into trusting you).
I'm rolling it in CoS as a Bardlock (currently Bard 5/Warlock 1 because of story progression). It's really fun and over the next two levels the build will peak with Agonizing Blast and Mantle of Majesty (EB+AB is perfect to supplement the bonus action Command). I went with Archfey for the theme but Hexblade would probably be the most 'optimized' choice. You are delaying spell progression and Magical Secrets but having a solid Cantrip and a few more utility/damage spells plus recharchable first level spell slots (great with Shield with Hexblade) can be great fun. Overall Glamour is a fun subclass, Mantle of Inspiration has been super clutch so far and really makes you feel like a conductor on the battlefield.
Hey TM, enjoying the series so far but it struck me this time it's a bit weird to completely leave out the upper level subclass features. I get the reasoning that tier 3 and 4 aren't reached by the average campaign and those features should be less important to character creation accordingly and thus less time spent on them in your analysis would make sense, but just saying 'they get something at upper levels and it's okay' is really vague for a comprehensive study like what you're attempting. Just my unasked-for opinion but I think briefly touching on the subclass capstone abilities would be worth an extra sentence or two as far as length or pacing goes.
The reason I'm not talking about them is that I really want to make it clear where I'm coming up with these ratings. If I start talking about an AMAZING feature that is high level, it might seem strange why I don't rank that subclass higher.
@@TreantmonksTemple To be a bit blunt, I disliked the omission. I watch your channel for the excellent analytical reasoning behind your opinions rather than for the opinions themselves. I trust that you have a good reason for saying that an ability is good or bad, but because of that trust I would rather not hear the opinion without any reasoning attached as it's more likely to make my own thinking more biased rather than more informed.
@@TreantmonksTemple i have to agree that not going over the ability at all is a mistake and honestly makes the video not as fun to watch. Give us all the info, not just the info you think is most important, also higher level abilities tend to be the more interesting or abnormal. I know you focus heavily on optimization but DnD is a game and the way to optimize any game is to make it the most enjoyable, same with UA-cam content.
I actually agree with Treantmonk with this one. I feel most high level abilities are basically a non-factor in most campaigns thus it's relative power of said abilities doesn't really matter. So I actually feel that the lower abilities are a much stronger consideration for picking a class where most characters will spend the majority of their time, then a potentially exceptional trait that only comes online at level 14 for about the last quarter of a campaign. It's why capstones shouldn't factor into most class reviews at all; because they come so late that they will be experienced once or twice. If you feel those abilities are important, then doing your own research is pretty vital. I personally feel Lore is an A-rank instead of B due to the sheer availability of options, but then Treantmonk is providing his opinion based on his feelings and research, different tables will have different priorities.
@@lordbiscuitthetossable5352 agreed, also this is explained in the intro for how abilities are weighted. On top of that keeping a video to a reasonable length with a reasonable number of comparative points to juggle and compare in one's minds (or notebooks if you like to take notes during lectures) are points to consider when crafting a video. A final point for why this type of editing is helpful is people can visit his more in-depth video on a specific subclass/book to get a reasonable handle on what a full level 20 subclass may look like.
3rd level can create magic materials for free/2nd spell slot and can create tools or items. In combat you can make obstacles for your opponents or just put them in a box. Animated object can slow enemies down automagically and allow you to out speed anything as you can jump on your flying carpet. Creation can easily beat anything it comes across without fail making it S+ tier
Kinda curious what the Cleric subclasses are going to look like. Twilight and Peace in S-tier obviously. But in Treantmonk's previous tier list (made before Tasha's) Bard was a full tier higher than cleric, so does that mean the rest of the older cleric subclasses are in B and C tier?
After all the videos are published I would really like to see the 'behind the curtain' process of the ups and downs of how all this was done as well as insights into your process for what you found most surprising or misconceptions you had that were revealed to you in this process. (Note, I am a high school teacher who often has this type of analysis discussion with colleagues as we teach or study and enjoy the 'how we analyze and understand our world's conversation)
I get putting eloquence ahead of lore, but valor (even as a tie)? WHOOF this coming from the man that says spells are the reason to play a trickery cleric! c'mon chris! magical secrets FOUR LEVELS ahead of all other bards is nuts! counterspell! revivify! slow! haste! misty step! I AM A SALTY BOY!!!
I didn't appreciate how powerful the Valor Bard's medium armor plus shield benefit was until I played a bard for the first time. The Dungeon Master was running a module where the players get ambushed by giant badgers; I somehow survived 4 attacks when the average result should have seen me knocked out. I was determined to go Lore Bard though, so I grabbed a level of Knowledge Cleric to obtain the medium armor and shield (Protector Aasimar of Milil). I was initially delighted with my choice, until I discovered how painful my level 5 would be due to not knowing level 3 spells. The only reason my bard didn't become ignorable was the acquisition of a Wand of Lightning Bolts.
I disagree about Cutting Words. When I played a Lore Bard, I used it all the time. It saved mine and my allies lives multiple times. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that you can only use it to protect yourself. If you could only use it to protect yourself, yes, it would be weak as fuck, but you can use it to protect your allies. So, if your cleric is about to get hit, but you roll a six, bringing the enemy's attack roll down to 4 under your Cleric's AC, then you've just saved the party. "Also at 3rd level, you learn how to use your wit to distract, confuse, and otherwise sap the confidence and competence of others. When a creature that you can see within 60 feet of you makes an attack roll, an ability check, or a damage roll, you can use your reaction to expend one of your uses of Bardic Inspiration, rolling a Bardic Inspiration die and subtracting the number rolled from the creature’s roll. You can choose to use this feature after the creature makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the attack roll or ability check succeeds or fails, or before the creature deals its damage. The creature is immune if it can’t hear you or if it’s immune to being charmed."
Bard's are my favorite class it hurts so much seeing you put most of the subclasses as mid. Also the Lore bard is insanely good should probably be up there alongside Eloquence bard
Eloquence bards are insane. I played one and good lord, he was a monster in and out of combat. The bonus action debuff on enemy saves is simply absurd.
My favorite combat i rolled with a bard was with my 7th level mark of healing halfling college of swords bard. He was fighting in a tournament and entered because he heard a rumor that the champion of the ring, a paladin, was cheating through some unknown means. Magic was allowed as long as it wasn't enchantment or summoning magic and i figured by exposing him as well as winning the tournament it would drum up a lot of attention in the city for the circus my bard was ringmaster of. To note there was a short rest between each match Round 1 was against a rogue somewhere between 5th-7th level. Pretty easy match. My rapier is enchanted with a booming blade spell that grows with me so between that and my defensive flourishes i barely got touched. The second round was by far the hardest. I could have finished easily with magic but rumors had it this masked fighter was a true warrior and i wanted to test my mettle; not to mention save my spells for any chicanery the paladin was using to cheat. That decision almost cost me the tournament. Turned out this masked warrior was an 11th level echo knight. I used my power flourish the first turn to kill his echo while laying into him but his attacks were hitting hard. My hp dropped quick and in a panic i knocked him away with a mobile flourish and backpedaled; using my bonus action for aura of vitality. I kited him the remaining 3 turns keeping him just out of range with mobile flourish and wracking up the damage with booming blade while i took the time to recover then bit the bullet and dove in when my inspirations ran out. His first attack broke concentration on aura of vitality but i had healed up just barely enough and i took him down with 2hp left. Round 3 was against one of my party members who made it to the semis, a fairy barbarian who was the strongman in our circus. I bribed him with a real fight later as well as the prize money the to take a dive after explaining there was no way he'd be able to detect the champions cheating if it was magical. We made the fight look good and ended it with me tossing him out of the ring for a ring out. His wings were hidden so the crowd didnt know he could fly. Then the finals against the paladin. A talked a bit of trash to him to get him riled up and ensure he'd cheat against the little halfling that dared mock him. He went first and immediately tried to cast command on me, ordering me to surrender. I of course counterspelled it then in retaliation put on a dazzling show for the crowd by trapping him in a hypnotic pattern. I then took the minute i had to weave a tale of treachery as i extolled the champion's crimes sullying the good name of the arena and that if the crowd wanted to see true trickery and theatre they were all welcome to visit our circus for a glorious time. I then drew my rapier, slammed the cheater with a mobile flourish, and launched him over the wall and out of the ring to land hard in the water below; my guarunteed critical from hypnotic pattern ensuring i could launch him the distance to clear the arena.
Loved playing glamour bard for dungeon of the mad mage. Enthralling performance was especially effective in diplomacy situations. For multiclassing, consider great old one warlock for telepathy so you don’t have to worry about a language barrier for your command option or for spells like suggestion. The level 14 ability is really good here and saved my butt on several occasions. Really fun to play as a rock bard.
Thanks for the guide. I'm playing a lore bard and find it tough to beat. The ability to essentially use a reaction to turn a hit into a miss on a reaction is pretty amazing. I think you may have it undervalued here as you get to use it as a reaction, which at low to mid tier level play, you don't often get to use. The fact that you get magical secrets at 6 allows you to get counterspell early as well some other great spells to fill out your party. You make a great case for Eloquence, and perhaps I should have considered it more, but I think the value of it is somewhat reduced as you can get your inspiration die back after a short rest and assuming you have an 18 or 20 CHA by level 8, 5 die is a good amount. As a lore bard, I can't wait for my DM needing to play mind games with me trying to force my cutting words just to avoid me using counterspell on their big baddy. I get that you also get magical secrets at 10, but there are so many amazing spells and having 2 more open to you is pretty amazing.
Currently playing a Tiefling Valor Bard 5 / Genielock 2 in Rime of the Frostmaiden and the massive AC increase of Medium armour + shield to a character with 14 dex has given me the highest AC in the party. I've always got a use for my action and bonus action, I get a lot of resources back on a short rest (and song of rest makes those short rests more enticing for the whole party) and I've got cleric AC with a full powered Eldritch Blast and Green-flame blade for if I choose to enter melee. Very strong combination and I think the extra durability from Valor really seals the whole build
Last (very small) point in defense of lore bard: it is worth noting that you get the bonus proficiencies at the same level that bard gets expertise. So, even if it is a little weird narratively, you can jump from unskilled to expert in two skills of your choice, that you did not select at character creation. Level 3 is a nice place for that to happen - assuming you start at level 1, by level 3 you should have a good sense of what other players bring to the table (literally) in terms of skills. You may also have some sense of which skills, if any, might be unusually valuable for the campaign setting, which may not have been obvious when you made the character.
Chris, maybe you don't think much of it and I know you have a lot to cover, but you totally glossed over the second part of the Glamour's Mantle of Inspiration feature. All creatures receiving the temp HP can move up to their speed w/o opportunity attacks. When a Bard starts getting the dice back on a short rest, you can use this multiple time during an encounter hand have your party flying around the battle field.
I agree that the Glamour Bard is underrated. I even found a way for Enthralling Performance to be used effectively in battle. Never shut up. Always have your bard performing at all times. This can get annoying. It's meant to. Don't annoy your fellow players by constantly performing, but make it clear that your character is always on. Telling joke, playing music, dancing, etc. If the potential enemies hear you coming from a mile away you can immediately activate Enthralling Performance the moment a disagreement breaks out because you've been performing for them to hear for more than a minute.
Glamour is underrated. Treantmonk was right say so although it deserves a higher Tier than B. Mantle of Inspiration is extremely unique. The Mobility aspect without allowing opportunity attacks is hugely undervalued here. Why is Enthralling Performance considered out of combat? It could very well prevent a combat or allow a major advantage. Many creatures and NPC's chat and engage before a conflict. Mantle of Majesty is terrific. Unbreakable Majesty is an extremely powerful as well. Even if the creatures saves it has disadvantage on it's next saving throw. If that alone was what happened it would be powerful.
I like playing the talky-talky characters so the Eloquence Bard is really my jam. I've read a few comments suggesting it should be ranked S class because you could use it to create unfailable persuasion and deception checks but it's important to remember those skills have their limits. To use a classic example you cannot persuade a king to surrender his crown. Succeeding on that check just means you *won't* be immediately thrown into the dungeon. Similarly you cannot deceive someone into believing something that is patently false. Your lies have to at least be plausible.
I agree, people don’t seem to understand how social interactions work as per the DMG. Simply rolling a 20 doesn’t just mean you automatically succeed. You may move an indifferent NPC to friendly or a hostile one to indifferent and the person you’re trying to persuade or deceive can still roll a high Insight check. I GM an eloquence bard and nobody thinks they are OP. Sure they are great at social things but it’s fun to have a great face in the party. Bring on more role playing I say.
I think they are S because it's ridiculous how strong they can make their saves when the bard list is filled with incredible save or die spells. Suggestion, Phantasmal Force or Hold Person are all fantastic when you can basically guarantee failure.
@@drz0b Persuade is a DC roll based on your relationship with the NPC and the nature of the request. Deception is indeed a contested roll against the NPCs insight but their roll (and yours) can be given advantage or disadvantage based on the circumstances, the nature of your relationship and the plausibility of the the lie or how much the NPC wants to believe it. And trying to determine what kind of lie an NPC wants to hear might also be an insight check on the players part. It's not just a lie detector, insight is about understanding the motivations of others. Player: Can I bribe him? DM: Roll an insight check. Player: 23 DM: Based on x, y and z you think he may be open to a bribe.
Well stated. The one caveat I'd add to Cutting Words is that its value goes up if you play with idiots. I use it, usually, to protect concentration on an ally who decides to rush into melee while concentrating on something important. If you play with window lickers, it's clutch. Both looking forward to, and dreading, the Cleric episode. It's my favorite class, and I know there are some broken features. I won't even roll up either of the two new ones.
I hope WOTC fixes the clerics with Tashas errata in 2022 because I hate disallowing subclasses and would rather not mess with untested home-brew tweaks.
@@bigdream_dreambig I so agree. Cleric is my favorite overall class, and I love the concept of both the Peace and Twilight domains. But, appreciating how they break things, I can't bring myself to even ask a DM to let me run one. Hell, even my current plain Jane, straight out of the box Tempest Cleric is a dominating presence in our group. It takes away from the fun if I have to pull back, just to let other players have a role.
Something to remember when you mentioned the Lore Bard additional skills is that Jack of All Trades can actually be less than half for quite a while. So I think the skill proficiencies are still pretty good on Bard.
Great listing. Lore is just so powerful at 6th level on top of just Cutting Words on initiative rolls. You want a bard with an army? Learn Conjure Animals. You want a bard with Cleric awesomeness? Learn Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon. And as you mentioned, a great summoning spell could work out well here too. If you're worried about defense, i'd dip 1 lvl into Sorcerer just to grab Shield and Absorb elements, or 1 lvl Hexblade to get Shield and medium armor and shield proficiency. Both good ways to get good defense with just 1 lvl and additional spells.
Swords bard and Valor bards kind of have the best spell for weapon attacking since they can gain access to swift quiver than any other class, including ranger(hell, any ranger and paladin only spell are basically bard spell)
Unfortunately swift quiver isn't actually a particularly strong spell. If you have crossbow expert, Haste tends to be better. The turn you cast it you get two attacks (just like swift quiver) one from the haste action which triggers your bonus action, and one from your bonus action. Subsequent turns you get 4 attacks (2 with your action 2 with your haste/bonus action) very similar to swift quiver. But haste also gives you +2 AC, doubles your movement speed, and gives you advantage on dexterity saving throws. And to be fair swift quiver has some advantages of its own, you don't need crossbow expert, you can use a longbow and be a threat at longer range, you can use a d8 weapon instead of a d6 weapon. But the real nail in the coffin to me is that Swift Quiver is a 5th level spell, and Haste is a 3rd level spell. So while yes, Bards in general can steal high level paladin and ranger spells, swift quiver would not be high on my "to steal" list. I'd need a lot of convincing that the build absolutely can't make room for crossbow expert, cause I'd much rather use a 3rd level slot than a 5th level slot.
@@KaitlynBurnellMath A couple notes: The Crossbow Expert bonus action requires a full Attack Action, not just the extra single Attack provided by Haste. Also, even if you're using Crossbow Expert, you can get the 4 attacks using the 1d10 Heavy Crossbow instead of the 1d6 Hand Crossbow. Additionally, the two Bonus Action attacks from Swift Quiver don't actually require a preceding Attack Action, so with it active you can still use your Action to cast a non-concentration spell and get two attack in the same turn, whereas with Haste + Crossbow Expert using your action to cast a spell brings you down to one attack for the round. Finally, Haste has a pretty hefty penalty if you lose concentration. That said, for all the reasons you mentioned Haste is still pretty attractive and I would actually be inclined to take both on an archer build.
@@adriangoetz5108 Haste lets you take an attack action. During the haste version of the attack action you can make one weapon attack only, but since you've taken the attack action that is still enough to trigger crossbow expert. The trick with using a non-concentration spell and then taking two attacks with your bonus action...still also works with Haste for the same reason. Cast your non-concentration spell. Take the haste attack action, which triggers the crossbow expert bonus action. Additionally there's one other scenario to consider, where you want to cast a bonus action non-concentration spell (such as healing word) where Haste will actually get 3 weapon attacks (two with the regular attack action, one with the haste attack action), wheras in this scenario swift quiver will only get 2 weapon attacks. This is the one scenario I know of where there's actually a different number of attacks for haste vs swift quiver. I don't think I would ever take both on one character since they have so much overlap. I might consider Swift Quiver on a character where crossbow expert simply wasn't an option.
I think Lore is substantially better than Valor. So Valor is better at not dying, but at the cost of not nearly being as useful while alive. Otherwise a good list
I'll be honest, I'm surprised to see the Bard subclasses mostly in B-tier after you placed Bard as the second best overall class in your older tier list of classes. Did you have a change of heart? Also, did you swap the Artillerist and Storm Herald from our last video? Why?
Yes, this. I don't take umbrage with the relative ranking, but 1 class as A tier when the base class was ranked second among all classes? That doesn't make sense. Good on Treantmonk for creating this ranking system though.
B tier in this is still incredible as it says, it's good and doesn't need much to be effective. But most bards do need some way to deal with the gap in their defenses.
@@BreakingStarGames If this ranking was to be taken in isolation, and all prior rankings were to be disregarded, I would agree with you. However in this case, Treantmonk has already made multiple videos about how ranks Bards relative to other classes. They were 2nd among all classes. And so, it's going to be a little odd seeing multiple subclasses from inferior classes finish higher in the relative order. I'd like to know why that is?
Maybe there's a degree of relativity to the base functions of the class? Like, this class is mediocre overall, and is being evaluated as such, but THIS subclass is kinda broken, vs that class is super super good, but most of the subclasses are just on par with one another?
Another great installation in the series! I learn something new in every one. I appreciate the focus on the commentary and less detailed review of every feature. Sure, the rankings are subjective, but to debate for the fun of it: Valor bard came out ahead largely due to proficiency in medium armor and shields. I get that multi-classing complicates the situation, but ... a 1 level dip in a number of classes would give any of the bard subclasses these proficiencies and more (e.g Con save proficiency + fighting style for Fighter dip). So I suggest that a subclass ability that could be gained from a 1 level dip be weighted less than those that can't.
Not sure why? The uniqueness of an ability doesn't dictate its effectiveness. The VB's proficiencies are highly effective and free, which pushes other classes to multi-class for 1 level in order to keep pace, but then this costs those classes heavily in spell progression. The Bard is a full caster. Anything that pushes it to deviate from being a better full caster is by definition suboptimal.
I think Swords Bard was underrated, here. I agree with the B ranking considering the subclass on its own (though not its placement in that rank). However, I think it's one of those subclasses that boosts another class up by multiple tiers, like Hexblade Warlock, but with more investment and return. Considering just the multi-classing potential alone, I might've given it top of A-tier, which would've made me increase the overall rank of the subclass to somewhere in A rank. Great video.
Note that both the Whispers and Glamor bard use "Talking for a minute" as the initial casting trigger. This means that if you copy a bit of a favorite song for Glamour, or recite Dirty Harry, john Wick, or Taken for whispers IN REAL LIFE for a minute, you can then say you are triggering the ability. One thing a DM will 90% of the time let you do is go on a long diatribe if its amusing or impressive, then you drop this and look like a damn hero. Don't just look at the casting time of 1 minute and dismiss it completely. Wont work in combat though.
I was surprised that Glamour Bard was ranked so (relatively) low, as the subclass excels in tactical options while shoring up defensive weaknesses. Mantle of Inspiration: Imagine that you, the Paladin, or the Battlesmith Artificer are mounted... I'm sure a Greater Steed Pegasus (Magical Secret) with 23% more health and 270ft. of flight in one round would be useful somewhere. Mount reactions were pretty useless, until now. Also, I didn't hear you talk about the 14th level ability, Unbreakable Majesty, a short rest ability that gives you Sanctuary+; either you are immune to being directly attacked or the enemy has disadvantage against your spells, and it's a CHA save (relatively weaker). Even though it comes online late, I was surprised it wasn't mentioned for directly addressing a weakness of the Bard chassis.
I know right? I guess I’m just partial to my tiefling glamour bard in dungeon of the mad mage. Was able to convince hallister to come out of his cave and tour with me 😀.
I think Cutting Words was underrated here. My bard almost never used them on himself. The paladin and barbarian are going to be needing them when we fight Storm Giants. I can't always been turning them into a Giant Ape!
Creation is probably my favorite bard. You can create anything. It’s like the illusion wizard’s 14th level feature but at 3rd level and doesn’t require a spell slot. You mentioned how wall spells are noticeably missing in the base bard spell list, well you can create one. It’s restricted by size but that improves as you level. You could even build like a closet sized 5x5 (medium sized) metal room and try to push a spellcaster inside. The Telepathic feat would allow you to do it as a BA. Your free object interaction could be to then lock the door. The spellcaster is temporarily taken out of combat unless they have a certain spells prepared but at that point they’re wasting spell slots while you were able to keep yours. I agree with the ranking since so much depends on creative use but creativity can open so many doors. It’d be great to have a video of you covering some combat options for song of creation. Maybe players might need a little help thinking up creative solutions :)
@@TreantmonksTemple lol fair. Maybe at 3rd level then it’s just a stand alone wall for personal cover, given low the bard’s lower AC. The lowest level wall spell is a third level spell. At 6th level crest bard you could do 10ft… which is only 1/3 of of wall of sand and 1/5 of wall of wind. Hmm.. yeah, ok, it’s still not up to par with other wall spells lol. Under the right circumstances though it could still split enemies up, remove their line of sight on you, or force them to trickle in. I’d still keep it in the back of my mind as an option.
Perhaps I am just bias, but whispers is harshly underrated. The ability to take someone's shadow and assume them.. you get a +5 on deception rolls against it and if you have expertise, thats +15. The chance of it failing is significantly low. Since you garner information thats privvy to people it knows and trusts... you slay a guard of a keep. You know all orders given to your unit, you know the other guards, you know the layout and your patrol route. You would know where the prisoners are, where the armory is, who the commanding officer and other leaders would be. Its such a useful class that you dont need to be in combat. You can frighten people into thinking you know their more private fears and secrets, using detect thoughts allows you to actually know and use after the spell is done. The psychic bladed with animate object and dissonant whispers is so strong in itself. People think bards are pure support and thats the only way you can play them. I feel there are people who are intimidated by being creative and cunning and whispers allows just that. If you wanted to be a support character, there were other options but this redefines what a bard is in my opinion.
I don't think a guard would give all that info to a "casual acquaintance". And either way, many parties wouldn't be okay with killing people for this ability so it makes it situational.
Cutting words can be broken, you roll the die and subtract it from the number rolled, this means the face of the die basically changes, so you can turn crits into non crits with it, maybe even misses. The only problem is that knowing when something would crit is either impossible due to the DM screen or Metagaming ina pvp scenario for example.
Is Eloquence our first top 5 subclass? It feels pretty borderline for S-tier. After the Chronurgist, Peace, Twilight, and Clockwork Soul, what else is even in contention for S-tier by these strict standards? The Illusionist? Post-Tasha's Shepard? Aberrant Mind? War Mage? I'm really excited to see how the exact order of the top and bottom 10 compares to my own opinions when this is all done.
Wouldn't be illusionist considering their most potent ability comes in at such high level, and a premise of these videos is down-valuing abilities that come in at levels that people barely play.
I imagine TM will rank most high tier wizard subclasses over it but I would disagree with that. As good as wizards are, they don't break bounded accuracy to force monsters to fail their saves.
With the rise of the mountain dwarf, I’m not sure medium armor proficiency is quite as potent as it used to be, so with the current meta of optimization I’d value Swords and Valor a bit less. Still, great vid!
It's unfortunate the Mountain Dwarf does not come with shield proficiency, that's -2 to AC compared to a variant human with the Moderately Armored feat on a bard at lvl 1.
@@adamkaris Sure, but the point is Valor Bard is still pretty good because it brings shield proficiency, which means at least 2 AC (and often more AC cause magic shields are much more common than magic armour).
@@skymanta1222 But any dwarf who doesn't know how to swing a warhammer or battleaxe is no dwarf at all, certain to be looked down on (and maybe even shunned) by their community! 🙈
ב"ה I know multiclassing isn't the biggest consideration, but a paladin that after 5 levels of paladin multiclass into a college of whispers bard is very powerful.
I find 1 level of sorcerer patches a lot of holes in the bard spell list. You get an attack cantrip, grease, shield, not to mention con save proficiency
I think eloquence should be considered S tier. Unsettling words breaks bounded accuracy. At high lvl play it’s like having 5 portents per short rest. Chrono can’t even compete for ST lock down The defense shortfall is a problem but can be made up by a starting dip in DSS for absorb elements and shield, taking moderately armored at 4 (you can also add 1 peace if no one else dips peace replacing the feat you would have taken for moderately armored). Even straight classed it can still take moderately armored.
I noticed Unsettling Words is more offensive whereas Cutting Words is more defensive. The latter can do more but failing a saving throw is typically worse than failing an attack roll.
The Eloquence bard surely can make a good argument for itself.
Underrated comment
(Sad trombone noises)
Well said
You're better than this joke.
Aldo could have made it more eloquent and high brained
I’ve said it before but a Lore Bard using Cutting Words on an enemy’s initiative can end the fight in less than a round.
I like that I never thought about using cutting words for that
@@ebertgameandstuff Initiative is a skill check and can be debuffed. That being said it only works on one creature. So you need to be aware of that or talk to your DM about how to adjudicate that ruling
Omg thank you! Almost too late, as I'm playing CoS with my lore Bard and next session is the final battle. Any guesses as to what I'm going to do to Strahd at the start of the session?
Speaking of initiative, consider a dip in divine soul sorcerer. I never multi class a full caster early in a campaign because of the slowed progression, but in adventure league, worth considering. Timing it is not always possible, but casting Guidance cantrip on a board controller or rogue gives them a d4 to add to their initiative. Then use cutting word on an enemy that rolled high.
On top of that, I took sacred flame and toll dead for damage, and of course mind sliver because it should be a Bard cantrip (pairing this with Bane is a heck of a debuff), plus shield and absorb elements for spells. I prefer that dip over hexblade for a Lore Bard
@@wrongnote5606 Have you made my exact same character? Also, free Inflict Wounds.
Regarding Lore, you might have undervalued cutting word. I use it a lot on initiative if I know the target is not immune to charm. It prevented a lot of powerful enemies from going first, which is invaluable. Also great on an AoE as it's a reaction after the rolls. Cutting fireball damage from average of 27 to an average of 22 (assuming d8) before resistances, saving throws and reactions, like absorb elements, is incredible. It is inconsistent though as you can roll 1, but when you roll max, your teammates are cheering and thanking you. I know it competes with other reaction uses, but the above are great options when needed
I hadn't considered using it on an AoE, that's a good use for sure.
Love the AoE Cutting Words when it comes up. Reducing a Cone of Cold damage by 18 after 2 save and 2 fail because you rolled a 6 is a great use for Inspiration.
@@TreantmonksTemple also it could be quite good for enemies casting counterspell
I can’t wait for Treantmonk’s list of monk S tier subclasses ;)
Now that’s funny.
S tier: Four Elements
A to F tier: literally everything else
haha good one, but the reral question is which one will get more monk or hunter^^
@@blubblubwhat Hunter?
We might have to wait a long time.
I think it's hard to argue against College of Lore being an A tier subclass. I understand what you're saying about cutting words being unreliable, particularly at lower levels. but being able to see the roll before applying the debuff means that you're going to be able to play the averages and come out ahead way more often than not. Your video also didn't seem to take into account non direct damage applications of cutting words; like forcing an enemy to fail a key grapple or counterspell, or altering the BBEG's initiative so your team can nova it down before it even has a chance to act.
I also think you undersold the level 6 magical secret, despite the praise it was given. Giving a full caster access to two third level spells from any class list is incredibly powerful; not only does it allow you to address individual shortcomings, but allows you to plug capability gaps in your party. No cleric in your party to raise the dead? Revivify! No druid to use summons for action economy? Conjure animals! Third level spellcasting represents such a big power spike for most caster classes, being able to pick and choose among them at 6th level almost makes this an A tier subclass on its own.
As always, appreciate the work and discussion from your videos and am looking forward to the next round of cleric
The other thing about Level 6 is it's not Magical Secrets but Additional Magical Secrets. The difference, the spells gained from Additional Magical Secrets don't count against the number of bard spells known, meaning they will have two more spells known then any other bard. As a spellcaster, you really like having more spells to play with.
The magical secrets also allows the lore bard to gain more defensive capability. Mage armor, shield, armor of agathys, these are all great defense spells, that the lore bard can take.
Cutting words was way undersold. Reducing ability checks and damage rolls goes quite a bit beyond just negating attacks. And the criticism based on die rolls is a head scratcher as it applies to any use of bardic inspiration. Any other application depends on party members not using it like idiots, something you can better control in using your own reaction for likely utility.
Bards are one the best classes in the game, as they can reliably shine in any scenario. The trick with subclasses is that what one of them doesn't give, you could easily get through multiclassing or via feats, so in the long run, most fell in the same place, a really good one indeed.
At 6th level tho, we get a ✨B A N G E R✨ hahahahahahhahha I love Chris so much lol
Bard is pretty much one of my favorite classes. I would say their base class damage output suffers a tad when they really have to kill something. I'm interested in using creation for animating a canon, though.
Bards aren't really meant to kill things. They're meant to make sure that their companions are actually able to kill things and live to tell the tale. ;-)
Bards kill by making allies kill the target. Dissonant whispers and now command feom Tashas are both fantastic
Well, upcasting animate objects and spiritual weapon can give you some nice sustained damage while doing other stuff. You could hack/fire at your enemies or cast some damage spells. Someone on Reddit claimed, Whispers bards could actually deal the most single class DPR at around level 10, this way. I have only looked at its performance when multiclassed but bard only should still be quite good. Haste and Greater Invis also give you some nice options.
That said, I think (physical damage) bards really shine when getting Paladin smites and a Hexblade dip. Alternatively, mixing it with Swashbuckler for sustained DPR or maybe Fighter if you wanted to go max burst is also viable.
Wasn't mentioned, but one of the best parts about Glamour is that when creatures gain the temp HP, they can then use a reaction to move without provoking opportunity attacks. This is very useful for battlefield control, almost on par with the 6th level spell Scatter, but they can do it multiple times starting from 3rd level. Having seen Glamour in action, I'm surprised it wasn't an A.
I did mention it, but you're correct I should have discussed the value of that more. Was just playing a couple weeks ago where the glamor bard gave the party a chance to move out of a blade barrier before taking damage. You can also provide movement to someone in a web before they make their saving throw for entanglement.
I did this in a recent one shot. We were in a bad situation, our melee were all out of range and the NPC we were supposed to protect was surrounded. I used this and the battlefield suddenly shifted to our advantage immediately. No one actually needed those temporary hit points.
Friendly heads up that College of Creation can use Performance of Creation to make costly spell components, with no limit by level 14. This makes expensive spells like heroes feast, simulacrum, and all of the resurrection spells COMPLETELY FREE. You also essentially get non-concentration flight by level 6, and that flying object can deal damage and reduce movement speed. It pairs amazing with the "slow" spell, which was added to the bard spell list in Tashas.
There are also the more mundane benefits of Performance of creation. Creating walls out of nowhere, up to huge size by level 14 (and at level 14 this can be an adamantine wall, since you don't have a price limit). you can block off doorways, create full cover, or use it as a poor man's baby wall of force. Handy in a fight or a getaway.
Performance of creation also creates handy adventuring gear, siege weapons, or impromptu vehicles. Slap a chariot on your paladin's "find steed". Cross a moat in style with your handy portable boat. etc. College of creation has quickly risen to become my favorite bard subclass for these reasons. I highly encourage playing one when you get the chance.
I will be playing one in a campaign set in the 1920's cant wait to make cars.
I can agree that Spirits isn't the best bard from an optimization standpoint. But it's such an interesting subclass to bring to the table. Tales from Beyond is practically always useful and feels like you're turning your Inspiration points into 1/2nd level spells. And sitting your friends down to do a divination séance will always be dope. Call it a C-tier for power, but it's an S-Rank for fun and flavor.
I believe I've seen builds that go paladin 2-6, Whispers Bard X before. Expending a bardic inspiration die on a crit will be a rare but potent effect to stack with a smite.
Can’t you do a similar thing with the swords bard though?
@@SilverKarlov you can, but it doesn't add nearly as much damage as Psychic Blade
Think it's really cool that the Valor and Lore bards, the PHB ones, are tied. Pretty good balancing of the Bard's inherent weaknesses, either through proficiencies or extra spells.
I think a nice choice for College of Swords would be to add the thrown weapon style from Tashas. I don't know that it's a better/more powerful choice, but I do think it's on theme for the subclass. Gotta throw those knives at the beautiful creature assistant tied to a wheel, after all.
My dm let me take superior technique and I paired it with Martial adept for a really fun build.
Throwing Knife Bard =Thomdril Merrilin the Gleeman??
Chris, if you have dared to rate the classes, you may want to stick your ratings to the left of the grades, but still visible. I think it would give some depth to your subclass rankings and allow for an increased idea of what the subclasses add or subtract from the base classes, from your opinion. Great job. Can’t wait to see the rest. Thank you.
Was really looking forward to this because Bard is my favorite class! :)
@@kel8923 I actually kind of like their "silly" flavor of singing or in a broader term performing to boost the morale of their allies. More importantly, though, I just really like their playstyle of being the ultimate supporter and one of the best "Buffers" in the game. In addition to that they're the best Skill Users, esspecially when it comes to "Social Skills". On a more personal note the class helped me discover that I'm not the introvert I believed myself to be but actually an extrovert.
Yeah, having played a Bard for a bit it really felt great to shine out of combat and make the party shine in combat
@@kel8923 I usually re-flavor my bards for the same reason you mention - don't feel the guitar magic stuff either. BUT, one of my favorite characters was a bard that I called a shaman / witch doctor. So, she did chants and such instead of singing in bars or whatever.
I loved my glamour bard
I believe your description of the Mantle of Inspiration as "solid" undersells the feature quite a bit. In my opinion it is exceptional. The temp hit points are very nice but the key feature is the ability to move your allies around the battlemap without provoking opportunity attacks. On multiple occasions I've been able to completely rearrange the battle layout with this feature, allowing the squishier party members, or those about to die, to move out of harm's way and putting the beefier party members right in the thick of the battle. With this, being ambushed by enemies is not nearly as dangerous as without. This feature has often turned very tricky battles into ones that are much more manageable. There's not a general in the entire history of war who wouldn't have loved to have had this ability to effect the field of battle.
I think that you grossly underestimated how strong the College of Spirits is. Automatically gaining guidance allows the bard to increase all around support; and is the only one that can cast it at range. The Tales table isn't really strong for damage, but the utility and support it provides is vast and diverse. Plus, it's options and dice scale with level, which is huge. 3d12 damage/healing with inspiration on demand is great. Getting to pull any divination or necromancy spell up to level 6, including cantrips, is huge! In addition to summoning and debuffing, this also allows you to grab any of the divination ritual spells. Why do people sleep on how insanely strong and useful this subclass is?!
I pretty much agree with your overall ranking of the bards, including lore bard, but I would point out a few things:
- For all bards, defense is a little less of a problem after tasha's. Fey touched feat, race-choice flexibility, added spells (mirror image!), mean that the bard has better defensive options. Of course there are opportunity costs to any of those options, but still - that is a lot more flexibility. Defense is still an issue for non-valor bards, but it is easier for a bard to get by now, at least for a while, without medium armor + shield proficiency.
- Cutting words is pretty nice to help out with defense at early levels, and when that aspect of it stops being good, you can still nerf the most dangerous enemy's initiative without any save. It can also be paired with some interesting spell options later. Telekinesis + cutting words, for example (note: skill checks bypass legendary resistance) - and that all blends nicely with jack of all trades, as well as (eventually) peerless skill.
- I mentioned this in a reply below, but not all tables are composed of very tactical players who are going to make great use of the bardic inspiration you give them. Sometimes cutting words will be your most practically effective use of BI, simply for that reason.
Not sure that all of this makes lore bard greater than B tier... Maybe B+ / A- ?
I agree with your overall assessment that lore bard is very good, and also overrated at the same time. (I have seen many people argue it is the best / in the top 5 subclasses, which is definitely an exaggeration.)
In AL I see bard insp die wasted time and time again - over half, it feels like. Players tend to forget they have them.
Lore is the most bard-y bard than most other subclasses, except Eloquence. Whereas other subclasses aim for more versatility - usually more melee-friendly. But if you're going for that classic non-combat gets-by-on-their-wits bard Lore was your best choice until Tasha's.
Wahoo! Swords Bard not low tier, I can die now ..
A sigh of relief, although TM is right: it really, really wants to multiclass. One or two levels in Paladin or Hexblade on a SB is 🔥
@@cultivatedjerk5574 How about one Hexblade for the CHA-based weapon use (or perhaps two for some Invocations), and two paladin to gain Smite? I realize this means you're going to lose a feat or ability increase, but it would also mean you only really need to increase CHA ... even for melee combat. And I really, really like the idea of that one particular warlock cantrip for my bard who's got essentially nothing for ranged attacks otherwise ...
@@cultivatedjerk5574 while I certainly don't think it sounds like a bad idea, I do wonder what makes it such a powerful option. Obviously lock makes it possible to attack with cha, but you're still gonna want that dex for AC..
Paladin makes more sense to me due to divine smites being an option.
@@morganpetros9635 don't you need 13 str for paladin?
@@flimpeenflarmpoon1353 Yes, but so what? If you're going to use heavy armor, you can basically turn DEX into a dump stat. In fact, you'll probably need to in order to *WEAR* heavy armor in the first place (minimum STR for plate mail is 15) ... unless your bard/paladin/warlock character is a dwarf ...
Damn I really thought Eloquence would be S. Guess Tashas Clerics are really that good lol
I didn't expect Eloquence to be S, just because Treantmonk's definition of S-tier subclasses are subclasses that actually break the game, where the DM might need to tell their player not to play a subclass, or reign in the use of some of their features. I can't really see a DM actually banning or reigning in the power level of an Eloquence bard (unless they're banning/reigning in the power level of a lot of other subclasses too).
@@KaitlynBurnellMath Not Being able to Fail a Check is Bannable offense in some (if not most) tables.
@@DonRaynor I haven't actually seen a table ban people from playing rogue, for what it's worth.
That is why I thought creation would be S tier. He assumes the DM will take care of it, but not for the clerics? That seems odd to me, as animating enemy armor and creating free spell components for glyph of warding or heroes feast are less broken then the peace cleric teleport thing.
@@skymanta1222 I say chron for sure. Clockwork I think he will put A, not S.
You forgot to mention that feats are not free
But he did in the opening explanation; feats aren't free and often are more powerful then a character's class features.
Gotta say: right off the rip, I love seeing one of my favorite UA-camrs advertising for a product by another of my favorite UA-camrs!
Cutting words is an amazing ability. Even if you only use your 5 bardics to make 5 attacks miss, thats 5 reaction misses you caused. I cant tell you how many times ive kept allies up because I had access to cutting words.
Can we just point out for a moment that with the Spirits subclass you have a 1 in 8 chance to automatically incap a target (provided they suck at wisdom saves)? The odds aren't great but the fact that there's a chance for that to happen is kinda spooky.
I'm a sucker for a random table roll ;)
About the Glamour bard being underused (and other subclasses like it, such as archfey warlock and enchantment wizard) I feel like a lot of it has to do with the community in general undervaluing charming and enchantment as a valid defensive option. Which isn't to say it's perfect, but it's a lot more useful than what most optimization circles seem to let on.
I played a Glamour Bard for a long while, and never found the charming abilities particularly useful. What WAS insanely useful was the bonus action "all my allies can move without getting attacked and get a big chunk of THP" five times per short rest.
@@shanebernier2483 command not so much, but if you’re in a diplomacy situation and your bard is allowed to play a little ‘background’ music, enthralling performance can really pay dividends.
Glamour Bard has always seemed like the best subclass for a Bard-barian. As the Mantle can affect yourself and be used while raging. Plus Enthalling Performance is great utility and thematic.
lore bard: "at level 14, we get...an okay ability." I'm slightly triggered by this. Peerless skill is VERY powerful. Win initiative (probably)? check. Counterspell/dispel pretty much anything with a 3rd level spell slot and an insp. die? check. Practically guarantee a skill check succeeds? check. The only issue with the ability is that you don't have enough inspiration dice to go around once you get it, because the situations in which peerless skill is incredible happen ALL THE TIME. Better hope for short rests.
I would argue that it's one of the best lvl 14 abilities for bard behind eloquence, glamour's is also quite good.
Let's compare it to valor's battle magic for example: valor gets to do like...1d8+4 with a bonus action after casting a spell...at level 14. One of these abilities is very very good, the other is...kinda bad.
I picked on valor a bit here because IMO their 14th level ability is the worst of any bard subclass (maaaaybe whispers is worse because it's rather narrow?). But I do think Valor is still a very good subclass, mainly single classed at low-mid levels. I'm honestly just trying to give peerless skill the shine it deserves as it's also a "banger" IMO.
Not trying to be adversarial here, just wanted to express my opinion in the form of a very wordy youtube comment lol, cheers. FWIW, I found my lore bard to be quite weak early on, one of the weakest characters I've ever played from 1-5(sleep helps early on), but gets much better at 6...like much much stronger. Just having 2 extra spells known ends up being massive in giving you flexibility as a caster. As you get more and more spell slots the difference feels very pronounced.
The level 14 lore bard ability basically lets you use a bardic inspiration die on yourself (except not on your saving throws or attack rolls). It's really good if nobody else in the party has initiative as important as yours. It's really good if nobody else in the party has counterspell.
But if you do have good party members, party members with counterspell, party members that would benefit from a bonus to initiative rolls, you can just hand out your bardic inspiration dice to them, and you're not losing too much if you don't have the lore bard level 14 ability. The bardic inspiration dice will still get plenty of value.
@@KaitlynBurnellMath One thing that is easy for tactical players to overlook is that bardic inspiration requires that your teammates are approaching the game with the same level of tactical tactical awareness. I don't mean for that to sound arrogant or snotty; there's nothing wrong with playing less tactically. But I have played a bard at tables where players would forget to use inspiration (even with gentle reminders) or - even worse - would squander them.
So, having ways fully within your power to use bardic inspiration (cutting words, peerless skill) can be nice for that reason, as well.
Title says subclasses ranked but it feels more like classes ranked with subclasses applying a small variance. If the base class is good it will get a high ranking regardless of subclass. A low ranking class will get a relatively low ranking regardless of subclass.
Don't get me wrong it's still super informative. And it does give you a picture of the quality of the different classes.
He talked about how since the dungeon dudes analyzed subclasses without the classes, he wanted to analyze the subclasses with the classes as part of them.
@@Johnrobertx Good to know. I do like seeing the overall comparison. I suppose I'm just nitpicking to be honest. I don't want to come off as someone trolling. Having said that, it would make more sense to be titled. Bard class/subclasses rankings.
The College of Eloquence is an S Tier subclass, meaning that, yes, it is over-powered!
Silver Tongue: You simply cannot fail any attempts at Persuasion or Deception. The whole point of rolling in this game is randomness. Taking the randomness out of it breaks the Social pillar of the game. It's exploitable. This is a power that should only ever be granted in the 3rd tier of play. Rogues receive Reliable Talent at level 11. Silver Tongue is a feature that should be given to the Eloquence Bard at level 14. It's a topper feature. Giving it at level 3... over-powered.
Unsettling Words: None of your enemies will save v your spells or features up to the number of Bardic Inspirations that you have. Far too strong because of the scaling Bardic Inspiration dice. It's an ultra powerful bane that doesn't cost a spell slot.
Unfailing Inspiration: If you have any left from not using Unsettling Words, your inspiration can't be wasted. Very powerful but not over-powered by itself.
Universal Speech: Not over powered by itself obviously but no other Bard gets 2 features at level 6. In fact, I'd say that Universal Speech should be the lvl 3 feature instead of Silver Tongue.
Infectious Inspiration: This feature is a very good and wouldn't be over-powered as a level 14 topper feature if it wasn't combined with Unfailing Inspiration. Allies can't lose their BI when it doesn't succeed but when it does work, now another ally has BI. It's unending inspiration that just gets transferred so now you can focus more on Unsettling Words.
Any one of Silver Tongue, Unsettling Words, Unfailing Inspiration, or Infectious Inspiration qualifies as a major major powerful feature. Each one of these could be a level 14 feature to a different Bardic College. Giving them all together to one subclass in Eloquence creates a monster.
We're comparing this to stuff like Chronurgist Wizard, Twilight Cleric, and Moon Druid. It is really really good for sure, but it doesn't even compare in the gamebreaking department to those subclasses.
Also, Silver Tongue only breaks Social pillar if your DM lets you. Persuasion isn't mind control. It's a powerful feature, and probably too powerful for the level, but it really isn't gamebreaking.
Remember that you only roll when you have a chance to succeed or to fail --- and when you do succeed, it doesn't necessarily mean you get exactly what you want. Rolling high after trying to convince a king to abdicate his crown only means he'll laugh it off as a great joke instead of executing you.
@@eshansingh1 your argument is that it doesn't break the social pillar because it can't affect things outside of the social pillar. You see the problem. Bounded Accuracy DCs mean expertise often breaks them, bardic inspiration makes it worse and this just guarantee a that normal hard and very hard DCs are pointless.
We all know that the social pillar has limits. That doesn't change the fact that if I try to make it important, there is no tension because it's automatic for this bard. But the true answer is don't bother using 5e for this. Go play a game designed around intrigue and social situations like Burning Wheel.
@@BreakingStarGames And yet everyone is playing 5E so we have to have a system where the Social Pillar functions properly and cannot be exploited by a single subclass.
I hadn't really played a Bard yet, but I think Eloquence would make a fun LE scuzzy lawyer type character (probably with the Criminal Background) having to bail the party out of trouble with his quick wit, sharp tongue, and perhaps a few creative interpretations of the truth. The kind of guy who had sold out any kind of ethics long ago, and hires his talents out to the highest bidder - the kind of people with vast fortunes in ill gotten gains and in need of his unique services to protect them.
rpgbot made an excellent point that instead of taking valor bard you could just dip a single level as hex warlock and using booming blade would outscale the two attacks
It would be greatly appreciated if you could put the abilities that you don’t talk about on screen while you gloss them over. I always feel obligated to check the abilities you ignore.
Indestructoboy did a great analysis of the eloquence bard. I kind of agree with his assessment. The subclass breaks the social pillar of play and suffers from feature bloat. Thoughts?
Eloquence breaks saving throws, buffs one of the strongest baseline features in the game, and breaks the social pillar to pieces at a shockingly low level. I'd bump all the bards he ranked up a tier and flip valor and lore, and put Eloquence in a well deserved S ranking. It's the bottom of the S tier, which honestly shocks me, but it's there.
Great stuff as always, Chris
Appreciated
I personally love college of lore. Fixes pretty much all the problems with bards by giving magical secrets both earlier and more often than other bards.
Lore's definitely a tier. If you can "dip" into magical secrets you can do amazing things. Like a ranged fighter that can shoot 4 times with swift quiver at level 10 and with sharpshooter you annihilate, all at level 10.
I have to say I disagree heartily on your assessment of Valor vs. Sword bard. I apologize in advance for the long comment...
The whole argument for Valor bard is they get a shield, so +2 AC assuming they're doing some form of Sword + Board. But, unlike College of Swords, they can't use their weapon as a spellcasting focus, so any time they want to cast something with an Material component they'd need to drop their sword and grab their component pouch. Almost no instruments could reasonably be played with a Shield in the other hand. Should you be lucky enough to get an Instrument of the Bards item, you will never be able to use it with your Shield equipped. Even the Warcaster feat doesn't fix this situation. And unlike a weapon, a Shield take a full action to drop, so any time you have to cast a Material spell you are forced to leave yourself unarmed.
In exchange for that clunky use of a Shield for +2 AC, the College of Swords bard gets:
- The ability to use any weapon you're armed with as a spellcasting focus, making that a lot smoother.
- A fighting style (something no melee character should be without)
- A MINIMUM of twice the expanded use of their Bardic Inspiration (the Valor Bard adds to damage OR AC vs just one attack, the Sword bard with defensive flourish adds that damage to the attack AND AC for the whole round).
- The Mobile Flourish ability for battlefield control. 6-17ft of forced movement may not seem like much, but you can use it to break an enemy's Grapple on yourself or another part member.
- A pool of up to 5 dice you can use on any melee or ranged (would be better if they had the Archery fighting style) weapon crit.
- A MUCH MUCH better level 14 subclass capstone. I mean yeah, that's a little late in the game, but level 14 is at least achievable.
- Significantly better multi-class synergy with the Paladin and Hexblade
- The ability to take the Dueling Fighting style so you can wield a Rapier in one hand and your Instrument of the Bards in the other (if you're lucky enough to get one)
- The ability to effectively dish out two bardic inspiration in your turn by using one as a Flourish and the other as a Bonus Action (can be useful in a clutch situation)
To answer your question of "Is this worth a Feat?", I would absolutely without question take a feat for what the Sword bard gets over what the Valor bard gets. Do you really think just a clunky +2 ac is worth ALL that? And to that point, at least any other bard CAN take a feat to get what the Valor bard gets. There is no feat a Valor bard can take to replicate the benefits of any other bard subclass. That's like arguing that the Champion Fighter would be king if there were a Feat to give +1 Str/Dex and a crit on 19. I get that Feats Aren't Free but if everything that makes your subclass special can be summed up in a single Feat, doesn't that say something?
Anyway, that's my College of TEDTalk. Thanks for the video!
Valor bard is better because it supports the party with its abilities. Sword bard does not support, and is generally very selfish with its abilities in order to be somewhat viable. This is why Valor is better.
@@brannenpfister2579 All bards have the capacity to support the team. Yet, the Sword bard can do *almost* everything the Valor Bard can do. The expanded uses of Bardic Inspiration the Valor Bard gets aren't great.
Even if the Sword Bard uses all it's inspiration to buff teammates, like a Valor Bard does, it still has better features. The combined power of the fighting style, using the weapon as a focus, and extra movement on the Attack Action are better than a Shield Proficiency.
At a minimum, a Blade Flourish inspiration is *less* wasted than a Valor Bard's Combat Inspiration because they can be used simultaneously for both effects.
You can't say a subclass is objectively worse just because you're assuming people will use it poorly.
@@adriangoetz5108 a sword bard can’t effectively make it through an adventuring day by both supporting the party and enhancing itself, unless your DM is lenient with short rests or the stakes are never high enough for it to matter. Sword doesn’t support the party better than any other bard. In fact it’s one of the worst. A paladin or Hexblade or hell even blade singer would be a better choice than swords because they all do things better. Sword just doesn’t really serve that role better than others. The valor bard isn’t much better in my opinion, but it can still least give the party the option to know a variation of what is essentially the shield spell - which can help survivability in a way no other bard or caster can.
That, is the difference.
Again you are welcome to disagree - I am just providing you with information as to why Valor is widely considered better. That’s all. 👍🏻
@@brannenpfister2579 I do disagree with the general consensus on this one, I just don't think the math adds up. But I appreciate you taking the time to compare, so thanks!
@Adrian Goetz The Valor Bard essentially has an extra Feat over the Swords Bard. It's up to you to evaluate how much that is worth? These classes also play differently. The Sword Bard is not everything the Valor Bard is and more. No. A Swords Bard grants weapon focus at the expense of defense and team support.
Consider: What is the Swords Bard focusing on for stats given the subclass features? I would say DEX and perhaps a more self focused spell set. Less DC spells because DEX is favored over CHA. By contrast, Valor Bard does not change its mode from favoring CHA because it's not incentivized to do so. It's focus should always be spellcasting.
Valor Bards also get ranged martial weapon proficiency which means they don't have to engage, which is optimal martial mode in the game, IMO.
And so, the Valor Bard can switch from melee and range, helps teammates more, while the Sword Bard focuses on the self and its DEX. They're really not the same.
My favorite was a lw 6 eloquence bard/ lw 7-14 fire genie warlock.
Start with lw1 bard - then lw7 warlock - then lw6 bard - then rest warlock
(Face/Infiltration) Have actor feat + mask of many faces + misty visions to be high class illusionist and manipulator + eloquence bard + expertise in Deception and perception ( Rank S)
(Scouting ) Pact of the chain imp to scout situation + high perception from expertise (Rank A)
(Utility)-Even you your skills are not in History or arcane or religion you do have useful skills (Comp Languages, Detect magic, Identify) And jack of all trades for a little boost (Rank B)
(Dps) Fireball for low lw crowds(Slots from bard and Warlock) + Concentrated damage from Eldritch blast and summon aberration while flying (Rank A)
(Control) Class has good combo ,Unsettling Words + Silvery barbs + Hold person/ Raulothim's Psychic Lance to almost guarantee a success on a boss. (Rank A)
(Survivability) You are not a tank but you do have Armor of agahtis + fly from genie + Misty step to avoid damage (Rank B)
(Support) Class does not have good support but you can give healing potions if if party has goodberry to imp for easy heals for dropped players and bardic inspiration (Rank C)
You didnt mention that at lv 6 Spirit bard gets to add 1d6 to any damage or healing they put out.
For the Seance spell, if you cant afford another concentration spell in summon undead, taking Toll the Dead off the seance is a great way to get a consistent ranged damage option without much cost.
I have been screaming about how underrated the glamour bard is. I have been playing a tabaxi glamour bard for the past year and my guy has been the most powerful support character I have ever seen at a table
Playing a Goliath Glamour Bard right now. It really is a super fun and powerful subclass.
If multiclassing is allowed the college of whispers mixes well with a hexblade
It works out like a psychic smite short rest monster with at least 5/5 levels
I really like this series, thanks for taking it on!
Ooooh, I love Bards! Honestly, I think they might be the best class in DnD. Although I do think some of the subclasses for other strong classes are better than the best bard subclasses. That said, I think Bard is a better multiclass than most of those. I pretty much agree with your rankings, although I do think Glamour is actually better, and probably A tier, if for no other reason than granting that reaction movement without provoking opportunity attacks. So useful for getting people out of sticky situations, or letting the tank block off a doorway or something. Really, I could see Glamour, Lore, and Valour all being A with Eloquence. I'd probably also put Whispers above Spirits, but I haven't played with Spirits so I can't really say.
I think there's a bit of inconsistency when considering multi-classing. It was only really mentioned for College of Sword, where it is ofc a notable addition, but I would say that College of Whispers pairs really well with a 3 level dip in Rogue, especially Assassin; you're getting additional expertise, sneak attack die, thieves cant, cunning action and your assassinate ability. This not only compliments some of the mechanical strengths of Bards (utility, proficiencies, etc), but also leans into the thematic strength of the subclass, which is (I think) very rogue adjacent. Moreover, they blend together nicely, with a mix of sneak attack and psychic blades keeping pace nicely with a rogues actual sneak attack progression. Is it finite unlike sneak attack? Sure. But is it a worthwhile trade off to be a full caster? I would say so, especially considering you're getting to match the damage output of a full rogue of similar level for only a 3 level investment while being a full caster that can make up for many of the other rogue abilities with levels and levels of magic. This allows you to fight like a Rogue when you want to, and hang back and be a support caster the rest of the time without really compromising too much on either. Not played the built yet, but I have one statted out and I reckon it's pretty solid 😊
I really like Cutting Words for its ability to target enemy Ability Checks. It's already been mentioned that you can target an enemy's Initiative check, but it's also good for enemies caught in certain spells. If someone in your party has Web, Phantasmal Force, Bones of the Earth, or some other spells, you can help make the spells more reliable for your team.
I'm interested in trying out the College of Glamour, besides dealing with their low AC issue, what else would you suggest for optimizing one?
You also want to improve your concentration saving throws. Aside from that, bards are versatile so it is hard to say.
If you want to focus more on support / buffing and don’t mind an early single level MC, a very simple but effective approach would be starting as Divine Soul sorcerer (take bless, shield, and absorb elements) then go bard.
You will be one level behind, but you’ll have full spell slot progression, so make sure to take some spells that, like bless, upcast well (aid is a must, but also consider invisibility, etc.)
Mountain dwarf or Tortle would set you up for decent AC and 17 Cha, so you can take fey touched at character level 5 (pick up gift of alacrity if your DM allows it), and then maxing charisma at level 9.
Upsides: good utility with lots of cantrips from three spell lists, good concentration saves, lots of defensive spells and abilities, and a bunch of ways to support your party.
Obvious downside that you will be one level behind on high level spell selection and bard class features. Also, you will be less effective if your party already includes a lot of ways to generate temporary HP (if that’s the case I would suggest going with a different bard subclass)
Personally I find Mantle of inspiration to be the glamour bard’s best feature, so synergizing with that is my top priority. You can reposition allies (or yourself) in combat without provoking opportunity attacks (but at the cost of your allies’ reactions). This makes you a little better at control than other bards as you can get your allies out of the way for a hypnotic pattern or move them up to priority targets after casting it. So you can potentially get optimal use of big control spells more easily. The Alert feat couples well with this ability (though your allies won’t be able to use reactions if surprised), as you’ll always be able to use the ability early. The Fey-touched feat (taking Gift of Alacrity) is a great option as well for optimal positioning, as you can boost your initiative, maneuverability (with a free misty step), and charisma at the same time (Charisma also affects how many allies you can target with the Mantle).
Because of your awesome positioning abilities, you can potentially neglect your AC a bit more than other bards, but I’d recommend getting a 16 in dex to start, if possible. This will help your AC as well as your initiative, obviously. A single dip in hexblade at level 6 or so will solve AC problems, as well.
Also, the Glamour bard from a role play perspective is very alluring and charming, so you might want to take spells to boost that. Suggestion, disguise self, charm person and enhance ability really help to get away with all kinds of social mischievousness, and really make this bard fun to play. I personally went with changeling, and the cons and schemes are out of control (in a good way). Also, the Aid spell can stack with your mantle of inspiration to create a wall of hit points on your team. Inspiring Leader does not, however, so you will want to skip that feat.
For magical secrets, control spells like wall of force/thorns/find greater steed all will help with positioning/control (and a Pegasus can help influence a lot of people into trusting you).
I'm rolling it in CoS as a Bardlock (currently Bard 5/Warlock 1 because of story progression).
It's really fun and over the next two levels the build will peak with Agonizing Blast and Mantle of Majesty (EB+AB is perfect to supplement the bonus action Command).
I went with Archfey for the theme but Hexblade would probably be the most 'optimized' choice.
You are delaying spell progression and Magical Secrets but having a solid Cantrip and a few more utility/damage spells plus recharchable first level spell slots (great with Shield with Hexblade) can be great fun.
Overall Glamour is a fun subclass, Mantle of Inspiration has been super clutch so far and really makes you feel like a conductor on the battlefield.
Glamour Bards do get a great defensive feature if you play into high level. Basically make a save, or I'm too beautiful to attack.
Valor bard makes for an excellent bow user, being able to eventually take swift quiver from ranger
Hey TM, enjoying the series so far but it struck me this time it's a bit weird to completely leave out the upper level subclass features. I get the reasoning that tier 3 and 4 aren't reached by the average campaign and those features should be less important to character creation accordingly and thus less time spent on them in your analysis would make sense, but just saying 'they get something at upper levels and it's okay' is really vague for a comprehensive study like what you're attempting. Just my unasked-for opinion but I think briefly touching on the subclass capstone abilities would be worth an extra sentence or two as far as length or pacing goes.
The reason I'm not talking about them is that I really want to make it clear where I'm coming up with these ratings. If I start talking about an AMAZING feature that is high level, it might seem strange why I don't rank that subclass higher.
@@TreantmonksTemple To be a bit blunt, I disliked the omission. I watch your channel for the excellent analytical reasoning behind your opinions rather than for the opinions themselves. I trust that you have a good reason for saying that an ability is good or bad, but because of that trust I would rather not hear the opinion without any reasoning attached as it's more likely to make my own thinking more biased rather than more informed.
@@TreantmonksTemple i have to agree that not going over the ability at all is a mistake and honestly makes the video not as fun to watch. Give us all the info, not just the info you think is most important, also higher level abilities tend to be the more interesting or abnormal. I know you focus heavily on optimization but DnD is a game and the way to optimize any game is to make it the most enjoyable, same with UA-cam content.
I actually agree with Treantmonk with this one. I feel most high level abilities are basically a non-factor in most campaigns thus it's relative power of said abilities doesn't really matter. So I actually feel that the lower abilities are a much stronger consideration for picking a class where most characters will spend the majority of their time, then a potentially exceptional trait that only comes online at level 14 for about the last quarter of a campaign. It's why capstones shouldn't factor into most class reviews at all; because they come so late that they will be experienced once or twice.
If you feel those abilities are important, then doing your own research is pretty vital. I personally feel Lore is an A-rank instead of B due to the sheer availability of options, but then Treantmonk is providing his opinion based on his feelings and research, different tables will have different priorities.
@@lordbiscuitthetossable5352 agreed, also this is explained in the intro for how abilities are weighted. On top of that keeping a video to a reasonable length with a reasonable number of comparative points to juggle and compare in one's minds (or notebooks if you like to take notes during lectures) are points to consider when crafting a video. A final point for why this type of editing is helpful is people can visit his more in-depth video on a specific subclass/book to get a reasonable handle on what a full level 20 subclass may look like.
3rd level can create magic materials for free/2nd spell slot and can create tools or items. In combat you can make obstacles for your opponents or just put them in a box. Animated object can slow enemies down automagically and allow you to out speed anything as you can jump on your flying carpet.
Creation can easily beat anything it comes across without fail making it S+ tier
Can't wait for the Cleric to just dominate the tier list
Cleric video will have to be 6 hours long with all those domains, lol.
Yeah twilight and peace is abserd. Imagine theorgy wizard with twilight domain.🤩
Cleric and Wizard, the two OP classes with 48 subclasses
@@JB-xl2jc thus why its a pitty the theorgy wizard never came out of UA.😅
Kinda curious what the Cleric subclasses are going to look like. Twilight and Peace in S-tier obviously. But in Treantmonk's previous tier list (made before Tasha's) Bard was a full tier higher than cleric, so does that mean the rest of the older cleric subclasses are in B and C tier?
After all the videos are published I would really like to see the 'behind the curtain' process of the ups and downs of how all this was done as well as insights into your process for what you found most surprising or misconceptions you had that were revealed to you in this process. (Note, I am a high school teacher who often has this type of analysis discussion with colleagues as we teach or study and enjoy the 'how we analyze and understand our world's conversation)
When the series is complete I'll consider where I have interesting enough realizations to make a video, if I do, I will.
I get putting eloquence ahead of lore, but valor (even as a tie)? WHOOF
this coming from the man that says spells are the reason to play a trickery cleric! c'mon chris! magical secrets FOUR LEVELS ahead of all other bards is nuts! counterspell! revivify! slow! haste! misty step!
I AM A SALTY BOY!!!
I didn't appreciate how powerful the Valor Bard's medium armor plus shield benefit was until I played a bard for the first time. The Dungeon Master was running a module where the players get ambushed by giant badgers; I somehow survived 4 attacks when the average result should have seen me knocked out. I was determined to go Lore Bard though, so I grabbed a level of Knowledge Cleric to obtain the medium armor and shield (Protector Aasimar of Milil).
I was initially delighted with my choice, until I discovered how painful my level 5 would be due to not knowing level 3 spells. The only reason my bard didn't become ignorable was the acquisition of a Wand of Lightning Bolts.
I disagree about Cutting Words. When I played a Lore Bard, I used it all the time. It saved mine and my allies lives multiple times. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that you can only use it to protect yourself. If you could only use it to protect yourself, yes, it would be weak as fuck, but you can use it to protect your allies. So, if your cleric is about to get hit, but you roll a six, bringing the enemy's attack roll down to 4 under your Cleric's AC, then you've just saved the party.
"Also at 3rd level, you learn how to use your wit to distract, confuse, and otherwise sap the confidence and competence of others. When a creature that you can see within 60 feet of you makes an attack roll, an ability check, or a damage roll, you can use your reaction to expend one of your uses of Bardic Inspiration, rolling a Bardic Inspiration die and subtracting the number rolled from the creature’s roll. You can choose to use this feature after the creature makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the attack roll or ability check succeeds or fails, or before the creature deals its damage. The creature is immune if it can’t hear you or if it’s immune to being charmed."
Bard's are my favorite class it hurts so much seeing you put most of the subclasses as mid. Also the Lore bard is insanely good should probably be up there alongside Eloquence bard
Eloquence bards are insane. I played one and good lord, he was a monster in and out of combat. The bonus action debuff on enemy saves is simply absurd.
My favorite combat i rolled with a bard was with my 7th level mark of healing halfling college of swords bard. He was fighting in a tournament and entered because he heard a rumor that the champion of the ring, a paladin, was cheating through some unknown means. Magic was allowed as long as it wasn't enchantment or summoning magic and i figured by exposing him as well as winning the tournament it would drum up a lot of attention in the city for the circus my bard was ringmaster of. To note there was a short rest between each match
Round 1 was against a rogue somewhere between 5th-7th level. Pretty easy match. My rapier is enchanted with a booming blade spell that grows with me so between that and my defensive flourishes i barely got touched.
The second round was by far the hardest. I could have finished easily with magic but rumors had it this masked fighter was a true warrior and i wanted to test my mettle; not to mention save my spells for any chicanery the paladin was using to cheat. That decision almost cost me the tournament. Turned out this masked warrior was an 11th level echo knight. I used my power flourish the first turn to kill his echo while laying into him but his attacks were hitting hard. My hp dropped quick and in a panic i knocked him away with a mobile flourish and backpedaled; using my bonus action for aura of vitality. I kited him the remaining 3 turns keeping him just out of range with mobile flourish and wracking up the damage with booming blade while i took the time to recover then bit the bullet and dove in when my inspirations ran out. His first attack broke concentration on aura of vitality but i had healed up just barely enough and i took him down with 2hp left.
Round 3 was against one of my party members who made it to the semis, a fairy barbarian who was the strongman in our circus. I bribed him with a real fight later as well as the prize money the to take a dive after explaining there was no way he'd be able to detect the champions cheating if it was magical. We made the fight look good and ended it with me tossing him out of the ring for a ring out. His wings were hidden so the crowd didnt know he could fly.
Then the finals against the paladin. A talked a bit of trash to him to get him riled up and ensure he'd cheat against the little halfling that dared mock him. He went first and immediately tried to cast command on me, ordering me to surrender. I of course counterspelled it then in retaliation put on a dazzling show for the crowd by trapping him in a hypnotic pattern. I then took the minute i had to weave a tale of treachery as i extolled the champion's crimes sullying the good name of the arena and that if the crowd wanted to see true trickery and theatre they were all welcome to visit our circus for a glorious time. I then drew my rapier, slammed the cheater with a mobile flourish, and launched him over the wall and out of the ring to land hard in the water below; my guarunteed critical from hypnotic pattern ensuring i could launch him the distance to clear the arena.
Loved playing glamour bard for dungeon of the mad mage. Enthralling performance was especially effective in diplomacy situations.
For multiclassing, consider great old one warlock for telepathy so you don’t have to worry about a language barrier for your command option or for spells like suggestion. The level 14 ability is really good here and saved my butt on several occasions. Really fun to play as a rock bard.
Thanks for the guide. I'm playing a lore bard and find it tough to beat. The ability to essentially use a reaction to turn a hit into a miss on a reaction is pretty amazing. I think you may have it undervalued here as you get to use it as a reaction, which at low to mid tier level play, you don't often get to use. The fact that you get magical secrets at 6 allows you to get counterspell early as well some other great spells to fill out your party. You make a great case for Eloquence, and perhaps I should have considered it more, but I think the value of it is somewhat reduced as you can get your inspiration die back after a short rest and assuming you have an 18 or 20 CHA by level 8, 5 die is a good amount. As a lore bard, I can't wait for my DM needing to play mind games with me trying to force my cutting words just to avoid me using counterspell on their big baddy. I get that you also get magical secrets at 10, but there are so many amazing spells and having 2 more open to you is pretty amazing.
Currently playing a Tiefling Valor Bard 5 / Genielock 2 in Rime of the Frostmaiden and the massive AC increase of Medium armour + shield to a character with 14 dex has given me the highest AC in the party. I've always got a use for my action and bonus action, I get a lot of resources back on a short rest (and song of rest makes those short rests more enticing for the whole party) and I've got cleric AC with a full powered Eldritch Blast and Green-flame blade for if I choose to enter melee. Very strong combination and I think the extra durability from Valor really seals the whole build
Last (very small) point in defense of lore bard: it is worth noting that you get the bonus proficiencies at the same level that bard gets expertise. So, even if it is a little weird narratively, you can jump from unskilled to expert in two skills of your choice, that you did not select at character creation.
Level 3 is a nice place for that to happen - assuming you start at level 1, by level 3 you should have a good sense of what other players bring to the table (literally) in terms of skills. You may also have some sense of which skills, if any, might be unusually valuable for the campaign setting, which may not have been obvious when you made the character.
Chris, maybe you don't think much of it and I know you have a lot to cover, but you totally glossed over the second part of the Glamour's Mantle of Inspiration feature. All creatures receiving the temp HP can move up to their speed w/o opportunity attacks. When a Bard starts getting the dice back on a short rest, you can use this multiple time during an encounter hand have your party flying around the battle field.
I agree that the Glamour Bard is underrated. I even found a way for Enthralling Performance to be used effectively in battle. Never shut up. Always have your bard performing at all times. This can get annoying. It's meant to. Don't annoy your fellow players by constantly performing, but make it clear that your character is always on. Telling joke, playing music, dancing, etc. If the potential enemies hear you coming from a mile away you can immediately activate Enthralling Performance the moment a disagreement breaks out because you've been performing for them to hear for more than a minute.
Glamour is underrated. Treantmonk was right say so although it deserves a higher Tier than B. Mantle of Inspiration is extremely unique. The Mobility aspect without allowing opportunity attacks is hugely undervalued here. Why is Enthralling Performance considered out of combat? It could very well prevent a combat or allow a major advantage. Many creatures and NPC's chat and engage before a conflict. Mantle of Majesty is terrific. Unbreakable Majesty is an extremely powerful as well. Even if the creatures saves it has disadvantage on it's next saving throw. If that alone was what happened it would be powerful.
I’m so glad you have a more reasonable tier ranking system than dungeon dudes their tier lists make everything seem good which is just wrong
I like playing the talky-talky characters so the Eloquence Bard is really my jam. I've read a few comments suggesting it should be ranked S class because you could use it to create unfailable persuasion and deception checks but it's important to remember those skills have their limits. To use a classic example you cannot persuade a king to surrender his crown. Succeeding on that check just means you *won't* be immediately thrown into the dungeon. Similarly you cannot deceive someone into believing something that is patently false. Your lies have to at least be plausible.
I agree, people don’t seem to understand how social interactions work as per the DMG. Simply rolling a 20 doesn’t just mean you automatically succeed. You may move an indifferent NPC to friendly or a hostile one to indifferent and the person you’re trying to persuade or deceive can still roll a high Insight check. I GM an eloquence bard and nobody thinks they are OP. Sure they are great at social things but it’s fun to have a great face in the party. Bring on more role playing I say.
I think they are S because it's ridiculous how strong they can make their saves when the bard list is filled with incredible save or die spells. Suggestion, Phantasmal Force or Hold Person are all fantastic when you can basically guarantee failure.
@@BreakingStarGames it's not really guaranteed, it's a roll of bardic inspiration. That can be only 1 or 2. But happy enough to agree to disagree.
@@drz0b Persuade is a DC roll based on your relationship with the NPC and the nature of the request. Deception is indeed a contested roll against the NPCs insight but their roll (and yours) can be given advantage or disadvantage based on the circumstances, the nature of your relationship and the plausibility of the the lie or how much the NPC wants to believe it. And trying to determine what kind of lie an NPC wants to hear might also be an insight check on the players part. It's not just a lie detector, insight is about understanding the motivations of others. Player: Can I bribe him? DM: Roll an insight check. Player: 23 DM: Based on x, y and z you think he may be open to a bribe.
Well stated.
The one caveat I'd add to Cutting Words is that its value goes up if you play with idiots. I use it, usually, to protect concentration on an ally who decides to rush into melee while concentrating on something important. If you play with window lickers, it's clutch.
Both looking forward to, and dreading, the Cleric episode. It's my favorite class, and I know there are some broken features. I won't even roll up either of the two new ones.
I hope WOTC fixes the clerics with Tashas errata in 2022 because I hate disallowing subclasses and would rather not mess with untested home-brew tweaks.
@@bigdream_dreambig I so agree. Cleric is my favorite overall class, and I love the concept of both the Peace and Twilight domains. But, appreciating how they break things, I can't bring myself to even ask a DM to let me run one. Hell, even my current plain Jane, straight out of the box Tempest Cleric is a dominating presence in our group. It takes away from the fun if I have to pull back, just to let other players have a role.
Something to remember when you mentioned the Lore Bard additional skills is that Jack of All Trades can actually be less than half for quite a while. So I think the skill proficiencies are still pretty good on Bard.
B is for bard.
Great listing. Lore is just so powerful at 6th level on top of just Cutting Words on initiative rolls. You want a bard with an army? Learn Conjure Animals. You want a bard with Cleric awesomeness? Learn Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon. And as you mentioned, a great summoning spell could work out well here too. If you're worried about defense, i'd dip 1 lvl into Sorcerer just to grab Shield and Absorb elements, or 1 lvl Hexblade to get Shield and medium armor and shield proficiency. Both good ways to get good defense with just 1 lvl and additional spells.
Ok I keep hearing him say "D&D is for everyone"....it has always been for everyone.
more money for TREANTMONK
Swords bard and Valor bards kind of have the best spell for weapon attacking since they can gain access to swift quiver than any other class, including ranger(hell, any ranger and paladin only spell are basically bard spell)
I really wish the Swords bards got the Archery style option, but even without it this is a very good point.
Unfortunately swift quiver isn't actually a particularly strong spell. If you have crossbow expert, Haste tends to be better. The turn you cast it you get two attacks (just like swift quiver) one from the haste action which triggers your bonus action, and one from your bonus action. Subsequent turns you get 4 attacks (2 with your action 2 with your haste/bonus action) very similar to swift quiver. But haste also gives you +2 AC, doubles your movement speed, and gives you advantage on dexterity saving throws.
And to be fair swift quiver has some advantages of its own, you don't need crossbow expert, you can use a longbow and be a threat at longer range, you can use a d8 weapon instead of a d6 weapon. But the real nail in the coffin to me is that Swift Quiver is a 5th level spell, and Haste is a 3rd level spell.
So while yes, Bards in general can steal high level paladin and ranger spells, swift quiver would not be high on my "to steal" list. I'd need a lot of convincing that the build absolutely can't make room for crossbow expert, cause I'd much rather use a 3rd level slot than a 5th level slot.
@@KaitlynBurnellMath A couple notes: The Crossbow Expert bonus action requires a full Attack Action, not just the extra single Attack provided by Haste. Also, even if you're using Crossbow Expert, you can get the 4 attacks using the 1d10 Heavy Crossbow instead of the 1d6 Hand Crossbow. Additionally, the two Bonus Action attacks from Swift Quiver don't actually require a preceding Attack Action, so with it active you can still use your Action to cast a non-concentration spell and get two attack in the same turn, whereas with Haste + Crossbow Expert using your action to cast a spell brings you down to one attack for the round. Finally, Haste has a pretty hefty penalty if you lose concentration.
That said, for all the reasons you mentioned Haste is still pretty attractive and I would actually be inclined to take both on an archer build.
@@adriangoetz5108 Haste lets you take an attack action. During the haste version of the attack action you can make one weapon attack only, but since you've taken the attack action that is still enough to trigger crossbow expert.
The trick with using a non-concentration spell and then taking two attacks with your bonus action...still also works with Haste for the same reason. Cast your non-concentration spell. Take the haste attack action, which triggers the crossbow expert bonus action.
Additionally there's one other scenario to consider, where you want to cast a bonus action non-concentration spell (such as healing word) where Haste will actually get 3 weapon attacks (two with the regular attack action, one with the haste attack action), wheras in this scenario swift quiver will only get 2 weapon attacks. This is the one scenario I know of where there's actually a different number of attacks for haste vs swift quiver.
I don't think I would ever take both on one character since they have so much overlap. I might consider Swift Quiver on a character where crossbow expert simply wasn't an option.
@@KaitlynBurnellMath Thanks for correcting me on the Haste attack action! That does make a huge difference.
College of swords does go well with the Dhampir lineage.
My favourite class.. Never a Bore...to go with Lore...it's not about the kills...but the skills..
I think Lore is substantially better than Valor. So Valor is better at not dying, but at the cost of not nearly being as useful while alive.
Otherwise a good list
Not about the kills? Say that to my fireball-spitting, dissonant-whispering monster of a Lore Bard. She cleaned up in Curse of Strahd. :D
@@vaevictusasmadi84 oooh tell me her story...is it Gory?...regale tales of Glory!!
I can't wait for the cleric list!
I'll be honest, I'm surprised to see the Bard subclasses mostly in B-tier after you placed Bard as the second best overall class in your older tier list of classes. Did you have a change of heart?
Also, did you swap the Artillerist and Storm Herald from our last video? Why?
I confirm that the Artillerist and Storm Herald were swapped without explanation. Whether it was intentional or an error...? 🤷♂️
Yes, this. I don't take umbrage with the relative ranking, but 1 class as A tier when the base class was ranked second among all classes? That doesn't make sense.
Good on Treantmonk for creating this ranking system though.
B tier in this is still incredible as it says, it's good and doesn't need much to be effective. But most bards do need some way to deal with the gap in their defenses.
@@BreakingStarGames If this ranking was to be taken in isolation, and all prior rankings were to be disregarded, I would agree with you.
However in this case, Treantmonk has already made multiple videos about how ranks Bards relative to other classes. They were 2nd among all classes.
And so, it's going to be a little odd seeing multiple subclasses from inferior classes finish higher in the relative order. I'd like to know why that is?
Maybe there's a degree of relativity to the base functions of the class?
Like, this class is mediocre overall, and is being evaluated as such, but THIS subclass is kinda broken, vs that class is super super good, but most of the subclasses are just on par with one another?
Another great installation in the series! I learn something new in every one. I appreciate the focus on the commentary and less detailed review of every feature. Sure, the rankings are subjective, but to debate for the fun of it: Valor bard came out ahead largely due to proficiency in medium armor and shields. I get that multi-classing complicates the situation, but ... a 1 level dip in a number of classes would give any of the bard subclasses these proficiencies and more (e.g Con save proficiency + fighting style for Fighter dip). So I suggest that a subclass ability that could be gained from a 1 level dip be weighted less than those that can't.
Not sure why? The uniqueness of an ability doesn't dictate its effectiveness. The VB's proficiencies are highly effective and free, which pushes other classes to multi-class for 1 level in order to keep pace, but then this costs those classes heavily in spell progression.
The Bard is a full caster. Anything that pushes it to deviate from being a better full caster is by definition suboptimal.
I think Swords Bard was underrated, here. I agree with the B ranking considering the subclass on its own (though not its placement in that rank). However, I think it's one of those subclasses that boosts another class up by multiple tiers, like Hexblade Warlock, but with more investment and return. Considering just the multi-classing potential alone, I might've given it top of A-tier, which would've made me increase the overall rank of the subclass to somewhere in A rank. Great video.
Note that both the Whispers and Glamor bard use "Talking for a minute" as the initial casting trigger. This means that if you copy a bit of a favorite song for Glamour, or recite Dirty Harry, john Wick, or Taken for whispers IN REAL LIFE for a minute, you can then say you are triggering the ability. One thing a DM will 90% of the time let you do is go on a long diatribe if its amusing or impressive, then you drop this and look like a damn hero. Don't just look at the casting time of 1 minute and dismiss it completely. Wont work in combat though.
I was surprised that Glamour Bard was ranked so (relatively) low, as the subclass excels in tactical options while shoring up defensive weaknesses. Mantle of Inspiration: Imagine that you, the Paladin, or the Battlesmith Artificer are mounted... I'm sure a Greater Steed Pegasus (Magical Secret) with 23% more health and 270ft. of flight in one round would be useful somewhere. Mount reactions were pretty useless, until now.
Also, I didn't hear you talk about the 14th level ability, Unbreakable Majesty, a short rest ability that gives you Sanctuary+; either you are immune to being directly attacked or the enemy has disadvantage against your spells, and it's a CHA save (relatively weaker). Even though it comes online late, I was surprised it wasn't mentioned for directly addressing a weakness of the Bard chassis.
I know right? I guess I’m just partial to my tiefling glamour bard in dungeon of the mad mage. Was able to convince hallister to come out of his cave and tour with me 😀.
I think Cutting Words was underrated here. My bard almost never used them on himself. The paladin and barbarian are going to be needing them when we fight Storm Giants. I can't always been turning them into a Giant Ape!
Looks like the Bard class is full of B-Listers. Where's the King of Rock'n'Roll at?
Creation is probably my favorite bard. You can create anything. It’s like the illusion wizard’s 14th level feature but at 3rd level and doesn’t require a spell slot.
You mentioned how wall spells are noticeably missing in the base bard spell list, well you can create one. It’s restricted by size but that improves as you level.
You could even build like a closet sized 5x5 (medium sized) metal room and try to push a spellcaster inside. The Telepathic feat would allow you to do it as a BA. Your free object interaction could be to then lock the door. The spellcaster is temporarily taken out of combat unless they have a certain spells prepared but at that point they’re wasting spell slots while you were able to keep yours.
I agree with the ranking since so much depends on creative use but creativity can open so many doors. It’d be great to have a video of you covering some combat options for song of creation. Maybe players might need a little help thinking up creative solutions :)
Being that the created item must be medium sized or smaller, that wouldn't be much of a wall.
@@TreantmonksTemple lol fair. Maybe at 3rd level then it’s just a stand alone wall for personal cover, given low the bard’s lower AC.
The lowest level wall spell is a third level spell. At 6th level crest bard you could do 10ft… which is only 1/3 of of wall of sand and 1/5 of wall of wind. Hmm.. yeah, ok, it’s still not up to par with other wall spells lol. Under the right circumstances though it could still split enemies up, remove their line of sight on you, or force them to trickle in. I’d still keep it in the back of my mind as an option.
Perhaps I am just bias, but whispers is harshly underrated. The ability to take someone's shadow and assume them.. you get a +5 on deception rolls against it and if you have expertise, thats +15. The chance of it failing is significantly low. Since you garner information thats privvy to people it knows and trusts... you slay a guard of a keep. You know all orders given to your unit, you know the other guards, you know the layout and your patrol route. You would know where the prisoners are, where the armory is, who the commanding officer and other leaders would be. Its such a useful class that you dont need to be in combat. You can frighten people into thinking you know their more private fears and secrets, using detect thoughts allows you to actually know and use after the spell is done.
The psychic bladed with animate object and dissonant whispers is so strong in itself.
People think bards are pure support and thats the only way you can play them. I feel there are people who are intimidated by being creative and cunning and whispers allows just that. If you wanted to be a support character, there were other options but this redefines what a bard is in my opinion.
I don't think a guard would give all that info to a "casual acquaintance".
And either way, many parties wouldn't be okay with killing people for this ability so it makes it situational.
A levels three creation bard can create a antimatter rifle that does 6d8 necrotic damage
Lore Bard using cutting words is literally Tattletale from Worm.
Can you make an Eloquence bard build? I would like to see what spells you would choose with Unsettling Words
Cutting words can be broken, you roll the die and subtract it from the number rolled, this means the face of the die basically changes, so you can turn crits into non crits with it, maybe even misses.
The only problem is that knowing when something would crit is either impossible due to the DM screen or Metagaming ina pvp scenario for example.
Is Eloquence our first top 5 subclass? It feels pretty borderline for S-tier. After the Chronurgist, Peace, Twilight, and Clockwork Soul, what else is even in contention for S-tier by these strict standards? The Illusionist? Post-Tasha's Shepard? Aberrant Mind? War Mage? I'm really excited to see how the exact order of the top and bottom 10 compares to my own opinions when this is all done.
Wouldn't be illusionist considering their most potent ability comes in at such high level, and a premise of these videos is down-valuing abilities that come in at levels that people barely play.
I imagine TM will rank most high tier wizard subclasses over it but I would disagree with that. As good as wizards are, they don't break bounded accuracy to force monsters to fail their saves.
@@BreakingStarGames Yeah, after this video, I seriously doubt we'll see more than four things in S-tier, total.
With the rise of the mountain dwarf, I’m not sure medium armor proficiency is quite as potent as it used to be, so with the current meta of optimization I’d value Swords and Valor a bit less.
Still, great vid!
It's unfortunate the Mountain Dwarf does not come with shield proficiency, that's -2 to AC compared to a variant human with the Moderately Armored feat on a bard at lvl 1.
@@scythius2019 Yea but mountain dwarf is still +2/+2 with darkvision, and weapon and tool proficiency.
@@adamkaris Sure, but the point is Valor Bard is still pretty good because it brings shield proficiency, which means at least 2 AC (and often more AC cause magic shields are much more common than magic armour).
Tortle Bard.
@@skymanta1222 But any dwarf who doesn't know how to swing a warhammer or battleaxe is no dwarf at all, certain to be looked down on (and maybe even shunned) by their community! 🙈
ב"ה
I know multiclassing isn't the biggest consideration, but a paladin that after 5 levels of paladin multiclass into a college of whispers bard is very powerful.
Have you ever thought of doing a video about the best choices for Bard’s Magical Secrets?
Did a video for every level of magical secrets. If you do a youtube search you'll see them
Creation bard at 14th level. No gold limit on your 3rd level creation ability.
I find 1 level of sorcerer patches a lot of holes in the bard spell list. You get an attack cantrip, grease, shield, not to mention con save proficiency
I think eloquence should be considered S tier. Unsettling words breaks bounded accuracy. At high lvl play it’s like having 5 portents per short rest. Chrono can’t even compete for ST lock down
The defense shortfall is a problem but can be made up by a starting dip in DSS for absorb elements and shield, taking moderately armored at 4 (you can also add 1 peace if no one else dips peace replacing the feat you would have taken for moderately armored).
Even straight classed it can still take moderately armored.
I noticed Unsettling Words is more offensive whereas Cutting Words is more defensive. The latter can do more but failing a saving throw is typically worse than failing an attack roll.
I actually really like the whispers bard. I feel like everyone is just too harsh on it.