How gimped is a 17Bard Spellsinger?

[tomfar72]

Ok, I'm looking at making a elf spellsinger, and I'm having some difficulty. I know many will say to stay pure, and I understand the reasons, but I'm wondering just how gimped would only 17 lvls of bard be? I guess I should say what my goals of the character are and what classes I have in mind. I'm looking to have fairly reliable CC, decent back up heals, decent buffs, as well as Elven Arcane Archer. The problem is I find myself very feat starved if I stay pure. I'm looking at 2ranger(bow strength, rapid shot, and twf for free)/1fighter(extra feat for toughness as well as fighter toughness)/17Bard. Granted, I really don't NEED twf, but it makes lvling a whole lot easier. I guess I could just use Master's Touch, grab a 2 hander and stay pure IF staying pure makes that much of a difference. Any thoughts?

[tomfar72]

Umm nevermind this thread. I decided to go pure Bard Spellsinger. I was looking through my bank character to see what wepons I had available for using Master's Touch, and instead remembered I have a pretty good selection of low-mid lvl staves. Granted, quarterstaves are not as good as a greatsword, but I already have a staff for pretty much every occasion from my acrobat/monk that got deleted. (Shock of PG, Metalline of PG, Acid, Ghost Touch of PG) Plus using staves will free up a spell slot for Focusing Chant, Charm Person, and Hypnotism.

[Rabbi_Hordo]

Right on, but just in case people want to know....

Bard songs get bonuses at level 14 and then at level 20, thus there is not difference on a Spellsinger as regards SONGS ONLY at level 17 to level 19 or level 14...all the same. Only at level 20 do you get an increase to your songs attack/damage/fear mod. This is the same for virtuoso, no PrE or warchanter even (but warchanters have a higher base attack/damage/fear mod than other bards as a perq for the PrE).

At level 15 you get the AC Song and at level 18 you get Mass Suggestion song as the only in-between song changes from levels 14-20.

Granted, this does not address feats, spell selections or any other item, but it is what it is.

[Valindria]

Here's the rough idea of my AA Bard. It's WC instead of SS though.

http://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p...0&postcount=15

The only CC would be through fascinate though.

[Hjarki]

Those 3 levels lose you +3 DC on your Enchantment spells (+1 DC on other spells), some SP, about 10%-15% of your healing (due to levels), +1/+1 on Inspire Courage, 3 spell penetration and a small number of spells. This is a fairly significant drop in power for a Spellsinger - which is why you'll rarely see multi-classed Spellsingers.

Going pure class and trying to go AA is also nearly impossible. The full AA feat chain is PBS, PS, IPS, WF:R, RS, MS, BS, IC:R. That's 8 feats. You also need a feat to qualify for BS (Power Attack, Combat Expertise, or Weapon Specialization), a feat to qualify for Spellsinger and you probably want Toughness.

Assuming that both Spellsinger and Arcane Archer are necessary for your concept, you'll have to make some compromises. The consequences of compromising on the Spellsinger tends to mean you very quickly go from being a reasonable spellcaster to making offensive casting pointless. So your best bet is probably to compromise on the archery end.

So let's see what we can toss out on the archery end. I'm going to toss IC:R immediately since it returns the least advantage of any of the feats (none of the AA benefits you'll ever use can crit anyway).

We have 3 mandatory feats (WF:R, Heighten/Maximize/SF:E/?). That leaves four feats.

Archery feats effectively come in pairs: PS/IPS, RS/MS, and ?/BS. Bow Strength is an enormous boost in raw damage once you pile on all the various benefits, but it also requires an investment in Strength and throwing away a feat to no purpose. So I'd say skip it in favor of PS/IPS and RS/MS.

Note that this also means you won't have Toughness. As an Elven Bard, this is a loss of 43 hit points - significant but not necessarily devastating in a primarily ranged/caster build. Especially given that we're going to take those stat points we didn't put in Strength and throw them into Constitution.

So I'm envisioning something like this:
Stats: 8/17/14/8/8/17+5. This leaves 1 point left over to put in Strength, Intelligence or Wisdom in a 32-pt. build. You'll need a tome before level 15 to qualify for Improved Precise Shot.
Feats: Point Blank Shot, Spell Focus: Enchantment, Weapon Focus: Ranged, Rapid Shot, Precise Shot, Improved Precise Shot, Many Shot.
Skills: Perform, Use Magic Device, Concentration, Jump, Balance, Diplomacy.

Note that such a build does involve some pretty significant compromises, but there's only so much you can do with if you want both Spellsinger and Arcane Archer.

[unbongwah]

For a bard-based AA, I would go ranger 2 / fighter 2 / bard 16; but I would go WC or Virt, not SS.

[paintedman]

I have a bard spellsinger/arcane archer, and so far I'm finding it fun and not too over powering. My feat selection is, PBS, WeapFoc:Ranged, Heighten, RapidS, ManyS, ? and ?.

I was gonna do ImpCrit:Ranged and Spell Penn, but after reading some post here I wondering how good PS and IPS are. I'm pretty sure that ImpCrit:ranged is not in the cards, but is it a choice now of Spellpen and ImpSpellpen vs precise?

Not gonna do WC cause of the feat availability and Virt just seems subpar. If you have some insight please let me know!

thanks,
Paint

PS this is my first bard to make it over level 6! I always get frustraited with em!

[Hjarki]

I have a bard spellsinger/arcane archer, and so far I'm finding it fun and not too over powering. My feat selection is, PBS, WeapFoc:Ranged, Heighten, RapidS, ManyS, ? and ?.

I was gonna do ImpCrit:Ranged and Spell Penn, but after reading some post here I wondering how good PS and IPS are. I'm pretty sure that ImpCrit:ranged is not in the cards, but is it a choice now of Spellpen and ImpSpellpen vs precise?

Not gonna do WC cause of the feat availability and Virt just seems subpar. If you have some insight please let me know!

The key Bard offensive spells are Otto's Sphere of Dancing, Mass Charm/Suggestion, Hold Monster, Otto's Irresistible Dance and Greater Shout.

OSoD and Greater Shout are not subject to spell resistance.

Hold Monster and OID are subject to spell resistance, but for an archer with an Improved Shattermantle bow, SR isn't really much of a concern (they are single target spells).

So really you're concerned about single spell (Mass Charm/Suggestion are effectively the same spell) where you can't just Shattermantle everything in the room (unless you've got IPS and they nicely line up for you). Given that you're about 5 feats less than you really want to be with such a build before you even start discussing SP/ISP, I'd say leave them off the list.

In terms of Precise Shot/Improved Precise Shot... Precise Shot is basically garbage. Aside from the fact that it's not all that useful, you can get the feat from gear (albeit at the expense of a suffix). Improved Precise Shot is the most powerful feat in the game - counterbalanced by its situational nature. Very simply, IPS multiples your damage by the number of targets.

The difficulty, of course, is that you need to have those targets in the first place (IPS is worthless in a single target fight) and you need to line them up.

As a Bard, lining them up is a lot easier than it would be for a Ranger since you've got the CC spells. You can slap an OID on a nearby target and then just shoot through them at distant targets. You can Mass Charm a room and then circle-kite the ones who resist, using the collision detection on your new allies to create a relatively stationary mass. You can drop an OSoD and keep switching targets as nearby mobs dance (and get arrows fired through them at more distant targets).

However, what it really boils down to is that an archer with IPS is actually good at something - decimating entire rooms full of enemies - while an archer without IPS is inferior to melee in just about every way imaginable.