Magic Feats

[Vaardalia]

I am a level five Bard, and I was wondering what feat will be more useful at level six, Heighten Meta magic or Spell Pen feat. I have extend and maximize atm as my level one and three feats. I think heighten is the one I want because I am looking to do max dmg/heal per cast.

[Doxmaster]

Which Prestige enhancement are you going for? What do you plan to do with that character?

Without regard to that, dont take a spell penetration feat at level 6. Monsters dont start getting spell resistance worth considering until midlevels (12-16) Even then, you might not need it depending on what you plan to do; hitting a monster with a sword/bow or using fascinate doesnt need to combat spell resistance and isnt helped by Spell penetration in the slightest.

[Aashrym]

I am a level five Bard, and I was wondering what feat will be more useful at level six, Heighten Meta magic or Spell Pen feat. I have extend and maximize atm as my level one and three feats. I think heighten is the one I want because I am looking to do max dmg/heal per cast.

Neither. You would do better with spell focus enchantment. You don't really fall behind much in DC's in those levels and the SP cost is better. Take heighten at lvl 9 or 12 and spell penetration at 15 or 18. SR isn't common at lower levels.

Toughness might be an option too. If you are going caster you want SF, GSF, Heighten, Quicken, Spell penetration to go with Maximize and Extend. Depending on what else you might trade spell penetration or quicken off but that would take some serious consideration.

[Gorbadoc]

What Aashrym said.

It looks like you didn't plan your whole build out from the start. Build advice is much easier we start by looking at things like what you want to do with the build and how well you know the game. Then we can move to questions like what kind of stats, feats, and skills will let you meet those goals. Just asking for your third feat of seven and offering two bad choices is not going to tailor a build to your needs.

Did that make any sense? It's late, and my mind is getting a bit foggy.

[locus]

We need to know what feats you already have (do you have Toughness? Extend? both of those are ahead of Heighten and Spell Pen at your level, imo). Take a look at the prestige enhancements available for your class, their prereqs and see which one you're leaning toward (battle bard + offensive buffs? Warchanter; play more like a caster and prefer crowd control? Spell singer; confused and don't want to pick? Virtuoso (sorry Virtuosos :S)).

[Gorbadoc]

We need to know what feats you already have (do you have Toughness? Extend?

He (she, it, whatever) already listed them. Get a post-it, draw some eyeglasses on it, and attach it to your monitor so you can see it without it blocking your screen; this way, you'll remember to look more closely at things. :-P

Seriously though, yes, more information is good. Also, you don't need Extend OR Maximize before level 9 or 12. I'm still not sure whether Extend is ever actually necessary, or if it's something that is just so darned convenient that people like to tell themselves it's necessary.

[Kinerd]

Heighten won't make you do any more heal per cast. It will only make you do more damage per cast if monsters are saving against spells you're casting that are lower than your highest spell level, and bards have terrible direct damage spells anyway.

What Heighten will do is make your spell-based CC more effective (under the same scenario as described above), which is a good thing for a bard but probably not what you need right this second.

[bartosy]

heighten only gets half interesting once you got dancing ball/mass suggestion and acces to lvl 6 spells before that i wouldn't take it your sp just dry to soon with it at lower lvls. Same goes for spell pen feats because mass suggestion and dancing ball both have spellpen checks i think also the spell pen check is needed for oid before that its kind of obselete especially at lower lvls. Maximise and extend are fine choices.. altho i would settle with emp healing because its less taxing on your sp bar extend however is a nice thing especially once your lvl 7 and got haste displacement at your disposal.

As next feats you probably want spellfocus enchant,greater spell focus enchant or probably even toughness more hp especially at lower lvls and as a pure d6 class is always welcome.

[Aashrym]

heighten only gets half interesting once you got dancing ball/mass suggestion

I think you mean mass charm monster. Mass suggestion is not affected by SR.

[bartosy]

I think you mean mass charm monster. Mass suggestion is not affected by SR.

i was talking about heighten ? mass suggestion is affected by a dc check wich heighten does raise . The first sentence was correct later on I mix em up..

[Aashrym]

i was talking about heighten ? mass suggestion is affected by a dc check wich heighten does raise . The first sentence was correct later on I mix em up..

Oops, I really shouldn't post late at night sometimes. I see heighten in my quote and still thought spell pen for some reason. Edit: I see the reason, I obviously failed my quoting skills tho.

[Vaardalia]

Thanks for all the info guys, I got side tracked talking to some level 20 Bards in game. I already had the idea of taking the enchantment school feats and all the Bards said it was a waste, end game Wiz and Sor do most of the cc, or charming is not useful end game etc. I was also told that anything other than a pure Bard is just someone who melees and try to look like they are doing something useful by playing songs. I made level 6 today and took the heighten, it seems more what I want out if my Bard despite some iffy feed back on the feat. My level 12 throught 18 feats I already had chosen so now I just need a level 9 which will most likely be toughness, however one of the Bards in game said Spell Pen can be very useful. They all said as long as you max out preform per level it is hard to go wrong, one also adding balance, consentrate, UMD, and haggle to the list.

[Aashrym]

Thanks for all the info guys, I got side tracked talking to some level 20 Bards in game. I already had the idea of taking the enchantment school feats and all the Bards said it was a waste, end game Wiz and Sor do most of the cc, or charming is not useful end game etc. I was also told that anything other than a pure Bard is just someone who melees and try to look like they are doing something useful by playing songs. I made level 6 today and took the heighten, it seems more what I want out if my Bard despite some iffy feed back on the feat. My level 12 throught 18 feats I already had chosen so now I just need a level 9 which will most likely be toughness, however one of the Bards in game said Spell Pen can be very useful. They all said as long as you max out preform per level it is hard to go wrong, one also adding balance, consentrate, UMD, and haggle to the list.

If you aren't focusing on spell DC's for enchantments there is no point in taking heighten. Either you are focusing on DC's or you are not. You won't get anything better than your enchantments to make that heighten worthwhile. That's why I mention heighten, SF, GSF together. There's not much point to taking 1 or 2 of the 3 and not the rest.

[Kinerd]

I made level 6 today and took the heighten, it seems more what I want out if my Bard despite some iffy feed back on the feat.

What do you think heighten is getting you, specifically?

[vVAnjilaVv]

Your next feat selection should be Toughness for more HP, that will help you by far more than either of the two you mentioned.

Also drop empower spell and get empower healing instead.......yes Bards have sonic spells but the amount of damage they do added to how much smaller of an SP pool they get is not worth investing in them for doing damage...more for the stun and CC...and u should already be able to cover that with Fascinate and enchantment spells.