BardBarian advice, please?

[LOOON375]

Im taking a second run at a BardBarian. My first run was a success. It turned out much better than I had hoped, especially since it was my first cross class toon.

I recently TR'd my 28pt pure barbarian in the hope of improving on my first attempt.

My first is a 16 SS bard, 3 Barb, 1 fighter.

Im not worried about feets or stats, Im just looking for a better class makeup.

What is the minimum of bard levels I can take? 12? 14?

I plan on going SS again, but still want to be able to take advantage of all of the Bard destiny abilities. I was thinking of trying 12 SS, 6 barb, 2 fighter or 12 SS, 6 fighter, 2 rogue (not for traps, but evasion)

Thanks in advance.

[boredman]

I personally like the Bard/Rogue/Fighter multiclass (the barbarian rage is cool but it lasts too little with few barbarian levels and also you cant cast spells while raged)

If you plan to be a strength meele Bard there are some splashes like for example Bard 16/Rogue 2/Fighter 2, to get inspire excellence and lvl 6 spells, or a Bard 14/fighter 6 splash (no evasion but keep inspire courage +2 and lvl 5 spells with fighter prestige I) or Bard 12/fighter 6/rogue 2 (just lvl 4 spells but get evasion).

If you dont plan to have trap skills maybe the Bard 14/fighter 6 is worth it, but having trap skills with 2 rogue levels splash on bards is not hard to do with some gear and some tome invest, so i personally like 2 rogue splash for evasion and traps.

If I have to choose one of that splashes mentioned I would go with Bard 16/fighter 2/rogue 2 able to do traps and with decent inspire courage and excellence in addition to ss abilities and meele dps with evasion (make sure to have a decent reflex save for that). (about weapon style, normally twf has more synergy with rogue splash but with epic destinies, especially legendary Dreadnought, the Thf style is very viable too with a EAGA or ESos or Cleaver at end level).

[AzB]

I had a lot of fun with my bard/fighter/barb 12/2/6. It was a lot of fun, brought a significant amount of dps while being able to self heal and buff. It was a little click happy though, between singing the songs, casting hage, displacement, etc, and then rage before every fight. But it was awesome!

But honestly, the barb levels were only there to get my barb pls as I played my first barb life pure and really couldn't get past relying on so many pots and other people to get through a quest. Especially at higher levels. I would be inclined to splash rogue instead and get some evasion and possibly trap skills. The sneak attack wouldn't hurt, but it won't be enough to make a huge difference.

I know you don't need feats, but a couple fighter levels gives you 2, and that's huge for many builds.

Another idea is to go helf and use the fighter dilly to get your weapons profs, then go rogue/bard. Max umd, sneak attack, skills, while still taking cleave/great cleave/thf line and maybe imp crit for decent, if not impressive damage in a straight up fight.

I've never tried a cleave on a sneak attack, does that work? That would be pretty awesome!

Just brainstorming here, hope something gets your imagination flowing.

[LOOON375]

I personally like the Bard/Rogue/Fighter multiclass (the barbarian rage is cool but it lasts too little with few barbarian levels and also you cant cast spells while raged)

If you plan to be a strength meele Bard there are some splashes like for example Bard 16/Rogue 2/Fighter 2, to get inspire excellence and lvl 6 spells, or a Bard 14/fighter 6 splash (no evasion but keep inspire courage +2 and lvl 5 spells with fighter prestige I) or Bard 12/fighter 6/rogue 2 (just lvl 4 spells but get evasion).

If you dont plan to have trap skills maybe the Bard 14/fighter 6 is worth it, but having trap skills with 2 rogue levels splash on bards is not hard to do with some gear and some tome invest, so i personally like 2 rogue splash for evasion and traps.

If I have to choose one of that splashes mentioned I would go with Bard 16/fighter 2/rogue 2 able to do traps and with decent inspire courage and excellence in addition to ss abilities and meele dps with evasion (make sure to have a decent reflex save for that). (about weapon style, normally twf has more synergy with rogue splash but with epic destinies, especially legendary Dreadnought, the Thf style is very viable too with a EAGA or ESos or Cleaver at end level).

Thanks very much!

You answered a question that I hadn't asked as well. 16 levels of bard for inspire excellence. I wasn't really sure on the requirements on that.

I will be THF since I already have an EAGA among other good THF weapons. I didn't really like the barb splash my first time around. Since you can't cast or scroll heal while raged.