D&D (2024) Playtest 6: Bard

[Marandahir]

Was just reading Brandes Stoddard's Bard breakdown over on Tribality, and it got me thinking:

What if Magical Discoveries was baselined as a core class feature at like 3rd or 5th level, but you couldn't swap these 2 spells from other power sources out until 10th level when you have access to entire spells chapter (minus class-specific spells, of course)?

Then Lore Bards could have Cunning Inspiration back, and every Bard could have a taste of the broader dabbling early, and Arcane Bards could have their healing, Primal Bards could have their enchantments, etc.

The rationale for not letting swaps on these two spells is that essentially you'd be able to crack open the entire spells chapter every single Bard level and options paralysis would set in. Holding that off until 10th level at least keeps it clear until when options paralysis would set in one way or another.

I think it would take again a tiny bit of balance, but I like the idea a lot.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Was just reading Brandes Stoddard's Bard breakdown over on Tribality, and it got me thinking:

What if Magical Discoveries was baselined as a core class feature at like 3rd or 5th level, but you couldn't swap these 2 spells from other power sources out until 10th level when you have access to entire spells chapter (minus class-specific spells, of course)?

Then Lore Bards could have Cunning Inspiration back, and every Bard could have a taste of the broader dabbling early, and Arcane Bards could have their healing, Primal Bards could have their enchantments, etc.

The rationale for not letting swaps on these two spells is that essentially you'd be able to crack open the entire spells chapter every single Bard level and options paralysis would set in. Holding that off until 10th level at least keeps it clear until when options paralysis would set in one way or another.

I think it would take again a tiny bit of balance, but I like the idea a lot.

I could see doing it, but would those count as additional spells? Or are we just talking about moving the Lore bard ability to a class ability at lower levels?

If it is the second, I'll remind you, people lost their minds that Lore Bards didn't get extra spells. Many people declared the Lore Bard dead, because it had been nerfed, because it lost access to those two extra spells. So, as much as I agree that the old Lore bard was a neat design, I think you would recieve massive pushback at taking the only feature Lore Bard players seem to care about, and making it universal.

 

[Marandahir]

I could see doing it, but would those count as additional spells? Or are we just talking about moving the Lore bard ability to a class ability at lower levels?

If it is the second, I'll remind you, people lost their minds that Lore Bards didn't get extra spells. Many people declared the Lore Bard dead, because it had been nerfed, because it lost access to those two extra spells. So, as much as I agree that the old Lore bard was a neat design, I think you would recieve massive pushback at taking the only feature Lore Bard players seem to care about, and making it universal.

Fair. I think what I’d make these 2 spells count toward your spells prepared total (as opposed to other class/subclass feature freebies).

I didn’t realise Lore Bard players lost their mind, though I also imagine that’s tied in with how restricted the Bard list was on Playtest Packet 2 to begin with. Would they really be upset if they got that feature as a Bard anyway? Is it about having the features for your Bard character or it being “exclusive” to the Lore Bard?

 

[Yaarel]

Fair. I think what I’d make these 2 spells count toward your spells prepared total (as opposed to other class/subclass feature freebies).

I didn’t realise Lore Bard players lost their mind, though I also imagine that’s tied in with how restricted the Bard list was on Playtest Packet 2 to begin with. Would they really be upset if they got that feature as a Bard anyway? Is it about having the features for your Bard character or it being “exclusive” to the Lore Bard?

Yeah, artificial scarcity makes the demand get weird.

 

[Kobold Stew]

I didn’t realise Lore Bard players lost their mind, though I also imagine that’s tied in with how restricted the Bard list was on Playtest Packet 2 to begin with. Would they really be upset if they got that feature as a Bard anyway? Is it about having the features for your Bard character or it being “exclusive” to the Lore Bard?

I think that the problem with the first Playtest version of the Lore Bard subclass was that there was nothing in the subclass about having "Lore" -- the only anchor to that word was the unique ability to pilfer knowledge (spells) from outside of what one normally has access to. If that is taken from the Lore bard, there's no lore left.

Which would be fine -- rename the subclass, and the cost to the lore bard is gone. (Indeed, that happened to the Knowledge cleric -- their schtick was put into the main class (and then subsequently watered down), and that has caused much less concern.

 

[Yaarel]

I think that the problem with the first Playtest version of the Lore Bard subclass was that there was nothing in the subclass about having "Lore" -- the only anchor to that word was the unique ability to pilfer knowledge (spells) from outside of what one normally has access to. If that is taken from the Lore bard, there's no lore left.

Which would be fine -- rename the subclass, and the cost to the lore bard is gone. (Indeed, that happened to the Knowledge cleric -- their schtick was put into the main class (and then subsequently watered down), and that has caused much less concern.

The problem is, the concept of "knowledge" is deeply important, yet the game mechanics lacks impactful ways to actualize it during the game. This also relates to why Intelligence is a subpar ability that usually serves as a dump ability.

For the scholarly aspects of the Bard class, it would be nice if knowing stuff had more impact during combat and elsewhere.

 

[Kobold Stew]

Exactly. That's what the spells from other lists gave the Lore Bard in the 2014 PHB.