Useful Bard Songs?

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I have found song 1 very good (damage and hit rolls), 3 is very good if someone is afflicted with fear. Song 5 is awesome; I've read some info on the net on luck and it is quite good. For example the first song doesn't affect rolls on generating and confirming critical hits and it doesn't help saves. Song 7 is the charm song and I don't think it works. I tried it on the barbarians before the white dragons and none of them got charmed. I mean, hey, they are dumb barbarians. Song 9 protects against sonic damage. How often does that happen? War chant is unbelievable, 2 dodge ac which stacks with other sources. Still luck could possibly be better if you are trying to deal damage rather than absorb it. Example if you are fighting more mages where you want to end the affair early before they get a spell off on you.

So my analysis is that 7 and 9 are useless. 5 and 11 are the best. 3 is awesome when feared. Anyone else find something different?

 

I love bards. I always take one at least up to level 11.

About the songs:

Ballad of the Three Heroes - Great song for level 1! It could even be worth a one level dip for certain characters. Always use this in battle. +1 to hit, damange, and saving throws.

Tale of Curran Strongheart - Good for when you know a fear based spell is incoming. It is also supposed to remove fear, but I'm not sure that it always does. Maybe there's a save involved.

Tymora's Melody - Another amazing song. Luck is +1 to luck, +3 saving throws is great! Always use this.

Song of Kaudies - Sound based attacks are rare, and this song only provides a 50% bonus, so it's not usually worth using. This might be interesting in games using the Tactics mod, because a lot of enemy mages will use silence.

The Siren's Yearning - Enemies make a will save against being enthralled for 5 rounds. This does work sometimes, but it's unreliable, even with low-will enemies. Plus, I think the enthrallment wears off if the enemy is hit (although I can't remember if that's the case).

War Chant of the Sith - Another great song that should always be used. There's a component in IWD2 Ease of Use that allows this song to be played outside of battle. It's a bit of a cheat since you can regenerate but I'm impatient enough that I'll just have my clerics healing up anyway. It is quite nice for Tactics games, though.



And you remembered to pick up the Lingering Song feat, right? Besides freeing up the bard for other actions, it's nice that you can use all the songs at once, although a bit of a cheat -- and it can definitely be abused -- some people will stack multiple versions of the same song together. I don't recommend using it that way, though.

 

I never thought that the idea of stacking songs was a cheat per se. Mulitple cheering sections pump up the footbal teams more than one cheering section, right?

 

Well.. there's nothing wrong with the songs stacking. Having just ONE bard sing them all - simultaneously and in several copies for each - sound a wee bit more unlikely, no?

 

I was refering to multipel Bard stacking. Yes, I agree single Bard stacking is the creamiest of cheese.

 

Having multiple bards stacking their songs is hardly a cheat, as you pay the price in terms of character development instead.

 

Tymora's Melody stays strong throughout the game.
War Chant of the Sith only activates in combat, though there's a mod that allows it to be active outside combat. Lots of regeneration abuse potential there, though leaving one last enemy alive is barely any different.

As you're probably awar, Luck greatly outweighs the benefits of regeneration and AC. It basically boosts attack and damage, critical range, spell success (or is the roll made by the defender?), saving throws. Everything that uses dice rolls gets a boost, and that's a lot in this game.

 

iirc luck does not improve spellcasting. Even with +5 luck the basic buff spells (1+d4) did not give +5 more often ..

 

Key point is that it increases your chances of landing a hit and hitting for critical damage. The bard is about the strongest complement to a summoning party there is, you could make an all-bard summoning party with just one wizard or sorcerer and it would probably do very well.

 

Hmm.. speaking of the strength of bard songs in general and Tymora's Melody in particular.

How about a party where EVERYONE has at least five levels of Bard as a mix-in? +6 to hits, damage and luck for everyone surely beats wondering whether constant +2 damage (fighters) or +4 buff (clerics) is better.

 

That might work, but not as well as the "gang of thieves" party where everyone has a couple of rogue levels mixed in. Their sneak attacks worked pretty well.
Still, the cleric doesn't mesh that well with the bard class.
Fighter/bards and sorcerer/bards do mix well.
Especially the sorcerer/bard. Bard11/SorcererX can be quite good.

 

Adding in a few levels of x probably won't change much, but for others because summoning spells scale with levels you'd have to design a very different kind of party.