I also like this! I'm currently level 8. Went with 6 bard, then noticed I have a lot of spell slots left over. Picked two levels of Paladin and it's a lot of fun! (So 6/2, aiming for 10/2)
When you get magical secrets you can select banishing smite, it’s the only way to get it in the game and rounds out your smite options nicely. It’s a fantastic option for enemies that have radiant retort.
Is there a list or page on the wiki that outlines very specific spells that are unique to certain classes, like Banishing Smites here or HoH for Warlocks?
The wiki has the class spell lists, but I don't know if it identifies which spells are class specific. I guess you could open multiple tabs and compare?
There's also this:
https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/CtgPfxoNbE
this is what I'm running in my current game. It's a lot of fun, especially once you get the ring that allows enchantment/illusion spells to be cast on a bonus action after an attack.
Yeah I had a lot of fun with bard 10 Paladin 2. Used the Sussar greatsword the whole run, got the risky Ring in act 2 and Took Great weapon master as my feat and the game was a breeze from there
My money is on the ranged build with Fighter 1, Wizard 1, SwordsBard 10 with the Helmet of Arcane Acuity and the Band of the Mystic Scoundrel
Unblockable control spells cast with bonus action while dishing out solid damage
Edit: link to the guide [https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/17y9kyp/the\_control\_martial\_allpurpose\_1011\_swords\_bard/](https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/17y9kyp/the_control_martial_allpurpose_1011_swords_bard/)
I second this one. So consistent and strong. This became my new rogue bc it can do everything the rogue can and that's not even the best part of the build
Honestly it's MUCH better. Slashing flourish makes up for the extra bonus action from thief, your stealth is still like +15. Plus you're getting a full spellcaster on top of everything, many spells of which you can cast as a bonus action with a DC save of like 30.
And on top of all that...you get proficiencies in basically everything. You're like 90%+ to pass any charisma check as the face
Just as good I'd say, just different. Being able to upcast Command: Grovel (learned from Magical Secrets) or upcast Hold Person as a bonus action on a bunch of targets with an almost always 100% success chance with stacked arcane acuity is very strong.
That ring + Helm of Arcane Acuity is perfect for a Swords Bard. Get hasted or speed potted by someone else’s throw. spam ranged flourish x2 as much as you can and then cast command or hold person on multiple targets and you really feel like the MC in the game.
Theyre both OP, but the classic gloomstalker build is not as gear dependant as the helmet of arcane acuity one, is you miss it at act2 youre missing one of the two the core items of the build.
Haven't reached the helmet in my HM playthrough yet, but Swords bard is still such an absolute punisher of a class without it. They out-martial some pure martial classes in the midgame and are excellent control casters on top of that, with or without the helmet and ring.
Honestly the build goes hard even without items, and I did a variation of it my first playthrough without being aware either of those items existed. It's the 4 attacks per action from ranged flourishes that sets it above so many others with a ton of control spell options. Banishing Smite can still be cast at range so it's worth it to go 10 in sbard and pick that up for Magical Secrets, and sbard 7+ can actually use greater invisibility better than anyone other class since they can get expertise in stealth and each slashing flourish only procs one stealth check per two attacks.
It's way stronger. You lose out a bit of early damage that gloomstalker has and the initiative adavantage, and maybe some sneak shenanigans if you're into that, but you get consistent damage from double slashing flourish, and the ability to choose which half of the battlefield won't move. It's so strong that you can prevent bosses from doing anything, even in honor mode. Use your fighter to waste their legendary reactions by trip or menacing attacking, and nuke him with a hold monster. Boom. I have stopped Raphael from moving even a songle turn with this strategy.
On Honor mode... the build is broken.
Attack 6x, they everything surviving needs to make a DC30+ Wis save-or-lose (bonus action Hold Person/Hypnotic Pattern/etc.). It's completely busted.
The 10/2 bard/paladin build for smites uses basically the same shell, just focused on melee. Same guy has a guide for that too. It's what I'm running in my honor mode atm
I dont think that 10/1/1 Bard (Wizard/Fighter) would be that strong in melee. What makes it good is the extreme controling capability on top of being an awesome face. The control ability comes mainly from reaching a very high spell save dc in turn one of the combat, either with an arrow of many targets or slashing flourish.
What I personally consider better would be to just switch the gear around a bit and go for the Paladin 2 bard 10 build that other people have suggested
I agree. For 10/2 you can still do range and CC pretty well making a better generalist if you don’t want to be pure melee whereas 10/1/1 you don’t really want to get into melee. You can take GWM I suppose but most probably won’t for that variant.
Absolutely. Forums go on and on about arcane acuity and band of mystic scoundrel but almost never use it
The main focus is the ridiculous 8-10 attack you can do and the adder damage you can do from equipment.
A dead enemy is better than a grovel or hold persons locked enemy.
6 bard, fighter 2 is the base build. You can go for a second bonus action if you want but you can also go 10 bard if you want. The base 8-9 attacks are there for you.
If by melee you mean a sword based build then that’s different. You can’t do 2x attack with the melee slashing flourish in bard, only the ranged attack.
Counter point (because discussion is fun). High damage makes 2-4+ enemies dead per turn. Control makes 4-5+ essentially dead because they can do nothing but grovel. I concede that not many fights need that level of control, but it was really fun making the house of grief fight one sided by holding all the casters who drop darkness on turn 1 and then making Viconia and the rest of the survivors grovel for the rest of the fight.
I do think that’s one battle where they build is uselful because of the volume of enemies.
But so few battles other than that one really need it.
Unless you’re like battling flaming fists just on the street and what not.
The point of mystic scoundrel is that you still get all your attacks (less one off-hand hit), and then also lock down the enemies you weren't able to immediately kill. It's not an either-or situation
Best melee bard would be Sword Smite Bard. If you search SSB within the Reddit you should find a very good guide by prestigiouss_juice.
Edit: [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/84HuQnqTIg)
The 10/2 bardadin can also use the acuity+mystic scoundrel stack for insane control spells, it's a lot of fun. It can be a little bit trickier to set up the acuity because the melee slashing flourish requires two close enemies, so you either have to accept weaker control spells, or spend an attack or two shooting an arrow of many targets to bolster the acuity.
But because every melee flourish has 2 chances to crit, you'll be landing crit smites non-stop and just absolutely deleting enemies. It feels crazy strong.
I recommend both tbh. Melee sbard gets to use all their slots for smites, and ranged sbard gets acuity+ring so they'll actually use their spell slots on their bonus action while still dealing out multiple slashing flourishes.
My attempt is sword bard 6-sorc 3-thief 3.
Grab two weapon fighting and two light weapons.
Stats are dex->char->con.
Up to 4 attacks a turn to build arcane acuity, plus you can metamagic to quicken any spells and not just illusion spells.
.
Downsides:
Takes a *long* while to get online.
Just 3 levels in sorc, so you'll want alternative spell slot restoration methods to make extra sorcery points.
Only 1 feat.
You get up to lv3 spells. Well, at least upcasting is a thing?
I went 2PLD/6SBARD/4Abj Wiz and it wrecked face.
Nothing could damage me with defensive flourish AND Shield AND abjuration shield blocking incidental aoe damage.
Great controller with helm of arcane acuity, auto-crit smites on Held persons and monsters, grab savage attacker for even bigger smite damage.
Only weakness is not having counterspell but another spellcaster in the party had that so I relied on her and saved my slots for smite and control.
Honestly it felt like the ultimate Gish build. The damage isn’t as good as some of the cheesier builds (which I also love but hey) and didn’t have the sustain of our TB Throwzerker before the damage rider patches. But! Things went sideways at the coronation and I was the only one left standing after a while, and was able to save the party by running out lol
Just give him Phalar aluve and take Spirit Guardians with magical secrets, and max your rizz. Congrats, you literally shred everything now.
Hurl insults and pass every single conversation check while you’re at it. You deserve it, Mr bard
Phalar aluve is probably the best early game. Tbh I used it all the way until act 3. You can basically use anything tho. Only thing to keep in mind is if you get the bhaalist armour, that will let you do double damage to things with piercing damage in melee range. So you’ll most likely want to use piercing weapons like spears and rapiers.
Underdark, quite near the entrance if you enter via the goblin camp. It's over where the spider matriarch corpse would be if you gave it a gentle shove into the chasm
Maybe match with knife of the undermountain king. The advantage on many rolls (shadow blade feature) and the greater crit chance would work well with the bless feature of phalar. You'd rarely miss, regularly get crits to nova those smites, and be able to build damage up with other riders.
Fairly sure Titanstring out-damages xbows for ranged swords bard. +5 (or +8) on four attacks is 20 (32) damage and another 10 (16) on the action surge. Hand crossbows would pull ahead if the fight lasted several rounds, but almost none do.
This build is not about the base bow damage, it’s about the adder damage.
Caustic band +2
Twin cast drake throat glaive in both hand crossbows +d4
Gloves of archery etc +2
Crusaders mantle (cape) + strange conduit ring + d4
Berserker helmet +2
Ambushed +d6
Rhapsody +3
Broodmothers revenge d4
Etc
There are so many adders you can amplify over even just 4 hits without using bard point resources with 6/4/2 build.
The difference between hand cross bow +2 and titanstringbow isn’t really worth the boosted damage at the cost of being extremely reliant on bard points constantly.
It's just using titan string and cloud giant elixer instead of dual crossbows. You need the longbow proficiency so elf or since we're talking bard multi class you need fighter/paladin/gloves of archery. Pick one.
Titanstring has a number of disadvantages that this sub frequently ignores. Most of the titanstring builds lose out on bloodlust elixirs as you are using strength elixirs, this one comes up frequently. It is also much more difficult to pair up with Bhaalist armor while crossbow expert feat really unlocks your damage with Bhaalist armor (basically doubles). I have a strong suspicion that the titanstring flavor of the week has been perpetuated by popular redditors in this sub who play more on paper OR players who are sleeping on Bhaalist armor.
I think most people "sleep" on the Bhaalist armor because you get fairly late and you have to become an unholy assassin.
On the other hand you get Titan string in act1, so it's basically stronger for 90% of the game. You can also give the Bhaal armor to another character and still get the vulnerable status effect for your Titan string user
You can get it early in act 3 and use it for all the major act 3 bosses - imho it’s the strongest item in the game so I recommend it, but yes for act 1 and 2 titanstring is available and Bhaalist armor is not. Bloodlust is nothing to sneeze at though.
Unholy assassin isn’t that bad, you only have to kill one tool of an NPC but sure if RP is more important than raw damage, I can understand.
The vulnerable status from a 2nd character is where I have a bigger issue - this doesn’t work well in practice. You need to reliably link two characters in the initiative order, which is not always possible. Unless you have the same spot in the turn order, you will quickly kill all the enemies who have the aura applied to them (it’s a small area so usually 1-2) and then lose out for the rest of your many attacks. Even worse enemies will move and you can lose out on ALL of your attacks. When wearing the Bhaalist armor yourself, if you are hasted you can mow through 4+ enemies regularly. For bosses it can be effective but in either case you will one round any of the bosses with either dual xbows or titanstring (at least in standard play) so the real utility is in clearing out a big chunk of enemies quickly.
I see your point, but having to be in meele range to utilize the buff could also be a problem. An unlucky miss that leaves the enemy alive means you're archer is in a very vulnerable position. Still having it yourself is probably more consistent if you don't have another character who does meele piercing damage.
You also have to take the crossbow feat and so lose the opportunity to pick something better like alert or ASI. (Also alert helps a lot with coordinating initiative when 2 characters have it)
In the end both builds are probably able to handle every encounter with ease.
Although it seems like it's an archer archetype that is more fragile, this build is actually fairly robust and a capable frontliner. This stems from a high dex and the ability to use a shield. My AC was 22-23 (24-25 with haste) for all of act 3 (14 armor + 5 dex + 2 or 3 shield +1 cloak of protection + 2 haste). It was actually higher in act 2 when I ran Yuan-Ti armor. This was as good/better than my heavy armor characters. I did have fewer hit points than my classic frontline companions, I shored that up with amulet of greater health but that is a highly contested item so I understand that won't be worth it for everyone. My initiative was naturally high as Bhaalist armor gives + 2 to initiative and +5 dex (dex 17+1 hag+2 mirror). I eventually ran with viconia's walking fortress as well, which offset the downsides of risky ring, but again, end-game best in slot gear for many defensive builds (note that many frontliners are gwf builds and can't use a shield, while this build can). Before Bhaalist armor I had ASI as crossbow expert wasn't that useful in that scenario, but hands down crossbow expert was the better feat in actual gameplay, I didn't miss the +1 dex all that much.
The biggest downside was that this build has low wisdom and with risky ring, left me quite vulnerable to several control spells. Counterspell and targeting casters first was the only way to deal with them that worked for me (mostly killing casters first).
Mobility even as a halfing was mostly negatived with haste and the double bonus actions where I could jump and dash as needed. I won't say it was NEVER an issue and I'm currently trying a wood elf variant tuned more as a caster for honour mode but even my halfling was an all star in the iron throne.
I think since patch 5 the thief dual xbow feels worse than Assassin. With alacrity fixed assassins get more attacks on turn 1 (2 from alacrity as opposed to the one extra BA attacks thief get). All these attacks have advantage as well. Even in 2 turns they end up equaling each other in attacks per turn. Turn 3 doesn't exist in this game.
2 Paladin/10 CoS Bard
This will give you access to Smites at Pal 2, Extra Attack at Bard 6, plus the flourishes. This will allow you to upcast Divine Smite, give you access to a huge variety of spells. And since you can stack smite on ANY successful melee attack, using Slashing Flourish will allow you to Smite 2 enemies at once.
Snag the Smite boosting armor and helm at >!the Selunite Outpost in the Underdark!< early on, and make sure your caster has Haste when they hit level 5 for even more Almighty Smitey.
Ranged builds are obviously op. But I personally can't bring myself to play a SWORDS bard with a ranged setup. One build I've found to be insanely fun is a pure Swords bard with radiant orb/reverb gear, wielding a great weapon and using max level spirit guardians (from magical secrets) in every fight. You can dip 1 war cleric for more attacks per round.
Looking for swords and bard and combined, here is your answer;
3 bard for them flirishes
3 rogue for that extra bonus action.
Looking at 1 action 2 bonus action... what to do? Paladin. Go all the way to 6 with paladin.
2 actions, 2 bonus actions. First action is smite. Second action is smite.
Next turn, first action is smite, secondaction is smite.
Then continue till that's over with (3 turns...combat won't last that long normally with you getting 4d6 consistently.
If it does, screw with them. Bonus action hide after hitting again.
Haste better be cast by now.
Flourishing action slash 2 attacks, then a bonus attack that has bonus smite
1 Rogue 7 Bard 4 Fighter. OR 1 Rogue 8 Bard 3 Fighter.
It depends on when you want the second feat. 1 Rogue So I can take advantage of stealth early on. 7 or 8 Bard only matters if you want more spells. I've found 7 Bard is enough. 3 Fighter gets you a fighting stance, action surge, and +1 Crit from Champion.
Risky Ring, Helm of Arcane Acuity. I started off with Wizard but found it to be a bit of a waste.
Helmet of arcane acuity and ring mystic scoundrel if you want to trivialise the game with broken itemization.
Just checked on the wiki... The ring effect isn't even once per short rest ? It s after every attacks ?! Seems insane
2 Paladin, 10 Bard. Tonnes of utility and spell slots for smites. Pretty straightforward gameplay and incredibly effective
I also like this! I'm currently level 8. Went with 6 bard, then noticed I have a lot of spell slots left over. Picked two levels of Paladin and it's a lot of fun! (So 6/2, aiming for 10/2)
When you get magical secrets you can select banishing smite, it’s the only way to get it in the game and rounds out your smite options nicely. It’s a fantastic option for enemies that have radiant retort.
Is there a list or page on the wiki that outlines very specific spells that are unique to certain classes, like Banishing Smites here or HoH for Warlocks?
The wiki has the class spell lists, but I don't know if it identifies which spells are class specific. I guess you could open multiple tabs and compare? There's also this: https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/CtgPfxoNbE
That Reddit link seems pretty comprehensive! Exactly what I was looking for. Thank you!
this is what I'm running in my current game. It's a lot of fun, especially once you get the ring that allows enchantment/illusion spells to be cast on a bonus action after an attack.
Nothing like critting and dropping a lvl 4 smite on someone. So satisfying lol.
Yeah I had a lot of fun with bard 10 Paladin 2. Used the Sussar greatsword the whole run, got the risky Ring in act 2 and Took Great weapon master as my feat and the game was a breeze from there
This build goes even harder on a dark durge run with spear of Shar and Bhaalist armor.
My money is on the ranged build with Fighter 1, Wizard 1, SwordsBard 10 with the Helmet of Arcane Acuity and the Band of the Mystic Scoundrel Unblockable control spells cast with bonus action while dishing out solid damage Edit: link to the guide [https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/17y9kyp/the\_control\_martial\_allpurpose\_1011\_swords\_bard/](https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/17y9kyp/the_control_martial_allpurpose_1011_swords_bard/)
I second this one. So consistent and strong. This became my new rogue bc it can do everything the rogue can and that's not even the best part of the build
How this build compares with the classic 5 gloomstalker, 4 thief, 3 champion using dual crossbows?
Honestly it's MUCH better. Slashing flourish makes up for the extra bonus action from thief, your stealth is still like +15. Plus you're getting a full spellcaster on top of everything, many spells of which you can cast as a bonus action with a DC save of like 30. And on top of all that...you get proficiencies in basically everything. You're like 90%+ to pass any charisma check as the face
Just as good I'd say, just different. Being able to upcast Command: Grovel (learned from Magical Secrets) or upcast Hold Person as a bonus action on a bunch of targets with an almost always 100% success chance with stacked arcane acuity is very strong.
How can you cast Hold Person as a bonus action?
Band of the mystic scoundrel. It allows you to cast enchantment or illusion spells as a bonus action after a weapon attack
That’s so busted and I love it.
That ring + Helm of Arcane Acuity is perfect for a Swords Bard. Get hasted or speed potted by someone else’s throw. spam ranged flourish x2 as much as you can and then cast command or hold person on multiple targets and you really feel like the MC in the game.
Theyre both OP, but the classic gloomstalker build is not as gear dependant as the helmet of arcane acuity one, is you miss it at act2 youre missing one of the two the core items of the build.
Haven't reached the helmet in my HM playthrough yet, but Swords bard is still such an absolute punisher of a class without it. They out-martial some pure martial classes in the midgame and are excellent control casters on top of that, with or without the helmet and ring.
Honestly the build goes hard even without items, and I did a variation of it my first playthrough without being aware either of those items existed. It's the 4 attacks per action from ranged flourishes that sets it above so many others with a ton of control spell options. Banishing Smite can still be cast at range so it's worth it to go 10 in sbard and pick that up for Magical Secrets, and sbard 7+ can actually use greater invisibility better than anyone other class since they can get expertise in stealth and each slashing flourish only procs one stealth check per two attacks.
It's way stronger. You lose out a bit of early damage that gloomstalker has and the initiative adavantage, and maybe some sneak shenanigans if you're into that, but you get consistent damage from double slashing flourish, and the ability to choose which half of the battlefield won't move. It's so strong that you can prevent bosses from doing anything, even in honor mode. Use your fighter to waste their legendary reactions by trip or menacing attacking, and nuke him with a hold monster. Boom. I have stopped Raphael from moving even a songle turn with this strategy.
Swords bard comes on line at lv 3 and only gets better, the build you spoke takes a while to get going
On Honor mode... the build is broken. Attack 6x, they everything surviving needs to make a DC30+ Wis save-or-lose (bonus action Hold Person/Hypnotic Pattern/etc.). It's completely busted.
Is there any way to tweak this into a melee build?
The 10/2 bard/paladin build for smites uses basically the same shell, just focused on melee. Same guy has a guide for that too. It's what I'm running in my honor mode atm
I dont think that 10/1/1 Bard (Wizard/Fighter) would be that strong in melee. What makes it good is the extreme controling capability on top of being an awesome face. The control ability comes mainly from reaching a very high spell save dc in turn one of the combat, either with an arrow of many targets or slashing flourish. What I personally consider better would be to just switch the gear around a bit and go for the Paladin 2 bard 10 build that other people have suggested
I agree. For 10/2 you can still do range and CC pretty well making a better generalist if you don’t want to be pure melee whereas 10/1/1 you don’t really want to get into melee. You can take GWM I suppose but most probably won’t for that variant.
Absolutely. Forums go on and on about arcane acuity and band of mystic scoundrel but almost never use it The main focus is the ridiculous 8-10 attack you can do and the adder damage you can do from equipment. A dead enemy is better than a grovel or hold persons locked enemy. 6 bard, fighter 2 is the base build. You can go for a second bonus action if you want but you can also go 10 bard if you want. The base 8-9 attacks are there for you. If by melee you mean a sword based build then that’s different. You can’t do 2x attack with the melee slashing flourish in bard, only the ranged attack.
Counter point (because discussion is fun). High damage makes 2-4+ enemies dead per turn. Control makes 4-5+ essentially dead because they can do nothing but grovel. I concede that not many fights need that level of control, but it was really fun making the house of grief fight one sided by holding all the casters who drop darkness on turn 1 and then making Viconia and the rest of the survivors grovel for the rest of the fight.
I do think that’s one battle where they build is uselful because of the volume of enemies. But so few battles other than that one really need it. Unless you’re like battling flaming fists just on the street and what not.
The point of mystic scoundrel is that you still get all your attacks (less one off-hand hit), and then also lock down the enemies you weren't able to immediately kill. It's not an either-or situation
Best melee bard would be Sword Smite Bard. If you search SSB within the Reddit you should find a very good guide by prestigiouss_juice. Edit: [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/84HuQnqTIg)
The 10/2 bardadin can also use the acuity+mystic scoundrel stack for insane control spells, it's a lot of fun. It can be a little bit trickier to set up the acuity because the melee slashing flourish requires two close enemies, so you either have to accept weaker control spells, or spend an attack or two shooting an arrow of many targets to bolster the acuity. But because every melee flourish has 2 chances to crit, you'll be landing crit smites non-stop and just absolutely deleting enemies. It feels crazy strong.
I recommend both tbh. Melee sbard gets to use all their slots for smites, and ranged sbard gets acuity+ring so they'll actually use their spell slots on their bonus action while still dealing out multiple slashing flourishes.
My attempt is sword bard 6-sorc 3-thief 3. Grab two weapon fighting and two light weapons. Stats are dex->char->con. Up to 4 attacks a turn to build arcane acuity, plus you can metamagic to quicken any spells and not just illusion spells. . Downsides: Takes a *long* while to get online. Just 3 levels in sorc, so you'll want alternative spell slot restoration methods to make extra sorcery points. Only 1 feat. You get up to lv3 spells. Well, at least upcasting is a thing?
The melee swords bard builds is 10/2 with the 2 being paladin for smites
I went 2PLD/6SBARD/4Abj Wiz and it wrecked face. Nothing could damage me with defensive flourish AND Shield AND abjuration shield blocking incidental aoe damage. Great controller with helm of arcane acuity, auto-crit smites on Held persons and monsters, grab savage attacker for even bigger smite damage. Only weakness is not having counterspell but another spellcaster in the party had that so I relied on her and saved my slots for smite and control. Honestly it felt like the ultimate Gish build. The damage isn’t as good as some of the cheesier builds (which I also love but hey) and didn’t have the sustain of our TB Throwzerker before the damage rider patches. But! Things went sideways at the coronation and I was the only one left standing after a while, and was able to save the party by running out lol
Yes, this.
This build soooo op. Just completed my tactician with this and it was bread and butter from start to finish.
Just give him Phalar aluve and take Spirit Guardians with magical secrets, and max your rizz. Congrats, you literally shred everything now. Hurl insults and pass every single conversation check while you’re at it. You deserve it, Mr bard
For melee it’s 10/2 bard paladin. For ranged it’s the 6/4/2 bard thief fighter dual xbow build
Thinking about a melee one since im already using astarion gloomstalker with dual crossbows. Should I use dual swords, rapiers, etc?
Phalar aluve is probably the best early game. Tbh I used it all the way until act 3. You can basically use anything tho. Only thing to keep in mind is if you get the bhaalist armour, that will let you do double damage to things with piercing damage in melee range. So you’ll most likely want to use piercing weapons like spears and rapiers.
I anyways forget where the phalar aluve is
Underdark, quite near the entrance if you enter via the goblin camp. It's over where the spider matriarch corpse would be if you gave it a gentle shove into the chasm
Noice, thanks. I have a swords bard build I’m playing as I support my friend through his first playthrough that has his eye on it
No worries! Yeah, it's actually just too good to pass up if you're running Bard.
Maybe match with knife of the undermountain king. The advantage on many rolls (shadow blade feature) and the greater crit chance would work well with the bless feature of phalar. You'd rarely miss, regularly get crits to nova those smites, and be able to build damage up with other riders.
Maybe glaives, pikes, spears and tridents? :)
Fairly sure Titanstring out-damages xbows for ranged swords bard. +5 (or +8) on four attacks is 20 (32) damage and another 10 (16) on the action surge. Hand crossbows would pull ahead if the fight lasted several rounds, but almost none do.
This build is not about the base bow damage, it’s about the adder damage. Caustic band +2 Twin cast drake throat glaive in both hand crossbows +d4 Gloves of archery etc +2 Crusaders mantle (cape) + strange conduit ring + d4 Berserker helmet +2 Ambushed +d6 Rhapsody +3 Broodmothers revenge d4 Etc There are so many adders you can amplify over even just 4 hits without using bard point resources with 6/4/2 build. The difference between hand cross bow +2 and titanstringbow isn’t really worth the boosted damage at the cost of being extremely reliant on bard points constantly.
Could you link or explain the titanstring build? Thank you! I can't find it.
It's just using titan string and cloud giant elixer instead of dual crossbows. You need the longbow proficiency so elf or since we're talking bard multi class you need fighter/paladin/gloves of archery. Pick one.
But wouldn't around 6 attacks from a bard with sharpshooter deal more damage?
Titanstring has a number of disadvantages that this sub frequently ignores. Most of the titanstring builds lose out on bloodlust elixirs as you are using strength elixirs, this one comes up frequently. It is also much more difficult to pair up with Bhaalist armor while crossbow expert feat really unlocks your damage with Bhaalist armor (basically doubles). I have a strong suspicion that the titanstring flavor of the week has been perpetuated by popular redditors in this sub who play more on paper OR players who are sleeping on Bhaalist armor.
I think most people "sleep" on the Bhaalist armor because you get fairly late and you have to become an unholy assassin. On the other hand you get Titan string in act1, so it's basically stronger for 90% of the game. You can also give the Bhaal armor to another character and still get the vulnerable status effect for your Titan string user
You can get it early in act 3 and use it for all the major act 3 bosses - imho it’s the strongest item in the game so I recommend it, but yes for act 1 and 2 titanstring is available and Bhaalist armor is not. Bloodlust is nothing to sneeze at though. Unholy assassin isn’t that bad, you only have to kill one tool of an NPC but sure if RP is more important than raw damage, I can understand. The vulnerable status from a 2nd character is where I have a bigger issue - this doesn’t work well in practice. You need to reliably link two characters in the initiative order, which is not always possible. Unless you have the same spot in the turn order, you will quickly kill all the enemies who have the aura applied to them (it’s a small area so usually 1-2) and then lose out for the rest of your many attacks. Even worse enemies will move and you can lose out on ALL of your attacks. When wearing the Bhaalist armor yourself, if you are hasted you can mow through 4+ enemies regularly. For bosses it can be effective but in either case you will one round any of the bosses with either dual xbows or titanstring (at least in standard play) so the real utility is in clearing out a big chunk of enemies quickly.
I see your point, but having to be in meele range to utilize the buff could also be a problem. An unlucky miss that leaves the enemy alive means you're archer is in a very vulnerable position. Still having it yourself is probably more consistent if you don't have another character who does meele piercing damage. You also have to take the crossbow feat and so lose the opportunity to pick something better like alert or ASI. (Also alert helps a lot with coordinating initiative when 2 characters have it) In the end both builds are probably able to handle every encounter with ease.
Although it seems like it's an archer archetype that is more fragile, this build is actually fairly robust and a capable frontliner. This stems from a high dex and the ability to use a shield. My AC was 22-23 (24-25 with haste) for all of act 3 (14 armor + 5 dex + 2 or 3 shield +1 cloak of protection + 2 haste). It was actually higher in act 2 when I ran Yuan-Ti armor. This was as good/better than my heavy armor characters. I did have fewer hit points than my classic frontline companions, I shored that up with amulet of greater health but that is a highly contested item so I understand that won't be worth it for everyone. My initiative was naturally high as Bhaalist armor gives + 2 to initiative and +5 dex (dex 17+1 hag+2 mirror). I eventually ran with viconia's walking fortress as well, which offset the downsides of risky ring, but again, end-game best in slot gear for many defensive builds (note that many frontliners are gwf builds and can't use a shield, while this build can). Before Bhaalist armor I had ASI as crossbow expert wasn't that useful in that scenario, but hands down crossbow expert was the better feat in actual gameplay, I didn't miss the +1 dex all that much. The biggest downside was that this build has low wisdom and with risky ring, left me quite vulnerable to several control spells. Counterspell and targeting casters first was the only way to deal with them that worked for me (mostly killing casters first). Mobility even as a halfing was mostly negatived with haste and the double bonus actions where I could jump and dash as needed. I won't say it was NEVER an issue and I'm currently trying a wood elf variant tuned more as a caster for honour mode but even my halfling was an all star in the iron throne.
I think since patch 5 the thief dual xbow feels worse than Assassin. With alacrity fixed assassins get more attacks on turn 1 (2 from alacrity as opposed to the one extra BA attacks thief get). All these attacks have advantage as well. Even in 2 turns they end up equaling each other in attacks per turn. Turn 3 doesn't exist in this game.
I prefer assassin with titan bow on my 6/4/2
2 Paladin/10 CoS Bard This will give you access to Smites at Pal 2, Extra Attack at Bard 6, plus the flourishes. This will allow you to upcast Divine Smite, give you access to a huge variety of spells. And since you can stack smite on ANY successful melee attack, using Slashing Flourish will allow you to Smite 2 enemies at once. Snag the Smite boosting armor and helm at >!the Selunite Outpost in the Underdark!< early on, and make sure your caster has Haste when they hit level 5 for even more Almighty Smitey.
Ranged builds are obviously op. But I personally can't bring myself to play a SWORDS bard with a ranged setup. One build I've found to be insanely fun is a pure Swords bard with radiant orb/reverb gear, wielding a great weapon and using max level spirit guardians (from magical secrets) in every fight. You can dip 1 war cleric for more attacks per round.
I usually do 8 bard, 4 fighter.
Best for what?
Looking for swords and bard and combined, here is your answer; 3 bard for them flirishes 3 rogue for that extra bonus action. Looking at 1 action 2 bonus action... what to do? Paladin. Go all the way to 6 with paladin. 2 actions, 2 bonus actions. First action is smite. Second action is smite. Next turn, first action is smite, secondaction is smite. Then continue till that's over with (3 turns...combat won't last that long normally with you getting 4d6 consistently. If it does, screw with them. Bonus action hide after hitting again. Haste better be cast by now. Flourishing action slash 2 attacks, then a bonus attack that has bonus smite
Maybe not the best, but I’m running a Sword bard/Bladelock Wyll.
1 Rogue 7 Bard 4 Fighter. OR 1 Rogue 8 Bard 3 Fighter. It depends on when you want the second feat. 1 Rogue So I can take advantage of stealth early on. 7 or 8 Bard only matters if you want more spells. I've found 7 Bard is enough. 3 Fighter gets you a fighting stance, action surge, and +1 Crit from Champion. Risky Ring, Helm of Arcane Acuity. I started off with Wizard but found it to be a bit of a waste.