#5e bard

[zephyrbug]

It’s time to take your final bow♦️🃏🎪

First Art Fight attack of the year for @plaguecleric !! Wanted to start with something dramatic and I knew Bonnie would be the perfect fit!!

[rizzledazzle]

Dragonborn Bard

[crunchetime]

SOLOMONA / “MONA” (any pronouns)

Kalashtar Bard - College of Spirits

Speaks with the dead. Dates ghosts sometimes. Probably knows what you had for lunch. Genderfluid icon.

D&D OCs - Redesigns - Set 1 #11(edited)

[lutethebodies]

OC Questions - Lost Singer Edition, Pt. 4

I was tagged for this ask game by @mogruith (whose post for Coranzan is here; anyone else, please tag yourselves if you wish). Gonna go with three of the same numbers that my asker picked for their post, and with three substantial answers for Cannor because he'll fit those particular questions better than my other characters. Note that most of my answers for him will reference his home turf (my original homebrew 5e setting), but some can translate to BG3. Goodies (with plenty of supporting links) are under the cut as always:

👕 Appearance Is there someone your character tries to look similar to?

In-world: Cannor has his own look, but his original inspiration to be a bard was fatefully catalyzed one night in Caranacia, the City of Fortune and his adopted home. He was young—about 11 or so—and earning his keep (in various good and bad ways) at the Wandering Star tavern as a general errand-boy when the venue was graced by famed traveling bard and notorious curmudgeon Ruqirt Al-Zeem (aka “Raz the Rambler”). The venerable foreign minstrel-poet captivated our impressionable future hero. "I was in the front row, and he looked at me." Cannor has clumsily modeled his self-centered, idiosyncratic, and dubiously truthful creativity on Raz ever since.

Meta: It may be hilariously and pathetically uncool by today's standards, but I don't care because it works for him: Cannor's look was originally based on early-'90s Sting and Bono (with ego and parental issues to match), but he's long since settled into something more like Gabriel Byrne from the same period. The popped collar is the tell.

📦 Objects Is there an item your character is embarrassed they own or want?

He is embarrassed to own, but will never part with, what he calls his "Redstone Ring" (mechanically, a Ring of Protection) because it symbolizes his exile and related life lessons. The dull-red, snake-shaped sardonyx jewel originally belonging to Lady Esadora Errocamesi of House Redstone, Cannor's one-time patron/lover and daughter of Caranacia's Supreme Councillor. Cannor had been splitting his time performing and dabbling in spycraft for the Equiposium, a diplomatic academy and intelligence arm of the city's Ruling Council. It was a risky but lucrative living, and for six years he swaggered and caroused through increasingly lofty circles while informing on competing guilds, rich nobles, and official institutions.

Fate caught him after Cannor discovered Lady Esa had another paramour—Zafraia of Enancia, a fellow Equiposian agent. The resulting scandal explosively convulsed Caranacia for two days as the rival spies dueled across the city until Lord Redstone's authorities and Equiposian assassins came after them. Both escaped with help: Zaf fled east with Tramontine smugglers, and Cannor sneaked out of the city in disguise on "official Redstone business" using Lady Esa's snake ring, which she gave him for that purpose and as a placating token of favor (he was officially banished from the city). Cannor stowed away on a northbound Klasi ship, eventually landing in Saithaaven as an exile.

🤝 Community and Relationships How comfortable would your character be singing and dancing in front of others?

He's a bard, so comfortable enough. But it's not that simple, so to answer I'll steal from a previous post, "Music is a Tool." For Cannor, performance is a means to an end. "Music, songwriting, stories, poetry—those are tools," he once told Ruy, "for clawing back some control from a world that constantly wants to take it away." Cannor went on to explain that creativity was essential for sanity and stability when dealing with reality. His song arrangements were considerably simplified from their various sources and influences, but his lyrics were compelling.

He preferred to write and sing his own story “because I figured nobody else would” rather than perform traditionally popular heroic epics, romantic ballads, or other troubadour clichés. Predictably, this didn’t get him many gigs, so he had to fight "the war to make people care." His methods involved what other minstrels might dismiss as "amateur incompetence" or even “cheating," but which could also be desribed as different and more unique skills than most in his trade. Cannor happily employed simple magic to change his instrument’s octave, for example, or to make it echo and resonate within whatever space he performed.

That instrument, the Savansi bailágrima, is an oversized, teardrop-shaped ebony-and-rosewood cittern. It creates low and resonant tones emphasizing the percussive, rhythmic style of the Floodlands. Cannor eschewed extended instrumental passages—his “stone fingers” produced rudimentary plucking and strumming—but a basic accompaniment structure allowed for more improvisation and storytelling, which suited his “semi-autobiographical” lyrics much better. His own life experiences (adventure, love, loss, conflict, renown, power, glory, shame, infamy) became as engaging as any hero’s tale.

I'll stop there but echo my asker: "if you are dying to talk about your OCs and we're mutuals, please don't feel shy about doing this and tagging me" and add a caveat: roll a d8 to see which of my characters will give you lore galore.

[orcbardneeul]

Is Neeul a "went to college" Bard or is he a "Learned through trial-and-error + pillow talks with spellcasters he hooked up with" Bard?

Neither! I actually have a canon, world-building answer for this, and amazingly, it isn't even horny! (sorry if that's disappointing.)

Neeul's bard spells work by channeling the Legacy or "Spirit" of notable orcs of history. The war songs, chants and ballads that are passed down through his tribe's story-keeper are what make up each of his spells.

It isn't, strictly speaking, directly channeling their spirits the way a cleric [or necromancer] would summon them from the after life. He could, in fact, summon the "spirit" of an orc who is still alive. But the idea is that the story of the Orc's actions and deeds (whether good or bad) get cemented into a powerful Legacy, which the songs then manifest into affecting real change in Neeul's surroundings.

So for example, Heat Metal is a story about an orcish blacksmith whose forge burned hotter than the sun, Dissonant Whispers tells of a chieftain who, plagued by paranoia, abandoned his tribe. So on and so forth.

Interestingly, as is the case with real life, Stories can be more powerful than the Truth. Many of these songs have changed over the years, ranging from details getting lost or exaggerated, up to fiction getting recorded as fact. But nonetheless, these stories are powerful tools and important to Neeul's culture.

Thank you for coming to my OrcTalk!!!

[thehomelybrewster]

College of Persiflage

"Persiflage is an old and prestigious art among bards, but few gain the mastery of it required to be considered College of Persiflage bards. It requires a mastery of the written word, comedic timing, and audacity that is hard to acquire and devoting yourself to spoofing and parodying the powerful can be a dangerous game to play. It is however a rewarding one, as satire is incredibly popular among the common folk, who see bards of this College as a source of respite and, sometimes, as inspiration for social change."

The first of my batch of subclasses I had originally intended to publish on DMsGuild. Turn enemy fumbles into opportunities for cantrip-based attacks, bolster your allies with your spells, and sharpen your bard's mind with the College of Persiflage!

Sidenote: While the key subclass feature, Heckler's Quip, was obviously designed around vicious mockery, you can also use it well with cantrips like true strike or cantrips you gain through other means, like a racial feature! A kobold with the Draconic Sorcery background feature could for example use fire bolt with this feature!

[littlesapphirereaper]

Another commission that was done, been a while though. I definitely had a fun learning experience with this one, both for pathfinder and bunny anatomy! Did you know they don't have beans?

[cocoshomebrew]

That's my epic tale, Our champion prevailed, Defeated the villain, Now pour him some ale!

This is my first bard subclass! It was a lot of fun to make and I'm really pleased with the end result. The College of Hunters teaches bards that there is no feat more valiant and worthy of song than a thrilling hunt. These bards are able to inspire their allies to help them take down fearsome foes, and even have the ability to enchant any... "memorabilia" they take from their epic battles. Bardic inspiration always struck me as being too limited in both how you can use it and how many times you can use it, so with this subclass I really tried to change that.

As always, you can grab the high quality PDF version of this subclass on my patron only dropbox (I've also just added a new patron exclusive race there!). And if you haven't pledged to my patreon yet and want to toss a coin to your homebrewer, I would appreciate the support immensely. I hope you're all managing to stay safe and sane, and that you're still finding ways to play D&D despite all the madness in the world right now. 

v2: Mark of the Hunt now affects attack and damage rolls to make it more useful, Inspiring Trophy limited to one trophy per character to avoid potential abuse of it, and Legendary Struggle revised so it now gives creatures affected by Call the Hunt temporary hit points equal to bard level.