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The Best Feats for Bards: D&D 5e 🎸 Drop the Beat, Use a Feat🎤🎵
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Oct 3, 2022
Like a proper #DND5e #Bard, I've recorded the keynotes and lyrics of this video in my article, which you can reference here (I took the notes for you): https://www.flutesloot.com/best-bard-feats-dnd-5e/?utm_source=youtube #DND characters can develop in many directions with feats, so make sure you consider your Bard's "type" so you can pick feats to push your narrative and concept. ⏰Time Stamps: 00:00 Considerations for Bard feats 01:18 "Mentalist" Bard feats 02:31 "Leadership" Bard feats 03:40 "Researcher" Bard feats 04:11 "Soothsayer" Bard feats 04:56 "Archer" Bard feats 05:34 "Defender" Bard feats 06:26 "Initiator & Controller" Bard feats 07:03 "Concentrator" Bard feats 07:28 "Polearm Gish" Bard feats 08:08 "Scimitar Gish" Bard feats 08:47 What are your favorite Bard feats? 09:25 What lyrics are stuck in your head? (sub-scry-be!) ---------
View Video Transcript
0:00
Hey looters! Today I'm going to talk about the best feats for bards in D&D 5th edition, today on Flute's Loot
0:09
See the link down in the description to find the article that accompanies this video if you want me to already take the notes for you
0:14
Or if you just like to read along while you listen to my sultry bardic voice
0:18
How do you choose feats as a bard? You already use your bonus action for a lot of bardic inspiration
0:23
You're a charisma-based class with a little bit of dex and constitution investment
0:26
A lot of bards like to get counterspell with magical secrets, so they're using their reaction
0:30
I want to keep that available. So with those minor considerations, we also keep in mind that bards are charisma-based
0:36
Again, that's one of the most common stats to build multiclassing around because paladin
0:41
sorcerer, warlock, bard, they all multiclass very well and they all can just share charisma
0:47
so that they don't have to spread out their stats too much. I'm not going to go into multiclassing in this video
0:53
I'm just going to go straight bard, what kind of feats to focus on. But bards are also very diverse in how they can be built
1:00
They are a jack of all trades. Instead of just giving you a top 10 list of what are the best feats for bards overall
1:06
I'm going to give you some concepts of what kind of bard you might try to build and what feats you might consider
1:11
You might want some stats and not just five different feats. I will give you some stats to focus on and three or four feats to go along with that concept
1:19
The first feature goes with the College of Whispers, and that's a Mentalist bard
1:22
A mentalist is someone who reads people and kind of gets them to give information and tricks them, that sort of stuff
1:28
You're a very tricky bard. Telekinetic, telepathic, and shadow-touched as your feats, and you boost your charisma with your ASIs
1:35
In addition to your soothsaying as a bard and your silver tongue, you can actually move things around with your mind, create illusions, and speak telepathically with people
1:44
Some DMs might allow you to use your bardic inspiration telepathically so that you can give bardic inspiration to an ally without actually speaking or making noise
1:53
A common scenario is the bruiser in your party is in some kind of one-on-one fight in a coliseum and you want to help, but if anyone perceives it, you're going to be in trouble
2:01
What about vicious mockery? Can you telepathically mock them viciously? Ask your DM about that because it's worth a shot
2:07
The telepathic feat in Tasha specifically has a picture that captions a bard giving inspiration to someone with telepathy
2:15
It seems like the game designers had this sort of possibility in mind. Telekinetic, you can push people around for some battlefield control with your bonus action, plus you get Mage Hand and their spell's always nice
2:24
And it's an invisible Mage Hand, you're basically an arcane trickster now. Use Shadow Touch to grab Cause Fear Silent Image or Disguise Self and then you can have a lot of fun with it The next concept is the Leader for the College of Eloquence Bard Inspiring Leader Moderately Armored Chef don stone me it just I it could be fun
2:43
And if you're a halfling, Bountiful Luck, I would take before Chef. Bountiful Luck is a great way to make friends as you allow your allies to reroll ones
2:51
Focus on charisma boosts beyond those feats. Moderately armor allows you to greatly increase your battlefield AC
2:58
so that you can have a shield and medium armor. And that allows you to stay close to some of your allies without staying too far away
3:05
so you can be a leader there in the middle of combat, dishing out bardic inspiration as needed in casting spells
3:10
Inspiring leader allows you to give scaling temporary hit points to your allies when you rest
3:14
When those run out, if you took the chef feat, then you can give your allies a bonus action option to give themselves more temporary hit points
3:20
and just keep them surviving a little bit more and more. Chef isn't a great feat, and a lot of people really don't like it
3:28
but I threw it out here because it seems like it could be a fun feat for you here
3:33
There's obviously other ones you could pick. Why don't you try thinking about it and see if Chef is something that interests you
3:38
For the temporary hit points, more than the role-playing. Anyone can cook food, come on. For another concept, we have the College of Lore Bard
3:45
This is the researcher. If you're a drow, you can take drow high magic. Otherwise, you can take Skill Expert, Fae Touched, and Shadow Touched
3:52
Fae Touched is always a good feat, so really you could put it on any of these concepts and have some fun with it
3:57
Other than the feats, focus on your charisma. This bard is all about learning as many spells as possible
4:02
Being a drow and getting drow high magic is really good because that includes spells like Dispel Magic
4:06
You also want to be good with your skills, so Skill Expert can be a great way to add some expertise and more skill proficiencies while boosting your stats
4:13
The next concept I kind of mentioned earlier is the soothsayer for the College of Glamour
4:18
You are one of those manipulators who might start a cult. You're going to need Eldritch Adept, Actor, Shadow Touched, and Fae Touched
4:25
Actor allows you to be a charlatan and pretend to be people you are not
4:29
You could do something horrible while you are in the guise of another person
4:33
Or you can manipulate a whole crowd while you are performing. You can make them think that you are someone that you are not
4:38
and they start to be prone to almost worship you. Especially if you have the Eldritch Adept feat
4:42
to cast Disguise Self over and over again with the invocation Mask of Many Faces
4:48
You can cast Disguise Self over and over with no limit with that invocation
4:51
It's really fun. Invest in some charisma beyond those feats and choose what spells make sense to you
4:56
though you might take a few enchantment and illusion spells. Next up is the College of Valor Bard and maybe you want to be an archer People have talked about bards being great archers before Here are the feats that help you be a successful archer Crossbow expert sharpshooter piercer and fighting initiate archery Basically all the feats that can help
5:13
feed into just shooting arrows or shooting crossbow bolts to deal damage. You might want to diversify
5:18
and get some spell casting or some defensive feats. Overall, this is the best way to help
5:23
yourself. Boost your dexterity probably more than your charisma because you're probably going to be
5:27
picking spells that don't rely on your charisma modifier too much, or like your spell DC, spell attacks, those sorts of things
5:33
Up your dexterity and really feed into being a powerful archer. The next concept goes for any bard college, really, and that's the defender
5:40
Moderately armored, again, gets you that medium armor and shield. Defensive duelist gives you a reaction to defend yourself with a rapier or some other finesse weapon
5:47
You can take tough just to give you more hit points. It's not always the best feat, but it is a vanilla way to just increase your hit points
5:54
And if you're a tiefling, Infernal Constitution. It's one of my favorite feats because cold and poison resistance can be very useful
6:00
especially because cold makes you immune to things like frigid water and high altitudes with freezing cold ice and snow
6:06
And it increases your constitution by one, so that's always nice too. Other than these feats, boost your charisma and make sure that your spells are going to be really successful
6:14
while you are also effective at defending yourself with your armor class being bolstered and having more hit points than usual
6:19
You'll probably want to use magical secrets to learn like the shield spell as well, so that you can just keep increasing your armor class as needed
6:25
This goes well with the College of Swords bard, who can already use a reaction to bolster its armor class
6:29
The next concept goes for, again, any bard college, the Initiator and Controller
6:33
So you want to have a high initiative and you want to control the battlefield. Alert, Fae Touched, choose Gift of Alacrity
6:38
Between Alert and Fae Touched Gift of Alacrity, you're going to have a big bonus to your initiative rolls
6:43
and your Jack of All Trades will give you another bonus to your initiative. Moderately Armored, make sure that you can defend yourself
6:49
so that you don't lose concentration on spells from just pitiful attacks hitting you because your armor class is low
6:53
Moderately armored will help you out. Beyond that, bolster your charisma so that you can be a very effective spellcaster
6:59
You can also take lucky or warcaster to make sure that you bolster your concentration
7:03
and you don't fail those constitution saving throws to maintain concentration. Speaking of concentration, any bard can become a concentrator
7:10
They focus on never losing concentration. Boost your constitution with the resilient feat and gain constitution saving throw proficiency
7:16
Warcaster, lucky, and moderately armored. Again, the armor makes it so you're harder to hit, so that you don't have to make concentration saves
7:23
Warcaster gives you advantage if you took damage and you're making a save to maintain concentration
7:27
and Lucky is just a reroll when you need it. Other than those, boost your charisma
7:31
Going back to a pullarm gish build you know a pullarm user who also casts spells we have the College of Valor Bard Take Pullarm Master Great Weapon Master Warcaster and actually boost your strength
7:43
with your ASIs. You'll be able to get in the thick of combat and deal a lot of damage with your Pullarm
7:49
Master plus Great Weapon Master combination. Warcaster allows you to cast spells as an opportunity attack, and you'll have advantage
7:55
on those concentration saves, like we mentioned before, if you took damage. The bard has some excellent concentration spells that you can be using in combat
8:02
So don't be afraid to be a Valor Bard with a little bit more armor, and be wielding a melee weapon with reach
8:07
and really dish out the damage and be a strong, hearty bard. If you didn't like the pullarm gish, how about a scimitar gish for the College of Swords bard
8:15
You want to be holding a one-handed weapon and use your blade flourishes, so what can we do with that
8:19
Defensive duelist, slasher, mobile, and boosting your dexterity and charisma will do you just fine
8:26
You don't want to sit there and melee as a bard and just let the enemy attack you back
8:30
You want to attack them, do your blade flourishes, have some fun with that. And then with mobile, move away freely and get far away
8:37
And then if they get close to you again, do the same thing. If they maintain their distance, they don't keep chasing you, cast some spells and help your allies out
8:44
Or get in, slash them some more, move back out. But you don't want to just stand there next to your enemies
8:49
So mobile is critical if you're a College of Swords bard. So those are my thoughts on bard subclasses and just general concepts for bards and how I've seen people want to build them or ideas I've had for how to build them
9:00
What do you think of these ideas? You could obviously swap some bard feats in and out. Some people would just say take alert and fey touched and then whatever, you know
9:08
But I wanted to give you some more ideas for those who don't just like to go down the most taken feats, you know
9:13
You don't just want lucky on every single character you make. Are there feats you really enjoyed playing as a bard
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Either for any of the builds I suggested that you think a feat might be a good one to swap into those
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or maybe for some other concept that you came up with or a feat that you just thought was fun
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regardless of what kind of build you were doing as a bard. Leave those thoughts in a comment below, or if you don't have anything to say, just post the lyrics to a song
9:34
A song that's stuck in your head, go post the lyrics in the comments because that's what bards do, right
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They sing, so let's sing in the comment section. I hope you'll consider subscribing and liking before you go because that helps us to interact again in the future
9:47
And like any bard, we like to have an encore. And so I'd like to have an encore with our other videos for you
9:54
Have a fantastic adventure this weekend and I'll see you in the next video. Bye
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