Hi everyone,

I'm sure you've all had your fill of "help me make decisions about my character!" threads, but hopefully you'll indulge me for just this one more. I've searched through the forums and found a lot of advice to new players deciding on classes, but none of them quite addressed my own issues.

I'm mostly new to IRE games, though I played Imperian for a month or so and enjoyed it well enough. I've been lured back by a friend who's heavily involved in Achaea, but also really recommended Lusternia. It looks like a lot of fun, and I was particularly excited about the (apparently relatively new) ability to play as a bard, which is one of my favorite character types in roleplaying games.

Judging by the forums though, no one seems particularly pleased with their current implementation here, and everyone seems to advise new players to stay away from them. Maybe I'm just stubborn, but I have to ask, is it really that bad? I'm more interested in roleplaying than pvp or bashing (though I'd like to do those too!) and I'm up for a challenge if bards don't fare particularly well in those departments, and really I prefer to play support-role characters (buffers and healers in various other games) rather than a front-lines fighter.

I'd love to hear any advice, opinions, or info on the various bard guilds and their newbie-friendliness or lack thereof. Are any of them more populous than others? Do any of them have more or less of an RP bent? I'm pretty sure I could get into a character that suits any of the cities or communes, so that's not so much a concern for me.

Thanks so much in advance, and I look forward to meeting everyone!

The 'stay away from bards' was before they got glamours. Glamours actually makes bards a lot stronger, even stronger than other archetypes.

Can't say anything about the RP of the bard guilds, though.

yes, there are actually a lot of people saying their skills need toned down right now, but they seem pretty close to where they need to be... and they can be very good, and fun to play.

rp-wise i can only speak of what i've seen from the harbingers, but i know they do a really nice job with things and have group concerts and other such events. i'm sure the other guilds do similar things and they all have access to illusions, which is a lovely skillset for supporting any rp you can think up

Bards are actually not as bad as the forums will make them sound. They used to be pretty bad, but the admins reviewed some suggestions, tweaked some skills, and added a whole new skills that make bards pretty good. The bard music specializations are actually pretty good buffs for allies and affect enemies in big ways, especially fighting in groups. Bards are also considered the best bashers in the game by most people. I don't know much about PvP but I hear bards do fairly well.

As the the various bard guilds, the Spiritsingers are the most populous and from what I hear they have good RP going and some very caring guild leaders. The Harbingers also have an okay population. Nowhere near as big as the Spiritsingers, but not too terrible. Like Hyrtakos said, they have little performances and concerts and care about their newbies a lot. I don't know much about the Cantors or Cacophony, so hopefully one of them will post something here.

Our guild, the Cantors, is usually small, but at certain peak times in the day we can have a large gathering, even if only temporarily. There haven't been any public performances for a while that I can think of. I'd like to see the other members in our guild do their own performances but that doesn't always happen, as I myself am feeling like I'm running out of creative juices too. Hopefully with this semi-big production we're working on it'll encourage people to do more. We have lots of resources for novices, and novices have the option of either training themselves or having a personal guide along with them (from experience though most just do the former). If I or one of the undersecs are around then we try to make novices comfortable and answer questions without intruding too much, though generally things are very quiet.

Monks > Bards for bashing. For group bashing, some of the bard guilds have nice songs though.

The Cacophony is very small. We have trouble retaining novices because many times when they join, there is no one else logged in who can welcome them. But our RP is splendid, if you like the RP of sophisticated, intelligent evil. I am the GM, and about often, and am attempting to make a lot of changes that will hopefully improve our low numbers. Because bards are not popular, and Magnagora is the less populous city, you can imagine how that affects our numbers.

So, of course I greatly encourage you to come try the Cacophony -- if you attempt to find RP, and seek it out, you will find great stuff. But that's the thing, you have to make the effort; whereas in other places it may just pop up. But Linaeve really makes a point to interact with the novices. And since we are so small, there is a lot of room for advancement and a lot of positions that will need filling, if you're into working and helping to shape a guild.

Hope to see you there

This goes for all the guilds! We can't Linaeve steal you away with her promises of awesomeness.

All the bard guilds are crazy small, so it's easy to become known in any of them- you won't be fighting for attention (at least in the Cantors). I love being a bard, and I encourage giving it a shot. For the most part, they can't tank for crap compared to other guilds, but they can hit reasonably hard and fast once you get maestro on your instrument, making them quite decent at bashing and at pvp. They're also good for influence with their +2 cha skill thats pretty low in one of the skillsets... music I think? There's lots of room for rp (nothing has really been history-defined for any of the guilds).

I recommend learning illusions/glamours over tarot and ecology. They're quite amazing in combat, and rather fun to play with outside of combat...

Bards are good in that their attack gets stronger the more you play your instrument, as opposed to growing stronger the more lessons you spend in Music.

The bard guilds are small enough that they appreciate all their members so lots of room to make yourself known!

*inno*

Bards are fun, and Glamours are cool.
I just dislike how Glamours is becoming the bard's 'Psionics' skillset, where Tarot and Ecology are never chosen, because Glamours is TOO good. Even Music pales in comparison (and although I love Illusions, that just isn't right).

Oh, and don't let anyone fool you, Bards are like paper. We're physically the weakest archetype, which makes bashing difficult.

We are like paper, but we have skills to compensate for that.

Eh, I had Illusions before, instead of Ecology, because of the RP possibilities. Ecology was the only sure way (to my knowledge) to PK, so nearly everyone else had it. Tarot wasn't an option, as I was in Serenwilde. I'm glad Glamours is actually useful, though, and I'll take it if I ever get the chance.

Log on and lend me the medallion Or at least hug me...

Bards can summon rats!!!

That is all

not true.

they can summon weevils too.

Easily one of the top 3 coolest skills, behind Tent and Hermit tarot.

It would be if it were an instant kill.

Acrune has been gnawed to death by the plague of rats under Estwald's control.

Spiritsingers has some very performance-oriented people like Lendren and Ialie. Lendren's pretty heavy on play production, too.

Taking Illusions well let you do some pretty nifty things- make messages appear whenever someone enters the ream, weave full-coloured illusions with a delay. Perfect to accompany performances with.