I’m going to be playing a bard in an upcoming game. I want to focus on storytelling as my art, with some simple ballads and chanting, maybe a bodhran drum or war horn, spurring my allies to action with stolen orcish war chants or inspirational dwarven stories of past triumph. I like the traditional image of the bard in the tavern, telling stories and learning local colour, but with a bit more grit, and less magic.
I could play with the standard bard, to make it a bit less magicky, or do the Awful Good one, or the Skald that I’ve seen on here, though that one seems a bit more directly combat oriented than the others… My question I suppose, is what are you favourite bards, and have you encountered a playbook that might be suited to what I’m describing above?
Having played both the standard and the Awful Good, the AG is way more fun and supports the kind of bard you’re picturing much better.
Tam H made this…
drive.google.com – The Celtic Bard.pdf
Thanks, both of you!
Well, if you reflavor the Arcane Art move to give it less of a magical feel, I don’t see the Bard as overly magicky.
+1d4 Forward could very well be due to moral
Healing could be “reinvigorating energy” or force of will
Mind shaken can be just a “psychanalist speech” to “snap out of it”
etc.
Moves that allows to make damage (Metal Hurlant, for e.g.) could be morale hit (think Maori’s hakka that tells their enemies about how there’re going to eat them).
So we had our session 0 last night, and I set up my AG bard. Works perfectly in the context of the very low-magic world that my GM has created, with a few minor flavour tweaks. He’s a street thug turned musical scholar who is collecting powerful stories and songs from across the world in order to better understand his mysterious gift for languages. He plays the bodhran. This is going to be fun. 🙂