Bard versus Fighter/Mage progression charts

[suy]

A Bard, specially a Blade, is often compared to a Fighter/Mage (or even Fighter/Mage/Thief). Both have their pros and cons, of course. But I've always wanted to visualize how the fast level progression of a Bard goes against the slow one of a Mage, specially a multiclassed one. Remember that the Bard or Mage levels determine the caster level, so spells that scale with level (e.g. Skull Trap, Chromatic Orb) will be more powerful by a Bard, even if it can cast less. But how much? Likewise for THAC0. As a Bard your THAC0 only improves by one each 2 levels. Does it lag behind so much? Well, here are some charts!

The first one is from 0 to 161k XP (the BG1EE cap):

Notice how the base THAC0 is very briefly better for a Bard (though irrelevant, given that a F/M can get proficiency bonuses), but it soon lags behind. The caster level, however, soon ramps up, and ends up being level 10, compared to the 7th level cap for the F/M.

Bumping the cap to include SoD, we have:

Now compare the builds throughout most Baldur's Gate 2 (from 161k to 3M XP, which was the cap in the original SoA).

Differences start to shine! The level progression of the Mage gets stuck a little bit, while the Bard remains strong at gaining levels fast. The THAC0, however, doesn't favor the Bard, even less than before. Since it cannot improve beyond 10 base THAC0, it gets stuck, and the F/M is gonna keep gaining distance at fighting. Remember that the chart is only about base THAC0. The F/M is gonna be much better because fighting because the bonus to damage and the extra attacks (which will improve even further at 2.5M when it reaches level 13).

Now let's look at the very late game, till the cap in ToB. This is from 1M to 8M XP:

As you can see the trend continued almost the same. The end result is often easier to compare, and probably not that surprising, except for the odd XP gap required to go from Bard level 39 to Bard level 40 (or Thief, which use the same XP progression).

If you want to see the charts more in detail, and/or if you have a modded installation that affects the XP tables, get Moebius Toolkit, the app that I did and that is used to make the charts. So far I can only compare THAC0 and level, but let me know which other things you'd like to see compared.

[morpheus562]

Thank you @suy! One thing I would like to see incorporated is the actual spell level progression that Bards and FMs have. Sure, caster level on the Bard is high, but overall access to spells is limited compared to a FM. I think that would paint a more complete picture regarding spells instead of solely focusing on caster level.

Your table shows well the vast disparity in Thac0, but is there a way to show average damage when factoring in weapon specialization and the 1.5 bonus apr the FM gets over the bard?

[suy]

Indeed, those are two good things to add! The access to a certain spell level should be doable without that much effort (but still some). I could do a quick test where I hard-code everything, and I could display that. I'll give it a look. The total number of spells at a certain XP (not just the highest casting level) could also be nice to see.

The one about average damage with a weapon sounds much more complex, and I cannot even start to imagine how to do it. In the damage calculator I sweep all the complex inputs across a range of ACs. If we add a variable amount of base THAC0, then it's a 3rd independent variable, and it becomes a completely different kind of chart. I've not done any 3D chart yet, but don't close the door to it. To make it 2D again, we would have to pick up a reference AC. This is all doable, but I don't know how to lay the controls. If I should make it a separate calculator, or what else to change the existing one.

Thanks for the feedback, as usual.

[morpheus562]

@suyfor the damage chart, would you be able to set the ac before damage starts to drop off? Or just assume AC 10 so you can focus on what happens best case scenario when damage starts to occur?

[suy]

That's a good idea. Take the "best damage" as starting point, then we could think of something else if doesn't give enough information. It's a bit harder to think how to implement it without copy/pasting all the code (which is a no-go for me), but it's a good challenge. I'll think about it.

[subtledoctor]

Are there any spells that a bard can cast (below 7th level) that actually provide any bonus for having a high caster level? Dispel Magic... I guess Skull Trap, depending on which version of Skull Trap you have... anything else?

[morpheus562]

3 minutes ago, subtledoctor said:

Are there any spells that a bard can cast (below 7th level) that actually provide any bonus for having a high caster level? Dispel Magic... I guess Skull Trap, depending on which version of Skull Trap you have... anything else?

One that got thrown around a lot was that bards get more stoneskins than FM. There is a brief blip where it is only two more skins, then it becomes one for a good portion before they both have the same amount. I personally think the number of skins is a silly thing to focus on when considering the grand scope of both classes, but it's an argument people go towards.

Edited August 22, 2022 by morpheus562

[Endarire]

Some mods and game versions allow Bards to cast arcane spells of level 8 and below.

Also, a higher CL means a longer duration.

[subtledoctor]

30 minutes ago, Endarire said:

Also, a higher CL means a longer duration.

Generally only up to level 20. I'm just saying, that stark blue line that appears to set bards so far ahead of F/Ms, could be deceiving since it might have very little effect on the actual game once you're past BG1 levels...

[Trouveur80]

14 hours ago, subtledoctor said:

Are there any spells that a bard can cast (below 7th level) that actually provide any bonus for having a high caster level? Dispel Magic... I guess Skull Trap, depending on which version of Skull Trap you have... anything else?

Remove Magic, Mordenkainen's Force Missiles, Vitriolic Sphere, Flame Arrows, Cone of Cold, Sunfire, the Shadows summon spells from IWD, Chain Lightning...

So the difference in caster level will definitely be perceived until the F/M also reach level 20 in mage.

If you had IWD bard spells progression table, unnerfed ThAC0 progression, and the Improved Bard Song with the Bard Hat, bard have some nice things for him.

[polytope]

20 hours ago, morpheus562 said:

Thank you @suy! One thing I would like to see incorporated is the actual spell level progression that Bards and FMs have. Sure, caster level on the Bard is high, but overall access to spells is limited compared to a FM. I think that would paint a more complete picture regarding spells instead of solely focusing on caster level.

Whereas wizards advance in spell circle choice every two levels after the first (3,5,7,9... except 6th circle spells that require 12th, not 11th level) bards advance in this respect every 3 levels (4,7,10,13,16 including the big power jump to sixth circle)

To cast second circle MU spells, bard needs lvl 4 at 5k xp, F/M needs mage level 3 (5k) so 10k xp total. Advantage to bard.

To cast third circle MU spells, bard needs lvl 7 at 40k xp, F/M needs mage level 5 (20k) so 40k xp total. Equal ability between classes.

To cast fourth circle MU spells, bard needs lvl 10 at 160k xp, F/M needs mage level 7 (60k) so 120k xp total. Advantage to F/M.

To cast fifth circle MU spells, bard needs lvl 13 at 660k xp. F/M needs mage level 9 (135k), so 270k xp total. Advantage to F/M.

To cast sixth circle MU spells, bard needs lvl 16 at 1.32M xp, F/M needs mage level 12 (750k), so 1.5M xp total. Advantage to bard.

However it should be remembered that a fighter/mage can be a gnome fighter/illusionist, one extra spell slot per level in exchange for the loss of necromancy. Still, a gnome with 18 con gets +5 to save vs wands/spells which is better than Spirit Armor would give, and fighter/mages don't really need ADHW (at the epic levels they could cast it at) because it's slow unless called through Chain Contingency and that goes against the general playing style of a F/M who wants to spend as much of their combat round as possible striking things before their precious buffs expire.

Edited August 23, 2022 by polytope
errata

[suy]

11 hours ago, subtledoctor said:

Generally only up to level 20. I'm just saying, that stark blue line that appears to set bards so far ahead of F/Ms, could be deceiving since it might have very little effect on the actual game once you're past BG1 levels...

True, and spells like Fireball are capped at just level 10, so it's indeed not that important for damage based spells.

The main edge of the caster level is not just for casting Dispel Magic, but also for resisting it, IMHO. If you cast Protection from Fire on someone else, and that someone else is exposed to hostile dispels, making those more likely to fail at dispelling. For example, I remember one playthrough where I noticed how painful it was to have Aerie as only divine caster, as the Death Ward on Keldorn was always dispelled, and he was dying all the time.