Levelling

In our Council of Thieves game last night, our party finally hit 8th level.  This is somewhat of a milestone, because I don't think I've been in a campaign that lasted this long.  I think it's a milestone for GM Jared (KnightErrantJR) Rascher too. 

So I'm trying to pick out what my bard (Chesterfield Agincourt Smythe - the "t" is not silent, but it is diminished.  Pretend you are going to pronounce the "t", but then don't.  It's an affectation.)  is going to do.  At this point, I really can't see him hitting any prestige class.  I briefly thought about harrower, because it looks so durn fun, but the bard is so much a secondary caster that losing all of the bard class advancement and only gaining new spells would really hurt.  (Sometime in the future, I'd love to play a Sorcerer or Wizard slash Harrower.  Maybe even a cleric.  But not my Bard.)

So he's Bard 8.  At 8th level, he gets one stat increase.  He's got a 24 Charisma (including a +2 headband).  All of his other stats are even numbers, so nothing is going to mean an increase to a modifier.  I'm probably just going to put the +1 into Charisma, bringing it to 25.  Either the campaign will last until 12th level when he'll hit 26, or I'll buy a Tome and bring it up magically.

He gets 9 skill points, which I'll used to bump Linguistics, Spellcraft, Use Magical Device, and three different Perform skills to keep them maxed out.  Then I'll distribute the other three points into maybe perception.  At 10th level, he's going to get to use another perform check to substitute for a skill, and I'm thinking Dance will give him Acrobatics and Fly, so it might be good to start putting ranks into Dance.  So I'll go 2 points perception, one point dance.

Spells:  Here's where I'm having trouble deciding.  Chesterfield gets one more 3rd level spell, and one 2nd level spell.  He can also retrain one spell.

Leading candidates for 3rd level spell: Charm Monster,  Haste, Major Image, or Slow.

Charm Monster plays into my having Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus (Enchantment).  Haste is a huge party buff (that doesn't help me at all).  Major Image is the big big brother to Silent Image, and Slow is a huge de-buff for all the bad guys.  Chesterfield already has Scrying and Confusion (which did awesome work against a gang of rogues last night!!!).  I'm thinking that I'll take Slow at 8th level, Charm Monster at 9th level, and then Haste/Silent image for my extra spells at later levels.

Candidates for 2nd level spell: Actually, Calm Emotions looks to be really good.  It could potentially end a fight before it begins.  I've seldom used Chesterfield's Enthrall or Ghostbane Dirge spell, so I might trade one out for Gallant Inspiration (+2d4 applied retroactively to a failed attack or skill check!!) 

Other choices?  Hmm.  I think that's it.  I get some hit points.  I get more rounds of bardic performance per day.  I get another +1 to all my knowledge checks (8th level/2=+4 to knowlege checks).  The will save versus my music goes up.

The only problem with this character is that I don't have any idea what he's going to be when he grows up.  I mean he just slowly accumulates these abilities, and spells that he knows.  But there's no goal for him.  No "when he hits 10th level, he's going to have this feat chain, or this combination, or whatever".  Maybe this is a good thing.  As a bard goes, he's top notch in party support.  He can buff party members, screw over the enemy, and make skill checks like nobody's business.  (Other than failing a DC43 Diplomacy roll last night.  He would have succeeded if I had remembered that I had Timely Inspiration that would have retroactively added +2 to his skill check.  Argh!!)

I'm having fun playing this character, and hopefully we'll actually get to finish this campaign.  (Hoping Jared has no immediate family/personal/professional troubles that cause the campaign to end!)