Bardic Crunch

Also titled: How Many Heals do Bards Get?

Good question. After looking at one of the Bard's more under appreciated class features, Multiclass Versatility, I think a better question is, how many feats do Bards get?

The answer? After poking around in the Character Builder I was able to create a level 12 Bard with the following:

• Majestic Word (Bard class feature - it's their 2/encounter heal)
• Theft of Life (Bard encounter power)
• Healing Infusion (Artificer multiclass feature - 1/day)
• Healing Spirit (Shaman multiclass power - 1/day)
• Healing Word (Cleric multiclass feature - 1/day)
• Healing Strike (Cleric encounter power)
• Insipring Word (Warlord multiclass feature - 1/day)
• Rune of Mending (Runepriest multiclass feature - 1/day)

Even with 6 multiclass feats and a novice power feat I was still able to give this build the Combat Virtuoso and Healer's Implement feats giving it a decent chance to hit with other class powers and a small boost to all heals. Stack her up with some River of Life Gloves and a proper Holy Symbol and she's starting to look like a real healer. I'm sure if I spent a few more hours tweaking it I could squeeze a few more points of healing in there but I've seen enough.

Here is a link to the build on iPlay4E.

In the end I still think the Cleric makes a more efficient healer, with bigger nuke heals and better access to multi-target healing. The Bard has the potential for a greater number of healing spells per day through multi-class feats but sacrifices specialization and a great deal of optimization due to the number of feats spent on multiclassing. A side benefit to all those multicass feats is a lot of cool extra class features and options. The shaman abilities alone and just really neat. These side benefits give this bard build some suprising utility at the table, which wouldn't you know it, feels quite bardic!

Now if only you could construct a plausible background for such a character....