Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Wizard / Bard multiclass?

In 5e, sure. In the opening main fight? No (viscious mockery is pretty awesome). In the full release? We don't know, because we don't know how multiclass is implemented. Also, bards seemed to get the most dialogue class options of any class in my EA playthroughs.
What I would say is that respeccing in this game is reportedly very cheap/easy so give it a try and if you find you don't like it you can always ditch the bard level. Personally, my plan is for wood elf rogue 1 wizard x for the 8 skills, 2 expert and extra ranged damage that sneak attack can give you when you are low on spells. And Gale has a high chance of getting a level of knowledge cleric on my playthrough.

One thing I would say about bards though is that you can't buff your own skill rolls with inspiration, so I feel like having Wyll as a warlock/bard may be better than having a bard as a main.

In PnP, Bard/Wizard is a rough multi-class. Your dump stats are STR and WIS.

I'd argue that it's always possible to play a "good guy" character, but not always possible to convince everyone else in the game that *they* should be good, especially when they are themselves not "good guys" to begin with. So there's a major difference between external outcomes and inner motivation.


Very much agreed. I simply don't share the notion that the game plays somehow "worse" or severely limits your options when not playing a high CHA face. That's just ridiculous.

Agreed. The people who are claiming that have obviously not played over a dozen characters with different combos of race/class/backgrounds. If you want to be a chatty wizard pick up the friends and charm person spells, which is more in character for most wizards anyway.

If someone in a D&D game said they want to play a charming wizard, I'd tell them to play a sorc rather than make a wizard with decent CHA. I would say the same thing to a BG3 player.

To be clear, that first sentence is in regards to needing a charisma based character to enjoy the game.

You don't. Full stop.

I have similar thoughts as you in regards to playing either a CHA or Skill MC but your comment above in regards to Rogues and Proficiencies got me thinking that a Lore Bard would be a better choice for a skill monkey than a Rogue.

Rogues get 1 Expertise at level 1 and again at level 6 while Bards also get 1 Expertise at level 3 and again at level 10 so yes Rogues will use Expertise sooner although both Rogues and Bards get the same 2 Expertise total.

In regards to Skill Proficiencies though, Rogues start out with 4 while Bards start out with 3.
Having said that though, a Lore Bard gets 3 more Skill Proficiencies at level 3 so ultimately, a Lore Bard would have 6 Skill Proficiencies while any Rogue would only have 4.

Considering that due to being a full spell caster, a Bard is arguably more "useful/versatile" than a Rogue (I'm open to being persuaded otherwise), ends up having the same 2 Expertise total just like a Rogue, while a Lore Bard has 6 total Skill Proficiencies compared to any Rogue's 4, in addition to also being a CHA based character with all the face/dialog benefits that such would entail, and the Bard having the luxury to concentrate on his primary CHA attribute while the Rogue needing to split between DEX and CHA, wouldn't a Lore Bard be a better choice for a MC than the Rogue, if one only cared about face/dialog/skills?

Bards also get Jack of All Trades for "half Proficiency" in everything.

If you did, that would be pretty bad game design.

It will depend alittle on how Larian fully handles Multiclasing... but in PnP iwe actually played a teurgh wizard / bard... its a odd combo but actually work deasently well... and what few actually know is,that the jack of all trades bonus actually work for counterspell checks as well... with the new DnD one aplication of of stats a +2 and a +1... you can go 8 12 12 16 14 14... its still far from the most min maxy build, but it is really fun, with alot of versatility... and my mantra is, if you have fun, then your doing it right !

Sure, there are two broad philosophies when it comes to building characters, optimizing and RP-oriented (which is not to say optimizers don't role play). I don't look down on optimizers, although I might not enjoy playing in a PnP game with some of them, depending on how much they like to role play. As I just mentioned, optimizers can and do role play, but many of them don't because that's not their focus,

Neither is wrong, and both styles create fun depending on plyers, its in the eye of the beholder... So its not that any of the play styles is wrong or right, they mix poorly with each other... it dosent really matter if a min maxer RPs, if they also min max everything, couse it ultimatly creates a gap between players, and that is to no ones foult, irs just a fact... a GM will be faced with a dilemma, that in order to challange the min maxer, it creates hurdles that might be two hard for those that dont min max, and vice versa, if the GM keeps threat at a level of all the others, you will have one player the min maxes that is essentially demi god...

But that is my take on it... some just play better together then others...

If you want to optomize your build to have every skill, do this:

Wood elf (2)
Background (2)
Ranger 1 (5)
Knowledge Cleric 1 (2)
Lore Bard 3 (4 +2e)
Lore Bard 4 pick Skilled feat (3)
Whatever else you want 6

If you go full caster for your whatevers, you'll still get lvl 6 spells.

People who don't play PnP might not be familiar with the term "session zero," but that's the meeting where expectations for the game get hashed out. In my opinion, "poorly met expectations" is the second biggest killer of games (after "real-life schedule or location changes").

No, Rogues get 2 expertise at level 1 and 2 expertise later. But definitely 2 expertise at level 1...this was shown in gameplay clips recently.

But Rogues and Bards are entirely different things...Rogues are about high single target damage, so they're basically boss slayers. While bards are mostly support characters. Can be useful to have a bard but eh, I generally don't really want one and I don't want to play as one either and since none of the origin companions are bards they don't really matter to me.

And Rogues I believe will be *the* class to play Dark Urge as, as at least some of the gear you get exclusively from the Dark Urge origin nobody else can get will be for Rogues.

Rogue also gets 4 skills and 2expertise at level 1, though at least in D&D it's less if Rogue isn't the first class you take at level 1, not sure how BG3 will handle it but could be less effective to multiclass into...and is much better at killing than Bards. I'll have Shadowheart as cleric as a support character in my group so I am absolutely not making my character support as well.

I double checked the wiki and you're right, Rogues get Expertise at both level 1 and level 6 and each expertise is given to two different skill proficiencies for a total of expertise in four skill proficiencies.

"Expertise is a passive feature that allows a character to double their Proficiency bonus on a skill. When a character gains this feature, they may choose two Skills they are Proficient in and gain Expertise in both of those Skills."

Having said that, I'm also right in that Expertise is also earned by Bards at both level 3 and level 10 so just like Rogues, Bards end up having the same number of expertise in 4 total skill proficiencies plus the additional 2 skill proficiencies that they get over any Rogue if a Lore Bard.

In regards to "Rogues being about high single target damage, so they're basically boss slayers", I would think that the Gloomstalker Rangers fills that niche better than any Rogue and would even say that a Gloomstalker Ranger is more viable playing a solo Dark Urge than any Rogue.

You're totally right about Bards being support/utility oriented though which to mind way of thinking, makes them a more appropriate class for a companion than for a MC, which is the main reason of my reluctance to play a MC as a Bard and I get the feeling that you share that sentiment which is why you would prefer a Rogue as opposed to a Bard for a MC.

Another strong reason to take a level 1 dip in some class is to get access to dialogue options, which can be reason enough depending on how you want to RP your character.

There is a solid argument for the Gloomstalker Ranger and Lore bard but I like Rogue much better because it strikes probably the best balancee between hitting power and skill monkey. Being the face of the party is important because in important story moments and at camp you can't have a companion roll the skill or saving throws for you and I don't want my character to be the support role because I want Shadowheart in the party. On top of all that specifically for the Dark Urge the connection to Bhaal and knowing the first of the Dark Urge specific rewards makes it clear to me we're going down the Rogue Assassin gear path...Bhaal himself in life was a shapeshifter Rogue Assassin, and that's what Orin is too. So yeah, I'm not willing to give up skill proficiencies for the Gloomstalker Ranger and not willing to give up combat effectiveness for the Lore Bard, and the Dark Urge connection to Bhaal and the rewards we get from that origin makes the Rogue Assassin a no-brainer for me.

4 is less than 5? If you don't have Ranger you don't get all 18 skills and still level 6 spells. You can start Bard, instead it would end up getting you more options for two of your skills.

If you don't care about spell slots, then you can possibly swap rogue in for cleric. That depends on how they implement getting multiples of skills.

It seems like they universally swapped any mentions of thieves tools proficiency with sleight of hand. The assumption then is that rogues get any one skill plus sleight of hand as a multi-class. However, to get that 5th ranger skill you have to take sleight of hand. So that drops you to 17 skills if you can't replace sleight of hand.

Unless they fix half-elves to have their 3 skills, then you can swap to rogue instead of ranger or cleric, no problem.