Bardbarian D&D Character Build Guide

Bardbarian D&D Character Build Guide
Nerdarchy revisits our Bardbarian character build for 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons. Here we turn that video concept into a 5e D&D character build guide.
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Cartoon Goblin Thumbnails- mmmmjava on instagram

All Other Thumbnails- Alex Guillotte of Critical Hit Publishing

Music- Zero Flux

Video Planning and Skit Scripting- Doug Vehovec, Dave Friant, Ted Adams

[rocksnrolls]

Storm Herald could be fun, as when you start raging, you could start playing "THUNDERSTRUCK!"

Imagine the party is low on health, and they hear thunder rolling in, as well as the opening bars to Thunderstruck as the dragonborn crests a hill, surrounded by lightning, Charing in.😂

[Twosocks]

My wife plays a homebrew we found called a Skald, which is basically a Bardbarian. It's a fun class.

[denizshalamanov]

My DM made a group of orc bardbarians and said that they are the founders of a new magical style of music ( pretty much metal ). Only a few chosen ones from Orcus are capable of surviving a full performance and the flavor is epic. I hope my group encounters them soon!

[TheCrimsonCat]

Nightwing in DC Metal, Jack Black in general and the game Brutal Legends, Zack Wylde, and Dethklok are basically why I want to play a Bardbarian. Fighting with an Axe that's also a magically enchanted guitar? FUCK YEAH 🤘

[BahamutZerodragon]

i always love builds like this... even more so if it involves Dragonborn... my favorite D&D race since 4E.

[merpins]

Swords bard is my favorite bard subclass. In my opinion, they make the best archers in 5e as well, since they get access to Swift Quiver with magical secrets, and all their "Blade" flourishes are written in a way that allows them to be used with bows.

[christineknight]

Thank you to the both of you for always explaining what you're talking about in such an easy to understand way :) As someone who is still "new" to the game I find all of the videos I have seen to be so incredibly helpful. Thank you again :)

[akaking]

As a forever dm my only long lasting character was DAHKAR THE BARDBARIAN. Dwarf totem barbarian with 3 levels of college of lore, played warhorn as a trumpet and mostly sang about how cool he was.
Also had a glider wings, ring of jumping and feather falling and of course did a spot on Brian Blessed voice to boot!

[RockstarWiley]

Currently I have an Orc who was raised by Satyrs and believed he was a Satyr until he got older and was told he was an Orc. He loved liked a Satyr and was a College of Glamour Bard, who, mid story, after only knowing lust and experiencing love for the first time, his first love was murdered and he snapped and began classing up as a berserker Barbarian. So I can cast Intellect Fortress on myself and not take any physical damage for an hour, then just tear up anyone in my sight.

[Year]

An amazing multiclass. I did a half elf 4 lore bard 12 bear totem. It was awesome with lots of options

[varkesh]

I have always loved the idea of the barbian shaman/lore expert as a concept.
And i like that this build comes online so early that you can have some fun with the other options to add more flavour backed up with some mechanics.
I don't even mind the idea of the paladin splash you can have them either start as a paldin or they tried to tame there rage with strict order but they relaise the only thing that quells there raise is the stories booth that they read/make and carve for themselves lots of great options.

[dracone]

It's always fun seeing these oddball builds. This past Christmas season I started wondering what building holiday icons as D&D characters could look like, so a party made up of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Saint Patrick, and the like. Given the forms a few holiday icons have in the public zeitgeist, a few of the builds would have to be homebrew/third party races, which would mean they wouldn't quite be League legal and would likely rely heavily on just how much the DM would allow. Although as an example of the kinds of characters that could be built, I have cited what I think Santa Claus could look like in such a setting, my thoughts are either a Bard (most likely College of Whispers due to how Subtle Santa Claus is attributed to being) or a Paladin (I'm not sure which subclass would work best, chances are there is a non-official subclass that would be a good fit) but someone on Reddit suggested you could have a character named Santa Claus that was a Barbarian and went around beating people with a big heavy sack. That all said making Santa a Bardbarian might be interesting, making him a Bard (College of Whispers)/Barbarian (Path of the Ancestral Guardian) might be a good way to tap into his lore and real-world history.

What we know as Santa Claus today is technically, and basically, an amalgamation of the Norse god Odin (and since historical Barbarians were often sworn to Odin, so the Barbarian part would make a lot of sense), the English Folklore character of Father Cosmo (which probably works really well with the Bard part of things), and historical figure of Saint Nicholas (Paladin levels don't make a lot of sense here since the historic Saint Nicholas wasn't recorded as being much of a combatant, he was recorded as being a generous and pious man though).


Building a party made up of figures and icons tied to actual holidays might make for a fun party build, maybe even an interesting game since you would be able to play around with how each of the characters could interact with each other, and a campaign that comes about where several holiday spirit incarnations are basically thrown into the mix together, possibly being forced to basically work together, is fun to play around with and talk about. I'm sure you could have a lot of fun putting together what a party made holiday icons could look like, although you probably would have to do a little research on few things to make sure you have enough for building a party and what race/class/background combinations could work best for each holiday icon/figure/character

[ancova]

This is always a fun concept. The oral tradition of the Norse Viking is iconic, and for those who can understand their language (or have one of many modern translations), completely epic. And for a slightly more unique take, I cannot help but plug my favorite Mongolian rock band, Hu or the Kiwi haka. These are just some of the ideas I'm using to start my bardbarian off of.

[matimil]

Eddie Riggs would be a storm cleric - valor bard

[darkstalkerknight]

A roaming dragonborn heavy metal and classic music band.

They travels between 50 towns and cities every year for a massive weekend concert and celebration where they are.

It's the kind of band where you have to ask them to come at least 3 to 12 months ahead of time and if you can get them to play at your event when they come to your area, it will do something great for you for the next year.

[brandoncreek]

I'm so happy we have a Wild Magic barbarian build! I love this subclass and I've been thinking of a neat multiclass idea and this one is definitely fun! I might want WMB 14/Bard 6 though just so I can get the last feature from Wild Surge.

[cerindraco]

My new character for my next campaign is a Goliath Totem of the Bear Barbarian, College of Swords Bard, and Swashbuckler Rogue... I made up a city that was built around a coliseum and is all about combat sports and tests of strength called Kalysium where my character was raised by his Herd... He has the Gladiator background which made the most sense to me because it makes every contest he participates in apart of his performance as a Bard... I'm really excited to see how it goes... for the spells I chose a bunch of buff spells that don't require concentration and some other spells to help heal up after the fighting is over...

[varietasVeritas]

Bardy hard!
Forget the Paladin, take hexblade. Sell your soul for METAL!

[stevesearle]

Instantly makes me think of Peter Steele from Type O Negative.

[dreddbolt]

Brutal Legend has some pretty neat tower defense mechanics.