I have a copy of Player’s Handbook 2 now, and I’ve been reading selections for the last couple of hours. I’ll need a few days to get through the whole thing, but in connection with today’s St. Patrick’s Day RPG blog carnival, I thought I’d share my first impressions of gnomes, bards, and druids—all of which have some stronger or weaker connection to Ireland.

Gnomes

D&D gnomes have some affinities with the little people of Irish lore, though they don’t slavishly imitate them. 4e gnomes belong among the fey races, apparently related to elves and eladrin. D&D no longer presents gnomes as tinkers, but as slinkers—experts not in things mechanical, but in going unnoticed. This talent finds mechanical expression in the gnomes’ curious ability to make a Stealth check at the same time one makes an initiative check, along with powers like fade away. Between their small size, a racial +2 to Stealth checks, the Reactive Stealth racial feature, and the fade away racial power, a gnome warlock with eyebite as an at-will power could prove a very elusive foe.

Bards

The bard class has always presented D&D designers with a bit of a challenge. Back in the beginning, a character who wanted to be a 1e bard had to be a little bit of a fighter, a little bit of a thief, a little bit of a magic-user … bards have never quite fit into the game system tidily. Yet the idea of a bard as a minstrel and master of lore fits quite well into the quasi-medieval D&D world. When the 4e Player’s Handbook shipped without a bard class, many players complained, yet 3.5e games didn’t necessarily overflow with bards in their day. WotC always planned to include bards in 4e, but delayed them until Player’s Handbook 2 to “get them right.” (And to release them on St. Patrick’s Day? Who can say?)

4e positions bards as arcane leaders, with a secondary dose of the controller role. The bard’s majestic word power resembles healing word and inspiring word enough to fulfill the same healing function, but has its own distinctive bardic cast: instead of adding +1d6 hp to the healing surge, majestic word adds the bard’s Charisma modifier, and allows the bard to slide the target 1 square (one might say that the target dances away from danger, or back into the fray). The bard’s Song of Rest class feature performs a similar function during a short rest.

Like all other classes, bards get several choices along the way. PH2 offers two example builds for bards. Choosing between Virtue of Cunning and Virtue of Valor is similar to choosing between a warlord’s Inspiring Presence and Tactical Presence. Bards hold onto their reputation as Jacks and Jills of all trades in 4e through their ability to multiclass into more than one class, and their +1 bonus on untrained skill checks. Thus far, and with their word of friendship power granting bonuses to Diplomacy checks, 4e bards nail the “feel” that longtime D&D players expect a bard to have.

Since bards rely primarily on Charisma, and secondarily on Intelligence and/or Constitution, gnomes (who get racial bonuses on both abilities) suit the bard class perfectly. I don’t quite get the storyline logic of the bard’s Constitution modifier having such a helpful impact on allies, but mechanically, this forces a healing bard to think about his or her physical attributes as well as his metaphysical ones. It’s no wonder, then, that tieflings and half-elves appear in many bard illustrations as well as gnomes.

For bardic powers, I personally prefer those that allow the bard to deal damage without wielding a weapon, those that tend toward the ranged, arcane side of the bard’s training and talents. A bardic PC probably proves most effective, however, with a mixture of ranged attack powers with built-in damage and melee attack powers relying on weapon damage. Among at-will powers, I think I would choose vicious mockery over guiding strike; guiding strike does more damage, and untyped damage at that, but vicious mockery‘s –2 to attack rolls finds broader application. At first level, I would also choose blunder (encounter) and probably stirring shout (daily), though the latter works best if the bard can quickly identify the threat who will draw the most allied attacks.

I admit that the PH2 paragon paths don’t excite me very much. If forced to choose one before the publication of Arcane Power, I’d probably go with war chanter, or choose a racial paragon path if available.

For me, the biggest “Huh?” moment for the bard comes from the bard’s use of wands as implements. I suppose it makes sense not to force all bards to use musical instruments; many real-world bardic traditions rely on the voice alone. Of course, magical musical instruments can serve as implements for bards, as can a “songblade,” an obvious counterpart to the warlock’s pact blade.

Druids

D&D druids—certainly 4e druids—perhaps bear less resemblance to their real-life counterparts than do bards. As primal controllers, druids can access many powers that reshape the battlefield; powers like frost flash and twisting vines (both attack 1, encounter powers) resemble wizard spells in many respects. PH2 really plays up the druid’s traditional wild shape ability, however. All druids can shift into a beastly shape, and some druid powers can only be used while in beast shape. Given the various options available, I suspect that building and running a druid may be slightly more difficult than the average class, comparable in complexity to building and running a wizard. As such, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend the druid for a first-time player.

Among paragon paths, I find the sky hunter most distinctive, but I think the others would also be fun to play.

In connection with the druid, PH2 introduces a new class of magic implements, totems. Totems have no melee attack value—your druid can’t bash his or her enemies with one—but they otherwise resemble wands in their basic usage. PH2 provides a robust selection of totems, and I imagine more will appear in Adventurer’s Vault 2 later this year.

Summary

All things considered, WotC did a great job bringing the gnome race and the bard and druid classes into 4e in Player’s Handbook 2. I’m eager to check out the other races and classes in the coming days.