Joining a new group - Wizard or Bard?

[jaydubs]

I just got invited to a new group, which has a Paladin (melee), Barbarian (melee), Zen Archer, and Cleric (archer). We're starting at level 5.

Noticeably, they don't have either an arcane caster or a rogue. So I'm debating between a wizard to fully cover arcane casting, or a bard to cover rogue stuff and semi-cover arcane. I'd be taking the Trap Finder trait to disable traps (I know it's a campaign trait, but the DM is lenient about material, even allowing some 3.5 if it isn't too abusive).

Thoughts on what would be more useful to the party and/or more fun to play? I've played a bard before, and enjoyed the social nature and versatility. I haven't tried a wizard, but hear good things and like the concept. Any input would be appreciated.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

If you can use 3.5 material, Beguiler in PH2 would perfectly fit the role you need to fill.

[Ssalarn]

The Bard is probably a solid choice. You can cover the skill aspect of things very solidly and still have some solid spell-casting to fall back on, if a little specialized. Some other things you could look at-

• Create a Summoner to be your controller whose Eidolon is built to serve as the skill-monkey. You'd be amazed how well this works.
  
• Alchemist is another option for someone who can do a lot of the traditional caster-y stuff while also serving as a competent skill-monkey.
  
• This may seem a little weird, but you can build a Magus who can pretty competently double as the party skill-monkey, especially if you're already going to be using the Trap Finder trait. His high Int makes up for low skill points, he's got a lot of fairly handy spells to help him deal with certain skill-based scenarios, and no one expects the guy who was throwing around magic and swinging a scimitar to also be the guy with the lockpicks.
  
• If you guys use 3pp stuff at all, there's some coll stuff out there like Dreamscarredpress' current playtest for the Guru, a skill-based class with some caster-y goodness, or the Cryptic a psionic skill-monkey. Rite Publishing's Masquerade Reveler from Convergent Paths can make a very unexpected skill-monkey with the right evolution choices, as can the Edgewalker from Interjection Games.

[jaydubs]

Ooh... Beguiler is something I had not thought about. Will definitely look into it.

Summoner as well seems really interesting. I had not considered using the Eidolon as a skill monkey. Will have to read up a bit on the class to see how that would work.

[Ssalarn]

The Eidolon actually has an evolution called "Skilled" which gives him a +8 Racial bonus to the selected skill and can be selected multiple times. Put a few of his base skill points into the appropriate skills, grab Skilled for any that you want "always on", and then use the evolution surge spell line to shore up any skills you need spur of the moment that you weren't already prepared for. It's a pretty unique way to cover bases, and it works really well when you're plugging two holes in the party since you can actually fill both at the same time.

I ran a Summoner once who did battlefield control from the back of his Eidolon who did double-duty as both a flying mount and the party skill-monkey. I think I described it as the most hideous possible combination of one of the flying apes from the Wizard of Oz and a Clydesdale...

[NoACWarrior]

I second beguiler if you want a rouge arcane caster - its also much easier to manage and adds less overhead than a wizard for the DM. You also won't be taking over party face from the paladin - as bards tend to do that. Lastly, you don't need to pickup that trapfinding trait since beguiler has it built in (I think).

If you only want a splash of arcane instead and want to go more rouge (beguiler is a much better choice than a more rougey character since you need some of the options a full arcane caster can bring) you could go spellthief. Note that a spellthief is rather weak by itself, and you won't have many spells to use, but you are a bonafide trapfinder. You also get the ability to be the second buffer / nuker utilizing spells from the paladin or cleric, and when sneaking monsters with SLAs you can steal it and disable thier usage of it.

In any case, when you take beguiler, be aware of the mind affecting status of the spell list, mostly illusions and mind affecting spells. If you want to expand your list take arcane disciple to open up domain spells. When an auto learning spell casting class takes that feat you don't need to learn it at every level - you automatically know the spell. You can get more than 1 domain in this way, and you don't need to worship the god to get the domain spells, just having an alignment which matches will do.

Edit forgot: Also for beguiler you might want to take a look at reserve feats from complete champion, it will allow you to use particular abilities in exchange for having an available spell slot in a certain level almost all day long.

[killem2]

I vote bard!

[Zweisteine]

WIZARD.

Play a wizard, and you can fill in that empt bard spot with ease. Buffs like fly and polymorph are far more important than bluff and disable device. If you want a real trap sensor, take a reserve summon feat, and send elementals in.

[Soarel]

I just got invited to a new group, which has a Paladin (melee), Barbarian (melee), Zen Archer, and Cleric (archer). We're starting at level 5.

Noticeably, they don't have either an arcane caster or a rogue. So I'm debating between a wizard to fully cover arcane casting, or a bard to cover rogue stuff and semi-cover arcane. I'd be taking the Trap Finder trait to disable traps (I know it's a campaign trait, but the DM is lenient about material, even allowing some 3.5 if it isn't too abusive).

Thoughts on what would be more useful to the party and/or more fun to play? I've played a bard before, and enjoyed the social nature and versatility. I haven't tried a wizard, but hear good things and like the concept. Any input would be appreciated.

I really recommend the bard for this situation. That Beguiler looks cool too from what others have posted so I wouldnt be against using that.

[ericgrau]

With 2 melee and 2 archers I'd play bard. At level 7 it will really take off with move action singing plus haste. Take gallant inspiration as one of your spells, and for your starting gear including as many scrolls of gallant inspiration as you can. With level 5 wealth and 200 gp a scroll, I'd get 12. If the DM is lenient see if you can get it on a wand and still have it be an immediate action (wands do work this way in 3.5, but PF doesn't have rules compendium). Never stop casting it unless the party is easily winning. With all of these together you'll be responsible for about 4-5 hits per round. Others are each responsible for 1-2 without you (hits not attacks). That's on top of whatever you do on round 2 and later. Perhaps glitterdust, tiny hut and/or silent image.

Later on a wand of invisibility and/or disguise other will let the whole party bypass some encounters.

Oh ya you can find traps and use skills too I guess.

If you go wizard then I'd get some crowd control and also haste. Web, sleet storm, solid fog, black tentacles and resilient sphere are some examples of crowd control. Those will make it easy for your allies to pick off the scrambled foes. Later on also try to get 24 hours of some hour/level spells.