In this Baldur’s Gate 3 article, I’m going to be showing you 3 Best Beginner Bard Builds that are fun to play and that anyone can put together. I wanted to give some early-game Builds for those of you who are near the beginning of the game. This is going to go to Level 6 and then for late-game Builds, it’s going to be from Levels 7 to 12. 

Baldur’s Gate 3 Best Beginner Bard Builds

Some of these Bard Builds are Multiclassed whereas one of them is a single Class Bard so let’s get into what they are.

Baldur’s Gate 3 College of Swords Bard

The first Bard Build I’m going to show you is a College of Swords Level 6 Build. Ideally, you’d have a different Race than the one I’m using so that’s either a Half-Elf or Human to gain Shield Proficiency. This is because once you reach Level 3, you’re going to gain Dueling as a Fighting Style or Two-Weapon Fighting. 

I think this BG3 College of Swords Bard Build lends itself better to Dueling since the Blade Flourish you gain only attacks with one Weapon that’ll give you higher Armor Class and you’ll still be able to use those. Also, you’re not dual-wielding to consume your Bonus Action with your Offhand Attack when you can use it for Bardic Inspiration or healing. 

Spells and Blade Flourish

What I really love about this Bard Build is that you have 4 Level 1 Spells, 3 Level 2 Spells, and 3 Level 3 Spells. That is a lot of Spells and you also have Extra Attack, meaning, you’re going to attack twice. You can use your Blade Flourishes such as Defensive Flourish in order to give yourself 4 Armor Class for 1 Bardic Inspiration, which is incredibly huge! And remember since we’re at least a Level 5 Bard, these Bardic Inspirations will recharge after each Short Rest. So if you were to take a Short Rest after every Combat encounter, you’ll be able to use this for 4x.

Additionally, these Blade Flourishes can be used at range or in melee. Just make use to use a Finesse Weapon because we’re using Dexterity and it works with Dueling. This feature also lets you hit two targets for an Extra Attack, which is phenomenal. It also means you can hit 4 targets in 1 turn using 2 Bardic Inspiration charges.

One thing that’s really great about Bardic Inspiration when using it for Blade Flourish is if you miss, you don’t consume it. So you almost have the same capabilities as something like a Battle Master Fighter plus 10 Spells to give you so much versatility. So you can use these to AOE when you need to such as casting a Control Spell and you can attack with them fairly well too, making this Baldur’s Gate 3 College of Swords Bard Build incredibly strong.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Bard Warlock Multiclass Build

So the next Bard Build I’m going to show you is a mix between Bard and Warlock by taking 3 levels of Bard and then 3 levels of Warlock. What this has allowed us to do is to gain Medium Armor Proficiency, Shield Proficiency, Martial Weapon Proficiency from taking College of Valor. Moreover, our Bardic Inspiration has turned into Combat Inspiration, which can also be used to buff a target’s Armor Class when they get attacked or to increase the Damage Roll of an ally.

Levels 1-3 Bard

Next, you’re going to cast Vicious Mockery and then bring 2 Expertise and Skills on top of 4 Level 1 Spell Slots and 2 Level 2 Spell Slots. This means that you’re going to have a lot more Spell Slots on your Warlock than you would if you were just playing a pure Warlock. What’s really great about the Baldur’s Gate 3 Bard Warlock Multiclass Build is that you can cast some of your Warlock Spells using your Bard Spell Slots like Arms of Hadar. It’s a great AOE Spell, particularly if melee enemies are coming up to you and you get surrounded by them. Arms of Hadar can be used with Level 2 slot to deal more damage since it can be upcast as your level goes higher. You can also cast the upscaled Armor of Agathys with your Bard slots, which is really nice.

Levels 1-3 Warlock

What you’re going to gain from the Warlock Class at this level are the 2 Level 2 Warlock Spells, and those are going to continue to get stronger and recharge after each Short Rest. You’ll continue taking Warlock all the way up to Level 9. Since Bards have Song of Rest, you can take Short Rests 3x in between Long Rests. So you’ll be able to get those 2 Spell Slots back every time you rest. 

You’ll then gain Eldritch Blast, providing you with a great ranged option based on your Charisma. Once you reach Level 3, you’re going to have access to Pact of the Blade, which makes it so that your melee attacks use Charisma so your need for Dexterity as a Bard will great diminish here. All you reall need Dexterity for is to increase your Armor Class as well as improvise Initiative and some Skill Checks. These Skill Checks will come in handy if you’re using your Bard for lockpicking, Sleight of Hand, and Stealth.

And then for our Eldritch Invocations, we’ll take Agonizing Blast to increase Eldritch Blast’s damage together with Devil’s Sight to see inside our Darkness Spell. What’s really great about playing inside your darkness is the Advantage you gain on enemies that are in here just like in the Baldur’s Gate 3 Best Beginner Warlock Builds article. But since you have a lot of Spell Slots, it doesn’t matter as much if burn a Spell Slot from your Warlock casting Darkness. You can then use Arms of Hadar against your targets in there and absolutely AOE the crap out of them with your Bard Spells. Alternatively, you can attack a single target that comes in, wait for them to group up around you and then AOE them with something like Thunderwave.

Level 4 Warlock

Once you take one more level of Warlock, you’ll be able to gain a Feat. You can take Great Weapon Master in order to get an extra attack if you’re leaning toward a melee route or you could take more Charisma with Ability Improvement to boost your Attack Rolls and your Spell’s DC. Both are great choices.

Level 5 Warlock

At Level 5, you’re going to gain Extra Attack if you’ve picked Pact of the Blade to execute two more melee attacks, which is really nice. 

Baldur’s Gate 3 Bard Thief Multiclass Build

The last BG3 Bard Build I’m going to show you is a little unorthodox. I think some people may question why we’d multiclass 3 Bard levels with 3 Thief levels. 

Level 3 Bard

By being a Bard, you’ll first take College of Valor at Level 3 to gain Combat Inspiration, which is a better version of Bardic Inspiration because you can buff Armor Class or the Damage Rolls of your party members. You’re also going to gain Proficiencies in Medium Armor, Shield, and Martial Weapons. Just make sure to wield a Finesse Weapon because you’ll still be attacking with Dexterity. And if you’re trying to do a Melee Sneak Attack, you’ll be using this Weapon type anyway. Lastly, you’ll have 4 Spell Slots at Level 1 and 2 Level 2 Spells along with Vicious Mockery. 

Level 1 Rogue

So Rogues are obviously going to bring Sneak Attack, which lets you gain 2d6 Sneak Attack Damage because of your Level 3 Rogue. Because of this, you’ll try to do Sneak Attack Damage when possible like attacking enemies that are standing near a friendly character or if you’re attacking them when you have Advantage such as attacking from Stealth. 

Level 2 Rogue

At Level 2, Rogues are going to give you Cunning Action: Disengage, Dash, and Hide, meaning that you’ll be able to use your Bonus Action to do these things. If you get in trouble, you can Disengage and still attack on the same turn or you can Hide and Sneak Attack, which is what a lot of Rogues will do.

Level 3 Rogue

Once you reach Thief at Level 3 Rogue, you’re going to gain a Bonus Action and what’s really great about this is the quantity of decent Bonus Actions you have such as Healing Word. Healing Word is a Bonus Action Spell so you can use that twice in an encounter or you could use Bardic Inspiration. 

For instance, you can apply Bardic Inspiration to two of your allies on your first turn and then use this again on two more party members. Alternatively, you can reuse it on the next turn. Doing so will help you turn the tide early on and you can still attack or cast a Spell at the same time, which is really strong. Or perhaps you can cast Healing Word on one person, Bardic Inspiration on another and then attack. Or cast Bardic Inspiration, Hide, and then Sneak Attack. There are a lot of options and combinations that you gain from the extra Bonus Action and I think this is really beneficial to the Bard Thief Build.

So moving forward with this BG3 Build, I would probably take another level of Bard followed by another level of Rogue in order to gain 2 quick Feats. But you could also take 3 more level of Bard to be able to extra attack more quickly. This would give you more higher level Spells and then you’d gain Extra Attack, which would make you much stronger. And then you’ll have that Bonus Action as well.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Bard Builds: Final Thoughts

So that wraps up our 3 Best Beginner Bard Builds. I hope you guys found it informational and inspirational for your Builds. I really love Bard in this game and it’s probably one of my favorite Classes, if not my favorite Class. 

You can do a bit of everything and if you’re wondering where the Paladin Bard Multiclass Build is, go check out our Baldur’s Gate 3 Best Beginner Paladin Builds because that’s a really strong combo. It’s there and not here because that Build starts out with 2 levels of Paladin before going deep into the Bard. I think that’s the way most people would play it. 

As always if you have more tips for new players, be sure to leave them in the comments and if you have questions, I’ll try and get to them as soon as I can. 

Stay tuned for more Baldur’s Gate 3 content.