You were quick to react to Kindred's incoming, hey. Nice art, I really like Bard ~

ehehe i couldnt help it! i took the furry bait-- theyre so good ;-;7

Wow, this picture is absolutely fantastic, and the detail ..

Lovely!

Thank you! The detail on the tree killed me ugh;;

Amaaaaaaaaazing!

thank u bae! ;-;

YOU FILTHY BARD MAIN D:<

HES SO GOOD
IM NEVER GONNA STOP
IM NEVER GONNA STOOOOOOP

Sounds like you jingled someone's bells >.>

I recently bought unlocked Bard and I love him, but I dont know how to use him effectively.
What do you usually do with him? Support? Roam? Jung? I know he's capable of all of that, but his kit is so reliant on a team thats willing or knowledgeable enough to follow up.

I'm gonna say straight up that I'm Gold 3 -- and I have 100k champion mastery with Bard ehehe...

Yeah the problem with Bard is that he's a champion who does well depending on his team's performance-- so a team dependent kind of champion? What use is a 5 man ult if your team just stands there doing nothing for the duration instead of setting up? Unfortunately I have a lot of teams who cant take opportunities so it is difficult.. so I advise playing with friends where communication is sure! (like Skype or even just chat!)
Not only is he a roaming support, but also a pseudo-jungler! While roaming, you can just tag team with your jungler if your ADC is doing so well that they dont need you-- and just roam with them to help gank other lanes!

A NOTE IF YOUR CARRY AFKS/DISCONNECTS: there is really no reason for you to stay in bot lane by yourself-- just go and support another lane, really.

I support since I'm a basic bitch, and start off with the usual Spellthiefs (whatever pokey gold dagger that is), Green ward, and Health Pots with Ward trinket!

****There are two abilities that you can start with****

**Q - Cosmic Binding**
I would usually take this as you are going to be guarding your Jungler's jungle, and if you so happen to bump into any champions you can disengage if you manage to land a stun!

**W - Health Shrine**
Buy items as soon as possible and then begin walking to top lane with only one purpose: placing a health pack behind your top laner's tower, then immediately head to mid lane. As soon as you get to mid lane (55 seconds) two meeps will spawn. Place down your second health pack behind your mid laner's tower and then gather those meeps for movement speed and mana while heading to the jungle where your jungler is standing by the camp that they are going to start with. Before the camp spawns, place a health pack where they won't accidentally walk over and waste and leash for them-- remember that the maximum amount of health shrines that you can place on a map is three! So that means you will have to wait for your jungler to use the health pack or else if you place a health pack in bot lane for your carry and exceed the limit of three shrines, the shrine you placed by your top laner's tower will disappear.

However, starting with W may be very risky, as that means that until level 2 if you or your teammate gets into a dangerous situation, you are going to wish you had that powerful level 1 slow instead of a 30 health insta-heal

Most guides tell me to max out my Q, which is Cosmic Binding, but I found that maxing out my W (Health Shrines) proved to be much more fruitful, as not only does it make you and your carry have sustain for days, but that little extra health and movement speed versus a stun that hurts more and lasts for a little longer may debatably be better, but it all comes down to your playstyle, really! Experiment in normal games or even custom games if you want to see which would be better, but always max your E (Magical Journey) last.

The first four levels in my sequence goes like this: W > Q > W > E -- I forget the rest, but I usually level up W whenever I can, and when I cant, I put points into my Q, of course putting a point in my R whenever I feel like it.

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*~~~~~~~~~~*Cosmic Binding*~~~~~~~~~~*
Ah yes, your only damage spell! Not counting meeps, of course.. this is a very versatile ability, although it is short range-- like Lissandra's Q, it gains range when it hits a target and extends a little further outward -- if it connects with a wall or another target, it will tether the two together and turn into a stun instead of a slow for the duration.

There are a few tips I have for this:
-Try not to fire this into minion waves, as from personal experience it behaves weirdly when minions are next to eachother-- and instead of extending back to stun a carry behind a minion, it would just tether that minion to another minion standing beside it <:/.. Be careful! As that means that both you and your carry are vulnerable without your disengage (being your Q) as well as you just wasted some mana, so use it sparingly! Timing is also important, get used to the speed of the projectile when shooting it so you will learn to throw it in front of people so that they will walk into it, rather than past it!

-Also, always try to angle yourself to get the stun off, but if you don't have the time to be all fancy and don't trust yourself to land a stun, sometimes the slow is good enough or.. make a magical journey and quickly go into it! (It took me a while to get it, but to go through your portal you have to click the Middle, rather than the Entrances.. you know, the little glowy thread things? I learned that the hard way) Once you come out of your magical journey, distance yourself a bit away from the exit, if your pursuers follow, throw your Q out as soon as they come out so that there is a guaranteed wall-stun.. however, if you are being chased by two or more champions, wait for the second person to come out (if they enter at almost the same time) before throwing your Q out, so instead of having one person stunned to the wall and the other chasing you, you now have two people!This is good for biding time for your W's cooldowns, where while you are being chased-- you can occasionally W yourself for the heal and movement speed! It's really cool.

-For a deadly initiation lockdown (assuming you have the cooldown reduction), if you see an opening (such as the enemy ADC and support standing conveniently together in front of you), throw your Q out to stun the two together, wait for the duration to ALMOST end (because as soon as they can use abilities again they may flash away or dodge) before throwing your ult on top of them-- then angle yourself and Q them together again to bide some time for your team to catch up and get set up. (tl;dr: Q > R > Q op)


Bard is such an asshole <:'D i love him

*~~~~~~~~~~*Health Shrine/Meeps*~~~~~~~~~~*
(to be honest i forgot the actual name but its his W lmao)
Ahh this ability is so good! Not only does it heal your target (be it yourself or your ally) but it also gives movement speed! Its just like he stole the health packs outta ARAM or something, sweet...
Anyways, first thing's first, your W at level one sucks -- I wouldnt rely on saving yourself too much until it's level 2 or if it's level 1 and has finished charging.
Speaking of charging, yeah you should know by know that your health pack doubles the amount of health you heal if you place it on the ground and wait 10 seconds for it to make that satisfying popping sound... mmm... its like a pokéball sound or something hell yeah I love it
It's easier to tell if a health pack is charged if you have the Elderwood Bard skin, because the flower would be bloomed which is really sweet

Anyways

-Your enemies can step on your health packs, so try not to place your W in the middle of lane unless you are aiming to bait them into walking over your health shrine on purpose so you can get a Q and an AA off! But other than that, I usually place them behind me and my carry -- and if the enemy team is pushed up, I place it behind the tower so that they'd have to get past it if they want to destroy your heal for whatever reason.

-Again, remember that health shrines do not time out, they only have the 3 limit! To conserve mana, wait until your carry has used a health pack before replacing it! So like, I usually keep a hoard of three shrines by the tower, and as soon as my carry uses one up-- I just put another in its place and wait for it to charge! It's so good...

-If there is a teamfight that is about to happen, place health packs behind your team in preparation-- because if an ally retreats to the back line because they are low on health, they can heal up and join back in! This is great for turning fights around, especially the very close ones.

-Also your W (assuming you're maxing it) takes up a lot of mana, but you can restore it by collecting meeps nearby.. be wary, though! As the choice to collect meeps is decided on a few things:
How well your carry is doing - If your carry is getting poked and harassed really hard and you have to stay by their side to keep them alive, then maybe it's not the best choice to leave them behind for even a second.. For example, if the enemy carry is Draven (who has crazy early-game damage) or if the enemy support is Leona (who has hard initiate that can take out your vulnerable, lonely carry), then I would bet on waiting for them to either die or recall before collecting meeps.

-If the enemy bot lane has recalled or if you are confident that they will not be turning to lane in a while, try to plan a route that will chain meeps together to stack the movement speed that you get from collecting them! So like, if there's a meep nearby, get the next meep that's nearest to that meep -- kind of like checkpoints! A little minigame! Do whatever, but always try to chain the movement speed together so that not only you will collect meeps (and regain mana) more quickly, but return to lane faster as well.*
*If a meep is in the enemy jungle that is unwarded, it is especially risky (I wouldnt even suggest collecting them until you're with your team who is in it for whatever reason) to just collect them. I have died many times because I wanted one more meep, and it is not worth giving the enemy 300g because you wanted 30 damage on your passive <=}...

*~~~~~~~~~~*Magical Journey*~~~~~~~~~~*
This ability is what makes me love Bard so much holy shit

http://puu.sh/keUyF/7b34be54ee.png
Here I've drawn some of the portals that you can make on the map-- I found the longer a portal is, the better! However, be careful when portalling through the enemy jungle, as you might end up coming out of the portal(frying pan) and into another enemy(fire)!

You can use Magical Journey for a variety of ways:
-Transporting your jungle into a lane for a quicker, unexpected initiate
-Baiting an enemy into your team
-Escaping
-Chasing/intercepting a fleeing enemy http://i.imgur.com/aZgm37h.png
-Baiting the enemy to go through the portal by pretending that you're going to go through it, when really you aren't and will just walk away (this is my favorite :3c)
-Buying time while being chased (again, that *E > Q combo I was talkin about!)

*You can also ult the exit just as they are about to come out, so they will be in stasis (I do this as an alternative if there's 3 people chasing me, but if there are 1 or 2, I save my ult and just use my Q to link them together)

However, there are some cons to this ability:
-You can still be targettable going through it! Meaning that an ADC's autoattack will still register and do damage, or you can be flayed out of it by Thresh, or even hooked out of it by Blitzcrank! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqjKC8KwnBw
-A magical journey may fail and instead of creating a long portal as you intended, it would only create a veeery small portal that would only transport you like.. an inch forward -- I have Smartcast on, and because of it I can't see if a portal would work or not, so I'd recommend turning Smartcast on for your Q, W, and R (turn it off for your R if you get used to the area as timing is very vital for this ult) and just get used to seeing the indicator

As you put points into your E, you and your allies will be able to go through the portal much more quickly than your enemy does, but I would prioritize this in late game-- when team fights and roaming are happening.


*~~~~~~~~~~*Tempered Fate*~~~~~~~~~~*
A fuckin AoE Zhonya's what more is there to say?

- This ult can target towers, baron, dragon, inhibitors -- you name it! But keep it mind that it can be blocked by spell shield, such as Sivir's E, Banshees, and Morgana's shield -- so I would either pop Sivir's E/Banshees veil with a meep-buffed autoattack (because your passive counts as a spell, this wont work for normal, unbuffed autoattacks) or wait for them to time out/ be on cooldown before ulting.

-Bard's ult can decide teamfights, it can save or kill your allies --and kill or save your enemies, it will take some time to get the hang of and learn to understand when the best time/situation will be to use it (hell, I'm still learning!) but practice makes perfect!

- I wouldn't suggest throwing your ult out on top of the enemy team when your team is already fighting them, because your ult might interfere with a perfect Zyra ult, etc. So basically, it's sometimes better to just save your ult to lock down a straggler or someone who is out of position rather than ulting people while a teamfight is going down and ruining it.
However, if your team has not initiated yet, I would advise ulting targets of interest (for example, if they have a REALLY fed carry and you can't get past the tanks, ult the front line where the tanks are so your team can just go on ahead and go for their carry -- because it's easier to have the tanks try to get you off of the fat Vayne/Draven/yadda yadda than to try to get past said tanks.

- If they are taking dragon/baron, try to ult the ENEMY, rather than the dragon, as your jungler might be trying to time the damage it is taking for smiting it, so it would save you the embarrassment of wasting your jungler's flash only to wait for the enemy jungler and dragon to come out of stasis-- and have their team smite it and take it as well as kill your jungler.

- If you are roaming or out of lane for meeps, keep an eye out on your carry's health bar, or the icons on the minimap. If the enemy is dangerously close to your carry -- try to move your camera over to make sure nothing is going down, and if need be, be ready to throw an ult (but of course make sure you're in range!)
Remember that the further away you are with your ult, the longer it will take to reach its destination (like Zigg's ult!)

- Keep in mind when you are going to ult someone who is by themselves, they will flash away if they see the area marked where your ult will land-- so try to aim a liiittle bit further ahead of them so you can catch them on the edge, or if they stop/back up to avoid the ult, that would only mean that you are closing distance between them.

- When you manage to ult someone nearby a wall or ult 2 enemies, position yourself in a way that you can stun them together to again, buy time.

- Bard ult is useful for canceling out Karthus ult or saving an ally from ignite! As, while they are in stasis, the dots will still tick -- but they won't take damage from it.

- !! DESPITE BEING ABLE TO ULT BARON, DRAGON, ETC., YOU CANNOT ULT YOUR OR THE ENEMY NEXUS -- (i learned this the hardway... eheheh.. fuckin backdoors man) so its better to just ult the enemy attacking your nexus <=}...


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But yeah, those are his abilities-- now for build... (I'm not very good with item builds, and it's all very dependent on who you're up against!)

1. I start with spellthiefs but whenever I get the chance to, I build Sightstone. As soon as I get Sightstone, of course I swap it out for the red trinket since-- you already have wards, no?
2. Second, I build Boots of Mobility, as I will need to roam to get around the map quickly-- be it for meeps or going to another lane to help.
3. Next, I get a tanky defense item, such as Frozen Heart or Randuins omen
((Upgrade trinket as soon as you can!!))
4. Afterwards, I finish my build for that Spellthief's dagger thingy and turn it into a Frost Queen's claim
5. Then I usually get my Magic Resist item (assuming the enemy even HAS ap) as a Locket of the Iron Solari or Banshees veil
6. Finally, after my item slots are full, I build up Ruby Sightstone, enchant my boots, and get Elixir of Iron!

Twin Shadows is especially good on Bard, as not only does it give you movement speed -- but if you are in the enemy jungle and don't know where the enemy is-- you can just activate it to reveal them or even slow chasers! good shit

i dunno what else to say, really! just-- good luck on ya bard travels ;-;7 he's a fun champion for sure! im sorry i kinda went overboard and wrote an entire mediocre guide, but I guess I can use this for future reference if someone else asks me!

Thanks much for all the info. I know most of this stuff already, I get how he works - but he's just tough to do well with especially solo.
I usually go for the CDR boots since you have Magical Journey and the chimes give you tiny speed boost and if you need it you have your W.
I've seen an aggressive Bard before, and it was actually pretty terrifying (me being an Ekko main - everything is terrifying, but thats what the ult is for.)
I'll try your built though, I usually dont have a chance to build any real items because I've gotten rolled over in all my bard games pretty early, so I'll try this out and see if I get any different results.

Hell yeah another Bard main! *high-fives*

I agree that Baiting an enemy into a portal when you didn't actually go in it is one of the best feeling ever! =P

But have you ever manage to steal a Drake/Nash from enemy team with Bard? I actually stole a couple of them sometimes all alone vs the enemy team by just veeery carefully ulting them when the Drake/Nash was low, portal inside the enclosure , then stun the enemy jungler ONTO the Drake/Nash with a well place Q as soon as Zhonya ends , and finish off the beast with a meep-powered auto-attack. You get destroyed by the enemy team whether you manage to steal it or not, but the feeling of utter smugness you get if you succeed is worth a thousand painful deaths. :D

I usually build him tanky as heck also (frozen heart is the best item ever), which allows me to really roam the entire map mid/late game and troll the bejeebus out of most enemy I find with the mobility from Chimes , the tankyness of the build itself and just the escapes and delay tactics of most of Bard's kit. (It's funny how the learning curve of playing Bard goes from -Trolling mostly your teammates- to -Trolling everybody whether they are friend or foe- to -mostly trolling the enemy team but sometime you still get to cancel your wukong's Ult by ulting the enemy team- XD )

Best ethereal buddies ahoy! :D

I can't wait to try my hand at Kindred, even though I will probably suck real hard because I can't play ADCs to save my life(yes I know they are junglers but it's still pretty much a squishy ranged carry =P)

But whether I can play them or not, I don't care because I love their personality so much either way. (I want to snuggle Wolf so bad) *-*

Wolf is so good ;-;7
When Kindred comes out I might learn to play them-- maybe main them too!
I'm going to main all the Ghibli champions omg

Aaa saw the WiP of this somewhere on tumblr! Turned out great. <3

bard and kindred make a great pair bard goes out for a journey and the hunter follows their pray

I found out Kindred has a line talking about popping Bard like a balloon OOP

Beautiful picture. :)