#bardic knowledge

Because I have so much information in my head, a sizeable chunk of which I know because 'I heard about it in a song/story/movie/play.' I've always been like this, if I hear something in a story format, it's 90% more likely to stay with me than if it's just presented as a normal fact.

Knowledge (nature) or (religion) DC14: Golgari, as the denizens of the Stonefare call them, are a new type of undead interwoven with living plants that began appearing in CY1420. The reanimated corpses give the plants mobility and better attack strength, while the plants lend greater durability and regenerative powers in return. The origin of these creatures is not widely known, but it has become rumored that they can ‘seed’ normal dead bodies they come across (or kill), spreading their kind autonomously.

Stunned and overwhelmed by jealousy's doubt A faithless bohemian sat in the tavern with a sad look His nerves were shot and his tears without remedy Like a tormented loon because of the ungrateful wench that left He's always seen surrounded by the best of friends that stand with him and tell him that he's drowned enough "You fix nothing with this crying, nothing with this wine. In the contrary, your heart remembers even more."

Then one night like a madman, he bit into the wine glass And he made such a sharp cut that his lips were destroyed And the blood that poured confused itself with the wine And in the tavern, his cries shook everyone

"Do not worry my friends, if I destroy my mouth. Do not fret, for it is with this broken glass that I will erase the print left from her treacherous kiss.

Waiter! Pour me another in this glass Pour, for this fever of obsession is tearing me apart. Waiter! Pour me another in this broken glass. Drop by drop, I will bleed out the venom of her love."

Okay, so lemme level with you guys about Bardic Knowledge.

In AD&D, I played a Bard. I had wanted to be able to do a little bit of magic and a little bit of stabbing, and a fair amount of not getting stabbed myself.

Therefore, the role of Bard sounded great to me. One of my favorite skills was told to me by my friend, the DM at the time, Bardic Knowledge.

By rolling under the appropriate percentile, I would be able to identify nearly anything in the world, as long as I could justify that someone, somewhere, had sang a song about it.

Using examples like Beowulf and the Iliad, I was often able to make a strong case for "knowing about that door in this dungeon."

"Look at the descriptions of Heorot's Great Hall!" I would argue. "They describe every inch of his castle in detail. There's no way that someone didn't sing about this door."

I would use this ability offensively too. One time, the party and I ended up in a room full of statues. Being adventurers, and possessing the usual level of paranoia, I immediately suspected gargoyles. But how to check?

"I Bardic Knowledge the statues."

"What? Why? You can't tell anything about statues from a Bardic Knowledge check!?"

"If they've got a statue, they've got to have a song about them."

"..."

"They're all gargoyles."

All of this made for an immense amount of fun, as I would be able to justify nearly anything due to this knowledge of stories and the world around us.Of course, like all good things, this too had to come to an end.

In this case, it was when I attempted to look up how much Bardic Knowledge went up per level, and couldn't find it in the Player's Handbook. The only thing I could find was an ability that allowed Bards a 35% base chance to recognize a MAGICAL ITEM. My friend had misremembered the ability, and we had just been rolling with it for several campaigns.

Knowledge (local) DC15: A blacksmithy and weapon dealer run by the grouchy hill dwarf expert3 Artin Stonebarrow, a factor for the owner Baronette Rigorim in Strongtown. Much of the stock is poor quality, weapons made of bone, stone, or iron by monstrous races, then stolen and sold by adventurers, but the shop still makes a good profit. 

Knowledge (local) DC15: A stationary shop run by the stately high elf wizard7 Laucian Starflower. He sells various types of pens, paper and parchment, ink of different colors and qualities, a handful of spell scrolls, and even blank books. He also sells blank spellbooks and some of the magical writing materials used by spellcasters to write in them or scribe scrolls. In addition, he can provide scrivening (copying or dictation), scroll scribing, and spellcasting services, and will allow other wizards to copy from his own large spellbooks for a fee.