[Heidrek]

Personally, I love bards. The combination of decent fighting ability, great defensive spells (blur, blink, mirror image, ghost armour) and pumps (Bull's strength, Eagles Spelndor, Emotion: Hope, Haste) and disabling spells (Chromatic Sphere, sleep, Charm Person, Dire Charm, Horror, Emotion: Fear, Slow, Confusion, Dominate, Great Shout) mean he is a very versatile class given a decent amount of levels. throw in pet summoning with Shades etc. and there's almost nothing the Bard can't do.

They're not the easiest class to master, but with some planning, they're fantastic. All he needs is some elemental damage capability and he'd be all set. Not to worry, there are plenty of items to offset this lack. With the 2 weapon fighting feats and haste, your 15th level pure bard can wade into combat with 5 attacks per round and keep throwing on Mirror Images every round to keep the hits off him or if he's taking a beating, drop an Invisibilty and run off to lick his wounds.

Back on topic:

Bards are well suited to the Eight Chambers challenges, due to their inherent pump abilities and summoning. Use Ghost Armour, Mage armour, Blur, Blink and Haste to make yourself hard to hit and go to town, or summon some shadows to help out.