| They do advance slowly. Which, strangely enough, is the major reason why I like to have one in my party, and why he/she will ALWAYS have thief as one of their classes.
I find thieves useful for opening locks and finding-disarming traps only. I do find that having one is handy, but I don't like to have a single-class or even a double-class thief in my group, as it takes away XPs from the more useful classes. Nor do I personally like to dual-class from or to a thief.
So I figured, "Well, what if I put together a character who is a 'secondary' fighter/mage with a little bit of thief to handle the traps and locks? I already have a 'primary' mage to do most of my magic, and having a fighter in the back to fire arrows is always handy. So having a triple-class F/M/T would make a nice supplement to my group as a backup. Having a 'jack-of-all-trades-but-master-of-none' would be good for my group, and I don't need to have the thief class go up that fast since around level 7 or 8 his Open Locks and Find Traps skills will be as high as I need them."
I have always had a F/M/T in all the groups I have played, and they have always worked out exactly the way I wanted them to work. If you plan their role for the group properly, they are great to have, IMO. But I do understand the line of reasoning you have when comparing them to other classes like the Bard.
The7thStooge...
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Q- "There are three men in a room with three beds, but only two blankets. How do they keep warm?"
A- "They turn on the heat."
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Bards can only cast spells up to lvl 8 (lvl 9 is not a big loss, as you only lose PW:Kill and a Monster Summoning), and mages have to wait until lvl 16 for 8th lvl spells, lvl 18 for lvl 9 spells.
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