[3.5] Suggestion for a Druid

[torakfade]

Hello all,

I'm a new d&d player and wanted some suggestion for a character build.

I do know about roleplaying in general, (Call of Cthulhu d100... I'm the master, and I convinced my group to DM some D&d 3.5 so I can play once in a while :smallbiggrin: ) and know the mechanics quite well from previous reading and playing pc games like NWN.

So, I wanted to be a human druid; I don't care about powergaming and min-maxing, we do actually play for fun rather than "winning". Because this game is not our main focus, I think we'll only have core books available, maybe the most common ones like Complete Adventurer and whatnot.

Considering this, what should my build be? I don't know if we will be rolling stats or point-buy, but surely my priorities will be Wis (hopefully 16+), then Con (14), Int/Cha (12) and dumping Dex and Str. I will NEED Profession(Cook) because it's awesome, the rest is up for the choosing.

In particular, what Feats should I be looking at? There's so many to choose, and so few to actually take... plus, knowing that they vary wildly in power and usefulness, I wouldn't want to burden myself with stuff I'd never use or notice.

Thanks for any help/suggestions! :smallbiggrin:

[sadi]

Build options, druid 20 seriously. Stat important is normally wis -> con -> int -whatever. A couple good feats are natural spell (at level 6) if you use wild shape, and you should since that gives the druid the most options for flexibility or power. I like companion spellbond (in phb2) extends your share spell abilty with your animal companion to 30 ft, so it can actually keep buffs on it instead of them disolving once its not 5ft from you. Some people state about using natural bond to get a better animal companion. I'm not sure if that's how it actually works, you'd have to talk to whoever is running about that (complete adventurer), other stuff, multiattack, possibly track or extend spell, and depending on how magic gear looks craft wondrous items.

[Eldariel]

Feats:
Natural Spell on 6
Extend Spell on some level (handy with long duration buffs, like Greater Magic Fang and later Barkskin)
Quicken Spell on 9 or 12 (and Quicken stuff like Entangle, Soften X and so on)


Those I'd consider useful enough to be musts. Beyond that, see below:

Beyond that:
- Augment Summoning is nice, though it has a weak (for you; most Druid Conjurations don't have saving throws) prerequisite. You can spontaneously cast Summon Nature's Ally so it's all good. Note particularly your level 4 summon "Unicorn", which acts as a great healer so you don't need to spend your own actions on that.
- Craft Wondrous Items is always useful (particularly if you can wear items while Wildshaped, e.g. by putting them on after shifting shape or purchasing Wilding Clasps [Magic Item Compendium]). Craft Rods is also handy though slightly less so, as is Craft Magic Arms and Armor.
- You can also pick up the various monstrous fighting feats if interested, such as Multiattack, Flyby Attack and Improved Natural Attack. They're in Monster Manual; very useful with Wildshape. Improved Trip is a good one for you from PHB.
- Natural Bond [Complete Adventurer] can be good depending on how you read it; if you read it so that it mitigates the Druid level penalty from a stronger-than-standard companion [see Player's Handbook], it's a solid choice. Otherwise, it does nothing obviously.
- Some metamagic from Completes such as Rapid Spell [Complete Divine] (to go with your summons), Chain Spell [Complete Arcane] (for e.g. Dispel Magic, buffs and so on; may need to combine with Reach Spell to Chain Greater Magic Fang though) and Sculpt Spell [Complete Arcane].
- Spell Penetration & Greater if you intend on offensive spellcasting. At that point, some Spell Focuses (e.g. Necromancy; you know Finger of Death among others) could also be useful.
- Improved Initiative is always decent.


And yeah, stats:
- Wisdom is 18 if at all possible. If not, as high as possible. Consider being middle-aged (+1 to all mental stats, -1 to all physical stats) or even Old (+2 to all mental stats, -3 to all physical stats) if possible; older Druids really kick even more ass. All your level-ups go here, obviously.
- Con is as high as you can afford. I'd never play with under 14 base Con; HP are pretty damn good and stop you from dying to that one stupid lucky crit.
- Yeah, rest Int > Cha > Dex with Str on the rock-bottom.

Skills:
- Casters always max Concentration (just for not losing spells)
- Spot/Listen are awesome
- Druids have Knowledge: Nature

- Handle Animal: you need at least +10 Handle Animal with your companion; generally that means +6 from Ranks & Cha as you get +4 with your Companion, though you can put more points if you e.g. intend on pushing it in combat (though with careful trick selection, that shouldn't be necessary) or plan on getting other animals to follow you.
- Spellcraft can be useful particularly if you're the party caster.
- Survival is decent but mostly doable with just your Wis-modifier.
Heal is completely worthless with magical healing available.
- Tumble is probably worthwhile to cross-class so you can reliably make the DC 15 check to avoid AoOs (Jump synergies aren't bad either).
- Diplomacy can be great if you have good Con and happen to be the only diplomatically inclined character in the party. Being good with words is never a weakness.
- Sense Motive can be worthwhile to cross-class thanks to your massive Wis.
- Hide/Move Silently can be worthwhile to cross-class given the Dex and racial bonuses of many of the forms you can assume.

[jiriku]

Some obvious choices:

natural spell, to cast spells in wildshape
extra wildshape, to do what you do more often
track, to exploit your potential for a high survival skill
metamagic feats like extend spell, empower spell, maximize spell, and quicken spell to give you more options with your spells

That would pretty much do it for you right there.

Skillwise, exploit spot, listen, and survival since those probably aren't class skills for your fellow party members. Be their eyes and ears, especially when you can use a hawk form for improved scouting. For stealthy scouting, max out move silently and hide, and use forms like cheetah and rat.

OOC, playing a druid is sort of like having ten characters, so be kind to your fellow players and prepare sheets for yourself, yourself in your animal forms, your animal companions, and and any nature's allies you're likely to summon before you come to the game. That way you'll avoid stalling an exciting scene while you look up the racial hide modifier on your cheetah form or the claw damage of your bear companion or somesuch.

[Cieyrin]

Pure Druid is pretty damn good, regardless of what you do with it.

What you want to play with your druid is also important, for different people play druids differently. Some focus on the spellcasting, some on wild shaping, some on their animal companion, some on minionmancy via Summon Nature's Ally and some on a mix of the lot. Just going w/ Core and Completes, Augment Summoning, Natural Bond and Natural Spell are all decent feats.

[torakfade]

Wow this was fast!

Natural spell goes without saying... I was just thinking about choosing Augment Summoning and Spell Focus:Conj as my two level-1 feats, because a spontaneously summoned nature's ally with +4 str and con is a nice meat shield/tank in the beginning, and they are still useful later on... or are there better choices at 1st level?

Plus, the Track feat... can't I track at all without it, even with high Survival?

As for my plans, I want to be the "utility" kind of guy: melee while wildshaped in tough encounters, heavy use of utility skills and spells (warp wood, tree walk, speak with animals, detect poison...), with a lightning bolt or ice storm when the situation calls for it.

[Eldariel]

Plus, the Track feat... can't I track at all without it, even with high Survival?

You can't, but many good low-level companions, particularly the Riding Dog, have Scent and Track and can cover that for you. But no, you can't track most prints without Track. Here's the relevant passage:
" Without this feat, you can use the Survival skill to find tracks, but you can follow them only if the DC for the task is 10 or lower. Alternatively, you can use the Search skill to find a footprint or similar sign of a creature’s passage using the DCs given above, but you can’t use Search to follow tracks, even if someone else has already found them. "

You can figure out the DC here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#track). So yeah, you can't really track anything worth tracking without it. But, as I said, your animal companion (or a separate tracking hound you keep around just for it; all you need is some Handle Animal) can do the tracking for you saving the feat.


And Augment Summoning is a fine option, yes, although you shouldn't summon much on level 1 (because the summons have casting time of 1 round and duration of 1 round, so they only get to take 1 action before they disappear; 1-round casting time means you start casting it on your turn and finish at the start of your next turn so the opponents have the entire round to disrupt your casting too).

You should wait until your caster level goes up a bit and your summons last a bit longer (their duration is 1 round/level). But picking the feats up on level 1 is a fine choice.

[sadi]

Only on DC10 can you use survival without track to follow tracks.

There is always the half-orc racial substitution level for level 6, you get the equivalent of augmented summoning instead of the 2nd use of wildshape. Summoning does take 1 full round so, it's not really a great choice to cast in combat, you want to make sure it lasts long enough to make it worth while. Of course for 3000 a wand of lesser extend helps this out immensely.

[Starbuck_II]

1st level Conj Wizard can grant(s) Rapid Spell with summons. So how about Druid 1/Wiz 1/Druid rest?
You get Augment summon and Rapid spell for summons (give up familiar + Conj bonuses).

[Leewei]

A pure druid is very potent and easy to play.

Feats would depend on the campaign setting. If you'll have downtime to do so, get Craft Wondrous Item and kit yourself out with a Cloak of Resistance, various stat bonus items (especially +Con and +Wis) and an Amulet of Natural Armor. Lagging behind other PCs for experience actually balances itself out since you get 140% of the award of a PC a level higher than you.

Natural Spell is decent enough. Improved Initiative is very nice for nearly all character classes. Extend Spell and Empower Spell are very sweet.

Learn what summon nature's ally <number> spells can do, especially creature special abilities. Most animals are good in a straight-up fight, but some are especially good in the right circumstance. Elementals are wonderful. Summon earth elementals to flank opponents and to push them and provoke Attacks of Opportunity from your companions. Water elementals can extinguish torches and lanterns, rendering human opponents blind in dark areas. Huge Giant Constrictor Snakes are wonderful grapplers, and become Gargantuan with animal growth. That's three size categories bigger than you -- you can occupy the same area and lock down 20'x20' where any opponent moving provokes an Attack of Opportunity and a vicious constrict. And then, there's the humble Thoqqua. These things burrow through stone and leave usable passages.

Your self-buffs and (by extension) Animal Companion buffs are solid. Longstrider gives a +10' move; barkskin and cat's grace are good AC buffs; ultimately, animal growth turns Fido into a terrifying brute. Heart of <element> spells are also decent self-buffs. Throw a few on yourself and you become immune to criticals. Freedom of movement makes you largely immune to grapples. Death ward is another great buff. Wall of thorns makes it nearly impossible for anyone to move within its area -- except you, that is. Control wind with your caster level properly boosted lets you grant missile immunity to your allies, thwarts flying or gaseous opponents and swarms, and allows you to reduce air-based attacks made against you and your allies. Stoneskin has a costly material component but soaks a huge amount of physical punishment for you.

[Eldariel]

Btw, about equipment:
- You should definitely equip your animal companion. Even just Masterwork Studded Leather Barding (something any animal can wear regardless of proficiencies; it has no armor check penalty and thus no penalty for wearing it) is a great addition to any animal, followed by Mithril Chain Shirt Barding once you can afford Mithril. Mithril Breastplate only has -1 ACP and with the Nimbleness-ability [Magic Item Compendium], +0.

Also, war-trained Animal Companions (such as War-Trained Riding Dog) are proficient with armor so you can wear the best armor available. Mithril Full-Plate of Nimbleness has mere -1 ACP, so it's somewhat ok on higher levels (though -1 to attacks sucks).
- For yourself, you'll eventually want one of two defensive items: Monk's Belt (which gets you Wisdom to AC and +1 on top of it) or Wild Dragonhide Fullplate (which works while Wildshaped, but without any of the penalties; Dragonhide is the only version of "metal" armor Druids can wear). Note that Wild Dragonhide Fullplate works even if you don't use some of the ways to wear items while Wildshaped.
- Metamagic Rod of Extend and Chain are both useful for buffing (Metamagic Rod of Chain has a reasonable price in Magic Item Compendium; the Complete Arcane-version somewhy has twice the price it should, costing more than Quicken-rods even though Quicken is +4 and Chain +3).
- Ioun Stones stick around even Wildshaped. Eventually you'll want at least the Orange Prism (+1 CL) one.
- Beads of Karma are great for "morning buffing" to cast the spells you intend on using all day at higher caster level. You're a divine caster so it works for you by default.
- Wand of Cure Light Wounds/Lesser Vigor (Lesser Vigor is more efficient but non-core) is the best healing item in the game. With it, you can do all your out-of-combat healing without any spell slots and for a cheap price. 750gp each, for many hundreds of points of healing. You can automatically use them since the spells are on your spell-list.

[Pigkappa]

My last character was a Druid (our campaign ended a few days ago) and I found a problem with roleplaying it.

I was a Druid who spent most of his life in a wood before starting to go on adventure. Our adventures involved big castles built by some crazy mage/sorcerer, struggles between good and evil cities, missions in some strange dungeons underground to discover old cities (we ended up on another planet in one of the last sessions!). I found that it is quite difficult for a Druid to find some good reasons to be interested in these kinds of adventures. While a good cleric is ok with everything that may involve fighting evil forces, and mages/warriors can have whatever reasons they like to adventure, to roleplay the Druid's connection with Nature is a little difficult sometimes.

So, I suggest you ask your DM what kind of campaign he is going to make in order to adjust your background in a reasonable way - for example, you may have been a Druid who has always lived on a high mountain and who feels a strong connection to Wind, if you are likely to have many missions which involve flying, or a Druid who feels a connection to earth if many dungeons are going to be underground.