[3.5] Earth Glide

[Crasical]

Hi, playground.

I've masochistically agreed to play a Druid in the upcoming World's Largest Dungeon game. The idea is that rather than the traditional PLANTS AND ANIMALS druid, I'm going for one that is more inclined to the building blocks of creation, the four elements. Specifically, Earth and Fire, the character in question being an island druid, and a priestess of the volcano god.

This post is about several things.

1. I gave my character the Alternate Class Feature of Elemental Companion, meaning she has a small earth elemental tiki (http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/337/3frontsh4.jpg) following her around. Does anyone have any creative uses of the Companion's Earth Glide ability, or a way to give it a spring-attack like-ability to have it leap out and attack before vanishing into the earth again, like a Shadow?

2. Blasphemy, I know, but I'm not really excited about wild shape, especially not sitting through 16 levels to get elemental shape. Does anyone know any fitting prestige classes for a druid devoted to earth and fire?

[pffh]

Someone (serpentine I think) homerbrewed a fire druid variant (it also had some earth like stuff iirc) right here on these very forums. Lets see if I can find it.

Edit: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=171732
Here it is serpentines druid variants the first one is a magma druid.

[Crasical]

I've already had my level 1 PC approved, so a homebrew variant isn't going to help me much....

[Prime32]

Shifter druids have an ACF which trades wild shape for buffs to shifting and summons.

Depending on your reading of Earth Glide, the elemental might be able to carry things with it.

[Gavinfoxx]

Planar Shepherd, of course! Ask your DM to write up a bunch of info on a Paraelemental Plane of Magma, since it would be really really nice for that to be in the cosmology because of your character...

Help him by doing lots of the work yourself! Go find lots of ash, soot, fire, and earth creatures, lots of things that would be in magma and volcanoes and stuff, especially lots of elementals, outsiders, and magical beasts, and read up on existing writeups of planes like that (there are a few in different books), and volcanic areas, and figure out some things for the plane to do to spells and such, and hand that to the DM!

[Crasical]

I really should have brought this up before getting my PC approved, huh? My character is human, not a shifter...

What book is the Planar Shepherd in?

[Gavinfoxx]

Faiths of Eberron. But it should be quite adaptable to other settings -- I'm playing one in FR, you just have to do the research on the plane you are choosing, or write it up, or whatever.

The handbook for that class assumes you are playing in Eberron, and describes the planes specific to there:

http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19871574/The_Planar_Shepherd_Handbook

[Crasical]

I don't have that book... damn.

[Gavinfoxx]

It's really the only Druid PrC that doesn't cause you to drastically lose power. Do you think you can buy the book on ebay or amazon or something, or borrow it from a friend, or find it some other way?

[Serpentine]

I've already had my level 1 PC approved, so a homebrew variant isn't going to help me much....I honestly think you'd be best off getting it de-approved...

One possibility, though, is to ask if you can get your normal Wildshape replaced with my Volcanic Form version (or something like it). You don't get it until a couple of levels later either way, iirc, so it shouldn't require changing your build.

[Fouredged Sword]

There is a feat that lets you summon unlimited small elementals so long as you have a summon spell of left to cast (and as a druid you can spontaniously do so and thus you can do so as long as you have a spellslot left) - disposable minions are very useful.

[megabyter5]

There is a feat that lets you summon unlimited small elementals so long as you have a summon spell of left to cast (and as a druid you can spontaniously do so and thus you can do so as long as you have a spellslot left) - disposable minions are very useful.

You mean one of the Reserve feats in CMage?

[nedz]

Its called Summon Elemental.

Ed: posted quickly because I expected to get Ninja'd :smallsmile:
I'm not sure its realy worth it since you can spontaneously summon Elementals anyway.

[Fouredged Sword]

Quantity is it's own quality sometimes. Having one of four minions of choice for any given task is very useful. Have an air elemental lift a rope into position and tie it. Have an earth elemental scout through doors. All elementals can set off traps. When they die, just summon more!

[nedz]

Quantity is it's own quality sometimes. Having one of four minions of choice for any given task is very useful. Have an air elemental lift a rope into position and tie it. Have an earth elemental scout through doors. All elementals can set off traps. When they die, just summon more!

I suppose that could be cool.
You could also play a spontaneous Druid for even more summonings; about half the time (every odd level) your highest level spell is SNA anyway.

[Crasical]

I've actually just been informed by another player that summoning spells are banned in this dungeons, since weird-magic-plot-**** means that it's impossible to leave via teleportation and summoning would let you call in an infinite amount of creatures.

... So, yeah. I'm really kind of bummed at how much the dungeon seems to be going out of it's way to say 'hahaha, **** YOU' to druids who aren't wild-shape focused. No summoning, few natural plants or animals...
:smalleek: Eeek, appologies for the now-censored profanity. It's late and I'm tired and depressed, it was a long day.

[Fizban]

I suppose that could be cool.
You could also play a spontaneous Druid for even more summonings; about half the time (every odd level) your highest level spell is SNA anyway.

Huh? You don't need any variant to cast SNA spontaneously as a druid.

For Earth Glide tactics, unless you can get it's feat's jiggered for Spring Attack you'll have to settle for just attacking out of the walls. With no tremorsense it will have no way to tell if there's an enemy in the adjacent square, but otherwise it should be able to attack from within a wall. It would have a 50% miss chance for not seeing, with total cover when inside the wall fully and normal cover when making it's attack (in case someone readies an action to attack during it's turn), adapting the rules for incorporeal creatures inside of walls.

You might check with your DM on if you can even use Earth Glide. While Earth Glide says "any stone, dirt, or earth except metal", most other burrowing abilities and spells won't let you mess with worked stone, and WLD is mostly worked stone, so they might not expect it to work that way. I'd also question if the DM knows what an impact that ability would have on the game, and same with the Summon Elemental reserve feat. A very big assumption with WLD is that the characters basically don't have any resources except their hp and spells per day. Having an unlimited flow of intelligent minions that can spring traps, fly, and walk through walls is going to wreck a lot of the traps and encounters, at least in the first three sections (that's as far as I've read myself), and even having one minion that can walk through walls is going to be an absolute headache.

Replacements for wild shape, preferably elementally inclined? You could refluff the Aspect of the Dragon ACF from Dragon Magic. It's frankly quite horrible, but still easier to use than Wild Shape. The normal options are breath weapon (fire only but no limit on uses!), claws, con bonus and paralyze immunity, wis bonus and darkvision, and wings. You could rename them to firey swath, slam attacks, earth body, water senses, and air body.

Edit: haha, wow, yeah. I somehow managed to forget that summoning is banned, for exactly the reasons I mentioned (swordsage'd!). So, yeah. You can still use your elemental companion (and if you're lucky your DM might let you find another or form one out of earth using some fancy ritual if it dies), but you can't use the reserve feat or the summoning. Still, you could probably get away without going full on Wild Shape. I know I just said Aspect of the Dragon is terrible, but the unlimited use (for an hour anyway) breath weapon is something the dungeon won't be expecting at all. There are also a few "summon" spells that aren't actually [summon] typed. You can still use the Animate Fire/Water/Wood spells (level one spells that summon small elementals, require concentration), as well as Animate Snow and Awaken Sand (6th level), Changestaff (7th, core) Animate Plants (7th, also core) if you can find or conjure the appropriate materials. You can also use all the usual Wall spells, many of which can be quite lethal with some well timed bull rushes (mmm, Wall of Lava).

Okay that's not the best list so far, but it's still better than nothing. And you've still got all the rest of the druid list to work with (and sanctified spells if any of those strike your fancy).

AHA! I'VE FOUND IT! THE SOLUTION IS HERE! Conjure Ice Beast, from Frostburn. It lets you choose from both the SNA and SM lists, then applies a quick template and you're done. Oh yeah, and it's a conjuration [creation] spell, so you can use it in the WLD! Ice Beasts loose all their normal special attacks, so you won't have poison or SLA's or anything, but most of them will have better hit points, and they'll all have frosty claws, engulfing, and ice breath. If all else fails, summon the biggest bug available and just run everything over. And, unlike Animate Snow, you don't need anything other than your normal divine focus to cast it. Elemental enough for you?

Oh, and I suppose I'll point out: yes, the dungeon is in fact specifically designed to screw over the players. It is supposed to be hard and resource constricted, and aside from the blanket ban on teleportation and summoning it also tells the DM not to let the players use battlefield control because "that would make it too easy." They specifically list Web as an inappropriate spell for players in WLD, never mind that they have a boss monster using it in the second section. And the loots, well...

Spoiler regarding loots from the first three sections below:
The loot consists of several +1 weapons, a few +1 armors, a ring of endure elements (that glows uncontrollably), one unholy and one anarchic weapon (specifically stated that "holy would be too useful"), a rod of wonder, and a +2 breastplate the existence of which is more of a puzzle leading into a trap than an actual piece of loot. And this is assuming the players have searched every room, found every hidden nook, and slain every "boss." It's basically just what I would expect from a published adventure: lots of high price-low use crap that makes it look like you're being generous when you're really not. Oh, and there's some cash and gems I guess, but there haven't been any shops yet, so I don't know if that even matters.
And another spoiler about difficulty. No actual stats, but if your DM wants you in the dark then you probably shouldn't read. It's the kind of stuff I'd let my players know beforehand, but everyone's different:
On the bright side, it's not nearly as lethal as you might expect at first. You don't have to kill every single thing in the dungeon, and in fact you can skip around half the encounters by retreating and/or just not murdering at first sight. A lot (a lot) of other encounters are traps, and those are only as lethal as your rogue is unlucky. Resting is far from impossible, as there are multiple saferooms in each section, some of which are perfectly secure and others which are ambiguous but should be cued by your DM. Most monsters so far have had horrible builds and tactics, so using spells like Grease and Web should mess them up good (obviously why the writers say they should be banned). The book does run off the basic CR calculations however, and there are lots of groups of advanced monsters that are not accurately rated, so you do have to know when to retreat.
I should stress that I've only read the first three sections, but that's what I've seen so far. I would recommend trying to bring at least something the designer's didn't expect, if for no other reason than to keep things from getting boring. A permanent earth elemental companion could work, or a source of reusable breath weapon like Draconic Aspect or Dragonborn, or really any other extra resource from outside core, even if it's not infinite. Anything more than just hp and spell slots will give you an edge.

[Gavinfoxx]

Okay. CAN you get planar shepherd or not? If so, choose a plane that gets you access to Stone Flyer from the book "Underdark" (The Forgotten realms version). At level 8, Wild Shape into it, being sure to use the spell Enhance Wild Shape.

This gives YOU Earth Glide. Alternately, as a level 5 druid / lvl 8 Planar Shepherd, Wild Shape into a Bluespawn Ambusher (MM4), again using Enhance Wild Shape, to get a burrow that specifically works in stone too! That would presumably leave a bunch of loose stone / pebbles / etc. in your path, so that everyone else could use spells to burrow the normal way behind you, and out of that cursed place!

Also, an artificer who can basically 'melt down' all the useless 'loot' to power XP based item creation and use all the gems and stuff to make USEFUL things would be *insanely useful* in this game... they would also give you easy and simple access to spells that let you burrow the hell out of there...

[nedz]

Huh? You don't need any variant to cast SNA spontaneously as a druid.
It now appears entirely acedemic, but I was under the impression that the OP was trying to maximise summoning. Spontaneous Druids do get more spells.

[Crasical]

Okay. CAN you get planar shepherd or not? If so[...]
Also, an artificer who can basically 'melt down' all the useless 'loot' to power XP based item creation and use all the gems and stuff to make USEFUL things would be *insanely useful* in this game... they would also give you easy and simple access to spells that let you burrow the hell out of there...

I do NOT have access to Planar Shepherd. Depending on if I get super-attached to my Druid I might buy it. I DO have access to a borrowed Eberron book, but my Artificer was vetoed as being a useless addition to the party when I put the idea forward to my DM/Party.



One possibility, though, is to ask if you can get your normal Wildshape replaced with my Volcanic Form version (or something like it). You don't get it until a couple of levels later either way, iirc, so it shouldn't require changig your build.

I don't know how big the tunnels in the WLD are, and the Volcanic Form explicitly increases your size to Large and then Huge. I fear enlarging myself and then being stuck in a narrow corridor...



AHA! I'VE FOUND IT! THE SOLUTION IS HERE! Conjure Ice Beast, from Frostburn. It lets you choose from both the SNA and SM lists, then applies a quick template and you're done. Oh yeah, and it's a conjuration [creation] spell, so you can use it in the WLD! Ice Beasts loose all their normal special attacks, so you won't have poison or SLA's or anything, but most of them will have better hit points, and they'll all have frosty claws, engulfing, and ice breath. If all else fails, summon the biggest bug available and just run everything over. And, unlike Animate Snow, you don't need anything other than your normal divine focus to cast it. Elemental enough for you?

For an elemental druid? Glorious. For a specifically Earth/Fire lava druid? Not so great. (Sorry to be such a buzzkill on that one)

Fizban, how long did it take before you reached the point where you had someone able to Create Food? Any suggestion on how much iron ration to bring in?

[Gavinfoxx]

Did you explain to them, "You do realize that the artificer will let you have access to every magic item ever, and every spell ever as well, earlier than the specialists in those spells can get access to them, generally, and their first and least trick is giving you bane against whatever you are fighting, and will let you completely bypass the fact that this module gives out crappy magic items, and artificer has a large number of ways to let spells last all day long, and artificer will let you turn those crappy magic items and the lots of mundane wealth this module gives into useful stuff, especially since for the longest time this module gives no place to spend the wealth or change the useless crappy magic items into useful stuff? And it is in general considered in the running for the most powerful class in the game, up there with Cleric, Druid, Wizard, and Erudite?"

[Crasical]

No, but I told them it was a class based around manipulating, crafting, and building magical items.

They asked how I was going to do this in an endless dungeon, with no access to shops and limited downtime.

I felt they kind of had a point with that.

[Gavinfoxx]

Oh that's easy!

1.) Craft portable hole.
2.) Craft multiple Dedicated Wrights that can craft from within the portable hole.

You can do that in part (the wright part) by level 4 or so. The portable hole might take longer... if you want to do something earlier, you could be a kobold variant and pick up craft relic and create that portable pit, for much cheaper and easier (and it's bigger!) than a portable hole. Just put up some scaffolding inside the thing, and build your lab in there. And make one homonculi yourself, and then have it make some helpers, and then have them craft whatever you want in the pit while you adventure!

And you can use infusions to simulate spells, rather than just crafting the scrolls, too, so you don't actually NEED downtime. And lots of spells can make temporary armor and stuff for your magic to work on.

Anyway, artificers work great with limited to no access to shops, because they basically let you get shop stuff without needing shops! That's the whole point.

Hell, at level 1, they can craft a scroll of the level 2 spell summon mirror mephit, and then they can summon a mirror mephit, and then they can command that mirror mephit to use it's ability to create a simulacrum of, say, the type of djinn that has the ability to make permanent plant based items of any plant, at will, and you can use that simulacrum as your main way of getting materials for scrolls, armor, weapons, etc.

Seriously, with at will creation of anything plant based, you can get anything useful, from bronzewood and duskwood armor and weapons, to poisons of all sorts, to paper to make scrolls, to wood for tools, to food and drink, whatever.

[Fizban]

For an elemental druid? Glorious. For a specifically Earth/Fire lava druid? Not so great. (Sorry to be such a buzzkill on that one)

Fizban, how long did it take before you reached the point where you had someone able to Create Food? Any suggestion on how much iron ration to bring in?

Ah well. I'd suggest Summon Desert Ally, but those are [summon] typed even though they do a similar sand construct template thing.

Food isn't really supposed to be an issue in WLD, so it shouldn't be a problem unless you think your DM might want to make it one. There are a few suggestions for how to hand wave food but even if it's not some sort of magical time slow field or mushrooms or something, well all the humanoids you're fighting have to get their food from somewhere, and you can get it from them. Everlasting Rations and an Everfull Mug together only cost 550gp, so you can afford them on a 2nd level budget if you want to do it that way (although forcing the characters to pay out of pocket to make up for the dungeon's logic problems is lame).

[Crasical]

Oh? Good to hear. At least we don't have to worry about starving.

I'm considering multiclassing Elemental Savant and becoming a pseudo fire elemental, and scouring the Spell Compendium for Druid blasting spells. Seemed fitting for a lava druidess. Might look for an earth-themed PRC elsewhere.

EDIT: A friend suggested Gehenna as a plane full of volcanoes.

[Gavinfoxx]

With Druid, you *really really really* don't want to not advance any of the three pillars of Druidic Awesome.

Those are

1.) Spellcasting
2.) Animal Companion
3.) Wild Shape

Planar Shepherd is considered the only Druidic Prestige Class that *doesn't lower your power* because it is the only one that advances all three pillars in sane ways.

Most of the other druidic prestige classes just advance one or maybe two, or advance one in ways that really don't work too well. That's why Planar Shepherd is considered the only VIABLE Druid prestige class.

Well... *maybe* Hathran might be okay, for a spellcasting focused Druid. Maybe.

[Crasical]

With Druid, you *really really really* don't want to not advance any of the three pillars of Druidic Awesome.

Those are

1.) Spellcasting
2.) Animal Companion
3.) Wild Shape


I'd be very happy with just 1 and 2.

The high level you have to get to reach and the very limited number of elemental wild shapes you get as a straight druid leaves it unappealing for a druid who's supposedly forsaken their bond with plants and animals to bond with the earth and fire of the magma below the surface of the world.

If druids are already tier 1 casters, I can sacrifice some power for flavor without becoming useless to the party, right?

[Gavinfoxx]

Oh yea, sure, you can sacrifice some of their power if ya want!

I'm not sure which of the prestige classes mix does best with just giving you those two particular pillars. Uhm...

I know Master of Many Forms focuses on wild shape to the exclusion of other stuff, and Hathran focuses on spellcasting I think to the exclusion of wild shape, and maybe animal companion too. I'd say you should ask some people who know more about druid prestige classes advance what... Do you have any more eberron books? There are a few druid / something other than druid classes that advance stuff, though.

But people tend to stick with Druid 20 for a biiiig reason... and that is really that there aren't many GOOD druid prestige classes in general... they didn't get a lot of love in the prestige class department, and the ones that do exist tend to have really narrow flavor, unfortuantely (like swans, or moon focused, or wild shape only or a specific faerun group of masked casters, or bard/druid types, or stuff like that).

[Crasical]

No Eberron books except for the base one, no.

[Serpentine]

I don't know how big the tunnels in the WLD are, and the Volcanic Form explicitly increases your size to Large and then Huge. I fear enlarging myself and then being stuck in a narrow corridor...Well, it also expicitly says you can choose to use a lower version... But fair point. Still think something like it could be worth considering, though.

[Fax Celestis]

2. Blasphemy, I know, but I'm not really excited about wild shape, especially not sitting through 16 levels to get elemental shape. Does anyone know any fitting prestige classes for a druid devoted to earth and fire?

See if your DM will waive the racial requirement on the Stonespeaker Guardian prestige class from Races of Stone. It'll let you turn all your wildshape uses into uses for the Stone Shape feat and powers it up, basically turning you into an earth-elemental lite. I use it for my earth druid.

You could also try using some earth and fire elemental grafts from Magic of Eberron, and/or seeing if your DM will let you turn some rock-themed items (like rock boots in MIC) into grafts.

Also, if you're willing to shell out a few bucks $1.44 since it's on sale, this (http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/s/superGeniusGames/pathfinderRPG/geniusGuides/magic/v5748btpy8dpn) is pretty handy.

If you're playing with Pathfinder rules, or your DM will allow them, try using the pathfinder druid and trading in your companion for the Earth, Fire, Cold Iron (in the pdf I linked) or Cavern domains. It's less powerful but more thematic.

[Crasical]

Quickly skimming over Stonepeaker Guardian, it's really neat! And hey, it grants Earth Glide for further shenanigans.

Considering a Druid 5/Stonespeaker 5/Elemental Savant 10 mixture, now. Gives a good mix of earth magic and fire magic. Gets just enough Druid to improve my elemental Companion (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20061010a)to medium sized, too.

I think I might check and see if my GM will allow it.

[Fax Celestis]

If you need backup, tell him my DM allowed it, and we have no issues, though I dunno how much weight that will carry. Also look at the Earth Dreamer PrC from the same book. It's more casty-focused than your typical druid PC, and Stonespeaker Guardian's unlimited Earth Glide is far superior to Earth Dreamer's minutes-per-day Earth Glide, but it has some other neat features.