Advice to give to my Druid player

[Godskook]

So, I've got a team of 6 going along now, and my Druid is constantly banging his head against the wall trying to carve a niche for himself, and he doesn't ever seem to be getting there.

His build:
Rogue 1/Druid 5

Plans:
Rogue 1/Druid 5/Daggerspell Shaper 10

Feats:
1.Natural Spell
2.Weapon Focus(Dagger)
3.Two-Weapon Fighting
4.Combat Reflexes
5.Archery feat
6.(I forget)

Animal Companion: Camel

Typical spell selection:
-Call lightning
-Flaming sphere
-Summon Dire Hawk
-Fire Wings
-Spider Climb

Relevant Houserules:
1.Xp can be spent on things other than item creation, namely:
-Increasing one's point-buy value
-Feats
-Maxing HD

2.Rich's polymorph ruleset, with two additions so far:
-Loses equipment unless wilding clasps are used
-Wildshaping gains 1 racial bonus feat per 3 'caster levels'

3.Test of Spite's ban/restricted list is used as a 'softban', in that anything listed there requires DM review before it sees play.


Party consists of:
1.Warblade 6
2.Crusader 7
3.Scout 3/Ranger 3(Swift Hunter)
4.Wizard 5/Crusader 1
5.Swordsage 6
6.Rogue 1/Druid 5

[Retech]

Focus more on wildshaping. He should be wildshaped most of the time.

[Croverus]

I agree with that he should focus on wildshaping.

I also don't see the point of summoning the dire hawk.

Instead he should pick some debuff spell that he can use to make his opponent more vulnerable to whatever form he wildshaped into.

Also that archery feat seems kinda useless unless he needs it for his build at some point down the line.

[Yora]

I'm not familiar with the daggerspell shaper, but from what I've found it's a combination of wild shape and sneak attack that gets almost full druid spellcasting.
That doesn't sound too different from a regular druid, except that it has sneak attack. I would advice on looking up guides how to best make use of wild shape as a druid.

[Godskook]

1.He can wildshape 1/day for 5 hours. Considering I'm good enough about timing that this *WILL* be an issue, I don't think that 'stay in wildshape' is good advice for a couple of levels.

2.The archery feat was part of his 'maturing' process of leveling through the last few levels, since he had significantly higher attack rolls with his bow than with anything melee.

3.He *just* got wildshape. Any particularly good forms other than Deinychus(pounce, 4 attacks, capped str, con, and NA).

4.A daggerspell Shaper is a druid with a few wasted feats, slightly better wildshape attacks(his claws and/or slams get the weapon's bonuses), 2 lost spellcasting levels, SA dice, and more skill points.

[Cespenar]

There was a feat that allowed you to deal your sneak attack damage in grapples. Savage Grapple, I think?

[Retech]

I believe there is a clothing item that gives druids an extra wildshape daily, but I can't remember what it was.

[Tvtyrant]

Leopard for pounce and rakes, cheetah for sprint and improved trip, a flying form and get Sudden Maximize to maximize your call lighting and then flitter around pulling lightning down on people, I believe Fleshrakers are medium sized, Dire Badger for rage.

[Godskook]

I believe there is a clothing item that gives druids an extra wildshape daily, but I can't remember what it was.

There is, but it costs a quarter of level 10 WBL, which is kinda above and beyond what I should be giving a level 6 PC in general.


Leopard for pounce and rakes, cheetah for sprint and improved trip, a flying form and get Sudden Maximize to maximize your call lighting and then flitter around pulling lightning down on people, I believe Fleshrakers are medium sized, Dire Badger for rage.

Leopard looks like a better choice than Deinychus, at least if he's charging.

Call lightning isn't impressive on a 1-round level, and he's already having the 1-use issues, so I don't feel good reccomending a single-use per day feat, especially since multiple encounters per day is frequent.

Cheetah is just fantastic for tripping

And I'm not sure about fleshrakers, but for things more obscure than animals, I think I'm going to enforce the "must see it" requirements.

[Tvtyrant]

Right, Call Lightning is normally weak. But if you Sudden Maximize it you do 18 damage a turn for 6 minutes, effectively making you a mini-warlock.

I agree that Leopard is the best medium form for damage, with Cheetah acting as an amazing tripper.

[Stallion]

Use creatures with advanced hitdie to his own hitdie. He'd have to apply the stats for each advanced shape as appropriate, but it'd get him that little extra kick. I know I'd rather wildshape into a 4 HD leopard/cheetah/black bear/crocodile than stick around at the regular 3 HD statblock. Especially if he can find something that would advance the creature in size category (which wouldn't really happen for a while).

[Godskook]

Use creatures with advanced hitdie to his own hitdie. He'd have to apply the stats for each advanced shape as appropriate, but it'd get him that little extra kick. I know I'd rather wildshape into a 4 HD leopard/cheetah/black bear/crocodile than stick around at the regular 3 HD statblock. Especially if he can find something that would advance the creature in size category (which wouldn't really happen for a while).

I'd rather stick to RAW advice for now, and RAW forbids the use of 'advanced' creatures.

[Stallion]

I'd rather stick to RAW advice for now, and RAW forbids the use of 'advanced' creatures.

As soon as you show me the RAW reading preventing or even discouraging that, I'll stop laughing.

[Godskook]

As soon as you show me the RAW reading preventing or even discouraging that, I'll stop laughing.

Point, but how would that help, considering that lvlup ability points and size increases aren't racial(to my knowledge, I'm kinda out of 'familiar' territory now), and are therefore not gained through the polymorph template in Rich's rules.

[Stallion]

Ahhh I see now. Herp. And derp.

[Coidzor]

What is the Wizard doing that prevents him from having a niche as the sole divine spellcaster? :smallconfused:

[Ungvar]

What is the Wizard doing that prevents him from having a niche as the sole divine spellcaster? :smallconfused:

+1

Sure doesn't seem like theres a dearth of available niches just waiting to be filled.

[...that sounded vaguely pornographic]

But yeah, from the spell selection, it seems like the druid is doing a lot of blasting. If your wizard is also of the blasty-persuasion, then you have a party full of damage dealers.

If your player just wants to identify a party role, then he should focus more on battlefield control (entangle), utility (wood shape), and healing (vigor spells). Great thing about being a druid is you can always convert any of those into a Summon Nature's Ally for a melee form of "blasting". Give him a Rod of Metamagic: Extend, and those rounds per level durations aren't so onerous.

But the fact that he's going Daggerspell Shaper makes me think he's going to want to do a lot of melee, particularly when wildshaped. If that's the case, I can see why he may feel lost in a crowd of combat-types. I would suggest Bite of the WereRat (again, extended) for melee, perhaps combined w/ Produce Flame. And I would reassure him that 5th level is a bit like puberty for druids. You're experiencing all these weird changes, and you're still not as effective/accomplished as you want to be, but with a little time (levels), you really grow into your own.

btw, Fleshraker is in Monster Manual III, and is far and away the best combat form until you get Large size. To be honest, I would almost feel a bit guilty wild shaping into that form as a player, unless the campaign had specifically introduced them.

[Coidzor]

Come to think of it, Fochlucan Lyrist and Greenwhisperer... even Heartfire Fanner as the entry into one of those others... might be appropriate for him if he's willing to give up wildshape since so many of the group would benefit from that kind of force multiplication... And he already has one level of Rogue...

[Thespianus]

So, I've got a team of 6 going along now, and my Druid is constantly banging his head against the wall trying to carve a niche for himself, and he doesn't ever seem to be getting there.

His build:
Rogue 1/Druid 5

Plans:
Rogue 1/Druid 5/Daggerspell Shaper 10

Is he Dex focused with his dagger attacks? How does he handle Melee?

Maybe I missed something, but the Spell Compendium has the Bite of the Wererat spell that gives a +6 Dex, +2 Con, +3 to natural armor and the Weapon Finesse feat as a level 2 spell. TWF-characters with Sneak Attack tend to be Dex-based, so maybe this would help a little?`

At level two, you also have Mass Snake's Swiftness that can really help the party rack up the attacks.

But, apart from this, there's a lot of Battlefield Control spells that can help the party out. The Savage Grapple feat will allow him to make sneak attacks in a Grapple, and Craven will always be a solid boost for any sneak attacking character, even with just one level of Rogue.

[Drglenn]

4.A daggerspell Shaper is a druid with 2 lost spellcasting levels

This is the main thing that matters

[Greenish]

And I'm not sure about fleshrakers, but for things more obscure than animals, I think I'm going to enforce the "must see it" requirements.That's just an excuse to throw a pack of fleshrakers at your players. :smalltongue:

A couple of them and your PCs will be in trouble faster than you can say "Eshka'rhavad'eth".

[mint]

Let him retrain out of the archery?
Get to druid 7 before going into daggerspell shaper so he gets more wildshape uses and 4th level spells.
Get the rejuvenation variant from PHB2. Usually a bad choice. But,
1) party has a lot of melee and no other divine casters.
2) party is big enough as it is, SNA is good but with so many players, annoying.
He should not be blasting. Buff spells and battlefield control. Maybe not entangle since his friends won't be able to charge if they get hit.


I would have focused more on being a caster in a party like that. The melee niche, it's really already taken here.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

My advice to him?

"You've gotten the only feat that really matters, Natural Spell. Now have fun. No matter what you do, you are still going to be more powerful than the rest of the party, except possibly the wizard, put together. You have class abilities more powerful than half the classes in the PhB, your spells are on par with the wiz/sorc/cleric, so it really doesn't much matter what you choose to do from here, you almost can't go wrong."

Having said that, there's a few tips I'd offer:

1) Entangle is absolutely one of the best 1st level spells in the game. Keep at least one memorized at all times.

2) Never underestimate the value of disposable minions, via Summon Nature's Ally. They can be a speedbump that takes a hit for an ally, or maybe sets up a flank for someone, or just more damage output while you are busy eating its face off.

3) Barkskin explicitly stacks with any natural armor bonus you currently have. It's a lot better than you think it is.

4) Greater Natural Weapon can be cast upon yourself, and if used to improve all natural attacks, can be quite good at helping you rip faces. This also means sharing it with your animal companion for free.

5) Animal Growth. Best buff ever for your animal companion. It won't work on you, even when shifted, because Wild Shape doesn't change your type or subtype (unless you get an aquatic subtype), but it will work on Summon Nature's Ally summons.

Other than that? The world is your oyster. Have fun. Don't sweat the rest.

[Coidzor]

Why did he select such a horrible Animal Companion, anyway? It's not useful as a mount and it's not useful as a scout and its not useful as a bodyguard...

[Greenish]

Why did he select such a horrible Animal Companion, anyway? It's not useful as a mount and it's not useful as a scout and its not useful as a bodyguard...It's not a bad mount, as fast as heavy horse, and stronger so it can carry more.

[Edit]: Plus it's a camel!

[Godskook]

[Edit]: Plus it's a camel!

That's 90% of the reason right there.

[Coidzor]

That's 90% of the reason right there.

So.... he wants to watch it die horribly? :smallconfused: I've never heard of any interpretation of camels other than hating them for being so foul-tempered and bloody-minded.

[Greenish]

That's 90% of the reason right there.You could upgrade it to War Camel from Sandstorm, so it's a bit more useful in combat.

Plus, War Camel.

[Blacktree]

Er, yeah I think the reason he's having a hard time filling a niche is because he's trying to fill one that is crowded as crap in that party. It's either change course sharply in his play style or continue feeling like another face in the melee crowd. The beautiful thing is he's a druid, hard to screw up and easy to change flavor. His problem isn't mechanical or feat-based, it's mentality based.

Probably a bad idea to go the daggerspell shaper route and lose out on spellcasting levels that would actually make him stand out in that group. Stick with druid, he'll have a growing selection of cool animals to wildshape in to that will still make him awesome in melee if he feels like getting in to the mix, but with better spells to back it up.

Again it's a head issue right now. I personally love theming druids, if he wants to make a sneaky, shadowy one, that's no problem. I've got one EXACTLY like that I'm about to fire up for an E6 campaign, he's an icy, shadowy, sneaky bugger from the dark, frozen north :)

[Gavinfoxx]

Have him retrain so he never loses a druid level, ever?

And read this:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=1354.0

And then have him read it.

[Coidzor]

You could upgrade it to War Camel from Sandstorm, so it's a bit more useful in combat.

Plus, War Camel.

I'm confused. You guys actually like camels? :smallconfused:

Or is there some colossal in-joke that I've managed to never stumble upon here?

[Godskook]

So.... he wants to watch it die horribly? :smallconfused: I've never heard of any interpretation of camels other than hating them for being so foul-tempered and bloody-minded.

He picked his animal companion in a way that was totally blind to the mechanical value of the feature.

[Darrin]

Typical spell selection:
-Call lightning
-Flaming sphere
-Summon Dire Hawk
-Fire Wings
-Spider Climb


It sounds like spell selection may be the crux of his problem. While call lightning and summon dire hawk are pretty decent spells, I'm not sure they fit the character concept (melee sneak-attack scrapper + spells). Flaming sphere is a complete waste of a spell slot (you'll get better damage out of summoning another dire hawk). Fire wings and spider climb are pretty nifty utility spells (particularly the latter), but fire wings borks up the whole dagger/sneak attack thing, and unless he's got Improved Unarmed Strike, also borks up stacking iteratives + natural attacks.

Some recommendations:

Golden Desert Honey (300 GP, Complete Mage p. 135). Reduces the casting time of summon spells to one standard action. Expensive at first, but once planar binding or summon monster VII becomes available, creating 20 cubic feet of the stuff (via djinn's major creation) becomes triflingly easy. Standard action summons allows the druid to get his flankers out quicker, and he can avoid the whole "full round punching bag" thing.

Lesser Metamagic Rod, Extend (3000 GP, DMG). A large number of druid spells are exponentially more awesome when extended, particularly creeping cold.

Lesser Metamagic Rod, Sculpting (3000 GP, MIC p. 165). A must-have for making entangle work with a party that loves to charge into melee before you can get your battlefield-control spells off, and multiplies the number of targets you can hit with call lightning by at least 4x. Also turns path of frost into uber-grease.

Spells:

1st:
Cloudburst (Spell Compendium). Debuffs ranged attacks (combos nicely with entangle) and increases the damage of call lightning when outside.

Conjure Ice Beast I (Frostburn). Access to all of the SM and SNA list, and you can add a special attack such as cold aura, 1d6 cold damage as a 10' burst every round as a free action *no save*.

Entangle (PHB/SRD). Bread-and-butter debuffer, don't leave home without it.

Instant of Power (Forge of War). One of the best spells to have in a wand chamber. As an immediate action, +4 enhancement bonus on an ally's next attack, save, or damage roll.

Path of Frost (Dragon Magic). Grease for treehuggers. Anything attacked on a slippery surface without 5 ranks in Balance is considered flat-footed per the Balance rules.

Winged Watcher (Complete Scoundrel). "Fly-or-die" spell as a swift action, either to get out of a melee cluster****, spy on an upcoming encounter, or avoid poorly designed traps.

Wood Wose (Spell Compendium). Unseen servant for treehuggers. Stupendously useful (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=8235936&postcount=8).

2nd:
Blinding Spittle (Spell Compendium). Ranged touch attack that blinds, *no save*. Blind target = sneak attack on a silver platter.

Creeping Cold (Spell Compendium). Fire-and-forget kill 'em slowly, or extend it for 21d6 damage over 6 rounds.

Daggerspell Stance (Spell Compendium). Actually kind of a lousy spell, but sounds like the entire character concept in a nutshell. Since it's a swift action spell, consider putting it in a wand + wand chamber to free up those 2nd level spell slots.

Fire Trap (PHB/SRD). Cast this on acid flasks, alchemist's fire, or just flasks of oil for a ranged touch attack that deals alchemical/energy damage, 1d4+1/CL fire damage, and possibly sneak attack damage.

Flame Blade (PHB/SRD). Melee touch attack that can also work with most weapon-related feats (including TWF and Power Attack). If your target is resistant/immune to fire damage, switch to scimitar of sand.(Sandstorm).

Frost Weapon (Frostburn). Not nearly as efficient as blades of fire, but TWF needs all the extra damage it can get. While it works quite well with your primary dagger, I like to put it on flame blade for the ironic perversity.

Kelpstrand (Spell Compendium). Debuffer and another good way to deliver sneak attack up the yinyang.

Saltray (Spell Compendium). Ranged touch attack + sneak attack + Fort save vs. stunned for 1 round.

Splinterbolt (Spell Compendium). Scorching ray for treehuggers, although as a normal ranged attack rather than a ranged touch attack. It's a volley attack, so you can only add sneak attack damage to the first splinter, but some DM's may handwave the stupid volley rules and give you sneak attack on every splinter.

Wracking Touch (Spell Compendium). Standard action means this does not work well with TWF, but this spell is an ideal pick for a +1 spell-storing dagger or Daggercast (Ex), which also allows you to add sneak attack damage even if the target isn't flanked/flat-footed. I think it's a melee touch attack, but I'm a little fuzzy on the mechanics... it looks like with Daggercast (Ex), you can get in a dagger attack as a touch attack on top of the spell effect.

3rd:
Conjure Ice Beast III (Frostburn). Huge centipedes can engulf large-sized or smaller creatures. Or summon four ice beast wolves with cold aura, 4d6 cold damage as a 10' burst, free action every round, no save.

Girallon's Blessing (Spell Compendium). Add all those TWF dagger attacks to your wildshape attacks. Consider adding permanency so you never get screwed over by a doorknob again (from a 13th-level NPC spellcaster, this will cost you about 8150 GP).

Heart of Water (Complete Mage). There are certain spells that have a great deal of multi-function utility, and then there's this spell, which is just a smorgasborg of awesomesauce. Water breathing, swim speed, +5 to escape artist checks, and you can dismiss it to gain freedom of movement for 1 round per caster level.

Hypothermia (Spell Compendium). 1d6 cold damage/CL, 10d6 max. A pretty decent direct-damage spell if you don't have flamestrike yet and don't have the patience to wait around for an extended creeping cold.

Icelance (Spell Compendium). 6d6 damage doesn't scale up at all, but the Fort save vs. stunned for 1d4 rounds is somewhat nifty, and it's another weaponlike spell that can be combined with sneak attack.

Infestation of Maggots (Spell Compendium). Another candidate for Daggercast (Ex), make a dagger attack as a melee touch attack, and the target may take 1d4 Con damage over several rounds.

Lion's Charge (Spell Compendium). Probably better/cheaper to pick this up as a wand from a ranger, but a good way to get pounce if your in a wildshape form that doesn't already have it.

Quillfire (Spell Compendium). Better base damage than daggers, can be either melee or ranged, plus poison, then add sneak attack. For extra LOLZ, wildshape into a form that naturally has a poison (Ex) attack, and then add venomfire (Serpent Kingdoms). The spell description doesn't mention if these are manufactured or natural weapons, but since they can also be thrown, there's no mention is made about primary/secondary attacks, and quills are not listed in the SRD as a "common" natural weapon, I would assume they're treated as manufactured weapons.

[Greenish]

Anything attacked on a slippery surface without 5 ranks in Balance is considered flat-footed per the Balance rules.Really? I thought that only moving on slippery surface triggers balance checks (and thus the flat-footedness).

[Darrin]

Really? I thought that only moving on slippery surface triggers balance checks (and thus the flat-footedness).

From the SRD:

"Being Attacked while Balancing: You are considered flat-footed while balancing, since you can’t move to avoid a blow, and thus you lose your Dexterity bonus to AC (if any)."



Slippery surfaces are considered difficult terrain, which costs double movement and requires a balance check when you *enter* that square. If a slippery surface suddenly appears beneath your feat outside of your turn, you didn't enter it and thus don't have to roll (beyond the usual Balance checks/Ref saves specified by grease, ice slick, path of frost, etc.), and you can move out of that square to a non-slippery square without a Balance check/Ref save. But if you get attacked while standing in a slippery square and you don't have 5 ranks in Balance, you lose your Dex bonus.

[Coidzor]

He picked his animal companion in a way that was totally blind to the mechanical value of the feature.

Which would make a lot more sense if it were some kinda cool animal. As it is, the whole camel thing just confuses me.

And if he's having trouble finding his niche, this seems either indicative of his mindset's overarching problem or is at least a contributing factor to keeping him from finding one. Don't have to have the equivalent of a pet fighter around, after all, even something more stealthy/scouty could be of help.

[Greenish]

From the SRD:

"Being Attacked while Balancing: You are considered flat-footed while balancing, since you can’t move to avoid a blow, and thus you lose your Dexterity bonus to AC (if any)."Yes, but you aren't considered balacing unless you actually moved on the slippery surface, or so I was told when I asked about it in the RAW thread.

[Darrin]

Yes, but you aren't considered balacing unless you actually moved on the slippery surface, or so I was told when I asked about it in the RAW thread.

Hmm... didn't see that thread, but that's still just someone's opinion on something that isn't explicitly clear in the rules.

My argument would probably be... being attacked while on a slippery surface requires you to be able to "move to avoid a blow". While this doesn't explicitly require a Balance check by itself, it still requires movement within a square with a slippery surface, and your ability to avoid blows has been compromised by whatever you're currently standing on, which is undeniably slippery regardless of how you got into the square or whether you've already made a Balance check. Thus, suck it up and take your sneak attack damage.

(Which is to say, my interpretation isn't any more or less valid than what was in the Q&A thread.)

But the "you're not balancing until you make a check" argument may only be valid with the path of frost and sleet storm spell. Grease requires a Ref save to avoid a fall when the spell is cast, thus you're balancing as soon as the spell is cast. While a Ref save isn't the same as a Balance check, I can't imagine any explanation of why a target would fail the save and subsequently fall that didn't involve mentioning either "slippery surface" or "losing your balance".

The ice slick spell in Frostburn may have been when the designers realized there was a problem with the Balance/slippery surface rules, because the spell explicitly requires a Balance check for anyone "caught in it when the spell is cast".

[Godskook]

*list*

You sire, now have a +1 internet.

[FMArthur]

A lot of people get so used to the assumption that Druids are always totally rigged based on their high, easy power ceiling, but their power floor is actually quite low. Most Druidy characters in fiction are the nature lovers who get along with all the critters of the forest - surrounded by birds, squirrels, and with their faithful dog or other small critter always at their side. Replicating this is easy, common, and woefully inept at combat. Not every Druid is a travelling bear circus.

[Z3ro]

A lot of people get so used to the assumption that Druids are always totally rigged based on their high, easy power ceiling, but their power floor is actually quite low. Most Druidy characters in fiction are the nature lovers who get along with all the critters of the forest - surrounded by birds, squirrels, and with their faithful dog or other small critter always at their side. Replicating this is easy, common, and woefully inept at combat. Not every Druid is a travelling bear circus.

Nonsense. Simply saying you're a druid causes most monsters to simply roll over and let you murder them.